that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. And if there be any that think to shroud unpunished amongst the thickets of ignorance especially amidst the means of knowledge take notice of this though it may hide the deformity of Sin from your own sight for a time it cannot palliate it from the piercing eye nor cover it from the revenging hand of Divine Justice As you would escape then that wrath to come come to Wisdom's School and how simple soever ye be as to this World if you would not perish with the World learn to be wise unto Salvation And truly its mainly important for this effect That the Ministers of the Gospel be active and dexterous in imparting this Wisdom to their people If they would have their Conversation to be Holy and Peaceable and Fruitful c. The most expedient way is once to principle them well in the fundamentals of Religion for therein is their great defect how can they walk evenly and regularly so long as they are in the dark one main thing is to be often pointing at the way to Christ the Fountain of this Wisdom you bid them be Cloathed and Cloath them not How needful then is it that Pastors themselves be Seers indeed as the Prophets were called of old not only Faithful but wise dispensers as our Saviour speaks St. Luk. 12. 42. That they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 able and apt to Teach 1 Tim. 3. 2. Laudible is the prudence that trys much the Churches Store houses the Seminaries of Learning but withal it is not to be forgot that as a due Furniture of Learning is very requisite for this employment so it is not sufficient When one is duly enriched that way there is yet one thing wanting that grows not in Schools except this infused Wisdom from above season and sanctifie all other endowments they remain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 common and unholy and therefore unfit for the Sanctuary amongst other weak pretences to Christs favour in the last day This is one We have Preached in thy name yet says Christ I never knew you surely then they knew not him and yet they Preacht him Cold and Lifeless though never so fine and well contrived must those Discourses be that are of an unknown Christ. Pastors are called Angels and therefore though they use the secondary helps of knowledge they are mainly to bring their message from above from the Fountain the head of this pure Wisdom Pure If it come from above it must needs be pure originally yea it is formally pure too being a main treat of God's renewed Image in the Soul By this Wisdom the Understanding is both resigned and strengthened to entertain right conceptions of God in his nature and works And this is primarily necessary that the mind be not infected with false opinions in Religion if the Spring-head be polluted the Streams cannot be pure it s more important then men usually think for a good life But that which I suppose is here chiefly intended is that its effectively and practically pure it purifies the heart Act. 15. 9. said of Faith which in some sense and acceptation differs not much from this Wisdom and consequently the Words and Actions that flow from the heart This Purity some render Chastity The Wisdom from above is chaste 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The word is indeed often so taken and includes that here but it is too narrow a sense to restrict it to that only It is here an universal detestation of all impurity both of Flesh and Spirit as the Apostle speaks 2 Cor. 7. 1. Pride Selflove Profanness of Spirit and Irreligion though they do not so properly pollute the Body as carnal uncleaneness yet they do less defile the Soul and make it abominable in the sight of God Those Apostate Angels called unclean Spirits are uncapable of bodily defilement tho'indeed they tempt and inveigle Man to it their own inherent pollutions must need be spiritual for they are Spirits Idolatry in Scripture goes often under the name of Fornication and Adultery and indeed these Sins may mutually borrow and lend their names the one to the other Idolatry may well be called Spiritual unchastity and unchaste Love carnal Idolatry earthly mindedness likewise is an impurity of the Soul in the Apostles phrase Covetousness is Idolatry and so a spiritual pollution yea it may well share with Idolatry in its borrowed name and be called Adultery too for it misbestows the Souls prime affection upon the Creature which by right is God's peculiar This Purity that true Wisdom works is contrary to all pollution We know then in some measure what it is it rests to enquire where it is and there is the difficulty it is far easier to design it in it self then to find it among men Who can say I have made my heart clean Prov. 20. 9. Look upon the greatest part of Mankind and you may know at first sight that Purity is not to be lookt for among them they suffer it not to come near them much less do dwell with them and within them they hate the very semblance of it in others and themselves delight in Intemperance and all manner of Licentiousness like foolish Children striving who shall go furthest into the mire these cannot say they have made clean their hearts for all their Words and Actions will bely them If you come to the meer Moralist the World 's honest man and ask him it may be he will tell you he hath cleansed his heart but believe him not It will appear he is not yet cleansed because he says he has done it himself for you know there must be some other besides man at this Work Again he rising no higher than Nature hath none of this Heavenly Wisdom in him and therefore is without this Purity too But if you chance to take notice of some well skilled Hypocrite every thing you meet with makes you almost confident that there is Purity yet if he be strictly put to 't he may make some good account of the pains he hath taken to refine his Tongue and his publick Actions but he dare not say he hath made claan his heart it troubles his peace to be askt the question He never intended to banish Sin but to retire it to his innermost and best room that so it might ewell unseen within him and where then should it lodge but in his heart yet possibly because what 's outward is so fair and Man cannot look deeper to contradict him he may embolden himself to say he 's inwardly suitable to his appearance But there is a day at hand that shall to his endless shame at once discover both his secret impurity and his impudence in denying it After these there follows a few despised and melancholly persons at least as to outward appearance who are almost always hanging down their heads and complaining of abundant sinfulness And sure Purity cannot be expected in these who are so far from it
