establish their Purgatory No O Sinner there is not any guilt left for thee to satisfie for not any reserve of punishment for thee to undergo but all thy Sins are so pardoned that they are in God's Account as if they had never been committed against him And therefore be thy Comforts never so strong and flowing and thy sense of God's pardoning Grace never so clear yet know that thy Pardon is still infinitely more perfect than thy Joy in it can be satisfactory For Assurance and the sense of Pardon is a Work of God's Spirit wrought in us and is commonly mixed with some hesitation and misgiving doubts but our Pardon is an Act of God in himself where it meets with nothing contrary and therefore with no abatement but is as perfect and absolute as ever it shall be in Heaven it self Thirdly Is it God that Pardons Then for thy comfort know that he can as easily forgive great and many Sins as few and small For the greatness and multitudes of thy Sins can make no odds in infinite Grace and Mercy only repent and believe God proclaims his Name Exod. 34 7. The Lord God Merciful and Gracious Long-suffering and abundant in Goodness and Truth forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin That is all sorts and sizes of Sins The greatest Sins repented of are no more without the extent of his Mercy than the least unrepented of are without the cognizance of his Justice And that there is any one though but one Sin unpardonable ariseth not so much from the atrociousness of the Fact as if it exceeded Mercy but only from the malignity of its Nature hardning the Heart against God and making it uncapable of Repentance otherwise could they who commit this Sin repent even they also should obtain Pardon Say not therefore Mine Iniquity is greater than can be forgiven I have out-sinn'd Mercy and there is no Portion for me in God his fiery Indignation will eternally devour me This is to be injurious unto God and to stint that Grace and Mercy which he hath made infinite And thou may'st with as much Truth and Reason say that thou art greater than God as that thy Sins are greater than his Mercy Yet here before I leave this let me caution you that you do not abuse this comfortable Doctrine of God's pardoning Sin and turn that into Presumption that was intended only to arm you against Despair Indeed both Presumption and Despair tend in a divers manner to encourage and harden Men in Sin The Despairing Sinner argues If I must not be saved if my Sins be so many and great that there is no Pardon for them to what purpose then should I live strictly To what purpose should I cross and vex my self by an unprofitable severity It is too great niceness to scruple farther sinning when I am already sure of Damnation and therefore if I must go to Hell I will make my way thither as pleasant as I can This is a kind of Despair that produceth not horrour as it doth in some but a most wretched carelessness what becomes of them On the other hand Presumptuous Men argue God is able to pardon the greatest and vilest Sinners they cannot sin beyond the reach and extent of his Grace and Mercy and therefore what need they yet trouble themselves to repent and reform they will yet indulge themselves a little longer in their Sins for it is as easie for God to pardon them at the last moment of their lives as upon many years preparation We see Iniquity every where most fearfully to abound in the World and doubtless both Despair and Presumption have too great an influence both upon the Minds and Lives of Men to make them careless in their Eternal Concernments Enough hath been spoken to the Despairing which are but few but to the Presumptuous let me add a Word It is the most unworthy and dis-ingenuous use they can make of the Mercy of God to press it to serve against its Authority Shall we continue in Sin that Grace may abound God forbid Shall we Sin licentiously because God pardons freely no the Grace of God obligeth otherwise the Love of Christ constraineth otherwise the filial disposition of the New Creature enclineth otherwise Gratitude and Retribution engage otherwise But if these motives be too refined and ingenious for thy sordid and slavish Spirit and if thou wilt still go on in the Presumption of thy Heart crying Peace Peace to thy self although thou continuest adding one Iniquity to another know O vile wretch that the Lord will not spare thee but the Anger of the Lord and his Jealousie shall smoak against thee and all the Curses that are written in his Book shall come upon thee and the Lord will blot out thy Name from under Heaven Deutr. 29.19 And thus I have done with the general consideration of God's pardoning Sin held forth to us in this Petition Forgive us our Debts or Trespasses Now in this Petition we pray not only for the Pardon of Sin but likewise for all things that are antecedently necessary to obtain it As First We pray that God would discover to us the horrid odious Nature of Sin that he would convince us of the woful miserable Estate that we are in by Nature and how much more wretched and miserable we have made our selves by our sinful lives that he would set home the terrours of Sin upon our Consciences to our humiliation and make us Despair in our selves that we might fly unto Christ and lay hold on that help and refuge he hath set before us Secondly We pray that God would humble us under the sight and sense of our manifold Transgressions that as our Sins have made us vile in God's Eyes so they may make us vile in our own to loath our selves in dust and ashes for them Thirdly We pray that God would give us his Spirit to enable us to confess our Sins cordially and sincerely to pour forth our Hearts before him and to acknowledge our manifold Provocations with shame and godly sorrow upon which God promised to grant us pardon and forgiveness Prov. 28.13 He that covereth his Sin shall not prosper but he that confesseth and forsaketh them shall find Mercy And the Apostle tells us If we confess our Sins God is Faithful and Just to forgive us our Sins and to cleanse us from all Vnrighteousness 1 Joh. 1.9 Fourthly We beg a more clear understanding of the Sacrifice and Atonement made by Jesus Christ through which alone all Pardon is purchased and procured To know both what it is and why ordained and likewise the knowledge of God's rich and free Mercy and the Conjunction of this Sacrifice and Mercy together in the great Mystery of the freeness of Divine Grace and the Satisfaction of Jesus concurring to the Remission of our sins and the Salvation of our Souls Fifthly We pray that we may have a high esteem of Christ and may hunger and thirst more after him and his
called our due and our right must be exacted to the very utmost what Debt is there that we are bound to forgive Those therefore are justly to be condemned that take every advantage against their Neighbours and although the Offence be but trivial a passionate Word or a sudden and light Blow that proceeded not from any propense and intended Malice or the like presently pursue such Advantages with rigour and extremity and because they may do it according to the Law of Man regard not the Law of God which commands us to forgive such Debtors And this is the first thing wherein forgiveness doth consist in abstaining from the outward Acts of Revenge and exacting satisfaction from those who have wronged us where we have seen how it is limitted and how to be observed Secondly Forgiving our Debtors consists in the inward frame and temper of our Hearts towards them that we bear them no Malice no Ill-will but be as much in Charity with them as though they never had offended us And this forgiveness we are bound always to exercise even in those cases in which we may seek for satisfaction yea although we could never prosecute them for satisfaction yet if we retain secret grudgings and animosities in our Hearts against them this is not an entire forgiveness and such as will be acceptable to God for he estimates the Heart and not only the outward Actions-which may have many bye ends to sway and direct them And thus I have as briefly as I could shown you what forgiving of our Debtors is and how far we are bound to do it And now Christians I know you cannot but reflect seriously upon it how hard and difficult a Duty this of forgiveness is It is that which the whole interest of Flesh and Blood and all the Party that Passions and Affections can muster up within us will certainly rebel against this Doctrine And alas how seldom is it that Men can conquer themselves so as to yield obedience unto it really and cordially Whence is it that all places are so full of Railing and Reviling Quarrels and Challenges vexatious Contentions and endless Suits Warrants Arrests Actions and Imprisonments and that upon slight Injuries and Provocations but only that they have not learned this necessary Duty of forgiving one another Nay many think it the part of a high Spirit and generous Nature to make themselves terrible to those whom they suppose have in the least wronged and affronted them and upon the least disgust fly out into all extremities of Threatnings and Revenge whereas in Truth this is but the Effect of a mean and sordid Spirit It is a Disposition breathed into Men's Souls by the Devil and demonstrates as a great deal of Pride so a great deal of Vileness and Baseness The truest Gallantry and Generousness is to imitate the great God in being patient and long-suffering and ready to pardon and forgive This is that heighth of Spirit the true Magnanimity and Greatness and if we would be perfect we must stoop stoop did I say rather we must aspire to this Heavenly Temper And to excite unto this consider First That it is infinitely more honourable to forgive a Wrong than to revenge it For First The one makes thee like to God the other makes thee like the Devil Yea it is the chiefest excellency by which God delights to be set forth I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions Isai 43.25 And who is a God like unto thee that Pardons Iniquity Micah 7.18 Now how Glorious is it to imitate God in that which he himself counts his chiefest Glory The Great Ones of the Earth imitate him in Power and Authority and are some kind of glimmering Types of his Majesty who daunts and dazles all approachers But a poor contemptible Christian whose meanness lays him open and exposed to all the Wrongs and Injuries of abusive and insulting Wretches may represent a far greater Glory of God than that wherein Princes and Monarchs shine even his Forbearance Pity Long-suffering and Pardon He may represent God sitting upon his Throne of Grace whereas the other represents him only sitting upon his Throne of Power Now God never Triumphs more in any Attribute than that of his Mercy See with what fair Flourishes he writes his Name Exod. 34.6 The Lord the Lord God infinite in Power that spreads forth the Heavens and rangeth all the Host of them that hangs up the Earth in the midst of the Air and the whole World in the midst of a vast and boundless nothing that pours out the great Deep and measures it in the hollow of his Hand that rides upon the Wings of the Wind and makes the Clouds the dust of his Feet No but when he would display himself in his greatest Glory he doth it in a still Voice The Lord God Merciful and Gracious Long-suffering and abundant in Goodness and Truth keeping Mercy for thousands forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin Now O Christian by forgiving those who have wronged thee thou makest thy self as a God unto them and imitatest him in that wherein he doth chiefly Glory Secondly It is more honourable because to Pardon is always the Act of a Superiour it is a Prerogative of Royalty and highly becomes the Majesty of those whom Christ hath made Kings as well as Priests and certainly they cannot better declare themselves such than by issuing out Pardons Think therefore with thy self O Christian when thou art wronged and affronted think what an advantage the petulancies of froward Men do give thee to make thy self their Superiour it is but pardoning them and thou ascendest the Throne And certainly they can never so much Triumph over thee by their Injuries as thou maist over them by Forgiveness And so much for the First motive Secondly Consider how many Offences God hath forgiven thee and this will be an effectual motive to engage thee to forgive others And here consider who it is that hath forgiven thee and what it is he hath forgiven thee First Consider who it is that hath forgiven thee And here consider the infinite distance that is between thee and him he is the Sovereign Lord and Creator of all in comparison with whom thou art nothing yea less than nothing He stands in no need of thee but whether thou live or die perish or art saved he is the same God for ever Blessed in himself He is able to destroy thee every moment able to breath thee back into thy Dust to look thee into Hell and Destruction They perish at the rebuke of thy Countenance Psal 80.16 And yet this high and absolute Lord at thy entreaty freely forgives thee all thy Debts although he might have gotten himself a great renown in thy everlasting Perdition and might have set thee up as a flaming Monument of his Wrath and inscribed on thee Victory and Truimph to the Glory of his everlasting Vengeance And shouldst not thou then O Man O Worm forgive thy Fellow-Servant
unto others that they may observe and admire them with us and give unto God that Holy Veneration which is due unto him Thus we see what the Name of God is and what it is to Sanctifie or Hallow this Name Thirdly Let us now consider what is contained in this Petition Hallowed be thy Name And here First In that Christ hath taught us to make this the first Petition in our Prayer to God we may learn that the Glory of God is to be preferred by us before all other things whatsoever And indeed that which God hath made the last and utmost of all his ends and hath appointed to be the highest and utmost of ours should be the First of all our Thoughts and Endeavours and preferred before whatsoever else is dearest unto us yea before our very Lives themselves This was our Saviour's Practice John 12.27 28. Father save me from this hour but for this cause came I unto this hour Father Glorifie thy Name As if he had said Though Life be naturally dear and the Cup which I am to drink very bitter and the Wrath that I am to undergo heavy and infinite yet all these things are not so considerable to me as thy Glory and therefore though it be by Agonies by Death by the Cross yet Father Glorifie thy Name The same mind should dwell in us likewise and we should hereby be instructed to desire and pray for other things with limitations and restrictions but for the Glory of God absolutely and simply Father Glorifie thy Name and if in the Counsel of thy Will and the course of thy Providence it cannot be otherwise than by my Suffering or Sorrow yea or Death it self yet Father even in this Glorifie thy Name and out of my very Ruins erect thou a Trophy and Monument to thy Praise Be thou Hallowed and Sanctified although at my cost and with the loss of all Secondly In that this Petition is placed in the beginning of the Lord's Prayer it intimates to us that in the very beginning and entrance of our Prayers we ought to beg assistance from God so to perform Holy Duties that God may be Glorified and his Name Sanctified by us in it It is a good and needful request to beg of God the aid and help of his Spirit to enable us to Hallow his Name in the succeeding requests we are to make Thirdly Observe that when we present this Petition before God we beg Three things of him First Such Grace for our selves as may enable us to Sanctifie and Glorifie him Secondly Graces likewise for others to enable them thereunto Thirdly That God would by his Almighty Providence direct and over-rule all things both good and evil to the advancement of his own Glory First We beg of God that he would bestow upon us such Graces as are requisite to Glorifie him in the World We beg Knowledge and Understanding of him of his Nature of his Will and of his Works for we cannot Glorifie that God whom we are ignorant of We beg likewise Patience and Contentment in all Estates thankfulness for every Providence Graces that do highly tend to the Promoting of God's Honour and Glory We beg Faith likewise whereby we give the highest and greatest Glory to God that Mortal Men are able to ascribe for to trust upon his Word and to build upon his Promises is to Honour his Truth and Faithfulness And therefore we have that