is of Consolation I would from this have Believers encouraged there are three great encouragements ye have from it 1. If ye be in Christ his Grace is infinit all your provocations cannot exhaust it if ye be in Christ it 's like a man would take a Miln-stone and cast in the Sea the Sea will cover the Miln-stone as well as it will do a little peeble stone the greatest provocations will sink in this Grace as well as the small ones it 's true if thou take occasion and sleep secure on this cod of Grace it shall be an aggravation of thy former guilt but if thou be a penitent this Grace will cover it though it were great as if it were small therefore be encouraged all that take them to this Grace in its due Order the Grace of it is infinit 2ly Ordinarly it 's the nature of Grace the more miserable the Object be the more Grace is manifested and appears in that it did Terminat on that Object the more wretched the more Grace hath appeared in curing that wretchedness so that God designs to exalt his Grace in this Covenant and the more wretched and miserable the more will Grace appear Grace hath shined brighter and hath the more of Grace into it that it did Terminat on the like of Paul Mary Magdalen and a Manasseh 3ly Consider that one Act of his Grace is a pledge of another if the Lord hath begun to give thee preventing Grace in thy effectual calling know the nature of this Covenant and the Grace of it it will not stop there until this Crown glorifie thee if the Lord hath brought thee under this Covenant of Grace and if he hath begun to prevent thee and carry on a work of Grace in thee it will never stop until it close in perfecting Grace and have the Crown set upon thy head Let us bless the Lord that hath changed one Covenant and hath given us another wherein the greatest Testimonies of Grace that could be given are manifested take your selves to it and labour to improve it and get an interest in it secured and ye shall find the comfort of it through all Eternity SERMON XXXIX 2 Samuel 23. Verse 5. Although my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my salvation and all my desire although he make it not to grow I Have dwelt the most part of this Summer on this Verse and purposes to close it this day there are two Objections one taken from David's guilt My house is not so with God another taken from God's Providence Although he make it not to grow The first of these I have handled in several Sermons and told you what was meaned by David's House it was not right with God There are two Observations remains and both of them Native and very Important First There is this Doct. 1. That Challenges for guilt of our house are excellently answered in the Covenant the Application of the Covenant is the proper Salve for such Sores I intended to have handled this Truth at some length but when I consider that famous Mr. Dickson in his Therapeutica a Book he hath written for securing all Cases by Application of this Covenant hath handled this so fully that I resolve to forbear I recommend only that Book to you where ye will find many diseases the Soul is lyable to and they are all cured by Application of the Covenant it 's not this Truth then that I will insist on Doct. 2. There is another Observation lies in this Although my house be not so with God That though a Believer be challenged for guilt and the sins of his house yet he is not to cast at the Covenant The sense of guilt ought not to put a Christian to cast at the Covenant Though my house be not so with God yet David can assert his interest in the Covenant notwithstanding of all his guilt personal or publick or in his Family This is a native Truth and massie ye have a remarkable confirmation of it Nehemiah 9.32 throughout the Chapter he is confessing the sins of the Kings of the Princes of the Priests of the Prophets of his Fathers and of the People and yet in this verse he appeals to God as their God Now therefore O our God the great the mighty and the terrible God who keepeth Covenant and mercy let not all the trouble seem little before thee that hath come upon us on our Kings on our Princes on our Priests and on our Prophets and on our Fathers and on all thy People since the time of the Kings of Assyria unto this day c. There a multitude of sins that are confessed by him throughout the Chapter and he looks on God as Mighty and Terrible and yet none of them dings him from the Covenant whatever be the smell of our guilt or of our Family yet we are not to cast at the Covenant I will in following this truth speak a little to these three things First I shall give you some grounds to prove that whatever be a persons guilt yet they are not to cast at the Covenant Secondly I shall clear some practical Cases about it and Thirdly shall apply it First I shall give you some grounds to prove that whatever be a sinners guilt he is not to cast at the Covenant though my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me a Covenant I will offer you these five remarkable grounds to prove it The first I take from God and there are three things in God relating to the Covenant that will prove the truth of this 1. For all our guilt God holds the Covenant firm guilt casts us not out of the Covenant it may cast us out of fellowship that will not cast us out of the Covenant Jer. 3.1 Thou hast played the harlot with many lovers yet return again to me saith the Lord. And vers 14. Return backsliding children saith the Lord for I am married to you there the Covenant holds firm and since God holds the Covenant firm under guilt we may warrantably plead the Covenant even though we be guilty of many sins 2ly When people are guilty God makes them offer of the Covenant Isa 1.18 Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be made white as snow though they be red like crimson they shall be as wool Psal 68. Though ye have layen among the pots ye shall appear as doves c. And since God offers the Covenant when we are most guilty may not we warrantably rely on it 3ly God hath given experience in Scripture of his accomplishing his Covenant to them whose house were not so with God the great Instances we have in David in Solomon in Manasseh in Paul and Peter who are now walking in long white Robes in Glory they all prove that he holds fast and accomplishes his Covenant though their house be not so with
God All these laid together evidence and are the first ground of the point that when we come to be challenged for guilt yet we may warrantably rely on and plead the Covenant 2ly The second ground is this though it be true the Covenant be a created thing it 's finit yet the rise and Seals of it are infinit there is nothing properly infinit but allanerly God and consequently the Covenant is finit mercy is the rise of it and truth is the seal of it and they are essential Attributes of God so though the Covenant and Promises be created things though though they be finit yet the fountain of the Promises and the Seals of them are infinit now what ever guilt thy soul can be challenged for thou has something that 's infinit in the Covenant the rise and seal of it cannot but be for finit guilt a sufficient ground of relying on infinit mercy and truth if Peter should stand and say Christs righteousness I have denyed him if Paul should say Christs righteousness I have blasphemed his righteousness will not cover my sin that which is sufficient to cover the sins of all the elect is sufficient to cover the sins of any particular elect there is ground under challenges to rely on the Covenant the mercy of it is infinit and the truth whereby it 's sealed is infinit 3ly The great end for which God challenges for guilt is to drive sinners to the Covenant it 's the great end for which he challenges and tells the person my house is not so with God it 's not to drive them from the Covenant but to it the Law in this case becomes a School-master to lead to Christ of all the Logick that ever I read it was the worst in Peter to say to Christ Depart from me for I am a sinful man he had rather ground to say come to me for he was the Saviour of sinners and he had his Name Jesus on that score because he saves his people from their sins Now to say Depart from me to him the case is so as when we say our house is not so with God and I cannot take the Covenant the mo challenges the greater need of the Covenant and here remember that when challenges and terrours are impediments to faith they are like Jordan flowing over all its Banks they are never kept in their proper limits but when they rely on the Covenant and the mercy and truth that are the springs and seals of the Covenant 4ly Take notice of this as one ground of the truth of this that challenges and guilt should not drive us from the Covenant but to the Covenant ordinarily a rejecting of mercy is a dismal sin hardly is there a greater injury done to Christ than when challenges or sense of guilt puts us to cast at his mercy and his Covenant I like the Divinity of one that tells Judas did Christ a great wrong in betraying him but a far greater in despairing of his mercy in betraying him he laboured to take away Christs life as man but in despairing of his mercy he laboured to take away the life of God there is no greater sin than when we cast at his mercy it is despair to entertain challenges and dwell on them and not rely on the Covenant now despair of all sins against God it 's one of the most hellish like and one of the greatest sins I will let you see four evils that ly in this sin of despair and are peculiar to it 1. Despair opposes God in his greatest Commands the greatest Command that ever he gave was to believe in his Son 1 Joh. 3.23 This is his Commandment that we should believe on the Name of his Son Jesus Christ now despair is unbelief in the highest degree therefore it opposes God in his greatest Commands 2ly It opposes God in one oâ— his chiefest Attributes the great end why he made the world was not to be glorified in his Power in his Wisdom in his Justice but in his Mercy and his Grace there is the great end of Creation and Providence that he may be exalted iâ— his Mercy and his Grace and despair opposes him in this 3ly Despair it enrages the soul against God the damned in Hell that are despairing of Christs mercy are weeping and howling and gnashing their teeth they would even bite God if they could reach him they are compared to a Dog gnashing his teeth in the place of the damned there is nothing to be heard there but howling and cursing and gnashing of teeth and that for ever and ever the reason is they despair of Christs mercy had they hope after a million of years to come to glory they would lay by their howling and cursing but that hope is past them the door is closed and they are enraged and fighting desperatly and none fights so desperatly as Souldiers that expects no Quarters 4ly Despair makes every sin unpardonable the smallest sin committed in the course of our life becomes an unpardonable sin if it be venomed with the venome of despair so ye see despair of all sins is most dreadful and most dismal to God and he that casts at the Covenant when he is challenged for guilt must despair and so eminently dishonour God Lastly We are not to cast at the Covenant in regard there is no way of an outgate from challenges but from the Covenant let folk turn themselves where they will under terrours there is no way of an outgate but from the Covenant and readily they that seek their contentment in other things and cast at the comforts of God under their terrours they are driven to seek an outgate in their lusts I remember a Passage of famous Mr. Hutcheson having one day to deal with a person under the terrours of God with whom he had been several times he made offer of the Covenant to him but the man did cast at all the offers of the Covenant and was overwhelmed with terrours and after several Arguments he pleaded with him thus says he if ye stubbornly refuse the comforts of God ye shall at length seek your comfort in your lusts and a little after the man turned profligat and continued profligat and prophane Now lay all these together and ye will see the truth of the point that when God challenges for guilt it 's not our part to cast at the Covenant but the more firmly to adhere and cleave to it and assert an interest in it Before I apply it there are two cases I will clear First one may ask Shall every one under challenges lay claim to the Covenant There may be a twofold difficulty here First I am not sufficiently humbled to lay claim to the Covenant great sins should have great repentance Manasseh was a great sinner and the Scripture says he humbled himself greatly before God Or Secondly readily one may say I come short of grief for sin and of the tears that an hypocrite will have and shall I
