and topped up height of all your places of worldly dignities have you picked out that common stamp in all your relations and operations which the spirit of the serpent sets upon them making them appear beautifull and desirable and are you diminished and corrected as having all such superfluous branches lopt away from you as yeilding no shelter nor glory or safeguard unto you Take it for granted that it is so yet here is a sufficient supply and remedy make your addresses and appeal unto God in Christ in whom they are all full and that in an eternall compleat and perfect supply as things that are onely proper and peculiar to the glory and duration of that eternall Son of God and not to that mortall fading and shamefull race and pedegree of the sons of earthly men whose breath as a vapour is in their nostrils for in Christ you shall have and be both king and subject and so shall never fail nor betray himselfe which no earthly man can attaine for he is that ruler in submission as the Apostle to Titus calls him for there is the truth of rule and submission in Christ as one and both in the utmost excellency thereof though men translate the word as a charge to obey magistrates Tit. 3. 1. To that effect the Apostle speaks I John who am also your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdome and patience of Jesus Christ or as the word is rightly rendred in the kingdome and under-abiding of Jesus Christ So that he is a companion in kingdom that is in power and authority and also in under-abiding or in a perpetuated submission to the will of the father so that in the state of Christianity there is all the relations acts and waits of administration of the kingdome all relations and mutuall respects are there in act and are fulfilled as in a kingdome of eternall glory and power and that onely in the losse and villification of nothing else but an earthly fading and corruptible Crown which Paul counts as dung and losse as the shame and undoing of man that he may win the Diadem and glory of the other Againe in it you shall have that mutuall relation of husband and wife in that glorious and happy espousall of Christ for he that is joyned unto the Lord is one spirit with him or one spirituall estate and condition in which is compleated and fulfilled all those mutuall and conjugal relations acts and operations of the married estate in the reality thereof in which the nuptiall day and joyful feastivity never ceaseth nor can time be found wherein it may not be said Behold this is the day of salvation behold now the accepted time yea this is the day which the Lore hath made let us be glad and rejoyce therein Moreover in the state of a Christian you shall finde the relation of father and son for the Father and I are one there is the language of the son of God and that in all the wayes and administrations oâ— Education donation resignation and inheritance of that purchased possession acted and done and ever in the act of doing betwixt the father of lights and that son of righteousnesse that great light that lightneth every one that cometh into the world so that in this appeal all losse of temporary condition is infinitely supplyed in eternall And further in it you have the state and relation of high Preist and people and that in all those severall respects of sacrifices services and oblations together with their respective virtues and operations in point of that reconciliation and agreement made between God and man in the multiplyed comfort thereof exercised in that house and temple not made with hands but is eternall in that heaven or height of happinesse in Christ who is that dwelling place of the most high But time would faile to speak of these things because they are infinitely uncountable and unmeasurable in all their relations offices respects and operations which are through that device of God in christ to be attained in this appeal because God himself who is infinite emence and eternall gives being unto and is the reallity of them all and yet man is really in the use comfort existance and exercise of them all even as it is true that the soul is properly the fountaine and cause of all the motions and operations of the body and yet the body is really in the exercise and hath the participation of them all For in this appeal is fulfilled that law of the spirit which Paul to the Romans saith is fulfilled in us so also speaks the Apostle John that the new Commandement is fulfilled in him and in us because the darknesse is past that is that which is proper and incident unto the creature and the true light shineth that is that which is proper unto God is broke forth and appeareth in us for a law cannot consist of one but must have respect unto twaine otherwise there is no bond therefore the law of the spirit is not contrived takes form or holds in any point thereof but as it consists of God and man in that faith of our Lord Jesus Christ in which or in whom stands all our Lordship and salvation for howsoever in the world there be Gods many and Lords many yet unto us there is but one Godhead who is Lord over all and one Lordship which abides and remains the same for ever Are we then at a losse in the world enjoying nothing that can abide by us as Abraham sojourned in Canaan as the land is carnally considered not injoying the bredth of a foot thereof as Stephen that faithful Martyr or witnesse makes report Let us make our appeal for in this off-spring and seed of God the whole inheritance in all its excellencies is perfected and compleated in us as the wole land was given to Abraham in his seed after the enduring of so great affliction So that in this appeal is contained a supply of every want a comfort against every affliction a restauration of every losse as being that year of Jubile or Jubel the time of carrying or leading along as the word imports into that ancient liberty rest and riches that are in the Son of God wherein wee finde an infinite augmentation and increase of all things wherein with respect to the world we are diminished And hence the second Query is added of purpose which naturally flows from this with the answer or direction annexed Is any merry let him sing By being merry pleasant or joyfull in this place is meant the joy of harvest or first fruits or that triumphant mirth and joyful feastivity and splendant liberty exercised in Israel in that year of Jubile when the land brought forth so plenteously of it selfe without the labour and toyle of the people or any means used by humane hands or administrations no not so much as to gather it in but feed upon the fruits where they were found naturally growing in the
whole mysticall body of Jesus Christ otherwise it is not the word or Gospel of the kingdome nor the spirit of intercession which is by Jesus Christ Object But it will be sayd that these things crncern the invisible Church and not the visible for the true visible Church is otherwise to be considered Answ To which we answer that it is a work of as great curiosity to frame a visible Church of Christ as to frame and compose a visible body of Christ therefore the Apostle comparing the true Church to a body sayth For as the body being one hath many members and all the members of that body being many are but one body so also Christ And agayn hear what the spirit sayth by the Apostle John viz. As he is so are we even in this world where he speaks of the Son of God So that to frame and compose a visible Church and to frame and compose a visible Christ are of the same nature and of like ease and difficulty and are alike strange unto the world and of the same acceptation to bring into manifestation and appearance Yet we know that Christ in both respects for otherwise we know him not is truly apparent and visible as also secret and unseen For Moses by faith saw him meaning Christ who is invisible that is he saw him who is unseeable and both are really true in a diverse respect And they who frame a Christ visible in one age of the world and not in another they do by the same argument conclude the visible Church to appear and to be manifest only within the same confines and precincts of time wherein Christ appeared For the Church was never known to appeare but in the reall form of Gods righteousnesse and wisdome which is Christ for he is the wisdome of God and the righteousnesse of God by saith which is the reality of the Church and as for all imaginary Churches we skill not for they will vanish and come to nought together with the professors of them as they have done in all ages Again such as form a Christ unto themselves to appear visibly unto a carnall eye so as to accept and approve of that his way of appearance at the carnall and perfunctory worshippers of the Jewes did Know this that whensoever the true Christ appeareth he will receive at the hands of such the same measure which was measured out unto Jesus born of the Virgin by Herod Pontius Pilate Scribes Pharisees with the cry of all the people saying Crucifie him crucifie him away with him crucifie him Even so they that frame unto themselves a visible Church so as to appeare unto a carnall eye or understanding as being in a capacity to approve and like well of it at the least for a certaine season Whensoever the true Church makes it selfe visible it shall receive like measure at the hands of such persons to the utmost of their power and ability as Christ did when he appeared unto the Jewes For in such persons and in that spirit is the zeale of persecution properly founded in the visible and apparant exercise thereof Moreover they that form a visible Church as not having the invisible vertue alike efficatious in every part and member thereof they also form unto themselves a visible Christ to appear without aving the compleat vertue of the wisdome and power of God in all respects in him either in point of his being or in the order and manner of his being and this is that great Image of Nebuchadnezzar which hath beeen so long erected and set up in the world where the Scriptures are traditionally acknowledged and read w ch all must bow down unto at the noise of their instruments and institutions or else the fiery tryall must passe upon them that obey not Only this is our comfort that the Son of God will so appear with them or in them that so much as a smell of that zeal or fiery fume and wrath of the world shall not appeare upon them but serve only to the destruction of such as are zealous actors in such matters of the worlds melody The next point is the exercise of the Elders and the first is they pray over him or for him or without any wrong to the Text with him that is in communion and fellowship with him for there was never prayer of faith made unto God out of which any elect or chosen vessel was excluded the reason is because every acceptable prayer hath in it the vertue of the intercession of Christ otherwise it is not in his name and authority and the spirit of Christ neglects not any one that appertayns to his mysticall body for if it should that soule could never be inspired with the spirit of prayer without which there is no participation in the mediation of the Son of God and then no acceptation with the Father therefore prayer is communicative to all the Saints if it be as the prayer of faith it is as the life-blood running into all the veyns of the whole body for none can enter into the holy place but he that carries all the Tribes upon his heart it is not our temporary and private wants which can bring forth a faithfull prayer to God for as prophesie is not of any private spirit or interpretation but holy men speake as they are moved by the holy Ghost of like publique spirit is true prayer So that this sick party is in unity with the prayer here spoken of for the eldership of this Church or that eternized fellowship in the ancient of dayes never appears unto any in that miraculous vertue of healing but in way of unity with the party healed Therefore it is that Christ will have the stone rouled away from the Sepulchre that nothing interpose betwixt Lazarus and himselfe when he restores him from death to life Also Elisha will be shut up in the same roome with the widows sonne when hee rayseth him up from the dead and Paul the Apostle falls upon Eutichus and embraceth him when he brings his spirit into him agayn Furthermore where this true Eldership appears it ever communicates a like vertue to every individuall of the body for the spirit is not received by measure for that which in it selfe is emence cannot be received by measure they that go about to perswade men that some have a greater portion of the spirit and some have a lesse measure thereof they may upon as good grounds perswade men that some shall be saved and be happy and blessed a long time and some a shorter time for if the spirit of God in any poynt of our salvation be subject to measure in latitude it is as truly subject to be measured and bounded in longitude and then salvation is voyd which is the doctrine of the most of our Elders in these dayes but the spirit of glory and of God that rests upon the Saints through this sicknesse and suffering is neither given out nor received by measure
