day cursing in Hell under the Wrath of God that they let slip and passed over so many golden Opportunities of the Gospel without improvement and know ye not that it will come to the same sad pass with you if ye do not receive it Do Men live always Is there not an appointed time for all Men upon Earth If before we have savingly exercised Faith on Him for making Peace with God we be drawn to a reckoning before His Tribunal what will come of it and are not our precious Opportunites apace and always sliping by and is not the work of Faith by delays still the more difficult are not our Bonds still the more strengthened and doth not our Indisposition still grow the greater and is it not very ordinary to see these who have slighted the work of Faith in their Youth to live stupid in their old Age and die Sensless 4. Consider what sort of Folk they are of whom the Scripture speaks as Unbelievers and whom the Word of God holds forth to be eternally secluded from the presence of God for the want of Faith Many think that it 's but the grosly Prophane or such as never had so much as the form of Religion and such as others would scunner and loath to hear them but mentioned that it's I say only such that are accounted Unbelievers But the Scripture speaks of some that seek to enter in and shall not be able that desire to be in Heaven and take some pains to win in and yet are never admitted to enter into it and what is the reason because they took not the way of Believing for the obtaining of Life and coming to Heaven they took the way of Works they took the way of Prayer of Purposes Promises and Resolutions to ammend and grow better quite overlooking Christ and the way of Believing in Him and so took the way of Presumption and promised themselves Peace when there was no true Peace nor any solid ground for it 5. Consider which is of affinity with the former Consideration them that are secluded from the presence of God for the want of Faith they are even Men and Women as we are that lived in the same Kingdom and City with us that prayed in the same Company with us that thought themselves as sure of Heaven as many of us do that were guilty of the same or like Sins that we are guilty of that have heard many of the same Preachings that we have heard and yet they perish for want of Faith for not believing in the Son of God Why then should we think that impossible as to us that is so common and frequent in others Is not the same Nature in us that 's in others and are not our Hearts naturally as deceitful and corrupt as those of others and so may not we be beguiled as well as others And is it not the same rule that He will walk by in judging of us that He walked by in judging of others What can be the reason that Folk will read and hear the Word and will promise to themselves Heaven when the same Word clears it plainly that Destruction is that which they have to look for from the Lord It is nothing else but this confident and proud Presumption that many take for Faith Let not your precious opportunities slip away and beguile not your selves in such a concerning matter as Faith is ye will never get this loss made up afterwards if ye miss Faith here Lastly Consider the great necessity that the Loâ—d hath laid upon all Men and Women by a peremptory Command and Charge to believe in the Son of God He hath not with greater peremptoriness required Prayer nor dependance upon Him nor any other Duty then He hath required this 1 John 3.23 And this is his commandment that we should believe on the Name of His Son Jesus Christ yea it 's singled out as His main Commandment If that great iniquiry be made What shall I do to be saved this is the answer Believe on Jesus Christ Do ye think that our Lord who hath so marked and signalized this Command in so special a manner will never take account for the slighting of it or do ye think to satisfie Him by your other Duties without minding this It cannot be Suppose ye should mourn all your Life-time and your Life were a pattern to others yet if ye want this one thing Faith in Christ ye will be found Transgressours as having neglected the main work Now for the Question ye will say What this is we are bidding you do when we bid you Believe Answ When we call you to Believe we call you 1. To be suitably affected with the sense of your own Naughtiness Sinfulness and Hâ—zaâ—d Till there be something of this Faith in our Lord Jesus hath no access nor will ever get welcome Deep apprehensions of the Wrath that is coming and a standing in awe at the thoughts of our appearing before Him contribute much to it I am not preaching Desperation to you as some mutter but we would press upon you the Faith of the Word of God that tells you what we are and liveliness under that impression that ye may not be stopped or letted till ye come to a thorow closure with Christ The most part of Hearers come never this length and this is the reason why many stumble in the very Threshold and make never Progress 2. We call for and commend this to you that ye would study to be through and clear as to the Usefulness and Excellency of Jesus Christ as to the efficacy of His Death as to the terms of the Covenant of Grace whereby a Sinner comes to obtain Right to Him to be sensible of Sin and Hazard without this is only the way to make a Man desperate and mad but when this is clear it makes an open door to the Sinner that he may see whither to run from the Wrath to come I do not only mean that ye would get the Catâ—chism and be able to answer to all the Questions concerning the Fundamentals of Religion contained therein but that ye would also and mainly seek to have the Faith of these things in your Hâ—arts and to have Faith in God that ye may be perswaded that He that was and is God died for Sinners and that by the application of His Satisfaction Sinners may obtain Life and that there is a sufficient Warrand given to a Sinner to hazard himself upon Him The first of these speaks the necessity of some Sense the second holds out the necessity of a general Faith according to that word Heb. 11. He that comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him We must know that there is a Warrand to come and ground to expect Acceptance from God upon our coming or else we will never come to nor believe in Christ The third thing that we call you to when we call you
which may be gathered from Heb. 4.1 that stout confidence that thinks it's impossible to miss the Promises is a suspect and dangerous Faith not to be loved it 's a much better Faith that fears then that Faith that 's more stout except there be a sweet mixture of holy stoutness and fear together It 's said Heb. 11.7 that by Faith Noah being moved with fear prepared an Ark c. Noah had the Faith of God's Promise that he should be keeped free from being drowned by the Deluge with the rest of the World and yet he was mourning and trembling in preparing the Ark If there were much Faith among you it would make many of you more holily feared then ye are Love not that Faith the worse that ye never hear a threatning but ye tremble at it and are touched by it in the quick 2. It 's a good token of Saving Faith when it hath a discovery and holy suspition of Unbelief wairing on it so that the Person dare not so lippen and trust his own Faith as not to dread Unbelief and to tell Christ of it There is a poor Man that comes to Christ Mat. 9.23 24. to whom the Lord faith If thou canst believe or canst thou believe yes Lord says he I believe help thou mine unbelief there was some Faith in him but there was also Unbelief mixed with it his Unbelief was so great that it was almost like to drown his Faith but he puts it in Christ's hand and will neither deny his Faith nor his Unbelief but puts the matter sincerely over upon Christ to strengthen his Faith and to amend and help his Unbelief It 's a suspect Faith that 's at the top of Perfection at the very first and ere ever ye wot There are some serious Souls that think because they have some Unbelief that therefore they have no Faith at all but true Faith is such a Faith that is by and beside suspected and feared or seen Unbelief That Faith is surest where Folk fear and suspect Unbelief and see it and when they are weighted with their Unbelief and cry out under it and make their Unbelief an errand to Christ it 's a token there is Faith there 3. The third Character is That it will have with it a sticking to Christ and a fear to presume in sticking to Him There will be two things striving together an eagerness to be at Him and a fear that they be found presumptuous in medling with Him and an holy trembling to think on it yet notwithstanding it must and will be adventured upon the Woman spoken of Mark 5.28 lays this reckoning with her self If I can but touch his cloathes I shall be whole and she not only believeth this to be truth but crouds and thrimbles in to be at him yet vers 33. when she comes before Christ she trembles as if she had been taken in a fault not having dared to come openly to Him but behind him she behoved to have a touch of him but she durst not in a manner own and avouch her doing of it till she be unavoidably put to it It 's a suspect and unsound Faith that never trembled at minting to Believe there is reason to be jealous that Faith not to be of the right stamp that never walked under the impression of the great distance between Christ and the Person the sense whereof is the thing that makes the trembling I say not desperation nor any utter distrust of Christ's kindness but trembling arising from the consideration of the great distance and disproportion that 's between Him and the Person Faith holds the Sinner a going to Christ and the sense of its own sinfulness and worthlesness keeps him under holy fear and in the exercise of Humility Paul once thought himself a jolly man as we may see Rom. 7.9 but when he was brought to believe in Christ he sees that he was a dead and undone man before I give you these three marks of a true Faith from that Chapter 1. It discovers to a Man his former Sinfulness and particularly his former Self-conceit Pride and Presumption I was saith Paul alive without the Law once c. a man living upon the thoughts of his own Holiness but when the Law came I died he fell quite from these high thoughts A second Mark is A greater restlesness of the Body of Death it becoming in some respect worse Company more fretful and strugling more then ever it did before Sin revived saith Paul though he had no more Corruption in him then he had before but it wakened and bestirred it self more I dare say that though there be not so much Corruption in a Believer as there is in a natural Man yet it strugleth much more and is more painful and disquieting to the Believer and breeds him a greate dale more trouble for says the Apostle on the matter when God graciously poured Light and Life into me Sin took that occasion to grow angry and to be enraged that such a neighbour was brought in beside it it could not endure that as an unruly and currish Dog barks most bitterly when an honest Guest comes to the House so doth Corruption bark and make more noise then it did before when Grace takes place in the Soul There are some that trow they have the more Faith because they feel no Corruption stir in them and there are others that think they have no Faith at all because they feel Corruption strâ—gling more and growing more troublesome to them but the stirring and strugling of Corruption if Folk be indeed burdened and affected and afflicted with it will rather prove their having of Faith then their wanting of it Love that Faith well that puts and keeps Folk bickerring to say so in the Fight with the Body of Death for though this be not good in it self that Corruption stirreth yet Sin is of that sinful nature that it flies always more in their face that look God and Heaven-wards then of others that are sleeping securely under its Dominion A third Mark is When the Soul hath never Peace in any of its Conflicts or Combats with Corruption but when it resolves in Faith exercised on Jesus Christ as it was with Paul in that Chapter after his Conversion That is a sound Faith that only makes Peace at first by Christ but that cannot to say so fight one fair stroke in the Spiritual Warfare nor look Corruption in the face nor promise to it self an outgate from any assault of the Enemy but by Faith in Jesus Christ as it was with the Apostle who toward the end of that Chapter lamentably crys O! wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death yet immediatly subjoyns Faiths triumphing in Christ I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord he belike before his Conversion thought he could do well enough all alone but it is not so now when he can do nothing without Christ especially in this sore
