and destroys it but waving them I shall only mention two Particulars wherein this energy of Faith in keeping Men from Sin is the most conspicuous First Faith preserves from Sin by bringing in and presenting to the Soul eternal Rewards and Punishments and that 's the peculiar Office of Faith These indeed are future unto Sense but they are present unto Faith for Faith is the substance of things not seen Heb. 11.1 It gives them a Being before they are and what we hope for or fear as to come by Faith it is enjoyed or felt as already present Why now what a mighty advantage is this to preserve men from sinning Would Sinners treat with the Devil or hearken to a Temptation if they should now see the whole World on flame Angels hastning them to Judgment and Christ upon his Throne here Heaven to receive and crown them there Hell with all its horrours to torment them would any of you dare to sin if all this were before your eyes Why believe it when Faith acts lively all this is as truly present to the Soul as it is certain it shall once be and therefore no more than we would commit a Sin if Sentence were now passing upon us either of Absolution or of eternal Damnation at the Judgment-Seat of God no more shall we sin while Faith sets these things evidently before our eyes and makes them as real to us as they are sure Secondly Faith preserves from sinning by representing that God who must hereafter be our Judge to be now our Spectator and Observer It is only an Eye of Faith that can discover things future as present and things spiritual as real Why now God he is a spiritual Being and therefore is invisible to the dull eyes of Flesh but the quick Eye of Faith that can see him who is invisible as it was said of Moses Heb. 11.27 it fixeth its eye upon the all-seeing eye of God and fills the Soul with awful Thoughts of God's Omni-presence and Omnisciency that all things are naked and bare before him in whose company we are where-ever we are and with whom we have to do whatever we are doing Why now consider with your selves Would I commit such or such a Sin to which possibly you are tempted if some grave person were in the room with you whom you did much respect And what shall the Presence of a mortal Man keep you from sinning and shall not the Presence of the Great God much more Shall we dare to sin when God's eye is fixed upon us when he views not only our outward Actions but also our inward Thoughts clearer than we can see the faces one of another It was the wise Counsel that a Heathen-Man gave to a Scholar of his That if he would preserve himself from doing any thing that was undecent he should suppose some sober and reverend man present with him and this would keep him from doing that which he would be ashamed to do before him Truly we need not make any such Supposition the great and holy God is present with us in reality and the eye of Faith discovers him so to be he is always looking on us yea always looking into us and certainly this to one that can exercise the discerning eye of Faith will be a more effectual means to keep a man from Sin than if all the eyes of Men and Angels were upon him Secondly As the exercise of Faith so the sprightly and vigorous exercise of Divine Love is an excellent Preservative against Sin Love will not willingly do any thing that may offend and grieve the Object loved Love it is an assimilating Affection it is the very Cement that joyns God and the Soul together in the same Spirit and makes them to be of one heart and of one mind it is the Load-stone of the Soul that toucheth all other Affections and makes them stand heaven-ward When once God hath wrought the Love of himself in our hearts this will constrain us to love what he loves and to hate what he hates Sin is the only thing that God hates and those that love him will not cannot but hate Sin their love to God will constrain them to do it Psalm 97 7. Ye that love the Lord hate evil And certainly the hatred of evil is the best security against the committing of it will any one take a Toad or Serpent into his bosome to lodge it there Truly as utterly impossible it is while the Exciting Grace of God stirs up and quickens our Love to him that we should ever embrace a vile lust and lodge it in our hearts since our sight of the beauty of Holiness hath made it ugly and our love to God hath made it hateful Thirdly To mention no more A Holy Fear and Caution least we should Sin is a most excellent preservative against Sin None are so safe as those that are least secure fear is the best preservative of Grace whereas those that are rash and venturous and confident of their own strength run themselves into many Temptations and come off with wounded and smarting Consciences Stand in awe says the Psalmist and Sin not Psalm 4.4 The timorous and trembling Christian stands firmest because such a one is apt upon every occasion to suspect his own strength and to call in God's And indeed when we consider the treachery of our own Hearts and the subtilty of the Devil this Holy Fear and Jealousie is no more than is needful and it is less than sufficient A Man that is to wade thorough a deep River will first try his Footing before he takes his step Why we are to wade thorough the depths of Satan