what hath he under taken for us I will have occasion to speak of this afterward but I will tell you two things he hath undertaken Answ 1 To get our consent to the Covenant all that the Father hath given me shall come unto me that is to say they shall imbrace the Covenant indeed this was a great undertaking and that he may be true to that trust he sends his Word to reveal the Covenant his Rod to presse it his Spirit to perswade to imbrace it 2. He has undertaken to pay all our faillings otherwayes the Father could not deal with us for we are Dyvors and Adam when he was perfect the Father knew in the state of innocency what it was to trust man without a Cautioner so he undertakes to the Father that we shall give our consent and for any failling or transgression he shall be comptable for it and it shall be on his score And lastly he is the Substance of the Covenant he is the marrow the very marh of the Covenant therefore all the promises of the Covenant are nothing else but the execution of his three Offices all the promises of pardon and of peace are the execution of his Priestly Office all the promises of teaching and guiding are the execution of the promises of his Prophetical Office all the promises of ruling defending and subduing our enemies are the execution of his Kingly Office So all the promises of the Covenant are but Christ representing himself as King Priest and Prophet of his Church So to take from Christ and ascribe to the Covenant would be very injurious to God for he is the Purchaser the Mediator the Surety and Substance of it Secondly to Answer the Question the doing of this is no injury to Christ to say that when we are at our last words the great encouragement is the Covenant no more than to abscribe to the Rayes of Sun or the pype or conduit that convoyes the water from the fountains that we are warmed with the Rayes of the Sun or that we are Quenched by the Water that comes from the pype for this derogats nothing either from the Sun nor from the Spring so this derogats nothing from Christ to say that our great encouragement at death comes from the Covenant for Christ is the Spring and the Covenant is the Conduit that convoyes the water from the spring and Christ is the Sun and the Covenant is but the Rayes that comes from the Sun both its heat and its Rayes comes from this Sun and this is necessary in two cases 1. To shew that sometimes in desertion when he hides or withdraws or frowns all the Promises and all the Ministers nay if Angels should Preach they will not prove conducible for an outgate or for scattering terrors the reason is the pype cannot communicat water without the Spring and the Rayes cannot communicat heat without the Sun it 's remarkable 2 Kings 4. when the Shunamites child died the Prophet Elisha sent his servant and his staff but the child remained dead untill the Prophet came himself so the Covenant and all the Promises abstracting from Christ if they were in the mouth of Angels cannot be an encouragement untill he come himself conferences and discourses bringing reasons convincing reasons from the Covenant from the freedom from the fullness of it will not bring one from desertion untill he come himself On the other hand It 's necessary to rebuke them that catch a Promise of the Covenant and will feed upon it and say they will come to Glory and God his made a Covenant with them and God has made Promise to them and yet has no interest in Christ it 's even as ye saw a man coming through a Garden and he claughts a Branch of an Apple-tree and he goes and layes it in his Chest and expects he will have Fruit of it in the Spring But the Branch cannot bring forth Fruit except it abide in the Root so what we say of encouragement among our last Words from the Covenant it derogats notthing from Christ more than a man should glory of such an Apple-tree I plucked Apples it derogats nothing from the Tree for abstract the Branch from the Root it will bear neither leaves nor Apple so the poynt holds true that the only encouragement when we are going to die is from the everlasting Covenant Vse 1. For Application First Is this the great encouragement when will be at our last words and we will be there ere it be long an interest in the Covenant it serves to reprove those who are seeking their encouragament else-where some take their encouragement in Life and Death from the World Soul take thee rest thou has enough laid up for many years as one observes well he might al 's well laid down a Promise for his body to feed on as to lay down enough for his Soul to feed on some has common convictions some has moraâ— qualifications and possibly some go a little higher but alâ— these seek their water our of gutters and come not to thâ— right Barrel for the wine the great encouragement is thâ— Covenant and an interest in it Question Before I go any further in this Vse I will clear thâ— practical Question how shall a Person know and by what Ruleâ— shall they try if they make their great encouragement to be the Covenant of God Answer For opening this a little I desire you may take notice that the Covenant takes in two things Promises and Duties now if we would try if the Covenant will be our great encouragement or if we make it our great encouragement we must first cast an eye to the Promise and â—â—en to the Dutie 1. Then for the Promises the design of â—â—em being to exalt Grace and Christ a Person may examine â—â—d find if they bring in their greatest Consolation from the â—ovenant in these Three or Four Cases First When they are cheerful not so much on the account â—f the possession of promised Mercies as on the right to the Mercie there are many indeed if they get sense and if they â—et the accomplishment of any Promise they presently are â—eady to be much cheered against Death and Terrors ay but â—emove that they can lay no weight on the Covenant it self â—t's indeed a desireable thing to have our hand full and the â—ensible accomplishment of promised Mercies but when Persons â—ant that Possession and they lay no weight on the Covenant â—t self and on a right to it that is to bring in your consolation from your Enjoyment rather than from the Covenant â—t's remarkable Song 2. The Bride is in a deserted case and what hath she to keep up her heart under all desertions in that Chapter My Beloved is mine and I am his Her right to the Covenant and Interest in it even when there is a cloud betwixt him and her makes her sing and in that she is encouraged So that when we have no enjoyment to crack of
City that hath the twelve Gates is allanerly Promise If Satan and our deceitful heart question thy right and say thou deserves Hell and thou hast many marks of going to it yet if thou have a Promise and a Title to the man that gives the Contract and draws the Articles of it thou may be very sure thy Covenant is a Covenant of Promise that is the second Name The third Name that is given the Covenant it 's called a Command ye have it getting this Name Gen. 17. Abraham is commanded to circumcise in the tenth verse every male child among them this is my Covenant which shal be betwixt me and you and thy seed after thee every male among you shall be circumcised and ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskine If ye compare this with the 13 and 14 verses He that is born in thy house and bought with thy money shall be circumcised and my Covenant shall be an everlasting Covenant and the uncircumcised man-child whose flesh is not circumcised that soul shall be cut off he has broken my Covenant that is my Command Here ye have the Covenant called under the Name of a Command And here I would enquire a little into two things 1st Why the Covenant goes under the name of a Command 2ly How we should improve this Name of the Covenant as a Command As to the First It goes under the name of a Command He has broken my Covenant that is my Command on these two grounds 1. The Covenant of Grace it does not only oblige to all the Commands of the Covenant of Works but to some moe this may seem a strange assertion there is no Command in all the Law but the Covenant of Grace binds to it I came not says Christ to destroy the Law but to fulfil the Law Thou shalt not commit adultery thou shalt not steal thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain thou shalt not covet thy Neighbours goods c. The Covenant binds to all these and to many moe it binds to Faith in Christ to Repentance which the Covenant of Works did not so no wonder it be called a Command for this Covenant binds to all the Duties commanded in the Covenant of Works and to many moe 2ly It comes to go under the name of a Command it was the same Covenant of Grace that Abraham had a seal of in Circumcision it 's called a command in regard never were persons so obliged to obey the command as these that are taken within the Covenant of Grace The taking of us within the Covenant of Grace is like a Woman Married that is more obliged against Uncleanness than she was before her Marriage the relation is in Christ the influences are from Christ The persons under the Covenant of Grace Antinomians say they are not so bound to the command as others but they mistake it quite if any person be bound in the world to the command it 's they that are not bound by the Law only but by Love the case is as it was with Moses Mother Pharaoh's Daughter calls her when she found Moses among the Flags and commanded her to Nurse the Child the best Motive that moved her to nurse the Child was Love she stood by to see the Child among the Flags and when she took up the Child Love influenced her as much as the Law So when there is a Covenant relation to Christ the person in Covenant has an eye to him not only from the command but from Love So that no wonder it be called a command for it has all the commands of the Law and some moe and the obligations to obey are stricter than under the Covenant of Works Quest 2. But here is a great Question ye say the Covenant of Grace is a Covenant of Works we love to hear Grace exalted and called a Testament and a Promise but that it should be called a command looks this like a Covenant of Grace Answ It 's true it 's called a command and it binds to all the Duties that the Covenant of Works binds to and a great many moe it binds to Believing in Christ to Repentance which the Covenant of Works had no dream of but this takes nothing away from the freedom of it therefore hearken to two or three remarkable things about the command and it will shew you that though it be a command the command takes nothing away of the freedom of it 1. Take notice that though it have so many commands as many as in the Covenant of Works and moe yet it will not stand on perfect obedience to them sincere obedience it 's one of the clauses of it and O! but it 's a sweet word He will accept of the Will in stead of the Deed Never one Treated with a Servant to give him a Fee if hâ— were willing to go to his Pleugh and go his Errands and if he did not go he indentured not to accept of the wilâ— for the deed but as a Father with a Child so he pitiâ—â— them that fear him it s a command indeed but he accept of the sincerity of the will it 's a remarkable way of dealing in this Covenant that he had with David he was siâ—â—ing in his house and grieved to see the Ark of God in the fields What am I says he that I should dwell in a house 〈◊〉 cedar and the Ark of God in curtains Nathan was sent tâ— him and told him because it was in thy heart to build me 〈◊〉 house I will build thee a sure house So there are Commandâ— in this Covenant that go under the name of a Commandâ— but the commands will be accepted in the point of obedience the Will will be accepted for the Deed. 2ly It contributes to evidence the freedom of it in the point of 〈◊〉 command in that there is nothing commanded but it 's promised it was not so in the Covenant of Works they haâ— habitual Grace the Grace that Adam was created with he was to have no other stock but that Make to your selves 〈◊〉 new heart and renew a right spirit within you If any will take that command and not look to the Promise they might say I may ly down and die there is no hope of Heaven for me I can no more make a new heart than I can make a new Heaven or a new Earth but a new eeart will 〈◊〉 also give thee and I will renew a right spirit within theeâ— There is no command but there is a Promise suâ—table to it that was not according to the Covenant of Worksâ— there was no promise of a new heart or of assisting in Prayer in the Covenant of Works though there be as many commands in the Covenant of Grace as in the Covenant of Works and many moe yet since we bake beside Meaâ— we need not be discouraged 3ly Not only will he give toâ— will and strength to will but which is a great mercy itâ— admits