to pray or to believe or the grace of remission of his sins expressed and declared in those glad tidings For the grace of Christ is as truly collective in the subsistance of it as distributive whosoever therefore receives freely that party hath a like vertue also freely to give Moreover the world who by wisdome know not God teach by that wisdome that a Christian may be possessed with and have the enjoyment of the spirit of Christ that holy spirit of the Son of God and yet the humane nature of Christ not present but wholy absent and remote in another place these men may aswel upon like ground professe themselves to be members of Christ but not of his body for of his Saints he saith Ye are flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone not of another So that the two natures in Christ according to the mystery of salvation in the Gospel are of the same extent that his mysticall body is and are co-apparent to the wisdome of God in whomsoever it is For the spirit of Christ never uttered or manifested it selfe but as the son of sorry man utters and manifests himselfe in and by such principles and abtitudes as are proper and peculiar to the living and eternall God taking their being and form from the wisdome and power of God and not from the policie and power of a creature for without the Coagulation of these twayn there is no spirit of Christ made manifest nor is it in its operation Therefore to separate the spirit of Christ from the humane nature of Christ in any of its operations is to make a nullity of Christ the faith of such persons is vaine their holy garments of the Ministry are moth-eaten their righteousnesse is the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharisees which enter not into the kingdome and their proper holinesse is the purification of the flesh purging themselves of all the operations of the spirit of life that no ray or beame thereof be found upon them which a wicked man is as careful of as the Saints of God are of being stained and spotted with the flesh For if we gather not up and take in true man into all the operations proper to the spirit of God wee dis-unite and separate that which the wisdome of God hath so curiously embroydered and wrought up together for the spirit of Christ and of God quickneth only to that blessed estate and condition of the Son of God and not to any other even as a rationall spirit filled with artificiall principles to find out the nature and cause of things quickneth only unto that state and condition of man-kind and not unto the condition of any other creature upon the earth Vers 3. Your gold and your silver is canckered and the rust of them shall be a witnesse against you and shall eate your flesh as fire yee have heaped treasure together for the last dayes AS Gold and Silver are the most precious and durable mettals in the account and use of man so righteousnesse and holinesse are the diadem and duration of the Gospel of the Kingdom the son of God and they are reckoned here as their Silver and Gold who crucifie the love of life and glory no otherwise but as sinne is reckoned upon Christ where it is said that he was made sin for us who knew no sinne even so these are made righteous that know no righteousnesse of God in Christ For the just and unjust are made of like yea of the very same matter for God and man are really to be considered both in the one and in the other and otherwise the true state of life and death canot be rightly composed neither is the gospel and faith of the Son of God preached For in what tone sence or respect man may be said to be in that worke of salvation wrought by Christ and participate in the power and glory thereof In like sence may the Sonne of God be said to be and is in that work of destruction and participates in the defect and shame thereof For as the wisdome of God in that way of Christ purifies and cleanseth that earthly and corruptible nature of man in its taking of it into unity from all sin and uncleanesse unto a state and condition becoming the Sonne of the holy and eternal God even so doth the wisdome of man or of the flesh in taking hold of and searching into the things of God corrupt and defile unto or in it selfe that holinesse and puritie which is in the word or Sonne of God unto a state and condition proper and peculiar to that man of sinne and son of perdition for the world by widome knows not God that is through its proper wisdome and Serpentine policie is blinded and become ignorant of him So that there is a true and reall proportion between the mistery of God in Christ and the mistery of iniquity in Antichrist else the state of the wicked could not have in it an Almighty power of wrath and displeasure as the state of the Saints hath in it an allsufficiency of mercy and love for the proper Original and fountaine of each is in themselves and not in another that is to say the proper fountaine of love and mercy is in Christ and not else-where to be found and the proper fountaine of wrath and displeasure is in Antichrist and not founded else-where So that righteousnesse and holinesse of the word of God or Sonne of God for it is not the word but in its creating virtue as it frames it selfe in Christ and this word is canckered in the world for God and man in a mistery are become a corrupt estate and condition in that way of Antichrist directly contrary unto that oriental Gold and seven times purified silver that is in Jesus Christ and that party who is ignorant of the mistery of iniquity in the corrupting and adultrating of the word of God may talk of the unity that is in Christ Jesus purifying making chast mans nature in that word of God but it is onely as he hath received it by tradition from Libraries Councels and Accademical courses but the revelation of the spirit he knows not the onely means of the conveyance of the knowledge thereof The purest mettal thus changed becoms rust and that is first witnesse against them secondly It eates their flesh as fire Rust we know is the putrifaction and filthinesse of mettals contracting it selfe and arising from the not using thereof even so the not exercising and putting into use the righteousnesse and holinesse of the word of God that royal law of the spirit is the contraction raising up of the vision and corrupt desires of the flesh which is the very cancker spot and staine of the soule that it becoms reprobate Silver thereby not to passe for currant to any in the kingdome of God First and this rust by this means contracted is a witnesse against them that they have put the just one to death as
the things of this present life and are not these carnall and vanishing then as held and practised by the Doctors of our dayes together with their followers and Pupils where then shall we find the men that take not their delight and place their pleasure in earthly and vanishing things whose religion is not vaporous Whereas the truth is there is nothing of Christ which hath not the nature divine in it or else it is not an ordinance act exercise or vertue becoming the Son of God who in all things is holy and pure and there is no holinesse without the spirit of God therefore they may as well hold and teach that the spirit of God vanisheth and comes to an end in the Saints as that any Ordinance Office Act Exercise or Vertue of Christ vanisheth and comes to an end in any of his mysticall body For if the unity of the Spirit cease in them in any respect then the wisdome and power of the Spirit ceaseth and then that new Commandement or law of the Spirit is abrogated and made voyd which the Apostle saith is true in him and in us because the darknesse is past and the true light shineth which is the substance of the Law in every point and particular of it And where the light of God once shineth to expell darkenesse in us it ever abideth yea in that imputed righteousnssse or righteousnesse reckoned together with us in faith prayer or whatsoever it abides firme and stable as the Son of God is firm and stable And as for eating drinking marrying and giving in marriage with all things of like nature transient having an end they are no proper parts of the Kingdom of God nor any thing whereof it doth consist but are useful in their time and season to the Saints of God and may be exercised with a holy respect unto the Kingdome for the promoting of it therefore it is said Whether yee eate or drinke or whatsoever yee doe let all be done to the glory of God Therefore when they asked Christ that question whose wife she should be in the resurrection who had had seven husbands his answer is that they erre not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God for in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like the Angells of God in heaven Therefore it follows And beene wanton That is they joyne with these earthly pleasures wantonnesse they are become effeminate womanish having estranged themselves from that heroicall and masculine spirit which the Apostle exhorts unto Stand fast in the faith quit you like men be strong that is behave your selves as men of God going forth in his strength and not in the strength of the arm of flesh which is true weaknesse and womanish But these are become wanton and lascivious doting upon transitory and vanishing things letting the substantiall passe being subdued and overcome with pictures shadows and semblances of things that have no substance nor validity in them and not with the things themselves being taken by the sight of a wandering eye and the hearing of a sensuall eare as the woman was by the words of the Serpent and shew of the fruit in the beginning These Siberificall persons being widdows in respect of any espousall with Christ for they are such as wax wanton against Christ and wil marry in making contracts with forms of earthly Governments forms of Churches forms of ordinances and exercises wantonizing in their carnall copulations with bread wine and water oyle spittle and cream so devoutly that none must intermeddle with their minnions but such as do it by contract according to their law of Carnulentia and if any conceive by any other seed