hold then of the blessed God in thy Meditations and fill thy thougts with him and dwell upon those thoughts Remember he is alwaies with thee and where ever thou art or what ever thou art doing most certainly he seeth thee As sure as thou are there the Lord is there He knowes thy thoughts he heares thy words he sees all thy waies And is such a God as this to be provoked or despised Were it not better provok and despise all the world Is his favour to be sleighted Were it not better to lose the favour of all the world Consider of this 2º Another thing that I would have you oft Think of is what end you were made for and what business it is that you came for into the world You may well think that God made you not in vaine and that he made you for no lower end then for himself And that he would never have made you nor so long preserved you if he had not cared what you do He would never have endued you with a Reasonable and immortal Soul but for some high and noble and immortal end Surely it was that you might be happy in Knowing him that he made you capable of Knowing him for he made nothing in vaine It is usefull to a horse to know his pasture and provender and work and perhaps his master but he needs not know whether there be a God And accordingly he is qualified But it is sure mans chief concernment to know that there is a God and what he is and how to serve him and what he is and will be to us Or else we should never have been capable of such things And he would never have made you capable of loving him but that you should be exercised and made happy in that Love The frame and faculties and capacity of your Souls and the scope of Scripture do all declare that you were sent into this world to seek after God and to Love him and obey him and rejoice in him in your measure and to prepare for a life of nearer Communion where you may Enjoy him and please him in the highest perfection Consider with your selves whether a life of sin be that which you were made for Or whether God sent you hither to break his Laws and follow your own lusts And whether the satisfying of your flesh and the gathering of a little worldly wealth and the feathering of a nest which you must so quickly leave be like to be the business that you were sent about into the world 3o. The next thing that I would have you consider of is How you have answered the Ends of your Creation and how you have done the business that you came into the world to do Look back upon the drift of your hearts and lives read over the most ancient records of your consciences and see what you have been what you have been doing in the world till now Have you spent you daies in seeking after God and your estates and strength in faithfull serving him Have you lived all this time in the admirations of his excellencies and the servent Love of him and delightfull remembrance of him and the zealous worship of him If you had done this you had not need of a Conversion But consider have you not forgotten what business you had in the world and little minded the world that you should have prepared for and lived as if you knew not him that made you or why he made you was sport and merryment the end that you were created for was ease and idleness or eating or drinking or vaine discourses or recreation the business that you came into the world about was living to the flesh and scraping up riches or gapeing after the esteeme of men the work that God sent you hither to do Was this it that he preserved you for and daily gave you in provision for what was it to forget him and sleight him and turne him out of your hearts and rob him of his service and honour and to set up your flesh in his stead and give that to it that was due to him Bethink you what you have done and whether you have done the work that you were sent to do or not 4º The next thing you should use to Consider of is How grievously you have sinned and what a case it is that your sin hath brought you into If you take but an impartiall view of your lives you may see how far you have mist your marks how far you have been from what you should have been and how little you have done of that which was your business And O what abundance of aggravations have your sins which I shall pass over now because I must mention them under another head It is not only some actuall out-breakings against the bent of your heart and life but your very heart was false and gone from God and set in you to do evill O the time that you have lost the means and helps that you have neglected the motions that you have resisted the swarms of evil thoughts that have filled your imaginations the streams of vaine and evill words that have flowed from your mouth the works of darkness in publik and in secret that God hath seen you in And all this while how empty were you of inwad holiness and how barren of good works to God or men What have you done with all your talents and how little or nothing hath God had of all And now consider what a case you are in while you remain unconverted you have made your selves the sinks of sinne the slaves of Satan and the flesh and are skilfull in nothing but doing evill If you be called to prayer or holy meditation your hearts are against it and you are not used to it and therefore you know not how to do it to any purpose But to think the thoughts of lust or coveteousness or hatred or malice or revenge this you can do without any toile To speak of the world or of your sports and pleasures or against those that you bare ill will to this you can do without any study You are such as are spoken of Jer. 4. 22. My people is foolish they have not known me they are sottish children and they have no understanding they are wise to do evill but to do good they have no knowledge You are grown strangers to the God that made you in whose love and service you should live and find your chief delights Your hearts are hardned and you are dead in your sins The guilt of the sins of your lives are still upon you You can neither look into your hearts or lives no not on one day of your lives or the best hour that you have spent but you must see the ugly face of sin which deserveth condemnation You have made God your Enemy that should have been your only felicity And yet you are alwaies at his mercy and in his hands Little do you know
sinne and Judgments are most eminent sorrow must be thâ—n predominant as being a necessary means to solid Joy And therefore ordinarily a sinner that is but in the work of Conversion and newly coming to God from a rebellious state must entertain more sorrow and let out himself more to groanes and tears then afterward when he is brought to Reconciliation with God and walketh in integrity Quest. But when is it that my sorrow is too short and I should labour to increase it Answ. 1. When there is no apparent danger of the last-mentioned evils that is Of destroying your bodies distracting your brains discomomposing your minds and drowning other Graces and duties and the rest then you have little cause to be afraid of an excess 2. When you have not smart enough to cause you to value the Love of Christ and highly prise his blood and the effects of it and hunger and thirst after him and his righteousness and earnestly beg for the pardon of your sinne you have cause to desire the more sorrow If you feel no great need of Christ but pass by him as lightly as the full stomack by his food as if you could do well enough without him you may be sure then you have need to be broken more If you set not so much by the Love of God that you would part with any thing in the world to enjoy it and would think no terms too dear for Heaven You have need to lie under the sence of your sinne and misery a little longer and to beseech the Lord to save you from that heart of stone When you can hear of the Love and sufferings of your Redeemer without any warmth of Love to him again and can read or hear the promises of Grace and offers of Christ and Eternall life without any considerable Joy or Thankfullness it 's time for you then to beg of God a tender heart 3. When you make many pawses in the work of your Conversion and are sometime in a good mind and then again at a stand as if you were yet unresolved whether to turn or no When you stick at Christ terms of denying your selves and crucifying the flesh and forsaking all for the hopes of Glory and think these sayings somewhat hard and are considering of the matter whether you should yield to them or not or are secretly Reserving somewhat to your selves this certainly shews that you are not yet sufficiently humbled or else you would never stand trifling thus with God He must yet set your sinnes in order before you and hold you a while over the fire of Hell and ring your Consciences such a peal as shall make you yield and resolve your doubts and â—each you not to dally with your maker If Pharaoh himself be off and on with God and sometime he will let Israel goe and then again he will not God will follow him with plague after plague till he make him yield and glad to drive or hasten them away And even where he deals in waies of Grace he maketh so much use of sorrows as to make men yield the sooner to his terms and glad to have Mercy on such terms if they were harder 4. When you are heartless and dull under the Ordinances of God and Scripture hath little life or sweetness to you and you are almost indifferent whether you call upon God in secret or no and whether you go to the Congregation and heare the Word and joyn in Gods Praises and the Communion of the Saints and you have no great relish in holy Conference or any Ordinance but do them almost meerly for custom or to please your Consciences and not for any great need you feel of them or good you find by them this shews for certain you want some more of the rod and spurre your hearts be not wakened and broken sufficiently but God must take you in hand again 5. When you can be mindless of God and of the life to come and forget both your sinne and Saviours Blood and let out your thoughts almost continually upon worldly vanities or common things as if you were over-grown the need of Christ this shews that the stone is yet in your hearts and that God must keep you to a harder dyet to mend your appetites and make you feel you sinne and misery till it call off your thoughts from things that less concern you and teach you to mind your Everlasting state If you begin to forget your selves and him â—t's time for you to have a remembrancer 6. When you begin to tast more sweetness in the creature and be more tickled with applause and honour and pleased more with a full estate and more impatient with poverty or wants or wrongs from men and crosses in the world and when you are set upon a thriving course and are eager to grow rich and fall in love with money when you drown your selves in worldly cares and busines and are combred about many things through your own choice this shews indeed that you are dangerously unhumbled and if God have Mercy for you he will bring you low and make your riches gall and wormwood to you and abate your appetite and teach you to know that one thing is needfull and so be more eager after the food that perisheth not and hereafter to choose the better part Luke 10. 41 42. Joh. 6. 27. 7. When you can return to play with the occasions of sinne or look upon it with a reconcileable mind as if you had yet some mind on it and could almost find in your heart to be doing with it again when you begin to have a mind of your old company and courses or begin to draw as neare it as you dare and are gazing upon the bair and tasting of the forbidden thing and can scarce tell how to deny your fancies your appetites your senses their desires this shews that you want some wakening work God must yet read you another lecture in the black book and set you to spell those lines of blood which it seems you have forgotten and kindle a little of that fire in your Consciences which else you would runne into till you feel and understand whether it be good playing with sinne and the Wrath of God and the Everlasting fire 8. When you begin to be indifferent as to your Communion with God and think not much whether he accept you and manifest his love to you or not but can huddle up your prayers and look no more after them or what becomes of them and use Ordinances and seldom enquire of the success When you can spare the Spiritual Consolations of the Saints and fetch little of your comfort from Christ or Heaven but from your friends and health and prosperity and accomodations and perhaps can be as merry in carnal company when you say and do as they as if you were considering of the Love of Christ this shews that the threatnings went not deep enough Sorrow hath yet another part to
