to the living God though they were in jeopardy of being stoned by them This is indeed the constant disposition of all upright-hearted men that they had rather suffer any Indignities Injuries Dammages Calamities themselves then have God's Glory and Honour be eclipsed they are willing that any Crime Shame Falshood should be imputed to them rather then the least Ignominy or Disgrace cast on God that their Names should become odious then God's have the least blemish And the Reasons are 1. Because they esteem themselves as nothing in comparison of God and therefore count it a small matter what Evil befalls them so that God be magnified When Abraham bespeaks God he useth this self-debasing preface Gen. 18.27 Behold now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord who am but dust and ashes And Jacob Gen. 32.10 I am not worthy of or as it is in the Hebrew I am less then the least of all the Mercies and of all the Truth which thou hast shewed unto thy Servant And Job 40.4 Behold I am vile what shall I answer thee I will lay my hand upon my mouth Chap. 42.5 6. Now mine eye seeth thee I abhor my self And David 1 Chron. 17.16 Who am I O Lord and what is my house that thou hast brought me hitherto 1 Chron. 29.14 15. Who am I and what is my people that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort For we are strangers before thee and sojourners as were all our Fathers our days on the earth are as a shadow and there is none abiding On the other side they ascribe all Greatness unto God Moses in his Song Exod. 15.11 Who is like unto thee O Lord among the Gods who is like thee glorious in holiness fearfull in praises doing wonders Deut. 32.3 4. Because I will publish the Name of the Lord ascribe ye Greatness to our God He is the Rock his work is perfect for all his ways are Judgment a God of Truth and without Iniquity Just and Right is He. Psal 145.1 2 3. saith David I will extoll thee my God and my King and I will bless thy Name for ever and ever Every day will I bless thee and I will praise thy Name for ever and ever Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised and his Greatness is unsearchable The four living Creatures rest not day and night saying Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty which was and is and is to come They give glory and honour and thanks to him that sitteth on the Throne who liveth for ever And the four and twenty Elders fall down before him that sate on the Throne who liveth for ever and ever and cast their Crowns before the Throne saying Thou art worthy O Lord to receive glory and honour and power for thou hast created all things and for thy pleasure they are and were created Rev. 4.8 9 10 11. Many more such expressions there are in the Songs of Hannah the blessed Virgin the 14000 Virgins and other Hymns of the Saints in the Old and New Testament which do fully shew that this is the constant disposition of all Holy hearts to nullify all their Excellency when it is compared with God and to extoll the Name of God as infinitely exceeding all created Beings and therefore they conceive it most equall that they should count the Disparagement of God as a more heavy Affliction then their own Sufferings 2. They know that God's Name is most tenderly regarded by him Num. 14.21 the Lord said Truly as I live all the Earth shall be filled with the Glory of the Lord. Deut. 32.26 27. I said I would scatter them into corners I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men Were it not that I feared the wrath of the Enemy lest their Adversaries should behave themselves strangely and say Our hand is high and the Lord hath not done all this Isa 42.8 I am the Lord that is my Name and my Glory will I not give to another neither my Praise to graven Images Isa 48.11 For mine own sake even for mine own sake will I doe it for how should my Name be polluted and I will not give my Glory to another Ezek. 20.9 But I wrought for my Name 's sake that it should not be polluted before the Heathen among whom they were in whose sight I made my self known unto them In the Third Commandment Exod. 20.7 God chargeth Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain And therefore the Godly are sensible of his Glory above their own Peace and more affected with any dirt cast on God's face then any wound given to their own persons 3. They know it is the Duty of all created Beings to prefer their Maker their Father their King and Lord before themselves They know they are engaged to fear this glorious and fearfull Name The Lord their God Deut. 28.58 as the Father that begat them the Rock that formed them Deut. 32.6 15 18. When S. John would have worshipped the Angel he forbade him See thou doe it not for I am thy fellow-servant and of thy brethren the Prophets and of them which keep the sayings of this Book worship God Rev. 22.9 As David's people counted their King as all good Subjects do worth ten thousand of themselves 2 Sam. 18.3 and all honest Servants count their Master's Wel-fare and Credit far before their own yea his Life before their own so do all Holy persons God's Glory as being their Master their Father their King Croesus his Son that never spake before opened then his mouth and said Kill not King Croesus when a Souldier was about to slay him So will every Child of God be moved when his heavenly Father is blasphemed and his Name stricken through though he be silent when himself is abused Christ bids us pray Our Father which art in Heaven Hallowed be thy Name before he directs us to pray Give us this day our daily bread And forgive us our debts The Relation of Creatures Children Subjects and Servants to God oblige every Holy person to mind and seek the sanctifying of God's Name though it be with never so great diminution and detriment to himself 4. And lastly They know that thus doing they shall best provide for themselves When David was little in his own eyes God chose him to be head of his people Israel He knew it to be true which God said to Eli 1 Sam. 2.30 Them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed As all Princes of worth will reward their loyal Subjects all good Parents their dutifull Children all wise Masters their obedient Servants so God will doe to all his true-hearted Subjects Children and Servants And this makes them regardless of themselves in comparison of God as knowing that they best provide for themselves when they are careless of their own
necessary and are always made by those who are wise-hearted in all Generations for the very best of Men or People can never acquit themselves from being guilty of such Iniquities as might justly expose them to greater Wrath then they feel There is not a Just man upon earth that doeth good and sinneth not saith Solomon Eccles. 7.20 Who can say I have made my Heart clean I am pure from my Sin Prov. 20.9 Holy Job of whom God testifieth that he was his Servant none like him in the Earth a perfect and an upright man one that feared God and eschewed Evil Job 1.8 though he still avouched his Integrity yet when he is to speak of his Afflictions as they come from God he is crest-fallen le ts down his Plumes speaks in such forms as these How should a man be just with God If he will contend with him he cannot answer him one of a thousand If I justisie my self mine own mouth shall condemn me if I say I am perfect it shall also prove me perverse If I wash my self with Snow-water and make my hands never so clean Yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch and mine own cloaths shall abhor me Job 9.2 3 20 30 31. He makes no such plea for himself as the proud Pharisee that trusted in himself that he was Righteous and despised others nor doth he out of meer Modesty speak thus of himself but out of the sense of the verity thereof he confesseth concerning all the Sons of Adam Job 14.4 Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean not one The Septuagint reads vers 5. No though his life be but one day upon earth and after them the Ancients Though he be but Infans unius diei an Infant of one day We reade of Hezekiah Isa 38.3 that he deprecated the Sentence of his Death in these words Remember now O Lord I beseech thee how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect Heart and have done that which is good in thy sight Yet when the Sentence was reversed he doth not ascribe it to his own desert but vers 17. he thus speaks to God Thou hast in love to my Soul delivered it from the Pit of corruption for thou hast cast all my Sins behind thy back He doth not like a proud Pharisee impute his Recovery to his own Righteousness nor like some boasting Frier brag of his own Merits or Works of Supererogation Such language of Self-justitiaries such Conceits of men puffed up with arrogant Self-esteem were far from him He speaks like an humble Penitent not like a vain Glorioso He assigns as the cause of his Recovery not his own Merit but God's pardoning Mercy Nor can any People justly reckon their own Innocency as the cause of God's sparing them but must if they will speak truth acknowledge they have deserved to be consumed Though David when the Pestilence was upon Israel said Lo I have sinned and I have done wickedly but these Sheep what have they done 2 Sam. 24.17 yet that there were Iniquities in the People which occasioned David's Sin is plain from vers 1. where it is said that the Anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel The Churches of Christ in the Primitive times were the purest yet S. Paul 2 Cor. 12.20 21. saith he feared lest when he came to Corinth he should not find them such as he would and that he should be found unto them such as they would not lest there be Debates Envyings Wraths Strifes Backbitings Whisperings Swellings Tumults lest when he came again his God would humble him among them and that he should bewail many which had sinned already and had not repented of the Vncleanness which they had committed In Christ's Survey of the Seven Golden Candlesticks the Seven Churches of Asia though golden or pure by his Acceptance yet he finds much drossy stuff their Light but dim and almost wasted and ready to go out such Imperfections such Errours such Decays such Practices of evil savour as were enough to move him to extinguish their Light quite and to remove the Candlesticks except they repented It is by reason of man's deceitfull Heart that God finds even in the best Men and Churches sufficient matter against them to consume them which yet he permits by his own just Decree and wise Counsel that he may hide Pride from man and none might glory in himself but that his Mercies might the better be discerned Which leads us to the III. OBSERVATION That there are Mercies and Compassions in God towards his People It is true Mercy and Compassion as they are in Man are Perturbations which do disquiet them Compassion in them is a dolorous Passion arising from some appearing Evil that is destructive or otherwise grievous which happens to a man undeservedly And it is occasioned by a sense of the common Condition of men and a possibility of the like Accident befalling themselves as Aristotle describes it in the Second Book of his Rhetorick But in God who is without Body Parts or Passions as the First Article of the Church of England speaks there is no such Perturbation no afflicting Affection But Compassion in him is a sweet calm and gracious Inclination of his Will whereby he hath regard to the Defects and Miseries of his Creature This Attribute is asserted by himself in that most majestick Proclamation of his when he shewed his Glory and made all his Goodness to pass before Moses Exod. 33.18 19. descended in a Cloud passed by him and proclaimed the Name of the Lord The Lord the Lord God Mereifull and Gracious Long-suffering and abundant in Goodness and Truth Exod. 34.5 6. The same hath been by many of the Holy Writers attested it being the great engaging Property of God whereby all his Creatures chiefly his Elect are eternally obliged to be his Thus he is styled by the Psalmist Psal 116.5 Gracious is the Lord and Righteous yea our God is Mercifull by S. James 5.11 a God very pitifull and of tender Mercies or of much Bowels of Compassion by S. Paul the Father of mercies and the God of all Consolation 2 Cor. 1.3 rich in Mercy Eph. 2.4 And therefore Mercy is most truly ascribed to him so that as Christ said There is none Good but one that is God Mark 10.18 so we may say There is none Mercifull or compassionate but one that is God understanding it of the most intensive Degree quoad Affectum in respect of the disposition of his Will to help and of the most extensive Latitude quoad Effectum in respect of the Effect and working of it for so it is universall Psal 145.9 The Lord is good to All and his tender Mercies in some kind are over all his works Thy Mercy O Lord is in the Heavens and thy Faithfulness reacheth to the Clouds Thy Righteousness is like the great Mountains thy Judgments are a great Deep O Lord thou preservest Man and Beast Psal 36.5 6. And Christ sets out
him and hide him from the Face of him that sitteth upon the Throne and from the Wrath of the Lamb For the great day of his Wrath is come and who is able to stand Rev. 6.16 17. Now then Deliverance from Death must needs deserve Praise and Thanksgiving Deliverance from the greatest Evil should be received with the greatest Gratitude Deliverance from natural Death causeth Holy persons to bless God but Deliverance from Sin the cause of Death from the Wrath to come eternal Death much more This makes the Deliverance most compleat and the Thankfulness should be most ample To which is to be added 2. That the Deliverance is by God it is He that delivers the Soul from Death Now what comes from God's hand is most acceptable to them that love God A Deliverance from Death by a man doth ingage our Affections to him we think our selves obliged to him while we live who hath preserved our Life especially if he be a person of great Quality To have our Lives saved by the King whom we had provoked to be pardoned our Treason exceedingly heightens our valuation of the Benefit There is much more cause to magnifie the Goodness of God who saves his people from Death by pardoning of their Sins by advancing them to Nearness with himself who so saves from Death temporal as to give Life eternal Behold saith Hezekiah Isa 38.17 for Peace I had great Bitterness but thou hast in love to my Soul delivered it from the Pit for thou hast cast all my Sins behind thy back The Forgiveness of Sins which occasioned Death is a greater Benefit then the prolonging of Life And then it is Happiness accumulated to the height when there is not onely length of days on Earth but eternal Life in Heaven conferred upon the saved Bless the Lord O my Soul saith David Psal 103.1 2 3 4. and all that is within me bless his holy Name Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his Benefits Who forgiveth all thy Sins and healeth all thy Diseases Who redeemeth thy life from destruction and crowneth thee with Loving-kindness and tender Mercies All which Mercies are the more joyfull to the believing Soul because they are not so much the fruit of our Prayers as of God's free Grace in Christ The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ so loved the World the sinfull World even when they were Enemies to him that he gave his onely-begotten Son to death even the death of the Cross that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting Life This Deliverance from Death proceeding from God's special Love that great Love wherewith he loved us when we were dead in Trespasses and Sins quickening us together with Christ saving us by Grace is that which makes it incomprehensibly welcome and encourageth the Soul to expect farther Preservation as David doth here which brings me to the Second Part of my Text now to be handled viz. II. David's Postulation Wilt thou not deliver my Feet from falling The Expression seems to be expostulatory but is to be conceived to include a Petition He demands of God Wilt thou not c not as one that challenged it as his due desert but as assured of the Continuance of God's Goodness He deprehends in God a Fountain of Love which is still running over flowing down in farther Streams of saving Mercy We have an exact and ample Paraphrase upon the words of my Text in that passage Psal 36. from vers 5. to the end where having set out the Wickedness of men and his own Danger he breaks forth in extolling God's Goodness in an assurance of a constant Current of Mercies and then is instant with God for the Continuance of his Preservation This part of my Text is a most precious passage of great Use for your Meditation in times of Danger by reason of Pestilence or War and it shews this to be the customary practice of Holy persons to gather Arguments of Assurance of future Help from God from their experience of his former gracious Deliverances So did David 1 Sam. 17.37 when he was to fight wïth Goliah he argued thus The Lord that delivered me out of the Paw of the Lion and of the Bear he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine And after him S. Paul 2 Cor. 1.9 10. We had the sentence of death in our selves that we should not trust in our selves but in God that raiseth the dead Who delivered us from so great a death and doth deliver in whom we trust that he will yet deliver In his former Deliverance he perceived the Power of God that he could deliver from Death he deprehends his watchfulness over him in the Continuance of his Deliverance his Love to him and Care of him which confirms him in the expectation of farther Help for the future As they say all Vertues are concatenate in Prudence so all Mercies are linked together in God's Love and Care of his Servants And indeed so the Apostle inferrs Rom. 8.32 He that spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things He that preserves our Lives will keep our Feet Thou hast delivered my Soul from Death wilt thou not also deliver my Feet from falling Surely thou wilt But then this Deliverance must be sought for at his hands which is also implied in this Expression When Christ cured the lame Cripple he bade him take up his bed and walk God when he saves our Life from death expects that we should walk before him Our Life is a Pilgrimage we walk from one Stage of it to another as the Sun runs its course so doth Man The Emanations of our Minds the Actions of our Members are our Steps If we walk not uprightly if we heed not what we think what we speak what we act our Feet will quickly fall first into Sin and then into Mischief The Psalmist Psal 73.2 tells us out of his experience of himself that his Feet were almost gone his Steps had well-nigh slipt He had stumbled at the Stumbling-stone to wit the Prosperity of the Wicked This begat Envy in him and that drew him on to a kind of Affection to their ways to a condemning of his own Course and offending against the generation of God's Children And had not God mercifully caught him when he was falling by directing him to the Sanctuary of God where he might see the End of the wicked that however they stood on smooth yet they were but slippery places they walked on Ice which would suddenly break under them and then they would sink for ever he had certainly perished Therefore he recovers himself and applies himself to God vers 23 24. and stays himself on the Manutenentia Divina Thou hast holden me by my right hand Thou wilt guide me with thy Counsel and after receive me to Glory As for me saith he in another Psalm 41.12 thou upholdest
so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether it be by life or by death That which is said by David but most truly verified of our Lord Christ is true of all that delight in the Lord Psal 40.8 I delight to doe thy Will O my God yea thy Law is within my Heart And this their Desire God always grants so that however he that delights in the Lord be assaulted with Temptations be benighted in his Apprehensions of God's Favour though Heaviness may endure for a night Joy shall come in the morning though he miss of his Way yet he shall find his Errour and return into it again The Steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord and he delighteth in his way Though he fall he shall not be utterly cast down for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand Psal 37.23 34. Next unto these ultimate and supreme Ends the Desire of his Soul who delights in the Lord is to see God How earnestly did Moses beg the sight of God's Face How often doth David bemoan his Absence from God's Worship at his Temple As the Hart saith he panteth after the water-brooks so panteth my Soul after thee O God My Soul thirsteth for God for the living God when shall I come and appear before God Psal 42.1 2. And in the next Psalm vers 3. O send out thy Light and thy Truth let them lead me let them bring me unto thy holy Hill and to thy Tabernacles So Saint Paul Phil. 1.23 I desire to depart and to be with Christ which is best of all And this Desire God will give them at last who delight in him Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God Matth. 5.8 Now are we the Sons of God and it doth not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is 1 Joh. 3.2 Manutenentia Divina God's supporting Grace here and Visio beatifica the Fruition of God hereafter are two grand Desires of Souls that delight in God these they petition for and he will grant them both There are other Desires which they have as the Prosperity of God's Church the Downfall of their Enemies which the Lord will also at last accomplish though not without much Contention and long Waiting They shall overcome the Powers of darkness and the World they shall see the people of God above their Enemies by the bloud of the Lamb and by the word of their Testimony though they lay down their Lives for it Other Desires of outward Blessings God grants not always in the kind but often in some Equivalent He repairs that which they lose for Christ and his Gospell by inward Comfort and Spirituall Strength Though they be in Want or under Persecution yet they know how to abound in that they have learned in whatsoever estate therewith to be content They can doe all things through Christ that strengtheneth them If they have a Thorn in the Flesh a Messenger of Satan to buffet them and it still molest them yet the Grace of God is not denied them and it is sufficient for them his Strength is perfected in their Weakness Many Desires of particular Blessings are granted them and this one comprehensive Privilege belongs to them that all things work together for good to them who love God Rom. 8.28 APPLICATION It remains then that we learn this way of Thriving by delighting our selves in the Lord. Self-love is naturall every man desires his own Good but all take not the right way to attain it God made Man upright or simple but he hath sought out many Inventions Many ways are devised by men for the attaining their Ends and many Ends propounded by them The Desires of men are almost as various as their Faces and their Designs and Courses are almost as manifold as their Heads So many Men so many Minds Among you who are my present Auditours though you meet here about the same Business the Serving of God yet how few in truth do desire to know him aright or to serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind Even in this very Action how few mind God's Glory How many observe onely the Custom in coming to Church or perhaps some worser Motives bring them hither and sinfull Thoughts possess them here And no marvell then if they grow not in Knowledge and holy Obedience are ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the Truth yea grow worse and worse because they delight not themselves in the Lord but aim onely at the feeding their Eyes or the tickling their Ears or some other sinister Ends of their own As these mens Hearts are not towards God so neither is God's towards them they have no Pleasure in God nor God in them How many of you are there of whom those things are verified which we reade Isa 58.2 They seek me daily and delight to know my ways as a Nation that did Righteousness and forsook not the Ordinance of their God they ask for the Ordinances of Justice they take Delight in approaching to God and yet for want of reall Delighting in God it may be your lot at last to hear Christ say to you I know you not depart from me you workers of Iniquity Is it not true of you which the Prophet said of his Hearers that they came and sate before the Prophet as God s People and they heard his words but they would not doe them for with their Mouth they shewed much Love but their Hearts went after their Covetousness The Prophet was unto them as a very lovely Song of one that hath a pleasant voice and can play well on an Instrument for they heard his words but did them not Ezek. 33.31 32. A Sermon is to most but as an Oration in Schools the Delivery the Composure is observed and perhaps censured but the Matter is not learned their Hearts not bettered their Ways not amended God not glorified After Dismission yet neither the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ nor the Love of God nor the Communion of the Holy Spirit remains in them but worldly Projects earthly Designs carnall Practices are still prosecuted Yea their Hearts are more hardened more estranged from God and the Life that is in him and their Wisedom remains earthly sensuall and devillish No marvell if such find no Incomes of Grace no Consolation in Christ no spirituall growth in Godliness Oh that you would ask your selves whether this Guilt lie not on you and that you would now at last apply your selves throughly to delight your selves in God especially in these great Duties of Prayer and Hearing his Word lest when you would have your great Desire of seeing God's Face in the great Day of Christ's appearing ye be shut out of his Presence and be cast into outer Darkness where is nothing but weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth Delight in the Lord now that he
Ashes on our heads creep to a Cross whip our selves naked go on Pilgrimage to Jerusalem to weep at Christ's Sepulchre this would make but a palliated Cure our Wound would not be healed at the bottom but it would fester and break out again and gangrene and become mortall And therefore VI. PROPOSITION The Penitent pious person in the sense of his Sin and Misery bemoaneth himself to God confesseth and bewaileth his Sin humbleth himself before him deprecateth his Wrath and earnestly seeketh by Prayer and Supplication for Forgiveness of Sin Healing and Peace from God which is the last Conclusion deduced from the Vocality of David's Weeping vers 8. The Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping There was a Prayer in David's Tears and that God heard And we may see how effectual this course is by the example of Manasseh King of Judah who did evil in the sight of the Lord like unto the Abominations of the Heathen whom the Lord cast out before the Children of Israel yea he made Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to erre and to doe worse then the Heathen And the Lord spake unto Manasseh and to his people but they would not hearken And the Lord brought upon them the Captains of the hoast of the King of Assyria which took Manasseh amongst the thorns and bound him with fetters and carried him to Babylon And when he was in Affliction he besought the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his Fathers and prayed unto him and he was intreated of him and heard his supplication and brought him again to Jerusalem into his Kingdom Then Manasseh knew that the Lord he was God 2 Chron. 33.2 9 10 11 12 13. By which Instance we may perceive what is the right course to be taken by any one whom God afflicts for Sin he is to seek the Lord to humble himself greatly and to make his Supplication also how efficacious a way this is to remove the greatest Evils from the greatest Transgressours Nor is this Case of Manasseh a singular Case but such as other passages of Holy Scripture warrant us to make a common Rule of both for Duty and for Success For Duty thus saith Jeremiah Lament 3.39 40 41 42. Wherefore doth a living man complain a man for the punishment of his Sins Let us search and try our ways and turn again unto the Lord. Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the Heavens We have transgressed and rebelled and thou hast not pardoned For Success thus speaks Elihu Job 33.27 28. He looketh upon men and if any say I have sinned and perverted that which was right and it profited me not He will deliver his Soul from going into the Pit and his life shall see the light For both the Prophet Joel speaks thus 2.12 13. Therefore also now saith the Lord Turn you even unto me with all your heart and with fasting and weeping and with mourning And rend your heart and not your garments and turn unto the Lord your God for he is gracious and mercifull slow to anger and of great kindness and repenteth him of the Evil. Whence may be gathered 1. That Complaints of our Punishments without Complaint of our Sins are vain and fruitless It was to no purpose for living men to complain of the Evils they felt while they were insensible of the Evils they did for in so doing they justified not God in his Judgments on them nor shewed any hatred of their own evil ways but either were insensible of their Afflictions as from God's hand and so gave him not the Glory of his Avenging act or being sensible hated God as an Enemy dealing unrighteously with them as not deserving it and fretting against the Lord in heart or blaspheming his Name because of their Plagues as those mentioned Revel 16.11 2. That the wisest and most successfull course that any can take in the time of God's Scourge upon them is to search and try their ways that is to find out their Sins which till they be discovered will be like Achan's Theft which caused Israel to fall before the Canaanites For if God set our Sins before him and we do not set them before our selves his Anger will burn us like fire and we know not where to cast water to quench it I confess there are some Errours that we cannot find out Psal 19.12 Who can understand his Errours And for those though we understand them not we may escape Vengeance if we know them in general are sensible that we have a vicious or imperfect Nature ignorant and heedless of what we should know and doe Yet those we should not be ignorant of nor slight them as Peccadillo's Venial sins in their own nature S. Paul doubtless cried out of these even the first motions of Concupiscence without Consent his very Lustings which he hated The Evil he would not doe that he did the Law in his Members warring against the Law of his Mind as a body of Death which made him wretched and of which he enquires Who shall deliver me from it When David speaks of his Sins as exceeding the hairs of his head doubtless he comprehends his Omissions his imperfect Performances of Duties Praying with distraction Praising God with coldness Hearing without attention of mind giving Alms with self-respect the Mixtures of Evil with what was Good his Vanity of thoughts his Ignorance Incogitancy Excess in words Jests Merriments and thousands of such Failings which though each of them be little yet the Multitude of them made them too heavy a Burthen for him Though Sand be but a small thing yet Heaps of it may sink a Ship So though Sins of Errour be but small yet being many they are to be known at least in the general though we be ignorant of each particular And accordingly David when he had said Who can understand his Errours adds Cleanse thou me from secret Faults These the Penitent must crave Pardon for and therefore take notice that he is guilty of them though he cannot make a particular Confession of them S. Austin often urgeth against the Pelagians that no man in this life is perfect without Sin because Christ teacheth us to pray as for our daily Bread each day so for Forgiveness of Sins each day thereby intimating that in the best who call God Father there are Peccata quotidianae incursationis Sins of daily incursion as Tertullian called them which have need of Pardon and that this must be begg'd of God Pelagian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sinlesness Popish Merit and keeping of the Law Monkish works of Supererogation Quakers imagined Perfection are all proud and arrogant Dotages contrary to Christ and his Gospel We are to charge our selves with Sin in our daily Actions yea to count all our Righteousness as an Unclean thing yet that which we should especially consider should be our open and scandalous Sins as bringing most Dishonour to God and being most pernicious
this your want of Repentance or the perfunctory doing of it And that you would bethink your selves that you may deceive your selves but cannot deceive God that your Dallying with God will end in your Damnation that you will never have Peace with him till you shew that you count and use your Sins as his and your Enemies Doe this then which David saith he did Search out your Sins impartially know them to be your own Brats that the least of them are of a Viperous brood that they will bring upon you everlasting Punishment without much Repentance and real Amendment Set your Sins before you in their ugly shape Set God before you as a severe Judge and yet withall a mercifull Prince Confess them to God with godly Sorrow Supplicate for Pardon with humbled Souls Sprinkle your Consciences with the Bloud of Christ by the hand of Faith and Resolve to leave your Wanderings and to follow Christ And then and not till then you shall have Peace with God which he grant for his Son's sake c. Amen LAVS DEO THE COMFORT OF THE Divine Presence Part I. The Sixth SERMON PSALM li. 11. Cast me not away from thy Presence and take not thy Holy Spirit from me OF all the Holy Patriarchs whose ways are recorded in the Old Testament there is none of whose Acts we have more relation remaining to us for our Imitation or our Caution then we have of David's In the constant course of his Actions he was so obedient to God that God gave this Testimony to him and said I have found David the son of Jesse a man after mine own heart which shall fulfill my will Act. 13.22 And yet he sinned so foully in the matter of Vriah that he is stigmatized by the Prophet Nathan sent by God to reprove him sharply for it as one that gave great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme 2 Sam. 12.14 He that in the time of his Persecution had shewed much Constancy in his Obedience to God and Adherence to him in the time of his Prosperity and greatest Tranquillity shewed his Instability so as to become a Reproach to the Profession of his God Whence it came to pass that as in his Afflictions he made many Psalms of Exultation in God and Exaltation of his Name so as to gain the Elogy of the sweet Singer of Israel so by reason of his great Fall in defiling Bathsheba he is fain to mourn as a Dove to change his tune to sing Lamentation to bewail his Transgressions and to cry Peccavi in this Penitential Psalm composed as the Title shews by reason of his Fall into those horrid Evils of Adultery and Murther For expiating of which though the Law yielded no Sacrifice yet the Grace of God he knew did and therefore he prays instantly both for Pardon of what he had done and for preventing Grace against future Relapses as the words of my Text import Cast me not away from thy Presence and take not thy Holy Spirit or Spirit of Holiness from me In which words he deprecates two Evils as most pernicious 1. The Ejection out of God's Presence 2. The Loss of his Holy Spirit Concerning these it may be enquired how he could pray against that which elsewhere he seems to reckon as not fecible when he saith Whither shall I goe from thy Spirit or whither shall I flee from thy Presence Psal 139.7 which intimates as if there were no escaping God's Spirit or avoiding God's Presence And therefore it was in vain for him to petition God against that which could not be effected though God should goe about it To which I answer That it is true that God's entitative Presence is every-where and therefore there could not be a Casting him out of it nor could he goe any whither where he might hide himself or not have the Spirit of God to find him out and to reach him his Omnipresence Omniscience and Omnipotency make such an Exclusion or Subtraction unimaginable But there is a Presence of Favour of Assistence of Protection an having of the Spirit for Guidance Comfort and Ability for operation here meant which a person may be excluded from and destitute of such as Cain dreaded when he said My Punishment is greater then I can bear Behold thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth and from thy Face shall I be hid And Cain went out from the Presence of the Lord Gen. 4.13 14 16. That is he was deprived of the light of God's Countenance filled with Horrour in his spirit out of the conscience of his unpardoned unnaturall Murther of his Brother God respected not his Offering admitted him not to any Communion with himself let the infernall Spirits haunt him delivered him into the hands of the Devil And this most horrible estate the Psalmist doth here deprecate since the conscience of his Guilt made him sensible that he might justly expect it Now to begin with the First Petition whence these Points are deducible 1. That God's Presence of Grace is most desirable 2. That the committing of great and enormous Sins doth endanger the Privation of it 3. That a Penitent Sinner begs earnestly against the Loss of it as his greatest Calamity and prays for the Continuance of it as his chiefest Good Dominus tecum cum spiritu tuo The Lord be with thee and with thy spirit are the most important Prayers in our Christian Liturgy To begin with the first of these That God's Presence of Grace is most desirable How desirable the Presence of God's Favour is to men may appear by that Dialogue between God and Moses which we meet with Exod. 33.14 15. wherein after God had made that terrible Commination of coming up into the midst of the people of Israel in a moment to consume them because of their great Provocation of him in making the Golden Calf and not to goe up with them vers 3 5. and Moses vers 12 13. had instantly made Supplication for God's Guidance in that great Expedition which he put him upon of bringing the people of Israel into the Land of Canaan the Lord tells him that his Presence should goe with him and he would give him rest Moses replies to God If thy Presence goe not with us carry us not up hence And gives this reason vers 16. For wherein shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight is it not in that thou goest with us From which passage may be discerned how much Moses valued God's Presence as that without which he counted all his Undertakings as vain that he could not effect any thing prosperously not subdue Enemies nor rule that people nor successively accomplish any undertaking But on the other side with God's Presence he doubted not but that he should bring to pass that great Business and all other Designs which he should be put upon if God did vouchsafe it to him The same is true in