then by their pulse and lentiles which onely serves to make red earthly or Edoms broth that profane fornicatour such persons are presently counted breakers of covenant pernicious persons Hereticks Schismaticks and blasphemers of their gods These have forgotten that ancient and masculine spirit of wisdome and gravity so skilful in geneology and chronology that it can reckon it selfe up together with eternity see Prov. 8. from v. 22. to 31. Which takes its delight and solace only in the compasse or circuit of his earth or of his land which the Prophet stiles the Lords land therefore he presently interprets it and saith his delight is with the children of men where he dwels and in whom he makes his proper abode This spirit threfore in whomsoever it is takes delight in nothing as to place its pleasure in it but in eternal things which God in the Messiah onely is and all other creatures relations and operations are but as so many letters or figures to lead unto and point out what man is in Christ in whom the delight and pleasure proper unto godlinesse is onely set Because nothing else as delightful can be eternal for eternal truth we know none but onely in Christ for he is that way that truth and that life of eternity besides whom nothing can hold correspondency with God so as to be the object or subject matter of his delight and pleasure And howsoever there is in the godly man that which is a creature made within the bounds and precincts of time yet that unity is eternal because in whatsoever the unity doth consist is properly of God who is eternity and not of the creature which is in time if it be love it is the love of God and not of a creature if wisdome it is of God and not of man if it consist in power it is infinite and not finite so that that state and condition of God and man in one is eternall and not temporary it lives the life of God it walks and works by the wisdome of God and not of the creature We know the body of man hath life and wisdome as well as the soul while it is in conjunction with it not another but the same that is in the soule much more hath the soule of a christian life and wisdome in and of God and not another so long as it is in conjunction with God which is for ever or else his Sonne his proper off-spring should not inherit and be posessed with the nature of the father If the mortallists of our dayes knew the way of salvation by Christ they could never conclude like beasts that the soule of man dyes with the body like a beast for God is not onely in unity with the soule as a worker and Creator but hee is also one in the workmanship which is made for the Son of God is as truly said to be made of woman and made under the law as he is said to be the Lord and maker of all things And it is the Image or wisdome of God that gives being and forme unto that glorious workmanship of God in man so that if the soule dye there is not a nullity of the work but also of the Creator the maker of it who gives the proper being and form to the
and originally of God and not of the creature as his Sonship is of God and not of the proper off-spring of man being begotten not of mortall but of immortall seed so are all the lineaments of God and man in Christ if wisdome joyne the Tabernacle that God builds and not man it is the wisdome of God if love make the contract it is the love of God shed abroad in the heart and not the love of man which is enmity with God if faith establish the heart that it wavour not it is the faith of God which is the power of God to salvation wherein consists the great work of God which is in beleiving as Christ tels him that asked what shall I do to work the work of God beleiue saith he for therein it consists for it was by the work of faith that Abraham was justified and not by that vaine or empty faith without works that is without the present power and operation of God for such faith the Devil may attaine unto who beleives there is one God and trembles but doth not consist in his power as made one of twaine in Christ So that whatsoever is in this unity is properly and originally of God and that from a principle or law of his bounty and goodnesse whereby he communicates himselfe unto another in all things which that law or goodnesse of his nature is apt and prompt to be and to do whereby he forms himselfe in his Son without whom or out of whom he never had being took form in any will or law nor put forth himselfe in any operation therefore it is said speaking of Christ God and man all things were made by him and without him was nothing made For if ever God had had being or motion so much as of minde and will out of man it had ever been so and then salvation had not been the Saviour had never appeared for salvation canot be compleat but in him that saves and is also saved and the Almighty never was but as he is a God of salvation yea in the plurality thereof as the expression of the Psalmist is the beginning of Christ therefore canot be fathomed nor spanned out no more then the beginning of the Almighty and eternall can though there be that in Christ which is in time yet he takes not his proper being from that no more then man takes his proper being from his body but from his rational soul and spirit which inliveneth acteth and moveth the same And in the one and the other doth the glory of the Sonne of God exist for God working in and by the faculties or aptitudes to do in the soule or spirit of the creature thereby his vertues and operations come to be distinct and so full of variety of glory being the spirit and life of the creature consists in change of motion or operation also here the works of God have their proper times seasons and opportunities which in the proper and simple eternal could never be Furthermore as man works not by the principles and properties of the creature but by those that are proper to God denying himselfe being resigned over unto God and so all his operations become of an eternal race and virtue and are in the true and reall account and reckoning of eternity of such nature is the condition of the Sonne of God therefore the Prophet saith who can declare his age he is the first and the last if he never end in being last he never had beginning as he is the first but is from eternity to eternity though that be in him which is temporary in it selfe even as mans body lives and understands though of it selfe it hath nor doth either as appears when the soule is departed Secondly concerning the unity of Harlots for he that is joyned unto an harlot is one flesh that is one carnall and corrupt estate in which all the ligaments thereof are such as properly the creature is the originall and fountaine of and not the Creator how then can this unity be eternall when the proper bond is of that which is mortall and temporary To this we answer that there are certain faculties or aptitudes to do or to be in the soule of a man as also a law or principle by which it is or doth such things and for the aptitudes to do or to be We may safely say that whatsoever the Almighty is prompt unto that through the sublimity and excellency that God hath made the spirit of a man to be of he is prompt unto the variety of operations and excellencies that are in the Son of God yea even to compasse the earth and comprehend all things and find out the causes relations and operations of them yea even to eternize himselfe on the earth by calling his lands by his name by living in his posterity by some great work wrought or monument set up to memorize him unto posterity and ages to come yea doubtlesse some States-men and Politicians of the world are apt to lay plots and platforms how to bring about accomplish and achieve things which they know can never be done in their dayes that their wisdome and policy may live and be in use when they are gone and of such use and from such aptitudes come humane Chronicles writing of bookes or the like to reach to eternity which God only wise is So that man works in and by the aptitudes of God but not from that law and principle proper to the Son of God For whereas God out of that law of bounty and goodnesse of his nature communicates himselfe in whatsoever he is apt to do and be whereby he doth it and is it in the creature The creature exercising it selfe in the way of mans wisdome in things which God himselfe is prompt to be and to do not by giving himselfe up unto God to be his and not his owne but by that principle of self-love and law of exalting the arm of flesh he arrogates unto himselfe and monopolizeth the things proper to God unto himselfe ascribing them unto the things of man to beautifie and to set up the things of the creature thereby attributing and giving unto the flesh that which is proper only unto the Son of God which is a turning of the truth of God into a lye a changing the glory of God into the image of a corruptible man and a worshipping and serving of the creature instead of the Creator who is blessed for ever Amen We conclude then that as God by that law of grace exerciseth himselfe in all his excellencies in the aptitudes of mans soul filling them with himselfe so as the things of eternity come to be distinct to have their proper season time place yea and person so as the Saints are truly distinct and the operation of their faith as the Apostle amply declares in that to the Hebrews Chap. 11. So also that man of sinn through that carnall law exerciseth himselfe in the aptitudes of God
filling them with the things of the creature so as they become unmeasurable not bounded by any time or season but take in the vast space of eternity and so the state of the wicked is also evelasting in that son of perdition as well as in that Son of God and yet that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit but both perpetuated of like race in respect of time in the sight of God and all that judg and discern according to the spirit of God for as it is affirmed of that eternall word that it was in the beginning In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God So it is affirmed of the wicked one that he is a man-slayer from the beginning and not to abide in the truth but is a lyar and the father of it There is therefore a change and a reall change in Satan for the truth of God is turned into a lye in him but it is in the number and act of his being so that it is as true and reall that he was never otherwise and therefore he is said also to be the fountaine and father of it as he that is so originally even as Abraham that high Father and ancient of dayes is sayd to be the father of the faithfull as the originall and propagator of them all And without this unity of the harlot prostrating and adulterating the word of God unto the lusts of men Satan is not known but works in and by and is conversant with man and man knows it not It is true also that there is a change and a reall change in Christ the son of the blessed for mans nature is changed from its visiosity and vanity proper to the wisdome of a creaeure to become the undefiled of God in the blessing and reality of son-ship but this change is from the manner instant and eternall act of his being so that it is as true that he was never other but that undefiled and reall son of God blessed for ever with respect to time past and that which is to come So that the Son of God is never alive in the spirit but Satan is dead in and to him nor is Satan alive in the flesh but Christ is dead in and to him and by his slaughter the world nourisheth its heart and feasts it selfe so that the mortification of the spirit of the Scripture or word of life is the revivall of the letter which becomes the proper