Expression Rom. 4.20 That Abraham was strong in Faith giving Glory to God We beg also that our Speech may be Savoury and such as may Minister Grace to the Hearers And lastly a humble blameless and exemplary life for by our good Works we are to Glorifie our Heavenly Father I cannot stand to insist upon these things particularly because my design is only to give you briefly and summarily an account of what is contained in this most Excellent Prayer that you may understand what you Pray for when you present these Petitions before God Secondly We herein beg of God That he would so over-rule all things whatsoever that his Glory may be secured nay promoted by them and therefore whatsoever falls out we ought to say Hallowed be thy Name by it Hereby we Pray that the Gifts and Eminent Graces of God's Children may redound unto his Glory that they may not be puffed up with them nor ascribe the credit of them to themselves That the Peace and Prosperity of the Church of Christ may turn to the Glory of God that outward Mercies may not make them careless and forgetful of his Service and Honour That the sins and failings of God's People may eventually turn to the Glory of God which seem directly to blot and stain it And that by their Repentance and Confessions they may give Glory to him whom they have offended and Satisfaction to them whom they have scandalized that all the Afflictions and Troubles of his People may in the end tend unto his Glory as well as their Good by declaring his Power in supporting them and his Goodness and Mercy in delivering them That all the Devices and Conspiracies the Rage and Fury of the Enemies of his Church may contrary to their intentions be overswayed to advance his Honour and that the Wrath of Man may praise him by shewing forth his Power Wisdom and Goodness either in restraining or overturning it And finally that all Creatures both in Heaven and in Earth yea all the Works of God's Hands should Glorifie God in the several Stations in which he hath set them Some by being the Manifestations of his Attributes and some the Manifesters of them Brutes and Senseless Creatures passively declaring the Glory of their great Creator and rational and intelligent Creatures shewing it forth actively and all concurring in this great Work for which all were made even the Glory and Praise of God Thus we see what a large and copious request we present before God when we pray that his Name should be Hallowed which that it may be let us our selves endeavour to be Holy for it is impossible that an unholy Heart or Life should Sanctifie a Holy God Whilst we persevere in our wicked Conversations we do but mock God and our selves when we desire to Sanctifie that Name of his which we daily prophane and pollute nay indeed we do but Pray for our own Destruction even that God would Sanctifie his Name part whereof is his just and dreadful severity upon all those and consequently upon our selves who defile and prophane it And thus I have finished the First Petition Hallowed be thy Name The Second Petition follows Thy Kingdom come This now very aptly succeeds upon the former because this is the best way and means to Hallow God's Name by enlarging his Kingdom and bringing in many to submit to his Scepter and Government For Praise waiteth for God in Sion Psal 65.1 And his Name is great in Israel Psal 76.1 Now here for our clearer proceeding we must distinguish of God's
comes from the Grace of God therefore much less can we do any thing to merit it Far be it from us to affirm as the Papists do that Good Works proceeding from Grace are Meritorious of Pardon and Salvation Alas what are our Prayers our Sighs our Tears yea our very Blood should we spend it for Christ They are but poor imperfect things and are so far from having in them any infinite worth and value to counterbalance our sins that the defects of them add to the number of our other Transgressions They cannot all of them make one blot in the Book of God's Remembrance but may well make more Items there against us Had it been possible for Men to have quitted scores with Divine Justice by what they could do or suffer Heaven would not have been so needlessly lavish as to send Christ into the World to lead an afflicted Life and to die an accursed Death only for our Redemption and Salvation Secondly The Pardoning Grace of God is not free in respect of Christ but it cost him the price of Blood It is the Blood of the Lamb Slain from the Foundation of the World that crosseth the Debt-Book Without shedding of Blood there is no remission says the Apostle Heb. 9.22 And this is my Blood which was shed for the Remission of sins Matth. 26.28 And although possibly God might according to his absolute Sovereignty have freely remitted all the sins of all the World without any kind of Satisfaction only by a Free and Gracious Act of Mercy Yet considering that he had otherwise declared in his unalterable Word of Truth that there must be a recompence made him for all our offences it had been a wrong to his Veracity if not to his Justice to have granted the Pardon of any one sin without the intervention of a full price and satisfaction No satisfaction could be made correspondent to the wrong done to an infinite God but by an infinite Person who was God himself for had the Person been finite the Sufferings must have been Eternal otherwise they could not have been proportionable to the offence which requires an infinite Satisfaction But if the Sufferings had been Eternal Satisfaction could never have been made but would for ever have bene making unto the Justice of God and consequently our sins could never have been Pardoned And therefore God appointed to this Work of reconciling himself to fallen Man his only begotten Son God Co-equal and Co-eternal with himself and every way infinite as himself that he might be able to bear the whole Wrath of God at once and at one bitter draught drink off the whole Cup of Fury which we should have been draining by little drops to all Eternity So that Justice being satisfied in the Sufferings of Christ for the sins of those whose Persons and whose guilt he sustained upon the Cross Mercy hath now a way opened to Glorifie its Riches in their Pardon and Salvation Thus in these two Positions it appears that though the remitting of our sins be an Act of God's Free Grace and Mercy in respect of us yet it is the effect of Purchace in respect of Christ God Pardons sins to them who committed them upon their Faith and Repentance but he Pardon 's not those very sins to Christ to whom they were imputed but exacted Satisfaction from him to the very utmost rigour of Justice Hence it follows Thirdly That the Pardon of sin is not only an Act of meer free Grace and Mercy but according to the Terms of the Covenant of Grace it is also an Act of Justice in God Indeed both Mercy and Justice are concurrent in it for since by the Union of Faith we are made one Mystical Body with Christ it could not consist with the Equity of God to punish the sins of Believers in their own Persons for this would be no other than to punish them twice for the same Offence once in their surety and again in themselves Now what abundant cause of Comfort may this be to all true Believers that God's Justice as well as his Mercy shall acquit them That that Attribute of God at the Apprehension of which they were wont to tremble should interpose on their behalf and plead for them Yet through the All-sufficient Expiation and Atonement that Christ hath made for our sins this Mystery is effected and Justice it self brought over from being a formidable Adversary to be of our Party and to Plead for us Therefore the Apostle tells us 1 John 1.9 That God is Faithful and Just to forgive us our sins And St. Paul 2 Thessal 1.6 7. It is a Righteous thing with God to recompence Tribulation to them that trouble you And to you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus Christ shall be revealed from Heaven with his Mighty Angels Fourthly When God pardons he doth no longer account of us as sinners Indeed after Pardon we still retain sinful and corrupt Natures and there is that Original Pollution in us that can never be totally dislodged in this Life But yet when God pardons he looks not upon us as Sinners but as Just The Malefactor that is legally discharged either by satisfying the Law or by his Princes Grace and Favour towards him is no more reputed a Malefactor but as Just and Righteous as if he had never offended So is it with us we are both ways discharged of our guilt both by satisfying the penalty of the Law in Christ our Surety and by the Free Grace and Mercy of God who hath Sealed to us a Gracious Act of Pardon and therefore we are Just in the sight of God as if we had never sinned Fifthly Pardon of sin is one great part of our Justification Justification consists of these two parts Remission and Acceptance We have them both joyned together Ephes 1.6 7. He hath made us accepted in the Beloved in whom we have Redemption through his Blood even the forgiveness of sins Remission of sins takes away our liableness to Death Acceptation of our persons gives us a Title unto Life Now to be free from our obnoxiousness to Death and instated in a Right to Eternal Life these two Constitute a perfect Justification For to be accepted of God in Christ is no other than for God through the Righteousness and Obedience of Christ imputed to us to own and acknowledge us to have a Right to Heaven And therefore we have mention of Pardon and an Inheritance together in St. Paul's Commission to his Ministery Acts 26.18 That they may receive forgiveness of sins and an Inheritance among them that are Sanctified It is not therefore O Soul a bare negative Righteousness that God intends thee in the Pardon of thy sins it is not meerly to remove the Curse and Wrath thy sins have deserved though that alone can never sufficiently be admired but the same hand that plucks thee out of Hell by Pardon lifts thee up to Heaven by what he gives thee together with
spoil the flourishing verdure and gayety of the Grass and Flowers Why that very Dung which covers them makes them afterwards sprout up more fair and fresh So God permits wicked Men to Dung the Earth with their filth that those Attributes of his which seem to be buried under them may afterwards spring up with the greater lustre and Glory From hence he will reap the richer crop of praise to himself Sometimes he glorifies the severity of his Justice by hardening them in their Sins to their own destruction sometimes the riches of his mercy by calling the greatest and most flagitious Sinners to Repentance and granting them Pardon and always his infinite patience and forbearance in not executing present Vengeance upon those who so daringly provoke him But although we cannot now so clearly comprehend the advantages that God makes out of the Sins of Men yet when we come to stand in the general Assembly at the day of Judgment God will then comment upon and explain the mysteries of his Providence and make us understand how those Sins for which he will then condemn the World put a gloss and shine upon his Attributes Secondly God by permitting sin exerciseth the Graces of his People The sins of others give us matter for the exercise of an Holy zeal for God who is daily affronted by them of an Holy Pity and Commiseration over those who like Mad-men wound and gash and destroy themselves for the exercise of an Holy caution over our selves least we be induced to sin after their Example Our own Sins give us daily occasion to renew our Repentance to humble our Souls before God to fortifie our resolutions to double the guards we set upon our own hearts and ways to watch over our selves more circumspectly that we relapse not into the Commission of them again Thus a true Christian may gain some advantage by his very falls As Husbandmen make use of the very Thorns and Briars that grow in their Fields to stop the Gaps and strengthen the fences about them so should we improve our very Sins and failings to fence our Souls that we lie not open to the like temptations for the future Thus you see that God brings good out of all the Evil which he permits he glorifies his own Attributes and exerciseth his Peoples Graces And thus you see likewise God's Providence both Proved and Vindicated asserted to be particular and punctual over all Occurrences that happen in the World and cleared from all the Imputations of Injustice that the Folly or Atheism of Man can lay against it I shall conclude with two or three Inferences or Corollaries First If the accurateness of God's Providence reach unto all the little concernments of the World we may be well assured that those which are the more considerable and important Occurrences of it are all guided and governed by a special hand of Providence And thus our Saviour himself urgeth as a strong incouragement for our confidence and trust in God Not a Sparrow falls to the ground without your Father fear not ye therefore you are of more worth than many Sparrows Yea not an Hair of your head falls without a Providence and think ye that the head it self shall Certainly God doth not like Domitian busie himself about Flies and neglect the great and weighty Affairs of his Government And this is the reason of that question the Apostle Asks 1. Corinth 9.9 Doth God take care for Oxen Yes certainly he doth nor did the Apostle intend to deny it but thereby to inferr that certainly his care is much more particular towards us This then may establish our hearts under any personal Sufferings or publick Calamities when evil is upon our selves or the Nation when Uproars and Confusions seem to reduce the World back to its Ancient Chaos when Storms and Waves over-whelm the Ship and we with the Disciples think our God asleep and begin to cry out with the Psalmist Awake O Lord why sleepest thou Our God is not sleeping but even then at the Helm he Steers he Governs and Guides all these Disorders and will conduct the whole Tumult and Hurry of Affairs to his own Glory and our Good Secondly If God's Providence hath the command and sway even over the Sins of Men this then may be abundant matter of Peace and Satisfaction in the worst of times when wickedness doth most of all rage and abound let us then consider that if God permits them he also can when he pleaseth Check put a Stop and Period to their Rage and Madness Their hands are Fettered by the adamantine Chains of a most strong Decree which they can neither reverse nor exceed whatsoever they do is but by permission a limited and a limiting Permission Our Saviour tells us Pilate thou couldest have no power over me except it were given thee from above The very power that Men have to Sin against God is from God and therefore certainly he will withdraw it when it doth not work out his own ends This was it that satisfied David when Shimei pelted him with Stones and Curses 2 Sam. 16.10 Let him alone let him Curse because the Lord hath said unto him Curse David Thirdly Hence see to what we ought to abscribe it that there is no more notorious wickedness committed in the World when we hear of any prodigious Villainy we are apt to wonder that ever such abominations should be incident to the Sons of Men. Wonder not at the matter as if any strange thing were happened to them but rather wonder at the goodness of God which is the sole cause that such things as these are wonders Were his permissive Providence as large as Mens lust are outragious these things would soon cease to be wonders and become the common and ordinary practice of all Men. Why are not our Streets continually filled with Violence Rapine Murthers and Out-cries Whence is it that we enjoy our Possession and our Lives in Safety The wickedness of Men lies hard and presseth upon God's restraints and wheresoever there are any gaps in it it breaks forth naturally and violently and if this Dam and Mound of Divine Providence were but broken down it would break out till it had overflowed the whole face of the Earth and covered it with a Deluge of Impiety and Profaneness But that God who sets bounds to the raging of the Sea and saith hitherto shall thy proud Waves come and no farther doth by the same Almighty Providence set bounds to the Lusts and Corruptions of Men which are altogether as unruly and curbs in the fury of their madness which else would drown the whole World in Perdition and Destruction Fourthly Lastly This should teach us to acquiesce and rest satisfied in every Providence of God as that which will certainly in the end redound to his own Glory When we see disorders and confusions abroad in the World we are apt to despond and to cry out Lord what wilt thou do for thy great Name thy