III. OBSERVATION Penitent Sinners such as David was do beg earnestly against the Loss of God's Presence as their greatest Calamity and pray for its Continuance as their chiefest Happiness The Holy Writings are full of such Petitions as these Let my sentence come forth from thy presence Psal 17.2 Make thy Face to shine upon thy servant Psal 31.16 Forsake me not O Lord O my God be not far from me Psal 38.21 Awake why sleepest thou O Lord arise cast us not off for ever Wherefore hidest thou thy face Psal 44.23 24. Return for thy servants sake Isa 63.17 Take away all Iniquity and receive us graciously Hos 14.2 As it is with a Child who misseth his Father he cries after him till he appears to him or as a Traveller that is out of his way and knoweth not what way to take nor what may become of him calls for his Guide to direct for his Company to help him So it is with a Repenting person who hath wandered out of his way he is sensible that he hath done foolishly in leaving God's way fears lest he shall become a prey to Satan finds the want of God's Guidance the need of his Assistence hereupon he cries aloud to God not to leave him he wrastleth with God as Jacob did when he feared his Brother Esau's hostile approach so as not to let him goe untill he bless him he weeps and makes Supplication till he becomes an Isaac one that prevails with God his Eye trickleth down and ceaseth not without any intermission till the Lord look down and behold from Heaven he bewails his turning aside into crooked paths begs to be led into the way everlasting and to that end resolves to hold close to God for the time to come and to keep his way lest he by Recidivation and Relapse drive away God for ever For which purpose he begs God not to take away his Holy Spirit from him as being his best Guide and Guard in his Pilgrimage on Earth Which leads me to the consideration of the Second Petition in my Text but at present time will not permit me to handle it Of what hath been said give me leave to make some Application APPLICATION You that have fallen into any such gross Transgression as David's was remember to imitate him in his Return to God As his Sin was very great so this Penitentiall Psalm shews his Sorrow after God was very conspicuous working Repentance not to be repented of 2 Cor. 7.10 What the Apostle said of the Corinthians guilty of Indulgence to the Incestuous person For behold this self-same thing that ye sorrowed after a godly sort what Carefulness it wrought in you yea what Clearing of your selves yea what Indignation yea what Fear yea what vehement Desire yea what Zeal yea what Revenge in all things ye have approved your selves to be clear in this matter the same was true of David and ought to be verified in every one of you chiefly in these things 1. To be sensible of the great danger of the Loss of God's Presence to know and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that you have forsaken the Lord your God and that his Fear was not in you when either by Wantonness or Intemperance or Profaneness or Unrighteousness or any other kind of Leudness though committed in secret from the eyes of man ye did Evil in God's sight and rebelled and vexed his Holy Spirit so that he was turned away from you became your Enemy fought against you and left you to be insnared by the Devil and to be led captive by him according to his will 2 Tim. 2.26 Oh this is a thing you should mourn for as one mourneth for his onely Son and be in bitterness for his absence as one that is in bitterness for his first-born 2. For the time to come that with the spirit of Grace and Supplication you instantly press God to vouchsafe you his preserving guiding comforting aiding Presence that you may not be overcome by a like Temptation nor wander from God by Errour nor by Infirmity of your flesh yield to such Motions in you or Solicitations of others as may overcome you and prevail upon you to goe astray from God and leave him who is your Shepherd lest the Wolf of Hell catch you and tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver you Oh what-ever you doe watch and pray that God may lead you in the paths of Righteousness for his Name 's sake And what-ever Bait or Suggestion may be set before you yet remember that which Joseph thought on when he was enticed to Leudness by his Mistris How shall I doe this great Wickedness and sin against God Oh set God alwaies before you who being at your right hand you shall not be moved It will be your everlasting Comfort in life and death that you can say I was upright before God and kept my self from mine Iniquity While you live on Earth walk humbly obediently patiently with God Doe as Enoch did who had this testimony that he so walked with God as to please him and then you may be assured notwithstanding your former Falls yet at last to be translated if not as he was not to see death yet so as not to abide in death but to be with your Father for ever Which the Lord grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE HEAVENLY GIFT Part II. The Seventh SERMON PSALM li. 11. Take not thy Holy Spirit from me IN this Penitentiall Psalm of David wherein he applieth himself to God for the recovery of his Favour after his great Fall in the matter of Vriah as he sincerely confesseth his Sin and humbly beggeth Pardon so he doth earnestly deprecate God's Dereliction of him as being the most sad presage of his everlasting Perdition and the taking away his Holy Spirit from him as the inlet to Satan's possession of him and so the forerunner of his extreme Ruine I have heretofore considered his Petition against Ejection out of God's Presence the regaining of which is a most desirable thing to a Penitent Sinner and though it be forfeited by Sin yet is it recoverable by humble and earnest Supplication It now remains that I consider the other Prayer in my Text against the Privation of God's Spirit in these words And take not thy Holy Spirit from me For explication whereof it is requisite that it be shewed 1. What is meant by the Holy Spirit or Spirit of God's Holiness which he feared might be taken from him 2. How it is taken away from a person 1. The term Spirit is meant sometimes of God the Father as Joh. 4.24 where it is said that God is a Spirit sometimes of the Son as 2 Cor. 3.17 where it is said The Lord is that Spirit and sometimes of the Third Person in the Holy Trinity as 1 Joh. 5.6 where it is said It is the Spirit that beareth witness who is termed the Holy Ghost or Spirit and is all one with the Spirit
which a Bee would convert to the sweetest Hony In the end this course is most pernicious to him that follows it there being nothing that more alienates Affection from a person then his abuse of Kindness God's Love abused turns to Rage and none have God more incensed against them then those that having tasted of the good Gift of God fall away into sinfull Courses that are so unthankfull for so great a Favour as the offer of Reconciliation the Sacrifice of Christ the Invitation to his Supper to the Marriage of the Son of God as that they chuse rather to be at home with their Oxen and Wives and Farms or to come without a Wedding-garment then to accept of his Motion and accommodate themselves to his Kindness that having had ten thousand Talents forgiven them take their Brother by the throat for an hundred pence When men despise the Riches of God's Goodness and Forbearance and Long-suffering not knowing that the Goodness of God leadeth them to Repentance after their hardness and impenitent Hearts they treasure up to themselves Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God Rom. 2.4 5. APPLICATION Oh then let me in the most tender Bowells of Compassion my Heart can be touched with with the most serious Importunity that my words can express with the deepest Adjuration by the most affecting things that I can mind you of instantly press you to take heed of this most vile ugly dishonest irrational and damnable Abuse of the Divine Grace so as to continue in Sin that Grace may abound It is most meet yea natural that Love should beget Love Grace should beget Observance Is not he a most egregious Villain that hates his own Father that begat him that kills him that gave him Life Is not the Lord the Rock who begat thee the God that formed thee And wilt thou then be so unnatural as to hate God as thou dost if this be thy Requital for his Grace to persevere in Wickedness He tells thee that he is hated when thou lovest any thing more then him givest his Glory to another makest thy Belly thy God gloriest in thy Shame mindest earthly things And wilt thou thus recompense so great Goodness with such extreme Badness He saith he will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain And wilt thou pollute the Holy Name of thy Holy Father with thy impure Swearing The earnal mind is Enmity against God as being not subject to his Law but inconsistent with it And wilt thou suffer vain Thoughts to lodge in thee fleshly Reason to sway with thee carnal Lusts to rule over thee All Benefits received engage to answerable Duty What art thou then but a very Miscreant that having so much taste how gracious God is how amply he hath vouchsafed to be bountifull to thee in giving Christ for thee how profusely he hath bestowed on thee the Riches of Heaven in the largess of Spiritual Blessings in heavenly things in Christ dost yet side with Sin and Satan his profest irreconcilable Enemies that canst harbour that Enemy which thy Allegeance to God binds thee to pursue zealously unto death Oh that rather the Sense of God's Goodness might make us good the Taste of his Grace might make us gracious Surely none are worse Enemies to God then such as have been acquainted with the excess of God's Grace in Christ yet exceed in their obstinate perseverance in Evil such as when God's Grace should draw Tears from their Eyes Sighs from their Breasts cause Dejectedness in their Spirits by reason of their Sinning against so incomprehensible a Love as that which he vouchsafes to the Sons of Adam in Christ have yet a Forehead of brass that cannot blush glory in their Wickedness boast of their Lewdness and are secure in their Impenitency Greater Woe was to Chorazin and Bethsaida then to Tyre and Sidon because they repented not upon such Proofs of Christ's Excellency as would have wrought on the other As they had been lifted up to Heaven so Christ foretells their casting down to Hell No people in the world are likely to have a greater degree of Torment in Hell then profane and unrighteous men among us who have the greatest Proof of God's Grace of any people on the Earth As then you either stand in fear of so great Damnation or are desirous of that abundant Grace which the Gospel of Christ exhibits abhorr the thought of Continuing in Sin that Grace may abound Let the Mercies of God lead you to present your Bodies a living Sacrifice holy acceptable unto God which is your reasonable Service for that will procure his Favour here and your Blessedness hereafter Which he grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE DIVINE COMPASSIONS The Fourteenth SERMON LAMENT iij. 22. It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed because his Compassions fail not I Have read to you a passage out of a most dolefull Poem composed by that Holy Prophet Jeremiah with much Art in the four first Chapters the order of the Hebrew Alphabet being observed in the initiall Letters of the Verses yet with a very deep sense of God's Judgments on Judah and Jernsalem and a tender Sympathy with them in their Affliction He had long and often foretold those Evils would befall them which he now saw come upon them quorum pars magna fuit and in which he had a great Share and he might well say Quis talia fando temperet à lacrymis Who could think or speak of such things with dry Eyes or an insensible Spirit This set may I say his Muse I should say rather his Prophetick spirit on work to endite and leave to the Church this Poem In which with much Compassion towards his Country he bewails their Desolation yet with much Piety towards God justifies him as punishing them according to the Demerit of their Sins and magnifies his Goodness as punishing them less then they deserved Both which are expressed in the words of my Text It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed because his Compassions fail not And sure we may say the like It is of the Lord's Mercies that London and all England are not consumed by the Pestilence because his Compassions fail not And therefore the handling of this Passage will be apposite to the present Face of things with us and the Occasion of this Day In it 1. The Prophet takes notice of the Mitigation of God's Wrath in that they were not consumed 2. He assigns the genuine Cause of it the Lord's Mercies or Benignities great Mercies which is exclusive of any other procuring Cause that might deserve it and intimates that there was sufficient reason did not his Mercies interpose why he should have consumed them 3. These Mercies are described 1. By the kind of them they were Compassions in the Original Bowel-mercies such as a tender Mother hath to the Child of her womb in God Pardoning Mercies Relieving
Mercies 2. By the Indesiciency of them Though men fail in their Duty though they fail in their Obedience though they be wanting in Returning to God though their Prayers be consumed yet his Compassions are not consumed and therefore they are not consumed And this is here alleged as a Door of Hope to the prophet that God would restore that People for to that end are these words brought in this place as that which follows in four Verses of this Chapter plainly shews From hence then this Explication of the words being premised these Observations do arise 1. That the Lord in Punishing of his People doth not consume them 2. That Holy persons ascribe not the Mitigation of God's extreme Severity in his Punishments to any promeriting Cause in themselves but confess their own Sins deserve utter Consumption 3. That there are Mercies and Compassions in God towards his People 4. That these Mercies fail not 5. That the Non-consumption of God's People is to be ascribed to this 6. That the apprehension of this encourageth them to hope and wait on God for a Consummation of their Health and Peace Of these I shall speak in the order propounded and then apply them to the present state of things and so conclude I. OBSERVATION That the Lord doth not in Punishing of his People consume them This is equivalent to what God speaks in the Prophet Isaiah 57.16 I will not contend for ever neither will I be always wroth And he gives this Reason For the Spirit should fail before me and the Soul which I have made It is true the Devil is a roaring Lion that goes about seeking whom he may devour 1 Pet. 5.8 He is the Apollyon the Abaddon the Thief that comes not to save but to steal and to kill and to destroy Joh. 10.10 because the Sheep are not his own He made nothing nor hath any Love to any thing and therefore seeks not to help any but to marre and doe mischief to all that God hath made But the People of God are the work of his hands and the Sheep of his Pasture Psal 100.3 and therefore he will have a desire to the work of his hands Job 14.15 What is our work we are loth to pull down So God doubtless doth not delight as Children to make a house of Sticks and then kick it down again As he made Man after his own Image so he is not easily induced to break him He that accounts it an hainous Injury to himself to curse Man with the Tongue who is made after his Image Jam. 3.9 and is so severe against what-ever shall destroy him that it is his strict Determination for Preservation of Mankind after the Floud that he will not let the killing of Man go unrevenged but enacteth this Law among his Precepts to Noah Gen. 9.5 6. And surely your bloud of your Lives will I require at the hand of every Beast will I require it and at the hand of Man at the hands of every man's Brother will I require the Life of man Whoso sheddeth man's bloud by man shall his bloud be shed for in the Image of God made he man He doubtless is so chary of Men as not to consume them himself utterly till Iniquity is grown so daring as that there is no Remedy His own People it is true do sin and provoke God and he often brings them low yet he doth not make an utter end of them because they are not onely his Creatures as others but also his Redeemed and Chosen people Thus the Prophet Samuel told the Israelites 1 Sam. 12.20 22. Fear not ye have done all this Wickedness yet turn not aside from following the Lord but serve the Lord with all your heart For the Lord will not forsake his people for his great Name 's sake because it hath pleased the Lord to make you his People That which a man hath purchased for himself he will hardly let it be taken from him with much more reluctancy will he cast it away Though Michal had been given to another and was defiled yet David would have her again 2 Sam. 3.13 because he had espoused her to him for an hundred Foreskins of the Philistines How much less will God let go those whom he hath purchased by his Son's Bloud He will not have him destroyed by our Meat for whom Christ died Rom. 14.15 If any through the Watchman's failing to warn them perish their bloud will he require at the Watchman's hands Ezek. 3.18 Which shews that he hath a Fatherly Care of his own People that they be not consumed And though they provoke him so as to cause his Anger to wax hot against them yet in the midst of Judgment he remembers Mercy He chastiseth as a Father doth not exterminate or extirpate as an Enemy If they break his Statutes and keep not his Commandments Then he will visit their Transgression with a Rod and their Iniquity with Stripes Nevertheless his Loving-kindness he will not utterly take from them nor suffer his Faithfulness to fail Psal 89.31 32 33. Though he make a full end of all the Nations yet he will not make a full end of them but correct them in measure yet will he not leave them wholly unpunished Jer. 46.28 Wherein he manifests a mixture of Mercy and Justice And therefore in the next place II. OBSERVATION Holy persons ascribe not the Mitigation of God's extreme Severity in his Punishments to any promeriting Cause in themselves but confess their own Sins deserve utter Consumption This was the acknowledgment of Ezra Thou our God hast punished us less then our Iniquities deserve Ezra 9.13 Though the Punishment of the Jews were exceeding great insomuch that our Prophet Lament 4.6 compares it to the Punishment of the Sin of Sodom and aggravates it as secundùm quid in some respect greater then it yet to speak simply and absolutely there was an ingredient of Mercy that did allay it and therefore they acknowledge their Sins to have deserved greater Evils then they felt Whence in all their Addresses to God they ascribe Righteousness to their Maker and take all the Blame of their Sufferings on themselves In the same Chapter vers 15. O Lord God of Israel saith Ezra thou art Righteous for we remain yet escaped as at this day But most fully the Prophet Daniel Chapter 9.11 12 13 14. We have sinned against the Lord our God And he hath confirmed the words which he spake against us by bringing upon us a great Evil for under the whole Heaven hath not been done as hath been done upon Jerusalem Yet made we not our Prayer before the Lord our God that we might turn from our Iniquities and understand thy Truth Therefore hath the Lord watched upon the Evil and brought it upon us for the Lord our God is Righteous in all his works which he doeth for we obeyed not his voice See also vers 5 6 c. of the same Chapter And indeed such Acknowledgments are
me in mine Integrity and settest me before thy face for ever Faith in God's sustaining Grace is the onely sure Preservative against falling into Sin and thereby into Misery Thou wilt keep him in perfect Peace whose mind is stayed on thee because he trusteth in thee saith the Prophet Isa 26.3 He that trusteth in his own Heart is a fool but whoso walketh wisely shall be delivered saith Solomon Prov. 28.26 He that leaneth on his own Free will his own good Purposes his own Reason his own good Merits shall be sure to fall S. Peter when he was confident of his own Strength that he should die rather then deny his Master and was so venturous thereupon as to go into the High Priest's Palace was so affrighted with the words of a Maid that he not onely denied him but forswore him Israel which followed after the Law of Righteousness attained not to the Law of Righteousness Wherefore Because they sought it not by Faith but as it were by the Works of the Law for they stumbled at the Stumbling-stone saith the Apostle Rom. 9.31 32. We are like little Children we love to be on our Feet not knowing our own Weakness and then we venture without God to guide and stay us and so we fall and wound our selves Our safest way is to distrust our selves to work out our Salvation with fear and trembling as knowing that it is God that worketh in us to will and to doe of his good pleasure Phil. 2.12 13. And accordingly to betake our selves to him as David did here that he may keep our Feet from falling having the same designed End that he had that we may walk before him in the light of the living Which leads me to the Third Part of my Text David's Aim in his Commemoration and Postulation but time will not now permit the handling of it Onely an Application of what hath been already spoken remains to be added APPLICATION What you have heard David did it concerns you to doe You that are here now alive may say God hath delivered your Souls from Death I wish I might say truly that God hath delivered your Souls from the Death of Sin that God hath given you Repentance unto Life that you were none of you such as should die in your Sins but by believing in Christ should see the light of Life I wish that he were to you the Resurrection and the Life so that though you were dead yet you might live that living and believing in him you might never die as our Saviour said to Martha Joh. 11.25 26. I hope the best of you However while you are yet alive especially you that have been in danger by reason of the Contagion of late endeavour to walk in the steps of David Remember what your Prayers were in your Perils what Vows and Promises you made when you expected Death what Perplexity and Anxiety seized on you when the Remembrance of your Sins filled you with Horrour when you looked for Death to attack you and cast your Body into the Grave and perhaps your Soul into Hell when you expected a Summons to the Bar of God's Judgment there to be tried and to have your Doom passed on you Call to mind I beseech you what secret Meditations what Purposes you had what pass'd between God and your Souls in those Streights you were in And then resolve as David did here to address your selves to God as he did saying Thy Vows are upon me O God I will render Praises unto thee for thou hast delivered my Soul from Death O remember what God hath done for you in giving you your Lives in bringing you back from the depth of the Earth again When thousands have fallen on your right hand and on your left hand yet the Evil hath not come nigh you If it have entred into your Houses lighted on your Persons yet it hath not taken away your Breath so that though the Lord hath chastened you sore yet he hath not given you over unto Death Chiefly if God have awakened you that slept that you might stand up from the dead and Christ might give you light O then rejoyce in God's Goodness to you let the Remembrance of it make the Thoughts of God delightfull to you quicken you to run the ways of his Commandments mind you to perform the great Duties of Reformation of your Lives and new Obedience to God that preserved you according to all the Vows Resolutions and Engagements which were upon you when you were in Trouble Yea if you were then insensible of your Condition and thought not on the accursed estate which would have befallen you if you had died in your Sins now at least begin to lay it to heart Sure though you have escaped out of the hands of Death now yet it will overtake you at last All the means you can use all the Advantages all the Privileges you have cannot avoid it or exempt you from going the way of all flesh Oh then that you would now become in your Life-time what you would willingly be found to be at the hour of Death If you would not be found of Death Swearing Lying Deceiving or engaged in any ungodly and unrighteous way then be not so now If you would then be found Praying Meditating on God's Word Praising God inure your selves to such Exercises now It will not be easie to doe it then if you be not accustomed to it now You will then have the Comfort of a happy Death if you be acquainted with the practice of a holy Life now If your Remembrance of God's Goodness towards you puts you on such Resolutions the Remembrance that you have tasted how gracious the Lord is how he hath redeemed your Souls from the nethermost Hell by the Bloud of his Son which you are to remember with the greatest Thankfulness when you come to receive the Holy Communion and preserves you from the second Death you will then be animated to expect of God that he will keep your Feet from falling Take heed that you stumble not at the Prosperity of the wicked so as to approve and chuse their ways Take heed that Christ be not a Stone of Stumbling and a Rock of Offence to you that you stumble not at the Word disbelieving the Gospel being disobedient to the Precepts of the Word lest ye be appointed unto Wrath and not to obtain Salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ Take heed of ordering your Steps by your own Reason by the imagined Light within you which is for the most part an Ignis fatuus a dangerous Meteor that will bring you into Pits and Bogs Take heed of trusting to your own Free will your own good Purposes they will prove but a broken Reed which when you lean on them will run into your hands and pierce them Get your Feet shod with the Shoes of the Preparation or as it may be well read the Pavement of the Gospel of Peace as firm ground upon which you may
entitative Presence or his Tuition or beholding him but also his pleasing God in his Conversation having a regard to his Approbation out of desire to obtain his Favour as well as to his Power to avoid his Anger As S. Paul saith of himself 2 Cor. 2.17 We are not as many which corrupt the Word of God but as of Sincerity but as of God in the sight of God speak we in Christ and Chap. 4.2 commending our selves to every man's Conscience in the sight of God There is somewhat more also I think in this Expression viz. That his Aim was to walk before God by worshipping at the Tabernacle for that place he means sometimes when he speaks of appearing before God as Psal 42.2 When shall I come and appear before God the meaning of which longing is thus expressed Psal 43.3 O send out thy Light and thy Truth let them lead me and bring me unto thy holy Hill and to thy Tabernacle and Psal 84.2 My Soul longeth yea even fainteth for the Courts of the Lord my Heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God And so it hath the same sense with that of Hezekiah Isa 38.20 The Lord was ready to save me therefore we will sing my Songs to the stringed Instruments all the days of our life in the house of the Lord. And then in the light of the living is all one with all the time of his Life or among the living opposite to that which Hezekiah said vers 18 19. The Grave cannot praise thee Death cannot celebrate thee they that go down into the Pit cannot hope for thy truth The Living the Living he shall praise thee as I do this day the Father to the Children shall make known thy Truth And to this sense is it which the Psalmist here saith I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living So that hence ariseth this OBSERVATION That a Godly man when God delivers his Soul from Death and his Feet from falling aims at walking before God in the light of the living as counting himself thereto engaged Indeed every Holy Christian counts his Life due to God Rom. 14.7 8. None of us saith the Apostle liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself For whether we live we live unto the Lord and whether we die we die unto the Lord whether we live therefore or die we are the Lord 's Every one that hath found God gracious to him doeth as Enoch Noah Abraham and all the Saints of old did he walks before God as counting his Life onely Vitam vitalem a Life indeed while he imploys it for God otherwise while he lives without God in the world he counts himself to live a liveless Life to be dead while he lives Now walking before God may be understood either Materially and so all men walk before God his Eye is upon them he knows their down-sitting and their uprising he understandeth their Thoughts afar off he compasseth their path and their lying down and is acquainted with all their ways There is not a word in their Tongue but he knows it altogether as it is Psal 139.2 3 4. or Formally and reciprocally so as that God is eyed by us his Omnipresence Omniscience Omnipotency are apprehended and observed by us as the Psalmist speaks Psal 16.8 I have set the Lord always before me because he is at my right hand I shall not be moved This may be done either Speculatively so as to contemplate his Being to enquire after him to have some Apprehensions of God or Affectively either so as to hate God as the Devils and damned Spirits that acknowledge God to be but with trembling and horrour of Spirit and against their wills James 2.19 or so as to love God If any love God the same is known of him or Practically so as not onely to acknowledge him to be God and to love him but also relatively to own him as our God as the Psalmist Psal 48.14 This God is our God for ever and ever he will be our Guide unto death This Walking before God comprehends the constant ordering the frame of our Actions for God A man is not said to walk who makes but one Step Walking imports a Continuation of Steps and Walking before God a Multiplication of Actions and those in God's way as they said Mic. 4.2 He will teach us his ways and we shall walk in his paths For though all the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord and he pondereth all his goings yet he counts no Walking to be before him but that which is in Holiness and Righteousness as it is Luk. 1.75 There must be a removing from the opposite term to wit Satan Some are already turned aside after Satan saith the Apostle 1 Tim. 5.15 Those cannot walk before God that hold Intelligence with Satan When Eve held Parley with the old Serpent she departed from God and so did Saul when he went after the Witch of Endor And in like manner doe all that are conformed to this World that are fashioned after their own Lusts that adhere to their own Reason Familiarity with Satan Conformity to this World Reasoning with flesh and bloud are inconsistent with walking before God There must be a turning from Darkness to Light and from the power of Satan unto God as the words are Act. 26.18 God must be the Terminus ad quem he to whom we come as it is Heb. 11.6 He that cometh unto God must believe that he is and that he is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek him And this Walking is not when we onely doe some Actions in God's way A man is not said to walk before God that sometimes is in God's way and then skips out of it again such Going in and out is not Walking but running counter like the way of a Serpent upon a Stone dancing leaping and frisking Then a man is said to walk to a place or person not when he doth make a Vagarie or two but keeps on in an uniform settled even pace hath his eye upon the Mark and follows after it wittingly willingly constantly when he doth as the Apostle speaks Phil. 3.16 go on gradually orderly by the same Rule that the Apostles and other Holy persons have heretofore gone by A man cannot come to God per Saltum by a Leap but by a constant regular Course of actions propounding to himself God as the Object unto whom he directs his Actions and his Motive for what he doeth And herein there must be two things especally eyed by us to wit 1. God's Sovereignty and Almightiness I am the Almighty God saith God to Abraham Gen. 17.1 walk before me and be thou perfect The Fear and Reverence of God as the Supreme Majesty as he that is Maximus the Greatest should attract our Eyes and our Hearts towards him with Awfulness as Subjects compose and order their Carriage with Awe and Respect to their Sovereign because he is their Lord attiring
that I desire besides thee My Flesh and my Heart faileth but God is the strength of my Heart and my portion for ever It is good for me to draw near to God I have put my Trust in the Lord God Such Apprehensions as these do affect the Spirits of a man as the breaking out of the Sun doth the Eyes after it hath been overcast with thick Clouds in the day or concealed by the Darkness of the night Then the Light is sweet and it is a pleasant thing to behold the Sun So it is with the Soul after such Perplexities and Affrightments and Disconsolations of Spirit as are incident to the most holy Saint by reason of the seeming Disorders and dismall Occurrences in the world which are obvious to him When he recollects himself and determines against all Arguings ad oppositum that the Lord God is a Sun and a Shield the Lord will give Grace and Glory no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly O Lord of hoasts blessed is the man that trusteth in thee Psal 84.11 12. then he delights himself in the Lord as the most pleasant and eligible Good thing as his Sun and his Shield and accordingly fixes his Contemplations on God quickens chears confirms raises up his Spirits in the remembrance of him expresses himself in holy Hymns in devout Prayers in wise Observations of his Doings in commemorating of his Works and his Word in holy Conferences and such like ways as shew that none is so amiable to him as God none to be adhered to in comparison of him none to be glorified like unto God Conformably hereto he delights in the Consideration of God's most excellent Being that he is not like the Vanities of the Nations that he is the living God and an everlasting King that in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting Strength that there is none holy as the Lord no Rock like unto our God that great is our Lord and of great Power his Vnderstanding is infinite that he is mercifull and gracious abundant in Goodness and Truth He delights also in the beholding and observation of his Works which however they are not minded by them who are alienated from the Life that is in God yet to the Godly enlightned Soul they appear Great so that in Admiration of them he is affected like the Psalmist Psal 8.1 O Lord our God how excellent is thy Name in all the Earth who hast set thy Glory above the Heavens Psal 104.24 In wisedom hast thou made them all and rulest all He is holy in all his Ways and righteous in all his Works and therefore are they sought out of all them that have pleasure therein His Work is honourable and glorious and his Righteousness endureth for ever And hereupon the Psalmist resolves Psal 104.34 My meditation of him shall be sweet I will be glad in the Lord. Nor is his Delight less in God's Word then in his Works I will praise thy Name saith David Psal 138.2 for thy Loving-kindness and for thy Truth for thou hast magnified thy Word above all thy Name And thus he often professeth that the Word of God his Judgments were more to be desired then Gold yea then much fine Gold sweeter then Hony and the Hony-comb that not onely his Word of Promise was his Comfort in his Affliction for by it he was quickened but that he greatly delighted in God's Commands they were the Joy of his heart And Holy Job 23.12 I have esteemed the Word of his mouth more then my necessary Food But Holy mens greatest Delight in God is when by Faith in Christ they apprehend God to be their God and they his People that he dwells in them they are his Temple that they are made by him Kings and Priests to him by his Spirit that he is their Father through Christ they his Children that they have access to him by the Faith of Christ and are assured of an Inheritance above with him When they understand this that Christ is All to them they delight in the Almighty and lift up their face unto God with Joy as it is Job 22.26 Now this indeed is best for the Godly thus to delight themselves in the Lord even in their own lowest Conditions and their Oppressours highest because the greatest Good that Evil men have is but vain Be it Plenty Peace Honour Liberty Power Pleasure or what-ever else is valued by men that have their Portion in this life it is but an imperfect fading vexing Good much of it is such as Beasts injoy more fully then they who have more Delight in their Food and sensitive Pleasure then Men have Applause Honours Wealth are but Toys such as Childish persons delight in rather then wise Men. Philosophers by the Light of Nature have censured them as empty of reall Worth not good because they made not the Possessours of them good Wisedom and Vertue are by them preferred before them Yea they bring often much Vexation in stead of Delight In acquiring and Using them is much Vanity In the midst of Laughter the Heart is sorrowfull Solomon styles it Madness But Delight in the Lord is the most rationall exquisite durable Delight far above not onely Epicurus his Pleasure and Zeno's Vertue and Seneca's Tranquillity of mind but also Solomon's Glory his Wisedom his Knowledge of the Properties of Natural bodies and what-ever Excellency short of Acquaintance with God he was endued with He confesseth as much in the close of his Penitentialls and before him his Father David Psal 4.6 7. There be many that say Who will shew us any Good Lord lift thou up the light of thy Countenance upon us Thou hast put Gladness in my Heart more then in the time that their Corn and their Wine increased This makes the Saints delight in Prayer and Praise and other Worship of God it being their Privilege as well as their Duty to delight themselves in the Lord Isa 58.14 and according to the Desire of their Heart Which brings me to the II. OBSERVATION That they who delight themselves in the Lord shall have their Hearts Desire and in fine speed better then they who are in the most illustrious estate of Wicked men The principal Desire of one that delights himself in God is to glorifie God that is the main End of such as glory in God that they may doe all to his Glory Therefore are they taught to make this their first Petition Hallowed be thy Name and to that end to pray Thy Kingdom come Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven Even in God's most severe Dealings with them they say with those Isa 26.8 Yea in the way of thy Judgments O Lord have we waited for thee the desire of our Soul is to thy Name and to the Remembrance of thee To which that of the Apostle Phil. 1.20 is consonant According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but that with all boldness as always