nourishment of the carnall minde which is that state of death for to be carnally minded is death So also it is true in Christ that the mortification of the flesh in the abrogating of that carnall law of sin and death is the slaying of that Leviathan Sea-Dragon or man of Sin who is given to be meate for Gods people in the wildernesse that is it is the revivall of the spirit which becomes the proper nourishment of the sons of God and is that bread from heaven that perisheth not and food of eternall life which abides for ever And as food becomes one with that body that feeds upon it in the nourishing of it so doth the spirit and life of the living and eternall God become one state and condition in that man of God and mysticall body of Christ Jesus our alone Lordship and salvation And so also doth that spirit of death and destruction in that the truth of God is turned into a lye become one state and condition in that man of sin that vile body and mystery of iniquity wherein that eternall death only consisteth and remayneth for ever In the next verse he declares who it is they have killed and the manner of it Vers 6. Yee have condemned and have killed the just and he doth not resist you Wherein observe 1. The act of the wicked Yee have condemned and have killed the just 2. The demeanour of the Just He doth not resist them Their act is two-fold 1. They condemn him 2. They kill him 1. BY the just here as hath been declared is meant the Lord our righteousnesse or our justice as the Prophet calls him Whose path is as the shining light which shineth more and more unto the perfect day that is hath all manner and motions of glory in it as from the rising of the Sunne unto the height thereof it is he onely in whom perfect justice resides which consists in a Justifier and a justified which is only found in Christ out of whom no perfect justice is found for if the Justifier be one and the justified another individuall or substance there is a fraction in the act it admits of default and imperfection you cannot find it whole in either of them Christ therefore is only just and hence it is that seates of Judicature must either condemn him in the world or else they cannot justifie themselves to have the perfection of the Law so they are sayd here to condemn the just or that just one To condemn implies the giving of sentence as by law for there must be a discerning wch is by a rule or else sentence cannot passe and every thing hath its proper and peculiar law whereby it seeks to effect the conservation and safety of of it selfe in its proper condition and where the wisdom of the flesh and carnall mind gives the proper being unto the condition it hath a certain law bond or engagement upon it in way of argumentall and legall reasoning for the safety and conservation of it selfe in its own principles and achievements and to condemn and sentence whatsoever makes for the bane and overthrow of them and unto that stands bound and engaged in it selfe as to its ruler or god Now the Crosse of Christ in the crucification of the flesh and order of that law of the spirit doth confound humane wisdome in the way of its being and all its enterprizes making it the proper folly of the world for it is written I will destroy the wisdome of the wise and will cast away the understanding of the prudent Where is the wise where is the scribe where is the disputer of this world hath not God made the wisdome of this world foolishness Therefore the wisdome of the flesh or carnall law doth bind over under penalty of destruction of it selfe to convent arraign convict condemn and passe a finall sentence upon the Son of God that law of the spirit of life otherwise it cannot reteyn and conserve it selfe So that we may as soon and with better acceptation perswade a rationall and ingenuous spirit to lye downe and utterly forsake the nature and activity of his wisdome and to become a beast of the dullest capacity as to perswade a carnall mind where the son of peace is not upon the true and proper conditions of the Gospel to become a son of God It is no marvell therefore though the world love their owne and hate such as are taught of
God condemning such as justifie the words of wisdome which only sets forth the folly of the world or else it appears not And they only love the works of darknesse and dare not come to the light least their deeds should be discovered 2. They do not only condemn but they kill the Just one and that in a two-fold respect First consider that a thing is said to be killed when it is expelled the proper place of its aboad so it is slain in way of negation and denying it its right and due Deny a fish the water and it is killed take a plant out of the earth and it withereth take water out of the Sea and it moves not in ebbing and flowing and deny any thing the benefit of the ayre and it cannot live no not the water nor the fire it selfe Now man-kind is the proper place of Gods residency and abode in the exercise and manifestation of his wisdome delighting himselfe in the habitable parts of his earth even in the sons of men But where the wisdome of the flesh beares sway and makes its abode there the wisdome of God is denyed any place of residency therefore Christ who is the wisdome of God and the power of God lives not there in any of his operations and vertues for as Jacob said of Joseph he is not that is he is not living in that heart 2. He is killed actually by laying violent hands or administrations upon him to the quenching of his spirit whereby he becomes life-lesse in the world haling him to the places of execution for Christ never appeared or was known in the world but by vertue of an office and institution For how can a King appeare but by vertue of his inauguration or a Prophet but by or in the spirit of a Prophet Or what is a Priest if he have not somewhat to offer for he cannot be a Priest without Christ appears not but by vertue of institution and commission to execute perform and do the will of the Father therefore he saith I come not to do my owne will but the will of him that sent me Now to institute temporary Ordinances and offices vanishing and fading not holding correspondency with the nature and constitution of Christ it is to destroy and thrust out the proper spirit and authority of Christ as it not having a being in the world For to frame an Office or Ordinance of Christ and not to have the spirit of Christ is to destroy and abolish unto themselves that mysticall body of Christ even as a naturall body deprived of the soule that gives it life is thereby abolished and turned to putrifaction Let us consider then how to form Ordinances and establish offices and Officers of Christ for if they have not in them the spirit of Christ they will prove no better then those legall and Jewish services taken up from Moses as representing the letter of the Scripture and accordingly practiced in the dayes of Christ by Herod Pontius Pilate Scribes Pharisees Lawyers and Souldiers and the whole body of the people who cryed out crucifie him crucifie him away with him When water in the River or Pond hath the spirit of life from God in it then we shall count it as an Ordinance of Christ when bread and wine on the Table have the spirit of mortification of the flesh and quickning power of the resurrection of Christ in them then will they prove spirituall Ordinances of Christ beseeming the son of the living God For there is no office exercise or ordinance proper to the kingdome of God that is voyd and destitute of the holy spirit of the Son of God who is that great ordinance of God in whom every particular is wrapped up and infolded and not one of them barren or destitute of the same spirit of life from God otherwise all Ordinances and offices taken up from Christ and his Apostles are of the same nature of those taken up from Moses in Christs days and shall prove of the same effect when ever Christ appears for the one stands upon the proper letter of the Scripture as well as the other and Satan can alledg the Scripture to back his temptation as well as Christ doth for the confounding of him Now if the spirit and life of such Ordinances depend upon the Priests and Elders the Instituters and Conservators of them why should they then contend with those which they call Papists but joyne hand in hand as being one with them Let us remember therefore that If we bereave the body of the proper soule and spirit of Christ we abolish and destroy the Just one and turn him to corruption unto our selves 3. The next poynt is the demeanor of the just And he resisteth you not that is he doth not stay or hinder your project violence from execution he doth not detain nor keep back himself from you but patiently suffers himself to be dispoiled of all his vertues and excellencies in you which are the native and proper operations of the Son of God ceasing from his own work in you that you may take your full swinge in that which is proper and naturall unto you as to exercise your pride and policy your principalities powers of darknesse your spirituall wickednesses in high places according to the Prince of the power of the ayre That wheresoever any heart is empty and destitute of she spirit of God hee insinuates himselfe to be the fulnesse of it that according to that plenty of wickednesse the wrath of God may finde fuell to kindle it selfe upon and so he freely without resistance layes downe his life in the wicked as a ransome that he may take it againe in his Saints and in them live for ever And so much for the death of Christ according to the spirit in the men of the world who crucifie afresh unto themselves the sonne of God and make a mocke of him And from this our Apostle infers an exhortation consisting of divers particulars which do concern the death of Christ according to the flesh as he is considered in the Saints and that is the second generall head in the Chapter which is contained to the 12. verse And with respect unto death in both these respects the Apostle Paul saith God forbid that I should rejoyce in any thing save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ whereby the world is crucified in me and I am crucified in the world Vers 7. Be patient therefore brethren unto the coming of the Lord behold the husbandman waiteth for the precifruit of the earth and hath long patience for it untill he receive the early and latter raine Wherein observe 1. The terme or kinde appellation Brethren 2. An exhortation in these words Be patient 3. How long or to what end To the coming of Christ 4. An allusion to a husbandman with respect to his seed-time and harvest 1. ANd first for the term given unto them Brethren which is with respect unto that