Creature who was the Subject The Wisdom and Love and Mercy of God would not give way to this that the world should be destroyed so soon after it was made and man left remediless in everlasting Misery Satisfaction therefore must be the Remedy This must be such as might be as fit to procure the Ends of the Law as if the Law it self had been executed that is as if the offendors had all dyed the death that it did threaten It must therefore be a publik Demonstration of Justice and of the odiousness of Sinne to the terrour and warning of sinners for the future And this was done by Jesus Christ when none else in Heaven or Earth could do it For it did as fully demonstrate this Justice of God and preserved his honour and the usefullness of his Law and government that a Person so high and Glorious and so dear to him should suffer so much for sinne as if all the world had suffered for themselves And thus God made him to be sinne for us who knew no sinne 2 Cor. 5. 21. And thus Christ hath Redeemed us from the Curse of the Law being made a Curse for us Gal. 3. 13. 2. Hereby also God Demonstrated the Holiness of his Nature How much he hateth sinne and how unreconcilable he is to it as light to darkness As the Law and Judgments of God do proceed from his Perfect Nature and Will so do they bear the Image of that perfection and demonstrate it to the world This therefore is the nobler End and work of Christ in our redemption to declare the Holiness and Perfection of God in his Nature and Will though the former the declaring of his Governing Justice be the neerer End If the death of Aarons two sonnes were such a Declaratition that God will be sanctified in all that draw neer him Lev. 10. 2 3 If his Laws and present Judgments do declare him to be a Holy and Jealous God that will not forgive sinne without a valuable consideration or satisfaction Jos. 24. 19. how much more evidently is this declared in the death of Christ If the Bethshemites cry out who is able to stand before this Holy Lord God 1 Sam. 6. 20. Upon the death of 50070 men how much more may the guilty Soul say so when he thinks on the Crucified Sonne of God As it is the End of Gods execution on transgressors that the Lord may be exalted in Judgment and God that is Holy may be Sanctified in Righteousness Isa. 5. 16. So was it his End in the Sacrifice of his Sonne 3. Another End of our Redemption by Christ is the Demonstration of the Infinite Wisdom of God His Wisdom in the preventing the ruin of the late-created world that it might not be said that sin and Satan had frustrated him of the Glory of his Creation and destroyed it almost as soon as he had made it Yea in getting an advantage by the malice of his enemies for the more admirable attainment of the Ends of his Law and the Glorifying of all his Governing Attributes He would not have made man a free Agent and left him in the hand of his own will and suffered him to sinne if his Wisdom had not known how to secure his own Intrest and Honour to the full And so also in the oeconomy and admirable frame of his Gracious Sapiential Government by Christ the manifold Wisdom of God doth shine forth Ephes. 3. 9 10. As the wonderfull structure of Heaven and Earth and every part of this Natural frame doth gloriously reveale the Wisdom of the Creator so the wonderfull Contrivance of our Redemption by Christ and the Reparation of the world by him and the Moral frame of this Evangelical dispensation doth wonderfully demonstrate the Wisdom of the Redeemer And as the observation of our Natures may give us Cause to say with David Psal. 139. 14. I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made So the observation of our new Natures and condition may well cause us to say I will praise thee for I am graciously and wonderfully Redeemed marvelous are thy Works and that my Soul knoweth right well As Nature may teach us to admire the frame of Nature so Grace will teach us to admire the frame of Grace and to see the beauty of its several parts and much more of the whole where all the parts are orderly composed 4. Yea the very Power of God is demonstrated in Christ. And therefore he is called 1 Cor. 1. 24. The Power of God and the Wisdom of God not only formally because Christ himself is the Wise and Powerfull God nor only Efficiently because God doth exercise his Power and Wisdom by his Sonne in Creation Redemption and Government but also Effectually and Objectively as Christ is the great and most admirable Demonstration of the Power and Wisdom of God in the world What work transcendeth the incomprehensible Miracle of the Incarnation That God should assume the Nature of man into personal Union The Creation of the Sunne is no greater a work of Power then the Incarnation and sending of the Sonne of God the Intellectual Sunne the Light of the world That living Light that lightneth every one that cometh into the world though yet the darkness comprehendeth not his light Joh. 1. 4 6 9. What was he but the living visable Power of God when he healed all diseases cast out Devils raised the dead and rose from the dead himself and ascended into Glory and sent down the Holy Spirit on his Church enduing them with Power from on high Acts 1. 8. Luke 24. 49. when he was on Earth he was Anointed with the Holy Ghost and with Power and went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the Devil Acts 10. 38. Being dead he was declared to be the Sonne of God with Power by the Resurrection from the dead Rom. 1. 4. When he ascended up on high he led captivity captive Eph. 4. 8. Yea he filled his servants with power Act. 6. 8. Even such as was admired and desired by the ungodly Act. 8. 19. He being the brightness of Gods Glory and the express Image of his Person and upholding all things by the Word of his Power when he had by himself purged our sinnes he sate down on the right hand of the Majesty on high being made so much better then the Angels as he hath by Inheritance obtained a more excellent Name then they Heb. 1. 3 4. As Christ therefore in his glorified Humanity united to the Godhead is far more excellent then the Angels of God and more glorious then the Sunne so is the Power of God more abundantly demonstrated in him than in the Sunne or the Angels or any other Creature The Illuminated do know this and what is the exceeding greatness of his Power to us-ward who believe according to the working of his mighty Power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and set him at
himself to hope that God will save him without so much adoe which by the help of the Devil he may easily be brought to hope away then goes the duty If you could not shew him that there is a Necessity of Family Prayer and a Necessity of sanctifying the Lords Day and a Necessity of forsaking his tipling and voluptuousness and a Necessity of living a heavenly life he would quickly resolve of another course For he had rather do otherwise if he durst He never was Religious from a true Predominant Love to God and a holy life but for fear of Hell and for other inferiour respects Remember this when you have precious opportunities before you of doing or receiving good and when you see that you have leave to take these opportunities and yet you draw back and are questioning How we can prove it to be your duty or that you cannot be saved without it Do not these Questions plainly shew that you Love not the work and Delight not in a holy life and that you had rather let it alone Are you not blind if you see not this is in your selves Yea it 's plain that you have such an aversness or hatred to God and a holy course of life that if you did but know what shift to make to scape damnation you would fly away from God and Holiness and have as little to do with them as you can Your Questions and Cavils do plainly declare this wicked emnity and backwardness of your hearts and consequently shew how farre you are from true Conversion Not that I am of their mind that think there is any Good which the Law of Christ Obligeth us not to accept and which we can refuse without sinne and danger to our selves For God doth both draw us and drive us at once But when the Threatning and Punishment only can prevail with men and men Love not God and Godliness for themselves but had rather have liberty to live as the ungodly I shall never take one of these for a sanctified man nor have any hope of the saving of such a soul how farre soever his fears may carry him from his outward sinnes or to outward duties Till God shall give him a better Conversion then this I say I have not the smallest hope of this mans salvation Then you are Gods Children when the Honour the Work the Family the Name of your Father are lovely and delightfull to you And when you grieve that there is any remnants of sin in your souls and when your sinnes are to you as lameness to the lame that pain them every step they go and as sickness to the sick that makes them groan and groan again and long to be rid of it And when you think those the happiest men on earth that are the most holy and wish from your hearts that you were such as they though you had not a house to put your head in When you look towards God with longing thoughts and are grieved that your understandings can reach no nearer him and know no more of him and that your hearts cannot embrace him with a more burning Love When you admire the beauty of a meek a patient a mortified spirituall heavenly mind and long to have more of this your self yea to be perfect in all Holiness and Obedâ—ence When your hearts are thus brought over to God that you had rather have him then any other and rather live in his Family then any where and rather walk in his waies then in any then are you indeed Converted and never till then whatever other dispositions you may have And now if that were my business what abundance of reason might I shew you to make you willing to come over unto God with Love and with Delight Whom else can you Love if he that is Love it self seem not lovely to you All loveliness is in him and from him The creature hath none of it self nor for it self To Love a life of sinne is to Love the Image and Service of the Devil and to Love that which feeds the flames of Hell What is it then to Love this sinne so well as for the Love of it to fly from God and Godliness Methinks men at the worst should Love that which will do them good and not preferre that before it which will hurt them Do sinners indeed believe that God and Holiness will do them hurt and that sinne will do them greater good Is there ever a man so mad that he dare speak this and stand to it If indeed you think it best to live in sinne and therefore had rather keep it then leave it your understandings are befooled I had almost used Paul's Phrase and said bewitched Gal. 3. 1. Will it do you any hurt to leave your beastly sensual lives and to live soberly righteously and godly in the world denying ungodliness and worldly lusts and looking for the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ This is the Doctrine of Saving Grace Tit. 2. 11 12 13. Would it do you any harm to be assured of Salvation and ready to die and to know that the Angels shall Conduct your departing souls to Christ and that you shall live in Joy with him for ever Or to be employed in those holy works that must prepare you for this day and help you to this assurance If God be naught for you if Holiness and Righteousness and Temperance be naught for you then you may as well say Heaven is naught for you and therefore you must resolve for sinne and Hell and see whether that be good for you I shall say no more of this Point because I have written of it already in the Conclusion of the Saints Rest which I desire you to peruse DIRECT XI The next part of my Advice is If you would not have this Saving Work misearry Turn then this present day and hour without any more Delay Somewhat I have spoke of this already and therefore shall say the less But yet I shall back this Direction with such Reasons as will certainly convince you if you be not unreasonable of the folly of Delay and shew you that it concerneth you presently to Return And though my Reasons will be numerous it is not the Number but the Strength of them that I shall urge you principally to Consider and because of the Number I will go over them with the greater brevity 1. Consider to whom it is that you are commanded to Turn and then tell me whether there can be any Reason for delay It is not to an empty deceitfull creature but to the faithfull All-sufficient God To him that is the cause of all things the Strength of the Creation the Joy of Angels the Felicity of the Saints the Sun and Shield of all the Righteous and Refuge of the Distressed and the Glory of the whole World Of such Power that his Word can take down the Sun from the Firmament and turn the