your Souls and knocked that he might be let in that he might sup with you and you with him How frequently have the Preachers of the Gospel the Servants of Christ invited you to his Supper to be partakers of that Grace of God which exceeds in worth all the Treasures of the Earth all the Pleasures under the Sun which is of greater Necessity and Advantage then all the Traffick by Land or Sea and yet his Word is not believed Oxen and Farms and Wives yea that which is worse Dalilah's Idols are minded more esteemed then Christ then his Love his Spirit his Kingdome his Righteousness Where is the man that is willing to deny himself his own Contents unjust Gains unclean Affections injurious Projects yea his vain Opinions and to take up Christ's Cross after him Where is he that will suffer I will not say Loss of Life or Goods or Credit with men for Christ but even a Divorce from his Lusts that will forbear a profane ungodly Oath a devillish Revenge or undergoe so much as a Scoff or Reproach that he may follow Christ and be his Disciple If this be not Perverseness in our Ways the Despising of the Lord in the most vilifying way I know not what is I beseech you bethink your selves in good earnest what will be the End of these things Think of that Wisedom Solomon speaks of Prov. 1. v. 22. and so forwards The very reading of it methinks should awaken and affright as many of you as yet persist in your Perverseness and will none of Wisedom's Counsel but despise all its Reproof As therefore you would not be rejected by Christ despised by him in that Day when he shall bid some depart from him into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels deny I beseech you your Vngodliness and worldly Lusts obey the voice of Christ trust in him and he will then receive you and ye shall be where he is Which the Lord grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE SAINTS Future Glory The Twenty-ninth SERMON REVEL vij 15. Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them YOU have here exhibited to your view the most happy and glorious Spectacle which humane spirits are capable of Brave Shows as at Princes Coronations and Marriages do greatly attract the Eyes of men One of the ancient Fathers wished much to see a Roman Triumph in its greatest Glory The Queen of Sheba was so affected with the Glory of Solomon and his Court that she took a great and costly Journey to behold them and was so transported with what she saw and heard that there was no more Spirit in her But I may well say A Greater then Solomon a braver Sight then Solomon's Court or a Roman Triumph is here Here is the God of Glory on his Throne Here the Court of glorious Spirits which are made perfect have their most splendid Robes on and the Ensign of their Victory in their hands that Palma nobilis which carries to God the Offscouring of the Earth and makes them that hid themselves in Dens and Caves of the Earth to be advanced to the Habitation of God in the highest Heavens And therefore this Show is worth your beholding which I shall endeavour to present to you though not in its Splendour yet so as I hope it may raise you up as to an Admiration and Extolling of the Divine Excellency so also to an Imitation of and a Following after those glorious Saints of whom it is said in the Verse before my Text that they came out of great Tribulation and washed their Robes and made them white in the Bloud of the Lamb and in this Verse Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them In which two Verses you have described 1. The Exploits and Estate of these noble Warriours or Combatants on Earth They had a great Fight of Afflictions They wrastled not onely against Flesh and Bloud but against Principalities and Powers against the Rulers of the Darkness of this world against Spiritual Wickedness in high or heavenly places And though they had sore Falls yet they washed their Robes and made them white in the Bloud of the Lamb and by the word of their Testimony at last they overcame Satan and the World not loving their Lives unto the death This was their gallant Fight of Faith this their glorious Victory over their proud and most treacherous Enemies 2. Their Triumph their Ascent into the Capitol their Reception into Heaven They are before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them Their present State there may be seen in these Particulars 1. In the place where they are they do not as they did on Earth wander about in Desarts and Mountains and in Dens and Caves of the earth but are about the Throne of God Nor are they cloathed with Sheep-skins and Goat-skins but have Royal or Priestly Robes like the Servants of Solomon about his Throne or the Priests in their Garments at the Altar or in the Temple 2. Their Imployment is not to grind in Mills or make Brick under a cruel Pharaoh but like the Priests and Levites at the Temple they day and night serve the Great the Glorious and Blessed Potentate who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords who onely hath Immortality and dwelleth in Light incomprehensible And their Service is the most pleasant and without any Tediousness to wit to praise and magnifie him everlastingly 3. Their Company is not base sordid and vexing Men or malicious and cruel Devils but he that sitteth on the Throne the King of Glory who hath all Beauty and Loveliness who will dwell among them so as to protect them and satisfie them with his Presence I shall not have time to insist upon the description of the Conflict and Atchievement of these Blessed Saints when upon Earth though the particle Therefore referring thither might induce me to consider thereof Nor is it necessary to inquire into the Time of that great Affliction which these are said to come out of I will without limitation of it to one sort of Saints as Martyrs at one time whether in the Ten first great Persecutions under the Pagan Roman Emperours or those under the bloudy Roman Popes by Burnings and most cruel Massacres apply this to all Saints and thence observe 1. That Afflictions Persecutions yea Death do not extinguish the Being of Saints who wash their Robes and make them clean in the Bloud of the Lamb. 2. That when they are removed from Men below they are placed before the Throne of God 3. That there they serve God in his Temple in Heaven perpetually 4. That they have God everlastingly cohabiting with them Of which in their order
consequent upon the desire he had to see him after the Revelation made to him Gen. 12.2 3. and Gen. 15.5 and his Exultation thereupon Gen. 17.16 17. Which is far more likely to be meant then his seeing him in the Type of Isaac to be offered or a Manifestation of the time of his Coming to Abraham being dead But if the sense be of Intellectual Seeing it may be understood of a Seeing by Revelation or Vision by such an Apparition as might be peculiar to Abraham and not common to those many Prophets Kings and Righteous men to whom it was denied to see those things which the Apostles saw and to hear those things which they heard Matth. 13.17 Luk. 10.24 Sure as Abraham's Faith was singular whereupon he had the denomination of the Father of Believers so the Manifestation of Christ to him what-ever it was had a Peculiarity in respect of Prophets Kings and Righteous men And therefore both in Mary's Magnificat and in Zachary's Benedictus the Performance of God's Promise is said to be as he spake to Abraham and according to the Oath which he sware to our Father Abraham 5. As for the Last This Seeing of Christ's Day whether it were Ocular or Intellectual proper to Abraham was matter of great Joy to Abraham in a more eminent manner then to others both in that he saw that Seed which was in special manner his not onely because it descended from him for so it was also David's Seed but because it was to come of Sarah in a supernatural way and also that in this Seed and so in him all the Nations of the Earth should be blessed and he himself should be a Blessing Gen. 12.2 Which therefore produced if not for the kind yet for the degree a singular Rejoycing in Abraham such as shewed it self not onely in so ready a following God whithersoever he called him a free choice of such an Estate of being as God allotted him but also in that unparallel'd Offering up Isaac when he was tried the great effect of his Faith as it is determined to have been Heb. 11.17 18 19. Having thus opened the Meaning of this Speech of Christ that I may accommodate it to this present Time and Occasion of celebrating the Memorial of Christ's Advent we may hence observe 1. That the Day of Christ or his Coming in the Flesh was foreknown to Abraham and other Holy Believers which preceded his Incarnation 2. That it was that which they desired and waited for 3. That the Certainty of its Accomplishment was the Spring of their Joy the Basis of their Comfort the Stay and Support of their Spirits in the days of their Pilgrimage on Earth Of which I shall speak in order I. OBSERVATION That the Day of Christ or his Coming in the Flesh was foreknown to Abraham and other Holy Believers which preceded his Incarnation This is told us in Mary's Song that God remembred his Mercy as he spake to the Fathers and in Zachary's Hymn as he spake by the mouth of his holy Prophets which have been since the world began Both to Holy Prophets and to Angels some though obscure Predictions and Foreshewings of Christ's Day were vouchsafed as those words of Jacob about the Coming of Shilo and the Gathering of the people to him shew Gen. 49.10 those also of Moses Exod. 4.13 when to decline the Expedition God imployed him in to Egypt he said O my Lord send I pray thee by the hand of Him whom thou wilt send likewise the many Passages in the Psalms and Prophets which were opened and explained by our Lord Christ All these I say shew that there were some though obscure Foretellings of Christ's Day And indeed that there should be a Day of Christ was made known to Simeon to whom it was revealed by the Holy Ghost that he should not see Death before he had seen the Lord's Christ Luk. 2.26 To Anna a Prophetess who upon Christ's Presenting at the Temple gave Thanks likewise as Simeon did unto the Lord and spake of Jesus Christ to all them that looked for Redemption in Jerusalem vers 38. Even the chief Priests and Scribes of the people knew that Christ should be born in Bethlehem of Judaea Matth. 2.4 5. The Woman of Samaria said to the Lord Jesus Joh. 4.25 I know that Messias cometh which is called Christ when he is come he will tell us all things Yea the Magi or Wise men of the East had intimation of his Birth and were led to him by a Star Matth. 2.1 2. Even Suetonius in his History of Vespasian's Life tells us that toto Oriente percrebuit sermo throughout all the East there was frequent speech of a Ruler that should come out from Judaea which was misapplied to Vespasian yet thereby the Foreknowledge of Christ's Day is manifest to have been far spred which caused the Desire and Expectation thereof in those Holy Believers who preceded Christ's Incarnation Which is the next thing to be considered II. OBSERVATION That this Day of Christ was by Believers of old desired and waited for If the words of Jacob Gen. 49.18 I have waited for thy Salvation O Lord do not intimate his Desire and Expectation of Christ's Day yet that Speech in the last words of David 2 Sam. 23.5 God hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my Salvation and all my Desire doth express it to have been his since there is no other thing but the Day of Christ promised to come from him that could be truly said to be all his Salvation and all his Desire As the Prophet Isaiah foretold that there should come forth a Rod out of the Stem of Jesse and a Branch should grow out of his Roots Isa 11.1 and the Prophet Micah Mic. 5.2 that the Messiah who was to be Ruler in Israel should come forth of Bethlehem whose Goings forth had been from of old from everlasting So it was confessedly expected even by the chief Priests and Scribes of the people And of him it is said Mal. 3.1 The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple even the Messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in behold he shall come and this soon after his Messenger that he sent was come to prepare his Way before him which to be meant of John the Baptist is expresly declared Mark 1.2 And that I may not be too copious in alleging Texts for proof of this even the Jews profest Enemies to Christ deny it not to have been true That the Messiah was to come of the Seed of David and out of the Town of Bethlehem where David was Joh. 7.42 Yea the words of the Prophet Haggai 2.6 7. applied to Christ's Kingdom Heb. 12.26 that God would shake all Nations and the Desire of all Nations should come and that he would fill that House they were then to build to wit the Second Temple with Glory these words I say shew that Christ's Day was the
XXXI SERMONS Preached to the PARISHIONERS of Stanford-Rivers in Essex Upon several Subjects and Occasions BY CHARLES GIBBES D. D. Rectour of that Church and Prebendary of Saint Peter's at Westminster Never before made publick QVI SEQVITUR ME NON AMBULAT IN TENEBRIS LOâ—â—â—â— Printed by E. Flesher 〈…〉 most Sacred MAJESâ—◠〈…〉 To the well-beloved the PARISHIONERS Of Stanford-Rivers in the County of Essex Grace and Peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ be multiplied IN this Age and Nation abounding with Learned Men and Books of all sorts especially in Points of Sacred Theology I should not have thought any thing of Mine worth the Press being conscious to my self of mine own Unfitness for that Employment by reason of Age and other Imperfections had not your Importunity extorted these Papers from me which I now exhibit to you But that I might not be wanting in what I am able for your Edification in the Doctrine of Christ I have yielded to adventure an Impression of them whereunto I have been induced by a like Consideration with that of Saint Peter 2 Epist ch 1. vers 12 13 14. where his writing is declared to be out of an apprehension of his approaching Dissolution that after his Decease there might be that extant which might keep in their Remembrance that which he had taught them and wherein they were established It is part of my Rejoycing that I have had so much Ability as to hold forth the Word of God to you in any measure and that it hath found so ready Reception with you It is that which I pray for and earnestly exhort you to that you will never forget the Saving Truths you have been taught though I be buried in oblivion nor backslide to Errour or Profaneness But that you be still constant in the true Faith of Christ and the right Worship of God in publick and in your private Families seeking the Divine Benediction on your selves and Families and living in mutual Love and Helpfulness towards all as knowing that the saving Grace of God hath appeared to all men teaching us that denying Vngodliness and worldly Lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present World looking for that blessed Hope and the glorious Appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all Iniquity and purifie unto himself a peculiar People zealous of Good works Whereunto if this Writing or any Labour of mine may conduce I have my Desire who recommending both you and this Work to the Almighty's Blessing do yet remain Your truly loving and faithfull Servant in Christ CHARLES GIBBES A TABLE of the several TEXTS discoursed upon PSAL. VI. 6. I Am weary of my Groaning every night wash I my Bed and water my Couch with my Tears Three Sermons pag. 1 19 37. PSAL. LI. 1 2. Have mercy upon me O God according to thy Loving-kindness according to the multitude of thy tender Mercies blot out my Transgressions Wash me throughly from mine Iniquity and cleanse me from my Sin 57. PSAL. LI. 3. I acknowledge my Transgression and my Sin is ever before me 75. PSAL. LI. 11. Cast me not away from thy Presence and take not thy Holy Spirit from me Two Sermons 87 99. PROV XVIII 14. The Spirit of a man will sustain his Infirmity but a wounded Spirit who can bear Two Sermons 111 121. PSAL. CXXX 4. But there is Mercy or Forgiveness with thee that thou maist be feared 131. PSAL. LXXIX 8. O remember not against us former Iniquities let thy tender Mercies speedily prevent us for we are brought very low 153. HEBR. IV. 7. To Day if you will hear his Voice harden not your Hearts 173. ROM VI. 1. and part of 2. What shall we say then shall we continue in Sin that Grace may abound God forbid 185. LAMENT III. 22. It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed because his Compassions fail not 197. PSAL. LVI 13. For thou hast delivered my Soul from Death wilt thou not deliver my Feet from Falling that I may walk before God in the Light of the living Two Sermons 217 235. PSAL. CXIX 15. I will meditate in thy Precepts and have respect unto thy Ways 251. PSAL. CXXII 1. I was glad when they said unto me Let us goe into the House of the Lord. 263. PSAL. XXXVII 4. Delight thy self in the Lord and he shall give thee thy Heart's desire 275. 1 PET. III. 13. And who is he that will harm you if ye be Followers of that which is Good 287. PSAL. XVI 11. Thou wilt shew me the Path of life In thy Presence is fulness of Joy at thy right hand there are Pleasures for evermore Two Sermons 305 325. PSAL. LXXIII 24. Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsel and afterwards receive me to Glory 345. PSAL. XL. 8. I will both lay me down in peace and sleep for thou Lord onely makest me dwell in Safety 357. 1 JOHN III. 1. Behold what manner of Love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the Sons of God 371. PSAL. CXIX 34. Give me Vnderstanding and I shall keep thy Law yea I shall observe it with my whole Heart 383. PROV XIV 2. He that walketh in his Vprightness feareth the Lord but he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth him Two Sermons 399 411. REVEL VII 15. Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them 421. JOHN VIII 56. Your Father Abraham rejoyced to see my Day and he saw it and was glad 435. GEN. XII 1. Now the Lord had said unto Abraham Get thee out of thy Country and from thy Kindred and from thy Father's House unto a Land that I shall shew thee 449. Imprimatur Febr. 27. 1676 7. Guil. Sill R. P. D. Henr. Episc Lond. à Sacris Domesticis DAVID's GROANS Part I. The First SERMON PSALM vi 6. I am weary of my Groaning every night wash I my Bed and water my Couch with my Tears THIS Psalm is intituled to David and is styled by many One or the First of his Penitentiall Psalms And it is true it expresseth his Agony and dolour of mind for his Sickness undoubtedly for his Sins as the Cause of it in likelihood and so for both as in a Psalm parallel to this he complains Psal 38.4 which two make a heavy Burthen too heavy for any man to bear The Burthen of one onely to wit of Sin though not his own made the Mighty One the Mighty God to stoop under it when he bare the Sins of Men in his own body on the Tree insomuch that as in the Garden he told his Disciples Matth. 26.38 My Soul is exceeding sorrowfull unto death so on the Cross he cried out in the Anguish of his spirit Matth. 27.46 O God my God why hast thou forsaken me No marvel then that
holy David though a man after God's own heart and one that was of so bold and magnanimous a spirit as to encounter with a Lion and a Bear that with the most gallant Courage a man shall likely meet with could slight the proud Vaunts and Menaces of the great Goliah of Gath and be no more affrighted by him then as if he had been to encounter with a Child while by faith he saw God for him yet when he saw God against him calling his Sin to remembrance laying Affliction on his loyns consuming him with the blow of his hand that he I say should shrink under the burthen his spirit slag his heart faint and he roar and cry out like a Child as in the words of my Text I am weary of my Groaning c. Which words express the sad plight of David under some heavy Pressure which drew from him 1. Groaning the dolefull sound of the Inwards Lungs and other of the Bowels upon the feeling of some oppressing Burthen Grief or Pain or the apprehension of some expected approaching Evil. And this Groaning of David is with weariness so excessive as that it did even break his Heart 2. It drew from him Tears which are the emanations of watery moisture from the eyes drawn out sometimes by excessive Joy but most commonly by sad afflicting Griefs which do not stupefy but affect the Heart These Tears of David are described 1. By the abundance of them They made his Bed to swim they watered his Couch Beds and Couches are Utensills made for Rest and Ease the one in the Night the other in the Day when either labour sickness or other malady makes us to betake our selves to them for repose and refreshing So said Job in his Calamity My Bed shall comfort me my Couch shall ease my complaint Job 7.13 Now to have the Bed to swim with Tears to have the Couch watered with his own Tears is a sign of no Rest nor Ease by them and therefore of extreme remediless Grief 2. His Weeping is aggravated by the incessantness of it in the Night made for Rest and that every Night yea all the Night And in the Day too for that is the time of using the Couch So that as elsewhere he expresseth himself he went mourning all the day long and day and night God's hand was heavy upon him and his moisture was turned into the drought of Summer But may it not be said Ad quid perditio haec Wherefore was this waste what was the cause of this excessive Groaning and Weeping Scire est per Causam scire We never well understand a thing till we know the Reason of it Weeping and Groaning are sometimes voluntary and of choice when a person sets himself to weep and groan as when S. Peter remembring Christ's words went out and wept bitterly Matth. 26.75 Sometimes they are involuntary as when the Christians Act. 20.37 38. parted with S. Paul they wept sore sorrowing most of all for the word which he spake that they should see his face no more Sometimes because of Calamity sometimes because of Sin and sometimes for both Sometimes to express Compassion Tenderness and Love as when S. Paul by the space of three years ceased not to warn the Arians night and day with Tears Act. 20.31 Sometimes for their own Sins and Calamities sometimes for the Sins or Calamities or both of others Christ when he perceived the Pharisees infidelity and hardness of heart sighed deeply in his spirit Mark 8.12 when he beheld Jerusalem he wept over it Luk. 19.41 when he saw Mary weep Christ groaned in the spirit and was troubled and wept upon Lazarus his buriall Joh. 11.33 35. Jeremiah the Prophet wisheth Oh that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people Jer. 9.1 And Chap. 13.17 he tells them If ye will not hear it my Soul shall weep in secret places for your Pride and mine eyes shall weep sore and run down with tears because the Lord's Flock is carried away captive Which he did abundantly perform when he made his Book of Lamentations David Psal 119.136 saith of himself Rivers of waters run down mine eyes because they keep not thy Law And these indeed were charitable Tears for others But the Groaning and Weeping in my Text was for himself partly naturall and involuntary because of his weakness the vexing of his bones partly voluntary and of choice 1. Because his Affliction whether Sickness or other Distress was likely to bereave him of Life and thereby deprive him of the opportunity of praising God among the living in which he so much delighted as to count his life a burthen to him when he could not come to the Tabernacle to praise God Psal 42.1 2. and 48.1 2 3. Which is gathered from his plea why God should save him from his present Malady For saith he vers 5. next before my Text in Death there is no remembrance of thee in the Grave who shall give thee thanks It seems he had some Sickness or other Danger which he apprehended to be mortall which is not related in the Books of Samuel and that put him upon this sad Complaint in my Text. As in like manner Hezekiah complained in his Sickness Isa 38.10 11. I said in the cutting off of my days I shall go to the gates of the Grave I am deprived of the residue of my years I said I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world vers 18. For the Grave cannot praise thee Death cannot celebrate thee they that go down into the Pit cannot hope for thy truth This then was the Grievance which made their other Malady so disquieting to them that it would put an end to their praising God on Earth I do not question whether the Patriarchs looked onely for Temporall Blessings whether they believed the Immortality of the Soul the Beatificall vision immediately after Death the Resurrection of the body sith Heb. 11. it is resolved that Abraham looked for a City which hath foundations whose builder and maker as God vers 10. that they confessed they were Strangers and Pilgrims upon Earth vers 13. that they sought and desired a better Country to wit an Heavenly vers 14 16. that they accepted not deliverance that they might obtain a better Resurrection vers 35. As our Lord Christ Luk. 23.46 and S. Stephen Act. 7.59 commended their Spirits into God's hands so David Psal 31.5 Into thine hand I commit my Spirit thou hast redeemed me O Lord God of truth Yet certain it is whether by reason of their great affection to the solemn Worship of God on Earth their expectations and apprehensions of God's Promises or their imperfect umbratile Twilight-knowledge of the Mysteries of Christ they seem not to be alike apprehensive of the Happiness of the Soul after death
regarded but for the use of it in God's Service As that learned Doctour who being dissuaded from studying so much whereby his Life was likely to be shortned and told that it was not wisedom perdere Substantiam propter Accidentia to lose Substance for Accidents meaning Life for encrease of Learning and communicating it by writing answered Nec propter Vitam vivendi perdere Causas that it was as unfit for him to take care of his Health and to lose the Use and End of his Life which was the doing his work glorifying of God and benefitting of others Doctour Reynolds Then a Holy man lives with Comfort when he can honour God and doe his work but when he is stopped therein then he is weary with Groaning and waters his Couch with his Tears as David did here for his present Affliction because it hindred him from the Assemblies wherein he might remember and thank God as also because he feared the insolent Pride of his Enemies that they would reproach God Which leads us to the IV. PROPOSITION That it aggravates a Godly man's Affliction when by reason of his Sufferings Reproach is likely to be cast upon God That the sense of this was that which so much disquieted David when he penned this Psalm and caused the mournful Groans and Tears here mentioned may be gathered from the next verse where he saith Mine eye is consumed because of Grief it waxeth old because of all mine Enemies and vers 10. Let all mine Enemies be ashamed and sore vexed let them return and be ashamed suddenly Now the Reason why his Enemies were such a thorn in his side when he was in Sickness or Exile in one of which it is likely this Psalm was penned is expressed Psal 42.9 10. thus I will say unto God My Rock why hast thou forgotten me why goe I mourning because of the oppression of the Enemy As with a sword in my bones mine Enemies reproach me while they say daily unto me Where is thy God God had sent Samuel to anoint him King over Israel he had promised to establish the Kingdome in his House and to subdue all his Enemies on every side of this he much gloried even then when he fled to the Philistines and changed his behaviour before them and his Enemies in Saul's Court or the Philistines insulted over him as if his hopes were at an end God had cast him off and would be favourable no more had forgotten to be gracious and did fail in his promise Psal 77.7 8 9. yet even then as the Title of the Psalm imports Psal 34.1 2. he resolved thus I will bless the Lord at all times his praise shall be continually in my mouth My Soul shall make her boast in the Lord. With this his Confidence in God they were wont to upbraid him when he was low in some Sickness or in a flitting Condition or driven from Jerusalem by his Son Absalom as Psal 3.1 2. he complains Lord how are they increased that trouble me many are they that rise up against me Many there be that say of my Soul There is no help for him in his God So when Shimei railed on him and cursed him 2 Sam. 16.7 8. The like may be gathered from passages in many other Psalms as Psal 7. concerning the words of Cush the Benjamite Doeg the Edomite Psal 52. and others By which it may be perceived that in his low estate David was more sensible of the Injury which might be to God's Name then his own Calamity Psal 22.7 8. among other things wherein whether in respect of his own Condition or prophetically describing the Anguish of our Lord Christ's Soul when he suffered for us of which that Psalm is a manifest Prediction David sets out his deplorable estate he urgeth thus that all that saw him laughed him to scorn they shoot out the lip they shake the head saying He trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him let him deliver him seeing he delighted in him Which being the thing done to Christ Matth. 27.43 and Christ using the first words of that Psalm Matth. 27.46 on the Cross it is evident that as to David in the Type so to Christ in the Antitype this was one of the greatest Vexations to them in their Sufferings that they were twitted with and scoffingly taunted for their Trust in God as if it were a vain thing to call upon God and to trust upon him And indeed the Apostle tells us Rom. 15.3 that herein Christ pleased not himself but it was an addition to the heavy Sufferings which he underwent that the Reproaches of them that reproached God fell on him When Hezekiah heard of Sennacherib's message in which he magnified himself and vilified the God of Israel it is said that he rent his cloaths and covered himself with Sackcloath and went to the House of the Lord and sent to Isaiah this message This day is a day of Trouble and of Rebuke and of Blasphemy It may be the Lord thy God will hear the words of Rabshakeh whom the King of Assyria his master hath sent to reproach the living God thereby shewing what he laid most to heart that the living God should be reproached When by reason of the Sin of Achan the men of Israel were smitten by the men of Ai Joshua rent his cloaths and fell to the earth upon his face before the Ark of the Lord untill the even-tide he and the Elders of Israel and put dust upon their heads and he prayed O Lord what shall I say when Israel turneth their backs before their Enemies For the Canaanites and all the Inhabitants of the Land shall hear of it and shall environ us round and cut off our name from the earth and what wilt thou doe unto thy great Name Josh 7.6 8 9. Wherein you may perceive that the Sore which most of all vexed the spirit of Joshua and the Elders of Israel which made them to put on the habit of Mourners was the Disparagement likely to befall the great Name of God if the Canaanites did prevail In like manner Moses when he interceded for the Israelites who had provoked God to destroy them by their Idolatry and their Murmuring useth this Argument of the Injury that would accrue to his great Name if he did not spare them preferring God's Honour before his own Advancement or Happiness Exod. 32.11 12. Num. 14.13 c. Yea the Dishonour done to God in making the Golden Calf did so incense Moses that he broke the Tables of the Decalogue and burnt the Calf made them drink the powder of it and set the Levites armed to kill the Idolaters Memorable also was the carriage of Barnabas and Paul Act. 14.14 When the people of Lystra magnified them as Gods for the healing of an impotent man and would have sacrificed unto them as to Jupiter and Mercurius they rent their cloaths and ran in among the people crying out Sirs why doe you these things We are men turn
return again and findeth the house empty swept and garnished that is after the Sinner in some sort hath repented and his Conscience hath been quieted and his former Courses relinquished for a time he grow secure and loose in his Conversation the unclean Spirit taketh with him seven other Spirits more wicked then himself and they enter in and dwell there and the last state of that man is worse then the first Matth. 12.43 44 45. Satan doth make such a person more sinfull then before and his Condition is worse then it was before his seeming Repentance Most truly doth S. Peter tell us 2 Pet. 2.20 21 22. If after persons have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ they are again intangled therein and overcome the latter end is worse then the beginning For it had been better for them not to have known the way of Righteousness then after they have known it to turn from the holy Commandment delivered unto them But it happens to them according to the true Proverb The Dog is returned to his own vomit again and the Sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire As it is with men who relapse into a Fever which was for a time abated their Disease grows worse and mortal so is it with them that after some imperfect Change and Peace acquired do fall back into the same or other Sins become secure and heedless of Temptations they commonly become more notorious Sinners and more hardned therein to their perdition None likely make a mock of Sin and sport themselves in Evil more then they who once seemed to be humbled penitent and reformed And therefore there is as great a necessity of begging for effectuall Renovation as Condonation from God Sanctification throughout in Body Soul and Spirit as well as Justification from all our Transgressions To which the onely Motive is God's Loving-kindness and the multitude of his tender Mercies according to the next Observation V. OBSERVATION That it is Loving-kindness and multitude of tender Mercies which is the Motive whereupon God blots out Transgressions washeth throughly the guilty Sinner from his Iniquity and cleanseth him from his Sin As God said of the people of Israel that it was not for their Excellency Multitude Righteousness or Vprightness of heart that he took them to be his People Deut. 7.7 and 9.5 but out of his own Compassion Ezek. 16.5 8 9. speaks of them under the Similitude of an unpitied outcast infant till he pitied loved washed and cloathed them so it is true concerning every person that is saved that is justified and sanctified that he is before unclean till the Loving-kindness of God towards him appears Not by Works of Righteousness which he hath done but according to his Mercy God our Saviour saves him by the washing of Regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost That being justified by his Grace he may be made Heir according to the hope of eternall life Tit. 3.4 5 7. And indeed all that is done by us before God pardons and cleanseth us from Sin provokes God against us nor is there so much as a thought in us of returning to God after our departure from his waies nor any help in our selves to deliver our own Souls till he pities us and saves us O Israel saith God Hosea 13.9 thou hast destroyed thy self but in me is thine help He blotteth out our Transgressions for his own Name 's sake and out of his abundant Mercy through Christ It is through the Bloud of Christ as a Price of answerable value that he redeems us and yet it is mere Mercy that procures this for the payment of our Debt So that full Satisfaction to his Justice and free Remission do well consist together notwithstanding the exceptions of Socinians And we must still acknowledge that it is not for our sakes but for his holy Name 's sake that he cleanseth us from our Iniquities and upon this consideration he will be inquired of by repenting Sinners to doe it for them as it is said Ezek. 36.22 33 37. Which brings us to the last or VI. OBSERVATION That the onely way to obtain Deletion of Transgressions and Cleansing from Sin is to beg them of God upon consideration of the multitude of his Mercies and his Love in and through Christ So did the poor Publican obtain Justification by his crying Peccavi and supplicating thus God be mercifull to me a Sinner whom Christ propounds as an Example of a prospering Penitent excluding the self-justifying Pharisee from attaining Righteousness This is the Gospell-way to address our selves to the Throne of Grace to confess our Sins to trust onely to the bloud of Christ for cleansing us from all Sin to make use of him as our Advocate with the Father and the Propitiation for our Sins In him we have Redemption through his bloud the Forgiveness of Sins according to the riches of his Grace Eph. 1.7 This is the way whereby God will be glorified and we shall be saved And therefore still our Litany must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lord have mercy on us or with David Lord be mercifull unto me heal my Soul for I have sinned against thee APPLICATION And now it behoves you that have heard David's Petition opened unto you to apply his Case to your own Souls You have sinned as David did if not in the same kind yet in Sins enough to sink you into the Lake that burns with fire and brimstone Can any of you say My Heart is clean I am pure from my Sin Can any of you deny that you were shapen in Iniquity and that in Sin your Mother conceived you Will not your own Conscience if you heed it inform you of many unholy and unrighteous Thoughts Words and Deeds If there should be any self-boasting Pharisee any ignorant Papist that imagines he can keep the Law of God and merit Heaven by his Works any deluded Quaker or other Fanatick that conceives himself perfect without Sin If there should be any Protestant Justitiary that conceives so well of his Innocence that he thinks God should wrong him if he should damn him so well of his Good deeds Prayers Alms Religious performances at Church or in private as to expect Heaven as wages due to them in exact Justice let him consider that he prefers himself before holy David S. Paul and such other holy Saints as have gone before us to Heaven Christ hath told us he is the Way the Truth and the Life and that no man cometh to the Father but by him Joh. 14.6 And S. Peter tells us Act. 4.12 Neither is there Salvation in any other but Christ for there is none other Name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved And therefore as it was said once to a Novatian by the Emperour Thou that thinkest thy self perfect set up thy Ladder and climb up to Heaven by thy self if thou canst so may I say to
