is trying what it will do for him as long as he hath any hope As the poor Infants in Ireland lay sucking at the breasts of the corpse of their mothers when the Irish Papists had slain them so will these poor worldlings still hang upon the world even when they find that it cannot help them and when it will scarce afford them a miserable life but with much labour and suffering they hardly get a little food and cloathing So that their affections are still alive to the world even when to their sorrow they look on the world as dead or almost dead to them But the Cross of Christ will teach you to Crucifie the world in another manner As Christ did voluntari'y contemn it and shew that he set so little by it that he could be content to be the most despicable Object upon earth in the eyes of men so will he teach you also voluntarily to contemn it and set up your selves as the Butt which all the arrows of malice and despight shall be shot at So that though you have naturally a desire of the preservation of your lives and from that may say Father if it be thy will let this cup pass from me Yet shall you have a far greater desire of Pleasing Enjoying and Glorifying God which shall cause you from a comparative Judgement to say Yet not as I will but as thou wilt Much more shall you be enabled to despise the unnecessary matters of the world and to mortifie your inordinate and distempered affections The Cross of Christ will shew you Reason though such as the worldly wise call foolishness even such Reason as none but a Teacher come from God could have revealed for the leading up your affections from the world and it will point you to the higher things that do deserve them This Cross is the truest Ladder by which you may ascend from earth to heaven When in this wilderness and as without the gate you are lifted up with Christ on the Cross of worldly desertion and reproach you are then in the highest road to Glory and if you faint not shall be lifted up with him into the throne For if you suffer with him ye shall also reign with him Rom. 8. 17. And to him that overcometh he will grant to sit with him in his throne even as he also overcame and is set down with his Father in his throne Rev. 3. 21. And as the Cross of Christ is Teaching so also is it Strengthning As the touch of his garment stayed the poor womans issue of blood so will a touch of the Cross by faith even dry up the stream of your inordinate affections that have run out after the world so long When a worldling mourneth over the Dead world as having lost his chiefest friend the Cross of Christ will cause you to rejoyce over it as a conquered enemy and to insult over the carkaise of its vain glory and delights For its one thing to have an angry God by providence to kill the world to them and another thing to have a gracious Father by his Spirit to Crucifie us to the world and the world to us by the changing of our â—â—â—imation and affections Set therefore a Crucified Christ continually before the eye of your souls See what he suffered for your adhering to the creature and what it cost him to loose you from it and bring up your souls again to God Can you still dote upon the world intangle your affections in its painted allurements when you consider that this is the very sin that killed your Saviour and which the blood of his heart was shed to cure Look up to that Cross and see the fruits of worldly love If you see a man that hath surfeited on unwholsom fruits lie groaning and gasping and trembling in pain and at last must die for it you will take heed of such a surfeit your selves It was we that took a surfeit of the creature and the Lord that saw there was no other remedy to save our lives did by a Miracle of mercy and wisdom derive upon himself the pain and trouble and groaned and sweat and bled and dyed for our Recovery And will you feed and surfeit again upon the creature Look up to that Cross of Christ and see the enmity of the world unto your Head And will you take it for your friend See how it used him and will you expect that it should deal contrarily with you Did it hang him up among Malefactors and will it set you on a throne or dandle you in its lap Did it pierce his side and will it heal your wounds Did it reach him Gall and Vinegar and will it reach you milk and honey If it do yet trust it not For the milk is but to prepare you for that sleep in which it may destroy you without resistance for you must next expect the hammer and the nail as Iael used Sisera Iudg. 4. 19 21. There is not so clear a glass in all the world in which you may see the world in its just complexion and proportion as the Cross of Christ. There you may see what its worth and how to be esteemed by the estimate of one that never was deceived by it but had a perfect knowledge of its use and value When you have so long beheld that Cross by faith as that you can be contented to be hanged between heaven and earth and become the most forlorn and despicable creature in the eyes of men and to be stript of all the comforts of life and life it self for the sake of Christ and for the Invisible Kingdom which by his Cross was purchased for you then are you throughly Crucified to the world and the world to you by the Cross of Christ. Direct 2. BE sure that you receive nâ—t a false picture of the world into your minds or if you have received such an one see that you blot it out and think of the creature truly as it is The most are deceived and undone by mis-apprehensions As if a man should dote on an ugly harlot because of a painted face or because he seeth a beautiful picture which is falsly pretended to be hers The world in it self is vanity and insufficiency As opposite to God it is poyson and enmity to us But most men conceive of it as if it were the very seat of their felicity and so are enamoured of they know not what If men did not entertain false apprehensions of God and his holy waies as being against them or hurtful to them or needless and uncomfortable they could not be so much against them as they are And so if they did not entertain false apprehensions of the creature and the waies of sin they could not be so much for them nor embrace them with so much delight For they draw in their fancies some odious picture of the blessed God and his waies and therefore they are averse to them And so they draw in