the Elect as their Surety and Gods Justice pursuing and holding him in on the other side so that he cannot decline being sisted at the Bar of Justice because as it is vers 6. the sins of all the Elect met upon him and he having as it is vers 7. the bitter cup in his hand which by his engagement he was obliged to drink he stands there by the Decree of God and by the Covenant of Redemption tying him to satisfie and being pursued by Wrath and Justice the words come out Father if it be possible let this cup depart from me yet not my will but thine be done his engagement hemming him in and wrath pursuing him he stands betwixt these two as a prisoner and upon these two the Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all and he was exacted upon and answered for them follows well the third that he was put in prison for in these Verses the steps of our Lords Humiliation are followed out in a legal way as before the bar of Gods Tribunal 2ly This being our Lords posture we shall consider the effects of this pressure of spirit which we may draw to these four heads 1. He was under the sense of great Soul-pain sorrow and trouble for the cup of the wrath of God being bitter which he was to drink it could not but deeply sting his holy humane nature which was the procuring cause of his agony and that which made his soul sorrowful and brought out the bloody sweat 2. Beside his grief and dolour there was a holy horrour and considering the party that he had to do with it was impossible it could be otherways impossible for a finit though a sinless creature to look on an angry God and on wrath poured forth into the cup which it must needs drink and not to have a horrour at it it were not becoming the sinless humane nature of our blessed Lord not to be affected with a holy and sinless horrour at that most bitter cup which brought out that sad cry Father let this cup depart from me which did not proceed from any dislike he had to fulfil his engagement or from any rewing or unsuitable resentment that he had so engaged himself but from an apprehended sinless disproportionableness to speak so in his finit sinless humane nature to encounter with the wrath of his Father to which though he most willingly yielded yet in it self it was dreadful 3. There was a pinshing and straitning of holy fear as if there had been in him a sinless dispute or debate what will become of this can a man win thorow this though he was God as well as man how will this be gotten born This looks as if death would get the victory Thus it 's said Heb. 5.7 In the days of his flesh he offtred up strong crys and supplications with tears and was heard in that which he feared he put up strong crys to be delivered not from dying but from the power of death and was heard in that which he feared to shew a holy care to prevent death could that have been and a sinless fear of it lest it should swallow him up 4. There was a pinshing and straitning from love to the Father and to the doing of his Will and from love to the Elect and to their Salvation which pushed him forward to perform and fulfil his engagement accordingly Luk. 12.41 he says I have a baptizm to be baptized with and how am I straitned till it be accomplished and hence it was that these words were uttered by him Father not my will but thine be done and therefore though he had power to command twelve legions of Angels for his relief yet to speak so love binds his hands that he will not use his power for his own liberation But to guard this Doctrine from mistakes take a fourfold advertisement concerning this inward soul-pinshing which will help to clear somewhat of his Soul-suffering that followeth And. 1. Think not that there was any sinful or unsuitable confusion or perturbation of mind in our Lord such as useth to be in us there being no dreg of corruption in his mind to jumble or discompose his holy humane nature 2. Beware of thinking that there was any fretting or anxiety in him or any discontentedness with the Bargain his expressions shew forth the contrary for saith he I could command twelve legions of angels yet he would not do it 3. Think not that there was any jealousie in him of the Fathers love though there was a suspension of the comfortable and joyful sense of it yet there was not the least lousing of the faith of it as is clear by his doubling of these words My God my God when in his saddest pinsh he cried out as bâ—ing forsaken 4. Ye would not look on this as holding out any distrust as to the event I have saith he power to lay down my life and I have power to take it up again and I will rise again the third day he knew that the Covenant of Redemption betwixt the Father and him stood firm and sure But it 's the consideration of God's now coming as his Party to exact the Elects Debt of him and his standing at the Bar to answer for it which puts him in this agony and though considering Christ as man personally united to the God-head whereby he was keeped from sinking he had no distrust to be carried thorow yet considering him as Man suffering and that to speak so with reverence in such a divine subject there was an eclipse of that sensible joy that proceeded from the two natures together It 's not possible to conceive of Christ in this posture but wrath and anger behoved to be some-way dreadful or terrible to him The Uses are 1. To evidence the truth of what our Lord suffered and how severely he was pinshed and straitned It was not the Scribes and Pharisees pursuing him nor the Souldiers buffeting and mocking of him and carrying him to the high Priest's hall and from Pilate to Herod and back again that so much troubled him but there was a higher Hâ—nd that he had to look to and a Judge and Court to which he was now answering that was very far above theirs And therefore as a 2d Use of the Doctrine Think it not such a light thing as many do to satisfie Justice or to give God a ransom for Souls ye see how it pinshed the Cautioner and put him as in a prison unspeakably deceived are they who think that two or three formal words will make their peace with God and that they will slip in to Heaven so Be not carried away with this delusion but consider seriously what will become of you if ye be put to answer for your own Debt when he handled the Cautioner his own Son so roughly ye that will sleep on and scorn to let any word pick at you or prick you the Justice of God shall prick you and put you to
have it more abundantly There are two things that we would speak a Word to for clearing of the Doctrine And then make Use of it The 1. is How this can be God's Design in Christ's Humiliation to beget many Sons to Life 2. How Christ's Death Contributs to this Design For the First When we speak of God's Design hâ—re we mean not His last and ultimat Design but His immediat Design in the Gospel which is subservient to that His last and ultimat Design to wit The Glorifâ—ing of His Grace and Justice in giving the Mediator to Satisfie Justice for Dyvour Sinners who are not able to Satisfie for themselves and He having chosen this as the Midst to that highest end we may well say that this is His immediat Design in the Gospel that thereby the Glory of His Grace and Justice might be manifested For the 2d Which is How Christ's Sufferings contribute to this end It may be soon cleared if we consider that there is a twofold Let in the way of Sinners partaking of Life which Christ's Suff rings do remove The 1. Let is a standâ—ng Quarrel betwixt God and the Elect they having Sinned and having nothing to pay their Debt This our Lord Jesus by His Death removes He payes the Debt and tears the Obligation called the hand writing that was against them nailling it to his Cross Col. 2. And in this respect His Death is called a ransome for many And in the Words before He is said to have made his Soul an offering for sin On the same account to wit That the Principal Debâ—or might be set free The 2d Let is Mans utter unfitnesse to walk with God For though the Debt were taken away yet they have no Life But Jesus Christ by His Death hath laid down a ground how a Sinner may be reconciled to God and may partake of Grace here And so be in case to walk with God even while sojourning in the World in some good measure and of the Life of Glory hereafter His Sufferings are not only a Ransome for their Debt but also a Bridge to speak so to step over the Gulf of the distance thâ—t is betwixt God and them unto Glory whither He as the Fore-runner is gone before them In this sense we have our Graces as the Fruits of Chriâ—t's Suffâ—rings the Life of Grace Faith Love Perseverance c. We have also Protection Preservation and Guiding in the way till we be brought through to Eternal Life As that Word is John 6.39 40. cited before That of all whom the Father hath given me I should loss nothing In the First respect Christ is surity for our Debt In the Second respect He is surity for our Duty In the First Respect we are admitted into Covenant with God In the Second we are entertained in it by Him who lives for ever to make Intercession for us Use 1. See here Believers what ye are in the Fathers Debt for sending His Son And what ye are in the Sons Debt for coming to die for you Ye behoved to have born the Curse your selves if He had not born it but He took it on H mself that ye might be Freed from it Thus it stood with you ye deserved to be shut out for ever from God to have the Sword of His Justice awakened against you And he gave his back to the smitters and his cheecks to them that plucked of the haire And was content that the Sword of Justice should awake against Him and smite Him that He might by His strips heal them and by His Death procure Life to them Yea it stood thus with you and it could not be otherwayes The Justice of God being provocked and the Elect being under the Curse as it is Gal. 3.10 Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things written in the Law to do them Ezek. 18.4 The soul that sins shall die Either they behoved to die or the Cautioner and our Lord was content to be a Sin-offering thereby to set Sinners free To be lifted up on the cross that he might draw all men after him to pay their D bt which all the Creatures could never have payed And therefore we would asâ— you if ye think Heaven and Glory to be of Worth and if ye think it to be a great mercy to be free from the Wrath to come and from the Damned State and Condition of Reprobat Angels and of Reprobat Men and Women in Hell And to be admitteâ— to enter with Abraham Isaac and Jacob into the Kingdome of God and into these Hâ—avenly Mansions Are ye not much in Chrisâ—'s Debt that procured this for you and at such a Rate that thereby Life might be communicate-to you who were Naturally Dead in Trespasses and Sins whatever the rest of the World think of it if any of you be Born again as you ought in a special manner to think much of it so ye will do in some measure for ye are as much in Christ's Common as all that is worth who was content that Poor Sinners should partake of Him and of the Life that is in Him to taste of Hâ—mself and who hath said Because I live ye shall live also In aâ—most wonderful way His Dâ—ath is the Price by which Life is Communicated to Us And it would become Bâ—â—â—â—vers well to be often reckoning what they are in His Debt It 's an of God's great Ends in the Work of Redemption even to have Sinners esteeming highly of and much Ravished with His Grace and with His Love brightly shinning in the way thereof yet less Conscience is made of this then of many other Duties by Believers We will send an Ear to a Practical Point of Doctrine and will some way ayme to mind it If we be bidden pray we will pray if we be commanded to Mortifie Sin we will endeavour it and so in other Duties But who minds this as a Dutie when we are called of God to Admire and Praise His Grace and Love and Humbly to Glory in Him so as seriously to set our selves to fall about it And yet this were a most Native Proper and Kindly Exercise for Believers even like the Work of those who say Salvation to our God that sits upon the throne and unto the Lamb Rev. 7.10 To him who loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood c. Rev. 1.5 To be taken up with such sweet Soliloquies in our selves about this Subject and with such Songs of Praise to Him who hath given us so noble a Beeing and Life which is convoyed to us by His Blood is sure a suitable Use of this Point For if our Life be of much Worth He must be of Infinitly much more Worth in Himself and should be so to us who purchased it at such a Dear Price The 2d Use is to exhort you whom we suppose to be renewed as some of you now hearing me are and O! that all of you were that when ever ye