Earth and all things into nothing for he doth more in giving them their being and continuance Of such Wisdom that was never guilty of mistake and therefore will not mislead you nor draw you to any thing that is not for the best Of such Goodness as that evil cannot stand in his sight and nothing but your evil could make him displeased with you and it is from nothing but evil that he calleth you to Turn It is not to a malitious Enemy that would do you a mischief but it is to a gracious God that is Love it self Not to an implacable Justice but to a reconciled Father not to revenging Indignation but to the embracement of those Arms and the Mercy of that compassionate Lord that is enough to melt the hardest heart when you find your self as the poor returning Prodigall Luk. 25. 20. in his bosome when you deserved to have been under his feet And will the great and blessed God invite thee to his favour and wilt thou delay and demurre upon the Return The greatest of the Angels of Heaven are glad of his favour and value no Happiness but the light of his countenance Heaven and Earth are supdorted by him and nothing can stand without him How glad would those very Devils be of his favour that tempt thee to neglect his favour And wilt thou delay to turn to such a God Why man thou art every minute at his mercy If thou turn not he can throw thee into Hell when he will more easily then I can throw this Book to the ground And yet dost thou delay There are all things imaginable in him to draw thee There is nothing that is good for thee but it is perfectly in him where thou maist have it certain and perpetuated There is nothing in him to give the least discouragement Let all the Devils in Hell and all the Enemies of God on Earth say the worst they can against his Majesty and they are not able to find the smallest blemish in his absolute Holiness and Wisdom and Goodness And yet wilt thou delay to Turn 2. Consider also as to Whom so to what it is that thou must Turn Not to uncleanness but unto Holiness not to the sensual life of a Beast but to the Noble rationall life of a man and the more Noble Heavenly life of a Believer Not to an unprofitable worldly toyl but to the gainfullest Employment that ever the Sonnes of men were acquainted with Not to the deceitfull drudgery of sinne but to that Godliness which is profitable to all things having the promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come 1 Tim. 4. 8. Sirs Do you know what a life of Holiness is You do not know it if you turn away from it I am sure if you knew it you would never fly from it no nor endure to live without it Why a life of Holiness is nothing but a living unto God to be conversant with him as the wicked are with the world and to be devoted to his Service as sensualists are to the flesh It is to live in the Love of God and our Redeemer and in the foretasts of his Everlasting Glory and of his Love and in the sweet fore-thoughts of that blessed life that shall never end and in the honest self-denying course that leadeth to that blessedness A godly life is nothing else but a sowing the Seed of Heaven on Earth and a learning in the School of Christ the Songs of praise which we must use before the Throne of God and by suffering a learning how to Triumph and reign with Christ. And is there any thing in this life which you have cause to be afraid of The sinnes and weaknesses of the godly are contrary to Godliness and therefore Godliness is no more dishonoured by them then health and life is dishonoured by your sicknesses As health is never the worse to be liked but the better because of the painfull grievousness of sickness so Godliness is to be liked the better because the very failings of the Saints are so grievous If a true Believer do but step out of the way of God he is wounded he is out of â—oynt he is as undone till he come in again though it was but in one particular And can you endure to continue strangers to it altogether so long I know you may find faults in the godly till they are perfect but let the most malicious Enemy of Christ on Earth find any fault in Godliness if he can Can you delay to come into your Fathers Family into the Vineyard of the Lord into the Kingdom of God on Earth to be fellow Citizens of the Saints and of the Houshould of God to have the Pardon of all your sinnes and the sealed Promise of Everlasting Glory Why Sirs when you are called on to Turn you are called to the Porch of Heaven into the beginning of Salvation And will you delay to accept Everlasting life 3. Consider also from what you are called to Turn and then judg whether there be any reason of delay It is from the Devil your Enemy from the love of a deceitfull world from the seducement of corrupted bruitish flesh It is from sinne the greatest evil What is there in sinne that you should delay to part with it Is there any good in it Or what hath it ever done for you that you should love it Did it ever do you good Or did it ever do any man good It is the deadly enemy of Christ and you that caused his death and will cause yours and is working for your damnation if converting and pardoning Grace prevent it not And are you loath to leave it It is the cause of all the miseries of the world of all the sorrow that ever did befall you and the cause of the damnation of them that perish And do you delay to part with it 4. Your Delaying shews that you Love not God and that you preferre your sinne before him and that you would never part with it if you might have your will For if you loved God you would long to be restored to his favour and to be near him and employed in his service and his Family Love is quick and diligent and will not draw back And it is a sign also that you are in love with sinne For else why should you be so loath to leave it He that would not leave his sinne and turn to God till the next week or the next Moneth or year would never turn if he might have his desire For that which makes you desirous to stay a day or week longer doth indeed make you loath to turn at all And therefore it is but hypocrisie to take on you that you are willing to turn hereafter if you be not willing to do it now without delay 5. Consider but what a Case you are in while you thus delay Do you think you stand on drie ground or in a safe condition If you
DIRECTIONS AND PERSWASIONS TO A Sound CONVERSION For Prevention of that Deceit and Damnation of Souls and of those Scandals Heresies and desperate Apostasies that are the Consequents of a Counterfeit or Superficial Change By Richard Baxter LONDON Printed by A. M. for Nevil Simmons Book-seller in Kederminster and are to be sold by him there and by N. Ekins at the Gun in Pauls Church-yard 1658. The Preface IT is weight so unconceivable that dependeth on the soundness of our Conversion and Sanctification that our care and diligence cannot be too great to make it sure As the professed Atheist Heathens and Infidels without so the self-deceiving Hypocrites within the Church do wilfully cast away themselves for ever by neglecting such a business of everlasting consequence when they have time and warnings and assistance to dispatch it Multitudes live like bruits or Atheists forgetting that they are born in sinne and misery and setled in it by wilfull custom and must be Converted or Condemned These know not many of them what need they have of a Conversion nor what Conversion or Sanctification is And some that have been Preachers of the Gospel have been so lamentably ignorant in so great a matter that they have perswaded the poor deluded people that it is only the gross and haynous sinners that need Conversion branding them with the name of Puritans that will not take a dead Profession joyned with Civility for true Sanctification and promise Salvation to those that Christ hath with many asseverations professed shall not enter into the Kingdom of God Others that confess that a through Sanctification is a necessary thing do delude their souls with something that is like it Hence is the misery and dishonour of the Church Holiness it self is disgraced by the sins of them that are unholy because they pretend to that which they have not Hence it is that we have thousands that call themselves Christians that live a worldly fleshly life and some of them hating the way of Godliness and yet think they are Converted because they are sorry when they have sinned and wish when it is past that they had not done it and cry God mercy for it and confess that they are sinners and this they take for true Repentance When sinne was never mortified in their souls nor their hearts ever brought to hate it and forsake it But when they have had the profit and pleasure of sinne they are sorry for the danger but never regenerate and made New Creatures by the Spirit of Christ. Hence also it is that we have such abundance of meer Opinionists that take themselves for Religious people Because they have changed their Opinions and their parties and can prate contentiously against those that are not of their mind and joyn themselves with those that seem to be the strictest they take themselves to be truly Sanctified And this makes such gadding from one opinion to another and such censuring reviling and divisions upon that account because their Religion is most in their Opinions and hath not mortified their carnal selfish inclinations and Passions nor brought them to a holy heavenly mind Hence also it is that we have so many sensual scandalous Professours that seem to be Religious but bridle not their tongues their appetites or their lusts but are railers or backbiters or tipplers or gluttons or filthy and lascivious or some way scandalous to their holy Profession because they are strangers to a through-Conversion but take up with the counterfeit of a superficial change Hence also we have so many worldlings that think themselves Religious men that make Christ but a servant to their worldly interest and seek Heaven but for a reserve when Earth forsakes them and have something in this world that is so dear to them that they cannot forsake it for the hopes of Glory but give up themselves to Christ with secret exceptions and reserves for their prosperity in the world And all because they never knew a sound Conversion which should have rooted out of their Hearts this worldly interest and delivered them up entirely and absolutely to Christ. Hence also it is that we have so few Professours that can lay by their Pride and bear disesteem or injury and love their enemies and bless them that curse them yea or love their godly friends that cross them or dishonour them And so few that can deny themselves in their honour or any considerable thing for the sake of Christ and in obedience and conformity to his will And all because they never had that saving change that takes down Self and sets up Christ as Soveraigne in the soul. And hence also it is that we have in this age so many dreadful instances of Apostasie So many reproaching the Scripture that once they thought had Converted them and the way of Holiness that once they did profess and denying the Lord himself that bought them and all because they formerly took up with a superficial counterfeit Conversion O how commonly and how lamentably doth this misery appear among Professours in their unsavoury discourse their strife and envy on Religious pretenses their dead formality their passionate divisions or their selfish Proud and earthly minds A through Conversion would have cured all this at least as to the dominion of it Having therefore in my call to the unconverted endeavoured to awaken careless souls and perswade the obstinate to Turn and Live I have here spoken to them that seem to be about the work and given them some Directions and Perswasions to prevent their perishing in the birth and so to prevent that Hypocrisie which else they are like to be formed into and the deceit of their hearts the Errour of their Lives and the Misery at their Death which is like to follow That they live not as those that flatter God with their mouth and lie unto him with their tongues because their heart is not right with him neither are they stedfast in his Covenant Psal. 78. 36 37 Lest denying deep entertainment and rooting to the seed of Life or choaking it by the radicated predominant Love and cares of the world they wither when the heat of persecution shall break forth Matth. 13. 20 21 22. And lest building on the sands they fall when the winds and storms arise and their fall be great Matth. 7. 26 27. And so they go out from us that they may be made manifest that they were not of us For if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us 1 Joh. 2. 19. Look therefore to this great important business and give all diligence to make your calling and election sure 2 Pet. 1. 10. And trust not your hearts too easily or too confidently But turn to the Lord with all your hearts Joel 2. 12. Cleave to him Resolvedly or with Purpose of heart Acts 11. 23. And see that you sell all and buy the Pearl Matth. 13. 46. And stick not at the price but absolutely resign