also he cannot be my Disciple When did we hear of any of the Prophets or Apostles tyed unto wife children congregation or family who have spoken in the power and authority of the Son of God or what earthly relation was any of them tyed unto We read of Hosea marrying a wife of fornications for a sign unto the people and also of Peters wives mother which are but slender arguments to encourage men to sit downe and dwell by temporary relations and make them a sufficient fence and guard to put off all Gods calls and intimations to attend upon him in any other way if it make not for the support and supply of such engagements where is there a man that acknowledgeth a call from God if it make not for the promoting of himselfe in temporary things at the least in his expectation and if it prove contrary hee takes it up as a fore burden what ever becomes of the cause of God it must be subservant to these things no marvail though the world be voyd of the joyfull presence of God when wee rejoyce in nothing but what in effect the bruit beasts seek after Obj. But it will be said that how ever the Prophets Apostles and Christ himselfe went on in the neglect of all temporary relations yet how carefull were the Patriarchs in the preservation and mayntaining of them Answ To which we answer that the Prophets Apostles and Christ himseife teach in their practice how we ought to stand affected with these earthly things and how to demean our selves towards them in this our pilgrimage through the world And the fathers of old teach us by their demeanor what care and respect we are to have in the conservation of such relations which are spirituall and abide for ever as they are constituted in Christ and conversant in the family and house of God Obj. It will be sayd that men uniting themselves to particular congregations as Pastor Teacher Elders Deacons and Members is of divine institution and ought to be mayntained and contended for according to the practice of the Apostles and those seven Churches with their 7. Angels or Messengers particularly described and set forth in the Revelations Answ To which we answer that such as the salvation and faith is which we contend for and maintain such is the Church but we contend for the common salvation and faith once delivered to the Saints and so we do for a universall Church and congregation of the first-born whose names are enrolled in heaven once and for ever constituted that doctrine and prayer which is of lesse comprehension that it reacheth not universally to involve the compleat mysticall body of Christ it is a private spirit and not consonant to the doctrine and intercession of Jesus Christ which hath a like respect to all the chosen of God and that in all times and ages And for those particular Churches mentioned in Scripture they are all represented unto us in those seven Churches in the Revelations which all vanish in the opening of heaven in the fourth Chapter and are never heard of againe which only set forth unto us in their severall vertues and seven-fold fulness and perfection therein the state of that Church governed by him only that sits on the Throne adorned with those 4. lively weights and four and twenty Elders furnished with that Angelicall and fulnesse of Ministery set forth by seven Angels seven Trumpets and seven Vialls inriched with all those excellencies declared throughout that whole booke and the perfection of this one only Church is signified unto us in the vertue of those seven as the excellency of one spirit of God is set forth unto us in that report of seven spirits of God being about the throne and this one Church is signified and set forth in that of Philadelphia which hath nothing but commendable things found in her and no reproof uncomelinesse or imperfection at all Againe those seven Churches teach unto us that one Congregation or Synagogue of Sathan wherein is contained that seven-fold wickednesse and fulnesse of sinne in that Babylon the great the mother of whoredoms and proper seate of wickednesse in the land of Shiner to which it is all conveyed and carryed in that Evah which the Prophet Zachariah speaks of and this is signified unto us in that one Church of Laodicea commended in nothing but condemned in all things according to just deserts having atracted all wickednesse from that Angelicall Ministry by turning the truth of God into a lye and this Church is ruled by the Dragon the beast and the false Prophet in all those abominable practises and filthinesses set forth therein to the end of that Book He therefore that sets himselfe as a Pastor over one particular people or congregation and yet it is not without reproof nor doth his exercise in the word and doctrine comprehend all the flock of God concerns the state of every Saint of God particularly that man will be found a feeder onely of the mother of harlots and as a Dragon to devour the man-child with Herod when he appears and not as that good shepheard who gives himselfe for the flock not having that spirit of the Apostle that the care of all the Churches is upon him as all in one and one in all as the true Spouse saith draw me we will run after thee A single eye hath respect to all Saints alike hath a like care of them and they are a like precious unto him the Son of God never directed the virtue of his death or labour of his love to some of his chosen before others but men in these dayes have framed a pastorall charge to be a fat pasture for themselves or else the call of God speaks not therein But a true Prophet is under the losse and in the departure from all these things and thereby is invested with the power and authority of the Son of God speaking in his name words of wonder and admiration and not as the Scribes And they do not onely suffer themselves to be dispossest of these things but they have long patience or under-abiding in this condition it alters not what change soever comes upon them in this world for they are not lesse jealous of that which the world counts prosperity then they are of that it calls adversity and are as watchfull under good reports as bad knowing a like snare in both Not as such as seem to suffer for a time and are zealous against the common practices of the world till they have gotten some high place amongst men and then they come to comply with the greatest worldling and conversant with worldly affaires that can put forth it selfe to be a consociate or suffragator unto them Note for conclusion of this point that a true Prophet knows his liberty how that all things are lawfull but all things are not expedient all things are lawfull but he is not brought under the power and dominion of any thing he
another is the wisdome of man that perisheth and comes to nought and not the wisdome of God which abides the same for ever and is that light which guides unto the Elders who are the onely governours and rulers of this universall Church called into communion and fellowship with this sick party and they are the first borne of every tribe having upon them the office of King Preist and Prophet in every family and inferiour to that dignity doth not this sicknesse call for any to come to visite it knowing all others to be Physitians of no value for this kinde of sicknesse summons none but the first borne of God into communion and fellowship with it that call which Cornelius gave to Peter that Elder of the Church was like unto this that when he spake of that unction of Christ the spirit of God descended upon those that heard it insomuch that Peter challengeth all men whether they can forbid water that those should not be baptized who had received the holy spirit as well as themselves as if he should say can any deny the signe of unity between Jew and Gentile which is communion and fellowship seeing they have the ground and substance thereof namely are partakers of the spirit of God that holy anoynting which is the truth and substance of all community whether we be present or absent in body we are one in that spirit of the Lord. The word of Prophesie therfore which is ever accompanied with prayer as in Cornelius or that word of true interpretation of the word of God knows how to give summons unto and call in the life and spirit of kingdome and Preisthood into fellowship with it selfe which is that healthfull spirit or unction that is by Jesus Christ Add further this sicknesse is the very foot of the throne upon which that great Elder even the ancient of dayes sits for when Daniel beholds through this spirit of interpretation he sees thrones set up or as the word will bear thrones cast down at you may see how the translators give it in both phrases signifying thereby that the power and glory of the world is cast down wheresoever this great Eldership is set up which is of no lesse antiquity then is the eternall that gives Judgement into the hands of the Saints of the most high and possesseth them with the kingdome for none but the eternall can give an eternall inheritance and he gives it not but as he sits on this throne namely the glory of man cast down and the gravity of this ancient of days set up whose garments are white as snow and the haire of his head like pure wooll and such is the royalty and authority of the Eldership here intended who are not brought in by any other call but by the Prophesie or interpretation of the minde of God therefore it is that the vision speaks so punctually and particularly where and with whom Peter is to be found Note here that even as the life of the flesh through the crucification of the spirit admits none into unity nor invests any into its proper condition but onely such as are of its own kinde so the life of the spirit which is in Christ Jesus through the crucification of the flesh admits none into fellowship nor invests any into its proper state and condition but its owne kinde For what is born of the flesh is flesh and what is born of the spirit is spirit and therefore none but the first-born of God are of this Eldership or callers of them into the exercise of their proper virtue and authority even as it was with the Apostles when they pronounce peace if the son of peace be not there their peace returns upon themselves and their abode is not in that house of family 3. By these Elders then in the third place we see what we are to understand by the Church they are of that is that unity and fellowship which the selected and chosen people of God are of and have in that fellowship and faith of Jesus Christ as they are considered not in one age much lesse in one Parish or company of people gathered together but as they are universally considered in all ages and times of the world For such as is the extent of the spirit by which every Saint lives and of those offices of Christ by vertue whereof the exercise of such extent is the true Church ever to be held and taken otherwise the Church is carnallized and cast into the mould of the letter that kills and not into the mould of the spirit that gives life So that to thrust up Christ as into a corner as in one age of the world or to monopolize him amongst a handfull of people is all one as to put him in the grave though with Nicodemus a Ruler among the Jews and that rich man Joseph of Arimethea both night Disciples for fear of the Jews they may seem to differ from Herod in that they perfume the dead body and wrap it in clean linnen being affected therewith but it is but according to the custome of the Jewish Sinagogue for they put it in the grave and roll a great stone thereupon as men without hope or desire of the resurrection having that common spirit that now lives in the world to beg leave of the Pilates and great men thereof before they dare adventure to trim up the dead body of Jesus and fit it for the Sepulchre But this universall Church of which these Elders are is called by the Apostle mount Zion the City of the living God the new Jerusalem the generall assembly and Church of the first-born which are enrolled in heaven And such as constitute and set up a Church not of this nature and comprehension they build it up upon mount Sinai under the terrors of the law and sprinckle the instruments and officers there of as with the blood of Abel speaking from the ground or earthly heart of Cain and not on mount Zion in that blood of sprinkling which speaks better things in that peaceable agreement and reconcilement of God and man in Jesus Christ Note here that where two or three are gathered together in any part of the world or at any time we deny it not to be the true Church of Christ but what is it which gives it its capacity to be that Church of Christ is it not he who is in the midst or in the heart of them as the word is who is no lesse then that everlasting father or that ancient of dayes what bounds then can be set unto it lesse then that which gives it its capacity to be such a thing who extends himselfe to the whole family of heaven for unto him all faces looke and every knee bowes and if once it be so in our selves we see it in the whole family and flock of God in all the elect So that the true sum volume of all their doctrine and prayers is of no lesse extent then the