books in which we may read his Name and Will Look after God in them and never come to a creature without either an actuall or at least an habituall Intending of God as the end thereof Judge that creature unprofitable wherein you receive not somewhat of God or do not somewhat for him by it Take not up with lower thoughts and uses of it It s one of the commonest and greatest sins and I doubt with most professors of Religion to use the creature for themselves and to over-look God in his works and in their mercies and so to prophane them and turn them into sin Do you understand what is meant by this that To the pure all things are pure and that all things are sanctified to us All should be Holy to Holy men To be Holy is to be separated unto God from common base inferiour uses If you your selves are separated to God all creatures will be sanctified to you they will be the Messengers of God the revealers of his will and his Remembrancers to your souls And you will use them accordingly in that measure as you are sanctified As we call the Temple and Utensils of Gods worship Holy because they are devoted to God for his special service So may we call our meat and drink and lands and houses our corn and grass and every plant and flower Holy in their places When the sanctified soul doth read his Makers name upon them and admire and fear and love him in them and study how to use them for himself You will confess that he is a prophaner of Holy things indeed that can read over the Scripture and never observe the name of God in it or else regard it but as a common word and use that Book but as a common Book Though I do not equal the creatures with the Scriptures in clearness or fulness of discovering the will of God yet seeing that it also is one of his Books and that more legible and glorious then some inobservant wretches do believe I would intreate all that fear God to lay this more to heart and to consider for the time to come Whether it be not Prophanness even flat Prophanness to usâ— Gods works as common and unclean and to over-look him who is the life and sense and glory of them And whether it be not a sin that we are all too guilty of to take up with selfish carnal uses of almost all the works of God when we should still use them all to higher ends I fear this great unholiness in our using of the world and all therein is little bewailed in comparison of what it ought to be Some Christians are apt enough to hearken to their priviledges and titles of honour given them by the Lord but they consider not that all these are for God and therefore oblige us to answerable duty Study well those highest titles that are given you in 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. You are built up a Spiritual house an holy Priesthood to offer up Spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Iesus Christ. And what 's a Spiritual house for but the habitation of the Lord and the performance of his service And surely these holy Priests must fetch their sacrifice from all the creatures that are fit for sacrifice And Vers. 9. Ye are a chosen Generation a Royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculiar people that you should shew forth the Praises of him that hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light And must not a people so holy and peculiar adore and hallow the Lord in his works Though you be not called to Minister at his Altar you are called to see him and sanctifie him in his creatures and in all that you have to do with Gods works are part of his name and therefore see that you take not his name in vain You are brought nearer him then the rest of the world and therefore remember that he will be sanctified of all that draw near him You have learned in point of Receiving to rise with Peter kill and eat and not to call that common which God hath cleansed See that you learn it also in point of duty and in regard of the use of the creatures which you receive and take them not as common things for common fleshly uses only as common men do but remember that they are cleansed and that you prophanely devour them further then God is intended in them By this time you may perceive that the Crucifying of the world is by its truest Exaltation and Improvement and that it is so far from being your loss as that it will prove your greatest gain I would commend it to you all that desire to live a life of holiness that you would make it your daily care and study to sanctifie your very trades and worldly labours and all the mercies and matters of your lives For it is not a bare contempt of the world that will serve If you should sleep out your daies and never think of the world or if as Melancholy men you should be weary of your lives because of the vexatious miseries of the world all this is little to Christian Mortification But if you can see and taste the Goodness and Greatness and Wisdom of God in every thing you have or do this is the using the world aâ—â—ght Quest. But how should a man get his soul to that frame to carry on his calling in order to God and to see him and intend him in all that we have or do Answ. To dispatch it in a word thus 1. Be sure that God be habitually your End in the main For if you take him not for your Portion and intend him not habitually in the drift of your lives you cannot rightly intend him in particulars 2. Make it your every daies prayer to God before you go about the labours of your calling that he would give you hearts to seek him in all and would watch over you and save you from ensnaring temptations and remember you of himself and give in somewhat of himself by his creatures and sanctifie them all to you 3. Keep up a godly jealousie of your hearts lest they should abuse the creature and seek it and use it more for your carnall selves then for God If God be jealous its time for you to be jealous of your selves Especially when the sin is the most common and radicall and destroying sin 4. Before you go about your callings bethink your selves how you may Improve them for God Find out his Interest and study how to promote it and how to improve all that he gives you to that end And renew your particular Intentions of God in the midst of your work 5. When you receive or use any creature consider it both as a mercy and as an obligation unto duty and as you will not run over the Bible by bare reading without considering what is the meaning but will endeavour to take the sense as you go so do in your