his own right hand in the Celestials farre above all Principality and Power and Might and Dominion and every name that is named not only in this world but also in that which is to come and hath put all things under his feet and given him to be Head over all things to the Church which is his body the fullness of him that filleth all in all Ephes. 1. 19. 20 21 22 23. Besides this even in the Works of Christ for his Church his Calling and Sanctifying and Ruling and Preserving them his subduing their Enemies and raising them from the dead and Glorifying them with himself how glorious is the very Power of God by his Sonne 2 Thes. 1. 11. Phil. 3. 10. Ephes. 3. 7 20. 2 Pet. 1. 3 16. 1 Cor. 4. 20. Ephes. 6. 10. 1 Cor. 15. 43. 1 Pet. 1. 5. And therefore his Gospel may well be called The Power of God to Salvation Rom. 1. 16. Which hath been the Instrument of his Power in doing such wonderful works in the world 1 Cor. 1. 18. 2. 5. 2 Cor. 6. 7. 2. Cor. 13. 3 4. 5. But the most sweet and conspicuous End of our Redemption was the Demonstration of Gods Love and Mercy to man-kind and that he might make known the Riches of his Glory on the vessels of Mercy prepared unto Glory Rom. 9. 23. Of all Gods Attributes there is none shineth more illustrously in the work of our Redemption than Love and Mercy Hereby perceive we the Love of God because he laid down his life for us 1 Joh. 3. 16. By the Creation and Sustentation of us we perceive the Love of God but more abundantly by our Redemption In this was manifested the Love of God towards us because that God sent his only begotten Sonne into the world that we might live through him 1 Joh. 4. 9. O wonderfull Love which condescendeth to such Rebels and embraceth such unworthy and polluted sinners and pittyeth them even in their blood Even after we had sold our selves to Satan and cast away the Mercies of our Creation and had all come short of the Glory of God and were sentenced to death and ready for the Execution then did this wonderful Love step in and rescue and recover us Not staying till we Repented and cryed for Mercy and cast our selves at his feet but seeking us in the Wilderness and finding us before we felt that we were lost and being found of us before we sought him and beging to us in the depth of our Misery Herein is Love not that we Loved God but that he Loved us and sent his Sonne to be the propitiation for our sinnes 1 Joh. 4. 10. Though God Love us not in our sinne and misery before our Conversion so far as in that state to Justifie us and Adopt us and take pleasure in us or have Communion with us in the spirit yet doth he so far Love us in that state as to Redeem us by the Blood of Christ and tender us his Salvation and to bring in his chosen effectually to entertain his offer And thus the Love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us For when we were yet without strength in due time Christ dyed for the ungodly And God commended his Love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us Rom. 5. 6 8. Greater Love hath no man then this that a man lay down his life for his friends Joh. 15. 13. What was the Sonne of God but Love Incarnate Love borne of a Virgin Love coming down from Heaven to Earth and walking in flesh among the miserable seeking and saving that which was lost Was it not Love that spoke those words of life those comfortable promises those necessary precepts those gracious encouragements which the Gospel doth abound with Was it not Love it self that went preaching Salvation to the Sonnes of death and deliverance to the Captives and offered to bind up the broken hearts Luke 4. 18 Was it not Love that invited the weary and heavy laden Matth. 11. 28 And that sent even to the high-waies and the hedges to compel men to come in that his house might be filled Matth. 22. 9 10. Luke 14. 23. Was it not Love it self that went up and down healing and doing good that suffered them for whom he suffered to scorn him and spit upon him and buffet him and condemn him that being reviled reviled not again that gave his life an offering for sinne and dyed and prayed for them that murdered him No wonder if the Gospel be it that teacheth us to call God by the name of Love it self 1 Joh. 4. 8 For it is the Gospel that hath most fully revealed him to be so No wonder if the Gospel do so frequently and importunatly require us to Love one another and even to lay down your lives for Christ and for one another when it hath given us such a ground and motive and president for our Love He that seeth the true face of Redemption and understandeth and savoureth the Gospel and the Grace of Christ must needs see most cogent Reasons for such dutyes 1 Joh. 4. 7 8 9 10 11 12. Beloved let us Love one another for Love is of God and every one that Loveth is born of God and knoweth God he that Loveth not knoweth not God for God is Love If God so Loved us we ought also to Love one another If we Love one another God dwelleth in us So 1 Joh. 3. 10 11 14 16 17 18. No wonder if by this Love we know that we are translated from death to life and if by it the Children of God be known from the Children of the Devil 1 Joh. 3. 10 11 14. For Love is the very Nature and Image of our Father No wonder if this be the New Commandment which had newly such a powerfull motive and president And no wonder if it be the great distinguishing Caracter by which all men shall know that we are the Disciples of Christ Joh. 13. 35. When he had set us such a Copie and taught us this lesson by such effectual means writing it out for us in lines of blood even of his own most pretious Blood and shedding it abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost But if we should come down to the particular benefits of Christ's death and see what Love is manifested in them even in our Calling our Justification our Adoption or Sanctification our Preservation and our everlasting Glorification we should find our selves in an Ocean that hath neither banks nor bottom and when we have fathomed as far as we can we must be contented to stand and admire it and to say with the Beloved Apostle Behold what manner of Love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the Sons of God! 1 Joh. 3. 1. And this is the blessed imployment of the Saints which they are called to by the Gospel to live in the participation and
consideration and admiration of this wonderous Love that Christ may dwell in their hearts by Faith and so being rooted and grounded in Love they may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the bredth and length and depth and height and to know the Love of Christ which passeth knowledg and be filled with all the fullness of God Ephes. 3. 17 18 19. And withall to be followers of God as dear Children and walk in Love as Christ hath Loved us and given himself for us an Offering and a Sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour Ephes. 5. 1 2. And to love without dissimulation Rom. 12. 9 10. Even from a pure heart fervently 1 Pet. 1. 22. That we love as brethren being compassionate pittifull and courteous not rendring evill forevill but contrariwise blessing knowing that we are thereunto called that that we should inherit a blessing 1 Pet. 3. 8 9 And that we keep our selves in the Love of God Jud. 21. that nothing may be able to seperate us from it Rom. 8. 35 36 37. And if we thus imitate our Heavenly pattern the God of Love and Peace will be with us 2 Cor. 13. 11. And thus I have shewed you the principall Ends of the undertaking of Christ in the work of our Redemption especially as they are attained directly by his Cross and Resurrection 6. Another End also is apparent in the Scripture which is the Glorifying of Gods Rewarding Justice together with his Mercy in the Salvation of his Elect. This End he hath partly attaineth here for God hath his Ends continually In this life his Servants have much of his Mercy and the beginnings of their Reward in the beginning of their Salvation But the fullness is hereafter in their Glorification All his promises he performeth in their seasons Even in the present pardon of our sinnes he honoureth his Faithfullness and Justice 1 Joh. 1. 9. His Faithfullness in making good his promise and his Justice in Rewarding the performers of the condition and giving what his promise had made their due that so men may even here in part discern between the Righteous and the Wicked between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not while they see God esteem of his people as his jewels and spaâ—e them as a man spareth his sonne that serveth him Mal. 3. 17 18. The King of Zion is just having Salvation Zach. 9. 9. The Righâ—â—ousness of God is manifested in our Justification Rom. 3. 21 22. Even the Righteousness of God which is by Faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe for there is no difference For all have sinned and come short of the Glory of God being Justified freely by his grace through the Redemption that is in Jesus Christ whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through Faith in his Blood to declare his Righteousness for the remission of sinnes that are past through the forbearance of God to declare I say at this time his Righteousness that he might be Just and the Justifier of him that believeth in Jesus Rom. 3. 25 26. But it is most eminently at Judgment and in the world to come that this Remunerative Justice with Mercy will be Glorified When Christ shall come purposely to be glorified in his Saints and to be admired in all them that believe not only in himself but in them and that because they were believers 2 Thes. 1. 10. When we have fought the good fight and finished our Course and kept the Faith we shall find that there is laid up for us a Crown of Righteousness which the Lord the Righteous Judg shall give us and all that love his appearing at that day â— 2 Tim. 4. 8. He will justifie and applaud them before all the world yea and adjudge them to everlasting Life with a Well done Good and Faithfull sevant enter thou into the joy of thy Lord I will make thee Ruler over many things even Because they had been faithfull in a little Luke 19 17. Matth. 25. 21 23. Because they shewed their love to him in his members he will say to them Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world Matth. 25. 34 35 36. He that now commandeth us to say to the Righteous It shall be well with him Isa. 3. 10. Will in Righteousness Cause it then to be well with him Then shall the Righteous shine forth as the Sunne in the Kingdom of their Father Matth. 13. 43 And the Righteousness and Mercy of their Father shall as conspicuously and gloriously shine in them For it is a day appointed for the Revelation of the Righteous Judgment of God who will render to every man according to his deeds Rom. 2. 5 6. The present Faith and Patience of the Saints in all the Persecutions and Tribulations which they endure is a manifest token of the Righteâ—us Judgment of God that they may be accounted worthy of the Kingdom of God for which they suffer It being a Righteous thing with God to Recompence Tribulation to them that trouble us and to us that are troubled Rest with the Saints 2 Thes. 1. 5 6 7. For the Righteous Lord loveth Righteousness Psal. 11. 7. and in Righteousness will he Judge the world Acts 17. 31. Rev. 19. 11. And therefore in the keeping of his Word there is great Reward Psal. 19 11. Yea a cup of water given in Love to him shall not be unrewarded Matth. 10. 41 42. To him that soweth Righteousness shall be a sure Reward Prov. 11. 18. If in this life men are forst to say Verily there is a Reward for the Righteous Verily there is a God that Judgeth in the Earth Psal. 58. 11. Much more when we receive the Reward of the Inheritance Col. 3. 24. This causeth the Saints to forsake the pleasures of sinne because they have respect to the Recompence of Reward Heb. 11. 26. This is it that maketh them Rejoyce and be exceeding glad in their Persecutions because that great is their Reward in Heaven and therefore it is that they Cast not away their confidence because it hath great Recompence of Reward Heb. 10. 25. If we let no man beguil us of our Reward Col. 2. 18. And if we Look to our selves that we lose not those things that we have wrought we shall receive a full Reward 2 Joh. 8. For the Lord hath said Behold I come quickly and my Reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be Rev. 22. 12. 7. Another End of Christ's undertaking in this blessed work is The Complacency and Glory of God in the Love and Praise and Service of his Redeemed ones in some measure here but in perfection when they are perfected Sinne had made us unserviceable to God And Christ bringeth us back into a fitness for his service He disposeth us Godward by Faith and Love and he hath Redeemed us from our iniquity and purifieth to