him And therefore howsoever thou mayest be advanced in Wealth or Honour or parts above others yet still remember that they are thy Brethren as they partake of the same common Nature and much more if they partake of the same special Grace Yea Christ himself who is the Lord of all is not ashamed to call them Brethren Heb. 2.11 And shalt thou who art but an Adopted Son no otherwise than the meanest Saint be ashamed of the Relation especially considering there is no Eldership nor right of First-born in the Family for they are all First-born all Kings and Heirs with Christ Jesus himself Secondly If thou art mean and low in the World this should teach thee to be well content with thy present State and Condition for God is thy Father and a Father to thee equally with the greatest There is not the highest person upon Earth but if he belong to God prefers that Relation above all his other Titles If he can write Prince King or Emperour and can afterwards subjoin a Child of God all his other Titles stand but for a Cypher with him This O Christian how mean how despised soever thou art this is thy Priviledge and a Priviledge it is that equals thee with David with Solomon and with all the great ones of the Earth that ever laid down their Diadems and Scepters at the feet of God What says the Apostle Gal. 3.28 There is neither bond nor free but all are one in Christ Jesus Thirdly Since when we Pray we must say Our Father this teacheth us to interest one another in our Prayers Our Father would not have us selfish so much as in our Prayers but in the very entrance into them we are put in mind of the Communion of Saints to beg those Blessings for all that belong to God which we ask for our selves for as Christ hath made us all Kings so he hath made all Priests to God and his Father Now the Office of a Priest is Intercession And therefore when we go to God we should bear upon our Breasts the Name of our Brethren and present them before God through the Intercession and Mediation of Jesus Christ our Great High-Priest that both we and they may be accepted of God And this we ought to do both in publick and private It is true in our secret Prayers we may pray particularly for our selves and we have frequent instances for it in Scripture yet ought we in every Prayer that we make to God to be mindful of the State and Condition of our Brethren Yea and it is very Lawful and Commendable even in secret between God and our own Souls in those cases that are common to us with the rest of God's Saints and People to joyn them in our Prayers and although we are all alone yet to say Our Father For we find Daniel praying Dan. 9.17 O Our God when yet he was in secret O Our God hear the Prayer of thy Servant And this is to shew that near and entire Communion which ought to be between all the Saints praying with and praying for all the Members of the Body of Jesus Christ and esteeming their Interest as our own Fourthly This shews us likewise the high Priviledge of the Children of God that they have a Stock of Prayers going to Heaven for them from all their fellow Saints throughout the World yea from those whom they never knew whom they never heard of yet are they continually appearing before the Throne of Grace on their behalf And thou who wouldst think it a great Favour if thou wert interested in the Prayers of some who are mighty in Prayer and whom thou hast begged to recommend thy Condition to God mayest here have abundant Comfort in that thou art nearly concerned and interested in all the Prayers that are put up to God throughout the whole World by all those that are most prevalent at the Throne of Grace yea which is more thou hast an interest in all the Prayers that have ever been preferred to Heaven by all the Saints from the beginning of the World unto this very day for not only this present Church but the Church in all Ages is the Body of Christ and every Member of it imitates the Pattern of Christ's Intercession John 17.20 Neither Pray I for these alone but for all those that shall believe in me The difference is that Christ's Intercession was Authoritative theirs only Charitative And thus much shall suffice to be spoken concerning God's Goodness and Mercy expressed in those Words Our Father The next expression sets forth his Glory and Greatness Which art in Heaven But is not God every where present Doth he not fill Heaven and Earth and all things Yea is it not said that the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain him How then are our Prayers to be directed to God in Heaven only since he is as well on Earth as in Heaven And were he only in Heaven and not every where present on Earth it would be in vain for us to pray because our Prayers could never reach his Ears nor arrive to his notice I Answer It is true God is every where present and all that we think we think in him and all that we speak we speak unto him he understands the silent motion of our Lips when we whisper a Prayer to him in our Closets yea the secret motions of our Hearts when we only think a Prayer Therefore when our Saviour bids us direct our Prayers to our Father in Heaven this doth not imply that God is no where present or that he no where hears Prayer but only in Heaven But this expression is used First Because Heaven is the most Glorious Place of God's residence where he hath more especially established his Throne of Grace and there sits upon it Now because it is a most Glorious and Majestical thing to hear the Suits and receive the Petitions that are tendred to him therefore the Scripture ascribes it to the most Glorious and Majestical Place and that is to Heaven And therefore we are commanded to pray to our Father which is in Heaven to keep alive a due sense of his Majesty upon our Hearts He would not have us think it a mean and trivial thing to have our Prayers heard and therefore he represents himself to us arayed in all his Glory and sitting upon his Throne in the highest Heavens willing to be thought a God never more Glorious than when he is a God hearing Prayer Secondly Our Prayers are directed to our Father in Heaven because though he hears them wheresoever they are uttered yet he no where hears them with acceptance but only in Heaven and the Reason is because our Prayers are acceptable only as they are presented before God through the Intercession of Christ Now Christ performs his Mediatory Office only in Heaven for he performs it in both Natures as he is God and Man and so he is only in Heaven And therefore we are still concerned to pray
First The Petition Forgive us our Debts Secondly The Condition or Proportion or Plea and Argument call it which you will for the obtaining of this forgiveness as we forgive our Debtors In the Petition we may observe that the same which our Evangelist calls Debts is by St. Luke 11.4 called Sins Forgive us our Sins We stand indebted to God both as we are his Creatures and as we are Offenders By the one we owe him the Debt of Obedience and by the other the Debt of Punishment First As we are Creatures we owe the Debt of Obedience And to the payment of this Debt we stand bound both to the absolute Sovereignty of God who is the Supreme Lord of all his Creatures and therefore may oblige them to what he pleaseth and likewise by his manifold Favours and Mercies conferred upon us From him we have received our Beings and all our Comforts he maintains us at his own Cost and Charge he enlargeth us when we are in Streights relieves us when we are in Wants Counsels us when we are in Doubts Comforts us when we are in Sorrows Delivers us in our Dangers and besides the manifold Temporal Mercies we daily receive from him gives us the Means the Hopes and Promises of obtaining far better things at his Hands even Eternal Life and Glory And therefore certainly upon these Accounts we owe him all possible Service and Obedience And indeed it is but Reason we should employ all for him from whom we receive all and give up our selves to his Service who are what we are by his Bounty and hope to be infinitely better than now we are through his Mercy Now this Debt of Obedience is irremissible and we are eternally and indispensably bound unto it For it is altogether inconsistent with the Notion and Being of a Creature to be discharged from its Obligation to the Laws and Commands of its Creator for this would exempt it from the Dominion of God and make it Absolute and Independent that is it would make the Creature to be no longer a Creature but a Deity We do not therefore pray that God would forgive us this Debt no he cannot so far deny himself and it is our Happiness and Glory to pay it To this his Sovereignty obligeth our Subject Condition and his Mercy and Goodness our Ingenuity Secondly As we are Transgressors so we owe God a Debt of Punishment to be suffered by us to make God some reparation to his Honour and satisfaction to his Justice for our transgressing his Law which sentenceth all Offenders to Eternal Death and Damnation This Debt now is that which we pray God would forgive us a Debt which if we pay we are eternally ruined and undone and there is no way possible to escape the payment of it but by the free Grace and Mercy of God remitting of it unto us And thus Sin is called a Debt not indeed properly as if we owed it but by a Metonymy as it is the meritorious Cause of this punishment the suffering of which we owe to Divine Justice Hence by the way we may observe that every Sin makes us liable to Eternal Death for Death and Damnation is the Debt which we must pay to the Justice of God and Sin is that which exposeth us unto it by the Sentence of the Law which we have transgressed For as against other Debtors is brought forth some Bond or Obligation to exact payment from them So against us is produced the Hand-writing of the Law and we not having performed the Condition of the Bond stand liable to the Forfeiture and Penalty which is no less than Curses and Woes and Torments and Everlasting Death Cursed is every one that continues not in all things written in the Book of the Law to do them Gal. 3.10 And the Wages of Sin is Death Rom. 6.23 And the Soul that sinneth it shall Die Ezek. 18.4 Now here to excite thee to a fervency in praying for the forgiveness of thy Debts consider First The infinite multitudes of thy Debts God's Book is full of them and there they stand on account against us under every one of our Names We were born Debtors to God our Original Sin and Guilt obligeth us to punishment and although we did not personally contract the Debt yet as being the wretched Heirs and Executors of fallen Adam the Debt is legally devolved upon us and become ours And ever since we came into the World we have run upon the score with God our Debts are more than our Moments have been for whatsoever we have thought or done hath been Sin either in the matter or at least in the circumstances of it God sets all our Sins down in order in his Debt-book some as Talents and some as Pence Our flagitious Crimes and hainous Impieties our presumptuous Sins committed against Light Knowledge Conscience Convictions Mercies and Judgments each of these God sets down as a Talent And how many thousands of these may we have been guilty of Our Sins of Ignorance Surreption and daily Infirmity are much more innumerable and though they may be but as Pence in comparison with the other yet the unaccountable numbers of them will make the Debt desperate and the payment impossible And yet notwithstanding our Debts are so many and very many of them such great Sums too yet we daily run ourselves farther in Arrears not considering that a Day of Accounts will come when both our Talents and our Pence shall be punctually reckoned up against us not omitting the least Item when every vain Thought and foolish Passion that hath flushed up in us with every idle and superfluous Word that we have unadvisedly spoken as well as the more gross and scandalous Passages of our sinful Lives shall be then audited all which will make the Total Sum infinite and us desperate Secondly That God who is thy Creditor is strict and impartial his Patience hath trusted and forborn thee long but his Justice will at last demand the Debt severely and every particular shall be charged upon thee even to the utmost Farthing for he hath booked down all in his remembrance and will bring all to thine And therefore we have it expressed concerning the last Judgment that the Books were opened and the Dead were Judged out of those things which were written in the Books according to their Works Rev. 20.12 What now are these Books but the two great Volumes of God's remembrance and our own Consciences These are two Tallies evenly struck that shall justly represent the same Sum and Debt and God's strict Justice will not then abate thee any thing of its utmost due for he will by no means acquit the Guilty Indeed we are apt to think that because God so long forbears us he will never calls us to make up and adjust Accounts with him Our present impunity tempts us to question his Omniscience and to suspect his Threatnings and because he winks at us we are ready to conclude that he
is Blind we are of that wretched temper described Psal 50.21 Because God keeps silence we think he is altogether such a one as our selves As careless in requiring his Debts as we are in contracting them but he will reprove us and set them in order before our Faces to our everlasting shame and confusion Thirdly That the least of all these thy Debts make thee liable to be cast into the Prison of Hell and to be adjudged to Eternal Death and Punishments Not only thy impudent and scandalous Sins which make thee detested of Men as well as hated of God but the least shadow of a thought that gives but an umbrage of vanity to thy Mind the least motion and heaving of thy Heart towards a sinful Object the exhaling but of one sinful Desire the wavering of thy Fancy a glance of thine Eye is a Debt contracted with the infinite Justice of God and a Debt that without forgiveness must be paid in the Infernal Prison of Hell So says our Saviour Matth. 