will let no other prosper under them They draw as much as they can to themselves For themselves is their care and daily labour Psal. 49. 18. They all mind their own things but not the things of Christ or their Brethren Getting and Having and Keeping is their business and as swine are seldom profitable till they die Benefit 12. THE last Benefit that I shall mention is this If you are now Dead to the world and the world to you your natural Death will be the less grievous to you when it comes It will be little oâ— no trouble to you to leave your houses or lands or goods to leave your eating and drinking and recreations to leave your employments and company in the world for you were dead to all that is worldly before Surely so far as the Heart is upon God and taken off these transitory things it can be no grief to us to leave them and go to God It is only the remnants of the unmortified flesh together with the natural evil of death that maketh death to seem grievous to Believers but so far as they are Believers and dead to the world the case is otherwise Death is not neer so dreadful to them as it is to others except as the quality of some disease or some extraordinary dissertion may change the case Or as some desparate wicked ones may be insensible of their misery How bitter is the sight of approaching death to them that laid up their treasure on earth and placed their happiness in the prosperity of their flesh To such a fool as Christ describeth Luke 12. that saith to himself Soul take thy ease eat drink and be merry thou hast enough laid up for many years How sad must the tidings of death needs be to him that set his heart on earth and spent his daies in providing for the flesh and never laid up a treasure in heaven nor made him friends with the Mammon of unrighteousness nor gave not diligence in the time of his life to make his Calling and Election sure To a worldly man that sets not his heart and hopes above the face of death is unspeakably dreadful But if we could kill the world before us and be dead to it now and alive to God and with Paul die daily it would be a powerful means to abate the terrours and a certain way to take out the sting that death might be a sanctified passage into life So much of the Benefits of Mortification AND now what remains but that you that are Mortified Believers receive your Consolation and consider what the Lord hath done for your souls and give him the praise of so great a mercy Believe it it is a thousand fold better to be Crucified to the world then to be advanced to prosperity in it and to have a heart that is above the world then to be made the possessor of the world And for you that yet are strangers to this mercy O that the Lord would open your hearts to consider where you are and what you are doing and whether you are going and how the world will use you and how you are like to come off at last before you go any further that you may not make so mad a bargain as to gain the world and lose your souls O that you did but throughly believe that it is the only wise and gainful choice to deny your carnal selves and forsake all and follow Christ in hope of the heavenly treasure which he hath promised And let me tell you again as the way to this That though melancholly may make you weary of the world and stoicall precepts may restrain your lusts yet it is only the power of the Holy Ghost the Cross of Christ the belief of the promise the Love of God the Hopes of the everlasting invisible Glory that will effectually and savingly Crucifie you to the world and the world to you It is a Lesson that never was well taught by any other Master but Christ and you must Learn it from him by his Word Ministers and Spirit in his School or you will never Learn or Practise it aright The second PART Of the CHRISTIANS Glorying SECT XXIII HAving thus dispatched the first part of my subject concerning a Christians Crucifixion to the world by Christ and his Cross I come to the second Part concerning the Glorying of a Christian The Iudaizing Teachers did Glory carnally even in a carnall worship and carnall priviledges and in the carnall effects of their Doctrine on their Proselytes but Paul that had more to Glory in then they doth disclaim and renounce all such Glorying as theirs and owneth and professeth a contrary Glorying even in the Cross of Christ and his Mortification The Observation to be handled is that True Christians must with abhorrency renounce all Carnal Glorying and must Glory only in the Cross of Christ by whom the world is Crucified to them and they unto the world In handling this I shall briefly shew you 1. What is included or what we may Glory in 2. What is excluded or what we may not Glory in For the former here are two things expressed in the Text in which a Christian may and must Glory 1. The Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2. Our Crucifixion to the world hereby So that the Positive part of the Doctrine containeth these two branches which I shall handle distinctly before I speak to the Negative part 1. True Christians that are Crucified to the world and the world to them by the Cross of Christ may and must Glory therein 2. Yet so as that their Glorying must be principally in Christ and their own Mortification must be Gloryed in but as the fruit of his Cross. For the first Part it must be understood with these necessary limitations 1. As Glorying signifieth a self-ascribing and Proud conceit of our own Mortification and is contrary to Christian self-denyal and humility and Glorying in God so we must take heed of it and abhor it 2. As Glorying signifieth any outward expression of this inward pride either by words or deeds we must also avoid it with abhorrence 3. So must we also do by all unseasonable offensive ostentation which may seem to others to savour of Pride though indeed it proceed from a better cause 4. But as Glorying signifieth the apprehension of the Good of the thing and our Benefit by it and the due Affections of Content and Joy and Exultation of mind that follow thereupon thus must a Christian Glory in his Mortification by the Cross of Christ. We commonly call this act a Blessing of our selves in the apprehension of our case As the carnal ungodly world do Bless themselves in their Possessing carnal things so may a Christian bless himself that he is Crucified to them that is he may rejoyce in it as a great blessing of God that tendeth to further blessedness 5. And when we are called to it we may express to others our Glorying herein But