him to them gave he Power to become the Sonnes of God even to them that believe in his Name Joh. 1. 12. This is the wonderfull Love that the Father hath bestowed on those that were his Enemies that they should not only be reconciled to him by the death of his Sonne but also be called the Sonnes of God Rom 5. 10. 1 Joh. 3. 1. For he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be Holy and without blame before him in love having predestiuated us to the Adoption of Children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his Will to the praise of the Glory of his Grace wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved Ephes. 1. 4 5. 6. O what an unspeakable Mercy is it to have the blessed God whom we had so oft offended to become our Reconciled Father in Christ. For it is not an empty title that he assumeth but he hath more abundant love to us and tenderness of our welfare then any title can make us understand 5. And hereupon it doth immediatly follow that we have a right to the blessed Inheritance of his Sonnes and are certain Heirs of his Heavenly Kingdom Col. 1. 12. For if Sonnes then Heirs Heirs of God and Joint Heirs with Christ Rom. 8. 17. Being saved by the washing of Regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost and justified by Grace through Christ we are made Heirs according to the hope of Eternal Life Tit. 3. 5 6 7. Being begotten againe to a lively hope by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an Inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for us 1 Pet. 1. 3 4. 6. With all the Holy Ghost is given to us not only to close us at first with Christ but to take up his abode in us as his temples and to be the Agent and Life of Christ within us and to do his work and maintain his Interest and clense us of all filthiness of flesh and Spirit and Sanctifie us throughout and to strive against and conquer the flesh and to keep us by Divine Power through Faith unto Salvation 1 Cor. 6. 19. Gal. 5. 17 22. 2 Cor. 6. 1. 1 Pet. 1. 5. For because we are Sonnes God seudeth forth the Spirit of his Sonne into our hearts whereby we cry Abba Father Gal. 4. 6. This Spirit of Adopton which we receive doth bear witness with our spirits that we are the Sonnes of God Rom. 8. 15 16. For if any man have not the spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8. 9. By this Spirit is the spirit of the world cast out of us the spirit of pride and of blindness and of delusion and hard-heartedness and of sensuality and malice and hypocrisie are cast out By this is Gods Image imprinted on our Souls we are conformed to his blessed Will we are made partakers of the Divine Nature being Holy as God is Holy Col. 3. 10. 2 Pet. 1. 4. 1 Pet. 1. 16. Hereby we are delivered from the thraldom of sinne and the slavery of the Devil and the seduction of the world and our treacherous Flesh. Hereby also we are fitted for the Service of God to which before we were undisposed and unfit O what an ease is it to the Soul to be free from so much of the burden of sinne What an honour is it to have the Spirit of God within us and to have a Nature so truly Heavenly and Divine How can it go ill with him that hath God dwelling in him and that dwells in God 1 Joh. 4. 15. 7. Another of our precious benefits by Christ is that we shall be actually imployed in the special and neerest Service of God that on Earth is to be performed Let diseased Souls desire idlenes and swinish sinners take pleasure in the mire and feed like ravenous beasts on carrion or as dogs on dung but the Saints will ever rejoice in God and take it for the most blessed life on Earth when they can but do him the greatest Service Let his Enemies that hate his Service be weary of it as if it were a toile or drudgery but his Children will desire no sweeter work They never think themselves so well as when they are most serviceable to their blessed Lord though at the greatest cost and labour to the flesh So sweet is Gods Service that the more of it we can do the more is our pleasure and honour and content Other work spendeth strength but this increaseth it Other work must have râ—creation intermixt but this is it self the most delightfull recreation Other service is undertaken for the love of the wages but this is undertaken for the Love of the Master and the work and is wages it self to them that go through with it For other service is but a means and that to some inferior end but this is a means to the Everlasting perfection and blessedness of the Soul and such a means as containeth or Presently procureth somewhat of the end All the Saints are even here a chosen Generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculiar People that they should shew forth the praises of him that hath called them out of darkness into his marvelous light They are an holy Priesthood to offer up a Spiritual Sacrifice acceptable to God by Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. Their very bodies are a living Sacrifice holy and acceptable to God in their reasonable service What a sweet work is it to live in the daily Love of God in his Praises in the hopes and sweet fore-thoughts of Everlasting Joyes The world affordeth not such a Master nor such a work 8. Another of the precious benefits by Christ is The liberty of accesse in all our wants to God by Prayer with a promise to be heard The flaming sword did keep the way to the tree of life till Christ had taken it down and consecrated for us a new and living way through the Vaile which is his flesh and now we have boldness to enter into the Holiest by the blood of Jesus and therefore may draw neer with a true heart in full assurance of Faith Heb. 10. 19 20 22. When worldlings may cry to their Baal in vaine the Righteous cry and the Lord heareth them and delivereth them out of all their hurtfull troubles O what a Mercy is it in our falls in our distresses in our dangers in our wants to have a God a faithfull mercifull Father to go to and make our moane to for relief What a Mercy is it when our flesh and our hearts do faile us when friends and worldly things all fail us to have God for the Rock of our hearts and our Portion Psal. 73. 26. When sickness begins to break these bodies and earthly delights do all forsake us and death calls us to come to our endless state then to have a Reconciled Father to go to and crave his ayd upon
the Joyes of Heaven may be stirring and working in the minds of the unsanctified but if they take not up the Heart for Christ the person is not a true Believer As the Gospel must be Believed to be True so Christ that is offered us in the Gospel as Good must be Heartily and Thankfully accepted accordingly And the Glory the Justification Reconciliation with God and other benefits procured by him and offered with him must be valued and desired above all earthly fleshly things If you are convinced that sinne is evill as contrary to God and hurtfull to you and hereupon have some mind to let it go and some wishes that Christ would save you from it and yet still have a Love to it that is greater then your dislike and the bent of your heart is more for it then against it and your habituate desires are rather to keep then to leave it this is not Sanctification nor a saving consent to be saved by Christ. If you have some convictions that Holiness is good as being the Image of God and pleasing to him and necessary to your Salvation and so should have some mind of Holyness on these grounds yet if you have on the other side a greater aversness to it because it would deprive you of the pleasures of your sinne and the Habitual inclination of your will is more against it then for it certainly this will not stand with true Sanctification of Faith in Christ to save you from the power of sinne by his Spirit Thousands deceive themselves by misunderstanding some common passages that are spoken to comfort afflicted Consciences viz. That the least true desires after Grace do prove the Soul to be Gracious This is true if you speak of the least Desires which are Predominant in the Soul when our Desire is more habitually then our unwillingness and we thus preferre Christ before all the world the least of this is an Evidence of Saving Grace But such Desires as are subdued by the contrary Desires and such a will as is accompanyed with a greater unwillingness habitually and such a Faith as is drowned in greater unbelief these are not Evidences of a saving change nor can you justly gather any special comfort from them He that hath more unbelief then Belief is not to be called a Believer but an unbeliever And he that hath more hatred or dislike of God and Holiness then Love to them is not to be called Godly but ungodly nor a Lover of God but a hater of him I am easily perswaded that many of you that are ungodly could be contented that God be Glorified if his Glory do not cross your carnal interest and so you desire Gods Glory even for it self as that which is absolutely Good in it self But if your fleshly interest be so dear to you that you will sacrifice Gods Glory to it and had rather God were dishonoured then your fleshly interest contradicted it is your flesh then that is made your God and your chief End It is not every wish or mind of Christ no not to save you from sinne as sinne that will prove you true Belielievers Nor is it every minding of God or love to him no not as one apprehended by you to be the chiefest Good and desirable for himself as your End that will prove indeed that you savingly love him as long as the contrary mind and will is Habitually predominant in you Such as the very habit and bent of a mans heart is such indeed is the man It s possible for a man even a good man to have two contrary ends and intentions yea ultimate ends as that which is desired for it self and referred to nothing else is called Vltimaâ—e but it is not possible for him to have two principall predominant Ends. So far as we are carnal still we make the pleasing of our flesh our ultimate End For doubtless we do not sinne only by pleasing the flesh as a means to Gods Glory nor only in the mischoosing of other means But yet this is none of our Principal End so far as men are truly Sanctified And because that is called a mans mind or will which is the chiefest and highest in his mind and will therefore we use to denominate men from that only which beareth rule in them And thus we may say with Paul It is not I but sinne that dwelleth in me For a disowned act that proceedeth from us against the bent and habit of our wills and the course of our lives from the remnants of a carnal misguided will is not it that must denominate the person nor is so fully ours as the contrary act And therefore though indeed we sinfully participate of it yet when the question is whether Believing or unbeliefe sinning or obeying be my work it is not Comparatively to be called mine which I am much more against then for So on the other side if the unsanctified have some transient superficial uneffectual acts of Desire or Faith or Love to God which are contrary to the bent and habit of their hearts this is not theirs nor imputable to them so far as hence to give them their Denomination It is not they that do it but the common workings of the Spirit upon them If ever then you would be assured that your are Christians look to the Habitual bent of your hearts and see that you do not only talk of Scripture and slâ—ghtly believe it and speak well of Christ with some good wishes and meanings and purposes but as you love your Souls see that Christ be Received as your dearest Saviour with Thankfullness and greatest Love and as your Soveraign Lord with true subjection and that he have your Superlative estimation and Affections and all things in the world be put under him in your Souls This must be so if you will have the portion of Believers No Faith that is short of this will prove you Christ's Disciples indeed or Heirs of the Promises made to Believers The voice of Christ that calls to you in the Gospel is My sonne give me thy heart Prov. 23. 26. Do what thou wilt in waies of duty and think as highly as thou wilt of thy self thou art no true Believer in Christ's account till thou hast given him thy heart If he have thy tongue if he have thy good opinion nay if thy body were burnt in his Cause if he had not thy Love thy Heart it were as nothing 1 Cor. 13. 3. For thy works and sufferings are so far acceptable through Christ as they are testimonies of this that Christ hath thy heart If he have not thy heart he takes it as if he had nothing And if he have this he takes it as if he had all For this is not only preferred by him before all but also he knows that this commandeth all If Christ have thy Heart the Devil will not have thy tongue and life the Ale-house or a Harlot will not have thy body nor the world will