5.26 Verily thou shalt not come out thence till thou hast paid the utmost Farthing Beware therefore then that you do not entertain any slight thoughts of Sin nor think with the Papists that there are some sorts of Sins that do not deserve Death which they call Venial Sins in opposition to other more gross and hainous Sins which they allow to be Mortal Believe it the least prick at the Heart is deadly and so is the least Sin to the Soul And indeed it is a Contradiction to call any Sin Venial in their sence who hold it is not worthy of Damnation for if it be a Sin it is worthy of Damnation for the Wages of Sin is Death if it be not How is it Venial There is but one Mortal Sin simply and absolutely such as God hath revealed in his Word that it shall never be pardoned neither in this World nor in that which is to come and that is the Sin against the Holy Ghost which St. John therefore calls a Sin unto Death 1 Joh 5.16 And so far are they who are guilty of it excluded from God's Mercy that they are excluded from the Charity of our Prayers for we are not so much as to pray for such as it is there expressed Again all the Sins of finally impenitent and unbelieving Wretches are eventually Mortal and shall certainly be punished at last with Eternal Death and Damnation For the Wrath of God abideth on him that believeth not Joh. 3.16 And God will render Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish upon every Soul of Man that doth evil Rom. 2.9 All Sins whatsoever are Mortal meritoriously both in the Penitent and in the Impenitent the Law hath condemned all alike though all Sins are not alike hainous nor shall be equally punished but with some it shall be far more intolerable than with others yet all are alike Mortal and deserve Death and the same Hell though not the same Place nor the same Degree of Torments in Hell for those Sins which are accounted most Trivial and Venial are in themselves Violations of the Holy Law of God and the Penalty that his Laws threaten is no less than Death The Law is accurate and reacheth to the least things yea to the least circumstances of those things and every Transgression against it shall receive its due recompence of reward Nay had we no other guilt left upon our Souls from the first moment of our lives to this present day but only the guilt of the least Sin that the Holy Law condemns be it only the wrenching aside of a Thought or Desire only a bye and sinister end in the performance of Holy Duties nay let it be but the first rudiment and imperfect draught of a Thought not yet finished without a full satisfaction and expiation this small Debt would cast us into Prison this little Sin would sink us irrecoverably into Hell and lay us under the Revenges of the Almighty God for ever Oh then with what horrour and amazement may Sinners reflect upon their past Sins With what dread and trembling may they expect their future State since as many thousand Sins as they have committed of all sizes and aggravations so many Deaths and Hells heaped up one upon another have they deserved and without intervention of a full payment and satisfaction must they be adjudged to undergo For though the least degree of Divine Wrath be a tormenting Hell yet God will inflame his Wrath to as many degrees of acrimony and sharpness as they have committed Sins till their Punishment be equal to their Offences and become infinitely intolerable Fourthly Consider thou canst never pay God nor discharge the least of thy Debts for ever For First Thou canst not possibly do it by any Duties or Services in this Life For whatsoever thou dost is either required or not required if it be not required it will be so far from being a satisfaction for thy Sins that it will be an addition to them and a piece of Will-worship which will meet with that sad Greeting at the last Day who hath required these things at your Hands If it be required it is no more than thou owest to God before and if thou hadst never sinned wert obliged to pay it To think to satisfie for thy Sins by thy Duties is but to rob one Attribute of God to pay another for whatsoever Obedience thou canst perform thou owest it to the Sovereignty and Holiness of God and his Justice will never accept of that which belongs to his Authority Besides it is absurd to think to pay one Duty by another to discharge the Debt of Sin by paying the Debt of Duty Secondly Thou canst not pay off thy Debts by any Sufferings hereafter It is true Sinners shall lie eternally in Prison and be eternally satisfying the offended Justice of God but in all that Eternity there shall never be that moment wherein they may say as Christ did in his making satisfaction it is finished the Debt is paid and Justice hath received as much as was due from me No that satisfaction must be eternally making and therefore the punishment must be eternally lasting For every Sin even the least Sin is committed against an infinite God and therefore the punishment of it must be infinite For Offences take their measures as well from the Dignity of the Person against whom they are committed as from the hainousness of the Fact in it self considered As a reviling Word against the King is Treasonable against our Equals but actionable and therefore by the same proportion the same Offence against the infinite Majesty of the great God must needs carry infinite guilt in it that is exposeth to infinite punishment Now then O Sinner think with thy self what satisfaction thou canst make to God that can bear a proportion to thy infinite Offences Thou canst not at once undergo an infinite measure of punishment for thy Nature is but finite Couldst thou do this then indeed
there were hope yea certainty of relief for thee for Divine Justice will not exact more than its due But because this is impossible thy Woes and Torments in Hell must be Eternal that they may be some way infinite as the Justice is which thou hast offended infinite if not in Degrees yet in duration and continuance And O what dreadful despair will this cause in thee when thou shalt have been in Hell under most acute and insufferable Torments Millions of years and yet the payment of all that sum of Plagues and Woes shall not be of value enough to satisfie for the least of thy Sins nor to cross out of God's Book the least and smallest of thy Debts but thy account shall still be as great and as full as it was at thy first plunging into Hell and still an Eternity of Torments remains to be paid by thee And now wretched Creatures that we are whither shall we turn our selves what hope what relief can we find shall we flatter our selves that God will not require our sins at our hands no they are Debts and therefore he may and he is a Just God Just to himself and to the Interest of his own Glory and therefore he will God hath before-hand told us at what rate we must expect to take up our sins and what we must pay for them at the last He hath told us as plainly as the mouth of Truth can utter it that the Wages of sin is Death and the ways Sinners choose lead down to the Chambers of Hell and Destruction Our own Misery is our own choice He hath in his Word set Life and Death before us and declared to us the means how we might escape the one and obtain the other He hath represented to us the unconceiveableness of both And if we will be so obstinate as after these manifest representations to choose Hell and Death it is but Reason and Justice that we should have our own Choice for it is our Choice interpretatively when we choose those ways and actions that expose to them And thus much concerning the acknowledgement we make in this Petition our Debts Debts vast and infinite which the Justice of God will strictly require of Sinners in their Eternal Condemnation Debts the least of which makes us liable to be cast into Prison into Hell and for the least of which we can never satisfie But what is there no hope Is there no possibility to cross the Book to cancel the Obligation whereby we stand bound to the revenging Justice of God and everlasting Sufferings Truly none by our own personal satisfaction but yet there is abundant hope yea full assurance of it through the free Mercy of our God And therefore as our Saviour hath taught us to acknowledge our Debts so he hath likewise taught us to pray Father forgive us our Debts And now that I have shewed you our Misery by reason of our Debts and you have seen the black side of the Cloud which interposeth between God and us So give me leave to represent to you our Hopes and Consolation in God's free Grace and the Divine Mercy in dissolving this black Cloud that it may never more appear And here let us First Consider what the Pardon of sin is And this we cannot better discover than by looking into the Nature of sin Sin therefore as St. John describes it 1 John 3.4 is a transgression of the Law of God And to the validity of all Laws it is necessary that there be a penalty annexed either literally express'd or tacitly implied The guilt that we contract by transgressing the Law is nothing else but our liableness to undergo this penalty And this guilt is Two-fold the intrinsecal and formal and that is the desert of punishment which sin always necessarily carries in it as it is a violation of a Holy and Righteous Commandment The other is extrinsecal and adventitious and consists in the appointment and designation of the sinner unto punishment This now doth not formally flow from sin but from the Will of God constituting and willing to punish sin with Death Now Pardon is nothing else but the removal of the guilt of sin But now the question is which guilt it removeth I Answer First It doth not remove the intrinsecal guilt of sin or the desert of punishment For the sins of those who are Justified and Pardoned do yet in their own Nature deserve Death and Eternal Damnation As a Pardon vouchsafed to a Traitor doth not cause his Actions not to have been Treasonable and worthy of Death for this doth necessarily follow immediately upon the Transgressing of the Law to which the Penalty is annexed So neither is it in the Power of Pardoning Grace to make that our sins should not deserve Death according to their own demerit for that were a contradiction since this demerit is necessary and essential unto sin as such Secondly Therefore Pardon of sin removes that guilt which consists in the adventitious Appointment or Ordination of the sinner unto Punishment flowing from the Will of God who hath in his Law threatned to inflict Eternal Death as the Reward and Wages of sin Now this designation of the sinner unto punishment is Two-fold either Personal or Mystical One of these two ways God will certainly punish every Soul that sins either by appointing the sinner Personally to undergo the punishment of his iniquities and thus he deals with unbelievers whom he will punish in their own Persons for their transgressions Or else he appoints them to undergo the punishment of their sins Mystically as being by Faith made one with the Lord Jesus Christ who himself hath born our sins in his own Body on the Tree Now Pardon of sin doth not remove the Mystical appointment of a Believer unto Punishment for he hath suffered it for Christ hath suffered it and Christ and he are one Mystical Person by Faith God never Pardons but he likewise punishes the very sin that he Pardons he punisheth it in our surety and undertaker when he forgives it to a Believer Pardon of sin therefore removes only that guilt which consists in our own Personal appointment and designation to punishment though the sin doth always in it self necessarily deserve Death though that Death hath been inflicted upon Christ and therefore upon Believers in him as Members of him But yet notwithstanding that God thus takes Vengeance on our sins he doth Graciously Pardon them when he releaseth our Personal Obligation unto punishment and reckons that we have suffered the penalty in Christ suffering it and therefore ought to be discharged from any further liableness unto it This now is that Pardon of sin which we pray for when we say Forgive us our Debts And for the more full Explication of it I shall lay down these following positions First The Pardoning Grace of God in respect of us is altogether free and undeserved We can of our selves scarce so much as ask forgiveness but even this
thy Pardon even a Right and Title to a Blessed and Glorious Inheritance Thy Pardon thou hast from the Passive Obedience of Christ in his Sufferings A Right to Heaven thou hast through the Active Obedience of Christ in fullfilling all Righteousness And through both hast thou obtained a compleat Justification God looking upon thee as Innocent through the Satisfaction of his Son and as Worthy through his Obedience both which are made thine by Faith Now this Pardon of sin is in Scripture set forth by very sweet and full Expressions It is called a blotting out of Transgression A Metaphor taken from a Creditors crossing the Debt-Book signifying thereby a discharge of the Debt And lest we might possibly fear God will implead us for them without Book the Prophet adds forgetting unto blotting out Esai 43.25 I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions for my Names sake and I will not remember thy sins It is called a covering of our sins Psal 32.1 Blessed is the Man whose Transgressions are forgiven and whose sin is covered Yea we have a further ground of Comfort for it is not only a covering of our sins but it is a covering of God's Face from them Psal 51.9 Hide thy Face from my sins and blot out all mine iniquities It is a casting of them behind God's back as a thing that he will never more regard Is 38.17 Thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back And lest we should suspect he should turn again to behold them it is called a casting of them into the bottom of Sea Mic. 7.19 as we do with things we would have irrecoverably lost and gone It is a scattering them as a thick Cloud Esai 44.22 When the Vapours of it are so dissipated that there shall not remain the least spot to obstruct the shining of God's Face and Favour upon our Souls Yea and so perfect an Abolition shall be made of all our Iniquities that though Divine Justice should enter into a strict search and scrutiny after them they shall not be found against us So the Prophet Jeremiah tells us Jerem. 50.20 In that day shall the iniquity of Israel be sought for and there shall be none and the sins of Judah and they shall not be found How hath God heaped up Expressions of his Grace and Mercy one upon another and studied words as it were to assure us of the Validity of our Pardon giving to us abounding Consolations as our sins have been abounding And thus much shall suffice to shew the Nature of Pardoning Grace and Mercy as expressed in these words Forgive us our Debts Secondly Let us consider unto whom this Petition for Pardon is directed and that is as all the rest are to our Father whose Laws we have violated whose Justice we have offended whose displeasure we have incurred and to whose vengeance we have made our selves liable and obnoxious to him we sue for Pardon and Remission Hence we may collect this note That it is the High Prerogative of God alone to forgive Sins God assumes this particularly to himself and seems to triumph in the Glory of this Attribute I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions And therefore when Christ cured the Paralytick the Scribes and Pharisees storm'd at him for a Blasphemer for saying Be of good chear thy Sins are forgiven thee Thou Blasphemest say they for who can forgive Sins but God alone Mark 2.7 And this Charge of Blasphemy which they laid against Christ had he not been the true God had been unanswerable And therefore our Saviour denies not their Principle which is most certain and infallible but to convince them that they themselves were Blasphemers in applying it to him proves his Deity by a Miracle and demonstrates his Authority to forgive Sins by his Power in healing Diseases But you will say if it be the incommunicable Prerogative of God only to forgive Sins How is it that we find this Privilege and Power ascribed unto Men also John 20.23 Whosoever Sins ye remit they are remitted It seems therefore that the Apostles and Ministers of Jesus Christ their Successors stand invested by Christ with a Power to forgive Sins I Answer Remission of Sins is two-fold either Authoritatively and Judicially or Secondly Ministerial and Declarative The former belongs only to God who by the meer Authority of his Grace and Mercy doth freely and fully acquit us of our Guilt without requiring any thing at our Hands by way of recompence or punishment Now for any Creature either in Heaven or Earth to assume this to himself is a most insolent and Blasphemous Pride which while the Pope of Rome doth he hath given us the strongest Argument that can be to assert and prove him to be the Antichrist and that Son of Perdition for among the many Characters that are given of Antichrist all of which do more than sufficiently belong unto him this is one that he exalteth himself above all that is called God 2. Thess 2.4 Not only above Titular Gods as Kings and Magistrates are for it is notoriously known what Power he arrogates unto himself in disposing Crowns and transferring States making Princes themselves far more inferiour to him than their Subjects are to them but also above the only Living and True God and the Lord Jesus Christ in pretending to a Judicial Authority to forgive Sins and Offences committed against God For it is clear and evident whosoever can Pardon the Offences of one Person against another must himself be Superiour to both and have Authority and Jurisdiction over both but chiefly over the Person offended to make him cease the Prosecution of his Right and sit down by the Wrong received For if a Prince should Pardon the Injury that one Subject doth the other he must command the Person grieved not to molest or prosecute him that hath done the Wrong and so disable him from taking revenge Now what a wretched and damnable Insolence is it for any vile sinful Man to pretend to such a Power of forgiving Sins committed against God as if by his Authority he could command God to surcease his Suit and to require no farther recompence but to rest himself contented that it is the Pope's Will and Pleasure to have it so What is this but to exalt himself above all that is called God not only on Earth but in Heavean it self A most horrid Blasphemy and so proper a Character of Antichrist that there needs no other to describe him by Secondly There is a Ministerial declarative Remission of Sins and this is either Internal in the Court of Conscience or External in the Court of the Church of Christ here upon Earth The former Remission is the Office or Ministery of the Holy Ghost sealing of us up unto the Day of Redemption by his silent and most comfortable Testimony witnessing unto us that our Sins are pardoned and our Persons accepted The External Declaration of Remission of Sins is an open publication to all