to give up your selves to pleasures and recreations and you think that you may do with your own as you list as if it had been given you to gratifie the flesh The words that converted Austin never suâ—k yet into your hearts Rom. 13. 13 14. Let us walk honestly as in the day not in rioting and drunkenness not in chambering and wantonness not in strife and envying but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof You never felt the meaning of those words Rom. 8. 13. If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if by the Spirit ye mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live But to turn my Complaint into an Admonition I beseech you consider what you are and what you do 1. How unlike are you to Iesus Christ your pattern that denyed himself all the Honours and Riches and Carnal delights of the world Read over his Life and Read your own and judge whether any man on earth be more unlike to Christ then a voluptuous worldly Gentleman Especially if Malignity be added to his sensuality 2. How unlike are you to the holy Laws of Christ. Are his precepts of Mortification and Self-denyal imprinted in your hearts and predominant in your lives Is a beast any more unlike a man then your hearts and lives are unlike Christs Laws 3. How unlike are you to the Antient Christians that forsook all and followed Christ and lived in a Community of Charity And how unlike to every gracious soul that is dead to the world and hath mortified his members upon earth and hath his conversation in another world Are you not such as Paul wept over Phil. 3. 18. Whose God is their belly who glory in their shame and who mind earthly things and that are enemies to the Cross of Christ. though perhaps you are no enemies to his Name Believe it Gentlemen whatever your thoughts of your selves may be you will find that no Religion will save you that stoopeth to the world and is but an underling to your fleshly interest 4. How unlike are you to your Profession and your Covenant with God and to your Confessions and Prayers to him Did you not renounce the flesh the world and the Devil in your Baptism Do you not still Profess that heaven is best and God is to be preferred and yet will you not do it but let your own Professions condemn you Do you not ordinarily confess that the world is vain and yet will you shew your selves such Dissemblers as to love and seek it more then God As if there were no more Power in the Spirit of Christianity then in the Opinion of Zeno the Philosopher who having oft said that Poverty and Riches were neitheâ— good nor bad but things indifferent was yet dismaye when he heard that his farms were seized on by the enemies the Prince having sent one with the report to try him telling him when he had done that Now Riches and Poverty were not things indifferent How oft have you prayed to be saved from Temptation and yet will you still date upon your snares and fetters and shew your selves such hypocrites as to love the temptations which you pray against 5. You are guilty of a double injury to God in that you are obliged to him as his Created subjects and yet more obliged by your Riches and Honours which he hath given you for your Masters use To whom men give much from them will they expect the more Luke 12. 48. For a servant that hath double wages to abuse you for a friend that hath received double kindness to prove false to you for a Commander in the Army to betray his General is sure an aggravation of the crime Must God advance you highest and will you thrust him lowest in your heart Must he feed you with the best and cloath you with the best and will you put him off with the worst Have you ten times or an hundred times more wealth from him then many an honest heavenly Believer and yet will you Love and Serve him less 6. Is it not pitty and shame that you should thus turn Mercies themselves into sin and draw your bane from that which might have been a blessing Will you be the worse because God is so good to you Must he give you health and time for his service and give you such plentiful provision and assistance and will you be worse in health then others are in sickness and worse in Plenty then others are in want Is not this the way to dry up the streams of Mercy when the more you have the worse you are 7. You exceedingly wrong the Church and Common-wealth For it is for the publick good that you are advanced and you should be a blessing to the Land And will you cast away that time and wealth upon the flesh which you have received for such noble ends Rob not the Church and Common wealth of what you owe it by engrossing it to your selves or consuming it on your lusts 8. Great men have a great account to make You shall shortly hear Give account of thy Steward-ship for thou shalt be no longer Stewarâ— If God have entrusted you you with a thousand pound a year it is not the same reckoning that must serve your turn as would serve his turn that had but an hundred Your improvement must be somewhat answerable to your receivings Do you need to be told how sad a reckoning it will then be to say Lord I imployed most of it in maintaining the Pomp and Pleasure of my self and family even that Pomp of the world and those sinful lusts of the flesh which in my Baptism I forswore and the rest I left to my children to maintain them in the same pomp and pleasure except a few scraps of my Revenews which I gave to the Church or poor 9. Your wealth and greatness do afford you great opportunities to do good and to further the salvation of your selves and others and worldliness and sensuality will rob you of these opportunities O how many good works might you have done to the honour of your Lord and the benefit of others and your selves if you had made the best of your Interest and Estates The loss of the Reward will shortly appear to you a greater loss then that which you now account the loss of your estates 10. Your worldliness and sensuality is a sin against your own experience and the experience of all the world You have long tryed the world and what hath it done for you that you should so over-value it You know that it is the common vote of all that ever tryed it sooner or later that it is vanity and vexation And have you not the wit or grace to learn from so plain a teacher as Experience yea your own experience yea and all the worlds experience 11. You sin also against your very Reason it self and against your certain knowledge You