Affliction but shall be for ever happy in the blessed Vision of his Face To him be glory Amen SERMON IV. PREFACE EXternal worship doth openly acknowledge a Deity but want of inward sense in Worship secretly denieth it The Fool hath said in his heart there is no God 'T is strange to hear so much noise of Religigon in the World and to find so little Piety To present the living God with a carcass of lifeless Worship is to pay him with shells of Services and so to mock him And it is a more admirable long-suffering in him to defer the punishment of such Devotion then all the other Sins in the World The Egyptian Temples were rich and stately Fabricks A Stranger who had lookt upon them without would have imagined some great Deity within But if they entered as Lucian says laughing at them nothing was to be seen but only some Ape or Cat or py'd Bull or some other fine God like those To behold our fair semblance of Religion that frequent this house it would appear that we were all the Temples of the Holy Ghost But who so could look within us would find in many of our hearts Lust Pride Avarice or some such like secret Vice adored as a God and these are they that while our Bodies sit here do alienate our Souls from the Service of the Eternal God So that we are either altogether senseless and dead before him or if any fit of Spiritual motion rise within us we find it here and here we leave it as if it were sacriledge to take it home with us But did once that Spirit of grace breath savingly upon our Souls we should straight renounce and abhor those base Idols and then all the current of our affection would run more in this Channel our Services would then be spiritual and it would be our Heaven upon Earth to view God in his Sanctuary and the obtaining of the change is and should be one main end of this our meeting and that it may be the happy effect of it our recourse must be to the Throne of Grace by humble Prayer In the Name of our Mediator Jesus Christ the Righteous Isaiah LX. 1. Arise shine for thy light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee ADmirable is the worth and depth of Divine Providence this either we know not or at least seldom remember while we forget the wonders of Providence we direct our thoughts to baser objects and think not on it and while we forget the depth of Providence if at any time we look towards it we judge rashly and think amiss of it If this be true of that general Providence whereby God rules the World 't is more true of his special Providence towards his Church This is both the most excellent piece of it and therefore best worth the reading and also the hardest piece and therefore it requires sobriety in judging above all other things he that suddenly judges in this makes haste to err To have a right view of it it must be taken altogether and not by parcels Pieces of rarest Artifice while they are a making seem little worth especially to an unskilful eye which being compleated command admiration P. Martyr says well De operibus Dei. Antequam actum non est judicandum There is a time when the Daughters of Sion embrace the dunghil and sit desolate in the Streets as Jeremiah hath it in the 4th of his Lam. verse 5. And at that same time the voice of Babylon is I sit as a Queen and shall see no sorrow Isa. 47. All is out of order here But if we stay a while we shall see Sion and Babylon appointed to change seats by the great Master of the World Come down says he Daughter of Babylon and sit in the dust Isa. 47. 2. And here to Zion Arise shine for thy light is come and the Glory of the Lord is risen upon thee It is an entire Catastrophe both Parties find a notable alteration together That same hand that exalts the one ruins the other When the Sun rises upon the Church her Antipodes must needs be covered with darkness As we find it in the next verse to the Text. Darkness shall cover the Earth and gross Darkness the People but the Lord shall arise upon thee and his Glory shall be seen upon thee The Prophet elevated by the Spirit of God to a view of after Ages as clear as if present seems here to find his people sitting under the dark mantle of a sad and tedious night and having long expected the Suns return in vain before its time they give over expectation when it s near them and desperately sold themselves to lie perpetually in the dark Now the Prophet as it were standing awake upon some Mountain perceives the day approaching and the golden Chariots of the Morning of deliverance hasting forward and seems to come speedily with these glad news to a Captive People and sounds this Trumpet in their Ears Arise shine for thy light is come c. The very manner of expression is sudden and rouzing without a copulative Not arise and shine But arise shine c. The words have in them a clear stamp of relation to a low posture and obscure condition They suppose a people lying or sitting without light deep distress is that dark soil that best sets off the lustre of marvellous deliverances and among many other reasons of the Churches vicissitudes why may not this be one The Lord is more illustrious in the World by that deep Wisdom and great Power that shines when he raises and restores her from desperate Afflictions then if he had still preserved her in constant ease he seems sometimes careless of her condition and regardless of her groanes but even then is he waiting the most fit time to be gracious as our Prophet speaks And when it is time out of the basest Estate he brings her forth more fresh strong and beautiful than before Though you have lyen among the Pots ye shall be as the Wings of a Dove covered with Silver and her Feathers with yellow Gold Psal. 68. 13. Do with the Church what you will she shall come through and that with advantage Mergâ—s profundo pulchrior exilit as one says of Rome Keep the Church seventy years Captive yet after that she shall arise and shine more glorious then ever But surely the strain of this Evangelick Prophesie rises higher than any temporal deliverance Therefore we must rise to some more spiritual sense of it not excluding the former And that which some call divers senses of the same Scripture is indeed but divers parts of one full sense This prophecy is out of question a most rich description of the Kingdom of Christ under the Gospel And in this sense this invitation to Arise and Shine is mainly addrest to mystical Jerusalem yet not without some priviledge to literal Jerusalem beyond other people They are first invited to Arise and
where the benefit so far exceeds all possible thankfulness Ought you to serve and obey him Doubtless he hath for that purpose redeemed you with his precious Blood And truly there is no obedience nor service so full and so cheerful as that which flows from love Should you study conformity to Christ and labour to be like him Yes for this is to walk worthy of Christ then there is nothing assimulates so much as Love Men delight in their society whom they love and by their society they do insensibly contract their customs and become like them These Virgins that love Christ for his Graces they love to converse with him and by conversing with him they receive of his Graces and have a smell of his Persumes Not only do they by the smell of his Garments or such imposed Rights obtain the blessing but likewise smell like him by the participation of sanctifying Grace of his Wisdom and Holiness in a pure and godly Conversation abstaining from the impure Lusts and Pollutions of the World of his Meekness and Humility Never think that one and the same Soul can have much Pride and much of Christ ever the more Grace a man hath the more sense hath he likewise of his own unworthiness and Gods free mercy and consequently the more humility If you love Christ you cannot chuse but be like him in love to your Brethren This is expresly compared by the Psalmist to the precious Ointment poured upon Aaron's head that ran down to the very skirts of his Garments Our Head and High Priest the Lord Jesus hath incomparably testified his love to Believers whom he is pleased to call his Brethren they are far from equalling him either in love to him or one to another but they do imitate him in both This is his great Commandment That we love one another even as he loved us which is exprest both as a strange motive and a high example 'T is not possible that a Spirit of Malice and implacable Hatred can consist with the love of Christ. Finally should you be ready to suffer for Christ Yes Then love is that which will enable you and if you were inflamed with this fire then though burned for him that fire would only consume your dross and be soon extinguished but this would endure for ever By these and the like Evidences try whether you indeed love the Lord Jesus Christ and by these fruits You that profess to love him testifie the sincerity of your love and be assured that if you be now found amongst these Virgins that love him you shall one day be of the number of those Virgins that are spoken of Rev. 14. 