as it 's one of the things that it seeks in Prayer so it 's one of the things that it eyeth in Repentance It 's much affected with the want of it confesses it to Him and aggredges the Sin thereof against it self from this ground that it loves nor Christ as it should I know not if there be much of this among us many will be sorry if they fall in drunkenness or in any other gross Sin but O! how few repent of their want of Love to Christ and that He gets not His own room in the heart 3. Where this Love is it is ever Suâ—picious and Jealous lest the heart cliver anâ— cleave to some other thing and give it room to the prâ—judice of Christ It 's a sad thing when folks let their affections go our at random and are not afraid lest they out-shoot themselves in loving the World their Pleasures their Credit c. But rather they are like the whore in the Proverbs who sayes come and let us take our fill of loves Love to Christ hath a Weanedness from these things and a Jealousy least they usurp a room in the heart that is not due to them Because as John sayes There is not a consistency betwixt the love of God and the love of the world in the heart and therefore it 's the watchfull care of a poor Bâ—liever to keep out inordinat love of the World and of these things that the heart is given to go a whoreing after Hâ—nce David prayes Psal 1â—9 Incline my heart to thy law and not to covetousness and Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity There is in too many a sort of râ—oted confidence that they love Christ and they nâ—ver suspect themselves of the contâ—are when yet some other thing hath his room 2dly There is ground here to exhort you to believe on Him as the Prince of Life and a Saviour that is well fitted and qualified to give Repentance and Remission of Sins And this is the very native Use that flows from this Doctrine even to lay a solid ground of Faith to a Soul lying under the sense of Sin to step forward to Godâ— Bar with confidence Considering Jesus Christ Crucified and put to Soul-travel for Elect Sinners who should betake themselves to Him Which if it had not been there had not been any ground for Faith And the lower He came in His Sufferings we have the more native and broad ground of Faith and the stronger motive to draw us to take hold of Him and to found and fix our Faith on His Satisfaction To clear this Branch of the Use a little 1. Consider here a ground for Faith in a fourfold respect And 2. The force of the motives that arise from these grounds pressing a sensible Sinner to exercise Faith on them or on Him by them And 3. The necessity that we are under so to do For the First 1. In general There is ground here to bring the heart to be through in the Historicall Faith of what is spoken concerning the Truths of the Covenant For doth not this Soul-travel of Our Lord say That Men are lying Naturally in a sinfull Condition and obnoxious to Wrath That there is a Covenant past betwixt the Father and the Son for delivering of Elect Sinners out of that Condition and that by the Sufferings of the Mediator And that by our betaking of our selves to Him we may be fred from Sin and Wrath Otherwayes why did the Mediator come thus low except it had been true that man was under a Debt that he could not pâ—y And why â—id the Father send His Son except He had been really minded that He should offer Himself up a propitiatory Sacrifice to God for Mans Sin And His accepting of the Satisfaction tells plainly that He was content that the Cautioners Payment should stand for the Principal Debtors All this supposeth a Covenant which is as real as if we had seen and had been Ear-witnesses of the reading over of the Covenant in all the Articles of it we wish that many were come this length as to be confirmed in the Historicall Faith of the General Truths of the Gospel summed up in Christs Sufferingâ— And there cannot be any serious Râ—ading or Hearing of Christs Sufferings but theâ—e must also be some considering of their Riâ—e and End if it be otherwise we do but superficially run over them 2. As this shews the Lords Seriousness in pressing the offer of Redemption on Sinners so it calleth you to be Serious in accepting of it According to that in John 12. When I am lifted up I will draw all men after mâ— Where Christs lifting up is made an Attractive to draw lost Sinners after Him And can their be a greater ground of Faith or a stronger motive to perswade a Sinner to be reconciled to God and to rest upon Christs Satisfaction in order to that then this That Jesus Christ hath purposly laid down His Life and undergone Suffering even to such an extremity to bring it about 3. When we say that Christ's Soul-travel calls for Faith It requires this and gives ground for it That they that betake themselves to Christ for Justification before God may confidently commit themselves to His guiding in all other things For will He not be tender of them in these when out of respect to them when there was not a Covenant betwixt Him and them though they were mentioned in the Covenant of Redemption He laid down His Life and Suffered such things for them May we not from this Reason as the Apostle doeth Rom. 8. He that spared not his own son but gave him to the death for us how shall he not with him also freely give us all things Can there be a greater ground for Sinners that fear to give Him credit to trust Him with all things that concern them then this That He suffered so much for them 4. Having betaken our selves 〈◊〉 Him it serves to confirm our Faith and to bring us to the quieting of our selves in resting on Him and acquiescing in Him For what more could we require for ouâ— settlement and quieting then this That Hâ— hath come so low and condescended so faâ—â— for the behove of poor Sinners Therefore in all these respects let me exhort you and in His Name Who was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in him Obtest you not to keep at distance from Him but take with your Sin by Faith to fl e unto Him and to the efficacy of His Blood O! Yeeld your selves by Faith to Him for use making of Him for your Juâ—tification And a little more particularly let me here speak a word to two soâ—ts of Persons 1. To them that are yet strangers to God 2. To them that are looking towards Christ And 1. For you that are strangers to God whose hearts were never yet â—ffected with the Conviction of the necessity of believing who can lye down and rise up without
I could never have expected mercy 2. In the solid Faith of a Believer there is as an Use-making of Christ Crucified allenarly as the meritorious Cause of Justification and Life So he is exercised in this to be allenarly settled on Him as such As for presumptuous Souls as they find it easy to believe so they find it easie to believe and to rest on Him only but as the true Believer hath it for one Piece of Exercise to Him how to win to Christ so it 's a Second Piece of Exercise to Him to get Him rested on only and to get Him as Crucified made the Ground of his Faith As the Apostle insinuates when He sayes 1 Cor. 2.2 I determined to know nothing among you but Christ Jesus and him crucified Where we have three Grounds of Sâ—ving Faith or Knowledge 1. Jesus Christ 2. Him as Crucified and 3. A determining to know no other thing but Him to rest upon for Life and Salvation It 's in this Respect that the Apostle Philip. 3. Doth count all things to be but loss and dung and cast as it were all over board that he may wâ—n Christ and be found in Him Many find it no difficult business to rest on Christ only and to keep out other things from being joyned with Him and never once suspect themselves in this by any thing But the Believer as I just now said hath here an Exercise and Difficulty to get Christ alone rested on so that nothing else be in the least rested on Because he knows nothing else to be a sure Foundation and because he knows that it 's natural to him to rest on other things beside Christ 3. The true Believer is taken up not only to have a sure Ground to build on but also to have his own Gripping at and Building on that Ground made sure It 's his exercise to have it out of question that his Faith is true Faith and not Presumption or Guessing To have the Grace of Faith Actually and Really taking hold of or apprehending Christ Whereas another that presumeth and hath only an Opinion or Conjecture in place of Faith As he is in his own Opinion easily brought to Christ so he finds it easy to exercise believing on Him he will it may be grant that he cannot Sanctifie the Sabbath-day and yet he can believe as if Believing were less difficult then to Sanctifie the Sabbath So many will grant that they cannot Pray and therefore do decline Worshipping of God in their Families who yet will confidently say that they can believe and that they do believe alwayes as if believing were lesse difficult then to Pray for a quarter or half a quarter of an hour But where solid Faith is the exercise of it is a difficult thing and the Person that hath it hath a holy Jealousy of it And the experience of many others and of himself sometime telling him that he may be mistaken he is often trying it and doth not nay he dar not trust much to it and is put often with that Man spoken of Mark 9. To cry and sometimes with tears Lord I believe help my unbelief He dar not trust much to his own Grip and therefore hath recourse to Christ to get it sickered and to have Him taking and keeping the Grip of his Grip as it was with the Apostle Phil. 3.12.4 When Believers have betaken themselves to Christ they have a new Exercise to know that it is so indeed It 's not only an Exercise to them how to Ground their Faith right how to quite all other things and to betake themselves to Christ only and to cast their burden on Him But it 's an exercise to thâ—m to clear that it 's Christ indeed that they rest on or to be clear that they have rested on Him It 's no good token when folk are soon Satiâ—fiâ—d with their Believing and never put it to the Tryâ—l And this is it that mâ—kes many go on guessing till they come to Death which makes a devorce betwixt them and their fancied Faith and discovers it to be but a Delusion Wheras it is Believers Work to try whether they have and to know that they have believed which they win not soon to know and the Reason is because the sense of Sin the apprehension of Wrath and their love to God and to Christ the Mediator with their desire to enjoy Him suffer them not to be quiet till they be sicker We may see all the Four together Philip. 3.7 8 9 10. Where the Apostle speaking of his case when he was a converted Christian in opposition to what it was when he was a Pharisee and thought himself to be very well and a strong Believer sayeth What things were gain to me I counted loss for Christ yea doubtless I count all things to be but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them but dâ—ng that I may win Christ and be found in him not having mine own righteousness c. The oâ—jâ—ct he would be at is Christ The manner how is Not having mine own righteousness The meâ—n through whâ—ch is Faâ—th in Him This is it that brings him to Union with Him And then he would know experimentalâ—y that he doth know Him savingly as a Believer in Him By finding the power of his resurrection by having fellowship in his sufferings And by being made comformable unto his death Whereby he would prove and make out to his own Quieting and Consolation that he is indeed a Believer The Bâ—liever is never right till he be in Christ and it s his Exercise to be quit rid of all other things and to rest upon him alone neither doth he rest here but he must be clear that he is in Him and that he hath fellowship in His Sufferings and Conformity to His Death This we would recommend to you as your main study as ever ye would comfortab y evidence to your selves your believing in Him SERMON XLVI ISAIAH LIII XI Vers 11. He shall see of the travell of his soul and shall be satisfied by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many for he shall bear their iniquities THE Bargain of Redemption is a great Bargain and we may say that it is a good Bargain wherein the greatest things that ever were imagined are transacted The sum whereof is in these two 1. What shall be the Satisfaction that must be given to the infinit Justice of God or what shall be the amends that must be made to God for the Satisfying of His Justice for the Sins of all the Elect and that is compended in these Words The travel of Christs soul That is the condition or these aâ—e the Terms on which only the Lord Jehovah will Tryst to speak so and He will Tryst on no other Terms 2. What shall be the Satisfaction that the Mediator shall have for all His Sufferings and Soul-travel
is not this a gross believing of the Lord God shall beat back many of your vain confidences in your faces and your hearts shall tremble and your faces wax pale when God shall cause your Charge and Summonds to come unto Judgement sound in your Ears These and such like confidences will never bear you through it is not these we speak of Yet 2ly We say that the right exercise of Faith wants not it's own confidence comfort and assurance when taken in a right sense much whereof is attributed by by some to the definition of Faith for some mistake Faith and others are mistaken or misunderstood in their speaking of Faith Some Divines that writ of Faith speak of it's being an assurance defining it at it's hight yet generally they take in and presuppose the active Act of Faith resting on Christ others define it by these two Acts a receiving of and resting upon Christ Therefore we would never conceive of them at least of many of them as making this assurance to our sense to be essential and absolutely necessary to the being of Justifying Faith much lesse would we think that they mistaken and passe by the true Acts of receiving and resting upon Christ only some of them which we humbly think is their mistake having to do with Papists who place Faith in the understanding adde an assurance of Faith to the Former Acts In which we say there is a ground of confidence or a conditional assurance upon supposition that Souls receive Christ and rest upon Him they may be confident that that is a ground that will not fail them They may be confident that He will not deceive them a confidence in this that they may step to or lean upon Christ and not fear that He fail them or that they may without all fear of hazard cast themselves on Christ Therefore He is called a tryed elect precious corner-stone a sure foundation and indeed that is no small ground of confidence That when a Soul comes to Christ by believing it may be sure He will not fail it 2. Being sure that we have committed our selves to Christ which supposes Faith's being put to exercise and practice there may be a confidence in this respect we may be sure He will not fail us in particular 2 Tim. 1.12 I know in whom I have believed and that he is able to keep that I have committed to him and that I shall not be ashamed He puts both these together I know that He is able and that He will not fail me I shall not be ashamed So Rom. 8. I am perswaded that neither death nor life c. shall be able to separat us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus If Souls have received the offer they may be sure it will not misgive them 3. Adde that this actual or active resting on Christ may be seperat from the sense of it or from the passive Act of Faith or quietnesse that follows on resting on Christ for there is a resting on Christ which is very Faith it