the day we Covenant with Him we make this an express Article in the Covenant Lord till thou fulfil thy part I can never fulfil my part SERMON VII 2 Samuel 23.5 Although my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my Salvation and all my desire although he make it not to grow I Divided this Verse in five Branches the first Branch was the Nature of the Security that David had from God for his encouragement he calls it a Covenant I have dwelt on this at length though Divines that write of the Covenant insist on several things that I have not mentioned yet I need dwell no longer in opening the nature of the Covenant than I have done there is no man nor society of man can loose the Obligation of a Covenant it always binds either to the Duties or to the Curse and Penalty of the Covenant and if we cast off the Obligation to the Duty wely under the Obligation to the Penalty But before I yet leave this Branch there is one thing I proposed in the Point when I named it that I will dwell on in the Work of this day which is to evidence and prove that this Covenant is a Covenant of Grace for so I told you in the proposing of the Point that the great ground of encouragement at death is the Covenant of Grace I confess I remember not where in all the Scripture it 's expresly called by this Name It 's called a Covenant of Peace and a Covenant of Promifes Ephes 2.12 And it 's called a Covenant consisting of mercies Isa 55. I will make an everlasting covenant with them even the sure mercies of David the root and end of it is said to be Grace to the praise and glory of his grace and to the exalting of his grace There are multitudes of Names given it in the Bible equivalent to this Name a Covenant of Grace Therefore it may very rationally have this Name a Covenant of Grace But the thing I intend to follow in the work of the day is to do these four things and if the Lord be with us and bless us they may be for our edification and advantage 1. I will prove and make appear to you that this everlasting Covenant this ordered and sure Covenant is a Covenant absolutely of Grace 2. I will shew you some reasons why God in Transacting this Covenant would have it to be entirely a Covenant of Grace 3. I shall clear an Objection or two And lastly shall help you to improve it in reference to some particular cases First For proving that it 's a Covenant absolutely of Grace I must first clear what is meaned by the word Grace It 's true sometimes it 's put for inherent Grace which Papists call Gratia gratum faciens 2 Pet. 3.18 But grow in grace and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ most ordinarly it 's put for Gods free favour and good will so we find Rom. 11. If it be of grace then it is no more of works otherwise grace would not he grace And when we call it a Covenant of Grace the meaning is it 's a Covenant consisting of meer Favour and Good-will and this is the thing I am to make out this day that this Covenant is absolutely and entirely a covenant of Grace I confess this is a generally supposed Principle among Christians yet it 's not well understood First That covenant which is founded neither in the merit of the Creature nor in any alluring motive from the Creature must be a covenant of Grace with the Creature there are must be a covenant of Grace with the Creature there are ordinarly two things that influence Transactions and Covenants the merit of the Creature or if there be no merit some alluring motive Abimelech entered in a Covenant with Isaac because he saw God was with him Shechem is content to enter in a Covenant with Jacob's Children for all their cattel saith he will be ours Many will enter in Covenants with others either on the account of merit a Master will covenant with his Servant to pay him his Fee and that because he hath wrought well or if there be no merit they go on some alluring motive a man will enter in a Marriage covenant sometimes on the account of beauty and sometimes on the account of riches but God is entering in a Covenant with us saw neither merit nor any alluring motive as for our beauty Ezekiel 16.6 When I past by thee thou wast cast out in the high-way lying in thy blood to the shame of thy nakedness and no eye pitied thee I passed by thee and cast my skirt over thee and the time was a time of love And for our goodness and riches Psal 50.12 If he were hungry he needed not tell us for the cattel upon a thousand hills belong to him and Psal 16.2 Our goodness extends not the thee He had been no less glorious nor happy if He had never created Man it had diminished nothing from His infinite perfection Now a Covenant founded and transacted betwixt Him and us where there is neither merit nor any alluring motive must absolutely be a Covenant of free will and entire Grace But Secondly the evince this yet further that it is a Covenant absolutely of Grace compare it with the Covenant of Works the Covenant made with Adam for in the Covenant made with Adam there was indeed Grace in it yet not so much Grace as appeared in this Covenant the Covenat made with Adam was made with a person that did not merit a Covenant yet it was made with an innocent man however he had not provoked God yet he did not merit that God should Covenant with him the Covenant made with Adam was made with an undeserving man indeed but He makes the Covenant of Grace with his enemy For when we were yet enemies Christ died for us Rom. 5. And he gave Himself for the ungodly and not for the innocent any of us may know by our own temper if we shall make that the measure whereby to consider Acts of Grace if a man had never wronged us nor injured us in word or in deed how ready are we to make peace with Him but if he had done his outmost out of malice and contempt of heart it 's not easie to fall under a Covenant with him The Covenant made with the first Adam was made with an innocent man that had done nothing to disoblige Him but when He made the Covenant of Grace He made it with fallen man the ungodly man that was his enemy now what a great deal of Grace was there in this if we had bound up Covenants of friendship and fellowship with a man and if he had betrayed and gone contrare to his engagements and turned implacable and vindictive would we bind up a Covenant with that man again And the case was so when He treated a
done without delay To day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts as in the provocation Heb. 3.7 Cited out of Psal 95.7 It 's not said to morrow if ye will hear his voice but to day It 's true there are some times and cases when it 's sweeter going about this work than at other times there are some approaches in Spirit to us which we should exactly observe as Courtiers that have their Nobilissima fandi tempora they get some fit opportunities of putting up their Petitions to Princes 1. It 's an excellent time in going about this work of Indenturing vowing and resolving with Christ when the Spirit is making his approaches yet we are not to delay till these times for the Command of God lies on us at all times It 's a great delusion of Quakers that think they will not pray or hear but when the Splrit comes the Obligation to Duty is the Command and the Command lies on us whether we be in frame or out of frame 2ly It 's true the Lord will sometimes deny his People assisting Grace that he may make way for accepting Grace He will leave them to toyl and wrestle with Duties and then He will take the strained Duty off their hand several times He will do with them as He did with the poor Widow to whom He gave but two Mites to cast in the Treasury and He accepts of them He will leave one to toyl and wrestle with Duty as one under Irons and then kindly accept of the Duty so whether we be in frame or not as we should pray read and meditat so it 's not in these times only that we should make a personal Covenant with God but we are to do it without delay and that upon these Reasons 1. Hardly is there a greater mercy bestowed on a person than when they give their youth to God and begin early to seek Him it 's remarkable Solomon shuts up that Book of the Ecclesiastes with Rmember thy Creator in the days of thy youth the time that others give to vanity the time that is most difficult to be regulat by Reason and Religion we are to give that time to God and to begin to enter in a personal Covenant with Him 2ly It ought to be done without delay in regard of the uncertainty of time and of the Gospel Offers we are all of us Tennents at will we know not what to morrow will bring forth it 's a wonder to see what a number of doors can easily be opened to let us in to the Grace and many have died very speedily that young Divine that died in Holland when he was yet a young man he wrote a Book wherein he says some have died of an hair in Milk some have fallen back from off the Stool that they sat on and died now since both the time and the Offers of the Gospel are so uncertain this accepting of the Offer and Indenturing on the Terms of the Covenant ought to be done with all speed and without delay 3ly It ought to be done timeously and speedily in regard ay the longer one continues in sin and in a natural estate they are constantly the more hardned the Conscience like a foot that it used to go bare it gathers a scurff what a rare thing is Conversion in old age how seldom falls it out So that this Work of personal Covenanting ought to be done without delay for ay the longer it 's delayed the heart grows the more averse and the more hardned and the custom of sinning takes away the conscience of it 4ly It ought to be done speedily in regard many times delays puts the Work wholly by it is never done when it is delayed there are severals as a man reported of himself when he was dying that took this gate of it If I were once come to thirty years I would be holy and when he comes to thirty he puts it off till he came to fourth and when he came to fourty he died Lamenting that he had delayed and put off so long It was so with Felix when he heard Paul preach of Righteousness and Jedgement to come I will bear thee says he at a more convenient time and that convenient time never came yet ordinarily delays evanished in nothing And lastly it ought to be done without delay in regard as we tell Papists in casuistical Disputs that Death-bed Repentauce is very suspicious it 's true we read of one and but one in all the Bible the good Thief on the Cross who got Repentance at Death there is one to shew its possible and but one to shew that it 's not very probable The Scripture calls it an houling on the bed readily the Lord will say to them then Because I called and ye did not hear ye shall call and I will not hear I have stretched out my hand all the day long to a rebellious people it 's remarkable in the Vine-yard some are called at the seventh hour some at the eight some at the ninth some at the eleventh but why are there not some called at the tweltth They say that the twelfth hour is the time of dismissing Servants and not of putting them to their work All these presses that this Act of accepting the Covenant and Indenturing through the Mediator ought to be done early and without delay This is the fourth Property Fifthly As it should be done deliberatly sincerely and timeously so it should be done confidently and boldly Heb. 4 16 Let us come with boldness unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need Let us come bodly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some render the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quesi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let us confidenly speak out all that is in our heart But ye will ask why may we not do it tremblingly fearingly and doubtingly I will tell you some Grounds on which Faith may build confidence in this Act of Indenturing with God 1. We have the Command of God to indenture with Him and accept of this Covenant it 's the great Command He has given if we slight Him in this Command He values not what we do in other things John 3.23 This is his command that ye believe on his Son that is a ground of confidence not only hath He commanded it but He hath threatned if we slight Him in this remember the similitude I illustrat to you the other day suppose ye were coming by a house and the Master of the house should cry down to you come in and eat and drink with me were it presumption for your to come in especially if he should swear if ye come not in I will come out and kill you So the Lord in His Indenturing in the Covenant hath not only commanded but he hath sworn by himself he will cast you in hell if ye do not accept of Him 2ly Desperat necessity is a ground of confidence I confess