humble Penitent Sinners the Absolution and Pardon of their Offences according to the tenor of God's Faithful Promises And in this sence alone the Ministers of Jesus Christ have power to pardon and remit Sins Whose Sins ye remit they are remitted that is whose Sins you declare that God hath remitted they are remitted not absolutely but conditionally in case Men come up to the performance of those conditions upon which God hath promised Pardon and Forgiveness which are Faith and Repentance And therefore in our Publick Prayers where the whole Congregation hath made an humble Confession of their Sins the Minister according to his Office and Power given him by Christ declares to them That God Pardons and Absolves all them that truly Repent and unfeignedly believe his Holy Gospel Or if on any other Occasion the Minister say I Absolve thee from thy Sins yet the meaning is the same he absolves him Officially not Judicially he Absolves by declaring him Absolved and Pardoned upon his sincere Faith and Repentance which if People did but better understand they would not be so forward to carp at least they carp at the very Gospel it self Nor doth this at all intrench upon God's Prerogative for the Minister only as the Officer and Messenger of God declares that it is he alone who Pardons and Absolves Penitent Sinners A Practice as far from bordering upon the intolerable Arrogance of Antichrist as it is on the other side from yielding enough to the express Authority of Christ to adjudge it vain and fruitless As it is the Prince that Pardons the Herald only proclaims it So here it is God only who Pardons Sinners the Minister's part is in a solemn and official manner to Pronounce and Proclaim this Pardon to all that shall accept it upon the Terms on which it is offered by God And this may suffice in Answer to that Objection But then again it may be Objected How is it God alone who forgives Sins whereas we likewise are bound to forgive those that Trespass against us To this I Answer Every Trespass against Man is also an Offence against God for so merciful is our God unto us that he hath taken his Creatures under the Protection of his Law and fenced us round with the Authority of his Commands so that no injury can reach us but it must commit a Trespass upon the Divine Law and break through those bounds that God hath set about every Man's Propriety and Right to defend it against unjust Invaders But yet if any shall dare to violate this we must forgive them so far forth as it is a wrong to us as I shall shew more largely hereafter but we cannot pretend to forgive the wrong that they have done to God in wronging us but this must be left between him and their own Souls to his Mercy and their Repentance If then it be the Prerogative of God alone to pardon Sin hence we may for our abundant Comfort be informed First That our Pardon is free and gratuitous for whatsoever God doth he doth it freely for his own sake without respect to any former deserts or expectations of any future recompence It is infinitely below the Sovereignty of his Grace to admit of any other motive for his Mercy but his Mercy And therefore he hath told us I will be Gracious to whom I will be Gracious and I will shew Mercy to whom I will shew Mercy Exod. 33.19 Since it is a God that Pardons it is infinitely unworthy of his Glory and Majesty to sell his Pardons and Indulgencies and to make his Mercy Merchandise But yet this pardoning Grace of God though it be free in respect of Purchace yet is it limited to Conditions in respect of Application which Conditions are Faith and Repentance Whosoever believes in him shall obtain remission of Sins Acts 10.43 Repent says the Apostle that your Sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come Acts 3.19 Think not therefore O Soul when thy Conscience is oppressed with the Guilt of Sin think not what Expiation thou must make what Ransom thou must pay to God say not Wherewith shall I come before the Lord or bow my self before the High God Shall I come before him with Burnt-Offerings with Calves of a year old Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of Rams or with ten thousand Rivers of Oil Shall I give my First-Born for my Transgression the Fruit of my Body for the Sin of my Soul as the Prophet speaks Micah 6.6 7. What shall I do or what shall I offer to make amends and recompence for my Offences This is to be injurious to the free Grace of God which requires no satisfaction from thee only thy present Acceptance and future Reformation This is that indeed which God requires from thee but to think to purchase his Favour and to buy his Mercy is infinitely to disparage it And they only judge rightly of it who judge it invaluable Secondly It is God that Pardons therefore our Pardon is full and compleat Indeed those Acts that God works within us are in this Life imperfect The Illumination of our Minds the Sanctification of our Hearts are God's Works within us and these are defective not as they come from God but as they are received in us As we know but in part so we are sanctified but in part But those Acts of God that he doth not work in us but only terminate upon us of which we are the Objects but not the Subjects they are all as perfect here as they shall be to all Eternity Thus God Justifies Adopts and Pardons fully and compleatly for these are Acts of God residing in his own Breast where they meet with no opposition or allay nor do they increase by any small Degrees as our Sanctification doth but are at once as perfect as ever they shall be I do not mean though some have so thought and taught that God doth at once Pardon all the Sins of a true Believer as well those which for the future he shall commit as those which he hath already committed which is an absurd and dangerous Tenet as if Sin could be pardoned before it were or guilt removed before it be contracted But only whatsoever Sins God pardons he doth it not gradually Nothing of guilt is left upon the Soul when God Pardons it though still there be something of filth left in it when God Sanctifies it And therefore as it is the great grief of God's Children that their inherent Holiness is so imperfect affronted by Temptations foiled by Corruptions oppressed and almost stifled to Death by a Body of Sin that lies heavy upon it yet this on the other Hand may be their exceeding great comfort and rejoicing that God's pardoning Grace is not as his sanctifying Grace is nor granted to them by the same stint and measure A Sin truly repented of is not pardoned to us by halfs half the guilt remitted and half retained as the Papists fansie to
and winnow us sometimes to his own defeat but too often to ours And in this fence there is no Temptation that befalls us but God leads us into it And therefore it is very observable that whereas in 1 Chron. 21.1 It is said that Satan provoked David to Number Israel yet in 2 Sam. 24.1 it is said the Lord moved David against Israel to say Go number Israel and Judah here one and the same Temptation is attributed both to God and to the Devil but it must be understood under a diverse habitude and respect Satan Tempted him effectively God only permissively And thus God may be said to lead every Man into Temptation whom he suffers to be Tempted When therefore we pray that God would not lead us into Temptation we pray that he would not permit the Devil to approach near unto us nor to cast his Fiery Darts at us but that he would put a hook into the nose of that great Leviathan and so bridle and restrain his Fury that he may not be able to assault us These now are all the ways that I know of how God may be said to lead Men into Temptation Either by offering them objects and opportunities by his Providence which may correspond with their inward Lusts and Corruptions and as it were entice and call them forth Or else by permitting Satan and wicked Men to Tempt us Or lastly by withdrawing from us the influences of his Grace and Holy Spirit and leaving us under the power of Temptations when they do assault us But for any proper effective or persuasive Tempting of Men to sin this is infinitely abhorrent to his Pure and Holy Nature in which sence St. James tells us James 1.13 Let no Man say when he is tempted that he is tempted of God for God cannot he tempted to evil neither tempteth he any Man But though God cannot thus Tempt any Man without a stain to his Infinite Purity and Holiness yet he may lead Men into Temptation either Providentially or Permissively or by substracting his Grace whereby they should stand And yet at last justly punisheth them for sinning And this is no unrighteous thing with God for he lays no constraint upon the freedom of our Wills but we sin freely and of our own accord Now although God can easily keep us from all assaults and attempts of our Spiritual Enemies yet he permits us to be Tempted by them for most Wise and Holy ends As First He leaves these Canaanites to molest us to teach us the Wars of the Lord to make us continually Watchful to breath and exercise our Graces to administer matter for our Conquest and occasion for our Crown and Triumph Secondly To convince us of our own utter inability to stand of our selves without his help and assistance thereby engaging us to depend upon his Arm and to call for Divine Supplies and Succours Thirdly To Glorifie both his Justice and Mercy His Justice in giving up wicked Men to the rage of Temptaons to be hurried by them from sin to sin till at last they put an end to the Succession of their sins in Eternal Damnation And his Mercy in succouring of and supporting and delivering his Children out of all their Temptations And therefore when St. Paul prayed to be freed from the buffettings of the Messenger of Satan God answers him My Grace is sufficient for thee my strength is made perfect in weakness 2 Cor. 12.9 When the Devil presumes he hath so well laid his Temptations that it is impossible for the People of God to escape his Snares yet God finds a way for their deliverance out of them all For God holds the great Tempter under a powerful restraint so that he cannot touch us beyond permission and commission And therefore that place in Revelat. 2.10 is very remarkable to this purpose Fear none of those things that thou shalt suffer behold the Devil shall cast some of you into Prison that you may be tried and you shall have Tribulation ten days How many restraints are here mentioned to be put upon that malicious Spirit He shall cast into Prison whereas he would willingly cast into Hell or at least into the Grave It shall be but some of you whereas his spight and rage is against all the Children of God And it shall be but for ten days but for a short time neither the Place the Number the Time all limitted and that with such a restraint that all the Pride and Rage of the Devil shall not be able to exceed it Fourthly God permits his own Children to be Tempted that by their Victory over Temptations he may confound the Malice of Satan and commend the Excellency of his own Ways and Service This highly honours God and shames the Malice of the Devil when we are neither terrified by Sufferings nor induced by the Pleasures of sin from the course of our Obedience for this evidently declares That we are True and Loyal to our Great Sovereign That we more fear his Eternal Wrath and Displeasure than those light Afflictions that are but for a moment and that we find more true Joy and solid Delight in his Service than in the ways of Sin and Vanity And therefore God calls us forth as his Champions puts his Cause in our hands and bids us resist manfully for the Credit and Honour of Piety and then le ts loose Satan upon us whom if we can but Conquer which certainly we shall do if we but seriously resolve it God and Angels who from the Theatre of Heaven are Spectators of the Combat give us their Applause and will hereafter give us our Crown See how God Glories over this baffled Devil and upbraids him with the Victorious Constancy of his Servant Job God had before commended the Integrity of Job Chap. 1.8 Hast thou considered my Servant Job that there is none like him upon the Earth a perfect and upright Man one that feareth God and escheweth Evil. To this that Malicious Spirit fullenly replies Doth Job fear God for nought thou needest not Glory in his ready Service and Obedience when he is so well paid for it no wonder he is so Pious and Devout when he gets so well by it but leave him a while to me to take from him those enducements that make him so Pious and Holy and I will undertake that even this perfect and upright Man shall curse thee even to thy Face God accepts the Challenge on his Servants behalf Satan and Job enter the List the Devil buffets him sore destroys all his Cattel ruins his House kills his Children yet Job shrinks not for all this but wrestles naked with his Adversary and foils him See now how God rejoyces at his Champion's Victory and upbraids the Devil with his shameful overthrow Chap. 2. 3. Hast thou considered my Servant Job that there is none like him in the Earth a perfect and an upright Man one that feareth God and escheweth Evil. God repeats the same Character and
to another part less dangerous So God by his Providence many times turns Men from the Commission of greater sins to a lesser sin And I believe there are but few Men who if they will but seriously examine their lives may produce may instances both of the Devil's policy in fitting them with occasions and opportunities of sinning and of God's Providence in causing some urgent Affairs or some sudden and unexpected Accidents to intervene whereby they are turned off from what they purposed Fourthly Sometimes by his Providence he takes off the Objects against which they intended to sin Thus God preserved St. Peter from Herod's Ambitious Rage He intended the next morning to put him to Death but that very night God sends his Angel to work his escape and thereby hinders the execution of that wicked purpose And thus in all Ages God many times hides his Children from the fury of wicked Men that their Wrath against them like Saul's Javelin misseth David and striketh only the Wall from whence it often rebounds back into their own Faces These now are some of the most remarkable Methods of Divine Providence in preventing the sins of Men. And I am very prone to think that there are very few who if they will be at the pains to reflect back upon and strictly examine that part of their lives that is past and gone they may easily produce many remarkable instances both of the Devil's Policy in fitting them with opportunities and occasions of sinning and of God's Providences in causing some immergent affairs or some other strange and unexpected accidents to interpose so that he hath either Graciously taken away our power or taken away the Objects of our Lusts or diverted us when we were in the pursuits of them To this we owe much of the innocency and in some respects blamelessness of our lives that we have not been a scandal to the Gospel a shame to the Good and a scorn to the Bad and this is the first way how God preserves from sin by his Providence Secondly God preserves from sin by his restraining Grace Now this restraining Grace is that which is common and vouchsafed to wicked Men as well as good Indeed God by it deals in a secret way with the very heart of a sinner and though he doth not change the habitual yet he changeth the present actual disposition of it so as not only by external checks laid upon Mens Lusts but by internal persuasions motives and arguments they are taken off the prosecution of those very sins which yet remain in them unmortified and raigning Thus Esau comes out against his Brother Jacob with a Troop of two hundred Ruffians intending doubtless to take revenge upon him for his Birth-right and Blessing but at their first meeting God by a secret work so mollifies his heart that instead of falling upon him to kill him he falls upon his neek and kisses him Here God restrain'd Esau from that bloody sin of Murder not in a way of External Providence only but with his own hand he immediately turns about his heart and by seeing such a company of Cattel bleating and bellowing timorous Women and helpless Children bowing and supplicating to him he turns his Revenge into Compassion and with much urging receives a Present from him whom he thought to have made a Prey The same powerful restraint God laid upon the heart of Abimelech a