self and not the effect come and ye shall find rest coming is before finding of rest to our sense at least we are not to knit this passive rest with the other active Act of resting as if it were impossible to rest on Christ without present sensible ease Beside it is this active resting that gives us right to Christ and not the passive Gal. 2.16 We believe that we may be justified This necessarily goes before our believing that we are Justified To close with a Word of more particular Use let me exhort you to lay lesse weight on your bare thinking that ye believe on your present ill grounded hope and peace Aim and endeavour to Act and exercise Faith on Christ actively receiving and resting on Him for winning to Peace This practice of Faith is the over word to say so of the Doctrine of Just fication That seing there is such ground of Justification laid down the Righteousnesse of Christ and that it is proposed to you and seing this is the very Act of Justifying Faith to receive and rest on Christ as He is proposed and offered when this offer is made to you let your Faith receive take hold of and consent to the bargain and ground and found your Defence here for answering all challenges that the Law and Justice may present against you That there was a Saviour offered to you and that ye received Him and rested upon Him will be a ground that shall bear you out when ye come before God and except this be made sure our speaking and your hearing of Faith will be to no purpose SERMON LX. ISAIAH LIII XI Vers 11. By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many For he shall be or their iniquitâ—eâ— THis is a great assertion and of mighty moment wherâ—in to the Knowledge of Christ the Justification of many is attributed and indeed if we knew what an advantâ—ge and benefit it were there would be nothing more studied then how to obtain it For it is the vâ—ry in let and opens the door to Glorification and if to be happy in the enjoyment of God be a benefit of great concerment then this of Justification must be so We proposed to speak of the way how this benefit is applyed and that is by Faith set out under this expression His knowledge or the knowledge of him and touched on the benefit of Faith and the necessity thereof for attaining Justification God having so ordered it in the Covenant that none others should be Justified but such as have Faith 2. We spoke also to the Object of this Faith Christ Jesus as our Righteousnesse and Peace So that Christ becomes in a peculiar manner the Object of Faith beside any other thing Because it 's only in Christ it can find a shelter Therefore it 's only to Christ that it flâ—es when it is pursued 3. We spake likewise of the nature of this Faith or it's Act it being the hearts trusting it self to Christs Righteousnesse whereon it hazards the weight of it's Peace and relyes here And as all the Terms of Justification are borrowed from Law wherein there is supposed a Charge a Tribunal and a Judge So is this resting in like manner It 's in effect an arraigned Persons making of Christ's Righteousneesse his Legal Defence against all Challenges The substance of the phrase is in that of Philip. 3.9 That I may be found in him not having my righteousness c. Where presupposing a lybelling and Charge where to does the Apostle betake himself and what is his refuge It 's Christ and His Righteousnesse even to be found in Him as if the question were proposed Paul what wilt thou do in the day of Judgement what wilt thou lean to for a Defence in that day To which he answers not to my own Righteousnesse but this is it even to be found in Him which he expones to be the having on His Righteousness by Faith
they have been in earnest though it hath been but with Moral seriousness that blows them up upon which ground it is that many shuffle in Prayer in the place of Saving Faith and when they Pray with warmness they trow they Believe when in the mean time they never knew what it was in good earnest to lay themselves over on Chist Jesus therefore when we invite you to Believe this is another thing we would bid you beware of that ye put not a flash of Sense in the room of Faith 3. There is yet a more subtile though no less dangerous Mistake that ye would beware of and that is When Faith is confounded with Obedience and is looked on in Justification as a piece of new Obedience with Love Repentance and other duties of Holiness so some think they Believe because they have some Natural awe of God in their Walk and some fear of Sin and do perform some duties of Religion and walk Honestly as they think according to the Rule which is to confound the Covenant of Works and of Grace and to make the Covenant of Works a Covenant of Grace or to turn the Covenant of Grace into a Covenant of Works only with this difference that though their works be not perfect but defective yet wherein they are defective they think there is worth in their Faith to make up that want and to supply that defect and so by Faith they think they will obtain the acceptation of their works and of their Persons on account of their works they look upon their works as pleasing to God but because they are not perfect they will believe or exercise Faith to make up their defects to which the way of Grace is quite contrary which makes the Tree first good and then the Fruit This way that many take is not to draw the evidences of Believing from works of Holiness which is warrantable but the founding of Faith or their hope of Heaven on works and the use they make of their Faith is to ward off Challenges for the imperfection of their works and to make Faith procure aeceptance as I just now said to their works and acceptance to their Persons for their works sake 4. Beware of that which ye ordinarily call a certain assurance or sure knowledge of your Salvation and that all the Promises are yours whereby ye think your selves in no hazard a hope and assuâ—ance of Heaven that ye can give no ground for nor proof of only ye think ye are sure of Pardon of Sin and coming to Heaven and that ye are obliged to maintain that groundless hope but that is not Saving Faith for it 's a hope of Heaven that can give you no right to Christ there must first be a fleeing to Him and closing with Him before ye can have any true and well-grounded hope of Heaven but your hope and confidence is never to question the matter ye are like Laodicea who thought her self rich and to stand in need of nothing when she was beggerly Poor or like these Men who when God was threatning them with Judgement yet would needs presume to think that they leaned on the Lord I think among all the Persons that God hath indignation against it 's in a special manner against these who have this sort of hope and to whom God discovereth the groundlesness of it and yet they will still stoutly maintain and stand fast by their hope it 's to these He speaks Deut. 29.19 who despise and tush at God's Threatnings and say We shall have peace though we walk in the imagination of our own hearts and add drunkenness to thirst the Lord there pronounceth a Curse and to the Curse addeth an Oath that He will not spare such Persons but will separate them for Evil and cause all the curses of the Law to overtake them judge ye now what a condition this is for Persons to be in to be believing that all the Promises are theirs and yet in steed of that to be in the mean time lyable to all the curses threatned in the Word of God it 's this that we call presumption and the hope of the Hypocrite that will perish Job 8.13 the confidence of such shall be rejected and sweeped away as a Speeders Web and shall be rooted out of their Tabernacles and bring them to the King of Terrours they think they Believe always when they are not troubled nor disquieted they never want Faith but have a great deal of it which yet is but a guessing which cannot support and uphold them when they come to a straiâ— when they are more secure they Believe very well and they think when they are more awaken'd and disquiet'd they believe less and their fancied Faith ebbeth quite on them when they hear of any exercise of Mind or trouble of Conscience in others they wonder that they wil not Believe and all this work is to maintain their deep Security and strong Delusion this is then the fourth thing ye would beware of for it 's not the Faith that will turn away the Complaint Who hath believed our report and yet how many are there of this sort who say they shall have Peace and please themselves with this their good Hope say the Word what it will O! be perswaded that this is nothing else but woful Unbelief and Presumption and we preach to you Terrour and the Curse of God though ye cry Peace to your selves the Lord complains of such Persons Jer. 5.12 saying They have belyed the Lord He sent His Prophets to denounce Judgments in the days of Josiah when there was a fair profession of Religion and Reformation yet they would believe and hope that no evil should overtake them That which we aim at in this part of the Use is to make way for what follows even to give you a cleanly ground for exercising of Faith on Jesus Christ when all these Stumblings and Mistakes are rolled out of the way We therefore exhort you to lay your Hand to your Heart and narrowly to try if ye have called or accounted any of these to be Saving Faith for there are hundreds nay thousands that perish under these Pretexts deceiving themselves and deluding others with a Faith they were born and brought up with and they have no more but their groundless hope to prove their Faith by and they will stick by it be said to them what will but be not deceived for God will discover you ye think a strong presumption is Faith and that ye can by such a Faith drink in the Promises but God will make you vomit them up and ye shall be declared to be void of Faith in the great Day therefore be more jealous over your Faith and seek to have your grips of Christ sickered which is done when from the belief of your Hazard and Self-emptyness and of Christ's fulness ye go to Him and close with Him to make up all ye want in Him and this Faith is especially qualified by
all we have said of the Warrand of the Gospel to Believe is to no purpose Christ never counted it Presumption to desire and endeavour in His own way to believe on Him for attaining of Life through Him To desire Heaven and Peace with God and to misken Christ and pass Him by were indeed Presumption but it is not so to desire these through Him 6. When ye have attained to this Heart desire if ye cannot distinctly to your satisfaction act Believing on Christ ye would firmly resolve to believe and essay it and say This is the way I will and must take and no other as David saith Psal 16.2 O my soul thou hast said unto the Lord thou art my Lord Hence the exercise of Faith is called a choosing of God Deut. 30.19 and Josh 24. and seriously sincerely and firmly to resolve thus is our Duty when we can win to do no more and it is no little advancement in Believing when such resolution to Believe is deliberatly and soberly come under 7. When this is done Folks would not hold at a resolution for to resolve and not to set forward will be found to be but an empty resolution therefore having resolved though still looking on the resolution as his gift we would set about to perform and believe as we may and when we cannot go we would creep when we cannot speak words of Faith we would let Faith breath when it can neither speak nor breath distinctly we would let it pant In a word to be essaying the exercise of Faith and often renewing our essays at it which if we did we should come better speed in Believing then we do thus though ye were walking under a Conviction that ye would do no more at this then a Man whose Arm is withered can do to streatch it forth yet as the Man with the withered Hand at Christ's word of Command essayed to streatch it forth and it went with him or as the Disciples when they had toiled long even all the Night and caught nothing yet at Christ's word let down the Net and inclosed a multitude of Fishes so though ye have essayed to act Faith often and yet come no speed yet essaying it again on Christ's calling to it it may and will through Grace go with you 8. When yet ye come not speed as ye would your short-coming would be bemoaned and complained of to God laying open to and before Him the Heart who can change it and ye would have it for a piece of your weight and burthen that your Heart comes not so up to and abides not so by Believing I would think it a good Frame of Spirit when the not having of the Heart standing so fix'd at Believing is an Exercise and a Burthen 9. When all this is done in some measure ye would wait on in doing thus and would continue in this way looking to Him who is the Author and Finisher of Faith for His influence to make it go with you to look to Him to be helped is the way to be helped to Believe or to Pray to Him to better and amend Faith is the way to have it bettered and amended it 's said Psal 34.5 They looked to him and were lightened and their faces were not ashamed And if it be said How can one look that sees not It 's true blind Folk cannot look yet they may essay to look and though there be but a glimmering as the looking makes the faculty of Seeing the better and more strong so the Exercise of Faith makes Faith to encrease this is it that the Psalmist hath Psal 30. v. last Be of good courage and he shall strengthen your heart all ye that hope in the Lord that is if ye be weak wait on and He shall strengthen you Believe and give not over though to your Sense ye come not speed Beginners that are looking conscienciously to their way though they have but a glimmering