cannot live longer than I have his love A. Neither dye nor doubt poor soul Thy Lord so loves thee that he will not leave thee or if he do for a time he will not alway Christs ☞ bowels burn with love and that fire however smothered for a time will break out in a flame at last Christs love is like himself immutable and unchangeable Love is Christs life as well as thine He will not surely kill himself by deserting thee Thou canst not live except Christ do love neither can Christ You Lord hath sworn and surely if he break his oath he dyes that the Mountains shall be removed but his love shall not leave thee Obj. Oh! But though Christ do love me yet men hate me I cannot be so cheerful in Christs love because I meet with the creatures wrath Rep. I pity thee poor Creature thou hast the love of the Potter and thou fearest the wrath of the Potsherd Why art thou so weak as to sink under the Creatures wrath while thou hast the Creators love Be of good comfort Christ can break in peeces all thy enemies with his Iron rod while in the mean time he will comfort thee with his Shepherds-crook Why dost thou droop at the hatred of him who dwelleth in a Tabernacle of clay and not rather triumph in the love of him who is set down at the right hand of the Majesty on high Look up Beleever Heaven is clear over thy head though the earth be dirty under feet though thou be in a storm among the creatures yet the Sun of love shines on thee from Christ He smiles and loves thee what though men frown and hate thee Fear not him who hates thy body and at worst can but destroy that rejoyce rather in him who loves thy soul and at the last will raise up thy body from the Grave and give thee a glorious body like unto his own and fill thy soul with eternal joy in the enjoyment of his everlasting love The last use of the point is-for counsel Sith Christ loves his Saints I would surely the point might and doth counsel both the world and beleevers First you men of the world If you have an ear to hear hear Christ loves beleevers be yee counselled to do the like Certainly Christ will take it well at your hands if you love them who are beloved by him His friends are sometime strangers in your Land use them well shew them love put it upon Christs score he loves them and he will reward you Jesus Christ doth so love beleevers as that he will not let a cup of cold water given to them in his name that is because hee loves them go unrewarded I say it again sith Christ is gracious and loves beleevers be ye wise and love them also However take heed that yee do not wrong them If you will not do them good beware you do them no hurt Beleeve it if you do Christ loves them and he will not bear it Tremble lest while you lift up your hand against beleevers that Jesus Christ who loves them dash you in peeces Beware of persecuting Christs beloved ones under pretences It will be but a poor excuse to say they were Schismaticks Christ knows them to be Saints Beleeve it the bloud of beleevers is very precious and as he will punish Antichristian wretches under what names or titles soever distinguished So also will he be avenged upon all those who dare touch beleevers under what nick-names soever disgraced Therefore if you will not be so wise as to love yet be not so mad as to hurt those whom Christ loves But secondly let this counsel beleevers sith the Lord Jesus loves them that they would walk worthy thereof Beleevers live as the objects of Christs love Advance his Kingdom imbrace his counsels love all his members be abundant in his work and service In all things shew that Christs love to you hath a constraining power in you at least be yee counselled to love Christ who loves you and that so much the rather because Christ deserves thy love though thou do not deserve his O let not the love of Christ plead against you and say I ranne out to them but they returned not in to me Let not Christ say I gave you counsel and you did reject it In love I gave you Commandements and you did transgresse them No but sith Christ loves you love him and if you love him keep his Commandements Rouse up your selves O beleeving souls and considering that Christ loveth you demean your selves accordingly If he call come If he bid you go go If his Kingdom be advancing joyn in the work it is the Kingdom of him that loves you If his Spirit counsel take it for it comes from love In a word in all things live as those who indeed are beloved of Christ And let your carriage be exactly obedient kinde and loving unto him who doth stoop so low as to love such poor creatures as you be And if any ask why you love and labour for Jesus Christ tell them it is because you love him And adde withall that did they but know how Christ loves you they would rather ask why you love him so little or do for him no more But if they demand how doth Christ love you Tell them that question is unanswerable Indeed say he loves you and that truly but withall transcendently That Christ loves you tell all the world of you know but how he loves tell them that passeth your knowledge yea and the knowledge of every creature for it is a love passing knowledge And this is the next thing and the chief thing which we shall speak of SERMON II. EPHES. 3. ver 19. And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge CHRISTS love is the Saints life Paul tells you he was dead to the Law that he might live to God And the ground thereof was this that hee lived by faith in Christ who loved him Galath 2.20 As the life so likewise the comfort of the Saints is wrapped up in the love of Christ A beleever can neither live nor rejoyce if the Lord Jesus smile not upon his soul But if Jesus Christ wil but smile and shine in the light of love Beleevers know not only how to live but also how to rejoyce in all even the worst of times Hence it was that this Apostle praying to the Father of our Lord Jesus for the Ephesians that they might not faint at his tribulations He intreats that to this purpose they might know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge Having briefly touched at the reality of Christs love to beleevers as it is included in this place I shall now speak more largely to the royalty thereof as it is set out in this phrase that it passeth knowledge Whence our second point was this viz. That love which Christ beareth to beleevers is a transcendent love You see how fully this point lies in these words It must needs bee
bosome is full of the wine of Christs love The Justice of the Father is not more exact to fill the bosome of sinnets with his wrath than the grace of the Son is free to fill the bosomes of Beleevers with his love Hence it is that he saith Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it Psal 81.10 You read a Box of Oyntment which when it was opened the whole house was filled with the odour thereof Joh. 13.3 such a Box of Oyntment is the bosome of Christ as may bee gathered from Cant. 1.3 which being opened in the houses i. e. the hearts of beleevers fills them full with the sweet favour thereof And indeed as Christ bids beleevers ask the Father that their joy might be full So hee is as bountiful himself as he would have his Father to be and therefore without their asking for he loveth first he lets out yea and fills them with his love In this life beleevers have at least might as much love as faith can let in and if the soul be not full it is only because the mouth is narrow as the bottle with the narrow neck in the Ocean And hereafter as much as vision it self can swallow So that now the transcendent fulnesse of that degree in which Christ lets out his love to beleevers doth evidently declare the love to be transcendent also 3 Adde to both these the consideration of the duration of Christs love to beleevers and this will further demonstrate its transcendency As the nature is high and the degree full so the duration is constant and perpetual Having loved his own he loved them els 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e to the end it may be to the perfection Joh. 13.1 Christs love is once and ever It is of the same nature with himself unchangeable As nothing in Beleevers was so good as to make him to set his love upon them so nothing is so bad as doth make him take it off again Indeed sometime the visible actings or demonstrations may be concealed but still the love it self remains sure and is never violated That look as Divines say of Christ upon the Crosse The beatifical vision was suspended but the hypostatical union was not dissolved In like manner though the light of Christs love may be for a time obscured yet the life thereof is still preserved The love may be dark sometime but dyes never There is nothing no not sin that can totally and finally separate between Christs love and a beleevers soul Paul asketh the question to this day it is unanswered yea and unanswerable What shall separate Rom. 8.35 The mountains shall depart and the hills shall be removed saith Christ but my kindnesse shall not depart Isa 54.10 Beleevers those high Hills which you sometimes see at whose sight ye wonder And the mighty mountains which you behold sometime and are amazed at their vastnesse those very hills and mountains not only may but shall depart But yet the love of Christ towards you is so transcendently high and sure that it shall not nay cannot depart So that as the very heavens themselves wax old like a garment and yet the person of Christ remaineth even so shall heaven earth every creature wax old decay and dye But still the love of Christ towards beleevers shall continue young fresh and flourishing Such is its duration such shall be its continuance Indeed the very life of Christ must depart and he dye again ere his love to his can decay For his love is not only the Beleevers life but his own as was hinted formerly O the transcendency of this love which shall thus last 4 Consider now in the last place the operation of Christs love to beleevers and you shall see its transcendency answerable to its nature degree and duration We guesse at the transcendency of things by the noblenesse of their operations It is a certain rule the more noble any thing doth operate the more noble it is in its self Love of all the affections being the most noble answerably it hath the most noble operations Christs love will easily appear to be transcendent if we consider how much more nobly it operates than any other love in the world From the first point of time untill this yea and till time shall be no more the operations of Christs love to beleevers have been are and shall bee transcendently glorious and noble I shall not in this place so curiously search into all actions of Christ because I shall more particularly speak to them by themselves to let them therefore passe I shall only instance in five particulars and in them you shall see the transcendent operations of the love of Christ to beleevers 1 There was no condition so low unto which Christ did not condescend to declare that his love did transcend High love stoops low and the higher still the love is the lower still it stoops You may take loves elevation by its condescention and the lower still that you observe love condescendeth the higher alway you must conclude it is elevated I think it was but a fancy which one reporteth of a great Prince who it is said took upon him both the habit and imployment of a Days-man working to build a House in which his beloved was that he might visit her Yet let me tell you it is no fancy but a reality in Jesus Christ that out of the height of his love to beleevers hee took upon him both the form and the imployment of a Days-man which some think though I do not to be intended in that of Job 9.33 to declare not only his obedience to his Father but his love to beleevers He emptied himself or made himself vain for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be translated and took upon him the form of a Servant c. Phil. 2.7 Christ became of no reputation that his love to Beleevers might bee of high reputation O how nobly did Christs love operate towards beleevers when he stooped so low for their sakes 2 There was no action so mean which he did not cheerfully undertake to declare his love to beleevers Royall love doth as it were debase the Soul to any though the meanest service to declare it self Jacob will bee a Servant and keep Sheep in the heat of Summer and the cold of Winter rather than not shew his love to Rachel And Jesus Christ will wash his Disciples feet a mean imployment and though he be Lord of all will be a servant unto all his Disciples that hee may not only teach them humility and love one unto another but also that he may declare the height and transcendency of love unto them all 3 There is no failing so foul which he doth not passe by to declare the surpassing greatness of his love to beleevers Great love passeth by and pardoneth great faults And the greater the faults are which be committed the greater is the love by which they are pardoned Peter failed grosly when
law but to declare the infinitnes of his love for by it beleevers may see he requires of them at no time more than he did himself The yoak of Christ by this is made smooth and easie Now his commandements will appear not to be grievous because hee did obey them first himself There is no duty O beleeving soul unto which thou canst be called in the whole course of thy life but thy Saviour in his life did the same The child may well say he hath a loving father when as he can see him first doing that himself in his own person which hee commands it to do Your everlasting Father Jesus Christ O ye children of faith in his life went through in his own person all those performances which you are to do in Religion And is not this transcendent love 3. Our Lord â—n the whole course of his life was ever carefull to provide and use all possible means for the strengthning of beleevers graces Knowledge Faith are the two great graces for the sweetning of the life of beleevers and Christ was very carefull to strengthen them Therefore it was that hee spake chiefly to those things which might strengthen these graces For knowledge how lovingly did hee speak that which his Disciples were able to bear And if he thought they did not well understand what he said how lovingly did he expound all things to them when they were alone as t is Mark 4. 