of his Holiness in my Text. Now he is so termed in opposition to the unclean Spirit Matth. 12.43 or evil Spirit and Spirit of Devils which are in some men as the Holy Spirit is in others For as the Heathens imagined that every man had his good Genius or his bad his good or bad Angel so the Holy Scripture expresseth the Motions of men to be from the Spirit of God's Holiness in them who are sanctified and from Satan in them who are unholy as in Cain and Judas Now the Spirit of God is sometimes spoke of as God's Instrument by which he works in the works of Creation Psal 104.30 Thou sendest forth thy Spirit they are created and thou renewest the face of the Earth Job 33.4 The Spirit of God hath made me and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life When God bringeth any great thing to pass he doth it by his Spirit Zech. 4.6 Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit That which is in Matth. 12.28 If I cast out Devils by the Spirit of God is in Luk. 11.20 If I with the finger of God cast out Devils whence it appears that the Spirit of God is Digitus Dei God's Hand or Finger whereby he works But especially the works God doeth in and for the Saints are ascribed to the Spirit of God All these things worketh that one and the self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally even as he will 1 Cor. 12.11 All those precious Qualities and Operations whereby we please God are termed Fruits of the Spirit Gal. 5.22 23. 2. This helps us to understand how the Holy Spirit may be taken from a person to wit by withdrawing from him those Operations of the Holy Spirit which are amiable to God or comfortable to us Now in this Petition it is to be considered that notwithstanding David's Sins he was not utterly bereft of God's Spirit for in this Psalm his humble Confession his ardent Supplication shew that there was some fire of God's Spirit remaining in him all the sparks were not gone out Yet he felt so little of the Vigour and Consolation of the Spirit that he feared its utter Extinction And because this would leave him in utter Darkness therefore he is importunate with God that he would not take his Holy Spirit from him but as it is in the next verse restore unto him the joy of his Salvation and uphold him with his free Spirit The Petition thus opened yields us these Observations 1. That the having of God's Spirit in us and with us is the most beneficial Gift which God gives to a Repenting Sinner 2. That great Transgressions endanger the Loss of God's Spirit 3. That a Repenting Sinner is an earnest Suitour to God for the Continuance of it to him Of these in their order I. OBSERVATION That God's Spirit is the most beneficial Gift that God bestows on a Repenting Sinner This is manifest from the words of Christ Luk. 11.13 If ye then being evil know how to give good Gifts to your Children how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him Which shews that the Gift of the Holy Spirit is a greater Gift and far better then that which earthly Parents give to their Children as bodily Food and the like and that God in giving his Holy Spirit to those that ask him shews an Affection far exceeding that which Parents have for their Children when they supply them with Corporall sustenance Adde hereunto that the Apostle 2 Cor. 13.14 in his Benediction of the Corinthians prays thus for them The Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the Communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all Amen Whereby it is manifest that the Communion of the Holy Spirit is ranked among the best things he could beg for that people to wit the Grace of Christ and the Love of God Nor is this without reason for the Spirit of God removes all that Evil which is odious to God and noisome to our selves it washes away that Filthiness of flesh and spirit which is loathsome to God it cures that Blindness of Mind that Hardness of Heart that Perverseness of Soul that Impotency of Faculties which make us unable to doe any thing that may please God or rectify our own Actions It is this clean Water which being sprinkled on us by God makes us clean in his eyes so as to cleanse us from all our Filthiness and all our Evils It is that by giving of which we have a new heart and a new spirit is put within us God takes away the stony heart out of our flesh and gives us an heart of flesh which causeth us to walk in God's Statutes and to keep his Judgments and doe them Ezek. 11.19 20. In whom the Spirit of God dwells not there is a Spirit of Slumber Eyes that they should not see and Ears that they do not hear even the Gospel is hid to them the God of this world blinds their minds lest the Light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the Image God should shine unto them they are held in the Snare of the Devil and are taken captive by him at his will An evil Spirit possesseth them so that they want the Consolations of God the Peace which passeth understanding which guards the minds of them that believe through Christ Jesus they are filled with Horrour of Conscience are under the spirit of Bondage they sow to the Flesh and of the Flesh reap Corruption On the other side where the Spirit of God inhabits it renews a man in the spirit of his mind so that he knows the things that are freely given him of God spiritually discerns the hidden wisedom of God in a mystery which God hath ordained before the world to our glory even those things which eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor have entred into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him Even to Babes are these things revealed by God's Spirit which the Princes of the world knew not but they were hid from the wise and prudent Matth. 11.25 Whence it is that they are made the Epistle of Christ written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God not in Tables of Stone but in fleshly Tables of the Heart with open face beholding as in a glass the Glory of the Lord they are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord 2 Cor. 3.3 18. By which means they are made the Temple of God in that the Spirit of God dwelleth in them vers 16. and holy unto God an habitation of God through the Spirit they are joyned to the Lord one Spirit with him new Creatures in Christ and conformed to him Whence it is that Sin bath not dominion over them nor the Wicked one toucheth them They are delivered from the Law that being dead wherein they were held
that they might bring forth fruit unto God serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the Letter For though the Letter of the Law killeth being the ministration of Condemnation yet the Spirit giveth Life being the ministration of Righteousness which exceeds in glory And consequently they have liberty by the Spirit of God are beautified by it so as that Christ is formed in them They live in the Spirit and walk in the Spirit The mind of the Spirit is to them life and peace They have access by one Spirit unto the Father The Spirit of God is the Spirit of Adoption whereby they cry Abba Father The Spirit it self beareth witness with their spirit that they are the Children of God and if Children then Heirs heirs of God and joynt-heirs with Christ that suffering with him they may be glorified together They are led by the Spirit sow to the Spirit and of the Spirit reap life everlasting through the Spirit wait for the hope of Righteousness which is by Faith In a word that Life that Holiness that Beauty that Liberty that Joy that Hope that Fruit which a Christian hath from Christ is communicated by the Spirit and that Glory of Soul and Body which is expected hereafter that Quietness and Rest in life and death which is desirable is from the Spirit of God If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of Christ's But if Christ be in us the Body is dead because of Sin but the Spirit is life because of Righteousness And if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in us he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken our mortal bodies by the Spirit that dwelleth in us Rom. 8.9 10 11. So that I may safely infer from this enumeration of Benefits even the most precious Riches that a Spirit is capable of that the Gift of God's Spirit to a man is the greatest Commodity the Jewel of Heaven What Solomon saith of Wisedom is true of God's Spirit It is a Gift more precious then Rubies and all the things we can desire are not to be compared to it And therefore the Loss of it is the greatest Loss Which brings me to the Enquiry what endangers the Privation of it and that was asserted in the Second Proposition to be great Transgressions II. OBSERVATION That great Transgressions endanger the Loss of God's Spirit This is manifest from David's Petition in that by reason of his Sins he was afraid of its Loss and therefore begs the Continuance of it notwithstanding his foul Trespasses It is I confess a great Dispute Whether a person once regenerated by the Spirit washed sanctified and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God can totally and finally lose its Continuance with him I will not meddle with that Point But this is out of question That some Gifts of the Spirit may be lost else the Apostle 1 Thess 5.19 would not have premonished the Thessalonians that they should not quench the Spirit Such Gifts of the Spirit as are for others good to which the Salvation of a person is not promised may undoubtedly be totally lost by great Transgressions So Saul lost the Royal Magnanimity and other Princely Endowments which he had before by sparing Agag and by usurping the Priestly Office in offering Sacrifice Judas lost the Gift of Healing which he had with the rest of the Apostles and other Abilities to preach the Gospell by his traitourous Selling of his Master he fell from the Apostleship and Ministry by his Transgression Nor is it denied but that some who were once enlightned and had tasted of the heavenly Gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and had tasted of the good Word of God and the powers of the world to come might fall away and not be renewed again by Repentance that they might crucifie the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame that they might tread under foot the Son of God and count the Bloud of the Covernant wherewith they were sanctified an unholy thing and doe despite to the Spirit of grace Heb. 6.4 5 6. and 10.29 Yea those of whom God gave testimony that they did that which was right in the eyes of God as did David yet even they fell so foully as that they lost the Fruits and Comforts of the Spirit so as not to regain them in that degree they once had them Of Asa it is said that his Heart was perfect with the Lord all his days 1 King 15.14 and yet he put the Seer in prison being in a rage with him for reproving his Relying on the King of Syria 2 Chron. 16.7 10. and even in his Disease he sought not to the Lord but to the physicians vers 12. And Hezekiah though he walked before God in truth and with a perfect Heart and did that which was good in his sight yet when God left him to try him that he might know all that was in his Heart he rendred not again according to the benefit done unto him for his Heart was lifted up 2 Chron. 32.25 31. Certain it is by David's and other Holy mens example that God doth sometimes leave men to themselves for a time so as to fall into such Sins as deprive them of the Joy of God's Salvation and the establishing virtue of God's Spirit so as not to be so active and constant in the exercise of Godliness as formerly at least for a time else why doth David pray in the next verse to my Text Restore unto me the Joy of thy Salvation and uphold me with thy free Spirit And however the event be yet there is great danger of an utter Loss of the Spirit of God not onely in respect of its Comforts and Motions but also of its inexistence and quickening virtue when men are so overcome by Lust as Solomon and David or Fear as Peter or other Temptations to sin so foully as they did The Reason whereof is because such Sins do grieve and vex the Holy Spirit For though the Spirit of God be not subject to humane Passions yet the Holy Scripture as it ascribes Repentance and some other Affections of men to God so doth it attribute Grief to the Holy Spirit Eph. 4.30 where it minds us that we grieve not the Holy Spirit of God whereby we are sealed unto the day of redemption in respect of the effect that Grief hath in man which makes him withdraw from that which grieves him And so saith the Book intituled the Wisedom of Solomon Chap. 1.4 5. For into a malicious Soul Wisedom shall not enter nor dwell in the body that is subject to Sin For the holy Spirit of discipline will fly deceit and remove from thoughts that are without understanding and will not abide where Vnrighteousness cometh in Contraria se invicem expellunt There is a Contrariety between God's Spirit of Holiness and man's spirit that
Conscience exagitate him when he went out from the Presence of the Lord and dwelt in the Land of Nod as a Renegado from God and one that was pursued by his own Bloud-guiltiness Nor is the Case of Judas less pregnant to demonstrate how furious and inevitable is the pursuit of a guilty Conscience He had sold his Master the Lord of Glory for thirty pieces of Silver but his Mony was as Fire in his Bosome the remembrance of his devillish Act did so envenome his Spirit that he could find no Rest till he had disgorged his Money and rid himself of his Life too So that of him was verified what Zophar spake of others who sin in like manner Job 20.12 13 14 15 16. Though Wickedness be sweet in the Mouth though a man hide it under his Tongue Though he spare it and forsake it not but keep it still within his Mouth Yet his Meat in his Bowells is turned it is the Gall of Asps within him He hath swallowed down Riches and he shall vomit them up again God shall cast them out of his Belly He shall suck the poison of Asps the Viper's tongue shall slay him How many Myriads of men have there been in the Ages of the world who have ventured upon Sin without Fear have blessed themselves in the Success of their unrighteous Projects have delightfully for a season satiated themselves with the enjoyment of their prohibited Lusts yet in the conclusion the Remembrance thereof hath been as a Fire in their Bones as a heavy Burthen that neither their own strength nor the help of other men could support them under And the Reason hereof is Because to them that obey Vnrighteousness there is Indignation and Wrath from God and consequently Tribulation and Anguish upon every Soul of man that doeth evil Rom. 2.8 9. And this is that which makes the Heart to be affected as Belshazzar's was When he saw the finger of a man's hand writing over against the Candlestick and upon the plaister of the Wall of the King's Palace his Countenance was changed and his Thoughts troubled him so that the Joynts of his Loyns were loosed and his Knees smote one against another How shall thy hands be strong saith God to the Jews Ezek. 22.14 when I shall deal with thee The Sinners in Zion are afraid fearfulness hath surprized the Hypocrites who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings Isa 33.14 Therefore the Lord saith I will not contend for ever neither will I be always wroth for the Spirit should fail before me and the Souls which I have made Isa 57.16 Which leads us to that which is intimated OBSERVATION That though the Spirit of man when it is wounded with worldly Sorrows or with Conscience of Sin cannot sustain it self from sinking yet the Lord can and doth support it This is verified by experience in holy Job then whom none was ever more sorely handled except our Lord Christ when he bare our Sins in his Body on the Tree insomuch that he complained Job 6.4 For the Arrows of the Almighty are within me the poison whereof drinketh up my Spirit the Terrours of God do set themselves in array against me yet did the Consolations of God so support him that he could allege Behold my Witness is in Heaven and my Record is on high Job 16.19 so as that he could never be drawn to disclaim his own Uprightness or God's Righteousness Holy Paul though he were abundant in Sufferings so that he had the sentence of death in himself yet he would not relinquish his Trust in God whom he found the Father of Mercies and the God of all Comfort so as that with the abounding of his Sufferings he had also abounding Consolation After the like sort was it with Christ Jesus who though he was in great Agony in the Garden so that his Soul was heavy unto death in the days of his flesh he offered up Prayers and Supplications with strong Crying and Tears unto him that was able to save him from death yet he was heard in that he feared Heb. 5.7 David after he had committed that Sin against Vriah the Hittite when Nathan had discovered the Evil thereof His Bones waxed old through his Roaring all the day long Day and night the Hand of God was heavy upon him His moisture was turned into the drought of Summer His Bones his Soul were sore vexed Innumerable Evils compassed him about His Iniquities took hold upon him so that he was not able to look up therefore his heart failed him yet God restored unto him the Joy of his Salvation upheld him with his free Spirit took away his Sackcloath and girded him with Gladness The waies that God takes to sustain the Spirits of men in their Infirmities are various Sometimes by allaying the Sharpness of their Afflictions sometimes by a mixture of outward or inward Refreshings sometimes by moderating their Temptations not suffering them to be tempted above that they are able but with the Temptation making a way to escape that they may be able to bear it making it short though it be sharp But the chief way whereby the Lord supports the Spirit when it sinks of it self is by giving to some the tongue of the learned that they may know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary Isa 50.4 whose business it is first to humble to search the Wound and then to pour in Oil first to discover the Malady and then to apply the Medicine This method is described at large by Elihu Job 33. from vers 15. to v. 29. When God hath spoken to man in sleep and otherwise to open his ears to seal his Instruction to withdraw him from his purposes to hide Pride from man He chasteneth him upon his Bed and the multitude of his Bones with strong pains so that his Soul draweth near unto the Grave and his Life to the Destroyers Yet if there be a Messenger with him an Interpreter one among a thousand to shew unto man his Vprightness to make known to him the Atonement which is made by the Bloud of the everlasting Covenant when he washeth himself with penitentiall Tears and sprinkles his Conscience with the Bloud of Christ by Faith Then he is gracious unto him and saith Deliver him from going down to the Pit I have found a Ransome He shall pray unto God and he will be favourable unto him and he shall see his face with Joy for he will render unto man his Righteousness If when God looks upon men they say We have sinned and perverted that which was right and it profited us not He will deliver their Soul from going into the Pit and their Life shall see the Light Thus did Hezekiah find it as he acknowledgeth Isa 38.16 17. O Lord by these things men live and in all these things is the life of my Spirit that is by God's undertaking for him vers 14. so wilt
in his Bloud to declare his Righteousness for the Remission of Sins that are past through the forbearance of God Rom. 3.25 that God doth forgive any Sins of any persons Eph. 4.32 Not for any Saint's or Martyr's Intercession or any Surplusage of Merits in the Treasury of the Church distributed by the Pope's Indulgence or for the bare Work done of saying Mass singing Dirges or other Offices for a person deceased or merely for the Priest's Absolution upon Auricular Confession in the Sacrament of Penance or for any humane Satisfaction whatsoever but by the Expiation of Christ's Bloud and his Intercession for them to whom Sins are forgiven though not without their due Qualifications which are next to be considered III. The Persons to whom God forgives Sins are not all whatsoever There are that after their hardness and impenitent Heart treasure up unto themselves Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God Rom. 2.5 Nor all that are in the visible Church that have been baptized into the Name of Christ Notwithstanding Simon Magus believed was baptized continued with Philip and wondered beholding the Miracles and Signs which were done yet when by his offer of Money for the power of bestowing the Holy Ghost his Heart appeared not right in the sight of God S. Peter admonisheth him to repent of that his Wickedness and pray God if perhaps the thoughts of his Heart might be forgiven him Act. 8.13 21 22. But 1. They to whom God forgives Sins must be real and unfeigned Penitents such as are sensible of their Sins and the Desert of them such as are humbled in their own eyes yea so as to loath themselves for their Iniquities such as have that Sorrow which is after God that worketh Repentance not to be repented of Such a Repentance as is not for some Sins onely but for all not onely for Sins open and notorious but also for Sins secret and known to themselves and God alone not onely for Sins of outward Action or Words but also for Sins of Thought of evil Concupiscence not onely for Sins of Commission but also for Sins of Omission and according to the degrees of them with a proportionable degree of Sorrow so as to mourn much where the Sin hath been very hainous as David's was And that not onely by reason of the Affliction consequent Danger of Hell or Infamy but also for the Dishonouring of God and the Offending of him not onely as a severe Judge but also an indulgent Father Against thee thee onely have I sinned and done this Evil in thy sight saith David Psalm 51.4 And Father saith the prodigal Son Luk. 15.21 I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son Thus S. John Baptist preached the Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of Sins Mark 1.4 S. Peter Act. 2.38 Repent and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the Remission of Sins And Repent and be converted that your Sins may be blotted out Act. 3.19 To them that thus Repent there is Forgiveness of Sins not to the Impenitent and unrelenting 2. To Repentance must be joyned Confession of Sin If we say that we have no Sin we deceive our selves and the Truth is not in us If we confess our Sins God is faithfull and just to forgive us our Sins and to cleanse us from all Vnrighteousness If we say that we have not sinned we make him a Liar and his word is not in us 1 Joh. 1.8 9 10. How full is the Scripture against all Self-justitiaries Pharisees Philosophers Votaries Pelagians Quakers and other Perfectionists that boast of their own Good works and their being free from Sin No marvel that they that think they have no need of Pardon should find none God filleth the Hungry with good things the Rich he sendeth empty away The proud Pharisee that talked of his own Well-doings the boasting Papist that is confident of his own good Merits from God are not capable of Justification It is the poor Publican that is sensible of his Sin that stands afar off that will not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven as being dejected by the sense of his Sins but smites on his breast saying God be mercifull to me a Sinner that goes home justified rather then the other as Christ himself hath determined Luk. 18.13 14. When I kept silence day and night saith David to God Psal 32.3 4 5. thy Hand was heavy upon me I acknowledged my Sin unto thee and mine Iniquity have I not hid I said I will confess my Transgression unto the Lord and thou forgavest the Iniquity of my Sin There was no necessity of Auricular Popish Confession to a Priest his purpose of doing it to God seriously and with true Compunction and Contrition of Soul was sufficient for his Pardon David said unto Nathan I have sinned against the Lord and Nathan without injoyning him Penance for Satisfaction tells him immediately The Lord also hath put away thy Sin A free and unfeigned Confession of Sins to God never goes without Pardon if it be with real Sorrow and giving to God the Glory of his Justice if other Qualifications be withall added which are also to be considered whereof the next and third is That there be a Forsaking of the Sin in Heart and in Act. 3. That Sin that shall be pardoned must be hated must be left He that covereth his Sins shall not prosper but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have Mercy Prov. 28.13 While we love and cherish Sin we bid defiance to God and shew our selves Enemies to him and therefore can expect no Favour from him for he is not a God that hath pleasure in Wickedness neither shall Evil dwell with him saith the Psalmist Psal 5.4 For a man to say he is sorry for his Sin as often men do and yet to commit it customarily again is indeed to belie himself True Sorrow would make men fearfull and wary how they fall into that for which they say they are sorry Piscator ictus sapit If they were sensible of the Evil of Sin they would dread a Relapse into it And besides it is no better then a mocking of God to confess Sin and pray him to forgive it and yet to continue in the practice of it It is all one as if thou shouldst beg of God to give thee a Licence or Dispensation to sin as if thou shouldst tell him thou hast sinned indeed but thou hopest he will not be angry though thou doe so again as if thou shouldst ask of God that he would make void his Law for thy sake let thee live as if thou owedst no Subjection to him It is to declare thy self a professed Rebell against him to tell him that he shall not rule over thee and in effect to say Depart from me for I desire not the knowledge of thy ways Much more evil is it when men
harden themselves against Reproof hate him that deals plainly with them because he shews them the Sin which they will not leave are Enemies to him that tells them the Truth hate him that rebuketh in the Gate and abhorre him that speaks uprightly Amos 5.10 Such men are so far from obtaining Pardon that they fall into Judas his Curse of adding Iniquity to Iniquity and never come into God's Righteousness Psal 69.27 4. That Sin may be forgiven the chiefest Qualification of all must not be omitted Faith in the Lord Jesus who though he knew no Sin yet was made Sin for us that we might be made the Righteousness of God in him 2 Cor. 5.21 This is the tenour of the Gospel as Christ himself instructed his Apostles that Repentance and Remission of Sins should be preached in his Name among all Nations Luk. 24.47 And accordingly S. Peter saith to Cornelius Act. 10.43 To Christ give all the Prophets witness that through his Name whosoever believeth in him shall receive Remission of Sins And S. Paul Act. 13.38 39. Be it known unto you therefore men and brethren that through this Man is preached unto you the Forgiveness of Sin And by him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the Law of Moses He was delivered for our Offences and raised for our Justification Rom. 4.25 Christ died for our Sins according to the Scriptures 1 Cor. 15.3 He was wounded for our Transgressions he was bruised for our Iniquities the Chastisement of our Peace was upon him and with his Stripes we are healed All we like Sheep have gone astray we have turned every one to his own way and the Lord hath laid on him the Iniquity of us all Isa 53.5 6. His own self bare our Sins in his own body on the Tree 1 Pet. 2.24 These and many more places in Holy Scripture do evince that it is by the Death of Christ that our Sins are remitted And the Apostle Heb. 10.12 tells us that after he had offered one Sacrifice for Sins he sate down for ever at the right hand of God and Heb. 9.24 that he is entred into heaven with his bloud to appear for us in the presence of God and Heb. 10.14 that by one Offering he hath for ever perfected them that are sanctified And therefore they that reject that Sacrifice and stick to the Law and its Priesthood miss of Forgiveness of Sins It is impossible now without Faith in Christ his Death Resurrection and Intercession at God's right Hand to be free from Condemnation and to obtain Forgiveness But Faith is sufficient without the Figment of the unbloudy Propitiatory Sacrifice offered by a Priest in the Mass to expiate Sin and to obtain Remission Whosoever therefore believes not that Christ is he that was to come that doth not believe and trust to his Bloud and Intercession for Forgiveness with God that trusts in the Sacrifice of the Mass the Milk of the Virgin Mary the Mediation of Saints or any other thing besides Christ's Death and Intercession that man forfeits his interest in God's Pardoning Grace 5. That Sin may be forgiven there must be a Turning to the Lord. Let the wicked forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon saith the Prophet Isa 55.7 Wherefore doth a living man complain a man for the punishment of his Sins saith Jeremy Lament 3.39 and directs him the best course Let us search and try our ways and turn again to the Lord vers 40. And that is to be done 1. By humble Supplication Ibid. v. 41. Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the Heavens by Praying for it Matth. 6.12 by justifying God condemning our selves taking Shame to our selves and acquitting God from all blame deprecating his Severity imploring his Mercy for his Son's sake whom God sending in the likeness of sinfull flesh hath condemned Sin in the flesh and therefore there is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus Rom. 8.1 3. 2. But then must be added the second thing wherein we turn to God to wit Newness of life There is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Wash ye make ye clean put away the Evil of your doings from before mine eyes cease to doe evil learn to doe well seek Judgment relieve the oppressed judge the fatherless plead for the widows and then saith God Come now and let us reason together Though your Sins be as Scarlet they shall be as white as Snow though they be red like Crimson they shall be as Wooll Isa 1.16 17 18. It is not the plea of Innocency that prevails with God but the earnest Supplication for Mercy not the Tale of a vain-glorious Pharisee but the feeling Prayer of a broken-hearted Publican that obtains Forgiveness Nor will he that hath escaped the Pollutions of the world through the knowledge of Christ be safe if with the Dog he return to his vomit and the Sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire He that sins again sins more dangerously as he that falls into a Relapse is more desperately sick New Obedience is necessary to assure the Forgiveness of old Sins 6. There is yet another Qualification necessary to the Forgiveness of our own Sins that we forgive other mens Sins against our selves Our Saviour puts it into the Lord's Prayer that we should profess to God our Forgiveness of them that are indebted to us as a Reason why we expect Forgiveness of him when we pray him to forgive us Yea he allows us not to ask Forgiveness of God but according as we forgive others If you forgive men their Trespasses your Heavenly Father will also forgive you But if ye forgive not men their Trespasses neither will your Father forgive your Trespasses Matth. 6.14 15. Yea in the close of that Parable Matth. 18.35 he tells us that our heavenly Father will exact our Debts cast us into Prison deliver us to the Tormentours if we from our hearts forgive not every one his Brother their Trespasses He that bears a Grudge that reserves a purpose of Revenge in his breast that saies he will forgive but not forget that passeth not an Act of Indemnity and Oblivion of his Brother's Injuries doth but delude God play the Hypocrite with him when he prays the Lord's Prayer shews himself to be unlike to God of a venomous Toad-like Viper-like nature malicious like Satan and so doth the more provoke and enrage God against him as being an unthankfull virulent Devillish Wretch that deals so unworthily with him and abuseth him to his face And this ushers in the last thing I am to consider to wit IV. Why there is Forgiveness with God Of many Reasons I shall name one or two besides that in my Text. 1. From
his Property of Mercifulness He is very pitifull and of tender Mercy Jam. 5.11 He is not like a cruel Tyrant that delights to destroy but like a gracious King that is glad to save Est piger ad poenam Princeps ad praemia velox Quique dolet quoties cogitur esse ferox It is for a Sicilian Tyrant to invent Torments or rather for a Fiend of Hell to rejoyce in doing hurt I am the Lord which exercise Loving-kindness Judgment and Righteousness in the Earth for in these things I delight saith the Lord Jer. 9.24 Who is a God like unto thee saith the Prophet Micah 7.18 19. that pardoneth Iniquity and passeth by the Transgression of the remnant of his Heritage he retaineth not his Anger for ever because he delighteth in Mercy He will turn again he will have Compassion on us he will subdue our Iniquities and thou wilt cast all their Sins into the depth of the Sea And then the Prophet adds vers 20. that which is my Second Reason why God forgives 2. Thou wilt perform the Truth to Jacob and the Mercy to Abraham which thou hast sworn unto our Fathers from the days of old This is the Reason why he hath raised up a Horn of Salvation and gives the knowledge of Salvation for or by the Remission of Sins to perform the Mercy promised to our Fathers and to remember his holy Covenant the Oath which he sware to our Father Abraham Luk. 1.69 72 73 77. And for this Reason the Bloud of Christ is termed by himself the bloud of the New Testament which is shed for many for the Remission of Sins Matth. 26.28 And the Covenant of God is alleged as witnessing the effect of Christ's Sacrifice wherein God said Their Sins and Iniquities will I remember no more Heb. 10.16 17. For which reason S. John saith that God is faithfull and just to forgive us our Sins and to cleanse us from all Vnrighteousness 1 Joh. 1.9 His Mercifull nature prompts him to forgive Sins his Wisedom hath directed him to doe it by the Bloud of Christ his Truth to keep his Covenant and the End is that he may be feared Which brings me to the Second Point in my Text. II. OBSERVATION That God's Forgiveness engageth and encourageth men to fear him It is objected against the Jews Jer. 5.23 24. that they had a revolting and a rebellious Heart because they said not in their hearts Let us now fear the Lord our God that giveth Rain both the former and the latter in his season he reserveth unto us the appointed weeks of the Harvest Which evinceth this to be an Evil That men fear not God notwithstanding his Providences to them for good and therefore God's Care of us should engage us to fear him And it is prophesied that the Children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their King and shall fear the Lord and his Goodness in the latter days Hos 3.5 Which intimates that God's Goodness is to be feared and that it is both an engagement and encouragement to fear him that he is good O fear the Lord ye his Saints for there is no want to them that fear him Psal 34.9 Now of all parts of his Goodness this is the chief his Forgiving Sins It is that which shews the greatest Kindness and Condescension in God Therefore when David blesseth God he puts this in the first place Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his Benefits Who forgiveth all thine Iniquities Psal 103.2 3. And it is the greatest Blessing to us Blessed is he whose Transgression is forgiven and whose Sin is covered Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not Iniquity Psal 32.1 2. This Favour then requires Fear in the greatest degree Not a tormenting Fear which consisteth not with Love and which is expelled by Love 1 Joh. 4.18 such as is in Devils that fear and tremble Jam. 2.19 but a dutifull Fear which makes us wary how we offend God and studious how to please him makes us fear him not as an Enemy or Tyrant from whom we expect nothing but hard Usage and sore Tasks but as a good Master or a loving Father whom we fear as our Superiour that may punish us yet love for his Goodness Bounty and Indulgence to us This Fear is usually termed a filial or reverentiall Fear which is manifested 1. in our Worship of him with reverence and godly fear Heb. 12.28 where the Fear of God is put for his Worship as Isa 29.13 2. in our Obedience to him both active in doing his Will and passive in submitting to his Correction Now to this Fear God's Forgiveness engageth us 1. Because such Forgiveness should and doth beget Love To whom many Sins were forgiven she loved much saith Christ Luk. 7.47 What Rebel is so hard-hearted as not to love his Prince that hath forgiven his manifold Treasons We have been more treacherous to God and yet he forgives us and shall we not then love him and fear to offend him 2. There is no greater Security can be given to draw our Hearts to God then the Forgiveness of Sins This is that Loving-kindness that draws us to God Jer. 31.3 the Chords of a man the Bands of Love that tie us fast to God Hos 11.4 And therefore there is no more expedite more rationall more sure way to maintain perpetuall Amity between us and God to devote us to his Service to bring us into Communion with him then the Preaching and Believing the rich Grace of the Gospel in the Remission of Sins by Jesus Christ according to the New Covenant in his Bloud But I see the time will not permit me to enlarge on this precious Subject I shall now apply that which hath been said in some necessary Uses and so end APPLICATION 1. First then If there be Forgiveness with God and that of the greatest Sins let no drooping Soul sink under the sense of his Sins though they have been Scarlet or Crimson Sins yet there is Pardon to be had It is true as now-a-days things go the greatest Sinners are most hardened in Security there is an Atheistical Spirit that makes men bold in Sinning Whether it be from the subtle Insinuations of some Seducers who like Balaam of old instill into mens minds those Principles which make them as audacious as Zimri and Cozbi of old were so that they declare their Sins as Sodom and hide them not ungodly men crept in among us turning the Grace of God into wantonness or from their doting so much on Nature as they call it that they forget the God of Nature so magnifying Naturam naturatam that they heed not Naturam naturantem as they barbarously speak in the Schools or that the Miscarriages of hypocriticall Professours of Religion induce them to think all Zeal in Religion is but from Fancy not God's Spirit and that all zealous persons are Fanaticks or men not in their right wits not soberly wise