weak sight of Christ and be as the Man that at first saw Mâ—n walking as Trees yet if they wait on they may attain to a more distinct seeing and to a more close and firm gripping of Christ We close with this word of Advertisement That as we speak not of these things as being in Man's power to be performed so neither can they be gone about to purpose but where there is some Faith and Love yet when they are at first looked on they are some way more within our reach then the distinct Exercise of Faith which is a great Mystery The Lord bless His Word and make it useful to you SERMON IX ISAIAH LIII I Who hath believed our report And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed IF Folks soberly and gravely considered of what concerment it is to make use of the Gospel and what depends upon the profitable or unprofitable hearing of it how serious would both Speakers and Hearers be This same poor mean and contemptible-like way of Speaking or Preaching is the ordinary way that God hath chosen to save Souls even by the foolishness of Preaching as the Apostle hath it 1 Cor. 1.21 and where Ministers have been tender how near hath it lyen to their Hearts whether People profited or not They that will read Isaiah how he resented and complained of it and how he was weighted with it will easily be induced to think that he was in earnest and that it was no little matter that made him thus cry out Who hath believed our report We shew that four things were comprehended in the words First That the great Errand of Ministers is to bring the glad Tydings of Jesus Christ the Saviour to Sinners Secondly That it is the great Duty of People to believe and receive the Offer of Jesus Christ in the Gospel Thirdly That it is the great Sin of a People that Hear the Gospel not to believe and receive Jesus Christ when He is offered unto them The fourth and last thing which now we are to speak of having gone thorow the first three is That the great and heavy Complaint that a faithful Minister of the Gospel hath is when these good News are not received and welcomed when they have it to say Who hath believed our report when it is but here one and there one that closes with Christ Considering these words as they hold out the Prophets Resentment and Complaint we shall from them draw four Observations which we shall speak shortly to and reserve the Use and Application to the close of all Observ 1. The first is That its meet for and the Duty of a Minister of the Gospel to observe what Fruit and Success his Ministry hath among a People and whether they Believe or not Isaiah speaks not here at random but from consideration of the Case of the People and as observing what fruit his Ministry had among them we would not have Ministers too curious in this as to the state of particular Persons neitner would we have them selfy or anxious
to Believe is That the Sinner would actually stretch out that Faith as the Souls Hand for the receiving of Christ and for the Application of Him to himself and would actually cast himself upon the Satisfaction of Jesus Christ for covering that Sinfulness that is in him and would catch hold of and grip to Him that is an able Saviour for keeping the Sinner from sinking under the weight of Sin that he lieth under This is the Exercise and Practice of Faith when it flows from the general Doctrine of the necessity of believing such things to be Truths in themselves and when it 's extended and put forth in Practice that we who are so certainly and sensibly lost must needs share of that Salvation which we believe to be in Jesus Christ and so for that roll our selves on Him The first piece of Sense may be in a Reprobate the second piece of Faith that there is a sufficient Salvation in Christ to be gotten by them that believe in Him may be in a Devil But this third of actual use-making of the Satisfaction of Christ for paying our Debt and rolling our selves upon Him that 's the Faith and Exercise of it that is peculiar to a sound Believer and the very thing that constitutes a Believer and it is that which we commend to you that ye may not stand and please your selves with looking only upon Christ but that ye may cast and roll your selves over upon Him that Christ may get your Weight and that all your Burthens and Wants may be upon Him which to do ye must be enabled by the mighty Power of Grace whereof in the next part of the Verse The second Branch of the Use which follows upon this is That we would desire you not only to follow this way of making your Peace with God but to follow the trying and proving of it to your own satisfaction that ye may be warrantably confident that it is so There is a great difference betwixt these to believe in Christ and to be clear and certain that we do believe in Him As there is a necessity of the first without which there cannot be Peace with God so there is a necessity of the second though not simply as without which there can be no Peace with God yet upon this account as without which we cannot be so comforted in God And seing there are so many who do not Believe who yet think themselves to be Believers and seing there is nothing more common among the Hearers of the Gospel then to reject Christ offered in it and to Misbelieve and yet nothing more common then to be confident that they do Believe There is good ground here to exhort you to put your Faith to the Touch-stone that ye may know whether ye can abide the Trial and whether ye may confidently assert your own Faith upon good ground and abide by it We would think if it were remembred and seriously considered how great a scarcety there is of Believers and how rare a thing it is to get any to receive Christ that Folk needed not be much pressed to put their Faith to the Trial and when there will not be one among many found who will pass under the account of a real Believer with Jesus Christ should not the most part suspect themselves seing the most part that hear the Gospel are the object of this Complaint Who hath believed our report or very few have believed it ye would study to have some well grounded confidence in this that ye are not guessing and presuming and going upon grounds that will fail you at last but that ye be in case to say on solid grounds with the Apostle I know whom I have believed c. There is a Faith and Hope that will make many ashamed and certainly in the day of Judgment when Christ shall have to do with these Persons that never once thought to be thrust away from Him they of all Men shall be thrust away from Him with greatest Shame O! the confusion that will fill and overwhelm them who had a profession of Christ and yet had never the root of the matter in them above and beyond many others Dare many of you upon the confidence ye have look Death in the Face It 's no great matter to be confident in the time of Health but will ye then be able to comfort your selves in the Promises of God do not promise to your selves the things in the Covenant except ye be endeavouring in God's way to be sure ye are Believers indeed Our Life depends upon our Faith but our Consolation depends much upon our clearness that we have Faith and that we are in Christ and therefore there is much need to press this upon you There is no way to rid you of the Terrours of God and to make you comfortably sure of your particular Interest in the Promises of God but by making it sure and clear that ye are Believers in Christ indeed There are three or four sorts of People to whom we would speak a little here 1. There are some who think that if they could do other Duties though they should never do this to wit to make their Calling and Election sure they would be and do well enough Are there not many of you that never so much as set your selves to try whether your Faith would abide God's tryal or not Ah! Ah! an atheistical Indifferency a slighting of the Consolations of God aboundeth amongst many so that they think the Promises and the Consolation that is to be gotten in the Promises are not of so much worth as to be thereby put to take pains to try and see whether they belong to them or not but the Day will come that many of you will curse your selves for your neglecting and slighting of this A second sort are these who because they were never sure of Peace with God themselves and because they were never sure of their own Faith neither ever concernedly endeavoured to be they think it 's all but fancy that 's spoken of assurance of Faith and of Peace with God they think it 's but guessing at the best There is such a sort of Persons who think they may be doing as they dow and need not trouble themselves with such fancies or nice things but if ye ask them what will come of them at last they will tell you they will lippen that to God Think ye it for nought that God hath laid so many Commands on you to make your Calling and Election sure and think ye it for nought that He hath given so many Marks to try it by and that some of the People of God do holily and humbly glory and boast so much of their Communion with God out of their assurance of His love to them and of their special interest in Him do not all these say that there is such a thing as this to be had There is a third sort that please themselves with meer
Grace of God exercised within Mens Hearts as well as the Word is preached outwardly to the Ear wherever Faith is begotten these two go together the Word without and the power of Grace within the one of which is distinct from the other 2. That this powerful internal and immediate work of Grace within is not common to all the Hearers of the Gospel but a rare and peculiar thing to some to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed it's but one or few of many to whom it 's revealed To these we have spoken already 3. The third is which indeed holds out the scope of all that there is an inseparable connexion betwixt these two the begetting of Faith in the Hearers of the Gospel and the application of this powerful work of the Grace of God for working of it so that where this powerful work of Grace is not there is never Faith nor Conversion wrought and where this powerful work of Grace is there is Faith and Conversion The Prophet makes them reciprocal and commensurable who is the Believer he to whom the Arm of the Lord is revealed and who is the Unbeliever he to whom the Arm of the Lord is not revealed These two are so conjoyned and knit together as they are never separated and so they must stand or fall together That we may be the more clear we shall take up the Doctrine in two distinct Branches The first whereof is That except the powerful work of God's Grace concur the most powerful preaching of the Gospel will never beget Faith in the Hearts of the Hearers of it The second is That where-ever this powerful work of Grace goes along with the preaching of the Gospel or wherever the Lord applyes His Grace with the Word preached there Faith is begotten in the Heart and that Soul is effectually united to Christ and savingly changed The one of these Branches serves to shew the necessity of God's Grace from the consideration of our sinfulness and impotency or inability and of the emptiness and ineffectualness of all outward Means in themselves and so to stop all Mens Mouthes as being utterly unable to contribute any thing to their own spiritual Good or Conversion that being the product of the Grace of God The other Branch serves mightily to commend the Grace of God as being the powerful Arm of the Lord that brings to Believe that calls and converts such and such Persons according to a prior engagement and transaction betwixt the Father and the Son As for the first of these It will easily be believed among Men and Women that have any true sense and feeling of the Corruption of their Nature and find dayly somewhat of the Law of the Members warring against the Law of the Mind and we are perswaded if all that ever received Faith were brought to depone in this matter they would bear witness that there is no Mean that without the effectual Power of the Grace of God can bring a stranger Sinner to close with Christ and believe on Him and if all that are now before the Throne of God in Heaven were called to speak to this great Truth they would put their seal to it and say Not unto us but to thy Name be the glory of our believing we had never believed if it had been left to the power of our own Free-will and if the power of thy Grace had not wrought in us the very Will as well as the Deed or Act of believing Yet because this Doctrine as we said serves to discover the sinfulness and impotency of Nature and how little we are obliged to our selves in this great work and to hold forth the absolute necessity of the Grace of God and how much we are obliged to it in the work of Faith and Conversion and to hold forth withall the emptiness and ineffectualness of all outward Means without this Grace and because it wants not its own considerable opposition from the enemies of the Truth we shall give you some Grounds for confirmation of it The first whereof is drawen from these express instances of Scripture wherein it is clear That there hath been much powerful Preaching and by the most eminent Preachers and yet the generality of People have been fruitless under it and their fruitlesness hath been brought to this very Ground to wit that the work of God's Grace and His out-stretched Arm went not along with it The first instance is Deut. 29.4 That Moses was a skilled Preacher who will deny he being faithful in all the House of God yet says he after much and long Preaching and after many Signs and Wonders wrought the Lord hath not given you an heart to perceive nor eyes to see nor ears to hear unto this