Warlike care Such an Army of Souldiers make an Host of Saints and if they thus lead a life of Grace the Lord of Hosts will lead them to a life of glory Their reward is in Heaven and they are sure of it the Lord never fails them that fear him but so soon as the Souldiers scabbard falls to the ground the blade is laid up with the Lord Though thou be at a loss for a time thy soul will be safe in Abrahams bosom It is better then to live well then fight well especially for Souldiers whose lives are so very oft in danger Let this threefold Admonition fore-arm them and warn us to lead a good life if ever we mean to enjoy a life everlasting Gods Love MANS LIFE John 3.16 God so loved the World that be c. LOrd inspire me with thy Spirit that my tongue may shew forth thy praise whilest my heart rejoyceth in God my Saviour And since it is not in the heart of man to sathom the depth of thy love O give me leave to admire thy love to him who deserves the utmost of thy vengeance Hadst not thou been a God whose mercy is not to be measured man had never tasted of so much mercy in the midst of his Misery But thus to love us when we had forsaken our first-first-love This is of the Lords doings and it is marvellous in our eyes Let me lay the guilt of Humane Nature wide ope to the World then the God of Nature will be magnified and the Attribute of his Mercy mightily admired Was not man made little inferior to the Angels The prime piece of Gods Workmanship in the likeness of God did God make man And could a Creature expect an higher favour from his Creator Was he not seated in Paradise an Heaven upon Earth Had he not given unto him Dominion over all the whole Creation And might not his Lordship have Lorded it over all the Creatures He who had all to obey him on Earth was tied onely to obey that one God in Heaven and yet he aspires to be as God A sin so transcendent to turn a Traytor to his Liege-Lord as no mouth dare justifie him no Angel plead for him for in committing this one sin he stood guilty of Ingratitude to his Liege-Lord of Covetousness for aspired to have the Regiment of Angels of Rebellion for rebelled against God and his King As Divines conceive in committing this one sin Adam coagulated all sins not making his Person onely but Humane Nature accessary And thus he dishonored God destroyed himself and corrupted all mankinde And yet rebus sic stantibus instead of punishing God pities instead of confounding God comforts Death was threarned if Adam sinned life is promised after he had sinned not for any foreseen good in man but because God would be so good to man Lust inthrald us Love set us at liberty it was the love of God and therefore of the best sort He so loved as no parallel can equal He loved the World a large extent and gave his Son not a servant his onely Son it s much to have but one and part with that one But why parts God and his Son That some of the sons of men might come to God even as many as believe All then are not at a loss as many shall be saved as lelieve Salvation then is not of works but faith And this Faith myst be in him not in the Jewish Talmud Turkish Alcaron nor Popes Pardons but a Belief in Christ Jesus a belief That as Adam made us guilty of death so that by the death of Christ me shall be freed from the second death and have life here a life of grace bereafter a life of glory here the Inchoation after the Consummation now we live to dye through Christ we dye to live and have a life everlasting What could Adam and all we have expected less what could he and we have more desired we were doomed to dye reprived to live by the Judge of Heaven sentenced to an Eternity of torments by the same Judge our sentence is repealed to a fair possibility of salvation And thus for us to sin against God and God thus to put it up and not onely not to punish with death but to provide for us life life everlasting This may put Humane Wit to a stand Was ever Love like this says the Scripture Can a Woman forget her own Childe The Quaere implies a possibility but a rarity Such forgetfulness may be in us mortals there in none at all in our Maker Being arch enemies to him he befriends us and parts with his own Son to make us his Sons and Daughters yea heirs heirs of God and joynt heirs with Christ Jesus And thus he gives gold for dross and all to make us who are dross to pass for currant coyn in his Kingdom Saith David to Jonathan Thy love to me was wonderful passing the love of women But behold and wonder here is love surpassing mans expression The love of God to man so to love him as to redeem him to send his Son to dye to save man from death and to require no more but to believe to believe His own Son hath paid the ransome with his own life to purchase us a life Everlasting O let my life answer my belief We do not believe in Christ if we lead not the life of grace Though faith onely justifies alone faith never justifies If I do good works to testifie my Sanctification before men then my belief in Christ will ensure my Justification before God As my faith must justifie me so my works must