3 4. that sing a new Song before the Throne of God If you hate the defilements of the World and be not polluted with inordinate affection to the Creature it shall never repent you to have made choice of Christ he shall fill your hearts with peace and joy in believing When you come to his House and Table he shall lend you home with Joy and sweet Consolation such as you would not exchange with Crowns and Scepters and after some few of these running Banquets here below you shall enter into the great Marriage Supper of the Lamb where Faith shall end in sight and Hope in possession and Love continue in perpetual and full Enjoyment where you shall be never weary but for ever happy in beholding the face of the Blessed Trinity To whom be Glory Amen SERMON IX PREFACE HOW true is that word of our Saviour who is truth it self Without me ye can do nothing severed from me as that branch that is not in me They that are altogether out of Christ in Spiritual Exercises do nothing at all 'T is true they may Pray and hear the Word yea and Preach it too and yet in so doing they do nothing nothing in effect They have the matter of good actions but it is the eternal Form gives being to things they are but a number of empty words and a dead service to a living God for all our outward performances and worship of the Body is nothing but the body of worship and therefore nothing but a Carkass except the Lord Jesus by his Spirit breath upon it the breath of life Yea the Worshipper himself is Spiritually Dead till he receive Life from Jesus and be quickned by his Spirit If this be true then it will follow necessarily That where numbers are met together as here pretending to serve and worship God yet he hath very few that do so indeed the greatest part being out of Christ and such being without him they can do nothing in his service Rom. VIII 7. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be THE ordinary workings and actions of Creatures are suitable to their Naure as the ascending of light things and the moving of heavy things downwards so the vital and sensitive actions of things that have life and sense The reasonable Creature 't is true hath more liberty in its actions freely chusing one thing and rejecting another yet it cannot be denied that in acting of that liberty their choice and refusal follow the sway of their nature and condition as the Angels and glorified Souls their nature being perfectly holy and unalterably such They cannot sin they can delight in nothing but in obeying and praising that God in the enjoyment of whom their happiness consisteth still ravish'd in beholding his face The Saints again that have not yet reach'd that home and are but on their Journey they are not fully defecated and refined from the dross of Sin there are in them two parties Natural Corruption and Supernatural Grace and these keep a strugling within them but the younger shall supplant the elder Grace shall in the end overcome and in the mean while though it be not free from mixture yet it is predominant The main bent of a renewed Man is Obedience and Holiness and any action of that kind he rejoyces in but the Sin that escapes him he cannot look upon but with regret and discontent But alas they that be so minded are very thin sown in the World even in Gods peculiar Fields where the Labourage of the Gospel is and the outward profession of true Religion unanimously received Yet the number of true Converts Spiritual-minded Persons is very small the greatest part acting Sin with delight and taking pleasure in Unrighteousness living in disobedience to God as in their proper Element and the reason is The contrariety of their Nature to our Holy Lord. The carnal mind is enmity against God The mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some render it the Prudence or Wisdom of the Flesh. Here you have it The Carnal Mind but the word signifies indeed an act of the mind rather than either the faculty it self or the habit of Prudence in it so as it discovers what is the frame of both those The minding as it
is used inâ—â— ver 27. conform to that of Moses Gen. 6. Every imagination of the thoughts of mans heart is only evil continually The word indeed signifies the wise thoughts so then take the full latitude of it thus The carnal mind in its best and wisest thoughts is direct enmity against God Carnal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What meant by the flesh here It is the whole corrupt Nature of man and that we may know by its opposition to the Spirit not to the Spirit or Soul of a man for so it hath no thoughts nor minding these being proper to the Soul but opposed to the Spirit of God Now the Corruption of Nature is called the Flesh not without very good reason not only to signifie the baseness of it the Flesh being the more ignoble and meaner part of a Man but because the greatest part of the sins of mens lives are about sensitive objects and things that concern the Flesh or the Body it lets in temptation of sin to the Soul by the doors of the Senses and it gives the last perfection or accomplishment to sin by external acting of it The very first sin that brought in Death and Misery with it upon Mankind the pleasure of the eye and of the taste were sharers in the guiltiness of it The carnal mind Man in regard of his composure is as it were the tie and band of Heaven and Earth they meet and are married in him A Body he has taken out of the Dust but a Soul breathed from Heaven the Father of Spirits a House of Clay but a Guest of most noble Extraction But the pity is it hath forgot its Original and is so drowned in flesh that it deserves no other but to go under the Name of Flesh. It is become the Slave and Drudge of the Body and as the Israelites in Egypt made perpetually to moyl in Clay What is all your Merchandise your Trades and Manufactures your Tillage and Husbandry but all for the Body in its behalf for Food and Raiment In all these the Mind must be careful and thoughtful and yet properly they reach it not for it self hath no interest in them It is true the necessity of the Body requires much of these things and superfluous custom far more but it is lamentable that men force their Souls to forget it self and its proper business to attend these things only and be busie in them They spend all their time and their choicest pains upon perishing things and which is worse engage their affections to them They mind earthly things whose end is destruction Philip. 3. 