Heathen King Gen. 20.6 where God tells him I with-held thee from sinning against me and therefore suffered I thee not to touch her Here was nothing visible that might hinder Abimelech but God invisibly wrought upon his heart and unhing'd his sinful desires And from these two instances of Esau and Abimelech we may clearly collect how restraining Grace differs both from restraining Providence and from Sanctifying Grace from Providence it differs because usually when God Providentially restrains from sin he doth it by some visible apparent means which do not reach to work any change or alteration upon the heart but only lays an external check upon Mens sinful Actions But by restraining Grace God deals in a secret way with the very heart of a sinner and although he doth not change the nature of it yet he alters the present inclination of it and takes away the desire of committing those sins which yet he doth not mortifie And from Sanctifying Grace it differs also in that God vouchsafes it to wicked Men and Reprobates to the end that their Lives may be more plausible their Gifts more serviceable and their Condemnation more intolerable And indeed the efficacy of this restraining Grace may be so great that there may appear but very little difference between the Conversation of a true Christian whom Special Grace Sanctifies and the Conversation of one in a State of Nature whom common Grace only restains they may both live outwardly without blame or offence avoiding the gross pollutions of the World and shine in a Sphere above the ordinary sort of Men and yet the one be a Star and the other but a Meteor The high-way may be as dry and as fair in a Frosty Winter as in a warm Summer bur there is a great deal of difference in the cause of it In Summer the Sun dries up the moisture in Winter the Frost binds it in So the ways of those who have only a restraint laid upon them may be as fair and clear as the ways of those who are truly Sanctified but the cause is vastly different Grace hath dried up the filth of the one but ownly bound in the filth of the other Now God doth thus by his restraining Grace preserve Men from sin by propounding to them such Considerations and Arguments as may be sufficient to engage Conscience against it when yet the Will and Affections are still bent towards it Restraining Grace thunders the Curse of the Law and brandisheth the Sword of Justice in the Face of a sinner reports nothing but Hell and Everlasting Torments and such terrible things which may scare Men from their sins though still they love them It is indeed a great Mercy of God to keep us from sin even by legal terrours and usually these are a good preparation and introduction for saving Grace Doubtless the thoughts and fears of Hell have with very good success been made use of to keep Men from those sins that lead unto Hell But yet if in our conflicts against Temptations we can draw Arguments from no other Topicks but Hell and Eternal Death and Destruction If we cannot as well quench the Fiery Darts of the Devil in the Blood of Jesus Christ as in the Lake of Fire and Brimstone it is much to be doubted whether our abstaining from sin be from any higher principle than what is common only for fear of punishment and not for love of God or Goodness Thirdly God hath another method of keeping Men from sin and that is by his Special and Sanctifying Grace And this is proper only to the
promised not to do Thirdly The Glory is God's therefore his Will shall be done in Earth as it is in Heaven The greatest Glory that God can receive from us is by our Obedience John 15.8 Herein saith our Saviour is my Father Glorified that ye bear much Fruit God's chiefest Glory is his Holiness and therefore he is Styled Glorious in Holiness And we have no better way to Glorifie the Holiness of God than by endeavouring to be Holy as he is Holy For then do we declare it to be a thing which we value as most Excellent and Glorious when we strive to imitate it and would fain get as much of it as our frail Natures can receive And therefore we may well pray in Faith Thy Will be done for thine is the Glory because the greatest Glory we can give to God is by doing his Will Fourthly The Glory is God's and therefore will he provide for us our daily Bread and all things that are necessary for our good And therefore when God was Miraculously to provide Bread for his People in the Wilderness he tells them Exod. 16.7 In the morning then shall ye see the Glory of the Lord. And certainly it is not for the Glory of God that any of his should want things fitting and necessary for them Only let us leave it to him to Judge what is so For although he should reduce thee to a morsel of Bread and a cup of cold Water yet he gives thee all that is fit for thee and should he give thee more it would not be a boon but a curse Fifthly The Glory is God's Therefore he will forgive thy Debts and Trespasses The Wise Man hath told us Prov. 19.11 That it is the Glory of a Man to pass over a Transgression and shall it not much more be the Glory of God whose Mercies are infinitely more Glorious than our Charity can be Yea he tells us Prov. 25.2 That it is the Glory of God to conceal a thing that is to hide and cover our sins so that they shall not be found against us And expresly Ephes 1.6 7. That we have redemption even the forgiveness of sins to the praise and glory of his Grace And I have shewed you in opening of the Petition that it is a very high Honour and Superiority to forgive it is the Prerogative-Royal of a King and therefore we may well pray with Faith Forgive us our Trespasses for thine is the Glory Sixthly The Glory is God's Therefore he will deliver us from the Assaults and Incursions of our Enemies he will deliver us from Temptations or from the evil of Temptation He will not suffer us to be tempted above what we are able to bear but will with every Temptation make a way for us to escape hereby to demonstrate the Glory of his Wisdom and Power that it is above all the wiles and power of the Devil and our Spiritual Enemies And therefore we may well pray Lead us not into Temptation but deliver us from Evil for thine is the Glory because it is the Honour of God to defend his Servants from the incursions of his and their Enemies Thus we have treated on three of God's Attributes ascribed to him in this Doxology His Dominion his Power and his Glory It remains now to consider the Amplification of all these by that expression For ever which is to be referred and accommodated to the foregoing Titles The Kingdom is thine for ever The Power is thine for ever and the Glory thine for ever Now this application of it denotes to us the Eternity of God's Attributes and consequently his Nature Indeed this Particle For ever doth not always in Scripture signifie a strict and proper Eternity for it is often applied to things of various durations First Sometimes most improperly those things which have both beginning and end are said to be for ever So the Mosaical Paedagogy and those rites and observancies which were imposed upon the Jews by the Levitical Law are said to be everlasting although they were not to continue any longer than between Moses and Christ which space was not compleatly Fifteen Hundred Years Thus the Priesthood is said to be eternal Numb 25.13 where it is called The Covenant of an everlasting Priesthood So the sprinkling of the Blood of the Passover is to be commanded to be observed for ever Exod. 12.24 So Circumcision is called an everlasting Covenant Gen. 17 13. And many more such instances might be given Yea things of a far shorter duration than these such as are only to continue during life are yet said to be Eternal The servitude of him that refused freedom was to be for ever Exod. 21.6 that is during his natural life And so the Psalmist often resolves himself and exhorts others to Praise and Magnifie God for ever And indeed it is very ordinary in Scripture that those things are said to be for ever which were not to alter their State for some continuance of time nor to be difused till the date prefixed to them were expired Secondly Some things which had no beginning but shall have an end are yet said to be for ever And such as they respect their Objects are the Decrees or Foreknowledge of God which shall in their due time be fullfilled Thus Ephes 3.11 they are called The Eternal purpose of God and yet they cease under the notions of Decrees and Prescience when that which was from all Eternity Decreed and Foreknown takes its accomplishment Thirdly Those things which had a beginning but never shall have an end are said to be for ever And such are the Angels all of them Created in the beginning of time but their future continuance is without bound or period And the Saints after the Resurrection are said to be made equal to the Angels because they shall not die Luke 20.36 And Christ is said to be made a little lower than the Angels in that he tasted of Death Heb. 2.9 The good Angels live in Eternal Beatitude they always behold the Face of God Matth. 18.10 And the evil Angels live in Eternal torments and a never dying Death They are reserved in everlasting Chains under darkness Jude verse 6. And thus the Souls of Men are everlasting For being Spiritual substances and free from all principles of decay and corruption they shall for ever continue in that Estate and Condition for which their Actions in this life have prepared them And not the Soul alone but the Body also shall be eternally preserved in its being This mortal must put on immortality 1 Cor. 15.53 And then shall we for ever be with the Lord 1 Thess 4.17 And yet all these had once their beginning by the Creating Word of God but are Eternal à parte post and shall always retain those natures and beings Fourthly That is most strictly and properly said be Eternal and for ever which neither hath beginning nor end whose prospect both ways is infinite and boundless And thus God only is
sinceall partake of the same common Nature much more as we partake of the same especial Grace To interest one another in our Prayers and thereby maintain the Communion of Saints Q. But since God is every where present why hath our Saviour taught us to direct our Prayers to our Father in Heaven A. First because Heaven is the most glorious Place of God's Residence and therefore God is represented to us in Heaven to affect us with his Glory and Majesty Secondly Because God no where hears our Prayers with acceptation but onely in Heaven For there onely are they represented by Christ's Intercession which he makes in both Natures Q. What learn ye from our being commanded to direct our Prayers to God in Heaven A. That we should so pray as to pierce Heaven which cannot be done by the strength and intention of our Voice but of our Zeal and Affection Q. Is the Voice necessary in Prayer A. It is onely upon three Accounts 1. As that which God requires should be imployed in his Service 2. VVhen in secret it may be an help to raise our Affections still keeping it within the Bounds of Decency and Secrecy 3. In our joyning with others it is an help likewise to raise and quicken their Affections Q What is the first Petition of the Lord's Prayer A. Hallowed be thy Name Q. What is here meant by the Name of God A. First God's Name is himself Psal 20.1 The Lord hear thee in the Day of Trouble the Name of the God of Jacob defend thee and many other Places Secondly The Name of God is any perfection ascribed unto him whereby he hath made himself known unto us Q. What are the Names of God A. His Titles and his Attributes Q. What are his Titles A. They are many as Jehovah which signifies Being and giving being Creator denoting his Infinite Power Lord and King denoting his Authority and Dominion Father signifying his Care and Goodness towards his Creatures Redeemer noting his Mercy and Grace in delivering them from Temporal Evils and especially from Eternal Death Q. What are the Attributes of God A. They are of two Sorts either Incommunicable or Communicable Q. Which are his incommunicable Attributes A. Such as are so proper to the Divine Essence that they cannot in any Measure or Resemblance be ascribed to the Creatures Such are the Eternity Immensity Simplicity and Immutability Q. What are his communicable Attributes A. They are such as may in some Analogy and Resemblance be found in the Creatures As Holiness Justice Mercy Truth VVisdom and Power Q. Since they are to be found in the Creatures how are they then the proper Names of God A. They are the proper Names of God when they are applied to him free from all those Imperfections that attend them in the Creatures Q. What are these Imperfections A. They are Three 1. First That all the Perfections of the Creatures are not Originally from themselves but derivatively from God 2. Secondly They are not infinite but limited 3. Thirdly They are not unchangeable but mutable Q. How then do these become the Names of God A. VVhen we ascribe them unto God as Originally from himself and infinitely and unchangeably in himself Q. What is it to hallow this Name of God A. It signifies to make his Name Holy Q. How can God or his Name be made Holy A. Neither by Dedication to Holy Uses nor by Infusion of Holy Habits both which are frequently in Scripture called Hallowing or Sanctifying but onely by Declaration of his Glory and Holiness Q. How do we hallow the Name of God by Declaration A. VVhen in our most reverend Thoughts we observe and admire the Expressions of his Attributes and indeavour to set them forth to others both in VVords and Actions Q. What pray you for in this Petition Hallowed be thy Name A. For three Things in the General 1. First VVe beg such Graces for our selves as may inable us to sanctifie the Name of God Q. What are they especially A. Knowledge and Understanding of his Nature VVill and VVorks Thankfulness for every Mercy Patience under every Affliction Faith in his VVord and Promises For to believe God's VVord gives Glory to his Name Rom. 4.20 He staggered not at the Promise of God through Vnbelief but was strong in Faith giving Glory to God An Holy and Exemplary Life whereby we especially glorified God and induce others to do so too Matt. 5.16 Let your Light so shine before Men that they may see your good Works and glorifie your Father which is in Heaven And lastly savoury and well ordered Speech that we may not prophane the Name of God by Oaths or Curses or vain using it but speak of him with all Holy Fear and Reverence Q. What else do we beg of God in this Petition A. VVe beg that others also may receive Grace to inable them to sanctifie his Name And Thirdly we beg that God would so over-rule all Things that his Glory may be promoted by them Q. What learn you from Christ's making this the first Petition of his Prayer A. 1. First That the Glory of God is to be preferred by us before all other Things whatsoever John 12.27 28. Now is my Soul troubled and what shall I say Father save me from this Hour But for this Cause came I unto this Hour Father glorifie thy Name Then came there a Voice from Heaven saying I have both glorified it and will glorifie it again 2. Secondly That in the Beginning of our Prayers we ought to beg Assistance from God to present them that his Name may be hallowed Q. What is the second Petition of the Lord's Prayer A. Thy Kingdom come Q. How manifold is the Kingdom of God A. It is two fold either Universal or else his peculiar Kingdom Q. What is God's Vniversal Kingdom A. The whole VVorld both Heaven and Earth and Hell it self and all things in them Psal 103.19 The Lord hath prepared his Throne in the Heavens and his Kingdom ruleth over all Q. How doth God exercise his Dominion over this Kingdom A. By the Power of his Providence disposing of all his Creatures and all their Actions according to his VVill. Q. But since wicked Men are Rebels against God how doth he maintain his Dominion over them A. Three ways 1. First In that they cannot sin without his Permission 2. Secondly In that he restrains them when he pleaseth 3. Thirdly In that he justly punisheth them for their Sins sometimes in this Life always in the next Q. What is God's peculiar Kingdom A. His Kingdom of Grace which is the Church and that either Militant here on Earth or else Triumphant in Heaven Q. How is the Church Militant to be considered A. As it is either Visible or Invisible Q. What is the Visible Church of God here on Earth A. It is a Company of People openly professing the Truths that are necessary to Salvation and celebrating the Ordinances appointed by Jesus Christ Q.