this sick party if they be Elders having it by right of inheritance of whom it may be said Thou art my son this day have I begotten thee For the day wherein Christ is begotten or the day of salvation or of the Saviour as the word will beare is like the seventh day in the Creation whereunto neither evening nor morning are annexed as to the rest of the dayes for it is ever the same where in the Son is begotten even an eternall light or day Therefore this Eldership knowing it to be the birth-day of the Son of God in that resurrection of the dead they cannot with-hold the whole Kingdome nor any priviledg prerogative or royalty thereof from any one that appertayns or belongs thereunto The use and benefit of the holy unction therefore is not yet ceased for then the kingdome of God should cease for all things in it that ever were are or shall be in it taken and understood according to the mind of God are of the same duration that the kingdome it selfe is which must be as ancient as the King himselfe But the carnallizing of the word of God in that and all things is ceased unto us according to the Leviticall services the Kingdom Priest-hood thereof holding no proportion with the Kingdom Priest-hood of our Melchisedech For men may as well go about to divide the Red Sea with a materiall rod or wand as to poure oyle upon a sick body to give him health and forgivenesse of sins Let us know therefore that such as trade in materiall oyle water bread wine gestures and vestments they are such as serve in the oldnesse of the letter that kills its subjects and not in the newnesse of the spirit which gives life to them that are exercised therein And to make a difference between the histories of Christ and his Apostles as being more cleer and to be practised in the letter then the histories of Moses and the Prophets it is a meer trick and device to deceive the world for the one hath as great a vaile upon it as the other and needs the same spirit of interpretation to open it For Christ himselfe uttered his minde in parables and without a parable saith the Text spake be nothing We conclude then that every Saint of God having received that spirit of antiquity which only makes an Elder or Governour in the kingdom of God without which no true Saintship or holinesse being a spirit of Princely rule dominion undaunted courage and fortitude in the things of God whatsoever he may appeare to be in the eyes of the world and judgment of men yet he is one that sheds forth the holy oyle having the materials of which is consists and skill to compose the ingredients according to the device of wisdome or that word of God which he pours out in prayer and prophesie to the healing of the sick strengthening of the weak quickning of the dead and acquitting of the soul from the guilt of sinne in all such who finde themselves dead unto all such things as men naturally live unto as they are the proper off-spring of the earthly man and these Elders do ever acknowledg as great an excellency and no lesse miraculous act in him that receives the unction as in him that pours it out for none but the first-born of God whose right it only is can receive it nor can any of lesse authority or more inferiour off-spring shed it forth Object But some will say That this doctrine denies that order set in the society of man-kinde consisting of superiour and inferiour Answ To this we answer that the order set in nature in poynt of sexe age gifts place c. they are all as significant intelligencers of higher and more noble and durable things for as it was in the creation of all things in the beginning so it is now in this poynt there being respect had unto man-kind in every particular work of Gods hand for whose use and service they were all created and he the last as being the end and scope of them all who was indeed that Microco sinus in himselfe as the very sum and Epitomy of them all Even so man in himself considered or with respect unto any creature act or thing unto w ch he may stand in any relation whatsoever to things in heaven or in earth he hath therein a proper respect unto the Son of God Jesus Christ poynting at and leading unto him even as all other creatures had a proper aspect upon man-kind for whom they were made and whensoever the thing taught by which is the Son of God appeareth who is the truth and substance of them all then the shadows fly away and are of no more validity nor value to a knowing and inlightned mind which carries some resemblance of the body and substance but holds no weight value or considerable worth with the same therefore when ever Christ appears who is the end and substance of the law then doth the letter betake it selfe to its respitillian wings and is no more in point of any account or reckoning with the sonnes of God who weigh and measure all things according to that law of the spirit of life which is in Jesus Christ For the unity and conjunction of God and man simply considered is that reall and substantiall Chaos or unformed thing taught unto us by that in the beginning which no mind or heart of man can so light up it selfe as to give a comely form unto the same or deck it with ornaments pleasing unto a meer Creature that is that God should be made man and become a creature who is the Creator of all things or that man being a creature should be made the Son of God he that creates all things without whom nothing is made Now the wisdome of the spirit of God brooding upon this deep as in the beginning brings forth all the ornaments of Christ in his unity offices vertues relations and operations whatsoever who indeed is that Microcosmus furnished and adorned with all those super-eminent excellencies and glory of the son of God being that world whereof his kingdome doth consist which is the world to come or else it could not be happinesse unto the inhabitants thereof if it were not to come as really as now it is For as he was before the earliest time that can be reckoned or retreated and fallen back unto even so he will be or is to come beyond the latest houre that ever can be marched unto hereafter And in this Chaos drawn out unto these ornaments and beautified with these honourabe and eternall vertues in Christ the order of God or the God like order doth consist who is that God of order and not of confusion and the most eminent and strictest order in the worlds account besides this is reall confusion Yea that Babylon the great the mother of harlots which the Scriptures forewarns us of and this order ariseth and is drawn out of the Chaos of
it is exprest in Ver. 6. For as the use and exercise of the law of the spirit in the declaration of the virtue of Christ Jesus the contraction and Emitto whereof is the splendant brightnesse of Christianity testifying unto all men that therein consists the crucification of the flesh in all the affections and lusts of it Even so the exercise of the law of the flesh in the contraction and sending forth of the desires and affections thereof testifies unto all men that therein consists the crucification and death of Christ Jesus according to the spirit testifying an eternal guilt upon an act of such nature as that is which is of no lesse concernment then the kissing of the Son of the eternal God Secondly It eates their flesh as fire now we know that as rust eateth and consumeth the mettals in which it breeds so doth fire consume and destroy the fuel in which it fastneth it selfe and taketh hold and without fuell the fire ceaseth for take away fuel and the fire goeth out Now the proper fuel wherein the wrath of God kindleth it selfe is the wisdome of the flesh so that take away that and the fire thereof goeth out it is not without that no more then fire is without fuel and therefore no creature in the world is capable of the eternal wrath of God but onely mankinde no more then any can be in a capacity of the consolation of God but such as are indued with his wisedome For as the consolations of God kindle themselves and become extant through that wisdome of God which hath given it selfe so glorious and an eternal forme in all the virtue relations and respects that are between God and man in Christ without which the consolations could not be no more then the eye can see without light or a house stand without the pillars and joynts of it even so the jealousie and wrath of Almighty God kindles it selfe becomes extant and in exercise through the wisdome of the flesh setting such a forme on the operations relations and respects as are conversant in the state of Antichrist between God and man For the wisdome of the creature or carnal law is wrath unto execution against such as use cruelty to the innocent especially in the highest degree and when the proper operations of the word according to the carnal law are made manifest it shall appear that they have exercised cruelty against the innocent Son of God that then in the highest degree in putting him to death in all that livelyhood and operation of his holy spirit which is not permitted to exercise it selfe or breath in them whereupon they must of necessity by that their wisdome judge condemn and execute wrath upon themselves which could not hold proportion with this their fact but as the power of God kindles it selfe therein yet so as the proper power and spirit of God is not any cause or original thereof that is of their torment but man himselfe is the proper cause and fountaine thereof out of which it for ever floweth For as the soule of man is kindled and inflamed through the wisdome of God with the love and consolations of God yet the soule of the creature is no proper original or fountaine thereof for they are the love and comforts of the Creator and not of a creature yet is the creature conversant and active in them even so the power and spirit of God kindles it selfe through the wisedome of the flesh the literall voice of the Scriptures written in all mens hearts in wrath and displeasure and is conversant and infinitely active therein yet is the spirit and power of God no proper original or fountaine of wrath but the wisedome and spirit of the creature is the proper cause and fountaine of it therefore it is sayd of the Lord fury is not in me We must remember then that when the Scriptures ascribe unto man love joy peace grace mercy glory power and virtue proper unto the Saints they are such as God is the fountaine and cause of and not the creature yet are they the excellency of the Sonne of God who is not without the creature though he be God blessed for ever So likewise when we see the Scriptures ascribe unto God anger wrath fury displeasure and vengence which are proper unto the wicked they are such as the creature is the proper fountaine and original of and not God yet are they not without God but are the proper exercise of that man of sinne and sonne of perdition yea of that Shadad or Shedim that destroyer of man kinde who is the God of this world the Prince that ruleth in darknesse which is accursed for ever And as for such devils as are composed through that conjuration of academicall Nations from literall expressions of the