33 34. Yea when they asked him of any Parable what its meaning might be How lovingly did hee satisfie their desires telling them that it was their privilege and to them it was given to know the mysterys of the kingdome of God Luke 8.9 10. nay when Jesus had spoke any thing which they understood not and did but perceive their reasoning among themselves about it he did voluntarily not being asked inform them as in that Mat. 16.7 8 9. And for faith its easie to observe how ready Christ was to strengthen it Did he not rejoyce when he had an oportunity so to do Mark that in Job 11. when Lazarus was dead and hee knew how his raising of him would conduce to the confirming of their faith hee professeth speaking of it that he was glad for their sakes that hee was not there when he dyed to the intent they might beleeve vers 15. Now my beloved what doth this care of Christ to strengthen your graces declare but the transcendency of his love to your souls 4 Jesus Christ in his life aimed more at and rejoyced more in Beleevers comforts than his own When he heard that great voyce from heaven saying I have glorified it i.e. his name and I will glorifie it He said This voice came not for his sake but for his Disciples It seems his end in that request for that voyce was an answer to his prayer was not his glory but their good And therefore not rejoycing himself in the excellent glory of that voice from heaven hee speaks to them and applies it to them professing it was for their sakes Joh. 12.30 Hence it is also that hee when hee was to die and knew that his houre was come and so one would think should have retired and spent his time for himself hee set himself to comfort his Disciples that in so doing he might declare that having loved them he loved them to the end with a transcendent love Joh. 13.1 Tell me my beloved should you see one going to the Stake or Scaffold to dye and should you observe him spend all his time breath and eloquence in comforting some one dear beloved would not you say his love did transcend in making him forget himself to comfort her why so it was with your Saviour There were but few houres ere he was to be taken and to suffer And yet as if he minded as indeed he did the comfort of his Disciples more than his own he improves all that time and spent as it were all his eloquence upon them labouring to silence their dispairings and sorrows not minding his owne death and sufferings Oh transcendent love Lastly it must be also minded that Jesus Christ being to pray to his Father the last action as it were of his life he in that prayer declared the transcendency of his love by putting up more requests in the behalf of beleevers than of himself You know the prayer in Joh. 17. And if you observe it you shall finde that albeit in the beginning he prayes for himself in that Father the houre is come glorifie thy Son yet having but as it were mentioned this in the 1 vers and reiterated it in vers 5. he doth in a manner shut himself out of all the rest of the prayer and spendeth it wholly for beleevers And oh what glorious things did he beg in their behalf That the Father would keep and preserve them ver 15. That he would own and sanctifie them ver 10 17. That they might be one with the Father as he was one ver 21 22. And in the close of all how doth he intreat the Father to admit them to be ther where he was and to behold his glory and how strongly doth he argue for this doth he not use the cogent motive of love for thou lovest me ver 24. As if he should say Father I know thou lovest me thou didst so before ever the world was now I beseech thee by that love as if ever thou wouldest declare that thou dost love me own preserve sanctifie make one with thyself mine as I am for this is the argument to the whole prayer and let them whom I loved in the world bee with me when they leave the world O Father as thou lovest me hear grant this as my last request for my beloved ones Tell me now how transcendent is Christs love and how near do beleevers lye to his bosome who being now as it were to pray and dye forgets himself and breaths out his last requests in so many so transcendent particulars in their behalfs Thus you see how easie it is to runne through the life of Christ and yet running to read all along transcendent love to beleevers But I must now speak a word to the death of Christ and you shall see this also as lively demonstrating as either or both the other branches the truth of the point viz. That the love of Christ to beleevers passeth knowledge The third head of demonstrations being the death of Christ I shall speak to it a little distinctly though briefly But where shall we begin his passton and at what part of it shall we enter upon this demonstration shall we goe with him into the Garden indeed there it began or shall wee ascend Mount Calvary how upon it it ended or shall we speak of what he suffered in the high Priests hall I think it not amisse to mention each To begin therefore at the Garden in which Christ was taken O how transcendently sweet is the smell of his love
A Discovery of GLORIOUS LOVE OR The Love of Christ to Beleevers Opened In the Truth thereof In the Transcendency and thereof In the Sweetnesse thereof Together with the necessity that lyes upon every Beleever to strive after the Spirituall and Experimentall knowledge of it Being the sum of VI Sermons Preached upon Ephesians 3.19 By JOHN DURANT Preacher of the Gospel in the City of Canterbury 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. Wee will make thy love to be remembred more than wine Cant. 1.4 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. He brought me into the house of wine his banner over me was love Cant 2.4 London Printed for R. I. to be sold by W. Gilbert son at the Bible in Guilt-spur-street without New-gate 1655. To the Right Honourable Robert Earl of Warwick c. My Noble Lord I Presume your Lordship well knows that Christs love is our soul and therefore sole life Then and indeed not till then do wee live when wee injoy divine love Our bosomes cannot breath forth the breath of life before Christ breaths in the breath of love Indeed it s the misery of most that they are strangers to this truth To speak to many of the Lord Jesus and to tell them of a life in love above what sence feels and of a comfort a glory a happinesse flowing from thence far surmounting what sight fees is a mystery which they cannot perceive nor indeed beleeve for t is foolishnesse unto them Not onely the News-mongers at Athens counted this News which they never heard of But even the Philosophers there themselves accounted Pauls preaching of these things a strange doctrine But I hope I may without either falsenesse or flattery say your Honour is well acquainted with these things As experimentally knowing that all your honour joy felicity lyes in this that you know the love of Christ passing knowledge And this is one ground of this dedication of these ensuing Sermons But it s not the onely ground For I desire by this also to declare to the world and your self how sensible and mindfull I am of those obligations which your Honour hath laid upon mee not onely by your owning of and respect unto my person but which I prize most my Ministry His person is above my praise whose pen hath blotted the common way of dedications Quia laudatur â—laudatoviro est la is vera But his ground was because for the most part they only flatter And yet hee allows of dedications when the argument of the Book agrees with the person whom its dedicated to Sir Francis Bacon de augment sâ—en lib. 1. page 19. The considâ—ration of which I hope as hath been hinted will secure mee from his or others censure Besides I know there is a difference between flattery and gratitude though the one bee odious as a vice yet the other is amiable as a vertue And t is at this which I have aimed in this dedication I know that the bare remembrance how gratefull soever of favours received is no requital But yet though it serves not to remunerate the favour yet 't will to vindicate the benefactor that hee hath not ill bestowed his benefits My Lord If I say that I cannot requite all your favours it s no more than all know And if I say that Christ can it s no more than I know you beleeve and I desire T will bee no over-exalting of Christs love nor any diminution unto your favours If I say that the least grain of love from Christ to you will abundantly compensate all the weight of your love to mee And this My Lord is not onely my prayer but my beliefi in your behalf I shall not trouble your Lordship with many words Onely let mee have leave â—o sound in your ears two words of the Lord Jesus the one was a word of Prophecie the other of Advice 1. His word of Prophecie was The love of many shall wax cold It s your duty to search Mat. 24.12 and t will bee your honour to find that there is no fulfilling of that in your soul But alas who can say that hee sees not too great a fulfilling of this in himself Oh! the decay of love zeal activity appearance c. in the things of Christ that is every where It s a thing that calls for bloody tears that besides the abounding of iniquity in enemies there is such waxing cold of love in friends I have sometimes thought Christ spake this Prophecie as Paul did his rehearsall Phil. 3.18 viz weeping II. Christs word of advice was this Strengthen the things that remain that are ready to dye Apoc. 3.2 It s well that under spirituall decayes wee have any thing that remains happy they who have not lost all It s wisdome to strengthen that which languisheth holy they that strive to do thus and the following Sermons may bee helpfull herein If the Spirit lay this truth upon our hearts That Christ loves us with a transcendent love 't will at once make us bleed for coolings and burn yea blaze a fresh with the fire internally and flames externally of love to Christ his people his truths his designes c. But I have gone beyond my intentions though I hope not beyond your acceptation If you will permit mee to adde that I am in the number of those who both praise and pray for you and professe to bee much obliged to you I shall trouble you no further save with the sincere subscription that I am My Lord. Your Honours singularly obliged Soules servant JOHN DURANT To his beloved friends the godly Inhabitants of the Town and Port of Sandwich Particularly The Congregation over which the Holy Ghost hath made my reverend Brother Mr. Francis Prentice Overseer Beloved in Christ HOwever those who are in the world may account the insuing Sermons riddles and paradoxes yet to you whom I hope Christ hath taken out of the world they are experienced truths It s true yee know them already for I have preached them to you But that you might have them in remembrance I have been willing to Print them for you And yet not for you only but for as many as beleive in the Lord Jesus It was Peters care to perpetuate those things by writing which hee had preached by word That so albeit his hearers knew yet they might bee established * in the truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. rooted or setled as upon a firm foundation Certainly next to the knowing of truths is the establishment in them which some wanting are gone aside after airy vanities T is true your establishment primarily and causally depends on the Spirit But yet secondarily and instrumentally it is attained unto by the word For therefore it was that Peter writ as hee sayes 2 Pet. 1.12 and surely his writings were words And yet the words of Christ were not bare letter No they were Spirit and Life And the truths of Christ held forth by any according to the
Joh. 13.23 19.26 and of him it is often said he was the Disciple whom Jesus loved yea and John will witness for more than himself He saith Jesus loved him and all Beleevers besides him For speaking to them he saith He i. e. Christ hath loved us Apoc. 1.5 Call in Paul and he will prove that Christ loveth Beleevers for Christ loved him and such was the love that Christ bare to Paul that he professeth that he could nay did live upon it I live saith he by the Son of God who loveth me Gal. 2.20 Nay Paul further bears record to this truth and witnesseth that Christs love stretcheth forth it self to every beleeving Soul We are saith he more than conquerers through him that loveth us Rom. 8.37 I shal adde no more testimonies to prove this truth Even the least Beleever though but a babe is able to lisp in the language of this love and tell you that there is a divine fire of love in Christs bosome burning brightly towards Beleevers I shall hint three Demonstrations of the Doctrin taken from the behaviour of Christ towards Beleevers which will evidently clear cordial love unto them Châ—ists love demonst ated Oculus amoris index 1 Christs eye is always on Beleevers and he takes delight to look there where they are The eye is the Index of love It is a sweet starre alway shining over the hearts and houses of those whom we love The Proverb tells us where we love there we look Ubi amor ibi oculus Now it is easie to observe the rowlings of Christs eyes how that still they are towards Beleevers Wil you listen to Christs love in its language this way Let me sethy countenance saith he to the Beleever for it is lovely Cant. 2.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i e. Thy appearance Such is the pleasure that Christ takes in beholding of beleevers that he seems to live upon their looks and speaks as if hee were ravished with their sight Thou hast ravished my heart my Sister my Spouse thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e Thou hast heartened me Cant. 4.9 He speaks once and again as if he did suck sweetness from the speech thou hast ravished my heart with thy sight How can we question Christs love to beleevers when his eyes are thus fixed on them that their sight doth ravish his soul Build upon it O beleeving soul Christs delight in looking on thee doth demonstrate his love to thee He peeps through the Lattesses to declare his love Cant. 2.9 Nay as if he were over-powred as indeed such an effect doth a look of love produce while he beholds beleevers he saith Turn away thine eyes from me for they have overcome me Cant. 6.5 The word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and it signifies have made me proud or as our Margent hath it have puft me up Christ seems to pride himself in the looks of beleevers his eye is on them and his heart is taken up if their eye be on him 2 Christs tongue speaks his love to beleevers Lingua amori tuba The tongue is loves trumpet the breathings of the Heart fill the Lips with sounds of love Love that is secret in the bosome sounds sweetly in the breath Speech as a Silver trumpet loudly sounds love It is said of Shechem the Son of Hamor that his Soul clave unto Dinah the daughter of Jacob and the Text saith he loved her and his tongue spake it for it is added that he spake kindly to the Damosell Gen. 34.31 Beleevers Christs tongue bewrays him his lips speak his love to you Oh how oft hath Christ spoke sweetly to thy Soul O beleever Canst not thou gather by his speaking to thy heart for that is the Hebrew phrase for speaking kindly the love of his heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How near thy heart O foul do those words of thy Saviour go If any thirst let him come and drink freely Doth not his heart open as a fountain of love in this speech And speaks hee not to thy heart i. e. very kindly when he saith If thou do but thirst come and drink Ask the poor Woman that had the bloudy issue Mark 5. whether or no Christ did not speak to her in the language of love when he said Daughter thy faith hath made thee whole Poor heart she had touched him as she thought at unawares and when she heard him speak of it she trembles as if she expected words of wrath But while she touched his garment secretly love touched his heart sweetly and his tongue bespeaks it when he called her Daughter And as Christs tongue trumpets out love when he speaketh to so when he speaketh of beleevers O the high Epithites 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 apâ—a Hermog i. e. that which he addes to beleevers names when he speaketh of their persons how rhetorical how encomiastical is the language of his love when he speaks of his Spouse Thou art faire saith he thou art fair thou hast Doves eyes thy hair is as a flock of Goats thy teeth are like a flock of Sheep thy lips are like a thread of scarlet thy neck like the tower of David c. Cant. 4.1 2 3 4. As beleevers declare their love to Christ by speaking highly of him so Christ declares his love to beleevers by speaking highly of them If beleevers call him the Lilly of the vallies he calls them the Lilly among the thorns Christs love will not permit him to speak of them in low language Thus the lips of your Lord O beleevers are a demonstration of his love to you 3 Christs actions seal to the truth and strengthen the demonstration of the Doctrin If there were nothing but the eye or the tongue it might bee feared lest the love expressed by them were but either feigned or fond But actions following these seal it up that the love is not complemental but cordial If love be only in the lip it is without life and it may be suspected as counterfeit But when men not only speak Act iâ— amoris ancillâ— but act love then love lives and is love indeed Indeed where love is in truth it will bee seen in act every action being only Loves Lackey to go of its errands and Loves servant to do its work Now should we take a view of the actions of Jesus Christ we shall see that they strive to excel and exceed his words in the declaration of his love to beleevers I shall only hint at some as intending the larger Discourse of them in the next Doctrin 1 Consider Jesus Christ manifesting himself and his secrets to beleeving souls and this will demonstrate the truth of his love Dalilah questions the truth of Sampsons love from the concealment of his secrets from her How canst thou say I love thee when thy heart is not with me saith she Judg. 16.15 Thus she seems to argue Where there is love