as the Apostle calls them and certainly it is but a requisite caution first to try our ground before we venture upon it to look about and consider whether such and such an Action be grounded upon a Command and secured to us by a Promise whether if we do it we shall not lay our selves open to such and such Temptations or if we do lie open to them whether or not we are in God's way and may expect his Protection and Preservation Truly such circumspection as this is will prove our best security and though we are not able by all our own strength and diligence to preserve our selves yet when God sees us so industriously solicitous to avoid Sin he will then come in by his Almighty Grace that helps not the Sloathful but the Laborious and he will keep us from those Sins that we cannot keep our selves from Now for the Application of this if it be so that it is the Almighty Power of God only that can keep us from Sin This may then be Convictive of that Errour that now a Days is very rife in the World that ascribes our preservation in our standing not so much to the Almighty Grace of God as to the Liberty and Freedom of our own Wills Truly this is an Opinion that proceeds much from the Pride and Stomach
purlues as soon as they are gotten within the Pale he ceaseth his pursuit It is usually the highest care and upshot of a Moral Man's endeavours to keep his Lusts from boiling over and raising Smoak and Ashes about him and if he can but obtain this let the Heart be brim full of Sin let the thoughts soak and stew in Malicious Unclean Covetous Designs and Contrivances he never opposeth or laments them a meer Restraint walks only round about the outward Man and if it meets with any Lust strugling abroad it drives it in again into the Heart but for those Sins that lie Pent up there it seldom molests and never subdues them The Heart may indulge it self in vain filthy destructive and pernicious Thoughts it may set brooding over Cockatrice-Eggs till it hatch them into Serpents and in them be stung to Death it may toss a Sin to and fro in the Fancy and thereby make some kind of recompence to the Devil for not committing of it and yet this Man be only under a powerful restraint from God's Restraining Grace But now Sanctifying Grace doth more especially oppose the Sins of the Heart and of the inward Man for there is its Seat and Residence in the Heart Restraining Grace watcheth without but true Grace dwells within And as Christ speaks of the Church of Pergamos it dwells there where Satan's Seat is it rules in the midst of its Enemies and it is engaged so to do for its own security that it may still crush them as they arise in the Heart Now from this particular we may be help'd in Judging whether our abstaining from Sin be only from common Restraining Grace or from Sanctifying and Renewing Grace See what Sins they are that you most of all labour to beat down do you strive only against the Sins of your Lives and not against the Sins of your Hearts that are the Spring and Fountain of the other Are you content when you have beaten your Corruptions from the out-works and driven them in where they do not rage so furiously as they have done whereas before they sallied forth at pleasure and made havock of your Souls and wounded your Consciences now they are Pent up in a narrower room and compass Doth this content you do you think it enough to lay close Siege to your Corruptions by Conviction and legal Terrours and to shut them up that they may no more break forth as formerly they have done to the gross defilement of your Lives if this be all then know this is no more than what a meer common Restraint may effect upon you without any work of Sanctifying Grace upon the Heart True Grace when it beats back Sin it follows it and pursues it into the Heart and there searcheth for it and if it sees it but breath in a Thought or stir in a Desire presently it falls upon it and destroys it Sanctifying Grace sets the will against sin but restraining Grace only awakens the Conscience Thirdly Sanctifying Grace when it keeps a Soul from sin it always engageth the will against it but common and restraining Grace only awakens and rouzeth up the Conscience against it the Will and the Conscience are two leading faculties of the Soul the one commands what shall be done and the other informs what ought to be done and all the rest of the faculties and affections of the Soul take part and side with these two now in a Godly Man these two are at an agreement what Conscience prompts the Will commands and the inferior faculties are already to execute Sanctifying Grace that works immediatly and specially upon the Will and makes a mighty change there that whereas before Conversion Man's Will is so utterly depraved that it can like nothing but sin after Grace hath touched it and mightily turn'd it about it cannot now any longer give its full and free consent to the commission of any sin if such a one sins he doth it truly and properly against his Will as the Apostle speaks in the Romans 7.15 Rom. 7.15 What I do I allow not now a wicked Man may sin against his Conscience but it is impossible that he should ever sin against his Will that is continually set upon sin and were it not that God sometimes raiseth