a thought of your hearts if a word of your mouths have not some relation to Christ to suspect it yea reject it Call it not a Sermon or a Prayer nor a duty that hath nothing of Christ in it Though the pure God-head be your principal End yet there is no way to this End but by Christ and though Love which is exercised on that End must animate all your graces and duties as they are Means to that End yet Faith hath Love in it or else it is not the Christian Faith and Christ is the Object of your Faith and Love and your perfect Everlasting Love will be animated by Christ For your Love and Praise will be to him that was slain and Redeemed us to God by his Blood out of every Kindred Tongue and Nation and made us Kings and Priests to God So much for the fifth Direction DIRECT VI. The next Direction which I would give you for a through Conversion is this See that the flesh be throughly mortified and your hearts be throughly taken off the world and all its pleasures and profits and honours and that the Roote of your fleshly Interest prevaile not at the heart and that you think not of reconciling God and the world as if you might secure your Interest in both This is a very common cause of the deceit and destruction of such as verily think they are converted It is the very Nature and business of true Conversion to turn mens hearts from the flesh and from the world to God and from an earthly and seeming happiness to a Heavenly Real Everlasting Happiness And when men are affrighted into som kind of Religiousness and yet never learnt to deny themselves and never mortified their fleshly mind but the love of this world is still the chiefest principle at their hearts and so go on in Profession of godliness with a secret reserve that they will look as well as they can to their outward prosperity whatever become of their Religion and they will have no more to do with the matters of another world then may stand with their bodily safety in this world these are the miserable deluded Hypocrites whose hopes will prove as the giving up of the ghost whom Christ will disown in their greatest extremities after all their seeming Religiousness O Sirs look to this as ever you would be happy It s an easie it s a common it s a most dangerous thing to set upon a course of outward Piety and yet keep the world next your hearts and take it still as a great part of your felicity and secretly to love your former lusts while you seem to be converted The heart is so deceitfull that you have great cause to watch it narrowly in this point It will closely cherish the love of the world and your fleshly pleasures when it seems to renounce them and when your tongue can speak contemptuously of them It was not for nothing that Christ would have the first fruits of his Gospel-Church who were to be the Example of their successours to sell all and lay it down at the feet of his Apostles And it is his standing Rule that Whoever he be that forsaketh not all that he hath he cannot be his Disciple Luke 14. 33. In estimation affection and resolution it must be forsaken by all that will be saved and also in practice when ever God calls us to it You can have but one Happiness If you will needs have it in this world in the contenting of your flesh there is no hope of having it also in another world in the fruition of God If you think not God and Heaven enough for you and cannot let go the Prosperity of the flesh for them you must let go all your hopes of them God will not halve it with the world in your hearts nor part stakes with the flesh much less will he be below them and take their leavings Heaven will not be theirs that set not by it more then Earth God will not call that Love to him Sincere which is not a Superlative Love and able to make you even hate all those things that would draw away your affections and obedience from him Luke 14. 26 27. There 's no talk of serving God and Mammon and compounding you a Happiness of Earth and Heaven Do therefore as Christ bids you Luke 14. 28 29 30. Sit down and count what it must cost you if you will be saved and on what rates it is that you must follow Christ. Can you voluntarily for the love of him and the hope of Glory take up your Cross and follow him in poverty in losses in reproaches though scornes and scourgings and prisons and death Do you value his loving kindness better then life Psal. 63. 3 Can you deny your eyes and your appetites their desires Can you consent to be vile in the eyes of men and to tame your own flesh and keep it in subjection and live a flesh-displeasing life that hâ—ving suffered with Christ you may also be glorified with him Rom. 8. 17. If you cannot consent to these terms you cannot be Christians nor you cannot be Saved If you must needs be rich or must be honourable yea if you must needs save your estates or liberties or lives it 's past all question you must needs let go Christ and Glory If you must needs have the world you must needs lose your Souls If you must have your good things here you must not have them hereafter too but be tormented when Christ's sufferers are comforted Luke 16. 25. These hopes of purveying for the flesh as long as they can and then of being saved when they can stay here no longer is it that hath deceived many a thousand to their undoing It 's a strang thing to see how the world doth blind very knowing men and how unacquainted these Hypocrites are with their own hearts What a confident profession of down-right godliness many of them will make yea of some extraordinary height in Religion when nothing is so dear to to them as their present prosperity and God hath not neer so much interest in them as the flesh What contrivances some of them make for riches or rising in the world And how tender others are of their honour with men and how tenacious they are of their Mammon of unrighteousness and how much money and great men can do with them And most of them pamper their flesh and serve it in a cleanlier way of Religiousness even as much though not so disgracefully and grossly as drunkards and whoremongers do in a more discernable sensuality If the times do but change and countenance any errour how smal an Argument will make their judgments bend with the times If truth or duty must cost them deer O how they will shift and stretch and wriggle to prove Truth to be no Truth and duty to be no duty and no Argument is strong enough to satisfie them when the flesh doth but say It s
bitter its dangerous it may be my undoing It s none of my meaning that any should needlesly runne into suffering or cross their governours and themselves through a spirit of pride singularity and contradiction But that men should think themselves truly Religious that keep such reserves for their fleshly interest and shew by the very drift of their lives that they are worldlings and never felt what it was to be crucified to the world and deny themselves but are Religious on this supposition only that it may stand with their worldly ends or at least not undo them in the world this is a lamentable hypocritical self-deceit When God hath so plainly said Love not the world nor the things that are in the world If any man love the world the Love of the Father is not in him 1 Joh. 2. 15. Nay that the neighbourhood and all the Country that know them should ring of the worldlyness of some that think themselves good Christians and yet they will not see it themselves What a cheating blinding thing is the world Well Sirs if you will be Christians count what it must cost you And if you will be Heirs of Heaven away with the world Cast it out of your hearts and if your hands must yet trade in it yet trade not for it Use it for God but enjoy it not for it self Take your selves as strangers here and look on the world as a desolate wilderness through which in the Communion of the militant Saints you may safely travail on to Heaven but do not make it your home nor take it for the smallest part of your felicity To be Sanctified without Mortification is a palpable contradiction Be at a point with all things below if you will groundedly hope for the Heavenly Inheritance But I shall purposely forbear to enlarge this any further because I have preached and written a Treatise on this Subject which I desire you to peruse DIRECT VII My next Direction is this If you would be truly Converted be sure that you make an absolute resignation of your selves and all that you have to God This is the very form and life of Sanctification To be Sanctified is to be separated in heart life and profession from all other Masters and Ends to God When the heart that was set upon the world and flesh is separated from them and inclined to God by the power of Love and devoted to him to serve and please him this is indeed a Sanctified Heart And when the life that before was spent in the service of Satan the world and the flesh is now taken off them and spent as to the drift and course of it in the Service of God for the Pleasing and Glorifying of him from the impulse of Love this is indeed a Holy life And herein consisteth the very nature of our Sanctity And when a man doth but profess to renounce the Devill the world and the flesh and to give up his heart and life to God this is a Profession of Holiness God is both on the title of Creation Preservation and Redemption or absolute Lord or Owner and we are not our own but his And therefore we must give to God the things that are Gods and Glorifie him in our Souls and bodies which are his 1 Cor. 6 19 20. As we are his Own so he will have his Own and be served by his Own Do not imagine that you have any title to your selves or propriety in your selves but without any more adoe make a full unreserved absolute resignation of your selves of your understandings and of your wills of your bodies and of your names and of every penny-worth of your estates to God from whom and for whom you have them Think not that you have power to dispose of your selves or of any thing that you have Ask not flesh and blood what life you shall lead or what mind or will you shall be of But ask God to whom you do belong Ask not your carnal selves what you shall do with any of your estates but ask God and then ask Conscience which is the way that God would have me use it in that is which way may I use it to be most serviceable to God And that resolve upon No service that you do to God will prove you Sanctified unless you have heartily and absolutely given up and devoted your selves to him and he that gives up himself must needs give up all that he hath with himself For he cannot keep it for himself ultimately when even himself is given up to God Though you be not bound to give all that you have to the poore nor all to the Church nor to deny your own bodies or families their due supplies yet must it all be given up to God even that which you make use of for your selves and families For as you are given up to God your selves so you must feed your selves as his and cloath your selves and your families as his to fit your selves and them for his Service and not as your own for the satisfying of your flesh Thus it is that all comes to be pure to the pure Sanctified to them that are themselves first Sanctified because when you feed your selfe you do but feed a Servant of God that is Consecrated to him and separated from things common and unclean And even as the Tythes and Offerings that were given for the food and maintenance of the Priests and Levites were called the Lords Portion and Holy to the Lord because they were their portion that were separated to his Altar Even so that which is necessary to fit you for Gods Service while you use it to that very end is Sanctified in your Sanctification and is Holy to God for all his Saints are a Holy Nation a Royal Priesthood to offer up acceptable sacrifice to him And thus whether you eat or drink or what ever you do you must do all to the Glory of God 1 Cor. 10. 31. For Of him and Through him and To him are all things and therefore to him must be the Glory for ever Rom. 11. 36. God who is the End of your hearts and lives must be the End of every action of them unless you will step out of the way of Order and Safety and Holiness For every action that is not from God and by God and for God is contrary to the nature of true Sanctification If then you would be Christians indeed be heartily willing that God should have his own Understand what an excellent honour and priveledge and happiness it is to you to be his If his Right to you will not move you let your own necessity and benefit at least move you to give up your selves and all you have to God Bring you hearts to the barre and plead the Cause of God with them and convince them of Gods title to them and how sinfully they have robbed him of his own all this while Have your daies and hours your wealth and interest