Scriptures as connexions of the dictates of their own hearts we skill not but give glory to God both in mercy and severity in the exercises of them and so the rest is an infallible testimony and witnesse of the nature and practice of Satan himselfe the God of this wicked world therefore the Apostle saith We know that we are of God and the world is of that wicked one as the word is that is of the Devill the off-spring and seed of the Serpent accursed from the beginning 3. He addes therefore in the third place Ye have he aped treasure together for the last day To heap treasure together is to augment increase inlarge and so to fill up as nothing more can be added which is impossible unlesse it be an infinite Treasury and then he who onely is infinite must be in the store so that almighty and eternal God is in the wrath hoarded up against the day of wrath and revelation of the just judgement of God for there is a fulnesse of sin without vacuity either in respect of time place or action for the sinne of the Amorites must be full when Abrahams seed possesse the land or else the fulnesse of our deliverance in Christ appears not for there is a fulnesse in or fulfilment of the letter of the Scripture in that way of Judas in his betraying of Christ unto death as there is a fulnesse in that law of the spirit or fulfilment of the Scripture in bringing forth unto light and of that Emanuel God with us For as Christ being true man naturally mortall is filled with eternal life in the excellency and purity of the Son of God so Antichrist being true God in the unity of his creation immortal becomes filled with eternal death through the lusts and corruption of man for it is whole Christ that dyes and not a part of him he dyes in the Saints unto sinne Satan and all corruptable things So that when the Prince of this world cometh he findes not in him to joyne himselfe with or lay claym unto and he dyes in the unbeleife unto all things of the spirit acceptable unto God and in this doth that ransome consist
mistery of iniquity also which properly makes and gives being unto the God of this world which is no lesse then Satan himselfe who attempts through his arrogating insatiable spirit to tender unto Christ all the kingdoms of the Earth and the glory of them the one of these is a wonder but a lying one because it brings not forth what it promiseth as the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharises is a righteousnesse but not that which enters into the kingdome and the other is a wonder and a true miracle because it brings to passe the things it promiseth even as the righteousnesse of Christ enters into the kingdom and sitteth in safety and honour at the right hand of God And they that preach not the Gospel as accompanied with these signes in the ministry of it according to the variety of the work proposed the speaking and creating word of his signes is not sent unto that people for their release and deliverance out of the house of bondage and yet it is true that tongues are for a sign not to them that beleive but to them that beleive not that is an unbeleiver ever expects that a signe should speak in the same form which formerly it hath done or else he takes it not for a wonder wrought by God but then there should need no interpretatiin the Church at all without which tongues are not of use unto edefying The worlds expectation of signes to accompany the preaching of the Gospel for the confirmation of it in the same forme as formerly is the expectation of Infidels such as follow Christ to be fed with carnal things bread that perisheth in the use like them that after they had been fed miraculously with the loaves and the fishes they persue and follow him to have a signe that he is a man of God and conclude that Moses was a man of God that could give bread from heaven but this not coming in like for me but from the Earth though in that wonderfull multiplication and increase is as nothing unto them But the signs wonders and mighty works accompanying the grace of the Gospel never appear twice in the same forme so that a man may as well expect the water that now bubleth up in a living and swift running fountaine to tarry and abide for him till his return to it againe as to fit down by a wonder wrought by God till it appear in the very same forme againe it coming out of that inexhaustible fountaine and swift running current of that infinite variety of his wisdome and power Moses miraculously fasted forty dayes and forty nights and is in the mount with God and hath in that fast the law the perfect pattern of all truth and holiness presented and shewed unto him and againe Christ fasted forty dayes and forty nights but was in the wildernesse among wilde beasts and therein had the temptations of Satan the proper platforme of the power of darknesse represented unto him which differs much from the pattern of salvation and kingdome of light Eliah also fasted forty dayes and forty nights but was miraculously fed before in the strength of which food he went into a cave by the mount of God and there had apparitions voices manifested unto him wherein God made himselfe manifest and also such wherein God appeared not at all one forty dayes fast not but in variety of wonder one death of Christ but a diverse signe in it he is slaine at Jerusalem and our Lord is also crucified in Sodome and in Aegypt true in both with respect to flesh and spirit And so much for the word Behold implying a wonder wherein observe the deceitfull sleights and cunning devices of the Magissians the Jannes and Jambres of our dayes who have erected for the confirmation of Princes great signes of honour and Godlike prosperity Kings Chappels and pulpits of State State-prayers and state-like officers in the Church for forming of them that they may carry their virtue by whomsoever uttered state-religion and state-like pompe in the exercise of it as though the Kings of the earth should be thereby declared to be not onely the off-spring of the almighty but the deputed Gods In what doth the successe and issue of these Doctors indeavors end in differing from those Magissians in Aegypt in the confirmation and incouragement of their King first born and his alies 2. The second point is who the Labourers are or the Labourer for the word may be read either singular or plurally as it usuall in Scripture to use words of active and passive signification as also such as may be read either in the masculine or feminine gender without wrong to the Text so also such as will beare either the singular or plurall number and so it is in this place To take the word therefore in the singular acceptation it is Christ collectively considered in that one intire and mysticall body of his comprehending all the Saints in all ages of the world Againe take it plurally Labourers and it is Christ distinctly distributed and given out in all the parts and members of that body for he is that Labourer or Husband-man that sowes good seed in his field though the evill one sow tares in the time of his sleep or when and where he is dead to all things of the spirit which is in that evill one only upon whom they grow He sowes with his owne hand as he is that one fountaine and giver out of the seed in all ages yesterday and to day and for ever the same And his seeds-men sow also as he is a participator and the receiver thereof for he receiveth the spirit though not by measure for it is immence 3. The third point is what the labour is in reaping down the fields By reaping here is not meant cutting downe but in gathering also as the word-imports Christs reaping therefore is the cutting downe of all those riches and ripened fruits of the flesh those superfluous branches from the true Vine that they be not found in the field or upon that hand of Emanuel which else-where is said to be the crueifying of the flesh in the affections and lusts and the slaying of the enmity in himselfe which are the proper in gatherings of the worke and that whereof their harvest and Vintage doth consist whereby their regions become white unto the harvest that is it sets them in a capacity to be cut downe by an eternall destruction and in these the labourer is defrauded who hath spent his strength in them in vaine or unto emptinesse and laboured for nought as he complains by his Prophet or in the Prophet Isaiah In them he hath lost his time as a labourer hath who is deprived of his hire for his time and age is not extant in them the time of grace is expended the day of salvation is not found in them his generation is ceased in them and is no more even as a labourer hath lost his time so spent as no
work by that which is of himselfe and not of a creature for it is his Image or wisdome which is the being and form of it as the reason and understanding of a man gives being and forme to a man and unto no other creature Without which wisdome and Image of God the workmanship of Christ never was nor can be for it never was but in that Image life and wisdome of God and without unity with God nothing can be eternall And however these men are ignorant of the state of the Son of God yet they shall know that their soules are eternized also and that onely by unity with the Almighty and eternall God but in the way of the harlot in adulterating and falsifying the word of God and that in the way of the mystery of iniquity as truly as Christ is in the mistery of God or is that mistery of God for the mystery of the Gospell consist wholly in him Those therefore whose darling and dalliance is not but in and with temporary and transitory things which exercise and lay out their strength and substance in and about them as their wisdome policy learning time study all their aquired abilities for the Greek word translated wanton sometimes signifies A monstrous profusion pouring out and expending ones selfe without measure in and unto all lasciviousness such are the persons the Apostle here speaks of whose proper strength is spent in things they canot eternize and are the proper crucifiers of Christ as those were of old who employed the strength of their zeal in and about outward ceremonies and beggerly rudiments destitute of the true substance and body which is Christ who are further decribed and set forth in the next phrase Ye have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter The word translated Nourish signifies to feed sustaine or foster as Joseph is said to nourish his father and his brethren in Aegypt with all manner of necessaries whereupon he is called the feeder and stone of Israel as being that corner stone that coupleth the building together or the rock and foundation whereon it stands as our spirituall Joseph is the Greek word Citometrion is used for a portion of meat who then is that faithfull and wise Steward whom the Lord shall make ruler over his house that Nourisheth or giveth a portion of meate in due season The word translated heart signifies in this place pleasure or delight so where one Prophet saith Solomon had finished the Lords house and the house of the King he had done all that was in his heart which another Prophet expressing the same thing saith he had done all that pleased him so where it is said speak comfortably or pleasingly to Jerusalem the word is speak to the heart of Jerusalem so where it is said I will allure her and bring her into the wildernesse and speak comfortably unto her the word is I will speak in her heart meaning Israel the Church of God and many the like And by a day of slaughter here is meant a day or time of feasting as it is said by the Prophet Isajah that the Lord called unto weeping and morning to baldnesse and