justifie my faith No man believes in Christ that lives in sin I say not who is sometimes gull'd but every day misled and willingly the effect of faith is an holy life As light attends on the Sun so good works on Faith he that lives well cannot believe ill Thy life ensures me of thy belief thy belief of the love of God yea and that thou art one of those of whom it is said God so loved the World that he c. GODS PRESENCE Patiences Protector Phil. 4. part of verse 5. The Lord is at hand THese words were writ to the Philippians occasioned for that surrounded with sorrow and overcast with care They profess Christ and for it scorn'd by the Jews scoft at by the Gentiles Now lest despair crush them or impatience provoke them this Memento is given them The Lord is at hand One able to support for A Lord No mean one for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord nor is he far off for saith S. Paul At hand on thy right hand to comfort not on thy left hand to scourge Our God is in Heaven and our God is here Residentially above Potentially below There is his Palace and here he perambulates and as thou canst not flie from thy shade no more from God The Sun is above and vertually with us and God is in Heaven yet always with men on
with my eye spiritual much more While I see without I may be blinde within and spy a world of wonders in this great World and yet not see that World of wickedness in this little World O Lord open the eye of my understanding lest while I look and see the way to thy Church I miss of thy Kingdom yet lest I miss I will look ad Sinistram at my Corrosives ad Dextram at my Cordials At my Corrosives my crosses in this life seeming hindrances in my spiritual Pilgrimage but sanctified pricking spurs pressing me unto the prize of my high calling O God my God twenty years current have those lasted and hadst not thou put strength into my anckle bones long since with Gad and Reuben I had sat me down on this side Jordan And now I turn ad Dextram to the right hand of thy gracious favours high cordials in the upshor of long distempers O heaviness hath endured a long Winter night but joy is come in the morning a Plerophoria a full sea of Peace and plenzy O my God as Adversity did nor quire deject me so let not Prosperity puff me up Now that I am in part restored to my Means let not my Means make me forget my Maker Beleive it he who sets his heart on Earth shall never inherit Heaven Now I am out of the bryars Lord let not the pleasant Pageants withdraw my eyes God sent afflictions to wean me from the World these contentments are proffered to try whether I love God more then the World I may look at them and not lose my way if I love them and inordinately I am at a loss and for ever And therefore once more I will look about me lest suppressed by Adversity or surprized by Prosperity Now this is done I will up and on and having little time and far to go and many by-paths in my passage I will look unto my ways There is but one way and yet it is here said I will look unto my ways Christ is the way via recta via tuta all other ways are viae deviae by-ways and yet this way Christ is cut into two pathes is viam Divinitatis Humanitat is The first step into the Heavenly way is per Christi Incarnationem the second is per Christi Divinitatem The hand that leads into these two which run into one is Amor Dei the love of God For God so loved the world that be sent his Son the second Person and therefore God born of a Virgin and therefore made man Now this is made my way to Heaven efficienter à Deo instrument aliter per sidem and this way is by Christs Godhead Manhood whilest the Godbead dwels in him bodily And now the two Natures being joyned together in one Person and that by an Hypostatical union this considered that one way may admit of a plural without prejudice to the single singular way I mean to him who is the Way the Truth and the Life But as all that go to Heaven must look unto this way Christ cut into two pathes so I must look unto my waies ways for Plurality mine for Propriety How different are these two waies the way Christ and my waies that is the way of Life this the way of Death Have I not need now to look about me Miss of that fist and I am out of the way to Heaven walk in this other and I march a full career to Hell and yet I am never in hopes to come into the way Christ till I take a survey of my own waies my thoughts words and works This is a large task and this a lazy generation Much is to be done and all to be left undone portends a fearful doom O Jacob why layest thou thy head upon a stone O Jonah why sleepest thou in the howl of the ship O ye Disciples can ye not watch one hour O! the sluggish blankets of carnal security have lull'd Gods dearest sons asleep when the Philistines have been ready to fall upon them The Disciples let Christ be taken from them O let not your selves be taken from Christ He that sleeps in sin is sensless and whilest he is a sinner he looks not to his waies he casts not an eye to Christ nor Christ to him but mark what 's said I will look to my waies