then satisfie one Whence also comes the Theevery the Lying for the sake of Commodity the over-witting and over-reaching of each other but from this sin Whence is it that most Ale sellers and Vintners will make a trade of poysoning souls and will nourish that odious vice which is the ruine of mens bodies the impoverishing of their families the dishonour of God and the shame and danger of the towns and Common-wealths in which they are committed but only for the love of a sordid gain And were it not more for fear of men then God the most of them by far would make the Lords day their chief Market-day for they care not to rob even God himself for this unprofitable gain And it s well if Butchers and many other Tradesmen would not do the like if the Laws of the Land and the severity of Magistrates did not restrain them This is the Love they have to God and eternal Glory Thus you may see whether they are dead to the world or rather to Christ Gehezi thought himself wiser then his Master when he went after Naaman for his prize And Achan thought himself wiser then all Israel when he hid the gold And Saul thought it wisdom to spare Agag and the best things from destruction But the Leprosie taught one and the stones taught another and Gods rejection taught the third to know that by experience which they would not learn by the warnings of the Lord. The like may be said of contentious Law-suits the common effects of Covetousness and Revenge and so of all other unlawfull gain If indeed you are dead to the world do not so much as tell a lie to get all the riches of the world Remember also the commands of God Lev. 19. 13. Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour neither rob him the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night And 1 Thes. 4. 6. That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter because that the Lord is the avenger of all such as we also have forewarned you and testified And 1 Cor. 6. 7 8 9. Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you because ye go to Law one with another Why do ye not rather take wrong Why do ye not rather suffer your selves to be defrauded Nay you do wrong and defraud and that your Brethren Know you not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God These lessons would be better learnt if covetousness did not stop mens ears But it s a befooling stupifying vice It makes men lose themselves for gain For as Austin saith Avarus antequam lucretur seipsam perdit antequam aliquid capiat capitur And all this is for the pleasing of their fancy that they may have more then they need For Avarus est caecus credendo enim dives est non videndo Amas pecuniam O caece quam nunquam videbis caecus possides caecus morituruses c. Idem And when they pretend Necessity it is but the voice of Covetousness For saith the same Austin Non est in carendo difficultas nisi cum fuerit in possidendo cupiditas Et alibi Pauperiorem se judicat abundans quia sibi deâ—sse arbitratur quicquid ab aliis possidetur toto mundo eget cujus non capit mundus cupiditatem 6. IF you are Crucified to the world let us see it by your improving all for God and not employing it to the pleasing of your flesh Use all that you have as men that must be accountable for them Remember that you receive them from your Master for his use Resolve therefore so to expend and employ them as may most further his service Look about you and see what good is to be done and then consider how far you are furnished and enabled to do it and accordingly lay out the talents which you are entrusted with Seek after such work and do not stay till it be brought to your hand If you love Christ indeed me thinks you should not stay for an invitation to do him service nor should you need that men come a begging to you to awaken your charity when you know before that it is a charitable and necessary work that is before you Two sorts of persons I would especially direct this advice to First to the rich and powerful in the world Secondly To all that are professors of Religion For the first sort let them consider that their Riches are snares to them and will prove a certain means of their damnation if they devote them not to God Tythes and Oblations and First-fruits were devoted to God under the Law but all is expresly devoted to him under the Gospel Which was expressed by the Primitive Christians selling all and laying down at the Apostles feet For as Life and Immortality is brought to light more abundantly in the Gospel So also is the means of obtaining it and the duty which we owe to him that giveth it And as Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ and the greatest mercies are revealed by the Gospel So the greatest holiness comes by Christ and the greatest obligations are laid on us in the Gospel Especially to self-denyal and an hearty Devoting our selves and all we have to God I beseech you observe the distinction which Christ useth Luke 12. 21. between Laying up Riches to your selves and being Rich to God and how dreadful the Application is If almost all your Riches be expended on your selves and yours or laid upin store as for provision for your flesh its plain then that you Lay up riches for your selves and so are concluded by the sentence of Christ among the miserable fools that are there described But if you are Rich to God you will study to improve your Riches for God and often bethink your selves which way they may be employed to his greatest service He that cannot spare his wealth for the service of his Redeemer and the good of his Brother and the furthering of his own salvation is very far from being Crucified to the world 2. And it is not only the great ones that have need of this advice but all in their places that are entrusted with Gods Mercies Think not your selves excused from works of Charity because you have but one talent for one talent must be proportionably improved as well as ten or else you will be condemned as unprofitable servants People of the lower rank do commonly think that God requireth nothing of them but to receive what others give them and to labour for themselves And when they have reviled sufficiently at Rich men for worldliness they often shew themselves as worldly by denying their mites and by unmercifulness to those that are poorer then themselves as the Richer do by denying their larger proportions The scarcity and defectiveness of charitable works with all sorts of men from the highest to the lowest even those that seem more forward in verbal devotions do shew us too evidently how common