So it is that the greatest part either openly commit the most horrid Sins monstrously Swearing as if they would dare God to his face Scoffing at the practice of Piety making no scruple of Deceiving spending their time in Drinking prodigally wasting their Estates by Luxury and the like which should be imployed to good Uses for the Relief of others and the publick benefit or they secretly practise some or all these Sins or worse if it may be under Disguises of Religion and other Vizors without Fear They that complain most of Sin are usually they that are most fearfull of Sin Yet to both it is needfull this Doctrine be taught of God's Forgiveness The most hardened Manasseh may be taken in the Thorns and humbled the most audacious Sinner among you may be awakened and his Eyes opened to see how evil and bitter a thing it is that he hath sinned against the Lord and his Fear hath not been in him Poverty Imprisonment Sickness or Death approaching may open his Ears to Discipline and make him remember God If these things happen let him remember though but then that there is Forgiveness with God And for any other perplexed person let him never forget to have this Cordial in the Closet of his Heart which may revive him in his Agonies and Faintings of spirit That there is Forgiveness with the Lord. But then 2. Let them not forget how and by what means it is obtained to wit by Repentance Confession Forsaking of Sin Faith in Christ's bloud humble Supplication to God new Obedience to him and Forgiveness of our Brother There must be another Heart a heart of Flesh not a heart of Stone in him that shall obtain Forgiveness He shall have Judgment without Mercy that shews no Mercy You must take heed of seeking Forgiveness by Popes or Priests supposed power to forgive Sins by their Authority by others officiating for you or by your own Satisfactions Works of Penance Fasting Alms or other laborious Works imposed or undertaken by your selves as meriting or procuring your Absolution But you must wholly rely on the Death and Intercession of Christ in Heaven and the Covenant in his Bloud Though in the mean time you are not to omit other Duties which I have shewed to be required of God in their place 3. Be sure not to forget to magnifie the Grace of God with whom is Forgiveness Stand and admire that infinite Goodness that after all the Sins of thy Progenitours Adam's Sin in Revolting from God his Maker and Benefactour the Sins of thy Pagan Ancestours in their horrid Idolatries and other Provocations the Sins of thy Popish Ancestours in their perverting the Gospell of Christ imitating the Vices and Superstitions of Pagans corrupting Christianity and destroying Myriads of holy Souls who in their Generations opposed their Abominations and contended for the Truth of Christ besides thy own Sins of Idleness Pride Wantonness Envy Covetousness Ungodliness Profaning holy things living without God in the world he should yet have Mercy on thee pardon thy Sins and save thy Soul Oh say with David Bless the Lord O my Soul and all that is within me bless his holy Name Psal 103.1 4. Forget not to fear him for the time to come It is the End of his Forgiving that thou shouldst fear him If God miss his End thou wilt lose thy hopes of Forgiveness Mark what our Saviour saith Joh. 5.14 Behold thou art made whole sin no more lest a worse thing happen unto thee Surely saith Elihu Job 34.31 32. it is meet to be said unto God I will not offend any more That which I see not teach thou me if I have done Iniquity I will doe no more If pardoning Grace do not better thee it will leave thee more inexcusable and thy Damnation more certain and just If thou become not obsequious to God and mercifull to others thy Pardon will be null'd Oh do not forfeit thy Pardon by After-disobedience but as thou hast God to remember thee in Mercy be sure to remember him by Dutifulness to him all thy days That when thou shalt meet with thy Father in Heaven thou maist be ravish'd with his Grace and he may welcome thee as his obedient Son into his everlasting Joy Amen LAVS DEO THE EFFECTUAL REMEDY The Eleventh SERMON PSAL. lxxix 8. O remember not against us former Iniquities let thy tender Mercies speedily prevent us for we are brought very low THE Message which was sent from Hezekiah that good King of Judah to the Prophet Isaiah This Day is a Day of Trouble and Rebuke Wherefore lift up thy Prayer for the Remnant that is left Isa 37.3 4. is by His MAJESTIE's Proclamation sent to us We are minded by our Gracious King That this Day is a Day of Trouble such as that we may call it Magor-Missabib Terrour round about us a Day of Rebuke wherein the great Correctour of the World rebukes us in his Anger and chastens us in his hot Displeasure Haeret lateri lethalis Arundo The Arrow of the Almighty flies by day and night among us sticks fast in us and drinks up our Spirit so as that we are consumed by his Anger and by his Wrath we are troubled And therefore it is now a Time for us to lift up our Prayer for the Remnant that is left and to betake our selves to our Litany in good earnest From Plague and Pestilence good Lord deliver us Hitherto are we led by this Precedent which I have read to you O remember not against us c. The Argument of the Psalm sufficiently intimates the Time and the Occasion of penning it The first Verse being a Complaint to God that the Heathen were come into God's Inheritance that is the Land of Judaea had defiled or profaned his holy Temple by casting it to the ground and had laid Jerusalem on heaps Which was done by none but Chaldaeans when this Psalm was composed and therefore it was composed after and upon occasion of the Demolition and Conflagration of Jerusalem and Solomon's Temple by Nebuchadnezzar's appointment of which we reade Jer. 52. which moved either Ezra or Daniel or some other Holy person of that Time to address himself to God with Complaint Expostulation and Petition in the words of my Text O remember not against us c. Wherein are 1. A Deprecation O remember not c. By former Iniquities some understand their Idolatry in making the Golden Calf in the Wilderness concerning which the Jews have a Tradition That in all the Miseries which came upon that People there was some Remembrance of that Sin according to that which is said in Exod. 32.34 Nevertheless in the Day when I shall visit I will visit their Sin upon them But more probably are meant the Sins of Manasseh and other Kings whereby they polluted the Temple with Heathenish Abominations filled Jerusalem with bloud brake their Oath to Nebuchadnezzar were obstinate against all the Warnings of the Prophets whom they mocked despising
Plagues require great Mercies and importunate Suing Now must the Bridegroom goe forth of his chamber and the Bride out of her closet The Ministers of the Lord all sorts of persons old and young must cry with Tears and Supplications Spare us O Lord and give not thy Heritage to reproach We must lift up our hands with our hearts to God in the Heavens as sensible that nothing but his Mercy can save us that he is ready to hear and help when we hope in his Mercy that we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous and he is the Propitiation for our Sins We must mind God of his former Mercies trust on him as one that hath promised to deliver us when we call on him in the day of Trouble look unto him with Patience as being assured that they that wait for him shall not be ashamed 3. We must adde an unmovable Resolution to amend our waies to sin no more as we have done to abhor Evil and cleave to that which is good in Duties of Religion Prayer Hearing God's Word Praising of God Thanksgiving to be more frequent and serious to cleanse our hands and to purify our hearts from double-mindedness to be upright in what we doe walking humbly with our God and seeking his Glory all our daies And in two things especially we are to deal rightly with God 1. In doing Justice to others if we be publick persons by punishing Sin and giving just Sentence for all that are wronged if private by restoring that which is not our own and righting those we have injured Remember that God abhors ex Rapina Holocaustum Robbery for Burnt-offerings and that the Prayers of the unjust are an Abomination to the Lord. 2. In shewing Mercy to others We are to be mercifull as our heavenly Father is mercifull chiefly when we beg Mercy at his hands This is a necessary Duty for a Fasting-day Isa 58.6 7. Is not this the Fast c Now especially is a time for this Duty in which there is so much Want by reason of the great Poverty that is come upon Families shut up now that Trading is decayed and Provision so dear and difficult to be got As you cry to God for Help so do others Necessities cry to you for Relief Have you then Bowels of Mercy for them as you would have Bowels of Mercy in God towards you Let your hand be open to them as you would have God's hand ready for you So may you expect Preservation in this time of Danger at least you may be assured however you speed now of Life eternall hereafter Which God grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE HEAVENLY CALL The Twelfth SERMON HEBREWS iv 7. To Day if you will hear his Voice harden not your Hearts THIS Passage is a Quotation with an Application of it beyond what at first the words seemed to import They were spoken by David but intended as a Monition to hear the Gospell They are a Summons or Writ of Appearance served upon Jews and Gentiles limiting them to a certain Day of accepting the offer of the Gospell without delay upon pretence of Business Profit or Pleasure by themselves without Attorney or Proxy The thing to be done is hearing his Voice the means thereunto is Removere prohibens to remove that which might hinder the Hardness of the Heart This being applied to the Gospell of Christ intimates 1. That the Preaching of the Gospel is the Voice of God 2. That it is to be heard 3. That it is to be heard to day 4. That to the end it may be heard to day the Heart must not be hardned I. OBSERVATION That the Gospel of Christ is the Voice of God It is the express Assertion of S. Peter 1. Epist 1.25 alluding to Isa 40.8 But the Word of the Lord endureth for ever and this is the Word which by the Gospel is preached unto you Which is demonstratively confirmed 1. By its own Evidence in respect of which it is termed the Light of the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ who is the Image of God 2 Cor. 4.4 It is not denied that it is the hidden Wisedom of God in a mystery which none of the Princes of the world knew yea it is such as eye hath not seen ear hath not heard nor hath it entred into the heart of man without Revelation from him it being not an humane Invention but a Divine Contrivance yet shining forth in the Preaching of it by Christ and his Ministers it exhibits such a Light as can come from none but God It is not like any Talmudicall Fable or Popish Legend or Poeticall Fiction or witty Romance the Brats of mens Fancy or subtile Composure But it is for the matter of it sutable to God's Wisedom Goodness and Holiness agreeable to the undoubted Oracles of God committed to the Jews foretold and prefigured by the Prophecies of the Old Testament and Shadows of the Law Whence S. Peter tells us 2 Pet. 1.16 We have not followed cunningly-devised Fables when we made known unto you the Power and Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and vers 19. that Christians had a more sure word of Prophecy to which they were to take heed as unto a Light that shineth in a dark place adding that the Evidence of the Gospell is as the Dawning of the Day and the Arising of the Day-star in the Christians hearts 2. And in truth the Gospel appears to be such by its Effects It doeth to the Heart what the Stars and the Sun do to the Eyes it enlightens it enlivens it warms it spirits the Heart It doeth that which Natural Reason could not doe Philosophy could not attain to the Law could not accomplish It discovers our selves to our selves the Being Properties Counsels of God to us It turns the Heart from Sin begets Men to God fills the Soul with heavenly Comforts strengthens and quickens the Spirit to doe the Will of God and to suffer for his Name It makes men to be of composed Spirits and celestiall Conversation beyond what either Stoicall Philosophy or Rabbinicall Dictates could raise men unto to be more noble and heroical then those renowned Worthies or Patriots which either Greeks or Romans have admired and magnified 3. And which puts it out of all doubt to be Divine it hath such Attestations as could be given by none but God For besides what John the Baptist saw and heard at Christ's Baptism besides what S. Peter and his Collegues testified who were Eye-witnesses of his Majesty when he received from God the Father Honour and Glory when there came such a Voice to him from the excellent Glory This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased 2 Pet. 1.17 besides all this the Miracles which Christ and his Apostles did so convinced Nicodemus that he confessed We know that thou art a Teacher come from God for no man can doe these Miracles which thou doest except God be with him Joh. 3.2 And that
I may not be infinite in this though of all Points it be of most concernment the Gift of the Spirit the fulfilling of Prophecies delivered by Christ the wonderous Success of the Gospell in converting the World the direfull Judgments of God on the Opposers and Persecuters of Christ Christians and the Gospell both Jews and Romans do abundantly witness the Divine Originall of the Gospell of Christ and that it is the Voice of God which therefore is to be heard and that is the II. OBSERVATION That God's Voice is to be heard This not onely the Holy Scriptures tell us but even the Light of Nature dictates When Ehud told Eglon King of Moab that he had a Message from God to him he arose out of his Seat Judg. 3.20 All Nations repair to the Oracles of their Gods and take Counsel from them When Cornelius was advertised that S. Peter was sent to him from God with all submission and devotion he attends him telling him We are all here present before God to hear all things that are commanded thee of God Act. 10.33 And great Reason it should be so He is a God of Truth that neither can be deceived nor deceive and therefore it is of greatest advantage to us to hear him Mens foolish Hearts hearken oftentimes to them that flatter them that speak pleasing things but it is to their Ruine The Devil's Oracles are so ambiguous so false that they delude they corrupt men to their Perdition But God's Voice the Gospell of Christ never misguides never perverts but leads men into all Truth for their present Benefit and their everlasting Happiness Besides God is a powerfull Lord the onely Law-giver who is able to save and to destroy Jam. 4.12 It is not safe to slight him it is the onely way of Salvation to hearken to his Voice We have so much wit as however we contemn our Inferiour's or Equall's words yet not to neglect our Superiour's Commands or Counsells Who is there that dares despise the Sayings of a Judge on the Bench or of the King on his Throne How obsequious in Attention how regardfull in Observance of what such Potentates say to them are all their Subjects They are aware that they speak with authority that they have Punishments and Rewards to accompany their Commands It is much more so with God He hath power of Life and Death Heaven and Hell are at his disposall And therefore it is necessary that his Voice should be heard which is a glorious Voice a mighty Voice heard with the Heart as well as the Ear with Subjection of Soul as well as Reverence of Body and that without any demurr or delay to day as it is in my Text. Which brings us to the next or III. OBSERVATION That the Gospell is to be heard to day By saying to day the Holy Ghost saith the Apostle limits a certain Day in which the Voice of God is to be heard which intimates that there is a day and but a day fixt for this transaction To day implies something inclusivè and something exclusivé That which is included is the Opportunity and the Duration That which is excluded is the Night succeeding the Day and all Duration after even to Eternity The Opportunity of hearing is while the Gospel is preached while the Spirit moves upon our Hearts while Christ stands at the door and knocks that we may open the door and he come in and sup with us and we with him While the Ministers of Reconciliation as Embassadours for Christ as Workers together with God beseech us that we receive not the Grace of God in vain is the accepted time and the day of Salvation 2 Cor. 6.1 2. It was Jerusalem's Day the time of her Visitation while Christ would have gathered them to him as a Hen gathereth her Chickens under her wings It was the Old World's Day while the Spirit of God did strive with them while Noah prepared the Ark and was a Preacher of Righteousness to them The utmost extent is but during this present Life Perhaps it may be shortned by our Obstinacy by our Grieving the Spirit of God which moves God to withdraw the tender of Reconciliation and the Influx of his Spirit and to leave us to the Blinding of the God of this world and the Obduration of our own Hearts The time after this Life is quite excluded in this business I must work saith Christ Joh. 9.4 the works of him that sent me while it is Day that is while I am in this world as he expresseth it vers 5. the Night cometh when no man can work As in Sales by the Candle he that bids not the price before the Candle goes out buies nothing so it is in this great Merchandise of the rich Pearl of the Kingdome of Heaven he that sells not all before his Light is extinguished can never purchase the Inheritance There is no knowledge no wisedome no operation to this end in the Grave whither we goe Neither Priests Masses nor Monks Prayers nor large Alms nor continuall Obits can buy Remission of Sins or recover a man from the Infernal place or state of eternall Punishment when once the Grave hath shut its mouth upon him In the Grave there is no Remembrance of God to this effect there is no Praise of him or hearing of his Voice to Salvation much less at the day of Judgment When once the Master of the house is risen up saith our Saviour Luk. 13.25 27 28. and hath shut to the door and ye begin to stand without and to knock at the door saying Lord Lord open unto us and he shall answer and say unto you I know you not whence you are depart from me all ye workers of Iniquity there remains nothing but weeping and gnashing of teeth If men slumber and sleep and get not Oil in their Lamps and Vessels no admission will be for them into the Wedding-chamber when the Bridegroom comes It will not consist with God's Majesty and Honour to be always waiting upon us to doe us good He is long patient but Laesa Patientia fit Furor his injured and abused Patience ends in Fury If while God assigns a Day to hear his Voice we make it a day of Provocation he will swear in his wrath we shall never enter into his Rest Besides the longer we defer the accepting of God's Grace the more we make our selves incapable of hearkening to God's Voice Custome in Sin hardens us therein They that are used to doe Evil hardly ever learn to doe well Often Sinning makes Sin habitual and that begets Hardness of Heart this must be removed if we will hear God's Voice which I propounded for the IV. OBSERVATION That we may hear God's Voice to day our Hearts must not be hardned The Heart in Scripture acception comprehends all the inward Intellectuall Faculties the Understanding Memory Conscience Will and Affections which must concur with the Ear in hearing God's Voice Rom. 10.17 They that had never
God's Mercy is the practice and delight of them that have a Spirit of Holiness in all Generations They write Ex dono Dei on all they have they ascribe all they doe to Mercy all their Prosperity Victory Success they account as Mercies from God When they cast up the Inventory of their Good things they have enjoyed all that they possess the Summe totall is innumerable Mercies How precious are thy thoughts unto me O God how great is the summe of them If I should count them they are more in number then the Sand Psalm 139.17 18. The Law of Gratitude then which none is more equal ties every one to magnify God's Mercy What hath any which he hath not received 1 Cor. 4.7 And who can look upon his Receipts as due Wages and not rather pure Alms Who hath not received loads of Benefits from God and all out of pure Mercy Our Forming in the womb is a prime Mercy our Birth our Education our Instruction our Preservation our Salvation That I be not infinite in this Account Our Life Breath and all our Ways all our natural Parts and Abilities all our Motions and Proceedings all our Escapes from Dangers from Sicknesses from Death and most of all from being a Prey to the Devil and our Deliverance from Hell are Evidences of transcendent Mercy in God which all God's people are sensible of And this leads us to the VI. OBSERVATION That the apprehension of God's great Mercy encourageth his People to hope and wait on God for a Consummation of their Welfare The greatness of God's Mercies encouraged David to cast himself into God's hand rather then to fall into the hands of men 2 Sam. 24.14 And Holy Daniel in that effectual fervent Prayer Dan. 9.8 9. to appeal to God's Mercy O Lord to us belongeth Confusion of face to our Kings to our Princes and to our Fathers because we have sinned against thee To the Lord our God belong Mercies and Forgivenesses though we have rebelled against him Vers 18. We do not present our Supplications before thee for our Righteousnesses but for thy great Mercies Psalm 138.8 The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me Thy Mercy O Lord endureth for ever forsake not the works of thine own hands Isa 63.15 Look down from Heaven and behold from the habitation of thy Holiness and of thy Glory where is thy Zeal and thy Strength the sounding of thy Bowells and of thy Mercies towards me are they restrained Psal 130.7 Let Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is Mercy and with him is plenteous Redemption Not one of all the Holy Saints in all the Bible hath ever dared to utter such Expressions to God or men as if they could challenge the least Relief in Trouble the least Abatement of Sufferings much less eternall Life and Reward in Heaven upon account of their own Merit as Pharisaicall Self-Justitiaries have presumed to doe Holy Jacob on the contrary Gen. 32.10 tells God I am not worthy of the least of all thy Mercies and of all the Truth which thou hast shewed unto thy servant And Nehemiah when he allegeth his Actings for God Neh. 13.22 thus bespeaks him Remember me O my God concerning this also and spare me according to the greatness of thy Mercy This is the Plea of all upright humble Souls this is the Anchora sacra the sure Anchour upon which their Spirits are stayed in all their Fluctuations this is that Gale of wind which carries them on comfortably in all their Voiages They have learned from the Psalmist Psal 33.18 Behold the Eye of the Lord is upon them that fear him and that hope in his Mercy and therefore they say vers 22. Let thy Mercy O Lord be upon us according as we hope in thee They have found this Address to God always prosperous and therefore they joyn with the Holy Prophet in the words of my Text and the two following verses It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed because his Compassions fail not They are new every morning great is thy Faithfulness The Lord is my Portion saith my Soul therefore will I hope in him APPLICATION And now what is more necessary more just more meet for us to doe then to joyn in consort with the Holy Prophet in this passage Surely we may each of us say that it hath been of the Lord's Mercies that we have not been consumed in this most deadly Pestilence which hath swept away in our great City and the neighbouring places not many short of an Hundred thousand and yet we have hitherto been preserved alive to be Monuments of his Mercy Have not his Mercies been new to us every morning when we have heard either the dolefull Knells or the hideous voice of Carr-men Bring out your Dead or the Reports of the Weekly Bills of Mortality so many Hundreds in such a Parish so many Thousands in the whole dead of the Plague and yet we alive It was thought by God no small Mercy to Baruch when the common Calamity added Grief to his Sorrow when he fainted in his Sighing and found no Rest to give him his Life Behold I will bring Evill upon all flesh saith the Lord but thy Life will I give unto thee for a Prey in all places whither thou goest Jer. 45.5 And should you not count it a great Mercy to you that in this common and sore Judgment in which perhaps you have lost Wives Husbands Children Friends Neighbours Goods in which you have been filled with Fears oppressed with Griefs that yet you are not consumed that yet the whole City the whole Land is not consumed that yet our King our Nobles our Teachers our Government our Glory is not buried in perpetual Oblivion It is true it is a heavy Calamity but we have deserved worse It is true we have lost our Friends but our Lives are not lost our Souls are not lost unless our Unthankfulness our future Disobedience our Murmuring provoke God to bring a worse Misery the casting of Soul and body into Hell-fire which our Sins have merited Oh then let us still all our impatient Complaints let us quiet our Spirits in the present estate we are in let us be thankfull to God that we are not in Hell let us confess our Unworthiness let us be humbled for the great Depravedness of our former sinfull ways let us justify God in his inflicting Vengeance on us and our Land let us forsake those Sins which we have been guilty of that we have reason to conceive added fewell to this Fire that hath burnt so fiercely and wasted so extremely Let every one of us bewail the Plague of his own Heart let us lay to heart and mourn for the Sins of the City and the whole Nation their Pride Uncleanness Riot Oppression Unrighteousness Profaneness and the iterated Rebellions first open and hostile secondly more secret in Non-Conformity to Laws and Government and this maintained even against the unparallel'd Goodness
for then all minding and intending other Business and other Duties whether Sacred or Civill yea the due use of Recreation by eating and drinking sleep and other Refections of the body which God allows yea commands should be sinfull But as we interpret other like Passages concerning continual Praying against the Dotage of Euchites or Messalians of old who as the Monkish Fraternities since thought they were to doe nothing but pray Shall not God avenge his own Elect which cry day and night unto him Luke 18.7 Without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my Prayers night and day 2 Tim. 1.3 of a constant course of doing this Duty when other Duties Offices and Necessities permit So in this Meditating of David in God's Law we are to conceive he resolves so to doe it as not to omit it out of Slothfulness or sinfull Avocation not out of averseness of Heart to desist from it but as often and as much as Opportunity Divine Providence and the Use of it did permit and require he would be occupied therein Concerning which profitable Exercise of Meditation many Directions might be given in respect of the Acts Degree Manner End and Use thereof As God appointed the King of Israel when he sate on the Throne of his Kingdome that he should write him a Copy of God's Law in a Book out of that which was before the Priests the Levites and that it should be with him and that he should reade therein all the days of his life that he might learn to fear the Lord his God to keep all the words of the Law and the Statutes to doe them Deut. 17.18 19. So he injoyned the rest of the People that the words which he commanded should be in the Heart of the whole People of Israel and that they should teach them diligently unto their Children and should talk of them when they sate in their houses and when they walked by the way and when they lay down and when they rose up Deut. 6.6 7. Which brings us to the II. OBSERVATION That God's Precepts are to be the matter of a Godly man's Talk Yea God commands that they should bind them for a Sign upon their Hand and that they should be as Frontlets between their Eyes and that they should write them upon the Posts of their houses and on their Gates Deut. 6.8 9. And that this Precept was not confined to the Five Books of Moses but that it exended to the rest of the Holy Scriptures that which is said of Timothy 2 Tim. 3.15 that from a child he had known the Holy Scriptures which were able to make him wise unto Salvation doth evince It is also manifest that the people of the Jews as they do to this day did conceive themselves bound by God old and young of all Sexes and Ranks to exercise themselves in reading and meditating on the Holy Scriptures which God vouchsafed to them in all the Books that were by any of the Prophets delivered to them To which accords that of the Apostle Rom. 15.4 Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning that we through Patience and Comfort of the Scriptures might have hope It is then evident that it was God's Institution and Design in vouchsafing to communicate to the sons of men the great Treasure of his Oracles that they should busy their Minds and Members about them Nor is this sufficient that they have them in their Houses or that the Grandees of the Earth for Parts and Learning the Clergy Priests and Religious Votaries do reade or study them while the Laiety or simpler sort do onely by an implicit Faith rely on their Rulers or Rabbins as heretofore the Judaicall Pharisees and at this day their Successours the Popish Clergy craftily and deceitfully insinuate into peoples minds But as God hath promised to write his Laws in their hearts and put them in their minds that they shall all know him from the least to the greatest so it is the Duty and Property of all that expect Mercy and Favour from God to imploy their own Eyes to reade and their own Ears to hear what God hath vouchsafed to impart of his Mind in them to the sons of men And not onely so but also to search into the Sacred Scriptures as our Lord requires Joh. 5.39 to seek after the Wisedom therein as for Silver and search for it as for hidden Treasure Prov. 2.4 and when any Doctrine is taught as from God to doe as it is said of the Beroeans Act. 17.11 who searched the Scriptures daily whether the things S. Paul preached were so or no and withall speaking the truth in love to edify one another by communicating what they have found and learned And indeed the Law of Gratitude binds us to meditate on God's Precepts it being one of the greatest Favours from God to Men that he is pleased to reveal his Will to them Among the many Mercies for which the Psalmist extolls God's Goodness after the Commemoration of his Providence in his ordering Peace and Plenty he concludes thus Psal 147.19 20. He sheweth his Word unto Jacob his Statutes and his Judgments unto Israel He hath not dealt so with any Nation and as for his Judgments they have not known them Praise ye the Lord. Which plainly intimates this to have been the top or chief of his Goodness to Israel not that he seated them in a Land flowing with Milk and Honey which was the glory of other Lands Ezek. 20.6 but that he revealed his Counsells to them whereby he advanced them above all the people of the Earth as Moses tells them Deut. 4.8 What Nation is there so great that hath Statutes and Judgments so righteous as all this Law which I set before you this day It would therefore be an high Provocation of God to Anger so far to neglect the great Favour he hath shewed in giving us such Holy Precepts and beneficial Revelations of his Counsell as not to make them our Study not to consider the Usefulness of them not to observe our Concernments in them not to set forth to his Praise his gracious dealing in his notification of them to us But besides as it is an extreme Neglect of God not to meditate on his Precepts so it is a most injurious Neglect of our selves and our own Good to take our selves off from the Contemplation of them For thereby men deprive themselves of that means which might make them wiser then those who neglect them or imploy their minds on any enquiry after Wisedom without them Which it were easy to demonstrate by comparing the Wisedom that may be got by them with the Wisedom of the most renowned Philosophers and the most profound Rabbins among the Jews or acutest Schoolmen among the Christians who have sought the knowledge of Morality or Religion from Inventions and Traditions of men from their own Reasonings or devised Rules without the excellent Directions of the Holy Scritures Holy David professeth his own