falling on the just and the unjust the shining of the Sun and Moon persevere but these natural things how changeable are they We have health to day and may be sick to morrow there are few but in a little ye will scarcely know their faces to be what they were there is a moth in their body and a thief in their strenght many time our humours are like our beauties we lose the things we love we find our Relations dissolve the Friends we hd are dead the Enemies we had and the things of time like a Wheel are constantly reeling and turning about and there is nothing but a few months produces another face than it had but it 's not so with these mercies of David in the Covenant they are everlasting it 's not so with our Election our effectual calling our union with Christ it 's not so with any fundamental priviledge of the Covenant ye that are constantly complaining and finding the reelings of the World learn like a Child that is weaned from the Pape it 's not that the Mother intends to hunger the Child but that she would have it feeding on stronger Meat the reason why so many are complaining of the bitterness of the things of time and the changes of them their health their strength and their friends are not what they were it 's not that ye should want them but we would have you seek them in the Covenant and the sure mercies of David there is a considerable difference betwixt them and the things of Time for who ever builds on the things of Time they are drawing their waters out of the Gutters and not out of the Spring but these are founded on an everlasting Covenant 7ly If the Covenant be everlasting then it informs us of the Wisdom and Skill of the guide of them that make choice of the Covenant there is hardly Wisdom in the choice of other things they will not last variable and changeable Humours and variable and changeable Things that every day fade they are no Fanaricks that take them to the Covenant the mercies of the Covenant are great mercies for though they were small yet they are everlasting and better long little than soon nothing and there is nothing in Time everlasting but like a Waster they soon spend and waste thy heart thy sense thy Flesh will fail thee thy Reason will turn to Melancholly and thy young Ones will look on thee as one that hath scarce the exercise of Reason all these things will reel to and fro in the World and we must expect that it will be so but this everlasting Covenant is as the Sun it will ay rise at its appointed hours and go to at them and there will be no stop of its Course it s not Fanaticism to go on the surest Grounds that ever men followed that take them to this Covenant and resolve to hang both their ill and their good on it that is the first use of the Point Vse 2. The second Use of the Point is this Covenant an everlasting Covenant then Christian labour to improve it as an everlasting Covenant make use of this Property of the Covenant that it is everlasting And there I will offer you five Cases that truly take in the most part of the exercise of Believers all of which come to have some answer in this Property of the Covenant that it 's everlasting 1. It comes to be an ordinar case and the improvement of the everlastingness of the Covenant it is a good answer to it I say it comes to be an ordinar case I am guilty I cannot feed on the Covenant for I know the thing of my self that no other knows this Property of the Covenant takes aways this challenge if God had made this Covenant so as he made the Covenant of Works in the day thou eats thou shalt surely die this Covenant is broken but the Mediator contrived it to be everlasthing which would never have been everlasting if ay when we were guilty the Covenant should be altered no under all the challenges that thou has if ever thou was in Covenant and hath the Marks that were given the last Sabbath Day of God's making the Covenant with thee there thou must continue in the Covenant or thou must scrape out of the Covenant everlasting Covenant no this Property of the Covenant when I come to the last verse and there shew you how you shall answer your Challenges ye will hear that guiltiness does not cast out of the Covenant for if that were it were not everlasting 2ly There is a second case wherein it is to be improven and it is very frequent I am a poor crossed Body and scarce have Bread and either I am not in the Covenant or he hath broken it But I say also that this is answered in this that it 's everlasting I like a word of Master Dicksons he says it 's ordinar for persons that treat with God in the Covenant they conform the Covenant to their case but they will not conform their case to the Covenant suppose there should be never so many crosses in thy case yet thou art to rule thy case by the Covenant and not to bring the Covenant to thy case it 's ordinar for thee to tell thy neighbour either I am not in Covenant with him or else it 's broken betwixt God and me but suppose thou should go to thy bed supperless and the next morrow have a greater cross and knows not what to get to thy Breakfast thou art to bring thy case to the Covenant but bring not the Covenant to thy case Abraham when he is to offer up Isaac on mount Moriah in a burnt sacrifice no body that would have met him but they would have said God hath broken the Covenant with him In thy seed shall all the Nations of the Earther be blessed Abraham knew well that out of the ashes of Isaac God would fullfil his Promise he reduces the ashes of Isaac to the Covenant reduce ay thy case to the Covenant but bring not the Covenant to thy case 3ly There may be another great improvement of it and it 's this I am frequently challenged and deserted it 's not poverty and sickness that I complain of but of challenges and desertions and I am undoubtedly out of Covenant it is not everlasting to me for I am challenged and deserted The Husband may go from home and bide long away and come home angry but that looses not the marriage ty the marriage union remains neither does his absence nor his quarrels prove the marriage to be loosed the Covenant the marriage Oath remains firm it 's a sore matter that when we come under any exercise we can never understand where we are until our exercise comes to fundamental doubtings it 's a sweet complaint my Husband is long away and he is come home but without a challenge to me but it 's a fore matter to come home with he hath declared himself
in one he offends in all as James says no but we may be stronger in one thing and weaker in another but a wilfull passing by any duty in the Covenant and slighting of it is an evidence thou despises it 3. The strictness of the order of the Covenant betwixt the Commands and the Promises will appear in this that there is no obedience to the Command can be given without the Promise and there is no evidence of a right to the Promise without the Command they are so inseparably knit that a man could as soon pluck the Sun out of the Frimamen and stop the course of the Moon as to obey the Commands without the Promise not that I would have you to run away from the duty but go to the promise with it on the other hand they are so knit together that it 's high presumption for a man to lay claim to the Promises except he give obedience to the Command however some may flatter themselves as the distracted man at Athens who would go to the Harbor with Paper and Ink in his hand and call for all the Ships and take a List of all the Goods into them and come away rejoycing that they are all his there are many do so in the Covenant they take the Promises and count them theirs but there can be no comfortable evidence of a Title to the promise if we conscientiously obey not the Command the reason of it is in the order of the Covenant he that treated and drew the Covenant in all the contents of it so as there is no Title to the promising part without the commanding part and no obeying the commanding part without the promising part so ye see the Order of the Covenant in reference to the Promisee of the Covenant and the Commands of it and the connexion betwixt the Promises and the Commands I say no more of the absolute Order of the Covenant Before I compleat this Discourse of the Order of the Covenant I would consider the relative Order of it Order is a right situating of things in order to the end Now both the Commands and the Promises whether ye take them separatly or jointly in the Covenant are excellently ordered in reference to the ends of the Covenant To open this unto you I will shew you three ends for which the Covenant of Grace is made with Believers or with the Mediator in their name and ye will find both the Commands and the Promises excellently ordered in reference to all the three 1. The Covenant of Grace was made to exalt the Father 2. It was made to golrifie the Son 3. It was made to make the Salvation of the Elect sure and easie Now in reference to all these three Ends the Covenant is excellently ordered in all things I will speak a little to this in regard the special order of the Covenant lies in the wise ordering of the End for which it 's made First I will shew you how this Order of the Promises and Commands tends to the honour of the Father 1. This Order in the Covenant contributes to exalt the Father there are some that write on the Covenant they offer some excellent Reasons to prove that the Father hath gotten a great deal more Glory by the Covenant of Geace than he hath gotten by the Covenant of Works even though Adam had stood still in his Integrity I will only let you see this in two or three particulars 1. Consider the Glory of his Justice the Glory of his Justice is exceedingly advanced indeed he had a great deal of Glory of his Justice when he sent the Deludge and destroyed the old World and when he sent fire and brimstone and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah all men might see the Glory of his Justice in this but this was nothing to what Christ met with from the Father Awake O sword and smite the man that is my fellow Any that heard of the Deludge and of destroying Sodom and Gomorrah by fire would say that he is a just God that would not suffer sin to go unpunished but they that hear of this that he took pleasure to bruise his own Son and had a delight in the breaking of Him that when he stood a Sacrifice in the room of Sinners he would not forgive him one Farthing when he cryed upon the Cross with strong cries and tears being in an Agony and commanded the Sword to awake and smite the man that is my fellow he would not stay until his Sword was wet with his hearts Blood is there not great glory in his Justice All the torments of the damned for all eternity declare not his gloy so far as the sufferings of Jesus Christ 2. It exalts the Father not only in his Justice but in his Power all the things that ever he did to declare his Power the making the World out of nothing and giving so excellent an Order to it declares him an excellent God but the Power that appears in the Refurrection of Christ and the working of Faith which is the exceeding greatness of his Power outstripes that when he made the World he made it out of nothing but here he brings it out of its contraries he brings a heart of flesh out of a heart of stone but the raising of Christ from the Dead that had all that the Justice of God could do and all that Satan could do he rose and declared himself to be the Son of God with power 3. If ye take notice of his Wisdom he is the only wise God the things that we quarrel at we find that he did it in Wisdom he hath given great proofs of his Wisdom but in nothing more than what he hath given in the Covenant of Grace that his Son should come from his Bosom and be personally unite to mans nature and in that nature to suffer that man might not be condemned if he take his Mercy his Love and his Grace and the rest of his Attributes whatever appeared in the Covenant of Works are all nothing to the contrivement of the Covenant of Grace so the Order of the Covenant is so well suited to the end especially to his Fathers golry that in all the things that are done or would have been done from the beginning of the World to the end it never appeared so as by the Covenant of Grace the Father is exalted above all that ever the Angels could devise by this Covenant of Grace But these are but one of the Ends the glorifying of his Son and making the Salvation of the Elect sure and easie are the two great Ends of the Order of the Covenant SERMON XXVIII 2 Samuel 23. Verse 5. Although my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my salvation and all my desire although he make it not to grow THere are three special ends of the Covenant of Grace the exalting the Father the