in truth there will be a communication of secrets But this I finde not in thee therefore I question whether thou indeed dost love me How ever Dalilah did or might argue thus against her Sampson Beleevers cannot argue so against their Saviours love The Lord Jesus unbosometh himself to Beleevers the secrets of his heart are with them Christ tells his Disciples that hee would manifest himself unto them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. lny himself open Joh. 14. The men of the world are strangers to Christs affections and therefore they are so to his secrets Carnal people do not know the minde of the Lord because hee doth not love them But we saith Paul that is we who are beloved by Christ we have the minde of Christ 1 Corint 2.16 Look as the Father loveth the Son and declares it by this that he sheweth him all things which himself doth Joh. 5.10 In like manner the Son loveth beleevers and actually demonstrates it by this that he declares all things i. e. all these secrets which were needful for them to know that he heard of the Father Joh. 15.15 The secrets of Christs Cabinet-councel are with those whom hee loves 2 Christ often takes Beleevers to his house and feasts them Thus wee deal with our friends and thus we declare to them our loves Christ deals so with his The King hath brought me into his Chamber Cant. 1.4 Nay he hath brought me into his banqueting house Cant. 2.4 When David would declare his love to Barzillai he said Come thou over with me and I will feed thee with me at Jerusalem 2 Sam. 19.23 thus Christ often speaks and declares his love to beleevers Come thou to me poor soul and I will feed thee with me in Jerusalem Nay Christ declares his love not only by inviting and bringing beleevers to his house but also by coming to theirs He doth stand at their door and knock and if they will but open he will enter Apoc. 3.6 if they love him so much as to let him in hee will come and declare his love by dwelling with them Joh. 14.23 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. make out abode or long stay with And he will feast with them in their house i. e. their hearts And because he will declare hee comes to shew love he will make the feast at his own cost He hath gathered his myrrhe with his spice for this purpose as it is Cant. 5.1 3 Christ unites himself to beleevers and in that demonstrates that hee loveth them Affection begets union Austin long ago defined Love to be the juncture of two in one Amor est junctura duo copulans Love it makes one of two It is said of Jonathan and David that their souls were knit together 1 Sam. 18.1 Christ and beleevers are knit together it is Christs love which makes the knot It s a more than moral union which is between Christ and beleevers they are not only his friends and brethren but his Spouses and Members If he bee a Head they shall be the body and if he be a Vine they are the branches Nay the union between Christ and Beleevers is nearer than that of the vine and branches of no branch can it bee said properly that it is in the vine and the vine in it But of Beleevers it is said Christ is in them and they are in him This union demonstrates also the truth of Christs love to beleeving souls I shall now make a word of Application and conclude this point There be but three uses unto which I will speak viz. a use of Information Comfort and Counsel Use I. The point informs us of the sweetness of Christ to all the Saints O how sweet how kind how gracious is Jesus Christ to beleevers thus to minde then thus to set his heart upon them Beleevers the Lord loves you Is he not in this sweet unto you Ruth at the consideration of Roaz his love falleth on her face and faith Why have I found grace in thine eyes that thou shouldest take knowledge of me seeing I am a stranger Fall on your faces Beleevers you were once strangers to Jesus Christ but you have found grace in his eyes your names are written upon his heart in letters of love well may you say that Christ is sweet seeing he loves such strangers as you were The King of Israel is surely sweet in setting his love upon you who were strangers unto Israel O how happy art thou O poor beleever in being the object of thy Lords love The meanest beleever may raise up a very high structure of happinesse upon this corner stone Christs love O how blessed art thou in thy beloved poor soul and how sweet is hee to thee that hath alway a fire of love burning in his bosome towards thee II. This point is very comfortable to beleevers It is a cordial to you is it not O beleever that Christ doth love you doth it not revive your hearts my brethren to hear that hee who is the Lord of Life and glory in himself is a Lord of grace and love to you Jesus Christ who hath written upon his Garments Lord of Lords hath also written upon his bosome love to beleevers Certainly Beleevers could you but see how near you are to Christ how highly he prizeth you how dearly he loves you I should not need to bid you rejoyce or be glad or be of good comfort Object No will the soul say Indeed you need not if I could but see that Christ loved me but I doubt that Res Doubt it not O beleeving soul but be confident and in that confidence bee comforted Christ loves you and that as wee shall shew hereafter with a transcendent love Object But it is good to have a ground of confidence and in vain shall you comfort me if I see no reason in your words Why what reason is there that Christ should love mee Res Christs love is its own reason He therefore loves because he will It may be the vanity of our wanton love that we love meerly because we love But it is the glory of Christs love that he doth so ☜ Mark and mind this The reason why Christ loves thee O poor soul is in his own bosome If thou look in thine thou wilt not finde it because it is not there but look up into Christs bosome and there it is He will have mercy upon whom he will Christ will love thee and doth love thee O Beleever because he will Do not therefore stand questioning why he should but be comforted and rejoyce in this that he doth love thee even thee O poor soul Though it may bee thy faith be little yet Christs love to thee is true Q. But though he love me now will he love me still Will not Christ dislike me hereafter and upon that dislike desert me Sure I am I shall give him cause and I fear he will take it And certainly if Christ desert I dye I
when it was first declared The Prophet tels us it was at such a time as in which we were most unlovely when we lay in our bloud and were not so lovely as to provoke any eye to pity us Then did Christ passe by and it was the time of his love and then did his love break forth with the light of Life for then he said Live as it is Ezek. 16. Surely hee did shew wit who fancied the feigned beloved all besmeared with a poysoned hand and made leprous thereby and yet stories that the Love was as constant in love as ever But we shall shew only the truth and the transcendency of Christs love to Beleevers if we affirm from Scripture History When beleevers were all poysoned with the leprosie of sin and lay as Lepers by the way side then Jesus Christ came and took them by the hand and opened the love of his heart in letting out a stream of bloud to wash them and make them clean Now that before ever the fountains of the deep were laid a fountain of love should spring up in Christs bosome to beleevers and that it should be opened in his side at such a time as they lay in their filth What doth this declare but that Christs love to beleevers is transcendent and as it is in the Text passeth knowledge it being set and declared at or in such a time Yet Lastly take in the consideration of that end which Christ aimes at in his love to beleevers and this will declare it also to be transcendent Christs love to beleevers is its own end He loves that he may love and this makes the love glorious Jesus Christ Beleevers in all the love which hee lets out to you aimes not at himself but at you Hee loves you now that he may love you ever The end which he drives at in declaring love in a lesser measure here is that he may declare love to you in a greater measure hereafter He makes you vessels of Grace in this world that you may be vessels of Glory in that which is to come All the glory which hee aimed at for himself was the glory of his Grace and that shall be towards you Christ delights to set the golden apple of his glory in the silver picture of your good He being Love only aims that men may see the light thereof and he chose your bosomes beleevers as the golden Candlesticks to set up the glorious light of his love to shine in Now then that so infinite a Majesty as Christ is should love such mean Worms as beleevers be And that he should set his love before the first of the times and let it out in the worst of times and that only for their good as the end Oh! who can consider this but must sit down and wonder and cry out O the transcendency of Christs love How how doth it passe knowledge Having thus demonstrated a little I would now apply this point at present in three uses viz. 1 Of Consolation 2 Of Conviction 3 Of Counsel 1 In as much as Christ loveth beleevers with a transcendent love How may this comfort Beleevers at all times Thou complainest O beleeving Soul that the World doth not love thee nay thou sayest it doth hate thee Why be of good comfort though the World hateth Christ loveth and the World cannot hate thee so much as hee will love thee His love doth transcend the Worlds hatred What the Angel told Daniel that say I to every beleeving soul who groaneth under the hatred of the World Dan. 10.19 Fear not O man greatly beloved Why complain you O beleevers for want of the puddle drops of the Creatures love you have the pure spring of Christs love what weaknesse is it to cry for want of the light of the Stars so long as you have the light of the Sun Thou hast the Creators love beleever be not sad therefore in wanting the love of the creature especially considering what a transcendent love it is Comfort your selves O my brethren with these thoughts Jesus Christ loves you and that love of his which he bears to you passeth knowledge 2 Let this be a word of Conviction unto sinners Wretches be ye convinced that however you say no body regardeth Beleevers yet there is one who is greater than all who regards them and that in a high manner know that Christ loves them with a transcendent love You break their souls in peeces you slay them and you murther them and yet you say the Lord doth not see neither doth the God of Israel regard it Psal 94.7 But be convinced now to the contrary The Lord Jesus doth see and he doth regard them and ere long he will make you know that however you deal with them they are dear unto him though you love them not at all yet he loves them highly Were you not afraid saith God to speak against my servant Moses Num. 12.8 God wonders that they were not afraid to speak against a man whom he loved so much And who can chuse but wonder that ever any wretches should be so vile as to speak and act against those cruelly whom Christ loves transcendently But I pity yee poor Creatures It may be you think that Christ slights them as you do yet be convinced now and take heed hereafter what you do certainly whoever they bee whom you oppose if they be beleevers be convinced that the Lord Jesus loveth them all with a transcendent love 3 This Doctrin might be a Counsellor and it counsels all to look after and prize a part in the love of Christ above all the loves of the world O friends I why do you spend your selves and lay out your souls in the pursute of that which is not love at least not transcendent love I wish you would now bewise you who court the creature court them now no more I shew you a more excellent way of love Consider the transcendent love of the Lord Jesus and be ye counselled to labour to get a share in it O that the hearing of this that Christ loveth beleevers with a transcendent love might make you sick in your souls till you participate of this love When one heard of the great love which was between two choyce friends he said Utinam tertius essem i. e. O that I were but a third that I might share with them in their great love Consider it you have heard of the high transcendent love which is between Christ and beleevers Be on fire therefore and burn with desire that you may partake of that love and that at least you may enjoy that love which those that have most are not able to expresse or conceive it being a transcendent love passing knowledge SERMON III. EPHES. 3. ver 19. And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge WE are lanched out into the great depth of our Saviours love wherein our souls may swim very sweetly and although I can neither sound ground nor see