up natural Conscience in him to oppose his corrupt Will he would every moment rush into the most damning impieties without any of the least regret or sense of it when the Devil presents a sin to the embraces of the Will and when the Will closeth with it and all the faculties of the Soul are ready to commit it God sends in Conscience among them what Conscience art thou asleep seest thou not how the Devil and thine own devilish heart are now plotting and contriving thine Eternal ruin Now this rouzeth Conscience and makes it storm and threaten and hurl Fire-brands into the face of sin while it lies in the very embraces of the Will and though it cannot change the Will from loving of it yet it frights the Will from committing of it this is the most usual way restraining Grace takes for the prevention of sin by sending in Conscience to make strong and vigorous oppositions against it there are none of us here but through Divine Grace have been kept from many sins that we were in great danger through the corruptions of our own hearts to have committed sin hath been conceived by us but God hath stifled and strangled it in the Womb would you know now whether this hath proceeded from God's Restraining or from God's Sanctifying Grace why then make a judgment according to this rule where restraining Grace only resists and hinders sin it doth it by setting one faculty and affection of the Soul against another but where sanctifying Grace hinders it it sets the same faculty and affection of the Soul against it self restraining Grace sets one affection against another Conscience against Will the fear of Hell against the love of Sin hellish terrors against sinful pleasures God's threatnings against the Devil's flatteries it martials up these and so enters the combat here are bandyings of one power of the Soul against another but now the Will that is entirely on sins part and if Conscience prevails and pulls away a beloved lust from the embraces of the Will the Sinner parts with it very heavily and unwillingly following it as Phaltiel did Michal weeping tho he durst not make resistance but now when sanctifying Grace opposeth and hinders sin it sets the same faculty and affection of the Soul against it self Will against Will and Love against Love Desire against Desire he wills the commission of sin it is true but yet at the same time he wills the mortification of it he loves to gratifie his sin but yet at the same time he wills the crossing of it too he desires to enjoy that pleasure and contentment that he fansies he may take in sin and yet he desires at the same time to destroy it here
that the inclinations of the best were too strong even to those Sins that a perfect Moralist would think scorn that they should be suspected of and therefore he Exhorts them with all earnestness and frequent importunity to Mortifie such foul Sins as these are Thirdly From the irritating Power of the Law It appears also from the irritating power that the Law hath Even in the best of God's Children there is accidentally through our Corruption such a Malign influence if I may so call it in the Holy Just and Good Law of God that instead of quelling Sin it doth the more enrage and provoke it and this we call the irritating power of the Law Thus the Apostle tells us in Rom. 7.11 13. That Sin takes occasion by the Law to work in us all manner of Concupiscence Why now were it possible that Sin should grow strong by that Law that was given on purpose to destroy it but that there is in us violent propensions towards what is forbidden us and eager desires after that which God hath denied us So strangely depraved are our Corrupt Natures that we swell with our Yoke and labour to throw off whatever may lay a restraint upon us like Green Sticks which being bent one way by natural strength we start as far back the other way Can none of us call to mind some Sins that possibly we should never have committed had they not been forbidden to us the Command often-times gives Corruption a hint in what how it may offend God And is not this therefore a clear demonstration of that mighty proness that there is in all of us unto Sin when that Law that forbids Sin shall prove an incentive to it The more will a high mettled Horse foam and fling the harder you Rein him in And if you stop a River in its course it will rise and swell till it over-flows its Banks and whence is this but because there is a Natural Proneness in it to run towards the Sea And when God casts his Law before Men as a stop to them in their sinful course they swell the higher till they have born or over-flown all those Bounds and Dams that God hath set to bound them in And whence proceeds all this but only because there is a Natural tendency and propension in Men's Hearts to Sin and therefore the more they are opposed the higher still do our Corruptions swell and the more do they rage and although the force of this sinful propension may be in some of God's Children in a good measure broken yet in the very best of them is there some degree or other of this irritating power of the Law to stir them up to Sin even by forbidding of them to Sin And that 's the last demonstration The next thing propounded Whence it is that Christians have a