day where he not only puts a difference betwixt the preaching of the Word without and the work of Grace within but shows the necessity of the concâ—rrence of the work of Grace and lays the great weight of the Peoples profiting or not profiting on the wanting or having of that A second instance is in this Prophet Isaiah were there any among all the Preachers before or since that preached in a more Evangelick strain then he did and yet when he hath complained of the paucity of Believers saying who hath believed our report he fixes and stays on this as the cause to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed And Chap. 6.9 10. he gives an account of the sad Commission he had from the Lord who said to him Go and tell the people Hear ye indeed but understand not and see ye indeed but perceive not make the heart of this people sat c. where there is also a clear distinction made betwixt the inward working of Grace and the outward Ministry A third instance and one that is beyond all exception is in our bless'd Lord Jesus who spake as never man spoke and preached with such power and life that even carnal Hearers wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth for he preached with Authority and not as the Scribes and yet Joh. 6.44 when they begin to murmure at Him what says He Murmure not at these things none can come to me except the Father draw him none can Believe except the powerful Grace of God work Faith in him there must be a higher hand then ought ye see or hear a more powerful work then any external Preaching of mine as Prophet of my Church ere a Soul can believe on me and though his Hearers were not free of the guilt of this their Unbelief but had their own sinful accession unto their continuing in it yet our Lord looks in on the soveraign way and work of Grace and holds there telling them that his external Ministry will not do the turn but there must be an inward powerful immediate work of Grace for the working of Faith We add a fourth instance and it is of that chosen Vessel Paul who laboured more abundantly then all the rest of
grave and composed frame of Spirit is better then a light and unsettled frame it being very hard if not impossible to keep the Heart right even where there is Grace but where there is some counterpoise or wither-weight and it must be far more impossible to keep it right where the work of Grace is not or but in the very first beginnings of it and though I do not call this composedness of frame Grace yet it keeps Folk in some capacity as it were to receive Grace It 's said Lam. 3.27 28. That it 's good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth he sitteth alone and keepeth silence because he hath born it upon him he puts his mouth in the dust if so be there may be hope for though Crosses are not always blessed to Conversion yet we may see now and then that sad times are the beginnings of better times and even in Hypocrites their sad times ordinâ—rily are their best times I neither desire nor allow any to bring Crosâ—es upon themselves yet I would desire all to make the best use of any Cross they are under and to be acquainting themselves with their Sin and Infirmities and with their Hazard and with such other things as may weight and compose them without fostering discouragement and aâ—xiety and to love as well to speak and hear such things spoken of as may provoke to sighing and sadness as these that may provoke to laughter I said of laughter saith Solomon Eccles 2.2 it is mad and of mirth what doth it and Prov. 14.13 Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful and the end of that mirth is heaviness though oft times our Laughter may not be so sinful yet it readily more indisposeth us for any spiritual Duty then Sorrow doth the Heart is like a Clock whereof when the inner wheels are set a reeling it is not soon righted and setled 7. I would propose Ephraim's example to you Jer. 31.18 19. and desire that ye would in the fight and sense ye have of your sinfulness weakness fecklesness be bemoaning your selves and your sad condition to God putting up that Prayer to Him Turn thou me and I shall be turned These words flowing from suitable sense are good and then follows after that I was turned I repented It 's observable that in the very entry he is graciously taken notice of by the Lord Surely I have beard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus so it is with God's People when they consider how great Strangers they have been to God how sinful and stubborn and how impossible it is for them to mend themselves of themselves they retire themselves into some corner and there bemoane their case and cry out O! what a sinful nature is this and when will it be got amended I am as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke says Ephraim and the Lord tells He heard and observed it when possibly he thought he was scarcely if at all Praying but rather sighing out as it were a short ejâ—culation to God O! that I were amended the last word of his Prayer is Turn thou me and I shall be turned or convert me and I shall be converted he sees that when all is done he must cleanse his hands and leave the matter to God I cannot but thou canst work the work and it ends sweetly in words of Faith for thou art the Lord my God and where words of Faith are after serious exercise that exercise hath oft times Faith going alongs with it hence are these words Lam. 3.20 If so be there may be hope Psal 119 Incline mine heart open mine eyes c. and Luk. 9.13 How much more will your heavenly Father give his Holy Spirit to them that ask him it's good to pray for the efficacy of Grace and to offer our selves Subjects to be wrought upon and Objects to receive what Grace offers to us As we began these Directions with a word of Caution so we would close them Do not think that these things in a Natural Man following this sinful course will bring forth Grace neither conclude that where these things only are discerned and no more in some Persons that there Grace is wanting it being to help such forward that we mainly speak to them Only in sum 1. Keep clean and clear the Light ye have 2. Improve the strength bestowed And 3. What ye have not put it over on God and seek from Him who hath Grace to give for working that in you and it would seem that in reason ye should refuse none of these three 1. We say Keep clean and clear your Light for if ye detain the Truth of God in unrighteousness and make as it were a Prisoner of it by setting a guard of corrupt Affections about it ye may bring on blindess 2. Improve what strength ye have for if ye improve not your strength were it but in Natural parts and endowments that makes you inexcusable when Spiritual and gracious qualifications are denied to you for ye have procured this to your selves are there not many things that ye thought your selves able for that ye never seriously once essayed much more might have been done as to Repentance Love to God Charity to others and the like and when ye have not stretched your selves to the yondmost in these there are sure many things left undone that ye might have done 3. What ye dow not do or find your selves unable to do put it on God to do for you seriously humbly singly and self-deniedly for if ye come not to God with that which ye are unequal and unable for ye are still on this side your duty and without excuse Take these then together Improve any strength ye have according to any measure of Light God hath given you and coming to God through Jesus Christ seek that ye want from him and leave the acceptation of your Persons and of your Performances on Him This is the result of all that we have spoken of this Doctrine of Grace that ye may not take occasion from the way of Gods dispencing Grace to continue graceless which if ye do it will be ground of a most grievous challenge against you but that ye may see an excellent consistency betwixt the soveraignty of Grace and your going about the means appointed of God in order to Faith and Conversion and the study of Holiness and that ye may go on in the use of these Means with an Eye to Grace in the sense of your own insufficiency to think as of your selves so much as a good thought leaving all your Duties at Christ's feet walking before him with a stopped Mouth when any thing is wanting standing at his Door and begging it from him and when any thing is received cleansing to say so your own Hands of it and giving him all the Thanks Praise and Glory of it To him be Praise for ever SERMON XVII ISAIAH LIII II III. Verse 2. For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant
so that as he himself saith Luke 24.26 O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to have entered into his glory therefore he behoved to be in an Agony and to sweat great drops of Blood to be crucified and die and to be laid in the Grave 2. These things which we call accidentally due to Sin are mainly two 1. That horrible desperation of the damned in Heâ—l where they gnaw their tongues for pain and blaspheme God This we say is not properly and essentially the desert of Sin but only accidental 1. In respect of the Creatures inability to bear the wrath that Sin deserveth and hence ariseth not only a sinless horrour which is natural but a sinful desperation 2. Add to this inability of the Creature the enmity thereof whereby it cometh to thwart with and contradict the will of God hence the desperation not only ariseth but is increased Now our Lord Jesus not being simply a Creature or a Man but God and Man in one Person he was able to bear the sorrow and wrath due to the Elect for their Sin and and there being no quarrel nor ground of any quarrel betwixt God and him on his own account though he had a natural and sinless horrour at the cup of his Fathers displeasure when put to his head yet he had no sinful desperation The 2d thing accidentally due to Sin is the eternal duration of Wrath or of the Curse because the Sinner being a meer Creature cannot at one shoke meet with the infinite Wrath of God and satisfie Justice at once therefore the Lord hath in his Wisdom and Justice found out a way of supporting the Creature in its beeing and continuing it for ever under wrath because it cannot being finit satisfie infinite Justice But our Lord being God and Man being of infinite worth or value and of infinite strength was also to satisfie Justice and bear at once that which the Elâ—ct could never have born yet he had the essentials of that which sin deserved to wit death and the curse to meet with and did actually meet with them as the hiding of his Fathers face and the suspending and keeping back of that consolation that by vertue of the personal union flowed from the God-head to the Man-head And he also had the actual sense and feeling of the wrath of God the awaked Sword of the Justice of God actually smiting him so that men wondered how he could be dead so soon We shall only add a word or two of reasons for clearing and confirming the Doctrine and for proof of it these three things concur 1. That sins deserving by God's appointment is to have sorrow following on it 2 That by God's appointment according to the Covenant of Redemption the Son of God undertook that same very debt that was due by the Elect. And 3. That it was God's design not to pass one of their sins without satisfaction made to Justice but to put at the Cautioner for them all for the declaration of the riches and glory of the free grace of God when the sinner is liberat and not put to pay Anâ— for the declaration of the holy severity and justice of God when not one farthing is owing but the Cautioner must needs pay it and that both these meeting together there may be to all generations a standing and shining evidence of the unsearchable riches both of Gods Grace and of his Justice This is a sweet Doctrine and hath many massie substantial and soul refreshing uses Out of this eater comes meat and out of the strong comes sweet This being the very marrow of the Gospel holding out not only Christs sufferings but that he suffered not at randome or by guess but that he suffered the sorrows and griefs that we should have suffered and though the equivalent might have been received yet he would needs undergo the same sufferings in their essentials Which may exceedingly confirm the Faith and Hope of believers in him of their exemption and freedom from the wrath and curse of God seing he suffered the same that they should have suffered had not he interposed betwixt them and it as their Cautioner and Surety Use 1. Hereby we may know what an evil and bitter thing sin is that hath such effects Would God we could once prevail this far with you as to make you take up and believe that sin hath sorrow and grief inseparably knit to it and that the sinner is miserable and liable to death and to the curse of God and there is no difference but this that sinners are insensible how miserable they are and so in greater capacity to be made obnoxious to that misery Do ye mind this O sinners that God is angry with you every day That indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish is to every soul of man that does evil That God will by no means clear the guilty Tremble to think upon it Many of you pass as gay honest folks who will be found in this Roll And would ye know your condition and the hazard that ye run It 's of wrath and of the curse of God eternally with desperation and blasphemy And if that be misery sin is misery or brings it And the day comes when there shall be a storm from Heaven of Fire and Thunder that will melt the Elements above you and not leave a stone upon a stone of these stately buildings on earrh about you in which day sinners will be confirmed in the belief of this truth That it is an evil and bitter thing to depart from the living God To press this Use a little There are two sorts of sinners who if they would soberly let the truth of this Doctrine sink in their minds they would see their folly The 1. sort are these whoâ—ly quietly under bygone guilt unrepented of as if the sorrow were past becâ—use the Act is so but think not so will the just God avâ—nge sin on his Son and will he let it pass in you Ye that will grant ye are sinners and are under convictions of sin ye had need to take heed what is following it As ye treasure up sin ye are treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath O! wrath is a heaping up in store for you A 2. sort are these that go on in sin whatever be said to the effects of it and will confidently put their hand to it as if there were no sting in it at all and drink it over as so much sweet liquor but of these stoln drinks that seem sweet in secreet will be vomited up again with pain torment and sorrow and either it shall be grief and sorrow to you in the way of repentance or eternal grief and sorrow when the cup of Gods wrath shall be put in your hand and held to your head for evermore Use 2. By this ye may see a necessity of making use of the Mediator