shoar yet I am loath to desire to be from this Sea for it were delight in the highest manner to be drowned here The love of Christ is so surpassing sweet in it self and so infinitely necessary for our souls as that it is my desire at least to make some further discovery of its transcendency You see what an Hyperbole the Apostle useth to express the greatness of Christs love by viz. That it passeth knowledge The last time wee gave out the meaning of the expression and entred upon the proof of it in the prosecution of this point of Doctrine viz. That the love which Christ beareth to Beleevers is a transcendent love This being the main thing which I eye in the Text and indeed the main thing which every soul ought to eye and live upon I shall proceed further in the prosecution thereof All which I spake the last time for the demonstration of the truth of the Doctrin was but in a general way I shall therefore now go on to demonstrate the love of Christ to be transcendent from a brief survey of the course of his life Indeed Christs Life was as it were but one great act of love begun at his Birth and carried on even to the time of his Death If we follow this Lamb in the whole tract of his Life we shall see that from his Cradle unto his Crosse the whole way was paved as the bottom of Salomons Chariot was with love There be three Heads or demonstrations which I shall now touch upon that the transcendency of Christs love to Beleevers may appear yet more full and glorious They are these 1 His Birth and Incarnation 2 His Life and Conversation 3 His Death and Passion Each of these seriously considered will abundantly demonstrate the love of Christ to beleevers to be transcendent First consider his Birth and Incarnation How doth Christs love transcend in this act The low condescension of Christ in becoming Man doth evidently declare the high transcendency of his love to beleevers Had it not been great love in the Lord Jesus to have taken upon him the Angelical nature Sure it had If Christ would have come into the World with tidings of love and life he might have came as an Angel of glory not as a pe ce of clay and such a condescension as that had been much But he passed by the nature of Angels and took upon him the nature of man that in this act he may declare love to beleevers The Apostle tells us that he took not upon him the nature of Angels Heb. 2.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. in no wise at no hand would he take upon him the Angelical Nature but he took upon him the seed of Abraham to declare his love to the Children of Abraham That we may see a little more clearly how the love of Christ doth transcend in his birth I shall speak to this head in some particulars and by all of them you shall see how Christs love unto beleevers did appear and shine gloriously in this act of his when he became man and was born for their sakes Here I shall consider therefore particularly under this Head these four things 1 Whence Christ came 2 Where Christ came 3 How Christ came 4 Why Christ came when he was incarnate And out of all these you will see the transcendency of Christs love 1 Consider whence he came Christ was in the bosome of the Father where hee lay and lived in his Fathers love hence he came to declare love to beleevers John tells us hee came down from Heaven Joh. 6.38 Jesus Christ from all eternity was in Heaven There he had his Fathers company There he enjoyed his Fathers love There he was blessed in his Fathers bosome for so the Scripture saith he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. 1.18 He was living in the light of the Fathers love And being with God he solaced himself in God In that very light and glory in which God himself was in that same light and glory did Christ triumph And yet from this from this he came for beleevers sakes He forg at as it were his Kindred and Fathers house to bee born for beleevers To undertake a long journey and from a rare place for any doth declare much love to them O how long a Journey did Christ undertake and from what a Paradise of pleasure did hee come unto beleevers when he was born Surely great was his affection transcendent is his love who came at least for a time from the house of Love his Fathers bosome to open to Beleevers the fountain of love his own bosome 2 But where did Christ come when he came from Heaven was it into some Goshen some land of light was it into some Paradise some land of life was it into some Elysium some place of pleasure Nothing lesse The place to which he came was Aegypt where beleevers sat in darknesse It was the Wildernesse where beleevers were in the shadow of death It was into this World where nothing is but vanity and vexation Here it was that Christ came for beleevers sakes And on what transcendent love was it that brought Christ here His eyes saw that his beloved ones were in a defiled place which therefore could not be their rest as it is Micha 2.10 his love therefore prevailed with him to come here to fetch his beloved hence It was great love which Ebedmelech the Aethiopian shewed unto Jeremiah when hee came to the brink of that filthy Dungeon in which the Prophet was and put down cords to draw him thence But what great love had it been if Ebedmelech had not only come to the brink of the Dungeon but come down into the Dungeon and not only drew him up with ropes but carried him up in his arms this had been love indeed Why let me tell you beleevers you were in this World in a worser Dungeon than Jeremiah was in which you were ready to dye for hunger and to be drowned in the mire thereof And the Lord Jesus Christ came when hee was born not only to the brink of the Dungeon with cords to draw you up but into the Dungeon it self to take you up in his very bosome and to bring you out from perishing here I came forth from the Father saith Christ that was great love but he addeth I came into the world Joh. 16.28 Here was love indeed For Christ to come from Heaven the Fathers Throne into the world Satans Kingdom For Christ to come from the place in which glory shines Heaven unto a place which lies in evil the world For Christ to come out from the presence of the Father who always smiled upon him and to come into the place of men who ever frowned upon him For him to come from thence where he always heard the Hallelujahs of Angels to come here where his ears were filled with the revilings of sinners 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O the height and the depth O the
was to unite himself more clearly and convincingly unto beleevers Union is an effect of affection and love desires to unite And if union be designed as the end of any act we may safely say Love was the Agent in that design Christ indeed unites himself to Beleevers by communicating unto them his own Divine Nature but that hee might make the Union more firm he was born to take upon him their Human nature Beleevers Christ is nearer united to you than unto the Angels his love to you did in this respect transcend his love to them hee took not upon him their nature and so was not united to them that way but he took upon him your nature and was for this end born that hee might be united to you this way Say is not this love Yet 5 Christ had another end of love for which hee was born viz. That he might be fitted in a more familiar manner to condescend to the capacities yea and to sympathize with the infirmities of beleevers Christ desires to converse with them sweetly and to sympathize with them seriously neither of which he could so clearly do as God therefore it was he would be born man As he was God and had only the divine nature beleevers were not able in so free a manner to converse with him his glory was so amazing that their weak eyes could not behold it his Majesty was so overpowering that then frail spirits could not converse with it Hee was therefore pleased to take our nature and be born that they might converse familiarly with his grace and not dye who could not behold fully his glory and live Had Jesus Christ took upon him the nature of Angells and so have come into the world unto his alas his presence like that of the Angells had been terrible Beleevers could not have borne it For this end therefore the word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us as 't is John 1.14 That so we might behold the glory of God in the only begotten son the divine glory can now more safely bee contemplated by beleevers while it is in the tent that I may allude to the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of flesh then it could bee by it self Now Beleevers may look upon the luster of his Deity more sweetly while they can behold it as it were through the love-hood of humanity Besides Christ being born he is now fitted to sympathize with the infirmities of his It behoved him saith the Holy ghost in all things to be made like and this is spoken of his becomming man unto his Brethren that hee might bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. one that can shew tender mercy or pity Heb. 2.17 Christ by his being born and so actually experiencing the infirmities of the humane nature knows now the better how to sympathize with his Now tell me is not this great love that Jesus Christ who might if he would have solaced himself in the contemplation of his own glory and never have stoopt to the sence of our infirmities yet that he would be born that so we might behold his glory and he might sympathize with us he by his birth condescending to our capacities and making himselfe sensible of our infirmities 6 Adde to all these ends this in the last place That Christ by his nativity hath raised our humane nature the dignity of which was another end of it Oh! how might I shew the love of Christ to transcend in this end of his nativity Certainly beleevers Christ by uniting your nature to his own did mightily dignifie it How doth the humane nature shine in the luster of the divine How doth the peble mans nature glister in the golden I should say the glorious ring of the divine nature O the transcendency of Christ love that hee would stoop so low as to be born for this end that thereby he might raise high the nature of his beloved ones i.e. beleevers So that thus you see how the birth of Christ throughly viewed giveth a bright discovery of the transcendency of his love Certainly if you spiritually contemplate all that love which shines in the birth of the Lord Jesus you will easily conclude that his love to beleevers passeth knowledge The second head from which I said I would demonstrate the transcendency of Christs love was the life of Christ And now a little to speak to this you must not imagine that I dare undertake the whole History of his life and demonstrate his transcendent love from every Act thereof No this were too large a field to walk in I shall hint something in the generall of it and then I shall in a more particular manner speak to some remarkable passages thereof all speaking transcendent love to beleevers Generally the life of Christ was a perfect myrrour of his love every action of it was full of love and if wee put all the actions of his life together we may conclude that he was born not so much to live as to love There was not a word which dropped from his lips but it was full of love and for his works which he did they all spake love so loud as that the deafest eare might hear it So that we may say as the Psalmist in another case There is no speech nor language where the voyce of his love was not heard the line thereof went through every act of his life Should we begin at the Temple where he disputed with the Doctors and follow him to the mount where he was crucified by the souldiers we should see all the way strewed with love-roses And as there is no beam in the Sunne in which there is no light so there was no Act in the life of Christ but to a spirituall eie shines with the light of love But omitting others I shall instance only in five particulars and shew how Christ in the actions of his life did declare the transcendency of his love 1 Jesus Christ did run for beleevers sakes through all the miseries of this life You cannot bee in any misery which is humane but Christ was in it for you to sweeten it unto you Art thou hungry he was Mat. 4.3 Art thou thirsty hee was Art thou weary hee was John 4.6 Meetest thou with scoffings scornings derisions blasphemies buffettings Why thy Lord Christ out of his transcendent love runned through all these in his life for thee Beleevers I beseech you mind it when ever you meet with any of the miseries of this life your beloved met with them for your sakes and that for this end that hee might sweeten them to your souls And therefore when you meet with and are pressed by the miseries of this life in any kind then think upon your Saviours love who lived a life sensible of these miseries out of his love to you And I doubt not but you will say O transcendent love 2. The Lord Jesus submitted to all the duties of religion which was not only to fulfill the righteousness of the
here Beleevers look upon your Saviour in the Garden See him when his soul began to be sorrowfull and very heavy and listen a little to what he saith My soule is exceeding sorrowfull even unto the death Matth. 26.38 you experienced Saints Tell mee what manner of love is this For your Lord to be sad unto the death that he might remove those clouds which have sometimes kept your soules in the shadows of death and darknesse But go on and listen to your Lords cry to the father once again when he begged that the cup might passe from him Surely the wrath in the bottom of the cup was very bitter which made him desire to be delivered from it But as surely the love in Christs besome was very sweet which yet prevaileth with him to submit his will to the Fathers and to drink it up for your sake Did you hear ever of sweating in a cold night and that upon the cold ground in an open Garden Surely you will say hee must be hot within that can or could do so Why the heat of your Saviours love was such as that it supported him to bear the heat of Gods wrath than as cold as the night was and t was a winters night as is rationally conjectured and as open as the place was a garden yet then and there he did sweat and that clods of blood his veines issuing out freely and the air congeling it presently and this in the beginning of his sufferings beleevers for your sakes I presume you are not blind and yet certainly you are if you cannot read matchlesse love in this Some have been so weak reports reiterated tell us so as to write letters to their beloved with their blood If it be true you will say it is much and I le say 't was mad But yet let me tell you it s no simple tale but a sweet truth Christ in the garden bled enough to write a large letter of love to you And if you read spiritually you read such love as yet when you read you cannot expres it while you read the story of Christs agony in the garden The greatnesse of Adams folly is not so legible in his eating the forbidden frult in the garden which was the shutting or us out of paradise As the transcendency of Christs love is in his agony in the garden which was to re-instate beleevers in a happyer state than Paradise was or could bee But le ts follow our Lord from the garden to the High Priests hall and here let 's hear a little the hideous out-cryes of the rude rabble against him Ah Lord what was that stopped our Saviours ears so that hee would not regard and silenced his tongue that hee would not reply was 't not love when you read how some spit upon and others railed at Christ How some blasphemed him and others buffetted him how many scoffed how many scorned how many accused how all cryed out against him I say when you read this cannot you as sweetly read the transcendent love of Christ to you as the transcendent malice of the Jews against Christ But not to stay here goe out with Christ to Calvary As hee ascends the Mount doth not the demonstration ascend too See him nailed to the Crosse for your sakes and tell mee if that sight doth not clear this truth as a nail fastened by the masters of assomblies such as Paul was viz. That the love of Christ passeth knowledge Surely beleevers Christs hanging on the Crosse and then breathing out his last breath and powreing out his hearts blood in a shamefull cursed and tormenting way for your sakes is enough to make you cry out O the