perswade you to part with it to supply his wants At least you will never be perswaded to part with all and follow Christ till the Belief of a Treasure in Heaven do perswade you to it Luke 18. 21 22. Can you say from your hearts Let all go rather then the Love of God And in a case of tryal do you certainly find that There is nothing so dear to you which you cannot part with for God and the hopes of everlasting life This is a sign of an effectual Faith For neither nature nor common grace did ever bring a soul so high 3. It is also a certain evidence of unfeigned Love For wherein is Love so clearly manifested as in the highest adventures for the person whom we Love and in the costlyest expressions of our Love when we are called to it Then it will appear that you Love God indeed when there is nothing else that you prefer before him and nothing but what you lay down at his feet When the greatest professors that love the world do shew that the love of the Father is not in them 1 Iohn 2. 15. So far as it is loved 4. To be Crucified to the world and alive to God is the very Honesty and Chastity and Iustice of the soul. This is your Fidelity to God in keeping the holy Covenant that you have made with him in Christ. This is your keeping your selves unspotted from the world and undefiled by it When the friends of it live in its Adulterous embracements Iam. 4. 4. Thus do you give the Lord his own even both the creature and your hearts when worldlings do unjustly rob him of both This is the great command and request of God Prov. 23. 26. My Son give me thy heart Give him but this and he will take it as if you gave him all For indeed the rest will follow this But if you give the world your hearts God will take all the rest as Nothing Benefit 2. THE second Benefit is this If you are truly Crucified to the world Your minds will be free for God and his service When the minds of worldlings are like imprisoned hampered things What a toylsom thing is it for a man to travail in fetters or to run a race with a burden on his back But knock off his fetters and how easily will he go and take off his burden and how lightly will he run Do you not feel your selves that the world is the clog of your souls and that this is it that hindereth you from duty and hindereth you in duty and keepeth you from the attainment of an heavenly conversation When you should chearfully go to God in secret or in your families the world is ready to pull you back Either it calleth you away by putting some other business into your hands or else it dulleth and diverteth your Affections so that you have no heart to duty or no life in it or else it creepeth into your Thoughts in duty and taketh them off from the work in hand and makes you do that which you seem not to be doing And if you shake off these thoughts and drive them out of your way they are presently again before you and meet you at the next Turn But in that measure as you have Crucified the world you are freed from these disturbances The Apostle Peter describeth the miserable estate of Apostates 2 Pet. 2. 20. to be like a bird or beast that had escaped out of the snare that he was taken in and after is taken in the same again Having escaped the pollution of the world c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are again entangled therein as a beast in a snare that cannot escape or help himself So 2 Tim. 2. 4. its said no man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. So that you see that the world is a snare that entangleth mens souls and holdeth them as in captivity The table of the wicked becometh a snare to them and so do all the bodily mercies which they possess But the mortified Christian may look back on all these dangers and say Blessed be the Lord that hath not given us as a prey to their teeth Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers the snare is broken and we are escaped Psal. 124. 6 7. Oh with what ease and freedom of mind may you converse with God in holy Ordinances when you are once disâ—entangled from this snare Now that which formerly drew off your hearts and clog'd your affections is Crucified and dead that enemy that kept your souls from God and was still casting baits or troubles in your way is dead As the Apostle saith of sin Rom. 6. 7. He that is dead is freed from sin So I may say of the world He that is dead to the world in that measure as he is dead to it is freed from the world Let us therefore lay aside every weight and the sin that doth so easily beset us and then we may run with Patience the race that is set before us Heb. 12. 1. This makes a poor Christian sometimes to live in more content and comfort in the depth of adversity then he did before in the midst of his prosperity because though his flesh hath lost his soul hath gain'd though he want the fleshly accommodations which he had yet the world is now more Dead to him then before and so his mind is freer for God and consequently more with him How blessed a life is it to converse with God with little disturbances and interruptions A runner in a race is willing to be rid of his very cloathes that should cover him and keep him warm because they are a burden and hinderance to him in his race But the lookers on would be loath to be so stript Take away prosperity from an unmortified man and you take away the comfort of his life When if the same things be taken from the mortified believer he loseth but his burden How readily will that man obey that is dead to the world when he is commanded to do good to relieve the poor according to his power to suffer wrongs to let go his right to forgive and requite evil with good to forsake all and follow Christ. When to another man these duties are a kind of impossibilities and you may as well perswade a Lyon to become a Lamb or a beast to die willingly by the hand of the Butcher as perswade an unmortified worldling to these things They think when they hear them These are hard sayings who can bear them Or at least they are duties for a Peter or a Paul and not for such as we There is a very great part of Christian obedience that will be easie to you when you are Dead to the world which no man else is able to endure nor will be perswaded to submit to Benefit 3. ANother Benefit of this Crucifixion is this The