We may and ought but our Care must be onely prudent and provident not perplexing and desponding Q. Why is that Expression this Day added A. To shew us that every Day we stand in need of Supplies from God and therefore should daily pray to receive them Q. Since we pray for daily Bread why is it called our Bread A. To note that we ought to use lawfull Means to acquire what we pray for Q. What pray you for in this Petition A. 1. That God would give us the good Things of this Life as the Acquisitions of our lawfull Endeavours 2. That he would bless the Increase of what is lawfully ours 3. That he would bestow upon us a spiritual Right in whatsoever we injoy through Jesus the Heir of all Things 4. We pray that we may not desire nor covet what is anothers 5. We pray for Life it self that it may be prolonged whilst God hath any Service for us to do in this World 6. For all the Means that may lawfully preserve our Life and Health 7. That he would strengthen our Faith and Dependence on his Providence who is the giver of all good 8. That he would give us Contentment in that Portion of Earthly Blessings which he allots us Q. What is the fifth Petition of the Lord's Prayer A. Forgive us our Debts as we forgive our Debtors Q. What things are observable in this Petition A. The Order and the Matter of it Q. What observe you from the Order of it A. That after we have prayed for our daily Bread we are taught to pray for Pardon of Sin Which Method is most rational 1. Because the Guilt of Sin many times with-holds from us those Temporal Comforts which we stand in need of Isaiah 59.2 But your Iniquities have separated between you and your God and your Sins have hid his Face from you that he will not hear 2. Because without Pardon of Sin our Temporal Injoyments are but Snares and Curses Q. What observe you in the Matter of this Petition A. Two things The Petition it self Forgive us our Debts And the Condition or Proportion or Plea and Argument for obtaining this Forgiveness As we forgive our Debtors Q. What mean you here by Debts A. The same which St. Luke 11.4 Calls Sins And forgive us our Sins for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us Q. How stand we indebted to God A. We stand indebted to God both as we are his Creatures and as we are Offenders on the former Account we owe God the Debt of Obedience on the latter the Debt of suffering Punishment Q. Which Debt do we pray God to forgive A. The latter onely for the former is irremissibly due to our great Creator Q. How come we to be thus indebted unto God A. By the Sentence of the Law which condemneth every Transgressour of it to undergo the Penalty it threatens which Penalty is all manner of Woes and Curses and Everlasting Death Gal. 3.10 Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them Rom. 6.23 For the wages of Sin is Death Ezek. 18.4 The Soul that sinneth it shall die Q. Since the Suffering of these is the Debt we owe to Divine Justice why say you that Sin is that Debt A. Because Sin alone is the meritorious Cause of these and we owe the Suffering of them onely as we are Sinners Q. Are there no Sins venial in their own Nature so as not to deserve Eternal Damnation A. No not the least for the wages of every Sin is Death All therefore are Mortal in their own Nature and all are Venial through the Mercy of God in the Merits of Christ excepting onely the Sin against the Holy Ghost Q. Can we no way pay off these Debts so as to satisfie the Justice of God A. No for neither can we do it by Obedience nor yet by Sufferings Not by the Duties of Obedience for these are a Debt we owe to God's Holiness and Soveraignty and therefore cannot pay the Debts we owe to his Justice and we cannot pay Debts by Debts Not by suffering for Sin being an infinite Evil must be punish'd with an infinite Punishment but we cannot suffer a Punishment infinite in Degrees therefore it must be infinite in Duration so that the Damned in Hell shall never be able to say It 's finish'd Q. How then may we hope to be acquitted of our Numberless Debts A. Onely through the free Mercy and Grace of God pardoning them in Jesus Christ and therefore we pray Forgive us our Debts Q. What is Pardon or Forgiveness of Sin A. It is the removal of the Guilt of Sin Q. What is the Guilt of Sin A. The Guilt of Sin is either the intrinsecal Desert of Punishment or else an Obnoxiousness and Liableness to it through God's Designation of the Sinner to undergo it Q. Doth pardon of Sin remove both these Guilts A. No it removes not the former for still the Sins of those who are pardoned do in themselves deserve Eternal Death But it removes the latter viz. it takes away our Appointment unto Death 2 Sam. 12.13 And David said unto Nathan I have sinned against the Lord and Nathan said unto David the Lord also hath put away thy Sin thou shalt not die Q. How is it consistent with the Justice of God to pardon Offenders without Punishment A. Though Believers are not personally appointed to Punishment yet Mystically they are which Punishment they have already suffered in Christ their Surety with whom they are made one by Faith Q. To whom is this Prayer for Pardon of Sin directed A. To God onely whose Royal Prerogative is to forgive Sins Isa 43.25 I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions for mine own sake and will not remember thy sins Mark 2.7 Who can forgive sins but God only Q. Have not the Ministers of the Gospel power to forgive sins according to that of St. John 20.23 Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted A. They have a ministerial and declarative Power as Officers not an authoritative and judicial Power as Soveraigns As the Prince onely pardons the Herauld proclaims it So God alone by the Prerogative of his Grace grants pardon the Minister by his Office publisheth it to all that repent and believe Q. What then must we judge of that absolute and plenary Power which the Pope assumes of pardoning Sins A. That it proves him to be Antichrist in exalting himself above God 2 Thess 2.4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God For whosoever can forgive wrongs done against another must be superiour to him and have Authority to cause the Person offended to surcease the Prosecution and sit down by the wrong done him Q. If God onely can forgive Sins how then are we bound to forgive those who
trespass against us A. We ought to forgive them so far forth as they have wronged us but we cannot forgive the wrong they have done to God in wronging us but must leave them to his Mercy and their Repentance Q. Since it is God's Prerogative and Glory to pardon sins what Inferences may we collect from hence A. First That our pardon is free and gratuitous without respecting former Deserts or expecting future Recompence Secondly That our pardon is full and compleat because it is an Act of God within himself whereas what he works in us is in this Life imperfect Nothing of Guilt is left upon the Soul when God pardons it though still there is something of Filth left in it when he sanctifies it God does not pardon by halfs nor leaves any Guilt to be expiated by Purgatory Thirdly That upon our Faith and Repentance our sins whether greater or less fewer or more shall be forgiven for this makes no difference in infinite Grace and Mercy Q. But may not this incourage Men to continue in sin A. Many do so abuse it but their Damnation is sure and just Deut. 29.19 20. And it come to pass when he heareth the words of this Curse that he blesseth himself in his heart saying I shall have peace though I walk in the Imagination of mine heart to add Drunkenness to Thirst Ver. 20. The Lord will not spare him Q. You have formerly observed that it is God alone who can forgive sins and from thence inferred both the freeness and fulness of pardoning Grace What observe you farther A. 1. That though God's pardoning Grace be altogether freely bestowed in respect of us Isaiah 43.25 I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions for mine own sake and will not remember thy Sins Yet in respect of Christ's Purchase it is not free but cost him the Price of his Blood Heb. 9.22 And almost all things are by the Law purged with Blood and without shedding of Blood is no remission Matt. 26.29 But I say unto you I will not drink hence-forth of this Fruit of the Vine untill that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's Kingdom 2. That the obtaining of Pardon is not free from the Performance of Conditions on our Part. Q. What are the Conditions upon which Pardon is granted A. They are two Faith and Repentance Acts 10.43 That through his Name whosoever believeth in him shall receive Remission of Sins Acts 3.19 Repent ye therefore and be converted that your Sins may be blotted out Q. Is therefore a mere sorrow that we have sinned a sufficient qualification for obtaining Pardon A. No for so Judas is said to repent Matt. 27.3 Then Judas which had betrayed him when he saw that he was condemned repented himself and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief Priests and Elders But as true Repentance includes in it a Sorrow of Heart so Reformation of Life and Manners is always joined with a lively Faith Q. Is pardon of sin an Act onely of God's Mercy A. It is likewise an Act of God's Justice to pardon the Sins of those who perform the Conditions of the Covenant of Grace Q. How prove you this A. Both by express Scripture 1 Epistle of John 1.9 If we confess our Sins he is faithfull and just to forgive us our Sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness And likewise by Scripture-Reason because Believers being made mystically one with Christ therefore their Sins being already punish'd in him their Surety and their Debts paid by him cannot be again justly punish'd in their own Persons nor demanded from them Q. Is pardon of sin our intire Justification A. No but it is one principal part of it For Justification consists both in Remission of Sins and Acceptation of our Persons the former depends upon Christ's Passive the other upon his Active Obedience his Satisfaction applied by Faith makes us accounted guiltless of Death and his Obedience worthy of Life both which compleat our Justification Ephes 1.6 7. To the Praise of the Glory of his Grace wherein he hath made us accepted in the Beloved Ver. 7. In whom we have Redemption through his Blood the Forgiveness of Sins according to the Riches of his Grace Q. We have thus considered the Petition Forgive us our Debts what remains further considerable A. The Condition upon which we ask it or the Plea we urge for obtaining it As we forgive our Debtors Q. Who are meant here by Debtors A. Other Men. Q. How are Men Debtors one to another A. Either 1. By owing them a Debt of Duty and thus all Men are mutually Debtors to one another Superiours to Inferiours and Inferiours to Superiours and Equals owe one another Love Respect and Kindness 2. By owing them a Debt of Satisfaction for Injuries and Wrongs done to others Q. Which of these Debts is here meant A. The latter onely for we are bound to forgive those who owe us Satisfaction and Reparation Q. What learn you from hence that those who have wronged others are called their Debtors A. That they who in any kind wrong others are obliged to make them satisfaction If in their good Names by acknowledging the Offence and stopping slanderous Reports If in their Goods and Estates by a full Restitution Q. Is Restitution necessary to the obtaining of Pardon A. It is For unjust Detainure is as Evil as unjust Seisure and it is a continued Theft And our Repentance can never be true while we continue in the Sin we seem to repent of and without true Repentance there can be no Pardon or Salvation Q. But what if those we have wronged be since dead A. We ought to make Restitution to those to whom it 's to be supposed what we have detained would have descended Q. If none such can be found what must we then do A. Then God's Right takes place as the Universal Lord of all and we are obliged to restore it to him that is to his Servants and to his Family and in the Works of Piety and Charity Q. We have already considered the Debtor's Duty which is to make Satisfaction and Restitution what is the Duty of the Creditor or Person wronged A. To forgive his Debtors For we pray that God would forgive us as we forgive them Q. Wherein doth this Forgiveness consist A. In two Things 1. First In abstaining from the outward Acts of Revenge upon them 2. Secondly In the inward Frame and Temper of our Hearts towards them bearing them no Grudge nor Ill-will but being as much in Charity with them as though they had never offended us Q. Must we then sit quiet under every petulant Wrong that is done us and so tempt others to the Sport of abusing us A. Private Revenge is in no Case whatsoever to be allowed Rom. 12.19 Dearly beloved avenge not your selves but rather give place unto Wrath for it is written Vengeance is mine and I will repay saith the Lord. Revenge
Heart Q. What therefore do we pray for when we pray Lead us not into Temptation A. We pray for three Things 1. First That God by his Providence would so order and dispose all the Occurrences of our Lives as not to lay before us those Objects nor offer us those Occasions which might excite or call forth our inbred Corruptions 2. Secondly That he would not permit the Devil to assault us nor any of his Instruments 3. Thirdly That he would continue the Influences of his Grace unto us to enable us to stand when we are tempted Q. For what ends doth God thus lead Men into Temptation A. For many wise and holy Ends especially Four 1. First To exercise and breath forth our Graces to teach us the Wars of the Lord to administer Matter for our Victory and Occasion for our Crown and Triumph 2. Secondly To engage us to depend upon his Help and Assistance and earnestly to implore Divine Succours and Supplies 3. Thirdly To glorifie his Justice and his Mercy his Justice in giving up wicked Men to the Rages of Temptations to be hurried by them from Sin to Sin punishing one Iniquity with another till at last he punisheth all in Hell And his Mercy in supporting his Children under them and delivering them out of all their Temptations making his Strength perfect in their Weakness 2 Cor. 12.9 And he said unto me my Grace is sufficient for thee for my Strength is made perfect in Weakness 4. Fourthly That by our Victory over Temptations he may confound the Malice of the Devil and commend the Excellency of his own Ways and Service Job 2.3 And the Lord said unto Satan hast thou considered my Servant Job that there is none like him in the Earth a perfect and an upright Man one that feareth God and escheweth Evil Q. Which is the positive part of this Petition A. But deliver us from Evil. Q. What observe you from the Order and Connexion of this Branch of the Petition with the former A. I observe that the best Security against Sin is to be secured against Temptations to Sin Q. Are not strong Temptations to Sin an Excuse for sinning A. No for the Devil can onely persuade he cannot constrain for if be could compell he would likewise Justifie since there is no Sin where there is no Liberty All our Sins are of our own free Choice and so by Consequence is the Eternal Misery thy expose unto Hos 13.9 O Israel thou hast destroyed thy self but in me is thine help John 5.40 And ye will not come to me that ye might have Life Matt. 23.37 O Jerusalem Jerusalem thou that killest the Prophets and stonest them which are sent unto thee how often would I have gathered thy Children together even as the Hen gathereth her Chickens under her Wings and ye would not Q. Wherein consists the great Danger of being tempted A. In the Sympathy and Suitableness that is between Temptations and our corrupt Natures whereby they are apt to excite our Affections and our Affections will sway our Actions Q. What mean you by the word Evil when you pray Deliver us from Evil A. First Satan whose Stile it is to be the Evil or the Wicked One Matt. 13.19 When any one heareth the word of the Kingdom and understandeth it not then cometh the wicked one and catcheth away that which was sown in his Heart John 2.13 14. I write unto you Fathers because ye have known him that is from the Beginning I writ unto you young Men because you have overcome the wicked one Vers 14. I have written unto you Fathers because you have known him that is from the beginning I have written unto you young Men because ye are strong and the Word of God abideth in you and ye have overcome the wicked one Secondly All other Evils whether they be of Sin or for Sin whether Transgressions or Punishments But especially Sin which is the greatest of all Evils Q. Why call you Sin the greatest of all Evils A. Because it is so both in its Nature and Consequents 1. First In its Nature it is wholly defect and irregularity and that onely thing which he always hates and never made 2. Secondly Because all other Evils are but the Effects and Consequents of Sin since the Devil could not hurt us but by Sin and no other Evils befal us but for Sin Q. What collect you hence A. That in praying to be delivered from Sin we pray to be delivered from all Evils whatsoever Q. What observe you from our Saviours teaching us to direct our Prayers to our Father in Heaven that he would Deliver us from Evil A. I learn hence that it is onely the Almighty Power of God that can keep us from Sin Q. Whence doth that appear A. First From the Consideration of the Almighty Advantages that our great Enemy the Devil hath against us Secondly From the Consideration of the Disadvantages we lie under to oppose his Temptations Q. What are his Advantages and our Disadvantages A. He is a Spirit we are but Flesh he is wise and subtile we foolish and ignorant he long experienced we raw and unpractised he is diligent and watchfull we careless and negligent He lays a close Siege to us without and we betray our selves within Q. What ways doth God take to keep Men from Sin A. In the General three 1. First He doth it by restraining Providence 2. Secondly By common and restraining Grace 3. Thirdly By renewing and sanctifying Grace Q. What are the Methods of God's Providence whereby he delivers Men from the Evil of Sin A. They are manifold and various but Five are most especially remarkable 1. First Sometimes Providence cuts short their Power whereby they should be inabled to Sin Thus God withered Jereboam's hand which he stretch'd forth against the Prophet 2. Secondly Sometimes God cuts off their wicked Instruments either for Counsel as he did Achitophel from Absolom or else for Execution as he did the Host of Sennacherib 3. Thirdly Sometimes by raising up another opposite Power to withstand the Sinner Thus the Rulers would have put Christ to Death but durst not for fear of the People 4. Fourthly By casting in seasonable Diversions Thus the passing by of Merchants altered the Patriarchs Resolution from killing Joseph to sell him 5. Fifthly Sometimes God removes the Object against which they intended to sin Thus he delivered David from Saul and Peter from Herod Q. We have seen how God preserves Men from Sin by his restraining Providence shew now how he doth it by his restraining Grace A. By restraining Grace God deals with the very Heart of a Sinner and although he doth not change the habitual yet he changeth the actual Inclination of it and takes away the Desire of committing those Sins which are unmortified and reigning Q. To whom doth God vouchsafe this Grace A. To many unregenerate Persons As he did to Esau and Abimelech Q. To what End doth he vouchsafe it A.