depth of his love 'T was well said by one that Mount Calvary was Loves Academy and he is worse than a Dunce that cannot learn the transcendency of Christs love to beleevers here The blood of the Crosse speaks love in strength and no such Sermon of love in the Bible nor in the Creation as the blood of the Crosse saith a fine pen. Greater love than this hath no man that a man lay down his life for his friends Joh. 15.13 Indeed man hath no greater nay scarce so great a love as that But Jesus Christ had and shewed as great nay a far greater love than this for hee laid down his life for his foes such beleevers you were 'T was but a brag of Peter his words were greater than his love when hee said hee would dye for Christ But 't was a reality in Christ when speaking of the baptism of his death hee said How am I streightened till it bee accomplished Certainly it was large love that streightened his soul till he tasted of death for you The Scriptures record it as the character of the transcendency of the Martyrs love to Christ that they loved not their lives unto the death for his sake But alas their death for Christ was but their duty they were bound to it because Christ loved them Whereas Christs love to us is grace for hee loved us first Ask a condemned Malefactour what if the Prince's Son should go to his father and say Father I confesse the wretch is deservedly to dye but I see a willingnesse in thee that hee should live only I perceive it sticks with thy Justice Thou wouldest magnifie thy mercy in his pardon couldest thou also satisfie thy justice why for that Father here I am and I will dye my self to satisfie thy justice onely let the poor wretch live to the glory of thine and my free grace and having thus said should goe to the place of execution and dye indeed Ask I say the Malefactor what kind of love hee counts and calls this Beleevers ask your own hearts for you were the Malefactors and tell mee what word is great enough to expresse the great love of Jesus Christ which hee lively expressed to you in his death for you Surely you will say the thought of the love is too big for your mouth you cannot through your narrow expressions let out your large conceptions of Christs love in his death I must professe if you can I cannot This head of demonstration is fitter for meditation than expression And yet when wee have meditated the most of it wee shall never bee able to reach the height of it The thoughts of Christs life are swallowed up by the thoughts of his death His death doth set out his love most to the life I will wind up this head with this conclusion You are no Scholars in Christs School if you cannot read a large and long lecture of love upon Christs Crosse Let it passe as an aphorism The love of Christ expressed in his death transcends so high above our thoughts that wee shall never bee able to come to the height thereof all our life His love transcends our expressions confounds our conceptions yet it must be believed and applyed At present I shall offer but three words to help you in the application of
is that although in wrath his iron rod break the Nations in peeces yet his golden Scepter is still stretched out in love to entertain the Saints You read in Cant. 3. that Solomon made a Chariot of the wood of Lebanon he made the pillars thereof of silver the bottome of gold the covering of it of purple the middest being PAVED WITH LOVE Cant. 3. v. 10. That Chariot which Solomon made for himself and in which hee rode might well set out the Chariot in which Christ rideth up and down the world of beleevers whom he governs Indeed it is very glorious and it glitters with beams of light but withall it is very gracious as being paved with stones of love Love is the throne in which he sits love is the Scepter with which hee ruleth and all his government is managed in such a way as that beleevers may say that he is the Lord of love even in his ruling of them Absolom did but flatter when hee stood by the way of the gate and kissed all that passed by and by it insinuated how sweetly hee would govern if he came to the Kingdome but that which was flattery in Absolom is reality in Christ When any of the spirituall pilgrims come as beleevers do to do him obeysance as they ought to doe being under his commands hee putteth forth his hands and taketh them and kisseth them and doth not only promise but perform transcendent love in all his commands over them But to read this more particularly you will see the transcendency of Christs love discovered in his command over beleevers if you consider three things First Christ layeth no commands upon beleevers but such as are full of love sweetnesse He reduceth all the Decalogue to these two heads Thu shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with al thy mind and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Mat. 22.37.39 Well might John say That his Commandements are not grievous 1 Joh. 5.3 the word is burthensome and indeed what burthen is there in the commands of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a weight unlesse love be a burden Indeed he might have commanded which is his peculiar Prerogative what he pleased but he commanded nothing but what is pleasant in it self and will be so to a sanctified soul which is the transcendency of his love A new Commandement saith he do I give unto you that ye love one another as I have loved you that ye also love one another Joh. 13. v. 34. Well may the Commandement be called New it being such as was never given by any King besides himself And surely there was great love in his bosome to beleevers when hee only laid a burthen or a command of Love upon their shoulders All her ways are ways of pleasantness Prov. 3.17 The waies of Christ which are his Commands are waies of pleasantnesse for I take it The word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is used for the pleasantnesse of a life of love 2 Sam. 1 26. that Solomon there by wisdome understandeth Christ Beleevers if you could but live in love you would fulfill the Law of your Lord for hee being a Lord of love to you Love is the fulfilling of the Law he layeth upon you Yea such is the transcendency of his love to beleevers that hee layeth no Commandement upon them to do any thing which hee did not himself Flesh and Blood may think it a hard and a harsh Command to wash the feet of a poor beleever a fellow servant But grace will see the Command to be sweet and lovely and Jesus Christ to be loving in laying this Command because it is no other than what himself hath done before Ask the servant whether his Lord be loving who layeth no Commandement upon him but that which is sweet in its self and sweet in its fruit and no worse than his Lord himself will undertake Beleevers it is your case all the Commands of your Lord Christ are sweet in themselves and sweet in their fruit and they are such as he himself while hee lived stooped unto Doth not this declare transcendent love Secondly Christ layeth all his commands in a way of love that which he biddeth beleevers do who are under his command it is in a loving way As the command is so is the manner of its imposing i. e. sweet and loving It is possible that a sweet thing may be injoyned in a harsh way An easie commandement in it self may be burthensome in the way of its imposall To command with a bended fist and a frowning forehead is not to command in a loving way but now Jesus Christ when ever he commandeth hee commandeth sweetly and smilingly he doth not lift up his voyce and cry as some understand that place Esa 42. v. 2. Hee doth not speak in an austere rough rugged manner But as the Lord is so is his language loving Observe with what love he layeth his commands on beleevers You are my friends if you do whatsoever I command you Joh. 15 14. He doth not threaten and say I will be your Foe if you will not obey but if you do you shall bee my Friends And so again If you love me keep my Commandements It is worth the noting that grace may be said to come in this respect by Christ He gave not his Law as Moses did with thundring and lightning in a dreadfull manner But he gave the Law to his Disciples himself in a sweet and loving way Hee beginneth his Sermons with Blessed are ye And all his commands drop from him like the drops of dew upon the tender grasse He shall come down saith the Psalmist Psal 72. v. 6. like rain upon the mown grasse as showers that water the earth i. e. Hee shall come down both softly and sweetly this is spoke of Christs comming as a King so that you may see the transcendency of Christs love unto you in the manner in which hee layeth his Commandements on you Thirdly Consider the end that Christ doth aim at in all his Commandements and that will also discover the transcendency of his love to beleevers Hee seeks not himself but them in all his Commands Hee biddeth the beleever work not that he may reap any thing himself but that the beleever may get all hee putteth them to labour in his Vineyard that they may have all the harvest As it is inconsistent with his Deity to have any thing added to him so also it is inconsistent with his love Hee putteth his servants to reap that they may have all the corn and hee setteth them to work rather that he may give them wages than that himself shall get any thing by their workings Take my yoke upon you saith hee and you shall finde rest unto your soules Christ layeth a yoke upon their necks not to burthen them but to ease them not to break their backs but to refresh
me If he layeth me in his bosome why is it that he suffereth me to lye at the worlds feet Answ 1. This may consist with love tell me thou weak soul was not Christ the dearly beloved of the Father and yet did not the father permit wicked men to persecute him Canst thou be reviled buffeted scourged or crucified worse than he yet notwithstanding all he was beloved of the Father and that in a transcendent manner in like manner thou mayest be the beloved of Christs soul and yet be delivered into the hands of thine-enemies as it is Jer. 12.7 Nay this is not onely consisting with love but 2 It is an act of love for while Christ permits these sufferings of thine hee maketh thee like unto himself It is desired of Paul as it makes him conformable unto Christ Phil. 3.10 Even a mourning garment is glorious when it is the same that Christ weareth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. We boast in a glorying manner What soul is there that may not as it were be proud and glory in its tribulations as the word signifieth Rom 5.3 when he considereth in them he is made like to Christ yea a suit of sackcloth is to a spirituall soul brave and fine when the Lord of glory goeth in the same fashion Object 2 But some will object further and say I do not question whether Christ loves me transcendently because of the sufferings I lye under but rather because of the desertions in which I am Alas I question whether he loveth me at all because he withdraweth himself from me so long much more reason have I to question whether be loveth me transcendently while I see him altogether deny me his company Indeed in a sense I think that the love of Christ passeth knowledge for I know but little of Christ Methinks I see him withdrawn I will not deny but he hath sweet smiles but I am a stranger to those smiles Time was when I thought hee loved me transcendently but now I fear hee loveth me not at all for hee deserteth me Answ To such a soul as objects thus I would say but three words First These withdrawings of Christ whereof thou complainest are but in shew not in substance The Sun is but absent in shew when it doth not shine it is prerent still though behind a cloud I have often thought that Christs withdrawing in this respect may be called rather his concealed presence Note this than his real absence He was close by Mary although she did not see him He was in the company of his Disciples though they knew it not His presence was not manifest not because his person was not there but because their eyes were held that they should not know him Luke 24 v. 16. Secondly These withdrawings whereof thou complainest are not total Christ never so withdraweth from the beleever but he leaveth something behind he putteth in his hand before he goeth as it is Cant. 5. v. 4. And surely his hand was never empty ☞ Mind this If he be absent in shining he is present in strengthning though he doth not appear rich in love yet he is still present upholding thy life The very breath that thou breathest poor deserted creature doth declare that Christ is present in some measure It were impossible that thou shouldest breath if Jesus were not within thy bosome thy weepings after him are demonstrations that in some measure he is with thee Thirdly Christs departure will not be final hee will be found again though he be not felt now And when he cometh he will make rich amends for his absence This said Mr. Peacock after this desertion The Sea is not more full of water nor the Sun more full of light than my heart is full of joy the joy that I feel in my heart is incredible Ah said another poor soul that had cryed Christ was gone He is come he is come he hath kissed me with the kisses of his lips his love is better than wine he hath not deceived me neither will he deceive any I shall therefore retort the Argument thus Though beleevers give Christ occasion to goe away very often yet Christ never goeth away altogether but even in his conceived absence vouchsafeth a concealed presence and at his sensible return maketh rich amends for his staying and going away What doe these declare but that his love is transcendent and as the Text saith passing knowledge Four words I shall adde by way of Application viz. A word of 1 Information 2 Reproof 3 Exhortation 4 Perswasion First for Information in as much as it is thus clear that Christ loves his with transcendent love then it may inform us of these four things First in the deservednesse of that great and dreadfull curse which Paul denounceth against those who love not Christ 1 Cor. 16.22 If any man love not the Lord Jesus let him be Anathema Maranatha That is let him be cursed with the highest and greatest degree of cursing that may be possible for of those three degrees of cursing which the Jews used in their threefold excommunication this of Anathema Maranatha was the highest and it includes as much as this Let the Lord come and strike this person with eternall perdition And tell me do not those deservedly expose themselves to this dreadfull curse who do not love such an one as Jesus Christ is who loveth all his with a transcendent love Mind this wretches you who love not the Lord Jesus what can you say for your selves that you should not lye under this curse Why do not you love Jesus Christ what reason have you for it Is not he lovely fairer than the sons of men Is not he loving Doth not his love to his pass the love of women Were Christ unkind you might with some pretence plead that you have reason not to love him but being so kind so loving as that he openeth his bosome and letteth out transcendent love to all that are his Certainly you may expect and that justly to be accursed in this high degree for not loving Christ Secondly See here the true ground of a beleevers glory Is it not a ground of glory to be beloved of Christ with such a transcendent love as you have heard Well may beleevers make their boast of Christ all the day long and well may they glory in the love that they enjoy for why that love is transcendent passing knowledge None of all the sonnes or daughters of men have any such just ground of glory though they should enjoy the love of all the creatures as beleevers have who do enjoy only the love of Christ For that love they have in him transcends and excells and that infinitly all that love which any can have from all the creatures Let the world falsly and fondly brag of their creature-loves and pity them Oh beleevers when you see them do so But rejoyce your selves in the mean time with joy exceeding great and full of glory