proneness in them unto every Sin was to enquire into the Original Cause whence this sinful inclination proceeds how it comes to pass that there is in all Men and even in the best Christians such a strong propension unto Sin Now in the enquiry into this I shall lead you on gradually by these following steps First In Man's first Creation the Will had in it a Natural Power to determine the Specification of its own Acts that is freely to sway it self either unto Good or Evil which of them it pleased and if there was any Biass in it to draw it more one way than another as some there was it was an inclination to that which is Good for Man's Faculties were then entire and perfect his Knowledg clear to discern what was his chief Good and his highest Happiness his Will free to choose it and his Affections ready to embrace and clasp about it His Love his Fear his Joy his Delight were all of them Centred in God that which is now in us from Grace was in him from Nature Since the Fall we need a Twofold assistance one a Common influence and assistance such as is vouchsafed to all Men to enable them to the performance of the common and ordinary Actions of this Life it is from God's immediate influence that we are enabled to Move to Think to Speak for in him we Live Move and have our Beings And then we need also a Special influence vouchsafed only to the Children of God whereby we are enabled to perform Holy and Spiritual Actions as to Love Fear and Obey God sincerely and this Special influence we commonly call Grace whereby we are enabled to Act Divinely and Spiritually Now the difference betwixt Common and Special influence lies in this that what God works in us by a Common influence that is wrought without any grudg or reluctancy in Man's Nature to the contrary but what is wrought in us by a Special influence that is brought to pass Nature gain-saying and contradicting it thus when God enables a Sinner to Act Faith or Love or any Divine and Heavenly Grace this is contrary to the tendency of Corrupt Nature and therefore this is called Special Grace Now while Man stood in the state of Innocency there was nothing in his Nature that contradicted his Fear of God his Dependance on God or his Love to God and therefore to enable him to Act all these he needed no Special influence of Special Grace but only of a common and ordinary Providence Before the Fall Adam stood in no need at all of any such thing as Special Grace as we now stand in need of but the same assistance of God for the kind of it that enabled him to Move or to Speak or to Think was sufficient also to enable him to perform the most Spiritual Obedience because then the most Spiritual Obedience was no more to him than those Actions which we call Natural as Eating and Drinking Speaking Walking and Thinking are to us now and therefore he required no more assistance from God for the performance of Spiritual Obedience than we now require from God for our Natural Actions Now as he had this perfection of power to perform what was good so he had a proneness of will also to it but yet in that proneness there was not perseverance He might as afterwards he did turn aside from God unto Satan and notwithstanding his inclination to Obedience and proneness to that which was Good yet having not a perseverance in that proneness but being Lord over his own Will as he was over the rest of the visible Creation he voluntarily and wilfully consented to the Commission of Sin Why now Secondly This voluntary inclination of Adam to Sin hath ever since by a dreadful yet righteous Judgmen of God brought upon all his Posterity a natural and necessary inclination unto Sin so that now either whatever they do is Sin or there is Sin in whatever they do Now that we may clearly apprehend how Adam's first Sin and Provocation committed so many Thousand Years ago causes such strong propensions to Sin in all his Posterity you must
they who thus argue and who thus act never knew what a sweet and powerful Attractiveness there is in the sense of pardoning Grace and Love to win over the Heart from the practice of those sins that God hath forgot to punish Pardoning Grace engageth to Love God Secondly This should engage us to Love that God who so loved us as freely for his own sake to forgive us such vast Debts and such multiplied sins This is the import of that Speech of our Saviour he loveth most to whom most is forgiven him And hence it is and you may commonly observe it That none are such great Lovers and Admirers of free Grace as those who before Conversion were the vilest and most flagitious Sinners Thirdly Pardoning Grace should teach us to forgive others Since God doth so freely pardon us let this teach us and prevail with us to pardon and forgive the offence of others This is that the Scripture doth urge as the most natural Inference of this Doctrine of God's pardoning Grace Thus the Apostle Ephes 4.32 Be ye kind to one another tender-hearted forgiving one another as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you And say not as ignorant People are wont to do I will forgive but I will never forget for God doth forgive and forget too I will blot out your transgressions and I will remember your sins no more Your sins against God are