never Christians till you see that in God that winnes your hearts to him so that you would not change your Master for any in the world and till you see that in the Hopes of Everlasting Glory that you would not change it for any thing else that can be imagined by the heart of man And till you see that goodness in a heavenly life that you had rather live it then any life in the world You are not converted to God indeed till you had rather live in Holiness then in Sinne if you had your freest choice and till you would gladly be the strictest holiest persons that you know in the world and long after more and more of it and fain would reach Perfection it self For though we cannot be perfect here yet no man is upright that desireth not to be perfect For he that loveth Holiness as Holiness must needs love the greatest measure of Holiness with the greatest Love This is it that maketh sound Converts to be so faithfull and constant with God A man is forward and ready to a work that he loves when he draws back from it as if it were a mischief that hath no mind to do it A man is hardly kept from the persons and places and employments that he loves but a little will withdraw him from that which he loveth not Why is it that we have so much adoe to take off a Drunkard from his Companions and his lusts but because he loves them better then temperance and gracious company And why can we so hardly draw the lustfull wretch from his filthy lusts or the glutton or the idle sensuall person from his needless or ezcessive recreations but because they love them And why is it that you cannot draw the worldling from his covetousness but he parteth with his money almost as hardly as with his blood but because he loveth it And therefore what wonder if temptations be resisted and the fairest baits of the world despised by him that is truly in Love with God No wonder if nothing can turn back that man from the way to Heaven that is in Love both with Heaven and with the Way No wonder if that man stick close to Christ and never forsake a holy life that tafteth the sweetness of it and feels its to do him good and had rather go that way then any in the world There is no true Christian but can say with David that a day in Gods Courts is better then a thousand and he had rather be a door-keeper in the house of God then to dwell in the tents yea or the Pallaces of wickedness Do but mark those Professors that prove Apostates and sorfake the way of godliness which they seemed to embrace and see whether they be not such as either took up some bare Opinions and outward Duties upon a flash of superficial illumination or else such as were frightned into a course of Religion and so went on from duty to duty for fear of being damned when all the while their hearts were more another way and they had rather have been excused These hypocrites are they that are disputing so oft the Obligations to their Duty and asking How do you prove that it is a Duty to pray in my Family or a Duty to observe the Lords Day or to come constantly to the Congregation or to use the Communion of the godly in private meetings or to repeat Sermons or sing Psalms and the like Intimating that they are as Birds in a Cage or Hens in a Pen that are boaring to get out and had had rather be at liberty If it were not for the fear of the Law of God that is upon them they had rather let all these Duties alone or take them up but now and then at an idle time when Satan and the flesh will give them leave If a Feast be prepared and spread before them a good stomack will not stand to ask How can you prove it my duty to eat but perhaps the sick that loath it may do so If the Cup be before the Drunkard he doth not stand on those termes How do you prove it my duty now to drink this Cup and the other Cup No if he might have but leave he would drink on without any questioning whether it be a duty If the Gamester or the Whoremonger might but be sure that he should scape the punishment he would never stick at the want of a Precept and ask Is it my duty If there were but a gift of twenty pound a man to be given to all the poor of the Town yea and to all the people in generall I do not think I should meet with many people in the Town that would draw back and say What Word of God commandeth me to take it Or how can you prove that it is my duty And why is all this but because they have an inward Love to the thing and Love will carry a man to that which seemeth good for him without any command or threatning If these ungodly wretches had one sparke of spiritual life within them and any taste and feeling of the matters that concern their own salvation instead of asking How can you prove that I must pray with my Family or that I must keep the Lords day or that I must converse with the godly and live a holy life they would be readier to say How can you prove that I may not pray with my Family and that I may not sanctifie the Lords Day and that I may not have Communion with the Saints in Holiness Seeing so great a mercy is offered to the world why may not I partake of it as well as others I can perceive in many that I converse with the great difference between a heart that loves God and Holiness and a heart that seemes religious and honest without such a Love The true Convert perceiveth so much sweetness in holy Duties and so much spiritual advantage by them to his â—oul that he is loath to be kept back he cannot spare these Ordinances and Mercies no more then he can spare the bread from his mouth or the cloathes from his back yea or the skin from his flesh no nor so much He loveth them he cannot live without them at the worst that ever he is at he had rather be holy then unholy and live a godly then a fleshly worldly life And therefore if he had but a bâ—re leave from God without a Command to sanctifie the Lords Day and to live in the holy Communion of the Saints he would joyfully take it with many thanks For he need not be driven to his rest when he is weary nor to his spiritual food when he is hungry nor to Christ the reâ—uge of his soul when the curse and accuser are pursuing him But the unsanctified hypocrite that never loved God or Godliness in his heart he stands questioning and enquiring for some proof of a necessity of these courses And if he can but bring
times Repent it that you delayed so long before you yielded O how it will grieve you when your hearts are melted with the Love of God and are overcome with the infinite kindness of his pardoning saving Grace that ever you had the hearts to abuse such a God and deal so unkindly with him and stand out so long against that compassion that was seeking your Salvation O how it will grieve your hearts to consider that you have spent so much of your lives in sinne for the Devil and the flesh and the deceitfull world O you will think with your selves was not God more worthy of my youthfull daies Had I not been better have spent it in his Service and the work of my Salvation Alas that I should wast such precious daies and now be so farre behind hand as I am Now I want that Faith that Hope that Love that Peace that Assurance that Joy in the Holy Ghost which I might have had if I had spent those years for God which I spent in the service of the world and the flesh Then I might have had the comfort of a well spent life and with joy have now lookt back upon those daies and seen the good I had done to others and the honour I had brought to God whereas I must now look back upon all those years with sorrow and shame and anguish of mind You will think to your selves then a hundred times O that I had but that time againe to spend for God which I spent for sinne and to use for my Soul which I wasted for my bruitish flesh Believe it Sirs if ever you be converted you must look for these Repenting sorrows for all your Delaies and that is the best that can come of it And who would now wilfully make work for sorrow 38 And I pray you consider whether it belongs of right to God or you to determine of the day and hour of your coming in It is he that must give you the pardon of your sinnes and doth it not then belong to him to appoint the time of your receiving it You cannot have Christ and life without him It is he that must give you the Kingdom of Heaven And is he not worthy then to appoint the time of your Conversion that you may be made partakers of it But if he say To day dare you say I 'l stay till to morrow 30. Nay consider whether God or you be likelier to know the meetest time Dare you say that you know better when to turn then God doth I suppose you dare not And if you dare not say so for shame let not your practice say so God saith To day while it is called to day hear my voice and harden not your hearts And dare you say It 's better stay one moneth longer or one day longer God saith Behold this is the accepted time behold this is the day of Salvation 2 Cor. 6. 2. And will you say It 's time enough to morrow Do you know better then God If your Physician do but tell you in a plurisie or a feaver you must let blood this day before to morrow you will have so much reason as to submit to his understanding and think that he knows better then you And cannot you allow as much to the God of Wisdom 40. Consider also that the speediness of your Conversion when God first calls you doth make you the more welcome and is a thing exceeding pleasing to God Our Proverb is A speedy gift is a double gift If you ask any thing of a friend and he give it you presently and cheerfully at the first asking you will think you have it with a good will but if he stand long delaying first and demurring upon it you will think you have it with an ill will and that you owe him the smaller thanks If a very beggar at your doore must stay long for an alms he will think he is the less beholden to you How much more may God be displeased when he must stay so long for his own and that for your benefit God loveth a cheerfull giver and consequently a cheerfull Obeyer of his call And if it be hearty and chearfull it is the liker to be speedy without such delaies 41. And I would desire you but to do with God as you would be done by Would you take it well of your Children if they should tear all their cloaths and cast their meat to the doggs and tread it in the dirt and when you intreat them to give over they will not regard you Would you stand month after month intreating and waiting on them as God doth on you in a foolisher course Or rather would you not either soundly whip them or take their meat from them till hunger teach them to use it better If your servant will spend the whole day and year in drinking and playing when he should do your work will you wait on him all the year with intreaties and pay him at last as if he had served you And can you expect that God should deal so by you 42 And consider I pray you that your Delay is a Denial and so may God interpret it For the Time of your Turning is part of the Command He that saith Turn saith Now even To day without delay He giveth you no longer day If time be lengthned and the ofâ—er made again and again that 's more then he promised you or you could have promised your selves His Command is Now Return and Live And if you refuse the Time the Present Time you refuse the offer and forfeit the benefit And if you knew but what it is to give God a denial in such a case as this and what a case you were in if he should turn away in wrath and never come neer you more you would then be afraid of jesting with his hot displeasure or dallying with the Lord. 43. And me thinks you should remember that God doth not stay thus on all as he doth on you Thousands are under burning and despaire and past all remedy while patience is waiting yet upon you Can you forget that others are in Hell at this very hour for as small sinnes as those that you are yet intangled and linger in Good Lord what a thing is a sensless heart That at the same time when millions are in misery for delaying or refusing to be Converted their successours should fearlesly venture in their steps Surely if Faith had but opened your ears to hear the cries of those damned Souls you durst not imitate them by your Delaies 44. And I must tell you that God will not alwaies thus wait on you and attend you by his patience as hitherto he hath done Patience hath his appointed time And if you outstay that time you are miserable wretches I can assure you Sirs the glass is turned upon you and when it is runne out you shall never have an hour of patience more Then God will no more intreate you to be