wee should know Secondly I say it is of necessary concernment some knowledge may bee of accidentall concernment to be known which is not of necessary concernment some things indeed as being accidentall to some greater truth and the discovery thereof are in that respect of concernment to be known and so may concern a man to endeavour for the knowledge thereof But now this knowledge hath a necessity laid upon it and woe be to every soule that knoweth not the love of Christ Thirdly I adde it is of necessary concernment for every Christian some truths there are which albeit they may be of necessary concernment for some persons who are as it were anointed with an higher anointing and imployed in a more speciall way as officers in the Church c. may yet not bee of such necessary concernment to all But now this knowledge whereof we are speaking is of necessary concernment for every soule that is named by the name of Christ and so pretends to be a Christian but especially every soul that is united to Jesus Christ and so is indeed a Christian ought to labour for a solid knowledge of the love of Christ As the Fathers in Christs School are not above this knowledge so neither the babes and children in Christs School are beneath it but all even the one and the other are bound and it lyeth upon them as that which doth concern them very near and very necessary to know this love of Christ which passeth knowledge One word I shal only adde by way of Caution I do not speak neither would I have you understand mee as if this were the only knowledge to bee laboured for Indeed it is the sovereign but not the sole knowledge which Christians should desire and endeavour to obtain In all that therefore I shall speak I desire to be understood not exclusively shutting out other truths but as inclusively and eminently driving at this in a peculiar manner And as Christ said with reference to doing Those things you ought to have done that is especially and not leaving the other undone i.e. altogether neglect I say in like manner of knowing the knowledge of the love of Christ you ought especially to labour for as a thing of more choice and speciall and necessary concernment but you are not altogether to neglect the knowledge of other Gospell-truths as if they were of no necessity or of no necessary concernment at all For the Proof I shall not need to adde many places it being so fully laid down in this Certainly this wise Apostle Paul would never have so earnestly and particularly begged of God that the Ephesians might know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge if it were not of speciall and necessary concernment for them I shall only adde to this his desire for the Ephesians that determination of his for himself which he expresseth to the Corinthians I am determined saith he not to know any thing among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified Now the knowledge of Jesus Christ crucified as I hinted once before is the knowledge of Christ in his love Though the whole life of Jesus Christ was but as it hath been shewed like one great Sermon of love yet the death of Christ was as it were a longer and clearer Sermon of love than all his life was Never did Christ speak love more fully and more freely than when he was as it were in that Pulpit the Crosse Now then if certainly Paul did determine to know nothing but this wee may safely conclude both from his determination for himself and his desire for the Ephesians that the knowledge of Christs transcendent love especially in a clear experimentall way is of necessary concernment for every Christian I shall offer some reasons to make this point yet clearer First The knowledge of the love of Christ contains in it the summe of the Gospell Christ being the sum of the Gospell and love the sum of Christ God so loved the World that hee gave Christ and Christ so loved the world that hee gave himself containes in it the morrow and pith of all the Gospell This little word love written in the golden letters of free-grace upon the bosome of Jesus Christ is an epitomy of the Gospell Look as O love the father is the fulfilling of the Law so Christs love to us is the fullnesse of the Gospell You have done the Law if you love God sincerely and you understand the Gospel if you know Christs love soundly Secondly The knowledge of Christs love is of necessary concernment because it containeth in iâ— the chiefest motive to duty You will never doe duty at least with that sweetnesse in your own spirits which you should and with that acceptation of God which you would if you do not act from a principle of love Now the love of Christ known to us is that which chiefly enflameth our love to him what was the reason that notwithstanding that love that God shewed to Israel when he was a child taught him to goe taking him by the armes had not that impression upon Israel which it should have the Prophet hinteth the reason because Israel knew it not Hos 11.3 God shewed but Israel did not understand his love and therefore it was that Israel would not walk answerable thereunto In like manner wee shall never walk answerable by doing our duty for I take duty to be at least an answer of love in case wee doe not know what the love is wherewithall Christ hath loved us Paul was more abundant than all â—he rest of the Apostles were in his â—abours And surely this might be â—he reason that happily hee understood more of the love of Christ than the rest did Hence it may be that it is that you have that expression in the 2 Cor. 4.14 The love of Christ constraineth us The consideration of Christs love which Paul came to have by the knowledge thereof it was as it were a whole croud or throng of Arguments or like to a whole siedge of motives for the word will bear both metaphors unto Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 see Luk. 8.45 and Luke 19.43 both to dye and to suffer for Jesus Christ There is no soul but needeth a spurre to duty being dull in himself Now the knowledge of the love of Christ being of such speciall efficacy this way must needs also be of necessary concernment for every Christian Thirdly Christs love is a fountain of a beleevers life and therefore it must needs bee of necessary concernment for a beleever to know it in as much as he cannot live without it verily this is life eternall to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge If it bee of necessary concernment for the soul to live it must be also of necessary concernment to know Christs love in as much as without the one hee cannot enjoy the other I live saith Paul but how by the faith now faith is but a higher degree of knowledge
of the love of Christ of the Son of God who loveth me As Moses pressed the Israelites to the sincere keeping of the Law for it is saith he your life In like manner may we presse Christians to the serious knowledge of Christs love because it is our soules life Fourthly The knowledge of Christs love is the foundation of a soules joy and Christians comfort and therefore of such necessary concernment The reason why the Saints are sometimes so sad is because they doe not know the love of Christ at least in all the dimensions thereof Hence it is that Peace is joyned with love somtimes in the Gospell Peace saith Paul bee to the brethren but from whence from this as it is added and love from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ Ephes 6.23 the hearts of beleevers would be at Peace if so be they did but fully understand the love of Christ O saith the soul of that beleever and of this beleever indeed they live sweetly upon Christs love because they have it but I go sadly in the want of Christs love because I think there is none for me The soul is sad because it seeth not the fulnesse of the love of Christ I saith another soul such an one who hath more grace than I and such an one who hath lesse sinne than I have he may live joyfully because of Christs love but I must goe sadly because I fear hee will not love me The reason of this soules sadnesse is because it knoweth not the fullnesse of love that is in Christ and the freenesse thereof without doubt did we but know the love of Christ better than we do wee should not be so sad so often as we are That bosome Disciple John who knew much of the love of Jesus and had declared the knowledge of it unto others he saith it was for this end these things write I unto you saith hee that your joy might bee full Sith therefore the joy and the comfort of our soules is built upon the love of Christ as its foundation it doth necessarily concern us to get the knowledge thereof Fifthly the knowledge of Christs love is of necessaay concernment because it is the rise of Christian thankfullnesse Hence it is that thankfullnesse springs it is from this fountain whence it floweth Those soules will bee most thankfull for the love of Christ that understand is most Ignorance begets ingratitude but knowledge maketh thankfull Blesse the Lord O my soule and forget not all his benefits Men will not be thankfull for that which they do forger neither can men remember that which they do not know All that Christ looks for from the Saints is this that they should acknowledge the transcendent love he beareth unto them Wee will never be able to sing glory and dominion be to him who hath loved us except wee know how hee loved us Look as a Lark at the discovery of the light of the day ascends chirping and chirping and the lighter the Heavens appear the higher she ascends and the sweeter shee sings In like manner the soul who knoweth the love of Christ and seeth the light thereof mounteth and singeth and the more bright the beames of Christs-bosome love shines in upon them the higher is the soul elevated and the sweeter it doth chirp and chant that spirituall song of thankfulnesse unto Christ You are bound beleevers to thank Christ for his love but you will never to purpose go about to cancell that bond if so be you doe not know the transcendency of that love with which hee hath bound you Sixtly Christs love is all the legacy he hath left Christians Surely it is of necessary concernment for Christians to know that which Christ left them in his will He hath not left them ample possessions nor brave buildings in this world his father though he loved him left him not a house to put his own head in here but dear love rich love transcendent love love passing knowledge this Christ hath left to beleevers as his father left him as the father hath loved me so have I loved you Joh. 1.5 ver 9. Aske the widdow whether it doth not necessarily concern her to know that which her husband left her Aske the child whether there lie a necessity upon him to know that which his father left him both the one and the other will say yes Why beleevers your everlasting father and your soules husband Jesus Christ hath left you nothing but his love surely it is necessary that you should know it Seventhly As the soul is filled with the knowledge of the love of Christ so it is filled with the fulnesse of God You empty creatures doth it not concern you and that necessarily to be filled with the divine fulnesse the fulnesse of God surely you will say yes then know it doth as necessarily concern you to bee acqainted with the love of Christ without that you cannot be so filled Some have thought that knowledge is nothing but an union between the thing known and the understanding Hence it is that they say and conclude that by how much any partake of knowledge by so much they partake of fulnesse God is love and if the knowledge of Gods love be the union thereof with the soul then certainly by how much we know the one by so much wee partake and are filled with the other Observe how the Apostle therefore joyneth this in the Text To know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge saith he that you may bee filled with all the fullnesse of God Every drop of this knowledge of the love of Christ tendeth towards the filling of the soul with the fulnesse of God surely therefore to be filled and to be filled with God and to bee filled with the fulnesse of God yea with all the fulnesse of God being so necessary for every soul as it is and the knowledge of Christs love being so advantagious to this It must needs bee a thing of speciall concernment for every Christian to labour to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge Briefly now for application First it may serve for a use of Lamentation that notwithstanding the knowledge of the love of Christ is thus necessary yet First that this knowledge hath been little studied Secondly though it should be much studied yet it can be little obtained First I say it hath been but little studied Men have been very swift in searching after other truths but they have been slow in searching after this An ample exact discovery of this love of Christ may well be set down among the desiderata i.e. the desirables of Divines it having been so little handled by any Indeed much of the Law in the point of duty hath been discovered but little of the Gospel especially in this point of Christs love hath been inquired into I doe not know any one Authour of eminency indeed as yet I have met with none at all who on purpose hath handled or