I will offer you reasons of two sorts to prove that it is sure and the laying of them together will make it appear a very rational truth I shall first give you some negative Reasons and secondly some positive Reasons which being laid together will evince that it is guarded fortified and sure Reas 1. Negative For the first the Negative Reasons that will contribute to prove it sure I shall reduce them to three heads or rather there are three things that use to make a Covenant or Bargain unsure and all the three are removed from this Covenant of Grace 1. Either there must be something makes it unsure on Gods part or 2. There must be something on our part or 3. There is something makes it unsure in the nature and form of a Covenant These three ordinarily in Bargains makes them unsure and none of the three can concur to make this Covenant unsure examine all the three and ye will find is one of the best secured Bargains that ever was made to any First There can be nothing on Gods part there are three things on mens part that make a Covenant or Bargain unsure and none of them all concur in God 1. Often men makes Bargains and they forget them it 's remarkable Pharaohs chief Butler when Joseph had interpretred his dream promised that he would remember him but when he was advanced to his Dutlership again he forgot him Gen. 40.23 But this cannot be incident to God in making this Covenant Psal 111.5 He will ever be mindful of his Covenant And Heb. 6.10 For God is not unrighteous to forget you work and labour of love which ye have shewed towards his Name c. Now forgetfulness in him would be unrighteousness 2ly Severals break their Covenants not only through forgetfulness but through weakness and impotency they are not able to fulfill them and therefore they break them now this cannot be in God we believe and it is the first Article of our Greed and we may believe all the rest the better that it is there We believe in God the Father Almighty He that measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and metted out the Heaven with the span and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure and weighed the moutains in scales and the hills in a bullance in not he able to fulfill his Covenant There is no promise in all the Bible but he is able to fulfill it 3ly Severals break their Bargains through unrighteousness the rew them again there are some make vows to God and they seek out all the evasions in the world they can get to satisfie their Conscience that they may be loosed from those vows they do as Lycurgus said some do with their Oaths and their Vows as Children use to do with French Kyles they are at a great deal of pains to get them set up and in right order and when they are all set up they presently roll a Boul among them to throw them down again but this cannot be in God there 's no Attribute in him prejudged by his unrighteousness his mercy his justice his glory is more advanced by this Covenant than the Covenant of Works so he cannot do with his Covenant as we do with ours readily they that do so with their Bargains and Covenants they are like a Horse kept within a Hedge they are peaceable but when they break ovee the Hedge they range over the Countrey so do men with their Covenants so long as they are kept within the Hedge of the Covenant they seek not so much after their lusts but when they have broken over ihe Hedge they get liberty to follow their lusts so there can be no failing of the Covenant upon Gods part 2ly It cannot be unsure on our part it is true here would appear the greatest weakness but it is abundantly secured on our part Remember ye not what ye heard when I was speaking of the Covenants being everlasting That a Believer cannot fall out of a Covenanted estate unless God break unto him Now it cannot be unsure in regard there are four of five kinds of Promises in the Covenant that makes it sure on our part First There are Promises of the first graces the want of an heart of flesh the want of clean water sprinkled on us cannot make the Covenant unsure on our part because all these are promised 2ly On our part it 's true we have grace but it cannot act and one may think that will make the Covenant unsure but there are promises of influence in the Covenant Hos 14.5 I will be as the dew unto Israel he shall grow as the Lillie and shoot forth is roots as Lebanon 3ly That might make the Covenant unsure on our part we may break and fall away but there are promises of perseverance in the Covenant remarkable it that promise Jer. 32.48 And I will make an everlasting Covenant with them that I will not turn away from them to do them good but I will put my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me It 's made an everlasting Covenant because not only God will not turn away from them to do them good but he will put his fear in their heart that they shall not depart from him 4ly It may make the Covenant seem unsure on our part that we are guilty and will not that make him break No guiltiness on our part will not break the Covenant for there are promises of repentance and promises of a righteousness of faith to cover our guiltiness if once we be really in Covenant with him he must break to us before we can come out of a covenanted estate with him Must it not stand then on very sure terms when there is nothing either upon Gods part or our part that can break this Covenant and make it unsure But thirdly The Covenant may be unsure because of the nature or form of a Covenant and in this covenant none of these two can concur to make it unsure and First there is nothing in the nature of it can make it unsure in Disputs with some who have laboured to loose the tyes of National Covenants there are three things hath been objected against them it 's true all of them groundlesly objected against them but that they be Objections against this Covenant of Grace ye will find them far from having any foundation 1. They tell us a Covenant is not sure when it is contrair to former lawful Oaths no question a Covenant about indifferent things contrair to former lawful Oaths cannot be lawful and the Instance they bring is the tye of the Covenant was contrair to lawful Oaths and therefore cannot be binding but this cannot be pretended to in the Covenant of Grace in the least shadow of it 2ly They say the Tye of a Covenant cannot be binding when the matter comes to be impossible the thing we promised when it was lawful becomes sinful when it is impossible yet the
afflictions or death so grievous but where a person hath gotten the hope of salvation he looks on the world as Abraham looked on Canaan he looked on it as a strange Land and looked for a City that had foundations c. 5. The hope of salvation proves a great encouragement in regard of Hope especially when the Soul comes to the full affurance of Hope it hath assurance of these three things 1. It assures the salva ion to be certain for hope grounding it self on Faith hath apprehended its object for Faith and Hope have the same object but diversly considered Hope brings in Assurance of the certainty of the object so where the Soul comes to a lively hope of salvation it 's sure 2. Hope brings Assurance that the object is transcendent that the salvation looked for will counter-ballance all the afflictions of time The light afflictions of this present world saith Paul are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed and what a special Cordial is this in affliction and at death 3. Hope discovers the subserviency of afficton to Glory through much affliction we must enter into Glory It may be said of every Christian as Christ said to the two Disciples going to Emmaus Ought not he to suffer these things Now when one comes to be lively in the hope of salvation it not only assures this is a rock a resting place but it assures that all our afflictions will be swallowed up in that Now lay all these together the influence that the hope of salvation hath on patience and joy and groaning after glory and contempt of the world and that it hath in it the assurance both of the glory to come and the transcendency of the glory and the subserviency of affliction to that glory I say lay them all together and I hope ye are convinced that the hope of salvation is a special Cordial though ye were under the greatest affliction and even at your last words Quest 2. The second Question I shall clear what is this hope of salvation that is so great a Cordial in affliction and at death It 's true we have no express definition of Hope in our Catechism many think it 's included in the description of Faith it being an act whereby we rely on God for the good promised and not yet accomplished differing only from Faith in that that the object of Faith is present and the object of Hope is future but that ye may know what this hope of salvation is I will describe it thus It 's a supernatural grace wrought by God in the heart of a believer whereby he expects and wairs for from God the good of the promise not yet accomplished It 's a supernatural grace grace cannot be the hope of salvation in a natural heart there cannot be a lively hope in a natural heart nay Heathens cannot have this lively hope they have had some hope of resemblance since the Fall their hope is like an old Tower that is all fallen and ruinous ye find some pieces of the Wall standing which tells there was once a stately House there but now there is nothing but a bit of an old Wall so the hope of the natural heart that remains since the Fall is but a bit of a decayed Tower it 's not an house wherein a man can shelter himself from challenges from rain storm and terrors it 's a supernatural grace and Heathens they can have no hope of salvation but some relicts of the old Wall that says once there was a House there Next it is a supernatural grace wrought by God all the Angels and Ministers could not work this grace of hope therefore if ye find a person tending to despair all the Ministers ye can bring to them cannot bring them to his hope of salvation till God work it 3. It 's a supernatural grace wrought in the heart of a Believer the person must be first a Believer before he can have the hope of salvation 4. The object of it is some good not yet accomplished for hope that is seen is no hope so if ye would see what this hope of salvation is that is so great encouragement in affliction and at death it 's a supernatural grace wrought by God in the heart of a believer Quest 3. There is only one practical Question to make way for the application that I shall clear and it 's this Have all believers this hope of salvation in their end to encourage them with David had it indeed but have all believers and all that are in Covenant with God have they this hope of salvation The rather this difficulty is to be noticed in regard 1. The Lord sometimes will bring some to their last words very despondent full of fears there are many their first assurance hath been the setting their foot on the Shore and many have gone in to glory and the tear in their eye with the fear of the pit have they all then this hope of salvation to be their encouragement at their last words Answ I will Answer this in these three or four particulars 1. All believers have grounds of the hope of Salvation they are all within the Covenant they have the purpose of God the promise of God and the purchase of Christ it 's true their Evidences may be out of sight and so dark that they cannot read them in the night and readily the tear may be in their eye and they cannot see to read their Evidences yet generally all the Elect and Believedrs they have as leamed men observe this hope of Salvation either in promisso in decreto or in semine they have a ground to hope for Salvation and ye must distinguish betwixt these two the actual hope and the ground of hope it 's true the very unbelievers and ungodly men have a possibility of hope which is a great mercy there is hope for a living man the Devils and Apostat Angels would buy this possibility of hope at a dear rate but they are excluded from a possibility of hope but the Elect they have a possibility of hope either in promisso in decreto or in semine they have the actual ground of hope though readily the exercise of their hope be slow 2. Though God deny to some the assurance of hope yet ordinarily he gives the full assurance of it then it 's a Question among Divinges what is the reason that many that have gone doubting all their days that when they have come to die have had more peace more joy more clearness than before They Answer that God who is the Steward of our peace and of our joy keeps it till then and then he letteth it out And 2. They whom God denyes the full assurance of hope they will be content of bare marks at death and under affliction they would not be content of it another time and the marks they rejected when they were well they are forced to take them then And 3.