experience Psal 119.97 98 99 100. O how love I thy Law it is my Meditation all the day Thou through thy Commandments hast made me wiser then mine Enemies for they are ever with me I have more understanding then all my Teachers for thy Testimonies are my Meditation I understand more then the Ancients because I keep thy Precepts And S. Paul tells Timothy 2 Tim. 3.15 that the Holy Scriptures were able to make him wise unto Salvation The greatest Wisedom is that which guides a man to the greatest Happiness and that is when he avoids the greatest Evill and attains the enjoyment of the best Good No Evil is greater then God's Wrath no Good better then God's Favour Now to the escaping the former and obtaining the latter the Meditation on God's Precepts conduceth most effectually For thereby we avoid Sin against God which incites him to Anger and thereby we learn how to please him which procures his Favour And therefore it is most evident to be the wisest course we can take and whereby we can shew most Love to our selves to Reade to Hear to Study and lay to heart God's Word And herein likewise we shew the greatest Charity to others by seriously endeavouring to make them intelligent therein it tending most to their Good if with Meditation there concurre also a Respect to God's Ways Which leads us to the other part of this Verse and the Conclusions thence deduced III. and IV. OBSERVATIONS That in his Practice a Godly man heeds God's Direction and That God's Works are his Observation The word which is rendred I will have respect or I will look imports the fixing and intentiveness of the Eye upon God's Ways such as is in a Traveller when he walks or a Sailour when he sails in the Deep whom it concerns that they have their eyes waking and their minds observant the one of the Path he treads in the other of the Chanel he steers his Ship in lest the first either miss his way or stumble and fall or the second run aground on Quick-sands or split upon Rocks and Shelves and so miscarry The Commandment saith Solomon Prov. 6.23 is a Lamp and the Law is Light and Reproofs of Instruction are the way of life And therefore as the Eye makes use of the Lamp and Light for its Direction so doth the Soul of a Godly man observe the Way of God's Precepts for his Rule and the Ways of God's Acting to encourage him in his Course and to deterre him from wandering therefrom Nor are the Ways of God's Providence either towards our selves or others to be let pass without heedfull Observation For thereby we are accommodated with usefull Arguments to give God the Glory of his Truth Justice Goodness and Power We have Experiments fitted either to deterre us from Sinning against him who is a consuming Fire or to encourage us to serve him with holy Reverence and godly Fear or to strengthen our Faith in a firm Dependence on him and a Reliance on the Lord in our greatest Difficulties Thus Phineas argues Josh 22.17 20. Is the Iniquity of Peor too little for us from which we are not cleansed to this day Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a Trespass in the accursed thing and Wrath fell on all the Congregation of Israel and that man perished not alone in his Iniquity That he might by this Argument deterre the Trans-Jordan Israelites from a Schismaticall departure from the God of Israel and a Communion in Worship with the other Tribes on this side Jordan Thus David in the great Trial of his Faith and undaunted Fortitude which he shewed in his heroick Encounter with the Giant of Gath recollects his own Experience of Divine Assistence formerly and fortifies himself against the fear of that Monster by assurance of the like now He alleges God's former Providences as the reason of his gallant Resolution to encounter Goliah without any hesitancy now telling Saul 1 Sam. 17.36 Thy Servant slew both the Lion and the Bear and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be as one of them seeing he hath defied the Armies of the living God As God hath given us his Word that thereby we may understand his Will so doth he exercise his Judgments that we may discern his Excellency As the Word of God his Precepts and Promises are to be remembred that we may believe and obey and therefore it is the Character of a Righteous person that the Law of his God is in his Heart and none of his Steps therefore shall slide Psal 37.31 so it is said Psal 111.2 3 4. The Works of the Lord are great sought out of all them that have pleasure therein God having made his Work honourable and glorious that his wonderfull Works might be remembred And therefore a Woe is denounced by the Prophet Isa 5.11 12. against those Epicurean Sensualists that spent their time in voluptuous Drinking and pleasant Musick but regarded not the Work of the Lord neither considered the Operation of his hands To which answers that true Censure of the Prophet Jeremiah 5.4 Surely these are poor they are foolish for they know not the Way of the Lord nor the Judgment of their God In having respect to both kinds of his Ways we glorify him in neglecting either we vilify him and live as it were without God in the World APPLICATION Hereby we may discern whether we have the same Spirit with David and other Holy persons in their generation who have always had their Eyes fixed on God in their Pilgrimage on earth and their Minds intent on what God saith and doeth as the principall Object whereon to imploy their Meditations and Exercitations When we reade of Enoch Noah Abraham and other Holy persons that they walked with God we may thereby collect that they moved in a higher Sphere then this lower World and though their Bodies were carried up and down on the Superficies of the Earth yet their Hearts and Spirits were with God him they set before them and kept close to him And so David professeth of himself Psal 18.21 22 23. I have kept the ways of the Lord and have not wickedly departed from my God For all his Judgments were before me and I did not put away his Statutes from me I was also upright before him and I kept my self from mine Iniquity And S. Paul Phil. 3.20 Our Conversation is in Heaven whence we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Surely they that seriously mind being with God hereafter must make it their business to get acquaintance with him here they that look for their Portion in Heaven must have their Conversation in Heaven while they are upon Earth As it is the description of a wicked man that God is not in all his Thoughts that God's Judgments are far above out of his sight that he casts God's Word behind his back that he hides his face from God So on the other side nothing is a more reall demonstration of a Holy person
his Will before the supplying of our Bread the Remission of our Sins or our Deliverance from the Evil one's Temptations from the Exceptions God takes against them that built themselves cieled houses when God's House lay waste them that had in their flock a male and vowed to the Lord a corrupt thing from his punishing such Slighting of him and asserting his Regal Majesty to convince men of the transcendent Regard that is due to him above all Potentates from the Protestations and Practice of Saints and Holy persons preferring the well-being of God's House and Service before their chief Mirth peremptorily refusing Delights neglecting any other Glory or otherwise desirable Advantage when God's House or Honour is impaired Mourning for it more then for their own Losses and reckoning them for their best-deserving Friends that promote the Service of God and them for their greatest Enemies that hinder it The Reasons of which are 1. On God's part His superlative Excellency in comparison of whom all the Glory Beauty Goodliness Power Wisedom or what-ever else is magnified in Creatures is but a Shadow yea Vanity or a mere Nothing All the Nations of the Earth in respect of him are as a drop of a Bucket counted as the small dust of the balance as Nothing Isa 40.15 17. And therefore to prefer our own Honour the Honour of any of the Grandees of the world or the glorious Spirits of Heaven before the Worship the Regalia or Royalties of the Great God who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords is to prefer a Torch-light before the Sun-light to esteem a Candle more then the glorious Lights of Heaven As there is in God more Glory then in all the Creatures so his Name his Service should be magnisied and adhered unto above and against all the Services and Names that stand in opposition to or competition with his 2. Nor is this Prelation less due on our part because of our Obligation of Gratitude to him Justice exacts it from us It is Debitum morale and naturale that we should honour our Father that begat us our Preachers that instruct us our Princes that protect us our Benefactours that help us All these is God to us in a superlative manner He is the Father that begat us the Rock that formed us we are the Work of his Hands and the Sheep of his Pasture He is our Shepherd therefore we lack nothing on him we depend from our mother's womb It is he that teacheth us Wisedom more then the beasts of the Earth He is a Sun and a Shield to us what-ever good we receive from any it is first derived from him He is the Fountain of living waters all Creatures are but broken Cisterns that can hold no water And therefore undoubtedly he should be preferr'd before all and by all Which that it may be done we should have the like Affection as David had and that is the next thing observable in this Text. II. David's Joy at the People's Forwardness to joyn in God's Worship As David preferred God's Service before his own Dignity so he rejoyced in the Conjunction of others with him therein This was it which gladded his Heart that not onely himself and his own House were ready to goe up to the House of the Lord but all the people of Israel likewise were forward to joyn with him in God's Service When the People offered willingly to the Lord for the building of the Temple it is said David the King also rejoyced with great Joy 1 Chron. 29.9 How often in the Psalms doth he invite all people to praise God Praise him all ye Nations Psal 117.1 is a Prophecy containing his Prayer for the Conversion of the Gentiles Rom. 15.11 Our Saviour teacheth us to pray not onely that we our selves who pray but all others may hallow God's Name When the Pharisees would have had the Children and Multitude that cried Hosanna with his Disciples rebuked our Saviour not onely justifies them but also animates them to it telling the Pharisees that if those should hold their peace the Stones would cry our Luke 19.40 Malignant spirits that seek the Praise of men their own Power and Interest envy the forwardness of people to joyn in the true Worship of God and the Duties of Godliness But to a holy and humble Heart it is a joyous thing As Moses said once to Joshua Enviest thou for my sake I would that all the Lord's people were Prophets and that God would put his Holy Spirit upon them Num. 11.29 Hereto every upright heart is moved both by the Love he bears to Men and the Love he hath to God who is honoured 1. Love to others makes him that loves them not seek his own Good onely but their Good also joyntly with his own Now there cannot be a greater Good to any person then when his Heart and Ways are set to glorifie God The best turn we can doe a man is to bring him into Acquaintance with God so as that his Fellowship be with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ And therefore if we love men indeed we cannot but rejoyce with them when they address themselves to seek God 2. Love also to God will cause this Rejoycing at the Associating of others with us in his Service The Corinthians Bounty to the Saints is commended from hence that it is abundant by many Thanksgivings unto God whiles by the experiment of such ministration they glorifie God 2 Cor. 9.12 13. We pray that all may sanctifie God's Name what we pray for sincerely we desire affectionately and what we desire affectionately to obtain we rejoyce in it heartily when it is acquired No man prays to God rightly but he who earnestly desires God's Glory by all the more therefore glorifie him the more is their Joy increased who love God truly especially when as here the Service is voluntary ready with alacrity when they say as it is in my Text Let us goe into the House of the Lord. Which leads me to some farther Observations III. The People's Willingness and Forwardness They invite each other to goe into the House of the Lord. Not to the house of Mirth and Jovialty not to the house of Bacchus or Baal not to the Idol-Temple or other house of Iniquity And therein is discernible the End and Motive of this their Invitation It was no doubt that they might worship God as those did who went up into the Temple to pray as it is said of the Pharisee and Publican in the Parable or as it is in the fourth verse of this Psalm to the Testimony of Israel to give Thanks unto the Name of the Lord. Thus it is said Luke 1.10 while the Priest burnt Incense in the Temple the whole multitude of the people were praying without And of Anna Luk. 2.37 she departed not from the Temple but served God with Fasting and Prayers night and day And in respect of this Practice our Saviour Matth. 21.13 allegeth out of Isa 56.7
that the House of God was to be the house of Prayer not of Merchandise or other profane uses Hereto accords that which is foretold Isa 2.3 of the New-Testament-times allusively to the practice of the Jews Many people shall goe and say Come ye and let us goe up to the Mountain of the Lord to the House of the God of Jacob and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths This then is the genuine End of going to the House of God or the Church of the living God the pillar and ground of Truth that we may pray together and praise God with one Heart that we may learn the Will of God that we may attend to the Preaching of the Word to the Reading of the Scriptures to the Sacraments of Christ and in a word that we may with one mind and one mouth glorifie God even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Which directs us also to consider IV. The Motive and Mode of their going up to the House of the Lord. The Motive is implied in the determination to whose house they would goe up to wit to the House of Jehovah the true and living God not to the House of Dagon Moloch or any of the Gentile Vanities but to his House who was their Defence the Holy one of Israel their King Psal 89.18 It is Faith in God as the true God and in Jesus Christ whom he hath sent which must excite us to goe to the Church on Earth to joyn with it in Holy Services and to approach boldly to the Throne of Grace in the Temple of Heaven where Christ our High Priest appears for us it is that must quicken our Hearts that must carry our Feet to the House of God and Religious exercises Alas many come to the Church out of Custome or to avoid the Penalties of the Law yea perhaps to sleep there as if they had no sense of God's Presence no spiritual Use of holy Ordinances no need of holy Instructions no want of God's Favour or Christ's Intercession and therefore they neither exercise Faith in Prayer or Praising God nor have any feeling of the Worth of Spiritual Services They are no better after they have been at Church then they were before no more humbled for Sin nor amended in their Conversation nor intelligent in the Doctrine of the Gospel nor zealous for God's Glory nor helpfull to edifie one another then if they had kept at home or been in profane Company They are not like these in my Text who here invited each other to goe to the House of the Lord. Which implies the Mode or Manner of their going Three things I conceive implied in this Expression Reverence Unanimity Alacrity 1. In that they goe to the House of the Lord it intimates that they did present themselves there with Dread and Awe of God They were wont to say as it is Psal 95.6 O come let us worship and bow down let us kneel before the Lord our Maker Thus it should be with us And therefore this Psalm is appointed in our Liturgy to be read in the beginning of Divine Service Our Reverence should be not barely in respect of the presence of persons of Eminency whether Ministers or People but more in respect of God's Presence We should be like affected as Jacob was and say as he did Gen. 28.17 How dreadfull is this Place this is none other but the House of God and this is the Gate of Heaven All Talking Gazing and other irreverent Carriage as is too too often among us even while we are here about Holy Duties shews an irreligious and ungodly Spirit and cannot but be odious to God and bring his Curse upon us 2. Their Unanimity is intimated in their Invitation of each other and joynt Association in going to the House of the Lord. And indeed this is also of very great moment in the publick Worship of God that as it was in the Primitive times we be of one Heart and one Soul Act. 4.32 that we continue together with one accord breaking bread and lift up our voice with one accord by praising God Act. 2.46 and 4.24 To think to get Peace with God by our Supplications when we have unpeaceable Hearts towards others to have Forgiveness from God while we forgive not our Brethren to have God's Love while we love not one another is a vain Delusion To pray together at Church and quarrel at home to sit in one Seat here and to fight one with another abroad to say Amen to the Prayer for Peace and yet to study Strife is monstrous Hypocrisie To praise God in singing Psalms here and yet to curse and revile one another abroad is horrible Impiety But to brawl contend for places in the Church before or immediately after Praying together shews a much more wicked Heart For where Envy and Strife is there is Confusion and every evil work Jam. 3. vers 16. 3. Therefore the third thing implied here Alacrity should attend our going to the House of the Lord. We should serve the Lord with Gladness come before his Presence with Rejoycing as it is Psal 100.2 which is read in our Liturgie after the Second Lesson God loves a chearfull Worshiper as well as a chearfull Giver As we would have God delight in us so we must delight our selves in the Lord and readily and freely out of choice come to the House of the Lord and there serve him APPLICATION And now give me leave both to complain and to admonish you God hath done for us greater things then he did for David his Gospel his Church his Worship is settled among us in a more Spiritual and Heavenly manner then it was among the Jews we are not carried away as the Gentiles who were led by dumb Idols we have not mere Latin Service not the Worship of a piece of Bread as the Papists nor are we fed with Legendary Tales or mens Traditions much less are we like the barbarous Heathens awed by Oracles the terrible Apparitions of Devils Wizzards and such Imps of Hell as many of them are or cheated with the ridiculous Fictions and Delusions of that impure Impostour Mahomet or imposed on by the Rabbinical Dotages of Jews And yet we come to God's Service with no better Devotion nay perhaps less then these do to their false Worship How few prefer God's Service before their own worldly Business God's Honour before their own Profit How many are so far from inciting others to goe to God's House that they are readier to draw them away from it Yea many chuse to keep at home or to goe to worse places and company Many have no other End in coming to Church but to keep their wont to doe as others Others come either out of a vain Affectation to shew their Bravery or a Curiosity to hear some eloquent Preacher as those did Ezek. 33.30 31 32. with affection to one party opposition to another yea with a contradicting Spirit How
many come hither without Faith or sense of God's Presence as if they came to a Court yea to sport or play With what Drowziness Irreverence Heedlesness do many appear here How many are weary with the Service with the Sermon to whom it is tedious to sit one hour to hear God's Word though they can endure to sit whole Nights and Days at their Pastimes or to be imployed in any mischievous Design How many bring their Bodies hither and their Minds the while are roving over the world How many are filled with unclean Lusts Contentions revengefull Imaginations and Devices even while they are in the Church How many come to carp at the Preacher or justle with their Brethren How many pray with their Mouths and curse with their Hearts Alas how will such bear Crucem Domini the Lord's Cross who are so backward to goe in Domum Domini into the Lord's House How can such expect to appear in the Temple of God in Heaven who defile the House of God on Earth How weary would they be of the Service there to whom his Worship here is so tedious Brethren let me deal plainly with you It is an ominous Presage an ill Sign that such as now are so averse from the House of God and his Service here are never likely to enter into the Temple of God in Heaven it would be a Burthen to them and they to it Oh then bethink your selves of coming hither as David and his People did Prefer the Honour of God before any Interest of your own Excite one another to goe to God's House out of Love to one another out of Love and Gratitude to God Goe not to any Idol-service or ungodly Meetings Come to God's Service with Faith with Concord and Unanimity with Chearfulness and Reverence And know that if you meet with God in his Ordinances he will meet with you in his Mercies Which the Lord grant c. Amen LAVS DEO DELIGHT in GOD THE Christian's Gain The Nineteenth SERMON PSAL. xxxvij 4. Delight thy self in the Lord and he shall give thee thy Heart's desire THIS Psalm is wholly doctrinall somewhat artificially composed after the order of the Hebrew Alphabet it is likely for the more ready learning and easie remembring of it The matter of it is a Receipt to cure that Lipothymie or Faintness of Spirit which is incident to the best men when they see the worst to prosper Which as it is in appearance rationall so it is highly dangerous as tending to undermine our Faith in God's Providence and to divert our Course from the Via Regia the high and right Way of holy Obedience to him to a walking in By-ways of our own chusing To prevent which after some Directions against Impatience and Distrust of God this Dose is here prescribed by one that could say Probatum est even by Holy David the sweet Psalmist of Israel who had by his own Experience found it true and the most sovereign Medicine and Cordiall in this case He had observed That notwithstanding the wicked man prospered a while and like a Comet blazed much yet it was but as a Meteor a Blazing-star that would soon vanish But that he who trusts in God and delights in him should be as a Fixed Star which though it be clouded or benighted for a time yet it hath a permanent Light and shall break out of its Obscurity That it is therefore best for such a one in the greatest Luster of the Wicked and in the most dismall estate that befalls himself yet to delight himself in the Lord and to assure himself that he will give him the Desire of his Heart Which words you may at first View perceive to contain in them 1. A Precept Delight thy self in the Lord. Affect not the Prosperity of Evil men Though they mount up to Heaven in Wealth Honour and Power so as that in their Luciferian Pride they say in their heart We will ascend into Heaven exalt our throne above the Stars of God we will ascend above the heights of the Clouds we will be like the Most high yet do thou humbly quietly patiently contentedly delight thy self in the Lord. 2. A Promise He shall give thee in the conclusion the Desires or Petitions of thine Heart either in that Deliverance thou wouldst have or that Comfort or Preferment which he thinks best for thee So that from hence arise two Conclusions of much importance 1. That it is best to delight our selves in God in the most elevated estate of Evill men and in our own most dejected Condition 2. That such as doe so shall have their Hearts Desire and in fine speed better then if they had been in a like illustrious estate to that of Wicked men I shall address my self to handle both in their order with what brevity and perspicuity I can I. OBSERVATION That it is best to delight our selves in God in the most elevated estate of Evill men and in our own most dejected Condition Delight is an inclining Affection of the Soul upon the apprehension of some pleasing Good that is sutable to the Mind and it is conceived in the womb of the Heart but not resting there it manifests it self by the motions of the Members by the speech of the Tongue glances of the Eyes hearkning of the Ears and by other gestures of the Members which discover the Complacency of the Spirit within Delighting then in the Lord is for a man to have pleasing Thoughts of God and thereby strengthening his Heart and Mind against all Objections concerning God or himself against all Fears and Occurrences which might cast down his Spirit Many sadning Objects do often present themselves even to the most Holy men on earth We find David sometimes complaining that God had cast him off I am cut off from before thine eyes Holy Job that God hid his Face from him and held him for his Enemy Such Complaints are frequent Thou hast cast us off and puttest us to shame Wherefore hidest thou thy Face Why sayest thou O Jacob My way is hid from the Lord and my Judgment is passed over from my God Others cry Wherefore doth the Way of the Wicked prosper Most fully we find this Argument urged against God's Providence even to the staggering of that Holy Psalmist in Psal 73.2 c. where he relates his Temptation and his Recovery out of it For notwithstanding what his Eyes saw his Ears heard his fleshly Reason suggested to him of the Happiness of Evil men and the vanity of Godly courses yet he upholds himself by delighting in the Lord and thus expresseth himself in that Psalm Vers 1. Truly God is good to Israel even to such as are of a clean heart and after vers 23 24 25 26 28. Nevertheless I am continually with thee thou hast holden me by my right hand Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsell and afterwards receive me to Glory Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth
hath not the Son of God hath not Life Joh. 3.36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting Life and he that believeth not the Son shall not see Life but the wrath of God abideth on him But Jus in re or the Consummation and full Possession of this Life is after the Resurrection in the World to come which therefore Christ by way of Excellency terms eternall Life Mark 10.30 And this is that Life in the assurance whereof Christ laid down his Life with so much quietness when he commended his Spirit into the hands of his Father Luk. 23.46 And upon the promise of Life which is in Christ Jesus 2 Tim. 1.1 not onely of the Life that now is but also of that which is to come 1 Tim. 4.8 S. Paul did both labour and suffer Reproach vers 10. In hope of this eternall Life Tit. 1.2 he exposed himself to daily danger of Death which he terms dying daily 1 Cor. 15.31 as being sensible as he saith vers 19. if in this life onely he and other Christians had hope in Christ they were of all men most miserable Now in hope and assurance of this Life Christ duram serviit Servitutem underwent the hardest Service that ever was undertaken he emptied himself took upon him the form of a Servant was made in the likeness of Men and being found in fashion as a Man he humbled himself and became obedient unto Death even the death of the Cross Phil. 2.7 8. Though the Cup he was to drink of were a very bitter Cup a Cup of deadly Wine such as had in it the Dregs of God's Anger and was mingled with the Sins of men for whom God made him Sin or a Sacrifice for Sin yet he drank it off yielding to his Father's Will as knowing it to be true which he himself taught the two Disciples that Christ must suffer these things and rise from the dead the third day and so enter into his Glory Luk. 24.26 46. And the Promise of this Life animated all the Holy Apostles Martyrs and Saints in their severall Generations to give all diligence to deny themselves to take up their Cross and so to follow Christ even to Death not counting their own Lives dear to them but being zealous to doe and suffer for Christ though with the Loss of all as having learned that whosoever will save his Life shall lose it and whosoever will lose his Life for Christ's sake shall find it Matth. 16.25 What things were gain to me saith S. Paul Phil. 3.7 8 9 10 11. those I have counted Loss for Christ Yea doubtless and I do count all things but Loss for the excellency of the Knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord for whom I have suffered the Loss of all things and do count them but dung that I may win Christ and be found in him that I may know him and the power of his Resurrection and the fellowship of his Sufferings being made conformable unto his Death if by any means I might attain unto the Resurrection of the dead Which occasions them to seek the Path of this Life which is the next thing enquired into and is now to be considered II. What is the Path or what the Ways of this Life The Ways or Path of Life is a Metaphor taken from Travellers who have a certain Track in which they are to tread and by going in which they are guided to the place to which their Journey tends and by its direction are ascertained of coming thither if they hold on their Motion Here in this passage it can be taken for no other then the Means of assurance of their attaining this Life Which in respect of Christ are 1. On God's part the Engagement of his Father to him Isa 53.10 11. that when he should make his Soul an Offering for Sin he should see his Seed he should prolong his days and the pleasure of the Lord should prosper in his hand He should see of the travail of his Soul and be satisfied Christ undertook the great Business of doing his Father's Will which was written in the volume of his Book by offering that Body which his Father had prepared him upon a Contract between them when he came into the world as it is described Heb. 10.5 7 8. And this was that he should so lay down his Life as to take it up again as Christ himself declareth Joh. 10.18 I have power to lay down my Life and to take it up again this Commandment have I received of my Father Which thing made it impossible that he should be holden of the pains of death Act. 2.24 And therefore it is said He foresaw the Lord always before his face as being on his right hand that he should not be moved with the fear of Death vers 25. being firmly assured by his Father's Covenant upon which he put himself on that great Expedition of Coming into the world to save Sinners by the offering of himself that he should not lose by his Adventure but should after his Sufferings enter into his Glory To which is to be adjoyned the Love that his Father bare to him for this reason as he expresseth it Joh. 10.15 17 18. As the Father knoweth me even so I know the Father and I lay down my Life for the Sheep Therefore doth my Father love me because I lay down my Life that I might take it up again No man taketh it from me but I lay it down of my self This unparallel'd Dutifulness of Christ to his Father in yielding so freely to his Self-exinanition and Humiliation unto Death did obtain a singular Love from his Father to him and engage his Truth and Power to revive and superexalt him 2. On Christ's part his ready Obedience to his Father's Will was the Path to Life which therefore he allegeth in that Prayer of his wherein he opened his Bosome to his Father Joh. 17.4 5. I have glorified thee on Earth I have finished the Work thou gavest me to doe And now O Father glorifie thou me with thine own self with the Glory which I had with thee before the World was In respect of Believers the Path of Life to them is 1. On God's part the free Love of God in chusing them to Life termed the writing their Names in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world Rev. 17.8 which because they are given to Christ is said to be the Lamb's Book of life Rev. 21.27 and our Saviour tells them their names are written in Heaven Luk. 10.20 Hereby is Christ engaged to give Life to them as he himself testifieth Joh. 6.39 And this is the Father's will which hath sent me that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing but should raise it up again at the last day And accordingly he saith Joh. 17.2 As thou hast given him power over all flesh that he should give eternall Life to as many as thou hast given him Hereby it is that Christ is
right wits is always desired Now Joys are of several sorts according to the variety of the Objects Motives and Means of Rejoycing There are Objects of Joy within us and without us matters carnal or spiritual temporal or eternal present or future from faith or sight hoping or feeling natural and acquired longer or shorter in duration which make our Joys either more pure or mixed greater or lesser with great difference in degrees upon variation of Circumstances different apprehensions of the Object and the Good that accrues by it either comparatively with the precedent Evil felt or feared or absolutely as the thing is good in it self and its own nature or in respect of our Interest in it good to us Should I here make a Philosophical discourse of this Affection and exhibit to you a Scheme of the several kinds degrees properties and effects of this one Affection I might spend more then an hour upon this Subject But I pass to the next Head II. What Joys are in the Presence of God Those Joys are the best which spring from the embracing of the best and most lasting Good with least Defectiveness and greatest Latitude And such are the Joys that are in the Presence of God or with his Face and Countenance For therein there is 1. a perfect Freedom from all Evil 2. an entire Enjoyment of all Good in its Purity and Resplendency 1. The Evils a man is delivered from do much enhaunse his Joys He that is delivered from Dangers and Fears doth rejoyce and the Joy is the more if the Dangers were great and apparent the Fears of Evil imminent and oppressing still more when the Evils have been felt and that with much Anguish and long Continuance How do men rejoyce when they have overthrown their Adversary in a Law-suit in which if they had been cast they had been undone in their Estates How do men rejoyce when they have overcome their Enemies in Battel to whom if they had been Captives they had been led into Exile from their own Country How do Slaves rejoyce when they are redeemed from Turkish Bondage and in stead of rowing in their Gallies are returned to live with their own Masters in their own Families How do Prisoners condemned to the Gallows rejoyce when the King sends them a Pardon and they escape the hands of the Executioner These Deliverances do cause much Joy and Exultation in men and sometimes much Glorying though perhaps they be not long free from the Fear and Danger of their Evils but in the Change of Fortune fall into the same or greater Mischiess or if they escape them yet their Victory Pardon or Redemption though it bring them Liberty perhaps reduces them to Poverty and a low estate And which is worst although they overcome their Adversary on Earth yet the Devil their Adversary prevails against them though they get the Victory against their other Enemies yet they are led captive by their own Lusts which sight against their Souls though they be without Wounds by a Sword in their Bodies yet they have sore Wounds in their Consciences by their Sins though they be pardoned by the King yet they are condemned by the King of Kings though they are redeemed from Turks yet not from Hell And sure a Holy heart that prospers in the one and not in the other finds his Joys damped so as that he can scarce think those Deliverances worth the rejoycing in A Holy heart rejoyceth indeed with hearty Joy when he prevails against his Adversary the Devil and his Temptations when he is cured of the Wounds of his Spirit when he hath gotten power over that Body of death that makes him cry out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from it They are the Desertions of God the Domineering of his Corruption the Absence of God's Spirit his Decay in Prayer his Doubts of his Interest in God's Grace his Backslidings Inconstancy in good and such like Spiritual Evils that do most annoy him eclipse his Joys beget in him Lipothymies Fainting fits cold Sweats Trembling of Heart Fearfulness and Dejection of Spirit These break his Bones envenome his Spirits make him loathsome to himself as a man whose Wounds stink and are corrupt And therefore there is no Joy to such an one till he have the Joy of Salvation from God till in the multitude of the thoughts of his Heart the Comforts of God refresh his Soul till he finds the Presence of God accepting him till he sfinds that God prepares his Heart to Prayer and then inclines his Ear to hear till God speaks Peace to him sprinkles the Bloud of Christ on his Conscience and frees him from his Fear of God's Wrath and Condemnation till there be a Messenger an Interpreter one among a thousand to shew unto him his Righteousness till God be gracious unto him and saith Deliver him from going down to the Pit I have found a ransome till he pray unto God and he be favourable unto him and he see his Face with Joy as Elihu speaks Job 33.23 24 26. He is not till then free from Anguish of Spirit and Anxiety of Soul In the day of my Trouble saith Asaph Psal 77.2 3 7 8 9. I sought the Lord my Sore ran in the night and ceased not my Soul refused to be comforted I remembred God and was troubled I complained and my Spirit was overwhelmed Will the Lord cast off for ever and will he be favourable no more Is his Mercy clean gone for ever doth his Promise fail for evermore Hath God forgotten to be gracious hath he in anger shut up his tender Mercies Thus mournfully also speaks Heman the Ezrahite Psal 88.3 6 7. My Soul is full of Troubles and my life draweth nigh unto the Grave Thou hast laid me in the lowest Pit in darkness in the deeps Thy Wrath lieth hard upon me and thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves And then expostulates vers 14 c. Lord why castest thou off my Soul why hidest thou thy face from me I am afflicted and ready to die while I suffer thy Terrours I am distracted Thy fierce Wrath goeth over me thy Terrours have cut me off They come round about me daily like water they compassed me about together Such Complaints are frequent in the Psalms Job and Hezekiah's Song In the Penitentials of Holy men in the Relation of the Lives of Godly persons of tender Consciences Men and Women of former and later days we meet with such Apprehensions of their Sins dangers of Temptations want of God's Spirit hiding of his Face as benight their Souls take away their Joys fill them with Pensiveness Horrour and Fear of Divine Vengeance of Hell-sire of Apparitions of Devils that they can neither feed pleasantly in the day nor rest quietly in the night but look ghastly with dejected Countenances and goe mourning in the bitterness of their Spirit all their days But when these Clouds are seattered this Darkness taken away so as that