discoursed exactly concerning this subject viz. the transcendency of the love of Christ I have heard that that precious Divine Dr. Preston was wont to complain of the great defect this way Surely it is very sad to think that the knowledge of the love of Christ being of such necessary and high concernment hath been so little inquired into O what a gallant Gospel-designe were it for some one who is acquainted with the Spirit in a large measure to goe over the whole history of the Gospel and to observe the glorious shinings of the love of Christ to beleevers in all It would bee precious if some would take it in hand and perfect it to the purpose But it is sad to think it hath been neglected so long Secondly we may lament not onely to think this knowledge hath been but little advanced by the labours of any but especially that it is such that after all labour it can be but little gained We may weep to think how little of the love of Christ it is that those who have most knowledge of it doe or can know We read of a Book which was sealed and John wept much saith the Text because no man was found worthy in heaven or in earth that was able to open the Book or to look thereon Beloved the heart of Christ may be compared to a glorious Book in which the mysterious history of his transcendent love is written But alas who is there not onely in earth but in heaven that is able to open this Book and to discover the mysteries thereof Beloved when we shall come to heaven wee shall then be in a capacity of more perfect knowledge of the love of Christ But alas even then wee shall never be able to comprehend the love of Christ in the perfection thereof that is so fully as it may be known Then indeed we shall apprehend it in the perfection of our knowledge i.e. so far as it can bee known by the finite knowledge of creatures but yet then we shall not know it so full as it is The Schoolmen speak of knowledge as they doe of seeing Duplex plenitudo scientioe visionis viz Plenitudo 1 Subjecti 2 Objecti There is a twofold fulness of knowledge First a fulnesse in regard of the object i.e. such a fulness as regards the thing it self Secondly a fulnesse of knowledge in regard of the subject in which it is Now for mine own part I incline at least for present to conclude that although without doubt there shall be a fullnesse of knowledge of Christ in respect of our knowledge i.e. according to the utmost bounds or extents which our knowledge when it is perfected to the highest is capable of yet notwithstanding in regard of the fulnesse of knowledge as it relates to the thing it self viz. The love of Christ quoad essentiam virtutem intensivam extensivam i.e. when it is considered so far forth as it may be had unto all the effects and purposes whereunto that knowledge doth extend it self this I say I think wee shall not have but to all eternity wee shall be admiring and adoring of this love of Christ which passeth knowledge Wherefore then wee must needs lament to consider that although the knowledge of the love of Christ be of such necessary concernment yet it hath been but little searched after by many and when wee shall make the greatest search after it we shall never be able fully to attain it Use Secondly it may be a use of Reproof unto those who neglect this study of the knowledge of the love of Christ altogether Many there are who are little in the study of the Bible lesse in the study of the Gospel but least of all in this which is the light and lustre and glory of all the Gospel the love of Christ to beleevers And I cannot chuse but think those blame-worthy and to be reproved who in these times speak much of their parts and abilities in the beating out of some truths merely controversall which yet I speak not against in its place and yet neglect this knowledge which is of such necessary concernment I doe not altogether blame those who study this headship of Christ I mean this Government it being I think this present truth which is most controverted in these times yet notwithstanding to study so far the head of Christ as to neglect his heart so far to mind his government as to neglect his love is without doubt a thing to bee reproved But much more are those to bee reproved who study neither the one nor the other but spend all their time their pains and their parts in controversies and niceties prying either into unrevealed positions or being busied about needlesse questions neglecting in the mean time this one necessary thing viz. the knowledge of the love of Christ How many are there that may as one said of the Schoolmen bee like unto Travellers or men in a journey who have good bread about them but goe gnawing and biting upon hard stones so indeed some men who have at least means to have the bread of life Christs love but they neglect it and spend their time in gnawing upon hard trivialls at least not usefull questions Be reproved O all ye who so far spend your selves about the obtaining of any knowledge when in the mean time you doe neglect the study of this knowledge the love of Christ which is of necessary concernment Lastly we shall adde a word of Exhortation to stir up all to the study of the love of Christ You who have spent or rather mispent many a precious hour in reading of Romanses and fond histories of feigned loves yea you who spend all your time though it be about some matters of concernment but neglecting this be stirred up now to lay out your selves in the study of that which is sweet and necessary viz. the study of the love of Christ which passeth knowledge you must conceive that as I hinted in the explication my desire is that you would labour to be well versed and to be exact students in this businesse I would not have you content your selves in some generalls but labour to make a particular discovery of the love of Christ in its substance in its circumstances and in its sundry actions and declarations O remember that this knowledge includeth in it all that knowledge which is necessary to be known for salvation When you have studied it well you shall find that there is nothing in the whole doctrine of salvation which is not comprehended in this love of Christ as Calvin hath well observed upon the place This knowledge is both safe and sweet it is not such knowledge as wil puffe up the head but it will purifie the heart I doe not doubt that any can grow wanton who attaineth to any spirituall saving degree of this knowledge The love of Christ will constrain to duty and restrain from sin therefore betake your selves to
this study above all others Now I shall offer something as meanes to help you and as motives to encourage you Onely by way of caution learn to take heed of promising your selves too much Doe not think that you shall ever come to perfection of knowledge in this point at least while you are in this life It is a point which may take up the study of all the Saints happily so much may bee couched in the 18 verse of this chapter that you may bee able to comprehend with all Saints He speaketh as if it were a Text about which not onely every Saint is to set himself but as which doth require all the abilities of all the Saints Look as some great point doth require the abilities of many Scholars and all little enough when joyned together to make a good discovery thereof such is the love of Christ as that all the Saints may well spend themselves in the study of it and when they have brought all their notes together and added all their studies together they will bee able to make at least in this life but a very little discovery thereof Therefore take heed of promising your selves perfection in this study Now I adde this caution not to deter you from the study but to make you the more serious in it and also to keep you from casting of it off after you have begun to understand it It is with some Saints as with Scholars who having set about some study and after some progresse find the business so hard and high as that they can never come to the perfect knowledge thereof they begin to slack in their indeavours and to cast it off But now beloved consider it beforehand that you may not afterwards cast off the study of the love of Christ when you have spent your selves to the uttermost you shall never come to a perfection Yet let me adde this the least beames of the love of Christ have so much light in them as that they will bee very sweet and every peece or part of this knowledge will be of very speciall worth yea the low and imperfect knowledge of the love of Christ if experimentall and spirituall is of infinite more value than the high and perfect knowledge of Tenne thousand things besides Yea and one thing more let me adde it is possible for you to attain to a very sweet and satisfactory degree of this knowledge Qu. But what shall I do to attain a satisfactory degree of this knowledge of the love of Christ so as that albeit I cannot attain to the knowledge thereof fully yet I may be able to attain so much as may make me at least say as it is in the Text The love of Christ passeth knowledge Answ For that I shall offer some directions as concerning the means and helps how you may obtain the knowledge of the love of Christ And also as concerning the manner how wee should carry our selves in that study First For the meanes I shall name these particulars First Be much conversant in reading of the Gospel How ever the Bible in general doth give testimony concerning the person of Jesus Christ and also in some measure concerning his affection to the Saints yet the Gospel of all parts of the Bible doth in a more ample clear and satisfactory Way hold out the love of Christ to beleevers That which all the Prophets spake of him or of his love is so allegoricall and so darkly as that it is not easie at least for every one to observe the light of Christs love so clearly shining in them Indeed the sun shine of Christs love is in the firmament of the old Testament but as it is there it is much clouded much veiled But in the Firmament of the new Testament it shineth in its full brightnesse luster and glory And therefore bee most coversant in reading of it And while you read the Gospel be sure to carry this along with you that all that which you shall read there either ther in the life or death of Christ is still to be understood as a demonstration of his love to beleevers Secondly If thou wouldest know the love of Christ be sure to labour to get into the bosome of Christ that Soul knoweth little of Christs love in the power and sweetness and Spirituality thereof who knoweth only Christ in his head as being without him and is a stranger to the knowledge of Christ in his heart as being in him Labour therefore to have Christ revealed in thee as Paul speaks of himself otherwise all that knowledge which thou hast of the love of Christ will be to little or no purpose Look as Jesus Christ did therefore know the Father most because as the Scripture saith he lay in the Fathers bosome In like manner do thou labour to be in the bosome of Jesus Christ that thou mayest the better know what is his love to beleevers Thirdly Consule with Beleevers Ask those objects of love concerning the love of Christ to them They that have had experience of his love can best inform thee I make no question but that a poor beleever who hath tasted of the love of Christ and in some measure experienced the transcendent sweetnesse thereof is farre better able to helpe thee in this great study of the love of Christ than the greatest Scholar in the world is who it may bee hath read or heard something of his love but yet hath no experience thereof in his soul Fourthly Study thine own experiences Consider the carriage of Christ particularly towards thy soul Remember how long hee bare with thee whilst thou wast in the state of nature I and an enemy unto him How long did hee stand knocking at the door ere thou didst open How long did he come wooing of thy soul ere thou didst imbrace him How many ways did hee take to work upon thee to open thine heart to let him in that hee might love thee How freely did hee tender love to thy soul was there any other condition on which hee tendred himself to thee than thine acceptance of him Said he not when he came and knocked at thy door if thou wilt open I will come in and sup and thy heart shall be at no cost to prepare I have brought that with me that shall feast thee Said hee not if thou doe but thinst come and drink and if thy heart bee but willing eat the good things of my bosome and live for ever Thus mind those experiences of Christs acting towards thee Remember all the Feasts of love which hee hath given thee and by these thou wilt come to see how good how kind how loving he is Lastly Adde prayer to all these It is the choycest wisdome to be wise in the knowledge of Christs love And if you lack this wisdome James giveth you his advice ask it of God and if you ask of God a wise heart in this particular doubtless he will not deny thee for he giveth
liberally to those that ask and upbraideth no man Then ask of him much Beg of him a wise and an understanding heart to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge Intreat God that thou mayest be taught of him to know what is the love of himself and of his Son As Christ saith Every man that hath heard and learned of the Father cometh to me So every Soul that the Father teacheth will quickly learn to know what is the love of Christ to beleevers And that thou mayest bee able to know the love of Christ in its luster beg of God to bestow upon thee his Spirit Christ hath said The Father will give the Spirit to him that asketh him And the Apostle saith As no man knoweth the things of a man but the spirit of a man which is in him so none can know the things of Christ but the Spirit of Christ Go to the Lord Jesus and remember him of his promise Tell him he hath promised to send his Spirit and that when the Spirit is come he shall take of Christ and shew it unto the Soul Intreat him therefore to shew his Spirit and intreat him also that his Spirit would come with the shedding abroad of his love Say O! that the Spirit would take of thy love and shed it into me and O! that he would shed it abroad into mine heart that I may be able with all Saints to comprehend the height and the depth and the length and the breadth of the love of Christ and that I may be able also to know that love which passeth knowledge Having thus hinted a few words as concerning the means how we may attain the knowledg of Christs love I shall now adde a word or two concerning the manner how we should behave our selves in the use of this means while we study the knowledge of Christs love and for this take these directions First Be very exact Exactness is requisite in all studies but especially in this Gather up O Beleever all the crumbs and filings of this gold Christs love When thou readest any thing concerning Christ be exact to observe the smiles of his countenance the words of his lips the gesture of his hands the turning of his eye love doth thus observe them Sic oculos sic ille manus sic ora ferebat Observation was made of eyes and of hands and of countenance so doe thou observe be very curious â—o study this love in all its circumstâ—â—ces in all its doings in all its demonstrations If ever you would shew exactnesse in any study shew it in this Doubtlesse the exacter you are in this study the clearer you will be able to comprehend Christs love Secondly be loving Those know most of Christs love to them who abound most in love to him John seemeth to be most loving of all the Disciples and therefore hee seemeth to have the greatest knowledge of Christs love he was so happy as to lean on the bosome of the Lord Jesus and to him was revealed more than to the rest of the Apostles Look as that man doth but in vain expect mercy of God who is without mercy himself so doth that soul in vain desire to know Christs love who is without all love himself you may doe well to observe the context here in this 3 Ephes 17 18 19. v. The Apostle saith that you Being rooted and grounded in love may bee able to comprehend with all Saints what is the length breadth and depth and height of the love of Christ c. To be grounded in love is an excellent way to comprehend love And doubtless Christ will bee very kind in the revelations of his love to those in whom hee observes the workings of love Thirdly bee very admiring in all the study let all your reading bee mixed with admiration at every love-passage of Christ sit and meditate at every word of love stay and wonder adore the glory of that light which appeareth in any beam of love And in the admiration of that love which doth appear cast thy self at the feet of Christ and cry out O the depth of love in thee O the riches of the love of thy bosome that shouldest thus let out thy self to beleevers Lastly when thou comest as it were at a stand and canst not comprehend the transcendency of this love Imitate the Philosopher and cast thy self