him And these are distinguished from these not given John 17.6 11. And are called his sheep Joh. 10.15 and 17. Therefore doth my Father love me because I lay down my life to wit for my sheep And all the strain of this Chapter being to shew Gods way of contriving and prosecuting the work of Redemption and Christs executing thereof according to the Covenant of Redemption All this spoken of Christs suffering must be expounded according to that ingagement 2. Whereas it is said v. 8. For the transgressions of my people was he stricken It is certain this our and us and we for whom Christ was stricken must be restricted to Gods people That is his peculiar people who are his by electing love as Christ saith Joh. 17.6 Thine they were and thou gavest them to me They are not his as all the World are his but are contradistinguished from the world as his own peculiar purposed designed people Sure all the World are not God's People in this sense therefore they are called his sheep and contradistinguished from these who are not his sheep Joh. 10.17 And therefore we are to look on these words our us and we as of equivalent extent with the peculiar people of God He carried the punishment of the sins of all Gods people that are his peculiar election 3. So v. 10. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin he shall see his seed Hence we gather this that these whose iniquities Châ—ist bare are Christs Seed and for these he purposely laid down his life as these whom he expected should be saved for satisfying of him for the travel of his soul and for no moe and these cannot certainly be all the World there being such contradistinction betwixt Christ Mystical or his Seed comprehending the Elect And the Seed of the Serpent comprehending the Reprobat and Wicked who are said to be of their father the Devil These are Christs Seed who are spiritually begotten of him and these doubtless are not all the World and for these only he suffered So that our sins here are the sins of all the Seed 4. Look to v. 11. where it is said By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many for he shall bear their iniquities Where it is clear whose sins they are that Christ bears it 's theirs who are justified by his knowledge or by faith in his blood and justification by faith in his blood and redemption by his blood are commensutable and of equal extent Now it being certain as to the event that not all the World nor all in the visible Church are justified by the Faith of Christ it must also be certain that the sins of others who are not nor shall not be justified were never purposly born by Christ And this ground as all the rest will be the more clear if we consider that it is given as an Argument why they must be justified because he hath born their iniquities A 5. ground may be gathered from the last words of the Chapter He made intercession for the transgressours Whence we may reason that Christ's intercession and his satisfaction are of equal extent he satisfies for no moe then he interceeds for Now it was not for all the World nor indefinitely and by guess for all in the visible Church that Christ did interceed but for them that the Father had given him out of the world John 17. v. 9. and v. 6. Thine they were and thou gavest them me And v. 10. All mine are thine and thine are mine Christs death being the ground of his intercession and it being by vertue of his death that he interceeded his death and intercession must be of the same extent He interceeds for such and such sinners because he hath payed a price for them that there may be a good account made of them at the last day The 1. Use of it serves to clear a great and precious truth concerning Gods Covenant and discriminating love whereby he hath put difference betwixt some and others 2. It serves to stir them up who are thus differenced to admire at and to commend his love who hath been graciously mindful of them when others are past by 3. It serves also to clear other Scriptures and this same Chapter and to teach us not to make common to all the priviledges bestowed on some peculiar ones and to guard us against the vilifying and prophaning of our Lords sufferings as if he had no special and peculiar design in them or as if they might be frustrated in the design of them contrary to the promises made to him of the Father And therefore here to obviat an Objection which is made from the 6 vers All we like sheep have gone astray Whence some would infer that it 's all who like sheep have strayed whose iniquities Christ hath born We say that that all is not meant to comprehend them whose iniquities Christ hath born only but to hold out the extent of straying or the meaning is not to shew that his suffering and satisfying of Justice extended to all that strayed but to shew that the Elect for whom he suffered had all of them strayed as well as others And this is like the reasoning which the Apostle hath 2 Cor. 5.14 If one died for all then were all dead The meaning whereof is not that Christ died for all that were dead but this is the meaning that all for whom Christ died were once dead so here while it 's said All we like sheep have gone astray It is to shew that the Elect strayed and esteemed him not as well as others and had Goâ—s curse lying on them as their due all Christ interposed and took it off them as well as others The Point might have also Use for Confirmation but we do not follow these 2. Surely he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows that is our griefs and sorrows who are his Elect his People his Seed who flee to him for refuge and are justified by his knowledge or by Faith in him and for whom he maketh intercession Hâ—nce Observe that Believers would endeavour the strengthening of themselves in the Faith of this that Jâ—sus Christ hath born their griefs and sorrows and hath satisfied Justice for tâ—en in particular they would study to be in case on good ground with the Prophet to say Surely he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows To make it sure that they are in the Roll of Elect Believers and Justified Persons To say with the Apostle Paul Gal. 3.13 He was made a curse for us And with the same Apostle 2 Cor. 5. ult to say He was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in him And to say with the Apostle Peter 1 Pet. 2.24 Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree they speak alwayes by way of application So in these places whereby we confirmed the Doctrine that Christ really bare that punishment of
such an end and yet so as he must flee into it ere he can plead for the benefit of the City So suppose a sinner to be fled to Jesust Christ by Faith he may plead for exemption from wrath by God's determining and appointing a Mediator for such an end And the Mediator Jesus Christ hath this priviledge conferr'd on him that he that thus flees unto him shall be safe Yet it is also suppos'd that such a sinner hath fled to him else he could not expect safety through him notwithstanding of Gods determining the Mediator for safety Thus we would have these three put together And yet as we said they differ for Gods determination is the efficient cause fountain of all Christs satisfaction is the meriâ—orious cause and our believing is the ground on which we have right to plead for the benefit of his satisfaction Even as the man that fled to the City of Refuge his safety was not by any vertue in his running but by God's determination yet his running to the City was requisite as the mids and except he run or fled to it he could not plead for the benefit of the City So our believing gives us ground to plead a right and title to Christ and his satisfaction without which we could not have that right But 2dly Because one will take up this under one notion and another under another To clear it therefore a little further we shall again consider in this Covenant these three steps 1. The determination of it as it is enacted in the Council of the God-head which in sum is this that such and such persons shall be satisfied for by the Mediator and his satisfaction accepted for them 2. The execution of this Covenant where we take in all our Lords sufferings all the stroaks and wounds that Justice pursued him with as Cautioner for the Elect and God's accepting and justifying of him and declaring his accepting of him and being well satisfied with what he did and suffered by his raising him from dead 3. The application of his purchase by his accepted satisfaction which consists in these 1. That these that were given to Christ on this condition that his satisfaction should stand good for them should be justified and saved that is that in due time application of his satisfaction should be made to the persons given him to to be saved by him Which takes in Christ's making intercession that Renewing-grace Faith c. may be given to such persons 2. That the work of the Spirit who as the Sanctifier begets Faith and perswads to imbrace Jesus Christ shall be given them Then 3. follows the Believers actual coming to Christ being sweetly and powerfully drawn to rest on him and his satisfaction Whereupon follows the application of the sentence of Justification and Absolution that results from the former So that whereas it was before Cursed is he that continues not in all things written in the Law Now it is He that believeth on Jesus Christ hath eternal life and shall never come into condemnation All these go and agree well together the Covenant as the ground Christ's satisfaction as the meritorious cause and the application of his satisfaction by Faith which entitles and gives the Believer a right to it The reason why we have so much insisted on this is that we may teach you to joyn respect to the Covenant of Redemption Christ's suffering and your believing together It will not be Faith that will justifie that is without respect to the Covenant Neither will the Covenant and Christ's satisfaction justifie without Faith yet ye would so put them together as the glory of Salvation through Grace may not lye on Faith but on God's everlasting Love and on Christ's satisfaction And indeed it is no little practick for a Soul sensible of sin in the exercise of Faith so to lay the weight of its Salvation on Christ and the Covenant as it neglects not running to Christ by Faitâ— and so to lay hold on Christ by Faith as it lay not the weight on Faith but on Christ and the Covenant As in the comparison before used suppose a man that had killed another unawares had been taken before he wan to the City of Refuge God's determination was not the cause of that but his not running or his not coming at the City So it may be that some are apprehended by the Justice of God that are less sinful than others yet the reason or câ—uâ—e is not in God's Covenant nor in Câ—rists want of worth but in the persons not running or not fleeing to Christ as to the City of Refuge and therefore they are not heard to plead for immunity by vertue of that satisfaction before the Bar of God A 2d sort of Uses are for exhorting and encouraging Sinners to come to Christ There is here then 1. A clear ground to our our Faith and a plain way opened to Heaven and a mighty encouragement to perswade Sinners to lay hold on Christ and to take this way for obtaining of life This Text opens as it were the gates of the City of Refuge and points out the way how to eshew the wrath which is to come There is a way here laid down in the Wisdom Justice Go dness and Grace of God which is made offer of in the Gospel and since it is so we beseech you that ye would not receive this Grace in vain but seing there is a Covenant well ordered and sure a Mediator and a Ransom provided and a way laid down how to come to Christ by Faith let all of you who come under the conviction of Sin and apprehension of Wrath step to and close with him and plead for Pardon by vertue of his Wounds and for healing through his Stripes with respect to the Covenant There are these four things here that will serve to give ground for this Application if we consider 1. The great ground of Faith that is here 2. The great reason we have to make use of this ground 3. The great encouragement we have so to do And 4ly The great necessity we have to make this Application A little to each of these But we shall premit one word to all and it 's this That considering you are all in tryfting terms with God whether ye live at a distance from him the Uâ—e will by way of Exhortation reach you or whether ye be brought to greater nearness under the sense of Sin and have some seriousness in seeking after God it will reach you for Consolation In a word we would exhort all and it may convince some comfort others But to the first thing we proposed We declare and proclaim this as a true and faithful saying that there is here an Everlasting Covenant wherein the salvation of the Elect is concluded through Christs satisfaction to Justice for them and a way laid down for making Peace betwixt God and all them that will thorowly renounce their own righteousnâ—ss and lay hold