in Christ In God's Favour and Presence are the real Joys though obscured from the World by the mean Condition upon Earth of those that possess them 2. Oh then you who have heard what Joys there are in God be persuaded to quicken and comfort your selves by them Let not the Scoffs or Censures of the profane Carnalist affright you from your Choice Place your Hope in the pursuance of those Joys that are Spiritual that are Heavenly David Moses S. Paul and He who was the wisest of men our Lord Christ slighted all the Contents on Earth and patiently underwent all Afflictions all the Reproaches and Persecutions of men that they might attain the Fulness of Joys in God's Presence Surely should all your days on Earth be spent with never so much Mirth yet you would be great Losers should you lose the Joys of Heaven Yea the want of the Peace of Conscience and Joy in the Spirit on Earth will so damp the Joys of the most Atheistical Voluptuaries on Earth that they will find them to be far short of that Sweetness they imagine in them and in the end to be as Gall and Wormwood in their Bowells On the other side the Joys of Christ and Christians in present fruition and future hope will countervail all those bitter Potions they drink here and fill them with endless and unmeasurable Satisfaction hereafter Let then the Joy of the Lord be your strength Nehem. 8.10 your Encouragement to follow all the Holy ones of God chiefly our Lord Christ running with patience the Race set before you and looking unto Jesus the Authour and Finisher of your Faith Amen LAVS DEO MAN'S Guide to Glory The Twenty-third SERMON PSAL. lxxiij 24. Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsell and afterwards receive me to Glory WE have in this Psalm whether composed by or for Asaph to sing a Skirmish between the Flesh and the Spirit with the Victory of the Spirit thereby strengthened to stand for God and to adhere to his Party The Combat arose from the Quarrel that humane Reason had against Divine Providence as either unequall or impotent in that the Wicked prospered in the world when the Godly as poor Abjects were depressed and trampled upon by the Nimrods of the Earth As if this did argue either that God was ignorant of humane Affairs that he saw not through the thick Clouds that according to the Epicurean Fancy he followed his Pleasure in Heaven and let things below run at randome leaving them to Chance or that he would not or could not remedy such Irregularities as fell out in the Government of this lower World To which the Spirit opposeth after some Staggering this Defence That the Prosperity of the Wicked was but for a moment an empty Bitter-sweet a fansied Dream a meer Vanity ending in Terrours which suddenly and irresistibly cast them down like a Hurricane and so carry them away to Destruction and Consumption That on the other side the Godly are preserved and guided to Glory And thence is the Spirit 's Io Paean its triumphant Song ascribing Happiness to men of pure Hearts and expressing a Resolution to hold fast to God as being well assured of Divine Guidance and Advancement in the words read to you Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsell and afterwards receive me to Glory In which words the Psalmist expresseth the Foundation of his future Happiness as in the Verse before he declares the Cause of his present Standing notwithstanding the Storm of Temptation that was upon him upon what Bottom he secures his Soul notwithstanding such Onsets and Perills of wandering out of his way to Blessedness For attaining of which Felicity he ascribes nothing to a fansied Light within him or power of Free will but to that special efficacious Grace which is preventing and sustaining that worketh in God's people both to will and to doe of his good pleasure Phil. 2.13 His Tuition and his Guidance is the entire and onely Cause of a Saint's assured Beatitude And this the Authour of the Psalm doth acknowledge whilst he expresses the sense he had of his own nearness to Ruine when as it is vers 2. he found that as for him his Feet were almost gone his Steps had well-nigh slipt had not God been with him continually and held him by the right hand guided him with his Counsell and led him to Glory From whence these Observations offer themselves 1. That when God leaves a person to his own Counsell it is a Forerunner of his Perdition 2. That it is the Safety of God's Servants that they are guided by his Counsell 3. That those whom God guides by his Counsell he doth bring to Glory I. OBSERVATION That when God leaves a person to his own Counsell it is a Forerunner of his Perdition That which is said Psal 81.12 that God gave the people of Israel up unto their own hearts Lust and they walked in their own Counsells and therefore he did not subdue their Enemies nor turn his hand against their Adversaries vers 14. doth sufficiently intimate that the Cause of their wasting and spoiling by their Enemies was God's leaving them to their own Hearts Lusts and their walking in their own Counsells The like Speech we have in the New Testament in that Sermon which was made by S. Paul and Barnabas at Lystra when to take them off from their intention of sacrificing to themselves they told them of the Evil of their doings and of the pernicious Consequence of their practices in sacrificing to them that were but Vanities and how that God in times past suffered all Nations to walk in their own Ways Which Passages do evince that the reason why both Jews and Gentiles were under Sin all the World were become guilty before God all had sinned and came short of the Glory of God Rom. 3.9 19 23. were under Wrath and Condemnation was because they were left to their own Counsells For in that case as it is Rom. 1.18 they held the Truth in Vnrighteousness vers 22. professing themselves wise they became fools Wherefore God also gave them up to Vncleanness through the Lusts of their own Hearts to dishonour their own bodies between themselves Who changed the Truth of God into a Lie and worshipped and served the Creature more then the Creatour who is blessed for ever Amen vers 24 25. For this cause God gave them up unto vile Affections And even as they did not like to retain God in their Knowledge God gave them over to a reprobate mind to doe those things which are not convenient vers 26 28. which brought upon them the Judgment of God And to like purpose is that Prediction which is upon cogent reason conceived to be verified in the Roman Apostasie 2 Thess 2.10 11 12. Because they received not the love of the Truth that they might be saved for this cause God shall send them strong Delusions that they should believe a Lie That they all might be damned who believed
is the grand Expectation of the Saints That God will not fail to lead them in his Paths for his Name 's sake and so to order their Steps in his Word that no Iniquity get dominion over them that the Spirit of God will so quicken them as they may run the way of his Commandments that he will enable them to live by Faith in Christ and thereby preserve them to his heavenly Kingdom It is that exceeding and enduring weight of Glory which is wrought by Afflictions and the Guidance of Divine Teachings and Providences that causeth them to look not at the things which may be seen which are but temporall but the things which are unseen and eternall 2 Cor. 4.17 18. For which reason the same Apostle tells the Thessalonians 2 Thess 2.13 14. We are bound to give thanks always to God for you because God hath from the beginning chosen you to Salvation through Sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the Truth Whereunto he called you by our Gospell to the obtaining of the Glory of our Lord Jesus Christ APPLICATION For Application hereof If the Apostle had cause to be thankfull for the Thessalonians because of God's calling them to the obtaining of the Glory of our Lord Christ much more hath each believing Christian cause to be thankfull to God to rejoyce and take Comfort in this so blessed a Condition of God's Guidance by his Counsell so as to bring him to Glory And since the leaving a man to his own Counsell is the Forerunner of Perdition how ought he to dread as a direfull Omen of the most execrable Condition the being given over to follow his own Counsell to be carried away by his own Lusts as being a certain sign of God's Desertion and exposing of him as a Prey to the Devill Wherefore it highly concerns every one who desires his own Salvation to follow that Admonition Psal 2.11 to serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with trembling or as it is Phil. 2.12 to work out his Salvation with fear and trembling When we consider our own Ignorance in the Way which leads to eternall Life our Folly and Unskilfulness in finding it out our Negligence in inquiring after it our Inadvertency to that Teaching and direction which might guide us in it when we ponder the vanity of humane Reason our Frailty and Easiness in hearkening to Deceivers the incessant Diligence and Vigilancy of the old Serpent in perverting us the impossibility of our attaining to Salvation by our own Wisedom and Strength and the extreme perill of Erring so as to perish eternally if we have not God's Guidance we shall see great cause to fear our selves find great reason to seek the Guidance of God's Counsell and to walk always by it to follow that Light which he hath held forth before us in his Word of Truth especially by his Son the Light of the world the Way the Truth and the Life by whom alone we can goe to the Father without whom we walk in darkness and know not whither we goe Without this Guidance we can doe nothing as we ought but as men driven by our Lusts or seduced by Satan we are hurried violently or tamely drawn into those By-paths which lead down to the Chambers of eternall Death Alas our Temptations which are many and with so much Wiliness laid to insnare us our Insufficiency to think any thing of our selves as of our selves the sad Experience we have of the Falls of many most precious Saints the frequent Complaints of the most mortified Christians who bemoan their Wretchedness by reason of that Body of Death which still depresseth them our Childishness in affecting what is most pleasing to Sense and our little apprehension of our own Necessities our undervaluing of spirituall Blessings in heavenly things in Christ the Prevalency of the Carnall mind in us which is too often as the Biass that turns us that inclines our Free will to Earthly things but is Enmity against God being not subject to God's Law neither indeed can it be All these things I say should make us suspect our selves and examine our Thoughts and Ways whether they be according to God's Counsell or not they should make us consider what Spirit we are of even in our Religious Duties how we are acted not onely in Secular affairs but also in our exercise of Godliness even in our Prayers and most zealous Service of God Solomon's Counsell is very necessary to be followed Prov. 3.5 6. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not to thine own Vnderstanding In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths This is the great Stay and Comfort of a self-knowing Christian that observes himself his own Weakness but yet is possessed with the taste of God's Grace That though he be weak and foolish yet he is guided by God's Spirit that he orders the Motions of his life by the Rule of Christ and still seeks to Heaven for Light from thence to lead him that God will guide him with his Counsell and then bring him to his Glory Amen LAVS DEO A BELIEVER'S SAFETY PEACE REST. The Twenty-fourth SERMON PSAL. xl 8. I will both lay me down in peace and sleep for thou Lord onely makest me dwell in Safety WHAT was the Occasion of composing this Psalm is uncertain Whether it were after or before his Entrance into his Kingdom before or after his Victory over Absalom sure it is it was made by David when he was in an holy frame of Spirit And in it he first bespeaks God as a Supplicant v. 1. then expostulates with his insolent Adversaries for their Malignity towards him vers 2. declares his Assurance of Divine Election and Tuition vers 3. admonishes them how to rectifie themselves vers 4 5. mentions the Study of the generality of men with his Request for himself vers 6. acknowledges the meliority of his Choice vers 7. and thereupon infers this Resolution which I have read I will both lay me down in peace and sleep c. There is no difficulty about the Reading or Meaning of the words whether we reade together in id ipsum as the Vulgar Latin or both as our Translation whether we reade Thou Lord onely referring to his single Help or Thou Lord makest me alone though I have no other with me dwell in Safety Hope Confidence or Security This Passage shews his settled Acquiescence in the Tuition of the Almighty grounded upon his experience and knowledge of his Love and Favour without any such anxious Thoughtfulness enfeebling Fears distracting Perplexities as others in the like Distresses and Destitutions to those he was in were wont to be oppressed with It is likely David when he speaks of his laying himself down in peace and sleeping meant it onely of his natural Sleep and his addressing himself thereto To which sense those words lead us Psal 3.5 where he saith I laid me down and slept I awaked for the Lord sustained
besides him yea when there are very many very potent very malicious Enemies against them yet even then God makes them dwell in Safety and Confidence The Lord saith David Psal 27.1 2 3 5. is my Light and my Salvation whom shall I fear the Lord is the Strength of my life of whom shall I be afraid When the Wicked even mine Enemies and my Foes came upon me to eat up my flesh they stumbled and fell Though an Hoast should encamp against me my Heart should not fear though War should rise against me in this will I be confident For in the time of Trouble he shall hide me in his Pavilion in the secret of his Tabernacle shall he hide me he shall set me upon a Rock The many Experiences he had of remarkable Evasions and Deliverances when he was as it were in the Lion's mouth how he killed Goliah alone with a Sling and a Stone and cut off his Head with his own Sword how he slew the Lion and the Bear how he avoided Saul's Javelin cast at him escaped Apprehension in his Bed by his Wife Michal's Cunning Saul's Fury by his Rapture and Prophesying at Ramah the Treachery of the men of Keilah the Malevolence of the Ziphims the Design of the Philistines in the Court of Achish King of Gath these made him full of Confidence of God's Assistence in the greatest imminent Perils though he were Single and had none that he could trust to It was no news to David that God's Power is no whit abated by the Multitude of Enemies and the want of Helpers Abraham's Victory over the Kings that took Sodom Pharaoh's Overthrow at the Red Sea Sampson's Slaughter of the Philistines with the Jaw-bone of an Ass his carrying away the Gates of Azzah Shamgar's slaying of 600 Philistines with an Ox-goad Jonathan and his Armour-bearer's Victory over the same People were such Examples as made his Heart to be fixed and not to shrink at evil Tidings The like Assurance of God's Might made Asa when he was invaded by Zerah the Ethiopian with an Army of a Thousand thousand and 300 Chariots to cry unto the Lord his God Lord it is nothing with thee to help whether with many or with them that have no power 2 Chron. 14.11 And of this Deliverance then Hanani the Seer minds him when he let go his Faith in God and relied on the King of Syria Were not the Ethiopians and the Lubims a huge Hoast with very many Chariots and Horsemen yet because thou didst rely on the Lord he delivered them into thine hand For the Eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole Earth to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose Heart is perfect towards him 2 Chron. 16.8 9. Elisha was not dismaied at the Army of the Syrians which besieged him in Dothan he knew there were more with him then against him though his Servant's eyes could discern none to be present but Enemies Hezekiah was not terrified by the proud Vaunts of Rabshakeh or the reviling menacing Letter of Sennacherib He knew that the God of Israel was the Lord even he onely that the everlasting God the Lord the Creatour of the ends of the Earth neither fainteth nor is weary there is no searching of his Vnderstanding that he giveth Power to the faint and to them that have no Might he increaseth Strength Even the youths shall faint and be weary and the young men shall utterly fall But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their Strength they shall mount up with wings as Eagles they shall run and not be weary they shall walk and not faint as it is Isa 40.28 29 30 31. The same Spirit in a more ample measure was in the Holy Apostles when they were brought before the Jewish Sanhedrim S. Paul when it was foretold by Agabus that he should be bound at Jerusalem when he was brought before the Council of the Jews the Roman Governours Felix Festus and King Agrippa knew in whom he believed that he was able to keep the Depositum that which he had committed to him When he received the Sentence of death in himself he trusted in him that raiseth from the dead Thus S. Stephen when stoned commended his Spirit into the hands of his Saviour and fell asleep And this brings me to the III. OBSERVATION That in Assurance that God onely makes them though alone and destitute of Help from any else to dwell in Safety Confidence or Hope Holy Believers can quietly take their Repose lie down and sleep though environed with Enemies even the chiefest Hell and Death and him that hath the power of Death to wit the Devil This frame of Spirit Holy David did discover in many of the Psalms especially in the 31. where having avouched God to be his strong Rock and his House of defence to save him vers 2. he thereupon without any Commotion of mind deposits himself with God Into thine hand saith he I commit my Spirit Thou hast redeemed me O Lord God of Truth vers 5. He was assured that he was his God that his Times were in his hands that great was his Goodness which was laid up for them that fear him that he would hide them in his Presence from the Pride of man that he would keep them secretly in a Pavilion from the strife of Tongues that he preserveth the Faithfull and therefore exhorts them to be of good Courage and God should strengthen the Heart of all them that hope in the Lord vers 14 15 19 20 23 24. But in none was this Composedness of Soul so eminent as it was in our Lord Christ who though it pleased the Lord to bruise him to put him to Grief though he were injured more then any man he was inclosed with the assembly of the Wicked they pierced his Hands and his Feet though his Heart like wax was melted in the midst of his Bowells and he cried out O God my God why hast thou forsaken me why art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my Roaring though his Soul was made an Offering for Sin yet did he then pray for his Enemies Father forgive them for they know not what they doe and when he had cried with a loud voice he said Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit and so gave up the Ghost Luk. 23.46 He did no Sin neither was Guile found in his mouth when he was reviled he reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously 1 Pet. 2.22 23. The same Tranquillity of mind did S. Stephen shew at his death And after the Example of the chief Shepherd of their Souls and the Protomartyr of the Christian Profession have the Holy Martyrs and Confessours in all Ages with the greatest Fortitude and Undauntedness of spirit conjoyned with Serenity and Calmness of mind unconquerable Patience and Submission to God's Will far beyond the Philosophers Insensibleness or Roman Stoutness which
of the good treasure of his Heart bringeth forth good things and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil Matth. 12.35 The most glorious Works of Piety or Charity that come not from a right Principle within please God no more then the offering of Swines bloud yea God counts himself mocked when our Prayers Praises or any Duties we doe come not from the Heart Heartless Service is no Service of God but a Derision of him He that is a Spirit must be served with the Spirit or else the Service is abhorred Nor must God's Law be kept with a part but with the whole Heart Blessed are they that keep his Testimonies and that seek him with the whole Heart Psal 119.2 He that keeps some of God's Commands and neglects others yea he that shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point since the Authority is the same in all is guilty of all Jam. 2.10 He must keep them in all his Faculties in his Mind by considering them in his Memory by retaining them in his Purposes by chusing them and in his Affections by adhering to them He must keep them with all his Might with the utmost degree of Observance that he can and wherein he is defective he must bewail himself He must not keep any man's Precepts that consist not with God's not the Statutes of Omri or the Ordinances of the house of Ahab Mic. 6.16 A divided Heart a double Heart an Heart and an Heart are monstrous Psal 12.2 We cannot serve God and Mammon No man can serve two opposite Masters no nor two co-ordinate As we cannot serve God while we observe the Traditions of men that evacuate God's Commands so neither while we observe the Traditions of men which are imposed as God's Commands In vain do they worship me teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men saith our Saviour Matth. 15.9 Yea all the just Commands of Men must be observed with subordination to God's they must give place to them and must be observed because of his Commands Whatever Servants doe in Obedience to their Masters they must doe it heartily as to the Lord and not to men Col. 3.23 Our Obedience must be de omni per se quatenus ipsum In a word all that we doe in Obedience to God we must doe for God There must be Integrity without Partiality and Sincerity without Hypocrisie Whatsoever we doe we must doe all not for our own Praise or sinister Ends but to his Glory 1 Cor. 10.31 without magnifying our selves or aiming at our own carnal Advantage And this is to keep his Law with our whole Heart APPLICATION You have heard how valuable a thing the Understanding of God's Law is whence it is derived to what End it should tend with what Sincerity that End should be prosecuted I hope hereby you discern the genuine and true Reason why there is so little Wisedom in the world And I wish you would apply your minds to get that Understanding which will make you truly wise It is the common Complaint That the World is full of Fools and no marvel it should be so since each man loves to be his own Guide and even generally all sorts of men affect to follow that Darkness which they miss-name the Light within them and are unwilling to be undeceived from their Errours Quis intelligit Delicta is in this sense true Though all are Children in Knowledge yet are they loth to abide under the tuition and conduct of their Overseers Some miss-lead themselves by their Lusts some by their Opinions few move in the direct Line of God's Law and no marvel then they suffer eclipses of their innate Light Earthly-mindedness like the Earth interposing keeps the Light of God's Word from them Love of transitory Pleasures hinders the Light of the Spirit from shining on them Nor do they lift up their Eyes and Hearts unto the Sun of Righteousness that he may arise with brightness in his Rays upon them It would be infinite to reckon up the Fooleries of Philosophers Jewish Rabbins Hereticks Papists and all sorts of Fanaticks who have declined from God's Precepts Let their Errours their Follies their Miscarriages make you inquisitive into God's Law wary how you turn aside from it diligent to observe it constant in adhering to it instant with the Father of Lights to direct your Steps in it They that sail at Sea count it safest to be in a Ship that hath a good Pilot They that live in a State think it happy to live where there are good Laws and good Governours Sure no Pilot is better then he that steers the Course of the Heavens no Laws better then the Laws of the Most high no Government equal to the Government of God If you leave his Guidance if you forsake his Laws you will suffer Shipwreck and be cast on those barbarous Coasts where Tyrants and Devils domineer Oh then what-ever ye doe prefer the Understanding of God's Will before all Knowledge beg earnestly of God that he would teach you forget not what ye learn of him let your whole Heart be sound in his Precepts Doe as Christ did whose meat and drink it was to doe the will of his Father and you shall eat and drink with him in his Kingdom Which he grant who loved us and gave himself for us To whom c. Amen LAVS DEO UPRIGHT WALKING Part I. The Twenty-seventh SERMON PROVERBS xiv 2. He that walketh in his Vprightness feareth the Lord but he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth him AMong the Variety of Holy Writings whereby the Wisedom and Goodness of God hath made provision for the Instruction and Guidance of Man who is born as a wild Asse's Colt Job 11.12 this Book of Proverbs is a Star not of the least magnitude having the Quintessence of Solomon's Wisedom in it who is said to have a Heart as large as the Sand upon the Sea-shore in respect of his Understanding in things both Divine and Humane in which he exceeded all the Wise men of his own and other Generations And among all the Sayings of this Book this is one of the most considerable as directing what way we may demonstrate our Fear of God which is the beginning of Wisedom and shun the chiefest of Follies in despising him the one by walking in our Vprightness the other by avoiding Perverseness in our ways as it is expressed in my Text He that walketh in his Vprightness feareth the Lord but he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth him The Words consist of two Propositions characterizing the Wisest of men and the veriest Fools The first have two Marks whereby they are discernible They fear the Lord and that appears by their walking in their Vprightness The other appear to be Fools by their despising of the Lord and that is manifested by their Perverseness in their Ways I shall begin with the I. PROPOSITION He that walketh in his Vprightness feareth the Lord. And herein I
13.22 Which is the great Scope of him that walks in his Uprightness and consequently a proof of his owning God's Sovereignty and uniting of his Heart to fear his Name 3. A man's Walking in his Uprightness proceeds from that Faith whereby the Believer presents God to himself sets him before his face sees him that is invisible as Moses did Heb. 11.27 which begets Fear of God takes away servile Fear of others keeps him in even and constant Obedience as Enoch Noah Abraham and all the Holy Patriarchs who walked with and before God without Fear of their Enemies in the Fear of God depending on his Protection and subjecting themselves to his Direction which engaged the Lord to be their God III. What Advantage accrues to him that walketh in his Vprightness and feareth the Lord. Of which very briefly The Psalmist tells us in few words Psal 84.11 that the Lord God is a Sun and a Shield the Lord will give Grace and Glory no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly Psal 97.11 Light is sown for the Righteous and Gladness for the Vpright in heart And after him the Apostle Gal. 6.16 As many as walk according to the Rule of the new Creature in Christ Jesus Peace be on them and Mercy and on the Israel of God Whence it is rightly inferred that all such as walk in their Uprightness out of a Fear of the Lord are assured of Light to guide them Protection to preserve them Peace to quiet them Supply of good things to chear them Assistence to help them Favour to comfort them and Glory to advance them APPLICATION And now what remains but that each of us as the Prophet minds the Jews Hag. 1.5 consider our Ways whether we have chosen the Way that leads to Life or that which is the Path to Destruction whether we walk uprightly in the Fear of God or perversly in Compliance with Satan All of us have a Journey to goe here we have no continuing City We may say as David 1 Chron. 29.15 We are Strangers before God as were all our Fathers our days on the Earth are as a Shadow and there is none abiding no expectation of a settled Mansion here We must arise and depart for this is not our Rest because it is polluted Mic. 2.10 Oh then how much doth it concern us to heed which Way we take whether the tendence of our Course of life be to walk in our Vprightness as those that fear the Lord or our Conversation be in the Lusts of our Flesh fulfilling the desires of the Flesh and of the Mind whether we devote our selves to the Fear of God spend our lives imploy our time and estate to please him to doe his Will or our Walking be according to the course of this World according to the Prince of the power of the Air the Spirit that worketh in the children of Disobedience If you say you fear God and expect Heaven you must manifest it by departing from your sinfull Ways by serving him in Holiness and Righteousness before him all the days of your life They must walk before God in their Uprightness here who would stand before God in Happiness hereafter Not Words but Works not a Form of Godliness but the Power of it prevails with God Be not deceived saith the Apostle Gal. 6.7 8. God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap For he that soweth to his Flesh shall of the Flesh reap Corruption but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap Life everlasting Follow therefore Holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Walk with that Company here with which you would have your Lot hereafter Walk not in the way with them with whom you dread to be associated at last Take heed of Complying with the World in your Life with whom you would not be condemned at your Death Consider the End of your Life and follow their Faith whose End you would purchase at the greatest rate Remember the Advice of the Prophet Jerem. 6.16 Thus saith the Lord Stand in the ways and see and ask for the old Paths where is the good Way and walk therein and ye shall find Rest for your Souls I direct you not to follow any New Lights neither to seek any new Ways but I advise you to goe to Christ that you may find Rest for your Souls to take his Yoke upon you and to learn of him to receive him and to walk in him rooted and built up in him and established in the Faith as he hath taught you abounding therein with thanksgiving Believe in the Light that ye may be the Children of Light Walk as Children of Light and walk as such while you have the Light Casting off the works of Darkness and putting on the Armour of Light walk honestly as in the day not in Rioting and Drunkenness not in Chambering and Wantonness not in Strife and Envying But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the Flesh to fulfill the Lusts thereof To all which let me adde that of the Apostle Eph. 5.1 2. Be followers of God as dear Children and walk in Love as Christ also hath loved us and hath given himself for us an Offering and a Sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour Amen LAVS DEO THE IMPIOUS CONTEMPT Part II. The Twenty-eighth SERMON PROVERBS xiv 2. But he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth him OF all Points of Wisedom this is the Inlet and as it were the Door to fear the Lord and of all Ways of Folly this is the greatest to despise him The one is demonstrated by a man's walking in his Vprightness of which I have already spoken the other by Perverseness in a man's Ways which is now to be considered II. PROPOSITION He that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord. Concerning this three Quaere's are to be answered like as there were in handling the former Proposition 1. Who is meant by him that is perverse in his Ways and when a man is said to be so 2. How such an one despiseth the Lord. 3. What is the Evil of such Despising the Lord. Of which in their order I. Who is meant by him that is perverse in his Ways By Ways as hath been already said are meant the Actions of a Man as he is a Rational Being whose Motions should be ordered by such a Rule as his Creatour hath made known and should tend to his Maker's Honour For God at first made Man upright or simple so as that he had no other Way but that which was God's but they have sought out many Inventions saith Solomon Eccles. 7.29 Whence it comes to pass that there are many and various Ways in which men now walk contrary to God's Way that is his prescribed Will which is the Way that every man should walk in and then he walketh in his Vprightness But when he chuseth any Invention of his own to direct the
Course of his Actions by and chiefly when he opposeth God's Will his Truth his Precepts then is he perverse in his Ways Now this may happen two ways either out of Ignorance or wittingly and this either willingly or unwillingly with a pure or a mixt Will out of Infirmity through Fear Forgetfulness Heedlesness or such like Cause as abates much of the Voluntariness of the Action or obstinately resolutely presumptuously after Conviction Warning Reproof Correction not onely actually but also habitually and incorrigibly with a high hand and contumacious mind He that fears the Lord and walks in his Vprightness may sometimes actually be perverse in his Ways out of Ignorance Infirmity through prevalency of Temptation and yet not be accounted so perverse in his Ways as to be said to despise the Lord so as Solomon here means S. Paul at Antioch chargeth S. Peter and S. Barnabas that they did not walk uprightly according to the Truth of the Gospel Gal. 2.14 because that S. Peter before certain came from James did eat with the Gentiles but when they were come he withdrew and separated himself fearing them of the Circumcision And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation Herein was a kind of Perverseness out of some Timorousness incident to a holy Saint and a Pillar among the Apostles and that in a Point which so much concerned the Truth of the Gospel and yet there was no such despising of the Lord as Solomon doth here stigmatize Nor dare I say but that David did that which was not right in the eyes of the Lord in the matter of Vriah the Hittite in the business of Ziba and of Numbring the people but that he despised the Commandment of the Lord to doe evil in his sight yet was he not so perverse in his Ways as to despise the Lord so as here is meant because it was not done obstinately impenitently habitually But Eli's Sons Hophni and Phinehas who caused men to abhor the Offerings of the Lord and persisted in their Sin after their Father Eli's Admonition were obstinately habitually perverse in their Ways and despised the Lord 1 Sam. 2.17 25 29. In like manner all such are perverse in their Ways and despise the Lord so as Solomon here means who do stubbornly and impenitently persist in any sinfull Errour or wicked Practice against the Law of God or the Gospel of Christ either not relinquishing the one after Discovery or not amending the other after Reproof but upholding the one and continuing in the other against the Warnings of God and Man Of such Perverseness of men in their Ways there are many Degrees according to the several kinds of Warnings given them the Frequency of their Actings the Stifness and Stubbornness of their Wills the Proceedings of their Practices the Excellency of God's Will which they bend themselves against and the Engagements they have to conform to it Sometimes the Lord warns men of the Evil of their ways by the Reproof of an Enemy and it is Wisedom to make use of it for our Amendment Even Plutarch hath a Treatise directing a man How to get good by an Enemie's ill will this is to make Mithridate out of Poison Sometimes a Friend shews us our Evil and then it is great Perverseness to persist in it Sometimes an authourized Pastour a Parent a Yoke-fellow admonishes with due Correction and yet persons continue obstinate Sometimes God sends Warnings by his Prophets as he did to the Israelites 2 Chron. 36.15 16. He sent to them by his Messengers rising up betimes and sending them because he had Compassion on his people But they mocked the Messengers of God and despised his words and misused his Prophets until the Wrath of the Lord arose against his people till there was no Remedy Sometimes he warns men by his Judgments either on themselves or on others expecting that when his Judgments are in the Earth the Inhabitants of the world should learn Righteousness Isa 26.9 Yet though they be iterated varied be very conspicuous and terrible men return not to the Lord as the Prophet complains Amos 4.11 Yea they are so far from being bettered by God's Judgments that as it is said Rev. 16.11 some blaspheme the God of Heaven because of their Pains and their Sores and repent not of their deeds Yea so far are God's Judgments or Mercies from turning men from their Sins that oftentimes they multiply Abominations the more which shews extreme Perverseness The same may be said of them that abuse God's Patience and Long-suffering not knowing that the Goodness of God should lead them to Repentance as the Apostle speaks Rom. 2.4 And of those that because Sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily therefore their Heart is fully set in them to doe evil Eccles. 8.11 And according to this Stifness of their Wills there are Degrees of Perverseness in their Practices For some as the Prophet chargeth the Jews Zach. 7.11 refuse to hearken pull away the Shoulder stop their Ears that they should not hear Yea saith he vers 12. they made their Heart as an Adamant-stone lest they should hear the Lord and the words which the Lord of hoasts sent in his Spirit by the Prophets therefore a great Wrath came from the Lord of hoasts Some shut their Eyes against the Light in them by their vicious Affections darken the Light of their natural Conscience and are given over to a reprobate Sense Many hold the Truth in Vnrighteousness after it is made known to them Rom. 1.18 and not onely yield not to it but also wrangle and cavil against it Yea there are not a few who in stead of being altered by any Denunciations of Judgments from God or Convictions of his Law turn the very Speeches of the Prophets and Preachers that are sent to them into proverbial Scoffs as those that scornfully said Let him make speed and hasten his Work that we may see it and let the Counsel of the Holy one of Israel draw nigh and come that we may know it Isa 5.19 And those that tauntingly took up the Prophet's term of the Burthen of the Lord Jer. 23.38 To what height of profane Impudence and Perverseness in their Ways are they come who as if they counted it their Bravery abuse the very words of Holy Scripture even of Christ himself in their Discourses and foolish Jests though by themselves and those like them counted witty to make themselves sport and render them ridiculous who as if it were a part of Gallantry to provoke the God of Heaven glory in their outrageous Swearing and direfull Imprecations against themselves Others there are like Elymas the Sorcerer whom S. Paul Act. 13.10 terms a man full of all Subtlety and all Mischief a Child of the Devil Enemy of all Righteousness who ceased not to pervert the right ways of the Lord in seeking to turn away the Deputy Sergius Paulus from the Faith of Christ