Talents others Offences against you are but Pence and if for every trivial Provocation you are ready to take your Brother by the Throat and wreak your wrath and revenge upon him may you not fear lest your Lord and Master to whom you stand deeply indebted should also deal so with you for far greater Crimes than others can be guilty of against you and cast you into Prison until you have paid the utmost most Farthing especially considering that you pray for the forgiveness of your own sins as you do proportionably forgive the sins of others Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us And thus I have opened and demonstrated unto you the former part of the Doctrine That the Grace of God whereby he blots out and forgives sin is absolutely free I am now in the next place to prove that it is infinitely glorious Now this I shall endeavour to do by considering pardon of sin in the Nature of it in the Concomitants of it and in the Effects and Consequences of it From all which it will appear both how great a Mercy it is to us and how great a Glory it is to God that he blots out and forgets sin And First Let us consider the nature of pardon of sin what it is And this we cannot better discover than by looking into the Nature of sin Sin therefore as the Apostle describes it is a Transgression of the Law Now to the Validity of any Law there are Penalties literally expressed or tacitly implyed which are altogether necessary The guilt contracted by the transgressing of the Law is nothing but our liableness to undergo the Penalty threatned in the Law and this guilt it is two-fold the one is intrinsical and necessary and that is the desert of punishment which sin carries always in it The other is extrinsical and adventitious by which sin is ordained to be punished These two things are in every sin Every sin deserves Death and God hath in his Law ordain'd and threatned to inflict Death for it Question Now it being clear That Pardon and Remission of Sin is nothing but the removal of the guilt of sin the Question is Whether it removes that guilt that consists in the desert of punishment or that which consists in the voluntary appointment of it unto punishment or both Answer To this I Answer Pardon of sin doth not remove the intrinsical desert of punishment but only the adventitious appointment and ordination of it unto punishment flowing from the Will of God who hath in his own Law threatned to punish sin Remission doth not make that the sins even of Believers themselves should not deserve Death for a liableness to the penalty of the Law in this sence is a necessary consequent upon the Transgression of the Law But because God in the Covenant of Grace hath promised not to reward his Penitent Servants according to the evil of their doings therefore Pardoning Grace removes this guilt of sin arising from God's Ordination of it unto punishment As now suppose a Traytour should accept of the proffer of a Pardon the guilt of his Treason ceaseth not in the inward nature of it but still he deserves to be punished but this Obnoxiousness of his through the Prince's Favour and Appointment is taken away and so that guilt ceaseth So the Repenting Sinner every sin he commits deserves Death but upon his believing in the Lord Jesus Christ this liableness unto Death ceaseth being graciously remitted to them by God Now the Scripture sets forth this Pardon of sin in very sweet and full Expressions It is called a covering of sin Psal 32.1 Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven and whose sin is covered Though our covering of our sins is no Security from the inspection of God's Eye who clearly beholds the most hidden and secret things of Darkness yet certainly those sins that God himself hath covered from himself he will never again look into so as to punish for them Nay yet farther as a ground of Comfort Pardon of sin is not only called a covering of our sins from God's sight but a covering of God's Face and Sight from them so we have it Psal 51.9 Hide thy face from my sins and blot out mine iniquities It is a casting of our sins behind God's back as a thing that shall never more be regarded or look'd upon so it is expressed to us Isaiah 38.17 Thou hast in love to my soul says good Hezekiah when a Message of Death was brought to him by the Prophet cast all my sins behind thy back It is a casting of them into the depth of the Sea from whence they shall never more arise either in this World to terrifie our Consciences or in the World to come to condemn our Souls so we have it in Micah 1.19 I will cast all their Iniquities says God into the depth of the Sea It is a scattering of them as a thick cloud so it is called Esay 44.22 I will scatter their sins as a cloud and their iniquities as a thick cloud And in the Text it is called a blotting out and a forgetting of sin I even I am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for my own sake and will not remember thy sins a blotting out to shew That God will never read his Debt-Book against us and a forgetting it That we may not fear that God will accuse us without-book Now these and such like Expressions with which the Scripture doth abound do very much illustrate the Mercy of God in pardoning of sin and I