Is it not high time when surround in the rotten bogs of Whoredom and Bloodshed It hath been the hard hap of the Elect to tread awry and ere aware to step into the Red-sea of blood by the misleading of the old Man in the Womans habit Here are ways to be lookt at not walkt in See them and shun them they are dangerous by-waies leading to Hell leading from Heaven Their names are these The Vnclean Spirits Round Relapse into sin That beaten Tract Covetousness which is Idolatry That way which went of late too night the Royal Palace Rebellion and Regicide Hold of Hell-gars Despair the shadowed Grove Hypocrisie The barren Mount Presumption The new Reformers Road Sacriledge These have been common high-waies leading to Hell Death and the Devil and now the late walkers in them though disguized with the vizard of seeming Saintship are discovered But there are other more covert waies I must look to if ever I look to go to Heaven And in special that way or walk in which my corrupt heart meets with first Motions to sin Assent to sin A will to sin A seduced judgement to approve of sin in the secret of my soul Look to these waies and root out all thou meetest and fear not thou the wide road of thy conversation Smother sin in that way the entrance into the womb of thy heart and the work is done neither needest thou fear but that is the way to life everlasting But the Prophets Possessive my my waies makes him owner of these high-waies saith the Lord My waies are not your waies This Mine and Thine makes or mars Mans waies have in them nought of God Gods waies have in them nought of man While I look unto my waies I see a super plus of sins While at Gods the way to be disburthened of my sin To conclude I will look unto my ways through that looking glass the Law so I shall see I am a sinner I will look O Lord unto thy waies which thy sacred Testament points me out to ensure me of a Saintship And now O Lord lead me in thy way that so I may possess my soul in peace Lord give me grace to look unto my ways that so I may escape that death death eternal MERCY beyond MEASURE Psal 58. part of vers 1. Lord thou art become gracious unto thy Land THe people of God are returned from bondage and they sing a Psalm of Thanksgiving all Israel have been Captives and this their deliverance is of the Lords doings What the arm of man conoot the finger of God can bring to pass In the low ebb of Misery he can buoy up to a full
sea of felicity The Israelites are carried into Babylon and the Babylonians are planted in the Land of Israel Gods own people at a loss and the Devils darlings bear all the sway Sad news for the Saints to see such in their possessions and they transplanted into a forreign Land and imprisoned But we must not judge them the best who prevail the most As sinners in the next world shall not escape Gods venngeance so Saints in this life oft times are sad sufferers yea and such sufferers as cannot sing a song of Sion while by the banks of Bybylon O! Mesery without Remedy is able to leave heart-less the best of Saints yet when my reason fails to foresee deliverance let my faith in God tow me to the firm land of his gracious promises Though I should see no hopes in my frail judgement of a settlement yet will I hope for peace for that thou the God of peace art become gracious unto thy land to it and us To us who wanted grace to serve thee gracious to us who were enemies to our selves The God of peace hath made our peace he will have peace with us who had open war with him His mercie is over all his works and our sinful works cannot over-master his mercy Of his own free grace he is reconciled with us our sins set us at odds Gods love to man made the composition what love owe we to him who so loved the world who loved man that loved not himself who shewed love to us to learn us to love one another When Heaven proclaims peace a shame it is for us earthy worms to live at odds let the grace of God lead on to have peace will all men and the more mercie the Lord shews to us the less debate let be found among us our selves But wherein O Lord art thou become gratious unto us If any want eyes and sees it not let him that hath ears hear it Was there ever such an universal devastation Threè Nations off the Hinges Givil and Ecclesiastical Government disjoynted The Heads of the Kirk and Kingdom made shorter by the head Pharaohs lean Kine devoured all the fat Peters Patrimony was but a breakfast The Kingly Revenue unable to pay the publique faith The Riches of the Land exhausted The Souldier unpaid and our lives and livelihood left to the indiscretion of an Arbitrary power When we were fallen into this irrepairable Consumption the Lord set us on foot again composed our differences without blood-shed made peace when no hopes of peace replanted thousands under their own vines Now we may live at home without fear enjoy our own without sequestration have the society of our Wives and young ones in despite of Pike and Pistol O God my God this is thy great work this we attempted but could not bring to pass This thou hast done and none