into that sea of love which thou wouldest fain fathome or sound and art not able Let that love comprehend thee which thou canst not comprehend thy self Emerge and drown thy self in that vast Ocean of thy Saviours bosome and because thou art not able with any line of thine to sound the depth sink thy very Soul that it may be able to taste that which thy study will not help thee so much as to see I shall now adde but a word to stir you up in the use of these means and in this manner hinted seriously to prosecute the sweet study of the love of Christ First I might tell you That all the time that you spend in this study will be very delightful and very profitable and you will have no reason to repent thereof Those who have spent or rather mis-spent their time in reading of the fine Histories of feigned Loves have at last been forced to confess their follies in so doing That well-deserving person Sir Philip Sidney is reported to have lamented upon his Death-bed the mis-spending of those parts which God had given him in the penning of that well-penned peece his Arcadia But surely beleevers to lye upon a Death-bed and to consider that although all thy time were every hour thereof spent in the study of Christs love you will bee so farre from repenting of it as that you will have just cause to rejoyce in it But not to urge this doe but Secondly consider the times in which we live How little love is there in these dayes surely the love of many is waxen cold though it bee pressed much yet it is but little practised Though all pretend to complain of the want of love and seem to presse the exercise of love Yet where is the man that maketh it the sweetnesse of his life to let others tast the sweetnesse of his love Surely while there is such little love among men it is but meet that we should study the love that is in Christ But Thirdly especially consider the sweetnesse that the knowledge of the love of Christ will bring to thy soul in any case Little do you know what comfort is wrapped up in the knowledge of Christs love How oft doth but a thought of this revive the spirits of the fainting Saints With what a composure of spirit is a beleeve able to behave himself in any tribulation when he knoweth that the love of his Saviour is without knowledge Without the knowledge of this love nothing will bee sweet but with the knowledge of this love nothing can be bitter And this is that which we shall come unto
Christs love is of such speciall efficacy to keep up the heart from fainting under troubles lets us see what great need we have to study the love of Christ Men have much studied the nature of some Plants and Mineralls because they are of special use for cordials you hear of what speciall use for spirituall cordialls the knowledge of the love of Christ is have not you ground then to study it Paracelsus concluding all to lye within the compasse of his Sol Sulphur and Mercury spentall or most of his study in the search and knowledge of them The love of Christ is the most catholicall cordiall not onely including all other cordialls but the life that the soul doth find in all other Look as Gods love is put for all causes Joh. 3.16 when hee gave his Son So Christs love is put for all cordialls when the Saints get comfort Tribulation distresse persecution famin nakednesse perils sword neither any nor all these can bear down when the soul knoweth the love of Christ that loves him And as it is the most Catholicall cordiall so it is the most Homogeneall Those cordialls are of most efficacy which are most naturall and most suiting to the Spirits why love is our life Gal. 2.20 Christs love falls in with the life of a Christian it is most suitable to it and therefore most sovereign Verily if there bee need of studying that which may bee a cordiall to any condition there is necessity of studying of the love of Christ which is such a Catholicall and Homogeneal cordiall as it doth suit with the Spirits and as it fitteth all the troubles that any beleever may meet withall Secondly this Doctrine speaketh lamentation also How sad is it to see that though this love of Christ bee such a cordiall to beleevers in any trouble yet either First they neglect it and make no use of it such is their folly that they have this precious price in their hands and they doe not know it so as to make use of it what a sad thing is it for the fainting man to see a cordiall at the beds head and not to use it Secondly in stead of using this they use other cordials Who laments not to see beleevers in these times of trouble one while eying counsells another while eying Armies and in the mean while not eying the love of Christ which alone is able to comfort when all other things fail It is lamentable to see how beleevers leave this fountain of living comforts and seek after yea and dig for cisternes yea broken cisternes that neither have nor can hold any comfort in them Thirdly which is worst of all when Christ offers this cordial they put it by and will not take it How often doth Christ open his bosome to the beleever and le ts him see love written in the golden letters of Free grace and beseecheth the beleever to look and live to contemplate it and to take comfort from it How often doth Christ say Soul I love thee I love thee with an everlasting love therefore have I drawn thee into this wildernesse of trouble that here I might speak comfort unto thee where none can help thee And yet lamentable it is to hear beleevers saying that they will not beleeve it though their souls might bee comforted by it Thus beleevers this cordiall point may set you all a weeping that notwithstanding the love of Christ bee so comfortable you use it not but instead thereof use other cordialls That when Christ openeth this cordiall you will not open your mouths widely that hee may fill them with it Use Thirdly be reproved you children of faith for this fault Hath Christ provided such a cordiall for you and do you neglect it Is there such refreshing for your souls in his love and will not you use it Doth hee as it were bring it home to your hearts and will not you take it be reproved for your folly O yee of little faith suppose the Mother should provide some cordiall for the weak fainting child and bring it to the child beseeching the little one to take it that it might live were not the child much to bee reproved if forgetting all the Mothers care and cost it should put it by It is your folly and your blame O beleevers who notwithstanding all the care yea and the cost of Christ too in preparing and bringing this cordiall his love unto you yet too too often you put it by and Rachel-like because your children creature comforts are not you will not bee comforted with this cordiall of Christs love Use Fourthly let it bee a use of direction to direct beleevers whither to go for a cordiall in time of trouble What have you to doe with the waters of Sehor Run you to the bosome of your Saviour why doe you spend your selves to goe after the pudled streams of creature sweetnesse goe you to the running river of your Lords love drink thereof and bee refreshed and bee comforted in any case Object I saith some soul I would goe thither as being indeed in a sad case needing comfort but how shall I doe to draw out the water of life that is in Christs love Rep. Why what is thy case poor heart what is thy case in which thou needest comfort and for which thou wouldest goe to Christs love Answ My case is spirituall my soul is troubled within I see much sin but little grace and this goeth to my heart filling it with trouble how shall I improve Christ love in this case for a cordiall Answ For that beleever know Christ loveth thee notwithstanding all this I beeleeve you think that Christ doth not affect you because your sinne is so much and your grace is so little Know soul though the woman was a sinner in the City and so full of sin yet Christs love passed by her sin and pardoned her Christs love took the advantage of her many sins to shew much love to her soul And it is his custome where sins abound there to make love superabound Therefore thou maist comfort thy self O sad soul with the thoughts of Christs love This love made him to suffer for sin and this love maketh him every day to pardon sin yea and hee will shew the transcendency of his love in passing by the transcendency of sin Object O but I have not only much sin but little grace A. Bee it so O beleever yet the love of Christ may comfort thee notwithstanding it Thou thinkest that grace is the cause of love but thou art deceived it is the effect of love Christ loveth not because there is grace but because hee loveth hee giveth grace Grace is given in a time of love Love is not shewn because of grace therefore comfort thy self O beleeving soul at the consideration of the transcendency of Christs love It is the glory thereof that it pardoneth much sin and that is loveth little grace and it will work so that in time sin shall
bee little and grace much Ob. O but saith the poor soul I have lost Christ I think there was a day in which I saw that his love was my life and the consideration thereof was my comfort but I have lost the one and so cannot solace my self in the other A. Why yet beleever the consideration of Christs love may bee a choice cordiall here Didst thou consider the very nature of Christs love aright thou wilt know this to bee the glory thereof that once had it can never bee lost It may bee the Sun may bee in a cloud and thou not see it but it will appear again But the Sun shall sooner leave the Firmament than Christs love shall leave thee Didst thou but also consider the transcendency of Christs love thou wouldest know that though Christ seemeth to withdraw himself a while yet his love will not permit his withdrawing to bee long yet a little while and you shall not see mee It is but a little while that Christ is seemingly lost and yet a little while and you shall see mee again Christ knoweth your Spirits would faile if hee should bee long away Love therefore looks to it that it shall never bee so long as in the losse thereof thou shouldest faint and dye Didst thou know the transcendent nature of Christs love thou wouldest know this that though thou mayest faint a little yet thou shalt not dye Love will come and revive thee yea didst thou but consider the love of Christ aright it will bee a cordial in other particulars also in that it maketh a large amends for a little tarrying for a moments withdrawing it lets out everlasting kindnesse and it therefore departed for a season that thou mightest have it for ever O.b. O but saith the soul I faint to think that I have lost Christ through mine own defect I have been so base as to drive him out of my bosome and I faint to think that hee will never come again A. Why poor soul thou art ignorant of the nature of Christs transcendent love Couldest thou but know it thou wouldest easily resolve thy soul in this case and support it with a sweet cordial such is the nature of transcendent love that though you have been foolish to drive Christ away yet it is so powerfull to bring Christ again It was the folly and the fault of the spouse that though her beloved was knocking at her door till his locks were wet with the dew of the night yet she sluggishly lay in her bed and would not let him in Indeed hee went away that shee might see her folly but hee came again that hee might shew loves transcendency Ob. Nay saith the soul with all this I have violated and wronged conjugall love and the thoughts of these sink my Spirit I faint and dye to think of this for fear that Christ will not passe by these Answ Still I say beleever didst thou but know the nature of the transcendent love of Christ it would afford thee a cordial in this case also This is the glory of this love that it passeth by such violations Indeed the love of men will not but the love of Christ will passe by this foul transgression because that Christs love transcendeth mens love Thou hast played the harlot with many lovers yet return to mee Jerem. 3. ver 1. and surely saith hee as a wife treacherously departeth from her husband so have you dealt with mee O house of Israel yet return you back-sliding people and I will heal your backslidings O transcendent love which is in Christs bosome which knoweth how to pardon the defilement of the bed of love Indeed there is no failing so great but didst thou know the transcendency of Christs love thou wouldest see it to be greater than any failing of thine can conquer so that now in case this fear should bee able to disturbe thy comfort and to make thee faint yet the consideration of Christs love may support thy soul and bee a cordial unto thee even in this case Object But yet I hear others cry out and say how shall wee doe to draw out joy out of this well of salvation How shall wee make the consideration of Christs love a cordial to us in our troubles Quest Why what are your troubles poor souls which make you stand in need of the comfort of this consideration Answ I have lost much nay all for Christ because I stood to his cause I have lost all the creatures lands and livings too yea and house and houshold too c. I have lost all Answ But yet consider Christs love and it will comfort thee in the middest of this losse It is the nature of transcendent love to repair all losses that double in your land you shall possess double Isa 61.17 And there is no man that hath left for Christ Parents Brethren house or children but love will make up all that as Luke 18. ver 29. Transcendent love scorns to let any bee a loser by it May not this comfort thee Ob. O but saith another I have not onely lost all but am still opposed they have stripped mee to my change for Christs sake and yet oppose my very skin How shall I comfort my self with the consideration of Christs love now A. Why thus poor soul consider Christ will comfort as fast as men oppose transcendent love giveth the soul answerable consolation to any tribulation in which the soul can bee In the world you shall have tribulation saith Christ but bee of good cheer I have overcome the world and in mee you shall have peace Transcendent love giveth a smile for every frown a kisse for every buffet an imbrace for every blow this is the nature thereof consider it and bee of good comfort Ob. O but saith the soul I have not onely lost all and been stripped to the change but am brought to the stake how shall I fetch comfort out of Christs love now A. Consider thou dying soul Christs love hath provided a comfort for it It saith you shall have your life by thus losing of it You are in the way to secure your life by this you shall not dye but live thus saith transcendent love because I live you shall live also Joh. 14. v. 19. After one blast into Christs bosome It is but a wink with the eye and into the land of the living presently Thus you see whither to goe for comfort in any tribulation viz. to Christs bosome and there you may find in his love a cordial suitable to any tribulations whether within or without spirituall or corporal Be directed therefore upon all occasions O you beleevers to run to Christs love and to comfort your selves in the consideration thereof Use Fifthly it may bee an use of Terror to Christlesse creatures you hear the consideration of Christs love is a cordial able to support in any trouble but wretches that you are you have no right to it tribulation is for every soul that