do tend to and that without which we are uncapable of sincere magnifying either Creation or Redemption 9. It is certain that we may Glory in the healing of our diseases and recovery of our depraved miserable souls He that must be sensible of his sin must needs be sensible of the mercy of the deliverer It cannot be that we should be obliged to mourn for sin and yet may not Glory in our deliverance from it Nature it self constraineth us to lament the known unhappiness of our souls as well as the wounds and calamities of our bodies And therefore the same nature must needs teach us to rejoyce and glory in our spiritual recovery 10. If we may Glory in our Remission or Iustification then by proportion or parity of reason we may also glory in our Mortification For both are ours by gift and neither are deserved by us But it is past doubt that we may glory in our Pardon or Justification therefore we may also glory in our Mortification 11. Undoubtedly we may glory in the ruine of the enemies of Christ and us How can a souldier be obliged to fight and not to glory in the victory or good success But our Mortification is the ruine of Christs enemies and ours therefore we may glory in it 12. We may glory in that which tendeth apparently to the good of our Brethren yea to the common good of Church and Common wealth For he that is bound to Love his Brother and the Common-wealth is bound to rejoyce and glory in their benefits But certainly the mortification of every individual member doth tend to the good of each part and of the whole Oh how profitably should we converse together if it were not for this sin How peaceable and edisying and comfortable would our conversation be to all about us We should not then tempt them to sin by our example nor disturb the peace of families or neighbourhoods by the distempers of our souls and lives â—or draw down Gods judgements on the places where we live No wonder if all about them be the worâ—â— for one unmortified man and if the Ship be in sudden danger till Ionah be cast over-board or if Israel be dismayed for Achans sin And all that are about them may fare the better for a mortified Believer In this respect therefore we must glory in our mortification 13. It is certainly lawfull to glory in that which is the earnest of our heavenly everlasting glory or a note or evidence of our title to it For it cannot be that Felicity can be desired as Felicity which is with our highest affections and endeavours but we must needs glory in that which assureth us that we shall attain it But our Mortification is a certain sign of our title to it and an earnest of it And therefore we may justly glory in our Mortification 14. Lastly it is undoubly meet that we glory in that which is Pleasing to God our Father For the Pleasing of him is our ultimate end and the doing of his will is the whole work of our lives And therefore if we may not glory in that we may glory in nothing at all Even Christs own Sacrifice and Merits and holy Life are therefore to be extolled because they were fully Pleasing unto God and the full Commendation which the Father giveth him was This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Matth. 3. 17. Now it is certain that God is pleased also with the mortified souls and lives of his people and that through Christ they are amiable and acceptable to him 1 Cor. 7. 32. 1 Thes. 4. 1. 2 Tim. 2. 4. Heb 13. 16. They that walk with God by faith have this testimony as Henoch had that they please God Heb. 11. 5. Beloved if our heart condemn us not then have we confidence towards God and whatsoever we ask we receive of him because we keep his Commandments and do those things that are pleasing in his sight 1 Iohn 3. 21 22. To this end is all our wisdom and knowledge that we may walk worthy of the Lord in all well-pleasing being fruitful in every good work Col. 1. 9 10. He is not a Christian that Rejoyceth not in that which is pleasing to the Lord. The Righteous Lord Loveth righteousness Psal. 11. 7. And he Loveth a chearfull giver 2 Cor. 9. 7. And shall we not glory in that which is beloved of God You see then the truth of the point is most evident SECT XXIV Use 1. THE first Use that we shall make of this part of the Observation before we proceed to the explication of the other parts is To inform us of the mistake and injurious dealing of some misguided ones commonly called Antinomians who tell us that we must look at nothing in our selves nor fetch comfort from it and earnestly exclaim against the Preachers of the Gospel for teaching men to look at any thing in themselves and to take comfort from the Evidence of their graces and tell us that we must look to Christ alone and call all those Legall Preachers or Professors that be not of their mind in this But you may see by what is said before that they speak against the clearest fullest Evidence and that the whole stream of Scripture beareth down their opinion And therefore it is sad that when they go against the light of the Sun they should be so confident as to accuse their Brethren of darkness and so rash as to censure them as Legalists and ignorant of the righteousness of Christ. Let us a little distinguish and all the mists of their accusations will vanish and the case will be clear 1. We must distinguish between Carnal Self which we are called in Scripture to deny And Self as it signifieth our personal being And this we are commanded in Scripture to Love and Cherish For we must Love our neighbours but as our selves and a man must cherish and nourish his wife but as his own body and love her but as himself for no man ever yet hated his own flesh Eph. 5. 28 29 33. And Self in the third sense as taken for Renewed Self that certainly none is bound to hate Now in the first sense its true that we must look at Nothing in our selves for comfort that is at nothing in our carnal selves But of self in the other two senses we must further enquire 2. We must distinguish between that which is both in our selves and of our selves originally and that which is in our selves but not of our selves but of God by Christ Or only of our selves in subordination to Christ. The former sort we have small reason to glory in for it is our sin and shame But the later we may glory in for the glory redoundeth to the author 3. We must distinguish between Looking at something in our selves with a mistaking eye as judging it Meritorious or to be more our own then it is And looking at it with a right judgement and saying