else could do it To our endess comfort we may now report how Thou O Lord art become gracious to thy Land Thou hast restored the Kingdom to the King and the King to his Kingdoms the Nobles to their Honours and the Commons to their Birthright the Law is restored and the Gospel preserved and there is peace from Dan to Beersheba And now is not he ungrate who will not warble out this note O Lord thou art become gracious to thy Land If it had not been thine thou wouldst not redeemed it if thou hadst not been the Lord of Hosts no other L. General could have done it But what is thine who can keep from thee To think who thou art is able to blunt the edge of all opposers Blessed be God for that our Land is thine and thou hast owned it and that thou who art Lord of Heaven we hold our land here below on thee But by the Land is meant all in the Land The Brutes have found Gods favour they did groan under the pressure of a Civil War The War is ended and they at quiet now they may take their pastime in the pastures skipping over the Mountains and leaping over the Valleys Their Masters by a Metonymie may be here meant and by Land be understood the inhabitants of the land blessed not onely in their new Restorement but late punishment We had little grace till we had a large lash we had sinned much and have suffered long And as the Walnut-tree brings forth most fruit when most cudgel'd so that Sons of God are most penitent when most afflicted And thus our God is doing us good when we think harm he was never more gracious to his three Confessors then when they were in the furnace He casts us into the fire of affliction to make us run for current coyn in his Kingdom He brings us to Heaven by Hell-gates and first hacks and hues the bole of our bodies to make men serviceable timber to build up a living Altar His Cedars are fel'd and now made fit his metal melted and the gold resined The fuel is consumed but the Bullion forth coming our Tormentors taken away and we sufferers saved O our good God he whips his childe and burns his rod purges us and expunges our foes Blessed be our God who in mercy hath corrected us while in fury he hath consumed them them who had pulled down Majestie Magistracy Ministery They made our Kingdom an Akeldama a field of blood our Church a Den of thieves our Judicatures the High-places of high injustice But thou O Lord hast delivered us out of the Lyons paw from blood-thirsty and blood-guilty men who tyrannized over King and Kingdom Church and Church-men And for this cause we cannot but singing say and saying sing How O Lord thou hast been gracious to thy Land GODS MAGISTRATES THE Peoples Deliverers Psal 77.20 Thou didst lead thy people like sheep by the hand of Moses and Aaron THese words are spoke by David when sore afflicted what misfortune had befallen him I finde not upon record that shrewdly incumbred is without dispute But what a King and surrounded with sorrow and beset with care O! Majestie is not exempt from misery no more then the fairest day from a dark cloud and dashing shower But say the storm be raised and David in it How comes it to be becalmed When I think what God did for the three it puts me in hopes how he will relieve one I cannot but confide How my God will free his servant from the conspiracy of wicked men while I call to minde How thou my God didst lead thy people like sheep out of Egypt by the hand of Moses and Aaron Never people more made slaves forc't to work much and want their wages their task of brick is enreased and their stubble take from them they are ordered to spend all their days in Pharaohs Brick-kilns and yet while they do Pharaohs work Pharaoh murthers all their males Our Kingly Prophet in the midst of his pressures calls to minde this slavish oppression he grieved before takes up now had almost despaired of support but
a good Christian He is an unsufferable subject that pretends the fear of God and fears not the King He is a Demi-Chtistian who vaunts how he honors the King while the fear of God is not before his eyes But let us look into this Ark and we shall find Manna laid up in it good advice for after ages That enjoyned is Fear God Who should I fear if not God But what is he and what must I go do God is a Spirit uncreate eternal a parte post so are we a parte ante so none but he for God is never to have an ending nor ever had a beginning And this Eternity à parte ante is it that no humane reason can fathom Lord where Reason fails give me faith to believe and that it is an eternal God Creator of Heaven and Earth that I must fear And have I not just cause to fear him whom so oft I have offended But this Scripture hints not at fear of punishment but such a fear as love leads on to the keeping Gods Commandments He hath the true fear of God in him that fears to break the Commandments He that says he fears God and casts his word behinde him doth not so much deceive the World as the Devil deceives him When I square my life by Gods Law then I keep this command a prophane person then hath no fear of God in him and if to be guided by Gods Word picture