19. The same word that 's here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Will you consider seriously that your Souls run the hazard of perishing because you consider not their Spiritual Nature When that earthly Tabernacle of yours shall fall to the ground and e're long it must your Souls must then enter Eternity and though you had as large a share of earthly things as your earthly hearts now would wish they all lose their use in that moment they are not a proper good for the Soul at any time and least at that time If you keep it all your life long busie about the interest and benefit of the flesh the Body how poor will be when thy part having provided nothing at all for it self but the guiltiness of a sinful life which will sink it into that bottomless Pit Be forewarned then for to be carnally minded is death verse 6. precedeing the Text. The carnal mind Now as Sin hath abased and degenerated the Soul of Man making it Carnal so the Son of God by taking on our Nature hath sublimated it again and made it Spiritual The Souls that received him are Spiritualized yea as Sin made the Soul Carnal Grace makes the very Body to become Spiritual making it partaker and co-worker in spiritual things together with the Soul in doing and suffering and participant of the hopes too of an everlasting reward This is the main Christian Character our Apostle gives here that they are spiritually minded and that their actions suit their minds They walk not after the flesh but after the spirit whereas before with the rest of the World they were eager in the pursuit of Honours and Profits and Worldly Pleasures Now the stream of their desires run in another channel they seek after Honour and are very ambitious of it but it is such Honour as the Apostle speaks of in this Epistle Rom. 2. 7. By patient continuance in well doing they seek for glory and honour and immortality Their mind is upon profit and gain but it is with the same Apostle Philip. 3. that they may win Christ and they account all other things loss in comparison And their desires are after pleasure too but not Carnal Pleasures those are both base and of short continuance but the pleasures they aim at are those that are at Gods right hand and for evermore Psal. 16. 11. And that path of life he there speaks of that way of holiness that leads thither is their delight Spiritual Excercises they go to not as their task only but more as their joy and refreshment And this change the Spirit of God works in the Soul making it yea and the body wherein it dwells of Carnal to become Spiritual as the fire to which the Holy Ghost is compared refines Sand and Ashes and makes of them the purest Glass which is so neat and transparent Enmity against God Sin hath not only made us unlike God by defacing his beautiful Image in us not only strangers by making us wander far off from him but enemies nor enemies only but Enmity in the abstract for that is emphatical The carnal mind is Enmity nothing else but Enmity Now this Enmity is described in the latter clause of the Text by an Antipathy so to call it or Not-compliance with the Law of God it is not subject to the Law of God neither can it be to wit while it remains such There is an absolute impossibility in it to suit with the Law of God and consequently with God himself the reason lies in their opposits qualities God is spiritual and holy and so is the law as our Apostle hath it in the preceeding Chapter and the opposition he there makes betwixt his Unregenerate part and the Law is wholly true of the Unregenerate man The law is holy says he ver 12. And ver 14. It is spiritual to which too he opposes but I am carnal sold under sin Where are now those that so vilifie Grace and magnifie Nature Or shall I rather say Nullifie Grace and Deifie Nature Here is the best Elogy the Apostle will bestow upon the best of Natures Enmity against God Nay all the sparkles of Virtue and Moral Goodness in Civil Men and Ancient Heathens is no better besides many other things to be said to the Vertues of those Philosophers as ignorance of Christ by whom alone this enmity is removed I
This is the great point we ought to examine it for much is sowen and little brought forth our God hath done much for us what more could be done Yet when Grapes were expected wild Grapes produced what becomes of all Who grow to be more spiritual more humble and meek more like Christ more self-denying fuller of love to God and one to another Some but alas few All the Land is sowen and that plentifully with the good Seed But what comes for the most paâ—t Cockle and no Grain In felix lolium We would do all other things to purpose and not willingly lose our end not Trade and gain nothing buy and sell and live by the loss not plow and sow and reap nothing How sensible do we feel one ill year and shall this alone be lost Labour that well improv'd were worth all the rest Oh! how much more worth than all Shall we only do the greatest business to the least purpose Bethink your selves what do we here why come we here if we still remain as proud and passionate and as self-will'd as before what will all great Bargains and good Years and full Barns avail within a while That word Thou Fool this night shall they fetch away thy Soul how terrible will it be We think we are wise in not losing our labour in other things why 't is all lost even where most gained What amounts it to Cast up Vanity and vexation of Spirit is the total sum and in all our projecting and bussling what do we but sow the Wind and reap the Whirl-wind Sow Vanity and reap Vexation This Seed alone being fruitful makes rich and happy springs up to eternal life Oh that we were wise and that we would at length learn to hear every Sermon as on the utmost edge of time at the very brink of Eternity for any thing we know for our selves or any of us may be really so however it is wise and safe to do as if it were so Will you be perswaded of this It were a happy Sermon if it could prevail for the more fruitful hearing of all the rest henceforward we have lost too much of our little time and thus with the Apostle I beseech you I beseech you receive not the grace of God in vain Now that you may be fruitful examine well your own hearts pluck up weed out for there are still Thorns some will grow but he is the happiest man that hath the sharpest eye and the busiest hand spying them out and plucking them up Take heed how you hear think it not so easie a matter Plow up and sow not among Thorns Jeremiah 4. And above all Pray Pray before after and in hearing dart up desires to God he is the Lord of the Harvest whose influence doth all the difference of the Soil makes indeed the difference of success but the Lord hath the priviledge of bettering the Soil He that framed the heart changes it when and how he will There is a curse on all grounds naturally that fell on the Earth for mans sake but fell more on the ground of mans own heart within him Thorns and Briars shalt thou bring forth Now 't is he that denounc'd that Curse that alone hath power to remove it he is both the Soveraign owner of the Seed and changer of the Soil turns a Wilderness into Carmel by his Spirit and no ground no heart can be good till he change it And being changed much care must be had still of manuring for still that is in it that will bring forth many Weeds is a Mother to them and but a Step-mother to this Seed Therefore Consider it if you think this concerns you â—e that hath an ear to hear as our Saviour closes let him hear The Lord apply your hearts to this work and though discouragements arise without or within and little present Fruit appear but Corruption is rather stronger and greater yet watch and pray wait on it shall be