To whom those are near of kin of whom S. Paul speaks in his Farewell-Sermon to the Ephesians Act. 20.29 30. I know this that after my departing shall grievous Wolves enter in amongst you not sparing the Flock Also of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away Disciples after them All which perverse Proceedings are much aggravated by the Opposition in them not onely to the Law but also to the Gospel For as the carnal Mind is Enmity against God in that it is not subject to the Law of God Rom. 8.7 so it is much greater Perverseness in a man's Ways to neglect so great Salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him God also bearing them witness both with Signs and Wonders and with divers Miracles and Gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will Heb. 2.3 4. And therefore our Saviour saith Joh. 3.19 This is the Condemnation per Eminentiam the great Condemnation that Light is come into the World and men loved Darkness rather then Light because their deeds were evil It is also so much the greater Perverseness and renders it incurable unpardonable for men after their profession of the Truth after Vows to God of adhering to Christ after they have been once enlightned have tasted of the heavenly Gift and been made partakers of the Holy Ghost have tasted of the good Word of God and the powers of the World to come then to fall away so that they crucifie the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame Heb. 6.5 6. This is the most contumelious way of Despising the Lord among all the sorts and degrees of Perverseness in our Ways as may be discerned in answering the Second Quaere II. How he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord. Despising saith Aristotle in the Second of his Rhetoricks in the Chapter of Anger is the Act of Opinion in not shewing any regard of a thing or person And it hath its Effects in divers degrees Sometimes there is onely Slighting making none or little Esteem of either Sometimes Damnifying daring to harm because there is so mean a Thought thereof as not to fear any Revenge Sometimes there is insolent Scorning thereof as of no value And in all these degrees a person is despised when the Contempt is offered either immediately or directly as when a King is reviled to his face his Person kicked spurned derided openly or mediately when any such Usage is shewed to that which doth more peculiarly pertain to his Dignity as when his Image Coin Laws Son Friends Servants Officers Embassadours are vilified or abused The Contempt of whom though it be first terminated on them yet when it is offered for the King's sake out of Enmity to or Disesteem of him or Affront to his Government the Relation to him being known it is either actually or by interpretation a Despising of the King himself Now as the Prophet Malachi hath it 1.14 I am a great King saith the Lord of hoasts and my Name is dreadfull among the Heathens He is the true God the living God and an everlasting King Jer. 10.10 There is none like unto him he is Great and his Name is great in might vers 6. According as his Name is glorious and fearfull Deut. 28.58 so are all the things pertaining to his Essence and to his Greatness there is some Reverence due to them And God is despised not onely when he is disclaimed as he was by Pharaoh Exod. 5.2 or not minded as by those wicked ones who through the Pride of their countenance will not seek after God God is not in all their thoughts Psal 10.4 or when he is reproached and blasphemed as he was by Rabshakeh Isa 36.20 or when his Worship is neglected as it was Mal. 1.6 7. or his Providence denied as when it was asked Where is the God of Judgment Malach. 2.17 But also when his Works are undervalued He that mocketh the Poor reproacheth his Maker saith Solomon Prov. 17.5 Specially when his Children are despised He that despiseth despiseth not Man but God who hath also given unto us his Holy Spirit 1 Thess 4.8 In like manner to slight God's Laws his Threatnings his Judgments is an high Contempt of God But God is most of all despised when the Gospel the Grace of God in Christ the Embassadours that bring it the Son of God himself the Image of the invisible God are contemned and the Spirit of God despighted He that despiseth you despiseth me saith Christ and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me Luk. 10.16 And in this respect he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord because he despiseth God's Commands his Gospel his Messengers but most of all his Son in whom he is well pleased and his Spirit of Grace the chiefest of all the Gifts that he communicates unto men Whence may be discerned III. What is the Evil of such Despising of the Lord. Of which in a word All Indignities offered to a King are high Misdemeanours to rebell against his Crown to speak evil of his Person are Crimina laesae Majestatis amount to High Treason and are usually avenged by the most shamefull and tormenting Death Doubtless the Perverseness of his Spirit who is obstinate in his Ways and despiseth God's Statutes and his Judgments is no less High Treason against the Heavenly Majesty his Crown and Dignity chiefly when his Grace is rejected his Son is not kissed his Spirit is despighted there being no greater Affront to him who is the blessed and onely Potentate King of Kings and Lord of Lords then when his Grace in Christ is rejected when men will not have Christ to rule over them but prefer the Prince of this World before the Lord of Glory the Prince of Life and in stead of welcoming the Spirit of Life embrace the accursed Fiend the Authour of Death This makes the Wrath of God hot so that they perish from the way when his Wrath is kindled but a little Psal 2.12 Such men make God a Liar 1 Joh. 5.10 And that doth in effect un-God him and dethrone him By despising the Riches of his Goodness after their impenitent hard Heart they treasure up to themselves Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God Rom. 2.4 5. Which can be no less then fiery Indignation which shall devour the Adversaries who tread under foot the Bloud of the Son of God count the Bloud of the Covenant wherewith persons are sanctified an unholy thing and doe despight to the Spirit of Grace Heb. 10.27 29. APPLICATION Oh that these things were seriously pondered and laid to heart by you How many thousands of holy Monitions to turn from your evil Ways have some of you had How often hath God spoken to you by his Judgments from Heaven on your selves or others How often hath Christ stood at the door of
I. OBSERVATION That Afflictions Persecutions yea Death do not extinguish the Being of Saints who wash their Robes and make them clean in the Bloud of the Lamb. It is the saying of our Lord to Martha Joh. 11.26 Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die It is true that believing Lazarus her Brother was then in the Grave and had been dead to her apprehension four days insomuch that she made no other account of him but as of a putrefied stinking Carkase yet even then Christ avoucheth him to have been alive And in like manner he judged Abraham and Isaac and Jacob though buried many Ages before yet even then when he conversed on Earth to be alive and so to continue for ever God being their God and he not being a God of the dead but of the living they must by consequence live unto him Luk. 20.38 Be the Dissolution of the Bodies from the Souls of the Saints never so violent their Flesh and Bones never so much consumed by the most vehement Flames torn and devoured by the most greedy and ravenous Beasts be they never so much putrefied and wasted with Sickness yet in their Dust and Ashes there is a Seed of Life It is with their Reliques as it is with Seed that is sown which though it be buried under the clods of the Earth and in appearance to men annihilated yet hath it a seminal Life which shall spring up again and flourish This Job was assured of when he said Job 19.26 27. Though after my Skin Worms destroy this Body yet in my Flesh shall I see God Whom I shall see for my self and mine Eyes shall behold and not another though my Reins be consumed within me But this is not all The Spirits of men even when their Bodies have onely a seminal Life have an actual Life they have a Life of Sense and Understanding they neither have their Life extinguished nor laid asleep without Feeling or Cogitation Though the Dust return to the Earth as it was yet the Spirit returns to God that gave it The Spirits that were sometimes disobedient when once the Long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah while the Ark was preparing were in prison when S. Peter wrote 1 Epist 3.19 20. And it is the saying of the Authour to the Hebrews Chap. 12.23 Ye are come to the Spirits of Just men made perfect When Lazarus was raised from the Grave he had not a new Soul created which was not existent before but the same Soul brought back into his Body Neither at the Resurrection are other Souls joyned to the Bodies then those that before had lived in them For otherwise not the same Soul which had done good or evil should be rewarded but another When Act. 7.59 S. Stephen called upon God and said Lord Jesus receive my Spirit he being full of the Holy Ghost was assured that though his Body were buried yet his Spirit should be with Christ And when the Apostle Paul expressed his willingness to be absent from the Body yet his expectation was to be present with the Lord 2 Cor. 5.8 It was his choice and option to depart and to be with Christ as being far better Phil. 1.23 He had learned that Christ was in Death Life that he that believeth on him hath everlasting Life that his Life was hid with Christ in God that the Spirit of God that dwelt in him was Life because of Righteousness and therefore he counted not himself to live but Christ in him And as Christ did commend his Spirit into the hands of his Father when he gave up the ghost being assured he should be in Paradise so doe all the Saints that have the Spirit of Christ even when they lie down in their beds of Earth they yield up their Spirits into the hands of their Father as assured to be with Christ who is the Way to the Father And this brings in the II. OBSERVATION That when Saints are removed from Men below they are placed before the Throne of God Though God be a Spirit dwelling in that Light unto which no man can approach whom no man hath seen nor can see yet the Holy Scriptures express him to us under the Similitude of a glorious King suppose a Solomon in all his Glory sitting on a Throne or Seat of Royal Majesty and that in the Heaven of Heavens where his Son termed the Lamb in this Chap. vers 9 10. hath his Throne also at the right hand of God for being ascended into the Most holy place as an high Priest he is set on the right hand of the Throne of the Majesty in the Heavens Heb. 8.1 There the Angels who are ministring Spirits unto him and the Elders all the Apostles Prophets Martyrs Confessours as Kings and Priests unto God stand round about the Throne attending upon and beholding the King of Glory the number of whom is said Revel 5.11 to be ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands Now this place is by Christ termed Paradise Luk. 23.43 and by S. Paul 2 Cor. 12.2 4. said to be the third Heaven where is a place of Rest an Abraham's Bosome into which Lazarus is said to be carried by the Angels Luk. 16.22 Now though that were a great Happiness for a Beggar that lately lay at the Rich man's gate full of Sores and empty of Bread glad to have been fed with the crums which fell from the rich man's Table as the Dogs were who had more Compassion then the rich man for they licked his Sores when the rich man disdained to look on him or to pay for his Cure And though it be to all that undergoe sore Travail great Wants and Persecutions a very great part of their Blessedness that there remains a Rest for the people of God Heb. 4.9 and to the Saints which keep the Commandments of God and the Faith of Jesus after their patient Sufferings that a Voice from Heaven is heard saying Write Blessed are the dead which die in or for the Lord from henceforth Yea saith the Spirit that they may rest from their Labours Yet that is not the total Summe which completes their Felicity there is more in that which follows that their Works follow them so as to be approved in Heaven Their Persons are welcomed and entertained with Triumph over their Enemies they have the Crown of Righteousness conferred on them by the Righteous Judge of all the World their good Fight of Faith is applauded with an Io-Triumph as an Heroical act of the most gallant Fortitude by the Acclamation of the Celestial Quire of Angels and blessed Spirits they are cloathed with white Linen the Righteousness of Saints they are arrayed with the most sumptuous Apparel feasted with the Light of God's Countenance reign with Christ on his Throne are designed to be solemnly married to Christ and to be Judges of the World as Co-assessours with Christ at his Coming in the expectation of which they most delightfully see God
as being before his Throne and there serving him for ever Which brings us to the III. OBSERVATION That the Saints serve God in his Temple in Heaven perpetually The Service of a great and gracious Prince though but in the meanest Office about him is an Employment much sought after for the Advantages it brings of Safety free Access Esteem and other Privileges concomitant but to attend him in a higher quality is still more desirable for the Dignity and Nearness of it to such a Majesty David chose rather to be a Door-keeper in the House of God then to be as Haman the great Favourite in the Palace of Shushan with Ahasuerus King of Persia Yet these are but petty and low Advantages in comparison of what accrue by the Service of the Great God who filleth Heaven and Earth Surely it was a Happiness to be a Servant to God though but a Hewer of wood or a Drawer of water for the House of God as the Gibeonites were they were yet far more blessed that dwelt in his House as Priests and Levites to minister before him and to serve at his Altar but it is superlative Happiness to serve God in his Temple in Heaven and to doe this for ever without any intermission especially when the Service is no other then Service of Gratitude and Praising of the Great Creatour and Benefactour of the world even him who is Optimus as well as Maximus the Best of Beings as well as the Greatest even him who is the Father of Lights from whom every good and perfect Gift cometh in whom is no Variableness nor shadow of turning They that are still praising God on Earth are blessed Psal 84.4 As all God's Works do praise the Lord so his Saints do bless him they shew forth the Glory of his Kingdom and talk of his Power Psalm 145.10 11. Much more joyous and blessed a thing is it when the great Consort of Heaven do there perpetually sound forth the high Praises of their God where they have nothing else to doe but to sing Blessing and Honour and Glory and Power be unto him that sitteth upon the Throne and unto the Lamb for ever and ever where this New Song is sung with the best Musick of Heaven concerning the Lord Jesus Thou art worthy of all Benediction for thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy Bloud out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation and hast made us unto our God Kings and Priests and where with a loud voice with the greatest Shout of Angels and glorified Saints this Acknowledgment is echoed forth Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive Power and Riches and Wisedom and Strength and Honour and Glory and Blessing Oh how glad are men to tell of the Good they have received by such and such Benefactours If a gracious Prince hath but admitted them to kiss his Hands hath deigned to speak kindly to them to promise them Preferment at Court how do men like Haman tell their Wives and Friends of it with rejoycing how highly do they esteem themselves what Regard do they expect from others how do they please themselves in the expectation of his Performance how thankfully do they receive any Intelligence of him any Message from him And yet it often falls out that Princes Favourites be as a wise Heathen said like Counters which one day stand for pounds another day are of no value So that perhaps whom they magnified to day him they will curse to morrow whom they gloried in one day him they are displeased at the next It is otherwise with the Saints in Heaven then with Courtiers on Earth Once in God's Favour and they never lose it They have no fear of Frowns when once before him in his Temple they have no occasion of Dislike at any of his Looks or Speeches There is all Serenity of Aspect Entertainment with perfect Friendship matter of eternal Love everlasting Preferment And therefore with the greatest Freeness and Chearfulness without Intermission or Weariness the Saints do serve God in their Hymns in Heaven and that in his Presence for he that sitteth on the Throne doth dwell among them Which was my last Observation and is now to be considered as the Top of all their Happiness securing it from all Loss Disturbance or Diminution IV. OBSERVATION That the Saints have God everlastingly cohabiting with them Among the Promises and Preferments which are by God bestowed on his Servants this is the chiefest That as they are his Jewells a peculiar people to him are as lively Stones built up a spiritual House an holy Priesthood to offer up spiritual Sacrifices acceptable to him by Jesus Christ so they become the Temple of the living God as God hath said I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my People 2 Cor. 6.16 The Presence of God is counted so necessary to his People that Moses had rather stay in the vast howling Wilderness among fiery stinging Serpents then goe onward toward Canaan without it Exod. 33.15 On the other side the Psalmist professeth that though he walked through the valley of the shadow of death he would fear no evill because God was with him his Rod and his Staff did comfort him Psal 23.4 And indeed the chiefest Joy of Christians as well as Safety is in God's Company When God hides his Face the holiest Souls are troubled Satan affrights them the men of the World vex them their own Consciences bring their Sins to remembrance and cause Gripings and Pain in their very Bowells But when God returns when all the Clouds and Storms are dispersed Blessed saith the Psalmist is the people that know the joyfull sound they shall walk O Lord in the light of thy Countenance Psal 89.15 How much do Holy Saints here disquiet themselves by reason of their Cohabitation with profane and unrighteous persons When they are forced to dwell with them that are Enemies they are as a Sword in their bones when reproachfully they say daily to them Where is thy God How do they long for the Christian Society of sincere Believers and heavenly-minded Christians But their chief Prayer is Lord lift up the Light of thy Countenance upon us Their Soul thirsteth for God for the living God When shall we come and appear before God A wise and single-hearted Companion is justly valued as a most precious Jewell As Ointment and Perfume rejoyce the Heart so doth such Acquaintance a man's Spirit But the best of men are imperfect the purest Churches have their Spots Christ's own Disciples had a Judas with them They are not quite free from Satan's Haunts till they be where Christ is But when they behold his Glory are in the Company of the Lamb where he is are in the House where their Father in Heaven dwells have him dwelling with them so as that they behold his Face and are in his Hand then they are filled with everlasting Joy
abundantly satisfied with the Bread of Life drink of the River of his Pleasures with whom is the Fountain of Life and in his Light they see Light they find in God's Presence there is Fulness of Joy and at his right hand Pleasures for evermore APPLICATION And thus have I presented unto you a Shadow of that most desirable Light which is the Inheritance of all the Saints A comprehensive View of which is not attainable except there be afforded such a Sight as was to the Three Disciples at Christ's Transfiguration in the Mount or to S. Paul at his Rapture into Paradise till we be absent from the Body and present with the Lord and then we shall behold his Face in Righteousness and when we awake shall be satisfied with his Likeness In the mean time while we walk by Faith and not by Sight let us be such in our Choice in our Affections in our Endeavours as the Saints have been with Patience waiting for what we see not and running so as that we may attain it This will be our Comfort our Support when we come to the end of our Race that we have not run for a corruptible Crown but an incorruptible that we have not contended for an Earthly Portion with the men of this World but for an Inheritance laid up in Heaven for us that we have as the Saints have done parted with all to buy this Pearl laid up our Treasure not in Earth but in Heaven negotiated to be rich towards God and not to have Treasure here onely for our selves You that would be before the Throne of God must wash your Robes in the Bloud of the Lamb keep your Garments clean have your Conversation such as becometh the Gospel you must cast off the Works of Darkness and put on the Armour of Light walk honestly or decently as in the day as Children of Light not in Rioting and Drunkenness not in Chambering and Wantonness not in Strife and Envying but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the Flesh to fulfill the Lusts thereof Dream not that you can serve Sin here and yet serve God before his Throne in his Temple that God will walk with you and dwell with you if you yield your Members as Weapons of Vnrighteousness unto Sin that if you affect the Ways of Sinners walk in the Counsel of the Vngodly sit in the Seat of the Scornfull and joyn with the Congregation of Evil-doers you shall at last have your Portion with the Saints Apply then your time and studies and abilities to purifie your selves as God is pure if you hope to see him as he is And notwithstanding all the Sufferings and Opposition you may meet with with Patience possess your Souls Let this animate and strengthen your Hearts against Fainting and Backsliding that if you suffer with Christ you shall also reign with him Which the Lord grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE PATRIARCH'S JOY The Thirtieth SERMON JOHN viij 56. Your Father Abraham rejoyced to see my Day and he saw it and was glad AMong other Sufferings which Christ underwent the Antilogy that is the Contradiction of Sinners the Controversie which he had with cavilling and perverse Opponents or Disputers against his Sayings was not the least which therefore Heb. 12.3 is propounded to us to analogize that is consider and ponder upon that we may not faint or be tired in our spirits when we meet with such wrangling Gainsayers In this Chapter we have a Specimen of such Sophistry in the Jews who exercised Christ with their perverse Arguings to the intent they might hinder the Reception of his Testimony of himself and the Doctrine which he was sent to teach them which he terms the Truth vers 32. that would make them free This they disdainfully except against as glorying that they were Abraham's Seed never in Bondage and therefore scorned his offer of Freedom To both which our Saviour replies refuting their vain Brags of their being Abraham's Seed and free in reference to men sith they were the Servants of Sin and utterly unlike to Abraham in their Spirits who was far otherwise affected towards him then they were For saith he Your Father Abraham rejoyced to see my Day and he saw it and was glad whereas my Day is that which you spurn against as galling and vexing your Spirits To understand which it is requisite that I unfold 1. What is meant by Christ's Day 2. How Abraham is said to be their Father whereas vers 39. Christ had said If ye were Abraham's Children ye would doe the works of Abraham which imports they were not 3. How Abraham is said to have rejoyced to see Christ's Day 4. How it was true that he saw it 5. What matter of Rejoycing this was to him and how he was glad in such seeing 1. Concerning the First It is agreed on by most that the Day of Christ here is meant of his Advent or Coming in the Flesh which we at present celebrate Though some refer it more specially to his Passion or Suffering But the Jews understood it of his Birth and the Space of his Life on Earth which usually is termed a Man's Day in the Hebrew expression and in respect of Christ the Days of his flesh Heb. 5.7 2. As for the Second He terms Abraham their Father as they gloried by way of Concession acknowledging them vers 37. to be Abraham's Seed by natural Generation But yet he denies them to be Abraham's Seed in respect of their Minds and Spirits there being so great a Dissimilitude and Contrariety betwixt them and him therein that they were more truly begotten of the Devil whom in Lying and Cruelty they so much resembled 3. As for the Third The word rendred Rejoycing signifies such a Joy as is accompanied with Leaping or other Gesticulation as when a man is superlatively affected with a thing which he hopes for hath some tidings and assurance of its futurity and apprehends it as a Beatitude And it is conceived Abraham thus rejoyced when upon God's Promise of Sarah's Conception and the Blessing consequent thereupon wherein Christ's Coming was included he fell upon his face and laughed and said in his heart Shall a Child be born unto him that is an hundred years old and shall Sarah that is ninety years old bear Which was spoken by him not dubitativè by way of Doubting for the contrary is asserted Rom. 4.16 17 18 19 20. but out of Admiration as over-joyed at the news So it is said of John Baptist in the Womb that at the presence of Christ's Mother and her Salutation the Babe leaped or skipped in exultation for Joy in the Womb of his Mother 4. As for the Fourth Quaere It is true there be that understand the Seeing of Abraham of his beholding of Christ when with two Angels he appeared to Abraham in a Humane shape and Abraham saw him eat and talked with him as with the Judge of all the Earth which was
Desire of all Nations and that he was the Person whom the Godly did delight in and expect for what Reason appears by the III. OBSERVATION That the Certainty of the coming of Christ's Day was the Spring of Joy the Basis of Comfort the Stay and Support of their Spirits to Believers of old in the days of their Pilgrimage on Earth For this we have the words of S. Peter Act. 2.25 26 30. That David being a Prophet and knowing that God had sworn with an Oath to him that of the fruit of his Loins according to the flesh he would raise up Christ to sit on his Throne spake concerning Christ that therefore did his Heart rejoyce and his Tongue was glad and his Flesh did rest in hope And Heb. 11.26 it is said that by Faith Moses esteemed the Reproach of Christ greater Riches then the Treasures in Egypt And of Simeon it is said that he waited for his coming in the Flesh as the Consolation of Israel and accordingly when he had seen him he took him up in his Arms and blessed God and said his Nunc dimittis Lord now lettest thou thy Servant depart in peace according to thy word for mine eyes have seen thy Salvation Luk. 2.25 28 29 30. And conformable to these was also the frame of Spirit in all the Holy Believers when he appeared in the Flesh As persons over-joyed they were in a Rapture of Comfort so as that they could not contain themselves but must break out into holy Hymns of Praise My Soul doth magnifie the Lord said his Mother and my Spirit hath rejoyced in God my Saviour For he hath regarded the low estate of his Handmaiden And Blessed be the Lord God of Israel said Zacharias for he hath visited and redeemed his People and hath raised up an Horn of Salvation for us in the House of his Servant David When the Wise men of the East saw his Star they rejoyced with exceeding great Joy Matth. 2.10 And when the Angel had told the Shepherds that he brought them good Tidings of great Joy which should be to all People of the Birth of Christ in the City of David upon which there were with the Angel suddenly a multitude of the Heavenly Hoast praising God and saying Glory be to God in the highest and on Earth Peace Good will towards men the Shepherds in hast went to view Christ in the Manger and upon their Return glorified and praised God Hallelujahs were then the Exercise of all that knew of his Birth and so they were of all the Holy Patriarchs and Prophets when they did by Divine Revelation foresee and by Faith wait for his Coming And the same spirit of Joy shewed it self after in all those that saw his Day either with their bodily Eyes or by the Eye of Faith When Andrew finds Peter as over-joyed he tells him We have found the Messiah which is being interpreted the Christ When Philip finds Nathanael he is in the same tune We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write Jesus of Nazareth the Son of Joseph Joh. 1.41 45. And of succeeding Believers S. Peter saith 1 Pet. 1.8 Whom having not seen ye love in whom though now ye see him not yet believing ye rejoyce with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory So that I may by an Induction of Particulars raising the Observation from the Hypothesis to the Thesis conclude universally That the Day of Christ is to all Believers the Spring of their Joy the Basis of their Comfort the Stay and Support of their Spirits in the days of their Pilgrimage upon Earth The Reasons whereof are common to all Believers Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and to day and for ever Though the Mystery of the Gospell was not so clearly nor so fully revealed before as it was by the Apostles Preaching but from the beginning of the world was in a sort hid in God yet in no Age was there Salvation in any other none other Name under Heaven given among men whereby they must be saved He onely hath been the Way the Truth and the Life so that none come to the Father but by him Abel Enoch Noah Abraham Moses David and all the rest of the Holy Saints in foregoing Generations had Salvation by Faith in Christ as really as S. Peter and S. Paul or any of the Holy Martyrs and Confessours in the Catholick Church It is true the Knowledge of Christ was not so clearly revealed to the sons of men before his Coming in the Flesh as it was after when the Day-spring from on high visited us to give Light to them that sit in Darkness and in the Shadow of Death to guide our feet into the way of Peace And therefore John Baptist exceeded all the Prophets foregoing he being the man that could say Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the Sins of the World Yet the Apostles yea the least in the Kingdom of Heaven that can preach Christ Born Baptized Preaching Dying Rising Ascended into Heaven is greater then John the Baptist as having seen and heard that which many Prophets and Kings desired to hear and see but did not The Knowledge the Patriarchs had was Vespertine the Apostles and ours comparatively Meridian Besides before Christ's Ascension the Knowledge of him was not so amply revealed for though a few of the Gentiles found Christ yet the Way of Salvation was not prepared before the face of all People so as that Christ became a Light to lighten the Gentiles as well as to be the Glory of his people Israel But when S. Paul was made the Apostle of the Gentiles Christ was set to be a Light to the Gentiles that he might be for Salvation unto the ends of the Earth Act. 13.47 S. Peter was taught to call none common or unclean but to preach to the Gentiles as being those to whom also God had granted Repentance unto Lefe Act. 11.18 Whence the same way of Salvation was vouchsafed to Cornelius that was to Abraham Cornelius had his Faith imputed to him for Righteousness as well as Abraham God put no difference between them and us having purified their Hearts by Faith saith S. Peter Act. 15.9 He was the God not onely of the Jews but also of the Gentiles seeing it was one God which should justifie the Circumcision by Faith and Vncircumcision through Faith Rom. 3.29 30. And hence as Abraham rejoyced to see Christ's Day so did the Wise men of the East and in all that were made Holy Converts by the preaching of the Gospel there was the same Joy for the kind which was in Abraham all with the same Spirit of Faith glorified Christ though some with more enlarged Hearts then others In the Effects of this Joy Praising God Loving Christ and Adhering to him there is the same Mind in all the same Hope the same Expressions though not to the same degree in all In some Ages the Joy was more extensive then in others in
our Spirituall Voiage towards Heaven and our Christian Warfare The Presence of God is All in all without God's Presence we can doe nothing though we should have all the furniture of wit strength wealth and the assistence of men yet should we not be able to goe one step forward in the way to Happiness we of our selves should not be sufficient to think any thing as of our selves for all our Sufficiency is of God 2 Cor. 3.5 Yea our Adversary the Devil would easily devour us if the Lord should depart from us On the other side If God be for us who can be against us Neither life nor death nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall prevail against us The auxiliary force of God's Presence makes a Believer in Tribulation distress persecution famine nakedness peril sword to be more then a Conquerour even to triumph and to glory in the Lord as knowing that his Riches exceed Croesus his wealth his Glory Solomon's glory and that he may truly say without Thrasonicall vaunting Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come All are mine I being Christ's and Christ God's 1 Cor. 3.22 23. Thus did the Psalmist express his apprehensions of the benefit of God's Presence in relation to his Safety Comfort and Happiness That he restored his Soul and led him in the paths of Righteousness for his Name 's sake Yea though he did walk through the valley of the shadow of death he would fear no evil for God was with him his Rod and his Staff did comfort him Psal 23.3 4. That his Goodness and Mercy should follow him all the days of his life vers 6. That he would shew him the path of Life in his Presence was fulness of Joy at his right hand Pleasures for evermore Psal 16.11 As to be near such a King as Solomon was counted so great a Happiness that the blessedness of Solomon's Courtiers was magnified with admiration by the Queen of Sheba so much more blessed are they that are acquainted with God and are near to him In his Favour is their life Psal 30.5 The light of his Countenance is better then life it self Man being Animal sociabile a sociable Living creature needs Society it is most joyous for him to be with them whom he loves and who love him and can help him But such is none now in comparison of God and therefore no Company to a Holy heart like to God's David's Soul thirsted for God panted after him to come and appear before him But his Tears were his meat day and night in his absence from God and it was as a Sword in his bones to be reproached with this demand Where is thy God When God hid his face he was troubled Which comes to pass by our departing from God and that brings me to the II. OBSERVATION That the committing of great and enormous Sins endangers the Privation of God's Presence It is true that God sometimes to try his most upright Servants doth withdraw from them the light of his Countenance not out of Indignation against them for any great Transgression committed by them Thus he dealt with Job when he exercised his Patience which made him expostulate the matter with God Job 13.24 Wherefore hidest thou thy face and holdest me for thine Enemy vers 26. For thou writest bitter things against me and makest me to possess the Iniquities of my youth And Heman the Ezrahite Psal 88.14 Lord why castest thou off my Soul why hidest thou thy Face from me But this casting off and hiding God's Face is but for a time and not in wrath but like a Father's dealing with his Child when he for a little while sequesters himself to make experiment of his Child's Affection and to excite him thereby to seek him the more earnestly Nevertheless even this also tends to bring them to the acknowledgment of their Sins therefore the Prophet Hosea 5.15 brings in God thus saying I will goe away and return to my place till they acknowledge their Offence and seek my Face in their Affliction they will seek me early Even Job wanted God's Presence till he confessed himself vile and repented abhorring himself in dust and ashes Job 42.6 But there is a more direfull Casting out of God's Presence with utter Forsaking so as to cast a people or person out of his sight for ever by leaving them to be a Prey to those who waste and oppress them as when he threatned Jerem. 7.15 to cast the Jews out of his sight as he had cast out all their brethren the whole seed of Ephraim which he accomplished in the Babylonish Captivity as it is Jerem. 52.3 Through the Anger of the Lord it came to pass in Jerusalem and Judah that God cast them out of his Presence especially because of all the Provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withall 2 King 23.26 And indeed though Manasseh repenting was not utterly and for ever cast out of God's Presence yet by reason of the hainousness of his Sins the Lord brought upon him and his people the Captains of the hoast of the King of Assyria which took him among the thorns and bound him with fetters and carried him to Babylon 2 Chron. 33.11 And David himself when he had by his great Transgressions provoked the Lord to Anger in the matter of Vriah the Hittite found God's favourable Presence so removed from him that in his House he suffered by his Children great Calamities which were inflicted by God to shew his Indignation so that though he were not Filius Irae a Child of Wrath cast away with utter Dereliction as a Reprobate yet he was Filius sub Ira a Child under Wrath for that present which made him dread his Danger and to be thus importunate with God not to cast him out of his Presence And indeed in case of great Sins committed presumptuously against Warning or Conscience enlightned and continued in with Impenitency it is inconsistent with God's Holiness and Honour to afford his Presence it being contrary to his Nature and Glory to countenance Evil who is not a God that hath pleasure in Wickedness neither shall Evil dwell with him The foolish shall not stand in his sight he hateth all workers of Iniquity Psal 5.4 5. He is of purer eyes then to behold Evil and cannot look on Iniquity Hab. 1.13 As it is with a gallant Prince who cannot brook a base Coward or a neat and cleanly Nobleman who cannot endure in his company a sordid and nasty Sloven but will thrust or keep such out of his presence so it is with God When a Man or Nation have defiled themselves with such odious Iniquities as God abhors till they be washed with true Repentance and new cloathed by putting on the Lord Jesus there is no hope of finding God ready to admit them near to him Wherefore