to our Father in Heaven God indeed hears us upon Earth for there is not a Word in our Tongue but behold O Lord thou knowest it altogether but this will not avail us unless God hears our Prayers a second time as repeated over in the Intercession of Jesus Christ and perfumed with the much Incense which he offers up with the Prayers of all the Saints Since then we are directed to pray to our Father which is in Heaven This First May inform us that there is no circumstance of time or place that can hinder us from praying for Heaven is over thee and open to thee wheresoever thou art there is no Clime so remote which is not over-spread with that Pavillion and thou art in all places equally near to Heaven and God is in it sitting upon his Throne of Grace to receive and answer thy Requests wheresoever thou offerest them up unto him And therefore we find in the Scripture some praying in God's House of Prayer some making their Houses Houses of Prayer St. Peter pray'd on the House-top when he fell into his Trance Isaac in the open Fields our Saviour on a Mountain Jonas in a Whale's Belly Abraham's Servant in his Journey and Asa in the midst of a tumultuous and bloody Battel yea whatsoever thou art doing thou mayest pray so long as Heaven is over thee and God in it Whatsoever Company thou art in whatsoever Employment thou art about thou mayest still pray for thy Father that is in Heaven still hears thee He hears thy Thoughts and thy Desires when either they are too big or when it is not expedient to articulate them into Words Indeed the Voice in Prayer is not always necessary nay sometimes it is not convenient yea it is never necessary but only upon three Accounts First As that which God requires should be employed in his Service for this was a great end why it was given us that therewith we might Bless and Praise God With the Tongue saith the Apostle we bless God even the Father Jam. 3.9 Or Secondly When in Secret it may be a means to help to raise up our Affections keeping it still within the bounds of Decency and Privacy Or Thirdly In our joyning with others it helps likewise to raise and quicken their Affections otherwise were it not for these three Reasons the Voice is no more necessary to make our Wants and Desires known unto God than it is to make them known to our own Hearts For thy Father which is in Heaven is not certainly excluded from any part of the Earth he is with thee and lays his Ear to thy very Heart and hears the Voice of thy Thoughts when thy Tongue is silent And thou mayest whatsoever work or business thou art doing dart up a Prayer and a winged Desire unto him which shall be as acceptable and effectual as the more solemn performance of this Duty at stated times Secondly Is thy Father in Heaven thy Prayers then should be made so as to pierce the Heavens where God is But how can this be done since the distance between Heaven and us is so infinite This is not to be done by the intension of raising thy Voice but by the intension of raising thy Zeal and Spirit for Zeal and Affection is a strong Bow that will shoot a Petition through Heaven it self Let all thy Petitions therefore be ardent and carry Fire in them and this will cause them to ascend to the Element of pure Celestial Fire from whence thy Breast was at first inflamed It is a most remarkable place Exod. 14.15 when the Red Sea was before the Israelites and the Aegyptians pursuing them behind and unpassable Mountains on each side the People murmuring and Moses their Captain and Guide in an unextricable Streight we read not of any Vocal Prayer that Moses then put up and yet God calls to him Why cryest thou unto me a Prayer it was not so much as accented not so much as whispered and yet so strong and powerful that it pierced Heaven and was louder in the Ears of God than the Voice of Thunder And thus much shall suffice to be spoken concerning the Preface of this Prayer Our Father which art in Heaven Let us now proceed unto the Petitions themselves the first three of which relate unto God's Glory the other to our Temporal and Spiritual Good Of those which relate to God's Glory the First desireth the advancement of this Glory it self Hallowed be thy Name The Second The means of effecting it Thy Kingdom come The Third The manifestation of it Thy Will be done in Earth as it is in Heaven I begin with the First of these Hallowed be thy Name In the Explication of which we shall enquire First What is to be understood by the Name of God Secondly What it is to Hallow this Name of God Thirdly What is contained in this Petition and what we pray for when we say Hallowed be thy Name First What is meant by the Name of God To this I Answer That the Name of God is any perfection ascribed to him whereby he hath been pleased to make himself known to the Sons of Men For Names are given to this very intent that they might declare what the thing is to which that Name doth belong Thus when God had created Adam and made him Lord of this visible World he caused the Beasts of the Field and the Fowls of the Air to pass before him as it were to do Homage to their new Sovereign and to receive Names from him which according to the plenitude and perfection of his knowledge did then aptly serve to express their several Natures and were not only Names but Definitions too So when mention is made in Scripture of the Name of God it signifies some expression of his infinite Essence in which he is pleased graciously to condescend to the weakness of our capacity and to spell out himself to us sometimes by one perfection and sometimes by another since it is utterly impossible for us finite Creatures to have a full and comprehensive knowledge of that Being which is infinite for so God is only known to himself being as infinite to all others so finite to his own Knowledge and Understanding And therefore he hath displayed before us his Name to give us some help and advantage to conceive somewhat of him though his Nature and Essence are in themselves incomprehensible to us and shall be so for ever even in Heaven it self Now this Name of God may well be distinguished into two sorts his Titles and his Attributes First His Titles are his Name and so he is in Scripture frequently called Jehovah God Lord Creator and the like and most of these his Titles are relative respecting us so his Name of Creator denotes his infinite Power giving Being to all things Lord and King signifie his Dominion and Authority in disposing and governing all that he hath made Father signifies his Care and Goodness in providing for his
Creatures Redeemer his Mercy and Grace in delivering them from Temporal Evils and Calamities or especially from Eternal Death and Destruction Now these relative Titles though they properly belong unto God yet are they not absolutely essential to him but connote a respect unto the Creatures And therefore though before the Creation of the World God was for ever the same infinitely Blessed Being that he now is and by the Creation of it no accession was made to his infinitely perfect Nature for in him there is no variableness nor shadow of turning but he is yesterday and to day and the same for ever yet could he not be called by the Name of Creator or Lord or Redeemer or Father unless in respect of his Eternal Son But all these Titles result from the Relations wherein we stand unto God of Creatures Subjects and Children These Names therefore had their beginning some in the beginning of time and some since and yet they do very properly signifie unto us that God who is without beginning or end Secondly As his Titles so his Attributes are his Name and these are of two sorts either incommunicable or communicable First The incommunicable Attributes of God and these are those which are so proper to the Divine Essence that there is scarce the least foot-steps or resemblance of them to be found in any of the Creatures and such are his Eternity which denotes a duration as well without beginning as without end For though there are some Creatures whose Beings shall never have a period set to them as Angels and Men yet there is no Creature that never had no beginning of its existence And so God's Infiniteness and Immensity filling all places and exceeding all which was most excellently set forth in that most significant yet unintelligible Paradox of the Heathen Philosopher That God was a Circle whose Centre was every where but its Circumference no where His simplicity also excluding all Composition and Mixture which no Creature doth for take the most simple of them as Angels and the separate Souls of Men yet they are at least compounded in their Essences and Powers and Acts for the Power of Understanding is not the Soul nor the Act of Understanding the Power therefore in these there is one thing and another But it is not so in God but whatsoever is in God is God himself being one most pure and simple Act. Hence follows his immutability and unchangeableness there being nothing in God which was not from all Eternity And in the same rank are his Omnipotency and All-sufficiency his Omniscience and Independency and the like which are incommunicable Attributes and cannot without Blasphemy be ascribed unto any of the Creatures Secondly There are other Attributes of God that are communicable and are so called because they may in some Analogy and Resemblance be found in the Creatures also so to be Holy Just Merciful True Powerful and the like are the Names of God and yet may be ascribed to the Creatures So in that most Triumphant Declaration of his Name to Moses Exod. 34.5 6 7. we find that the most of the Letters that compose it may be found in some degrees even among Men the Lord proclaimed his Name the Lord God Merciful and Gracious Long-suffering and Abundant in Goodness and Truth forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin Now this Name of God Merciful and Gracious Long-suffering and Abundant in Goodness which he seems so much to delight and glory in and which he adorns with such fair flourishes he himself would have us to own and intimate Luk. 6.36 Be ye merciful as your Father is merciful To aspire to a resemblance with God in his incommunicable Attributes and Name is a most horrid and blasphemous Presumption a Pride that cast the Devils from Heaven to Hell But to aspire to a resemblance unto God in his communicable Name is the tendency of Grace and the effect of the Spirit of God conforming us in some measure to his Purity and making us partakers in this sence of the Divine Nature And therefore it is press'd upon us Levit. 29.2 You shall be Holy for I the Lord your God am Holy And Mat. 5.48 Be ye therefore perfect as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect Now these communicable Attributes of God though they may in some respects be found in the Creatures yet then are they properly the Names of God when they are applyed to him free from all those Imperfections with which they are necessarily attended in the Creatures Abstract them from all Imperfections and we may apply them to God as his Name Now these Imperfections are of two sorts either Privative or Negative A Creature is then said to be Privatively imperfect when he falls short of what he ought to be And so are the best of Men imperfect in this Life Merciful they are but still retain a mixture of Cruelty Patient they are but still they have Impatience mix'd with it Holy they are but yet not Spotless as the Law requires them to be And therefore in ascribing Holiness Mercy and Patience unto God we must be sure to separate from them all such Imperfections as are found in us through the mixture of the contrary Corruptions with those Graces otherwise they will be so far from being the Name of God that they will prove Blasphemous Derogatives from him neither is this enough but we must remove all Negative imperfections also Now a Creature is said to be Negatively imperfect when though it hath all the perfections that is due unto it or required from it yet it hath not all perfection that is possible or imaginable Thus the Holy Angels and the Spirits of just Men in Heaven although they are made perfect so as to exclude all Privative imperfection their Holiness and their Graces there being as perfect as they should be and as God requires from them yet have they a Negative imperfection that is there is some perfection of those Graces and of that Holiness further possible which they have not nor is it within the Sphere of their Natures to attain unto in which sence it is said Job 4.8 He chargeth his Angels with Folly that is not as if they wanted any Wisdom or Righteousness that was due unto their Natures but they had not all that Wisdom that was possible and so were at least Negatively imperfect In all perfections of the Creatures whether Angels or Men be they never so great or excellent there are Three imperfections that will necessarily attend them First That they have them not originally from themselves but derivatively from another who is the Author and Embellisher of their Natures Secondly That they have them not unchangeably but may not only increase but decrease yea or utterly lose them Thirdly That they have them not infinitely but in a stinted and limited measure Now in all the communicable Attributes of the Divine Nature remove from them these Three Negative Imperfections and then apply them