better this Fruit is to be brought forth with patience as St Luke hath it And this Seed this Word the Lord calls by that very name the very Word of his patience keep it hide it in thy heart and in due time it shall spring up And this patience shall be put to it but for a little while the day of Harvest is at hand when all in any measure fruitful in Grace shall be gathered into Glory SERMON XIV 2 Cor. VII 1. Having therefore these promises dearly beloved Let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit perfecting holiness in the fear of God IT is a thing both of unspeakable sweetness and usefulness for a Christian often to consider the excellency of that estate to which he is called It cannot fail to put him upon very high resolutions and carry him on in the divine ambition of being daily more suitable to his high calling and hopes Therefore these are often set before Christians in the Scripture and are prest here by the Apostle upon a particular occasion of the avoidance of near Combinements with Unbelievers He mentions some choice promises that God makes to his own people and of their near Relatition to and communion with himself And upon these he enlarges and raises the exhortation to the universal indeavour of all holiness and that as 〈…〉 hi 〈…〉 In the words are 1. The Thing to which he would perswade 2. The Motive The Thing Holiness in its full extension and intension Purging our selves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit and perfecting holiness in the fear of God The purging out of filthiness and perfecting of holiness expâ—est as usually they are distinguisht those two parts of renewing grace Mortification and Vivification But I conceive they are not so truely different parts as a different notion of the same thing the decrease of sin and increase of grace being truely one thing as the dispelling of darkness and augmenting of Light So here the one rendred as the necessary result yea as the equivalent of the other the same thing indeed purging from filthiness and in so doing perfecting holiness perfecting holiness and in so doing purging from filthiness That Perfection by which is meant a growing progressive advance towards perfection The words without straining gives us as it were the several dimensions of Holiness The breadth purging all filthiness the length parallel to Mans composure running all along through his Soul and Body purging filthiness of the flesh and spirit the highth perfecting holiness the depth that which is the bottom whence it rises up a deep impress of the fear of God Perfecting holiness in the fear of God Cleanse our selves It is the Lord that is the sanctifier of his people he purges away their dross and tin he pours clean water according to his promises yet doth he call to us to cleanse our selves even having such promises Let us cleanse our selves He puts a new life into us and causes us to act and excites us
and dilated And this word signifies both a high raised Soul and is sometimes taken for proud and lofty but there is a greatness and height of Spirit in the Love of God and Union with him that doth not vainly swell and lift it up but with the deepest humility joins the highest and truest Magnanimity it sets the Soul above the Snares that lie here below in which most men creep and are intangled in that way of life that is on high to the Just as Solomon speaks Good reason hath David to join these together and to desire the one as the spring and cause of the other An enlarged heart that he might run the way of Gods Commandments Sensible Joys and Consolations in God do encourage and enlarge the heart but these are not so general to all nor so constant to any Love is the abounding fixed spring of ready Obedience and will make the heart chearful in serving God even without those felt comforts when he is pleased to deny or withdraw them In that course or race is understood constancy activity and alacrity and all these flow from the enlargement of the heart 1. Constancy A narrow enthralled heart fetter'd with the love of lower things and cleaving to some particular sins or but some one and that secret may keep foot a while in the way of Gods Commandments in some steps of them but it must give up quickly is not able to run on to the end of the Goal but a heart that hath laid aside every weight and the most close-cleaving and besetting sin as it is in that place to the Hebrews hath stript it self of all that may faulter or intangle it it runs and runs on without fainting or wearying 't is at large hath nothing that pains it in the race 2. Activity Not only holding on but running which is a swift nimble race it stands not bargaining and disputing but once knowing Gods mind there is no more question or demur I made haste and delayed not as in this Psalm the word is Did not stay upon why and wherefore he stood not to reason the matter but run on And this love enlarging the heart makes it abundant in the work of the Lord quick and active dispatching much in a little time 3. Alacrity All done with chearfulnes so no other constraint is needful where this over-powering sweet constraint of love is I will run not be hail'd and drawn as by force but skip and leap as the Evangelick promise is that the Lame shall leap as an Hart and the tongue of the dumb sing for in the wilderness shall waters break out and streams in the desart Isaiah 35. 6. The Spouse desires her Beloved to hasten as a Roe and Hind on the mountains of Spices and she doth so and each faithful Soul runs towards him to meet him in his way It is a sad heavy thing to do any thing as in obedience to God while the heart is straightned not enlarged towards him by his Divine Love but that once taking possession and enlarging the heart that inward principle of obedience makes the outward obedience sweet 't is then a natural motion indeed the Soul runs in the ways of God as the Sun in his course which finds no difficulty being naturally fitted and carried to that motion he goes forth as a Bridegroom and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race This is the great point that our Souls should be studious of to attain more evenness and nimbleness and chearfulness in the ways of God and for this end we ought to seek above all things this enlarged heart 't is want of this makes us bog and drive heavily and run long upon little ground Oh! my Beloved how shallow and narrow are our thoughts of God Most even of those that are truly Godly yet are led on by a kind of instinct and carried they scarce know how to give some attendance on Gods Worship and to the avoidance of gross Sin and go on in a blameless course 't is better thus than to run to excess of Riot and open Wickedness with the Ungodly World But alas this is but a dull heavy and Languid motion where the heart is not enlarged by the daily growing Love of God few few are acquainted with that delightful Contemplation of God that ventilates and raises this flame of Love petty things bind and contract our Spirits so that they feel little joy in God little ardent active desire to do him Service to Crucifie Sin to break and undo Self-love within us to root up our own Wills to make room for his that his alone may be ours that we may have no Will of our own that our daily work may be to grow more like him in the Beauty of Holiness You think it a hard saying to part with your Carnal Lusts and Delights and the common ways of the World and to be ty'd to a strict exact Conversation