out this party such then who pervert the Word of God to their own damnation how dwelleth the fear of God in them I have cast my eye up let me now look down and look at a debt I owe as to God so to the King Religion obliges me to fear God the Law the King The Law Moral as my common Parent the Law Municipal as my Lord and Soveraign truth is he is a loose fellow will not be bound up to the Law The King is set over by God for is it not said By me Kings do reign Prov. 8. and since of his setting up none but a Devil will pull them down Obedience and reverence is due to the Prince and the want of each assert the breach of this charge Let no man separate assunder those whom God hath joyned together Yet let me set a vast distance betwixt fear and fear my Spiritual fear I reserve for God a Civil for my Soveraign There is an awful reverence due to the one as my Creator I owe reverence to the other for that set far above every sublunary Creature Love is the fulfilling of Gods Law and a filial fear leads on to the completion of the Kings commands As he that fears not the King the fear of God is not in him so he fears not the King who fears not to break his Laws Know it and for an assured truth That when the King in his vertual Capacity is contemned his personal Capacity stands in need of a guard And therefore either fear to break the Kings Law or else it is to be feared thou wilt attempt to wrong the Kings Person Experience is a witness to this Thesis and proclaims How haters of the Law have turned murtherers of their Soveraign Lord the King These deserve pity for they hate reproof while had rather dye in their sin then be told of their sin Let us resolve To fear God and the King let us shew our fear to him by our fear to stray from his wholesome Laws Laws able to keep you in possession of your own in peace one with another Thus you shall preserve the bond of peace in the unity of the Spirit live as Christian Brethren and dye true loyal Subjects To conclude where there is no fear of God there is a want of the grace of God But that you all may possess Grace and Peace Grace which assures you have Peace with God Peace which witnesses you are in high grace with the King Fear God for love and love the King for the fear of God And that thy fear may not interfear thy charge is Fear God and the King SIONS SAD COMPLAINT Isa 36. part of verse 13. O Lord our God other Lords besides thee have ruled us THis is a mixt Song sung in the tune Lachrymae sung in the Cliff Gaudete The people of God call d to minde their Babylonian Bondage and tears stand in their eyes They are brought back from Babylon and now with their sad thoughts are intermixed mirth and merriness The parallel of these Jews is the River Alphaltes in whose channel run salt and fresh waters How can it but grieve to think of their long and late Captivity How does it solace to enjoy their lost liberty that so long sufferers exhausts tears that sufferers are become conquerers For this cause rejoyce and again I say Rejoyce That other Lords have bore rule this flats our joy That they have but do not revives our drooping spirits Let us look behinde before at what past at what present at our late banishment miraculous restorement These duplicated thoughts extract mixt passions joy and sorrow hope and fear We grieve when we remember what past joy for that our griefs are past Those other Lords put us in fear O Lord our God thou puts us in good hopes And thus fear and hope sorrow and joy are here housed Of this I rest assured while this I hear read O Lord our God other Lords besides thee have ruled us These Israelites are not grieved that God hath punished but complains of that body of sin which provoked the Lord to punish They quarrel not at the stone they look at the thrower and takes all well as it comes from God yet think meaner of themselves for that O Lord our God other Lords besides thee have ruled them Them and us they led the round we hold out the dance Their Thraldom was long since ours scarce got from our doors The Jews were Captives in a forreign Land we made slaves at home a mighty King conquered them the off-scum of our Kingdom tyrannized over us Worshippers of Idols inslaved the Israelites Pretenders to God and Godliness plauged our Church and Nation When Religion must cloak faction that is the height of Rebellion and the Church then sadly suffers when her new Gospellers abhor Idols yet commit Sacriledge What can adde more to misery then to have the Law of God and the King trod undersfoot When the Kings Laws suffer an Eclipse the Kings Crown is under a cloud when the Preachers of the Gospel are turned out of their pulpits they are not far off who mean to rob them of their benifices We have experienced the merciless mercy of these Egyptian Taskmasters who caused us to make our stint of brick and seek our stubble live like men and miraculously get our maintenance O if we could have over-ruled our selves others should not have ruled us our sins led us into bondage it is of the Lords doings to redeem us Hadst thou not been the Lord thou couldst