They gloss it well that say The hope of the hypocrite shall go away as the giving up of the Ghost Thue Faith and true Hope had never greater enemies than the counterfeit of them Jeroboam was a great Politician when he resolved to keep Israel from the worship of the true God at Jerusalem he will not keep them from all worship but will set up in the place of one God two calves one at Dan and another at Bethel Some gloss it he will give them dayly work if he set up a counterfeit hope better have one true God than two calves and theere is nothing will hinder them more from the worship of the true God than these two calves therefore take heed of counterfeit hope for Whoremongers and Adulterers will enter into the Kingdom of God before proud Pharisees and they that have counterfeit hope 2 If ye would win at this hope of Salvation I exhort in the second place to be more diligent Heb. 6.11 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence wherefore diligence To the sull assurance of hope unto the end be not slothful or negligent a person that would come to his Hope would not only be serious but diligent in his seriousness we must be both diligent and serious or else we cannot have a well grounded hope of salvation Therefore if ye would be at this Salvation that comforted David at his last words take heed of a counterfeit hope and be diligent and serious in it 3. If thou would attain this hope of Salvation thou who art without it I exhort thee to be a serious student of the Covenant the great ground of hope is from the Covenant all that we may expect from Christ or mercy is holden out in the Covenant therefore a Christian that would trow in this hope of salvation or would have it real should like a Child be lying at the Breasts of the Covenant and sucking out of these Breasts Observe the Conditions of the Covenant if thou understand not the Covenant and suck not out of the Breasts of the Covenant thy hope is but a patched up hope and like the hope of the Hypocrite that hath only a Portraicture in the Soul and not a living hope study these things if ye would be at a well grounded hope of Heaven I know there are many would be at a well grounded Hope of Heaven they see they must die and that their days will not ay last and that it will not be the thoughts of creatures that will determine whether they be good or evil if you would have a hope that will stand through in that day observe these things consider there is a possiblity of genting it it may be it close before this Winter be done and consider if ye have no hope and be without God ye have no cordial in affliction and at death in a little ye must divide all that ye have and leave it behind you and not take a frothy thing to the grave with you and except ye retain a hope of salvation ye take not so much as a sheet to the grave with you â—ake heed of the counterfeit hope and be serious and diligent and such your hope out of the Covenant Vse 2. Another Use of this Doctrine is this hope of salvation so great a Cordial in affliction and at death I would from this encourage you that hath this hope of all the places of Scripture ye may take up that morning and evening 1 Pet. 1.3 and 4. and sing â—lessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away c. Suppose ye count on never so many Crosses if ye have hope of Salvation he hath made up in one Jewel all that he hath cast down in all his dispensations to them ye that have this hope I exhort you to two things first to live answerable to this hope secondly I exhort you to strengthen it first ye that have this hope live answerable many a time our hope and our way is knit together Quest 1. I will prosecute this Exhortation in answering this Question how a Christian that is hoping for Heaven lives answerable to his hope for it is unsuitable for us to profess the hope of glory and live as we do we speak of our Countrey but seidom and we speak not as Travellers going home to their Countrey Answ I will answer this in these few particulars 1. A Christian lives up in some measure to his hope of Salvation when he is careful to do nothing that will contradict his hope if we be without faith it 's impossible to please God and so without hope of Salvation there is no prayer we put up but we should examine is there faith in it we preach nothing we hear nothing we read nothing but we should examine is there a mystery of Faith in it we should do nothing but what may consist with our hope Nehemiah reasoned well when he was bid flie into the Temple to save his Life shall such a man as I flee says he If a man wrong you and ye find thoughts of revenge against him and will not forgive him ye contradict your hope have ye the hope of the forgivance of a Debt of a thousand talents and wilt thou stand with thy fellow servant for the Debt of an hundred talents if ye have the hope to walk with him in white and to have all the guilt of your heart and your way washenin the blood of the Lamb and will ye stand at a Triffle that expects the removal of a mountain 2. Positively one comes up to the hope of Salvation in the practice of these four things 1. We walk like our hope when we keep company in the world like our hope we profess we are strangers in this world and hopes in a little to be at home in less than threescore and ten years and yet we keep not company like our hope it 's a remarkable word of Abraham's Heb. 11.9 By faith he sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange countrey dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob the heirs with him of the same promise Abraham kept within doors and whom had he to converse with He had Isaac and Jacob heirs of the same Promise Travellers in a far Countrey upon the account they are countrey men and minds to be at home they travel they converse and traffick together and can thou have hope to be in Heaven and not walk suitable to thy hope here if a Person given to error or profanity be the person with whom thy converse is most and yet hopes to be in the land where there is neither error nor profanity thy walk contradicts thy hope 2. As thou would walk like thy hope in thy company so I would exhort
little to the Application and Practical part of the Point in regard it 's a thing of great Importance I resolve to fall from this Branch of the Verse and therefore will apply it supposing that I have proven it abundantly Vse 1. And I will apply it in three or four Vses First Is the Covenant satisfaction to all our desires Then it informs of three or four things 1. It informs of what an excellent thing the Covenant must be Riches may satisfie the Covetous and Honour may satisfie the Ambitious and uncleanness and Whoredom may satisfie the Lascivious but what a thing is there that will satisfie all desires that is allanerly to be found in God and in the Covenant ye that would have the thing in one Jewel that the generality of men are seeking in many pieces of Copper Coin get an interest in the Covenant and it will satisfie all your desires O! but it must be an excellent Jewel that will pay off all your Debt 2. It informs what is the reason that Believers have such a deal of quietness even in the worst of cases let them be in Prison let them be in a Fever in Reproach or in Poverty yet they have a great deal of sweet quietness I will tell you they have all their desires satisfied in the Covenant they desire no more and a man that hath all his desires in what condition soever he be he is quiet the great ground of our disquieting is we want something we desire but a Believer that can say he hath made with me a Covenant he hath Bread Apparel Wine Milk Gold Fountains Kingdoms Cities and he hath them all in the Covenant therefore no wonder if men labour to take their quietness from them if devils labour to take their quietness from them yet they have still a great deal of quietness for they have all their desires and they are all contained in the Covenant 3. It informs of a third thing of what is the reason of all the exercise of Conscience and disquietings that Believers have would ye know what it is there is one thing that is all their desires which is their security in the Covenant now no wonder when they are crost in that which is all their desire to see them hanging down their head and the seeble knees smiting one another for when they are crost in their interest in the Covenant they are not crost in a trifflle but in that which is all their desire so ye may see the reason of their peace and their trouble one thing have they desired of the Lord as it is Psal 27. And as one thing goes ill or well accordingly have they peace or not 4. Is the Covenant all their desire it informs of what a different nature the Spirit of Believers and the Spirit of the Ungodly are there are many they never care for the Covenant many say who will give us Corn and Wine and many hunt after their lusts it 's a wonder to see the great odds betwixt the desire of Believers and ungodly men even as great odds as betwixt East and West all their desires are satisfied if they can say God hath made with me an Covenant wherein he hath made over himself and his Son and all that he hath hardly will there a Cross come that will ly heavy on no wonder for they have all their desires and a man cannot count himself crost that hath all his desires Vse 2. Secondly for Use is the Covenant all the desires of the Believer Then I would exhort you to make it all your desire O! we are plagued sometimes with Lascivious Earthly and Frothy Desires how excellently did the Philosopher Socrates answer the man that came to him and said O! says he he is a happy man that hath all his desires but says he he is a happier man that desires nothing but what he may lawfully desire labour to get your desires regular according to the Covenant that these may be nothing in your desires but what is contained in the Covenant I would press this with several Motives and Considerations O! but the person is come to a noble Lot in his way to Glory that hath his desires regulat according to the Covenant whether they be desires for the Church of God or for themselves Readily ye may ask How shall we get our desires regulat according to the Covenant I will offer you two remarkable helps and two Motives to get you desires regulat according to the Covenant First then for helps to get your desires regulat according to the Covenant take these four things 1. I would exhort you to study the Covenant it will be an excellent help to get your desires regulat according to the Covenant if ye be acquaint with it the Covenant should be the glass ye should be looking into and bringing your desires to it and the Covenant like a face in the glass should resemble one another believe it Christian who minds to come to Heaven there is nothing thou needs either for thy being or thy well-being but it 's contained in the Covenant therefore be a student of it and be well acquaint with it it holds forth the things of Time and things of Eternity all the excellencies of God all that is communicable to Creatures are in the Covenant therefore if thou would have thy desires regulat according to the Covenant be a student of the Covenant A second Direction is consider seriously there is nothing thou can desire in Faith except it be a promised mercy and contained in the Covenant we have a great Question with the Patrons of Liturgie the English service Book some Divines write against it say they there are many Prayers in it for things not promised and we can only pray in Faith for what is promised we can warrantably pray for nothing but a promised mercy for Faith is always founded on the Promise so it is objected if the prayer go beyond it's Object it 's a prayer of the Service-Book and I believe some pray in passion against their neighbour and they pray for themselves ignorantly as their Opinion leads them but if it be not a prayer within the Covenant it will do no good for Faith is a believing in the Promise and if thou prays not in Faith thou prays in sin so this may be a pressing consideration that our prayers will never be heard though it be presented with as many Tears as there are Waters in the Ocean if it be not according to the Covenant A 3d. Direction endeavour a work of Mortification in thy desires unless thy desires be mortified they will go beyond the bounds of the Covenant therefore in Effectual Calling there is especially intended by the Spirit of God the Mortification of our desires we are not to desire as Christ said to the Mother of Zebedees Children Ye desire says he ye know not what she desired one of her Sons to sit upon his right hand and the other on his