at least a more piercing convincing deep and savoury apprehension of the essentials of Christianity then he ever had before Where note of this special Heavenly light 1. The being usually the Consequent of a more common knowledg therefore most ordinarily the sum of Christian Doctrine is in some manner known before 2. That it doth not reveal only some one point of Faith alone and then another and so on as if we savingly knew one essential point of Faith when we have no saving Knowledg of the rest For that is a Contradiction But finding all these Truths received in the mind before by a common Knowledg the special Light comes in upon them all at once and so shews us the Anatomy of Christianity or the parts of Gods Image in one frame as to the essentials 3. For the understanding of which you must further know that there is such an inseparable connection of these Truths and such a dependance of one upon another that it is not possible to know one of them truly and not know all For example Believing in Jesus Christ is an act so inseparable from the rest that if the essentials of Christianity be not essential to it certainly you cannot do this without them For to Believe in Christ is essentially to believe in him as God and man two Natures in one Person by Office the Mediator our Redeemer and Saviour to save us from guilt and sinne from punishment and pollution and to give us by the Holy Ghost a Holy nature and life and to give us the forgiveness of sinne and Everlasting life and so to restore us to the mutual Love of God here and fruition of him hereafter and all this as merited and procured by his Death Obedience Resurrection Ascension and Intercession for his Church Whether here be all that is Essential to Christianity and absolutely necessary to Salvation to be believed I leave to consideration but sure I am that all this is Essential to saving Justifying Faith And Christ is not taken as Christ if he be not thus taken For the Ends thus enter the definition of his Relation as the Redeemer and Saviour and Lord. So that the Love of God as our felicity and End and the belief in Christ as the way are both together in the same minute of time which soever of them be first in order of nature which is a question that I dare not here so unseasonably handle 2. Upon this special Illumination of the Soul and the special Consideration with which it doth concurre the Deliberating Soul is presently Resolved And in these two Acts which alwaies go together consisteth the special Sanctifying Work Even in the Illumination and Estimation of the Understanding and in the true Resolution of the Will 2. The Determination of the Will is its own free act performed by its natural self determining power procured by the special Grace of God I mean in this special case It followeth Deliberation While we are unresolved we Deliberate what to Resolve upon that is we are considering which is best and most eligible and which not and as we practically judg we use to Determine and to choose And when this choice after Deliberation is peremtory and full it 's called Resolution So that my meaning is to let you understand that when the Matter of our Faith is set open to the Soul it is not a wavering fickle purpose that is a saving closure with it but it must be a firm Resolution Much less will it ever bring a man to Heaven to be thinking and deliberating what to do as long as he is unresolved And now I shall prove the Necessity of this II. Till you are Resolved you are not Converted and that appeareth by these Evidences 1. If you are not firmly Resolved it is certain that you do not firmly believe For such as your Belief is such will be the effects of it upon the Will An unsound Opinionative belief will produce but tottering languishing purposes but a firm belief will cause a firm Resolution of the Will And if your belief be unsound you must confess you are unconverted 2. Moreover if you do not esteem God above all Creatures and Heaven above Earth and Christ and Grace above sinne you are certainly unconverted But if you have such a true estimation you will certainly have a firm Resolution For you will Resolve for that which you highly esteem 3. If God have not your firm Resolution he hath not indeed your Heart and Will For to give God your Hearts and Wills is principally by firm Resolving for him And if God have not your Hearts you are sure unconverted 4. Moreover if you are not firmly Resolved your Affections will not be sincere and stedfast For all the Affections are such as to their sincerity as the Will is which doth excite or command them And nothing is more mutable then the Affections in themselves considered They will be hot to day and cold to morrow if they be not rooted in the firm Resolution of the Will which is the life of them 5. Lastly Without a firm Resolution there can be no faithfull obedience and execution of the Will of God For if men be not Resolved they will heavily go on and lazilie proceed and easily come off For their hands go to work without their hearts It is the greatest work in all the world that God calls you to and none but the Resolved are able to go through with it Of which we shall give you a fuller account anon III. In the next place let me intreat you in the feare of God to look after this great and Necessary part of your Conversion There are many degrees of good motions in the mind but all that falls short of Resolution is unâ—ound Many are brought to Doubt whether all be well with them and to have some fears thereupon that yet will not be brought so far as to consider soberly of the matter and deliberate what is best to be done and to advise with their Ministers for the furthering of their Salvation Many that are perswaded so far as to consider and deliberate and take advice yet go no further then some cold wishes or purposes which are all overcome by the love of the world and the power of their sinnes Many that do proceed to some kind of Practice do only take a tast or an essay of Religion to try how they can like it and begin some kind of outward Reformation without any firm Resolution to go through with it Or if their purposes seem strong it is but occasioned by something without and not from a setled habit within All these are short of a state of special Saving Grace and must be numbred with the unconverted It is a common and very dangerous mistake that many are undone by to think that every good Desire is a certain sign of Saving Grace Whereas you may have more then bare Desires even purposes and promises and some performances and yet perish
Ghost is as necessary to your Salvation Without the sanctifying work of the Spirit you could never be delivered from sin and Satan nor restored to Gods Image and consepuently could never be the Members of Christ nor have any saving benefit by his Sufferings Would you not think him unworthy to live that would reproach the Fathers work of nature and say that the whole Creation is but some poor contemptible work And would you not think him unworthy the name of a Christian that had contemptible thoughts of the Sons Redemption as if we could be saved as well without a Saviour or as if it were but some poor and triviall commodity that Christ had purchased us I know you would confess the mistery of that man that believeth no better in the Father and the Son And how comes it to pass that you think not of your own misery that believe no better in the holy Ghost Do not you debase the Sanctifying office of the holy Spirit when you shew us your knowledg and parts and outward duties and civility and tell us that these are the work of sanctification What is Sanctification but such a thing as this Why Holiliness is a new Life and Spirit in us and these that you talk of are but a few flowers that are stickt upon a Corps to keep it a while from stinking among men till death convey it to a buriall in Hell O Sirs Sanctification is another kind of matter then the forsaking of some of your fouler vices and speaking well of a Godly life It is not the patching up of the Old man but the Creating of a New man I give you warning therefore from God that you think not basely of the work of the holy Ghost and that you think no more to be saved without the Sanctifying work of the Spirit then without the redeeming work of the Son or Creation Government or Love of the Father Sanctification must turn the very bent and stream of heart and life to God to Christ to Heaven it must mortifie Carnall Self and the world to you it must make you a people Devoted Consecrated and Resigned up to God with all that you have it must make all sin odious to you and make God the Love and Desire of your Souls so that it must give you a new Heart a new End a new Master a new Law and a new Conversation This is that noble Heavenly work which the holy Ghost hath vouchsafed to make the business of his office To slight and despise this is to slight and despise the holy Ghost To refuse this is to refuse the holy Ghost and not to believe in him to be without this work is to be without the holy Ghost if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8. 9. The holy Catholick Church is composed of all through the world that have this work upon them and therefore it is called Holy The Communion of Saints is the blessed Vitall fellowship of these Sanctified Ones For these only is the Resurrection unto blessedness the life everlasting with the Lord of life for all others is the Resurrection of Condemnation the everlasting punishment But if the other two Articles of our Faith have been so denied by the blind it is less wonder if this be so Some Hereticks denied God to be the Creatour of the world and because they saw so much evill in the world they said that it was made by Devils or evill Angels who indeed made the sin but not the world So dealt the Jewes by the Son and the Second Article of our Faith The Sacrifice of Bulls and Goats and such Beasts was all the Sacrifice for sin that they believed in And thus deale the multitude of the ungodly by the Spirit Indeed they know not themselves sufficiently to know the need and worth of Sanctification They are too whole to value the skill and care of Christ or the holy Ghost The insensibility of spirituall death and misery and thinking too lightly of Originall Corruption and too well of our depraved nature is both the cause of many of the Heresies of the learned and of the common contempt of Christ and the Spirit and recovering grace in all the unregenerate For it is not possible that men should have any deeper sence of the need or worth of the remedy then they have of the greatness of their sinne and misery O Sirs did we not come upon this great disadvantage to you that we speak to dead men that have indeed a naturall life which doth but take pleasure in their spirituall death how confidently should we expect to prevaile with you all But while you think lightly of your disease we can expect no better but that you think as lightly of Christ and holiness and all the meanes that tend to your recovery and think of the new man as the Poets fabled of the Promethean race that it grows out of the earth of your own poor sorry purposes and performances like ordinary plants Truly Sirs I have led you even as farre as I can and what more to say to you or what more to do for you to procure your Conversion I do not know If it had been in my power to have shewed you Heaven and Hell it self that you might better have known the matters that we speak of I think I should have done it But God will not have men live by sense in this life but by Faith If I could but help you all to such a knowledge and apprehension of these in visible things as the worst of you shall have as soon as you are dead then I should make but little doubt of your Conversion and Salvation Sure if you had but such a sight the force of it would so work upon you that before I went out of the Congregation you would all cry out that you are resolved to be new Creatures But though this be beyond my power and though I cannot shew you your great and wonderfull things that every eye here must shortly see yet I come not to you without a glass of Gods own making and in that glass you may see them There if you have but an eye of Faith you may see that God that you have so long offended and that now so earnestly inviteth you to return There you may see that Crucified Christ that hath opened you a way for Repentance by his Blood and pleadeth that Blood with you for the melting of your impenitent obstinate hearts There you may see the odious face of sinne and the amiable face of Holiness which is the Image of God There you may see both Heaven and Hell for all that they are invisible and may know what will be and that to all Eternity as well as what is And will not such a sight in the glass of Gods Word serve turn to move thee presently to give up the trade of sinning and to Resolve before thou stir for God I