being in themselves blind may come to Him for light being poor may come to Him for Gold to inrich them being â—â—ked may come to Him for garments to cloath them being ungodly may come to Him that He may Justifie them But alace People are for the most part sensless and regardless of their Sin and misery and therefore He gets no imployment from them Many sit very brave and fine here and have no Legal Bar on them to keep them from the Communion who yet have sleepy and sensless Souls and are ruining and destroying themselves This we assure you is the condition of many of you who never knew to make use of Christ and of His Righteousness and yet will boast of your Faith and of your good heart to God Away with your old presumptuous Faith take with your unbelief and presumption Say not ignorantly that ye shall do as ye can though ye cannot do as ye would ye are unsound at the heart mistaken about your spiritual state and know that the Devil by a deceitful heart is speaking out of you such language For it's enemies we are Commissioned to reconcile and it 's lost Sinners that Christ came to seek and save and ye see not your selves to be such and therefore ye care not for such offers of Grace But ah many of you if Grace prevent not will get a cold welcome from Christ at that Day and will be made sadly to smart for the slighting of many Precious Opportunities which God did put in your hand and whereof to make use ye had no heart SERMON LI. ISAIAH LIII XI Verse 11. By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many c. THere hath been much spoken from this sweet Scripture of Our Lord Jesus His Sufferings and somewhat also of the Promises made to Him that His Sufferings should not be for nought in these Words we have a compendiouâ— explication of the Effects that â—â—ow from them by which He shall be Satisfied for them all which ye may take up in these Four 1. The great benefit it selâ— that is holden out here and that is Justification 2. These to whom it shall come it is many so that His having a Seed spoken of v. 10. Is exponed here by this that many shall be justified 3. The way how this is derived to them by his knowledge which we shew is to be understood of Faith in Him 4. The ground from which this flows and on which it is built and that confirms it For he shall bear their iniquities And as it 's in the following v. He bare the sin of many And therefore they must be Justified it being but reason that these many whose iniquities He bears and whose Debt of Sin He payes should be Justified We may speak more particularly to the Explication of each of these as we come to them we shall then first expone and give the meaning of this Word Justification or to Justifie ere we come to the Doctrine because it will serve to clear it and will make way for it and so much the rather as it is the very hing of the Gospel and that on which our Salvation depends though yet but very little and very ill understood there being many that cannot tell what it is though there be not many Words more frequently mentioned in the Scripture and though it be that whereby a Person is translated from the State of Enmitie into the State of Friendship with God As for this Word To Justifie or Justification then there are three senses given of it Two whereof are Erronious and the last only is according to the mind of the Spirit of God speaking in the Scripture which we shall Clear and Confirm 1. Some take this Word Physically as if it were to make Just by the infusing of habitual Grace or by a Physical and Reall Change and so taken it is the same with that which we call Sanctification but in all the Scripture we know not one Place where necessarily the Word is so to be understood Although this acceptation of the Word is the great rise of the Popish Error in that Controversie concerning Justification 2dly Others take it for Gods Revealing Manifesting or Declaring the way how a Guilty Person comes to be Just and so to Justifie is for Ministers to teach the way to People how they may live holily As it is said Dan. 12.3 They that turn many to Righteousness c. By whâ—ch sense some Wickedly and Blasphemously detract from Christs Satisfaction as if His Justifying were no more but a teaching of Sinners the way how to be Juâ—â—â—fied to wit by living holily and justly But the Word that follows in the Text For he shall bear their iâ—iquities Cuâ—s the Throat of that Exposition for it is by Christs bearing of the punishment of the Elects Iniquities and for paying of their Debt that they come to be Justified Therefore the one is given for a Reason of the other 3dly Considering the Word according to the meaning of it in Scripture we take it for a Legal forensick or Court Word borrowed from mens Courts wherein a Person arraigned for such a Cryme is either Condemned or Absolved And when he is Absolved and Declared to be acquitted or made free from that which is laid to his Charge he is said to be Justified so is it before God and in His Court Justification is the freeing of a Sinner from the Charge that the Law giveth in against Him and the absolving and declaring of him to be free from the Guilt of Sin and from the punishment thereof which by the Sentence of the Law is due to Him The former two senses run to the making of a man to be inherently holy or without a Fault Which is as if a Guilty Man or a Criminal being sifted before a civil Court of Judicature were declared to be Innocent But this true meaning of the Word sets out a Man arraigned before Gods Tribunal and charged with Guilt and found Faulty but Absolved and Acquitted not because he wants Sin but because his Debt is payed and his Sins Satisfied for by a Cautioner Even as a Man that is called before a Civil Court for such a Sum of Money and is found lyable to the Debt but his Cautioner coming in and paying the Debt for him there is both in Reason and in Law just ground why that Man should be absolved and declared free of the Debt So is it here Christ Jesus taking on and satisfying for the Debt of the Elect and procuring Absoluâ—ion for them for whom He payed the Price there is Reason and ground in Law that they should be Justified and Absolved All these Opinions agree in these two 1. That Men naturally have Sin and that they must compt for it 2. That this Jusâ—ification whatever it be where it is doth fully Absolve and Acquit the Sinner and makes him free of Sin as to the Guilt the Punishment and Consequents of it Death and the
for our righteousnesses but for thy great mercies That is an improving aright of Christs intercession not to pray directly to him as a distinct party but to pray for mercy upon the account of his Intercession For what is for mercies sake in the latter is for the Lords sake in the former viz. because by him and by vertue of his Intercession mercy comes out unto us And this is a main use to be made of Christs Intercession to wit to have upon that ground an expectation of a hearing or to found our expectation of a hearing on that account and let it bear the weight of it as well it can 3. The right improvement of Christs Intercession hath this act of Faith That although there seem to be many difficulties and long off puting yet Faith upon the account of his Intercession will continue it's expectation of a hearing and it's looking for of what the person hath sought and stands in need of whatever cross dispensations thwart it's expectâ—tion and whatever signes of anger appear in the way of it's obtaining it waiâ—s on for all that Though Jonah be in the belly of the Wâ—ale and the weids wrapped about his head yet will he look towards his holy Temple So though a Soul have no life nor sense no inward â—â—isting nor arguments in the mouth yet acting on Christs Intercâ—ssion by Faith it will not leave nor give over it's suite considering that though it hath no ground of expectation of good from it self yet from Christs Intercessiâ—n it hath which is the improvement of that Heb. 7.25 He is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God through him c. If there were never so strong objections from unbelief and carnal reason and if it should be suggested ye have such and sâ—ch difficulties that cannot be overcome lying in the way of your Salvation and there is nothing in you concurring to make out your Salvation yet Faith sayes He is able to save to the uttermost or as the word iâ— he can save to the full or to the yond mosâ—â— and what is the ground because he ever lives to make intercession And this is the main thing to be taken notice of in improving of his Intercession when the sinner hath presented his suit or request to God through the Mediator to get his mind quieted on the account of Christs Intercession that it shall be answered even as a man who having a Cause to plead and geting an able Advocat who sayes to him I will warrand your cause quiets himself because of his undertaking So proportionably there is a weight laid on Christs Intercession by Faiths lippening to him which maketh the Soul to be without anxiety And this continued act of Faith doth not at all foâ—ter sin but strengtheneth rather to oppose sin quiets the mind and makes more humble and keeps a tranquillity in the Soul in bands as well as in liberty because it layes the weight of it's coming speed with God not on iâ—'s own argumenting but on the Mediators Intercession For as we shew from Revel 8. The prayerâ— of all Saints go up from his censer the weakest as well as the strongest because it 's his incense that makes them savoury 4. There is an improvement of Christs Intercession when any thing is obtained whether it be a mercy in preventing such and such a stroak or the bestowing of such and such a favour and that is when Faith derives not that mercy from nor attributs it to it 's own praying though it did pray and pray somewhat seriously but derives it from and attributs it to the vertue and efficacy of Christs Intercession and counts it self obliged to that as the rise of all the persons good and again by him returning thanks to God for it And this is a little proof of improving Christs Intercession Sometime when we want what we would have and are restrained we will improve all means to obtain yet when we have obtained there is but little acknowledgment of him therein which acknowledgment is our duty insinuat John 14.13 14. Whatsoever ye ask in my name I will do that the Father may be glorified in the Son And in this sense we ought to walk in the use of every mercy as beâ—â—iâ—g the acknowledgment of Câ—â—ists Intercession and to be affected with love to God and should withal have a new impression of it's obligation to be forthcoming for God upon the account of his Intercession Whereas the most part of foâ—k take their mercies and think not themselves to be in his common for them neither do they own him with thankful acknowledgment of them when they have gotten them even as a man who had gotten a favour through the mediation of another and should forget him would be very ingrate The making use of Christs Intercession in this respect is the improving of it for the awaking of our thankfulnâ—ss and the confirming of our obligation to him If we look through our life is there any day or hour but we will need something and be injoying something and the improving Christs Intercession thus would make the thoughts of Christ always fresh and lovely to us but we seek and get and enjoy as if a Mediator were not in heaven but as we acknowledge him in praying to him when we have need so when any thing is gotten we should acknowledge that we have received it and do enjoy it on the account of his Intercession who obtained it for us 3dly We said That this may be illustrat by similitudes And there are these Three whereby it may be illustrat The 1. is if we may call it a similitude the comparing of the use-making of his Intercession with the use-making of his Satisfaction wherein there is a resemblance we make use of his Satisfaction when we are convinced of our natural sinfulnesse and enimity and that we cannot make our own peace our selves yet hearing of his Satisfaction and having an offer of it and believing that His able to do our turn we hazard 〈◊〉 that ground to close with God in the Covenant And through the sense of peace come not for a long time yet we with confidence wait for it because the ground we lean on for it cannot fail proportionably to this we 〈◊〉 use of Christs Intercession when under a challenge we are convinced of a 〈◊〉 and daâ— not approach to God yet hearing tell that there is an Intercessouâ— in heaven who will undertake for them that imploy him we hazard confidently on that ground to propose our suits unto God and notwithstanding of difficulties expect and wait for an answer It may be Objected here that it seems there is no difference betwixt the improving of his Satisfaction and the improving of his Intercession Answer There is no difference in respect of the things fought nor in respect of the acts of Faith whereby we make use of the one and of the other nor in respect of the grounds whereupon