all your days But oh the reason of this is because the heart is yet straightned and enthralled by the base Love of these mean things and that is from the ignorance of things higher and better One glance of God a touch of his love will free and enlarge the heart so that it can deny all and part with all and make an entire renouncing of all to follow Him it sees enough in Him and in Him alone and therefore can neither quietly rest on nor earnestly desire any thing beside Him Oh! that you would apply your hearts to consider the excellency of this way of Gods Commandments our wretched hearts are prejudiced they think it melancholy and sad Oh! there is no way truly joyous but this They shall sing in the ways of the Lord says the Prophet Do not Men when their eyes are opened see a beauty in Meekness and Temperance and Humility a present delightfulness and quietness in them whereas in Pride and Passion and Intemperance there is nothing but vexation and disquiet And then consider the end of this way and this race in it rest and peace for ever 't is the way of peace both in its own nature and in respect of its end Did you believe that Joy and Glory that is set before you in this way you would not any of you defer a day longer but forthwith you 'd break from all that holds you back and enter into this way and run on chearfully in it the perswasion of these great things above would enlarge and greaten the heart and make the greatest things here very little in your eyes But would you attain to this enlarged heart for this race as you ought to apply your thoughts to these Divine things and stretch them on the promises made in the Word above all take Davids course seek this enlargement of heart from Gods own hand for it is here propounded and said before God by way of request see what is my desire I would gladly serve thee better and advance more in the way of thy
forbear to confess multitudes of offences that know themselves And who can chuse but seek thy Face that ever saw thy Face and that know thee In their affliction they will seek me early He that Prays not till affliction comes and forces him to it is very slothful but he that Prays not in affliction is altogether senseless Certainly they that at this time are not more than ordinary fervent in Prayer or do not at least desire and strive to be so cannot well think that there is any Spiritual life within them Sure it is high time to stir up our selves to Prayers and Tears all may bear arms in that kind of Service weak Women may be strong in Prayer and those Tears wherein they usually abound upon other occasions cannot be so well spent as this way Let them not run out in howlings and impatience but bring them by bewailing sins private as well as publick to quench this publick Fire and ye Men yea ye Men of courage account it no disparagement thus to weep we read often of David's Tears which was no stain to his valour That cloud that hangs over us which the frequent vapors of our Sins have made except it dissolve and fall down again in these sweet showers of Godly Tears is certainly reserved to be the matter of a dreadful storm be instant every one in secret for the averting of this wrath and let us now again unite the crys of our hearts for this purpose to our compassionate God in the Name and Mediation of his Son the Lord Jesus Christ. Job XXXIV 31 32. Surely it is meet to be said unto God I have born Chastisement I will not offend any more That which I see not Teach thou me If I have done iniquity I will do no more THE great Sin and the great Misery of Man is the forgetting of God and the great End and Use of his Works and of his Word is to teach us the right Remembrance and Consideration of Him in all Estates These words do particularly instruct us in the application of our thoughts towards him in the time of Affliction The shortness and the various signification of the words used in the Original gives occasion to some other Readings and another sence of them But this we have in our Translation being not only very profitable but very congruous both to the words of the primitive Text and to the contexture of the Discourse I shall keep to it without dividing your thoughts by the mentioning of any other Neither will I lead you so far about as to speak of the great dispute of this Book and the question about which it is held He that speaks here though the youngest of the Company yet as a wise and calm spirited Man closes all with a discourse of excellent Temper and full of grave useful Instructions amongst which this is one Surely it is meet to be said or spoke to God This speaking to God though it may be vocal yet it is not necessarily nor chiefly so but is always mainly and may often be only mental without this the words of the mouth how well chosen and well exprest so ever they be are to God of no account or signification at all But if the heart speak even when there is not a word in the mouth its that he hearkens to and regards that speech tho'made by a voice that none hears but he and is a Language that none understands but He. But it is a rare unfrequented thing this Communing of the heart with God speaking its thoughts to him concerning it self and concerning him and his dealing with it and the purposes and intentions it hath towards him which is the speech here recommended and is that Divine exercise of Meditation and Soliloquy of the Soul with it self and with God hearkening what the Lord God speaks to us within us and our hearts ecchoing and resounding his words as Ps. 27. 8 9. And opening to him our thoughts of them and of our selves though they stand open and he sees them all even when we tell him not of them yet because he loves us he loves to hear them of our own speaking Let me hear thy voice for it is sweet as a Father delights in the little stammering lisping Language of his beloved Child And if the reflex affection of Children be in us we will love also to speak with our Father and to tell him all our mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to be often with him in the entertainments of our secret thoughts But the most of Men are little within either they wear out their hours in vain discourse with others or possibly vainer discourses with themselves even those that are not of the worst sort and possibly that have their times of secret Prayer yet do not so delight to think of God and to speak with him as they do to be conversant in other Affairs and Companies and Discourses in which there is a great deal of froth and emptiness Men think by talking of many things to be refresht and yet when they have done find that it is nothing and that they had much better have been alone or have said nothing Our Thoughts and Speeches in most things run to waste yea are defiled as water spilt on the Ground is both lost cannot be gathered up again and it is polluted mingled with dust but no word spoke to God from the serious Sense of a holy Heart is lost he receives it and returns it into our bosom with advantage a Soul that delights to speak to him will find that he also delights to speak to it And this Communication certainly is the sweetest and happiest choice to speak little with Men and much with God One short word such as this here spoke to God in a darted thought eases the heart more when it is afflicted then the largest Discourses and Complainings to the greatest and powerfullest of Men or the kindest and most friendly It gives not only ease but joy to say to God I have sinned yet I am thine or as here I have born Chastisement I will no more offend The time of affliction is peculiarly a time of speaking to God and such speech as this is peculiarly befitting such a time And this is one great recommendation of affliction that it is a time of wiser and more sober thoughts a time of the returning of the mind inwards and upwards A high place Fullness and Pleasure draws the mind more outwards great light and white Colours disgregate the sight of the eye and the very thoughts of the mind too And Men find that the night is a fitter Season for deep thoughts It s better says Solomon to go to the House of Mourning then to the House of Feasting Those blacks made the mind more serious 'T is a rare thing to find much Retirement unto God much Humility and Brokenness of Spirit true Purity and Spiritualness of heart in the affluences and great prosperities of the