to the Covenant when ye find ye desire a thing ye cannot produce a Promise for suspect it as an unwarrantable desire and all that hath gotten the victory over the corruption of their heart if ye can go this night and ly down and appeal to him that is the fearcher of the heart ye desire no more than what is promised it s an evidence he hath mortified your desires and brought you under the Bond of the Covenant blessed are they that can say the Lord hath made with me an everlasting Covenant and desire no more if he would make me a King nay and give me all that is betwixt the rising of the Sun and the going down thereof I desire no more for he hath made with me a Covenant SERMON XXXV 2 Samuel 23.5 Although my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my salvation and all my desire although he make it not to grow DAvid is describing the Covenant that God made with him that it was everlasting and well ordered and sure he builds two great Conclusions on it this is all my salvation and all my desire the latter of these I have spoken to it 's a great mercy when we can have our desires regulat according to the Covenant when there is nothing desired but promised mercies irregular desires are the great foundation of the torment of our life they cannot choose but have sweet contentment and a life full of tranquillity that have gotten the victory over their desires not warranted by the Covenant But I will say no more of this before I leave these two there is one thing yet lying in them all my salvation and all my desire the two joyned together imports that the Covenant is a perfect Charter it 's a very rational Deduction from it That which is all the ground of the hope of salvation and that which is satisfaction to all desires must be a perfect Covenant therefore before I leave the handling of this Character of the Covenant I will take in this and handle it this day Doctrine That the Covenant of Grace made with believers is a perfect Covenant it is a very useful character of it and comfortable and therefore hearken unto it it may be said of the Covenant which David Psal 19.7 says The Law of the Lord is perfect converting the soul and that which he says Psal 119.96 I have seen an end of all perfection but thy Commandment is exceeding broad it 's as much as I can see no end of thy Commands they are so full and so perfect this is an excellent character and property of the Covenant whereas in other things we can see nothing but vanity and emptiness and froth there is a perfection in the Covenant That I may the more distinctly handle this I will propose these four things to be dwelt on 1. I will prove by some reasons that the Covenant of God is a perfect Covenant 2ly I will enquire in what respects it is perfect 3ly I shall clear some Questions and answer some Objections against its perfection and in the last place I shall dwell on the practical part of it Reasons First For some reasons to prove that the Covenant is perfect and indeed it 's not easie to believe the Covenant to be perfect every one will have their Objection against it yet there are these four things that will very strongly concur to demonstrat that it is a perfect Covenant 1. That to which nothing can be added and from which nothing can be wanting must be a perfect Covenant that is the proper definition of perfection now this agrees well to the Covenant there is nothing wanting in it and nothing can be added to it it is remarkable Rev. 22. He that adds to the words of this Prophesie God shall add to him the plagues written in this book and he that takes from it God shall take his name out of the book of life that is one sure reason to prove it a perfect Covenant Papists tell us they say they add no corrupt additions but perfecting additions to the words of this Book now corrupt additions is a contradiction for a corruption is not an addition but the Covenant is so perfect as whosoever he be that offers to add to the words of this Book God will add to him the plagues of this Book and whosoever he be that takes from it God will take his name out of the Book of life Reas 2. That Covenant that is sufficient to make the man of God perfect must be a perfect Covenant that which is in it self sufficient to make a Believer perfect what can be more requlsite to make up perfection as to us but the thing that will make us perfect And the Covenant is sufficient to make the man of God perfect 1 Tim. 3.16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness Now since they are sufficient to make the man of God Perfect the Covenant must be a perfect Covenant that is thus useful Reas 3. It will prove a perfect Covenant if ye consider that God in the Covenant is at the outmost of his offers now there can be nothing wanting if God be at the outmost of what he can offer There are three things that in the Covenant evidences God to be at his outmost so to speak with reverence that he cannot go beyond the three 1. The blessings of the Covenant he cannot go beyond them he cannot offer greater things than himself and his Son and both these are promised in the Covenant 2ly He is at the outmost of the freedom of the terms on which these offers are made it 's impossible to make an offer on freer terms that we should accept of him and turn from our iniquity and hearken and incline our ear to the Covenant what easier terms was it possible for God to make such great offers on 3ly He is at his outmost as to the Seals and Security of the Covenant it 's remarkable when he confirm'd the Covenant to Abraham Heb 6. Because he had no greater to swear by he swore by himself that imports that he gave the greatest Oath he could make if he could have sworn by a greater he would have sworn by it so he is at his outmost as to all these three Must not that then be a perfect Covenant where God is at his outmost and where to speak with reverence he can neither make greater offers nor freer offers nor give greater security for his offers Reas 4. That must be a perfect Covenant which upon the grounds given in the Text satisfies all desires and is all the hope of salvation this proves it a perfect Covenant our desires are very vast they are ordinarily like the Sea our desires are like an Ocean yet all desires and even when they shall be racked to
nakedness so the Covenant of Grace running in this strain we must be altogether free from having any accession to it there is none of us but we may say although my house be not so with GOd when he enters in Covenant with us For further clearing of this it will appear in these three or four Particulars 1. Take a view of the persons he takes in Covenant with him when first he meets with them they are sometimes simpler than other and sometime baser than others it 's not many Wife not many Noble but God hath chosen the foolish things to confound the wife several times when he begins first to take them into Covenant they are in regard of outward priviledges inferior to others was not Esau Jacob's Brother and the elder Brother they had the same Father and the same Mother and any thing that might be a difference Esau had it yet Jacoh have I loved and Esau have I hated the persons he takes in Covenant evidence it to be a Covenant of Grace and free favour sometime they are the simplest sometime the lowest sometime among the grossest of sinners what was Paul what was Mary Magdalen 2. It evidences the Covenant to be of meer Grace in regard of us in that the Lord keeps different ways with them he takes in Covenant after he takes them in and yet he does them no wrong there are some he will call at the third hour some at the sixth hour some at the tenth some at the eleventh he will give as much to them he calls at the tenth Hour as to them he calls at the third he will give as much Glory and as much Honour and when he hath done that he can tell Friend I have done thee no wrong I may do with my own what I will there may be one called in at the gates of Death that may have as much nay a greater gale of sweetness than the old standing Christians ever had it 's remarkable the good Thief on the Cross never man exceeded him in a gale of sweetness yet he searce had it one hour he had it out of Christ's own mouth this night thou shalt be with me in Paradise scarce any exceeded him in a flush of love he tells the ill Thief we are justly here says he but this man what hath he done and yet he came in at the eleventh hour So it evidences it 's of Grace absolutely in regard he will call what person he will in and dispense to them as he pleases when they come in tho they come in at the eleventh hour yet he will give them possibly a Feast that they that come in at the third hour get not 3. It evidences it in regard of us to be of Grace in that the dispensations of the Covenant they are not only communicat to what person and in what measure he pleases but in the third place their Dispensations are limited by no Law either as to Time or Place or Duration or Continuance under the Covenant of grace we cannot telll when we will have communion with God nor how long we will keep it it will sometimes come before we be aware and it will go before we be aware the Design of it is to prove that the dispensations of the Covenant of grace depends on the Will and good Pleasure of him that gave them of take a Believer at his fullest the Covenant is the enjoyment of it is proven to be of Grace in regard the thing given we can have no hand in it and it goes and readily he is no finful cause of it so these are clear evidences that the Covenant is of meer Grace This be the first ground on which I go to prove the Covenant to be of Grace The second is that on Gods part all he does proves it to be of Grace might he not have said that which is filthy let it be filty still that which is dying let it die after Man had fallen but he took another way The Grounds on which the-Covenant stands and the foundations Divines make are three and all the three are to be found in him the first is his Love the second is his Christ the third his Mercy these three are the foundations on which the Covenant stands and they all prove it to be of free Grace 1. There is his Love it 's so much the sweether that love is at the bottom of it if the Father give a Jewel to his Son but if he give it with a frown or a token of anger it would not be so much as if he had given him a Farthing with all the Testimonies of his Heart-love but here we have a Jewed and we have it with no frown it 's remarkable Deut. 7.7 The Lord did not set his love on you nor choose you because ye were moe in number than any people verse 8. But because the Lord loved you and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn to your fathers Now heard ye ever such a because as this I have loved you because I have loved you What Logick would this appear to Aristotle would they not call it an Identick but this holds well in the point of the Covenant I have loved you because I have loved you so that there is the first rise of the Covenant it 's love and if ye say what was the rise of the Love was it Beauty was it Service Merit or Price no it was Love I have loved you because I loved you 2. The great foundation of the Covenant is his Christ therefore the Covenant is called the sure mercies of David now David was dead long before Isaiah's time It shall come to pass says he in the latter days that David my servant shal be their King David was dead but there were two Davids and like the second Temple the glory of the latter Temple was greater than the first now the sure mercies of David are the sure mercies of the Covenant which are called so because they are sounded on Christ whose Type David was and he a Branch sprung out of the root of Jesse 3. The Covenant is founded on his Mercy that ye may distinguish from his love Mercy supposes misery the proper object of Mercy is misery we may rather call the ground of the Covenant Pity I had pity on them for my own names sake it 's not love that inclines some to be favourable to them that are in misery but pity the same was at the root of the Covenant he saw many to be created and born and knew they would eternally ruine and out of pity he entered into this Covenant For further clearing and confirming of this point that the Covenant is absolutely of Grace and free Favour I would have you take a view of the Blessings of the Covenant the conditions of the Conenant and thirdly of the end and design of the Covenant and all these three will evidence it to be a Covenant of Grace 1. Take a view of
ordered it in all things it 's one of the great fruits of the deep of his Wisdom and to go to abuse it is a great wrong 4ly All ye that live careless ignorant secure and scandalous under the Gospel and are always pretending to Grace and a Covenant of Grace know that to all your other guilt readily this may be added as the capestone that ye turn the Grace of God into wantonness and fall asleep in your guilt on this pillow that this Covenant was free therefore whatever hath been said of Grace as free stand by all ye that are living in any known sin and golrying in Grace and makes no use of Christ for Repentance whatever encouragement I have in commission to thee that desires to feed on the Covenant it 's the Childs Bread therefore let the former stand by and the latter take your own allowance Vse 2. Is this Covenant of Grace It serves for Information and it informs of four or five remarkable things 1. Of the great condescendency of Gods Grace he had made a Covenant with Aaam. the perfectest meer man that ever was when God mad a Covenant with him he broke it in the estate of Innocency it was made with him was it not a wonder that ever he should have thought upon any other way with fallen man when perfect man could not keep it yet when after that Covenant was broken and after the Bond we had failed He immediatly thinks on another Covenant and that to run in the channel of Grace it 's remarkable man was lapsed and fallen readily any then would have made it a ground of contradiction which he turned up into an Argument of pity O! the condescendency of Grace O! the height the depth the breadth of his love ye should be admiring his love and sometime speaking of it one to another that after we had broken one Covenant he would immediatly think of making another and that founded on Grace that it might be sure it 's of Grace that it may be sure Will ye be exhorted to be more in the meditation of this Grace will ye speak often to one another when ye have occasion of the condescendency of his Grace why should all your discourses run in complaints of misery and difficulties and not more in commending this admirable Grace that manifested it self when we had broken that Covenant to enter in another and found it on Grace 2ly Is this Covenant a Covenant of Grace Then it informs of what is the ground on which stands our enjoying the priviledges of the Covenant I like well the Observation of a Divine he says it 's a necessar work for a Christian to sit down and confider whence is it that one hath effectual calling and another wants it What is the reason I have pardon and another will never get it And sometimes what is the reason that I am not in the lake and left not to be tormented for ever and ever Would thou know the reason it 's Grace and meer Grace how necessar is it for us when we take up the Covenant as a Covenant of Grace to be considering that all our Mercies privative and positive what we are keeped from and what we enjoy they come all from Grace For the Covenant is a Covenant of Grace Were we serious in pondering this it would put a luster on our mercies the smell of Grace would add a great deal of sweethess to them 2ly It would make us use them very humbly what mercy has thou Grant it be Prayer or the Spirit of Prayer thou holds it of Grace and allenarly of Grace it 's Grace and Grace only that hath put the difference betwixt thee and him it 's no wonder that of all Christians those Christians be the most humble for when they come to glory and hath on their Sundays Cloaths Grace Grace will be cryed to be the Capestone the Papists say if we merited not Heaven we would not be so glorious in Heaven says one to whom is the glory to be given The distinguishing Grace preventing Grace the many privative and positive Mercies will be the ground of our Song therefore take up a Catalogue both of what thou has and what thou hopes for and give the glory to Grace 3ly It informs upon what warrantable ground we may want for the Calling nay for the Glory even of the most wretched it 's true if our effectual calling were to be merited if our pardon were to be bought we might give over all hope but since they come by Grace the Glory is to be ascribed to Grace there are three things in this Grace that may warrantably make the soul hope I Grace stands upon no bygones the sin against the Holy Ghost excepted if thou were never so gross a sinner if thou come and accept the offer of Christ as he is held out in this Covenant he is content to pass all bygones 2ly This Grace stands not at the weakness of Parts nor the meanness of Qualificatious no Babes and Sucklings and things that are not Grace will prevent them and pass by them 3ly Grace stands not at the weakness of Faith even though it have some mixture of corruption I believe help my unbelied said the poor man so thou may warrantably go to God and pray for such a friend that is living and may be sees not the danger of his natural State and thou thinks he is so gone as that he is incurable thou knows not that thou hast to do with a good God who is the foundation of the Covenant of Grace readily ye will say what ground of hope There is a Covenant of Grace that is founded neither upon merit nor price nor service but allenarly Gods Grace These Uses of Information and several others I will not insist upon Vse 3. Is this Covenant so free and of Grace then it serves for Exhortation Be exhorted to improve it as a Covenant of Grace frequently Believers deal with themselves as if they were often under a Covenant of Works and hence it is their consolation is no way answerable to their allowance several times they are like Children beside a full breast the Child is lying and it 's lean and ill like all the members of the Body of it are decaying the reason is not because the Nurse hath not a full Breast but the Child wants the art of sucking Therefore I will here press on Believers these two things 1. I would exhort you to take up this Covenant as a Covenant of Grace 2ly I exhort you to improve it as a Covenant of Grace 1. Take it up as a Covenant of Grace and that ye may do this two things I will only recommend unto you 1. Consider God intended absolutely to alter the nature of the first Covenant when he made the second in the first Covenant God required perfect obedience he would not admit of a Cautioner nor of the least failing were we under the Covenant of Works there is not the