that way That 's your chief honour which is most your own and least borrowed from others The deserving Son of a beggar is more truly honourable then the undeserving Son of a Lord. Glory rather that you are born again not of the flesh but of the Spirit not of corruptible seed but incoruptible the word of God that endureth for ever Your first birth how noble so ever makes you but children of wrath and slaves of Satan But your new birth is the truly honourable birth which makes you partakers of the Divine Nature the Sons of God the heirs of Heaven and Co-heirs with the Lord Jesus 1 Pet. 1. 23. Iohn 3. 6. 1. 12. Rom. 8. 17. 8. Have you friends that love you and are able to countenance you and are daily tender of you and helpful to you Bless God for them but glory not in man For Cursed is is he that trusteth in man and maketh flesh his arm and withdraweth his heart from the Lord Jer. 17. 5. Cease from man whose breath is in his nostrils for wherein is he to be accounted of Isa. 2. 22. Your best friends are uncertain and quickly lost and may turn so unkind as to break your hearts Or if their minds prove constant their lives are uncertain and the dearer they were to you with the greater grief you will lay them in the grave Or if you fall your selves into sickness they will prove but silly comforts to you They can but look on you and be sorry for you but that will not ease your pain nor succour you Oh how much more cause have you to glory in such a friend as Christ that will save you from sin and wrath and Hell In such a friend as God Almighty that can rebuke your diseases by a word Or make them tend to the cure of your souls and that will stick to you when others leave you with whom you must dwell in heaven for ever 9. Have you the pleasantest meats or drinks that your appetite desires the easiest lodgings the easiest lives the pleasantest recreations or companions Glory not in them These are the most desperate bait of the Devil and the common ruine of the world To take your fill and please your flesh and fit your lives to its desires is the very way to hell and the property of the slaves of Satan Your sweet meat will have sowre sauce If you live after the flesh you shall die but if by the Spirit you mortifie the deeds of the body you shall live Rom. 8. 13. You know what became of him Luke 16. that was cloathed in purple and fine linnen and fared deliciously every day It s a heavy case to have your portion and all your good things in this life Rejoyce rather that you have conquered the desires of your flesh and have brought it into subjection That you are Masters of your appetites and can eat and drink to the glory of God and that you can deny your ease and endure hardness as a soldiour of Christ That you have pleasanter recreations in the waies of life and sweeter comforts then the flesh can have any and that you have delights that are more durable and meat to eat that others know not of Rejoyce that you have conquered the flesh your greatest enemy and so have escaped the greatest danger For there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Iesus that walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Rom. 8. 1. 10. Have you the love of your neighbours and do all men men speak well of you Glory not in it as any of your felicity For it will be wo to many that are as well spoken of as you The world is not so wise nor so good that a man should much rejoyce in its good word Are they learned men that extoll you yet do not Glory in it They may boast you into Pride and Hell but they cannot add a cubit to the stature of your worth They see not the state of your soul and therefore you may be miserable when they have said their best Are they godly men that admire you and speak well of you yet Glory not in it as any certain Evidence of your felicity They speak as they think and may easily be deceived They are not your Judges As their hard thoughts cannot condemn you so their good thoughts or words cannot justifie you with God Oh Glory rather in Gods approbation who knows your heart to whose judgement it is that you stand or fall who judgeth not by outward appearance but in righteousness If he say Well done good and faithfull servant his words will be life to you but a thousand others may say so and do you no good at all but hurt 11. Are you famous for Learning and have you great parts in knowledge and utterance Glory not in it as any of your felicity or evidence thereof There are learneder men then you in hell the greatest knowledge of common things hath much sorrow and sheweth you so much of your ignorance and what is yet beyond your reach that it disquiets you the more Much more may you Glory that you know Christ Crucified and that you know your interest in the Love of God and can Love him whom you know without which all your knowledge would make you but as sounding brass or a tinckling Cymball Of all these together I may say Ier. 9. 23 24. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts let not the wise man Glory in his wisdom neither let the mighty man glory in his might let not the rich man glory in his riches but let him that glorieth glory in this that he understandeth and knoweh me that I am the Lord which exercise loving kindness judgement and righteousness 12. Have you spiritual mercies as well as corporall Take heed in what respect you Glory in them For example 1. Have you abundant and excellent means of grace Have you Ministers and holy Ordinances and Christian Communion in the purest order Glory in them as Gods mercies and helps to higher things But not as your felicity or a certain Evidence of it For many are first in these respects that will be last in respect of life Eternal The greatest fall is from the highest Mercies And many that had the chiefest place in the Church will have the â—orest place in hell Abominable Sodom will scape better then many hearers of the Gospel But Glory in this that you have the Spirit of the Gospel and that Christ within you that is preached in the Gospel 2. Have you much understanding in the Doctrine of the Gospel and are you eminent teachers of it to others Glory in it as an opportunity of serving your Lord and doing and getting good But not as a certain Evidence of a good estate For many shall say Lord have we not preached in thy name whom Christ will not own because they were workers of iniquity Mat. 7. 22. And he that knoweth his Masters will and doth it not