to excite it and call it up to act in the progress of sanctification Men are strangely inclined to a perverse construction of things tell them that we are to act and work and give diligence then they would fancy a doing in their own strength and be their own Saviours Again tell them that God works all our works in us and for us then they would take the ease of doing nothing if they cannot have the praise of doing all they will sit still with folded hands and use no diligence at all But this is the corrupt logick of the flesh its base sophistry The Apostle reasons just contrary Phil. 2. 12. It is God that worketh in us both to will and to do Therefore would a carnal heart say we need not work or at least may work very carelesly But he infers Therefore let us work out our Salvation with fear and trembling in the more humble obedience to God and dependance on him not obstructing the influences of his Grace and by sloth and negligence provoking him to withdraw or abate it Certainly many in whom there is truth of grace are kept low in the growth of it by their own slothfulness sitting still and not bestirring themselves and exercising the proper actions of that spiritual Life by which it is entertained and advanced From all filthiness All kind of sinful pollutions not as Men commonly do reform some things and take to themselves dispensations in others at least in some one peculiar sin their Mistress and their Herodias their Dalilah No parting with that yea they rather forego many other things as a kind of composition for the retaining of that Of flesh and spirit The whole Man must be purified and consecrated to God not only refined from the gross outward acts of sin but from the inward affection to it and motions of it that so the heart go not after it Psal. 131. Which under restraints of outward committing sin it may do and very often does as the Israelites lusted after the flesh pots their hearts remained in Egypt still though their bodies were brought out This is then to be done affection to sin to be purged out that is to cleanse the ground not only to lop off the branches but to dig about and loosen and pluck up the root though still fibers of it will stick yet we ought still to be finding them out and plucking them up Further These not only of the inner part of all sins but of some sins that are most or wholly inward that hang not much on the body nor are acted by it those filthinesses of the Spirit that are less discerned then those of the Flesh and as more hardly discerned so when discerned more hardly purged out Pride Selflove Unbeleif Curiosity c. Which though more retired and refined sins yet are pollutions and defilements yea of the worst sort as being more spiritual are filthinesses of the Spirit Fleshly pollutions are things of which the Devil 's not capable in themselves though they excite Men to them and so they are called unclean Spirits but the highest rank of sins are those that are properly Spiritual wickednesses These in Men are the chief strengths of Satan the inner works of these forts and strongholds 2 Cor. 10. 4. Many that are not much tempted to the common gross sensualities have possibly though an inclination to them yet a kind of disdain and through education and morality and strength of reason with somewhat of natural conscience are carried above them who yet have many of these heights those lofty imaginations that rise against God and the obedience of Christ all which must be demolisht Perfecting holiness Not content with low measures so much as keeps from Hell But aspiring towards perfection aiming high at self victory self denial and the love of God purer and hotter as a fire growing and flaming up and consuming the Earth Though Men fall short of their aim yet it is good to aim high they shall shoot so much the higher though not full so high as they aim thus we ought to be setting the state of perfection in our eye resolving not to rest content below that and to come as near it as we can even before we come at it Phil. 3. 11. 12. This to act as one that hath such a Hope such a State in view and is still advancing towards it In the fear of God No working but on firm ground no solid endeavours in holiness where it is not founded in a deep heart a reverence of God a desire to please him and to be like him which springs from Love This most Men are either strangers to wholly or are but slight and shallow in it and therefore make so little true progress in holiness Then there is the motive having these Promises Being called to so fair an estate so excellent a condition to be the people yea the Sons and Daughters of God therefore they are called to the coming forth from Babel and the separating themselves from sin and purging it out holiness is his Image in his Children the more of it the more suitable to that blessed Relation and Dignity and the firmer are the hopes of the inheritance of Glory Consider Sin as a filthiness hate it Oh how ugly and vile is lust how deformed is swelling Pride and all sin is an aversion from God a casting the noble Soul into the mire the defacing all its beauty Turning to present things it pollutes it self with them that he who was clad in scarlet embraces the dunghil as Jeremy in another sense laments Purity of things is an unmixture and simplicity corresponding with their own being and so is the Soul when elevated above the Earth and Sense and united unto God contemplating him and delighting in him all inordinate bent to the Creatures or to it self which is the first and main disorder doth defile and debase it And the more it is sublim'd and freed from it self the purer and more heavenly it grows and partakes the more of God and resembles him the more This then to be our main study first to search out our iniquities the particular defilements of our Nature not only gross filthinesses Drunkenness Lasciviousness c. But our love of this Earth or of Air or Vanity of mind our Self will and Self-seeking Most even of Christians are short sighted in their own secret evils the filthinesses of Spirit especially and use little diligence in this enquiry they do not seek Light from God to go in before him and to lead them into themselves as the Prophet had in the discovery of Idolatries at Jerusalem Oh that we could once see what heaps of abominations lie hid in us one behind another Then having searcht out we must follow on to purge out not to pass over nor spare any but to delight most in casting out the best beloved sin the choicest Idol that hath had most of our service and sacrifices to make room for Jesus Christ.