lay claim to the Covenant and assert an interest in it For removing of these the truth of this will hold that when we come to be challenged for guilt we are not to run from the Covenant but to rely on it and assert an interest in it this Objection overturns not the truth of the point For 1. There is a twofold suitableness of humiliation unto the sins we have committed there is a Legal humiliation and an Evangelick a Legal humiliation requires an exact proportion of repentance to the degree and measure of the sin an Evangelick humiliation requires a sincere and upright repentance now when we come to be challenged for guilt and we would stand at embracing the Covenant upon the account there is no suitable humiliation to the sin consider it 's true if it be an unsuitable Evangelick humiliation that is not sincere thou cannot plead the Covenant but though it be not legal humiliation thou may plead the Covenant A man in his grief for sin before he come to plead the Covenant he should do as a man coming to a deep Water O! saith he I will drown before I come to the middle of it therefore he casts about to see if he can get a Bridge the truth is the Gospel-suitableness is a Bridge to a Legal suitableness many take the Water and ask not the way to the Bridge therefore their terrours distract them and it is as it were the beginning of Hell to them But I add 2ly A hypocrite may have mo terrours when they are humbled and possibly more joy at another time than a sound believer will have for terrours and joy are but pendicles of Grace viz. of their Faith Love and Delight in God they are concomitants of the great Graces of the Spirit a Hypocrite may out strip a sound Believer in terrours and flashes of joy but they cannot out-strip them in believing loving and delighting in God certainly Judas sorrow for sin when he hanged himself as to the degree was greater than Peters I like the distinction Divines have betwixt terrours of conscience and terrours in the heart the least wound in the heart is dangerous the pain of the heart is deadly it does not admit of splutio continui as Physicians say but there may be a Fire and a Hell kindled in the Conscience that little affects the heart though a hypocrite out-strip thee in terrours and flashes of joy yet if thou has win to the Bridge that leads over the deep Water of legal Humiliation it 's Evangelick Sincerity if in thy mourning thou has looked on him whom thou hast pierced it 's Evangelick Humiliation There is another case occurs By what rules may a sinner know that he is humbled for sin that he may go and apply the Covenant How shall we know that even Evangelically our Humiliation is such as we may go and make use of the Covenant We say not for answer that all sinners and all humbled sinners may ay run to the Covenant that great Antinomian Crisp he makes use of that word a sinner reeking in sin immediatly after they have committed the sin says he they have no more ado but go to the Covenant but we say they must repent and be humbled and believe and go to the Covenant we say that thy legal Humiliation not beâ—â—◠〈…〉 dew there are others they will get it like a deludge But 2ly As Gods way is diverse in bringing to the Covenant so there are three qualifications of humiliation for guilt that whatever person hath them they may in that place warrantably go and rely on the Covenant and apply it 1. When the soul comes to be humbled for that which is worst in sin the worst is not that it is damning but that it is dishonourable to God and when the sinner comes to be humbled for guilt as it is dishonourable to God as having in it rebellion against his Law ingratitude against his mercy and contempt against his Majesty when a soul is grieved for that which is worst in sin in that case they may apply the Covenant and rely on it and have some sweet grounds of the accomplishment of the Promises of the Covenant 2ly When the soul is so humbled as it 's content to take the Covenant on the terms of the Covenant without the alteration of any of the terms they are content to take him for a Saviour and as content to take him for a King Oftentimes we would alter something in the order and method and nature of the Covenant but when we are content to take it for good and ill for duties and priviledges when the soul is so humbled as it 's content to take Christ for King Priest and Prophet and to take him in all the Articles of it as it stands in that case the Soul is Evangelically humbled and may plead the Covenant and rely upon it 3ly When the soul is humbled not only for the guilt of sin but for the blot of sin that it hath defiled a believer in his humiliation is like a man that will not touch a Coal some will 〈…〉 to do to take my Covenant in thy mouth Psal 50. since thou hates to be reformed No your hands will be knocked of from the Covenant all that grip to the Covenant and hath not Evangelick humiliation your hands shall be knocked off I tremble to see many dying persons pleading the Covenant and hoping for mercy yea even some in old age dying and pleading to the Covenant and knows neither what Legal nor Evangelick humiliation means take heed any of you that visits the sick that ye send them not in to Hell reeking and flattering them with a delusion in their right hand There are some plead the Covenant too slowly they think they are never right but when they are under terrours and they cannot long enough travel under them they are ay wading the Water that goes over their head and goes not about to the Bridge It 's righteous with God to give them their fill of terrours and to do with them as he did with that great Divine Mr. Lawer who prayed unto the Lord that he would give him terrours that he might know what they were and the Lord gave him his fill of them so that he went to the Grave forbidding all men to pray for terrours I will only exhort one another of you that are now and then put to this My house is not so with God to take the Covenant be not driven from it and I will give you three Rules in pleading of it 1. Plead the Covenant in the right method of it remember ye of the ordering of the Covenant the absolute Promises are to be taken before the Conditional the Promises of the first Graces before the second plead the Covenant in the right method of it if ye cry Lord give me pardon and has never gotten Repentance if ye cry Lord give me peace and has never gotten pardon ye pray out of the order
of repentance when we have done an ill turn to our selves if we had weeped as many Tears as there are Waters in the Sea If we should give the fruit of our body for the sin of our soul if we had offered our Children to God for what we had done it was all to no purpose In the day thou eats thou shalt die but though this Covenant be commands and yet though they be broken if we go and mourn over them the Covenant admits of Repentance And lastly which takes away the gall of being a command it admits of a cautioner and the Covenant is so ordered that it we can go and mourn and lay the weight on Jesus it 's all one as if we had not broken it at all so that it is a command of all that the Covenant of Works command and of many moe for there are many things commanded in the Covenant of Grace that were not commanded in the Covenant of Works and yet the calling of the Covenant a command takes not away the grace and freedom of it So ye have heard of the Covenant of Grace and of the three Names given to it that are handled this day it 's a Testament a Promise and a Command but the Name I especially designed to handle is the calling of it a Covenant Vse I will not fall on the Covenant now only I exhort you to three things which I resolved to press in the close of this Sermon 1. From all the work of the day learn the difference betwixt the Covenant of Grace and the Covenant of Works if ye be out of the state of Nature and can prove your effectual calling and that God has wrought a work of Conversion within you I know no tempation nor discouragement that needs to afflict you with the fear of Hell make but sure under what Covenant ye are and that God has indeed brought you to be born again and stated you under a Covenant of Grace the Glory ye look for how simple how low how guilty soever ye be it 's left to you as a Legacy in Christ's Testament and the Father will not control the will of the Dead If thou can come to be stated under a right Covenant thou needs not fear to plead as a Dept of Justice Lord give me thy Peace and thy Pardon If thou should say I am simple poor and ignorant but will these make exception against the things left in Testament by Christ The Mediator has left them in the Testament and if thou know once the things left thee in Testament nothing can obstruct any Peace however there may be a Fatherly anger there is nothing that can obstruct fundamentally and radically thy Peace about thy great interest for they are thine by vertue of a Testament and the Father cannot but fulfil the Will of the dead Learn then to know what Covenant ye are under for if ye be in Nature all your grief for sin all your repentance for sin all your pleading to Christ is all in vain yâ—â— Covenant admits neither of Repentance nor of a cautionâ—â— is the danger of men that are not effectually called on 〈◊〉 acount 2. I would have you look on this Covenant as a Promiâ—â— when ye get any thing of it either accomplished or a woâ—â— let in to you of it remember how ye held it Isaiah 〈◊〉 many a sweet Promise Jeremiah has many a sweet Promiâ—â—â— Ezekiel Moses and all the rest of the Prophets has maâ—â— a sweet Promise and how come they to be set down thereâ—â— They were not besought by us we did not so much as seâ—â— them to be set down far less were they purchased by 〈◊〉 they came only by Promise and take in what is requiâ—â— to a Promise these things are the fruit of his condesceâ—dency of his liberallty and they bring an obligation 〈◊〉 him to accomplish them 3. And I close with it from the work of this day 〈◊〉 may see that the Covenant is a command they have brokâ—â— my Covenant that is they have broken my command theâ—â— are many practical Antinomians among us they run away 〈◊〉 the Promises and forget that the covenant is a command 〈◊〉 no it's a Truth that I am not afraid to Preach there is nothing that the covenant of Works requires but it 's required in the covenant of Grace and a great deal more theâ— were many things never called for in the covenant of Workâ— that are called for in the covenant of Grace and yet thâ—â— Believer needs not be discouraged they are all promisedâ— the Will will be accepted for the Deed but if thou 〈◊〉 down carelesly and cast off the command and pleads 〈◊〉 the covenant as a Promise thou takes not up the covenanâ— aright of all persons bound to keep the covenant it 's thou that art in covenant with him like Moses Mother that nurâ—ed the child not only out of command but out of Loveâ— but of all the Rebels that ever sinned against him are these that sin against this command SERMON V. 2 Samuel 23. Verse 5. â—â—though my house be not so with God yet he hath made with 〈◊〉 me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure 〈◊〉 for this is all my salvation and all my desire although he 〈◊〉 makes it not to grow I Entred the last day to speak of the covenant of Grace and the first thing I proposed concerning it was to consider the Names it gets in the Bible I have spoken of is as a Testament and I have exhorted you to labour to try if your Names were in the Testament It 's called 〈◊〉 Promise and it 's likewise called a Command of all which â—e heard the last day but the proper Name of it it 's called 〈◊〉 Covenant it 's true Antinomians they deny that properly it 's a covenant for they say it 's free and without conditions but in effect this covenant of Grace whatever Grace appears in it it 's properly a covenant There are three things that properly make up a covenant and all the three concur in this covenant First there are parties indenturing and treating and concluding together 2. There are articles and terms on which the agreement is made 3. There is the interposing of Obligations for ratifying the Articles for the covenant carries a curse in the bosom of it against the breakers of the covenant and where these three are there is properly a covenant these three I would make appear to you for the Parties I will not speak of them now when I come to the second Branch of the v. God hath made with me I will â—â—eak of the Parties The things that I will insist on to evince the nature of this covenant to you is the Articles and the Obligations that are interposed for the ratifying of these Artieles the clearing of these two will contribut much to open the nature of the Covenant Therefore hearken and ponder them As for the Articles that ye may know what