relation your God to sin against him so grossly so continuedly with so high a hand and so impenitent hearts not reclaim'd by all his mercies by the remembrance of his Covenant made with you and mercies bestowed on you nor by the fear of his Judgments threatned nor by the feeling of them inflicted no returning nor relenting not of his own people to their God Sure you must be yet more punisht You only have I known of all the families of the earth therefore will I punish you for all your Iniquities I let others escape with many things that I cannot pass in you you fast and pray it may be you howl and keep a noise but you amend nothing forsake not one sin for all your sufferings and for all your moanings and cries you would be delivered but do not part with one of your Lusts or wicked Customs even for a Deliverance and so the quarrel remains still 'T is that that separates is as a huge Wall betwixt us betwixt me and your Prayers and betwixt you and my helping hand and though I do hear and could help yet I will not till this Wall be down you shall not see me nor find by any gracious sign that I hear you This hides his face that he will not hear This way God hath establish'd in his ordinary methods with his people though sometimes he uses his own priviledg yet usually he links Sin and Calamity together and Repentance and Deliverance together Sin separates and hides his face not only from a People that professes his Name but even from a Soul that really bears his Name stampt upon it Though it cannot fully and for ever cut off such a Soul yet in part and for a time it may yea to be sure it will separate and hide the face of God from them Their daily inevitable frailties do not this but either a course of careless walking and many little unlawful liberties taken to themselves that will rise and gather as a Cloud and hide the face of God Or some one gross sin especially if often reiterated will prove as a firm Stone Wall or rather as a Brazen Wall built up by their own hands betwixt them and Heaven and will not be so easily dissolved or broke down and yet till that be the light of his Countenance who is the life of the Soul will be eclipsed and withheld from it And this consider'd besides that Law of Love that will forbid so foul Ingratitude yet I say this consider'd even our own interest will make us wary to sin though we were sure not to be yet altogether separated from the love of God by it yet if thou that hast any perswasion of that love darest thou venture upon any known sin Thou art not hazardless and free from all damage by it if thou hast need of that argument to restrain thee then before thou run upon 't sit down and reckon the expence see what it will cost thee if thou do commit it thou knowest that once it cost the heart blood of thy Redeemer to expâ—ate it and is it a light matter to thee and though that paid all that score nothing thou canst suffer being able to do any thing that way yet as an unavoidable present fruit of it it will draw on this damage Thou shalt be sure for a time it may be for a long time possibly most of thy time near all thy days it may darken much that love of God to thee which if thou doest but esteem of think on it it changes not in him but a sad change will Sin bring on thee as to thy sight and apprehension of it many a sweet hour of blest communion with thy God shalt thou miss and either be dead and stupid in that want and mourn after him and yet find thy self and sighs and tears hold out the Door shut yea a dead Wall rais'd betwixt thee and him and at best much straightning and pains to take it down again contrary to other Walls and Buildings that are far more easily pull'd down than built up but this a great deal easier built up than pull'd down True thy God could cast it down with a Word and 't is his free Grace that must do 't otherwise thou couldst never remove it yet will he have thee feel thy own handy work and know thy folly Thou must be at pains to dig at it and may be cost thee broken Bones in taking it down pieces of it falling heavy and sad upon thy Conscience and crushing thee as David cry'd out at that work Psal. 51. for a healing Word from a God Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoyce it will force thee to say O fool that I was what meant I Oh! it is good keeping near God and raising no divisions What are Sins False delights but make ado and have ado a man to provide his own vexation Now this distance from God and all this turmoiling and breaking and crying e're he appear again consider if any pleasure of sin can countervail this damage sure when thou art not out of thy Wits thou wilt never make such a bargain for all the pleasure thou must make out of any sin to breed thy self all this pains and all this grief at once to displease thy God and displease thy self and make a partition between him and thee Oh! sweet and safe ways of Holiness walking with God in his company and favour he that orders his Conversation aright he sees the loving kindness of the Lord 't is shewn to him he lives in the sight of it But if any such separation is made yet is it thy great desire to have it removed why there is hope See to it labour to break down and pray to him to help thee and he will put to his hand and then it must fall and in all thy sense of separation look to him that brake down the middle wall Eph. 2. There it is spoken of as betwixt men Jews and Gentiles but so as it was also between the Gentiles and God separated from his people and from himself ver 16. to reconcile both to God in one Body And ver 18. Through him we have access by one Spirit to the Father And then he adds that they were no more strangers and foreigners dwelling on the other side of the Wall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Word is but fellow Citizens c. Oh! that we knew more what it were to live in this sweet Society in undivided Fellowship with God Alas how little is understood this living in him separated from Sin and this World which otherwise do separate from him solacing our hearts in his love and despising the base muddy delights that the World admires hoping for that new Jerusalem where none of these Walls of Sin nor any one Stone of them are and for that bright day wherein there is no Cloud nor Mist to hid our Sun from us Now for the