girding with sackcloth and behold joy and gladnesse slaying of oxen and killing of sheep eating of flesh and drinking wine even as these are called also to weep and houle for the misery that is upon them for he that beleives not wrath abides upon him that is in being already the sum is that they have fed their pleasures and fostred themselves in their hearts delights as in a day of captivity making their exercise in transient things their feastival season and time delighting themselves therein unto the full in which the slaughter and killing of the just one doth consist For nothing can feed unto fulnesse but by mortifying of that whereon it feeds because it must turne into the substance and nature of the thing fed and nourished So that a wicked man takes not away his owne proper life in his banquetting and wantonizing in the corrupt desires of the flesh and things which are transitory and fading but he takes away the life of another he slayes not himselfe who lives after the flesh but he slayes that Fatling the Lamb of God by temporizing and earnallizing that word of God unto himselfe and so it becomes his proper nourishment which is that portion of meate which the world universally in its wicked and unfaithfull Stewards gives unto its Pupils therefore it is that Christ makes that complaint in all his Saints For thy sake are we killed all the day long and counted as sheep for the slaughter that is the great day of feasting unto the world without the mortification of whom they cannot be fed for the two witnesses are killed in Christ which are the two Candlesticks which hold forth all light of truth and the two olive trees which feed the light with oyle that it never go out but stand before the god of the earth that is as Davids seed is said to be before God as the Sun that is stedfast and firm for ever in glory as God himselfe is Yea they are those two Prophets which prophecied one thousand two hundred and three score dayes which is the same time of two and forty moneths and of Elias his three yeares and sixe moneths of drought as also of the three dayes and an halfe wherein they lye unburyed only in variety of glory and truth of witnesse and testimony which is in a two fold respect and they that state the witnesse in any other carnallize the word of God who can only witnesse by prophecy or interpretation unto the eternall estate of the man of God as also of that man of sin which are those two great Candlesticks whereon the light of Gods mercy and severity shine for ever which never wants oyle for the trimming and supply of it signified by those two olive trees which none can interpret but the spirit of God it selfe therefore it is not done by army nor by power but by spirit saith the Lord of hosts for no man can give a true interpretation or testimony of the eternal estate and condition of the just and unjust for time to come but he that can witnes unto it as it is eternal with respect of time past also which none can do save our Zerubbabel that stranger from Babels confutation as his name signifies therefore they who affirm an eternal condition unto just and unjust for time to come and cannot interpret in point of looking back how it is really without beginning they affirm they know not what are false witnesses against Christ the Son of God and where this testimony failes the witnesses are killed and put to death which is in that Sodome and Aegypt where our Lord is crucified And as they are dead in the world for three dayes and an halfe so are they alive the same term of time in God and never want oyle to give the light and
brightnesse thereof in the one we see from what we are eternally delivered and in the other to what we are eternally delivered so that the three dayes and halfe is the same with that time times and the division of time in which the woman is sayd to be in the wildernesse it is for a time that is one simple time or act of eternity it is times plurally that is there is a time of the Son of God wherein nothing of the son of perdition is contained and there is a time of the son of perdition wherein nothing proper to the state of the Son of God is contained And there is the division of time that is in one simple individuall act of eternity they are everlastingly separated and divided infinitely remote from each other in all things which appertain and belong unto them If this Candlestick were not removed for it is but one by the testimony of the Prophet Zachary with seven bowles and this oyle and light extinct in the world and these Prophets or this Prophet killed the men of Belial could never glut themselves with the things of the flesh nor so send abroad and communicate the gifts thereof one with another as now they do holding only to the word of the beginnig of Christ and cease not there-from or the elements and rudiments of Christ or if you will the letter of Christ or literall Christ as the word imports that historicall Christ contained in such a time of the word and not else extant confined to such a place else-where not really present visible onely in such a particular person or else not apparant nor to be found These men that are ever laying againe the foundation of repentance from dead works faith towards God of the doctrine of baptisme and laying on of hands of the resurrection from the dead and of eternall judgement having them still to begin as in a subject out of Christ not placing them all in that one eternall act of God in forming of Christ as in that common faith once and for ever delivered unto the Saints but have ever a new fabrick to set up which is not yet raised and an old house to pull down not yet demolished whereas the summe of the Gospel is onely to proclayme what is Ad sum these men never attaine that perfection which the Apostle there onely exhorts and leads unto These men will never suffer the carkasses of the Prophets to be buried for their dead bodies must lye in the streets of that great City where our Lord is crucified that is they must set up a livelesse form of an eternall estate to allure and terrifie the world but take away that proper spirit and life that is the onely agitator and mover in each of them giving a livelesse form to a Church Ordinances as also the world and practices thereof with no more substance of the proper spirit of either then there is the vertue of fire in a shadow thereof painted upon a wall which to see a company of men to stand by and diligently turning themselves to warme in extreamity of cold would make a wise man admire Such is the care and zeale of most Churches if not of of all erected in these dayes they have taken away the life of the Prophets but keep a dead form as the Pharisees built their Sepulchres They have barked my Olive tree as the Prophet complayns that no sapp nor oyle can ascend And they have taken away the seven lamps and pipes from the top or head of the Candlesticke that no light can shine in the Sauctuary And as it is the greatest shame and abomination for man not to bury his dead his own kind out of sight when his nakednesse doth appeare being disroabed of all humane abilities even so it is the abhomination and shame that the world glories in to keep that great body politick of humane wisdome unburied in the Churches which it that which gives form and being to all their temporary Institutions and Ordinances which is as voyd of life proper to the wisdome and spirit of God as a dead body is when the soule is departed And therefore cannot move nor breath out the reality of the being of that estate both of the just and unjust to be as truly without beginning as without end for the world doth not eternize the Son of God by that common of trinity in unity and unity in trinity in the divine essence for he is not Christ that annointed son of God but as he is considered in both natures nor is the eternall wisdome or work of God beseeming himselfe who is infinite and eternal extant but in that workmanship of Christ for it is true that as the seed of man propagates not his kind but as considered in male and female even so the immortall seed of God produceth not his off-spring but as considered in God and man in Christ therefore they have killed the faithfull and true witnesse the head and top of the creation of God by not giving him the reality of being from eternity therefore he is sayd to be one that was dead and is alive or as the word is he is dead in the present tence as in the wicked and is alive that is in the Saints for the word translated was is the same where the Apostle faith I am an Apostle in the present tence And here let us adventure to insert a word of the nature of the unity between God and man which eternizeth the estate both of just and unjust seing there is in both mans nature which is temporary made and brought forth in time being a reall and proper creature For the unity that is in Christ which is a being joyned unto the Lord and becoming one spirit or one mystical and spiritual estate and condition together with himselfe Consider with me that there is in the eternall an aptnesse to do or to be and a proper principle or fountaine from which he doth or is such a thing For doing and being the thing done are conjunctive never seperated but where the one is there is the other to do the law of God is to be the law of God and so the Saints are a law unto themselves as well as the profane Gentiles the one not having or doing the law of the flesh no more then the other hath or is the law of the spirit God therefore is apt and prompt to know to be wise prudent to debate determine and conclude to love to pity to have compassion to be at peace to be kinde joyous and salvation but he doth or is these from that principle or fountain of goodnesse and bounty wherein hee communicates himselfe unto another in the being and exercise of them all wherein is such infinite fulnesse that that which is proper unto the principles and practice of a creature is superfluous in every one of them So that in whatsoever a christian is united unto or comunicates with God in it is properly
brother-hood which is in Christ who is not ashamed to call us brethren whereby he declares their disjunction and separation from the men formerly spoken of as not being naturalized or having any part or portion in that manner of death formerly expressed nor any allyance thereunto 2. Whence he infers the exhortation Be patient therefore that is as the Son of God suffers himselfe to be deprived and laid wast of all spirituall glory vertue and operations of his spirit in the world to rescue you and deliver you there-from even so do you suffer your selves without any resistance to be routed and dispoiled of all humane transitory and fading excellencies of the world that as he fully suffereth in the wicked in point of the spirit as being layd waste of all the things thereof for there is a fulfilling or fulnesse of the Scripture in Judas and the Jewes in putting Christ to death in regard of the letter of it So do you patiently endure to be dispoyled and layd waste of all that carnall and temporall glory of the world in whatsoever it may seem to consist for there is a fulfilling or fulnesse of the Scripture in the man of God also even in that Emanuel God with us or in us in regard of the true spirit and life of the word of God therefore the flesh must be abolished that so the fulness of the spirit may appear which otherwise it cannot do The word translated patience is the same where the Apostle John saith I John even your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdome and patience of Jesus Christ or in the Kingdome and under-abiding of Jesus Christ as the word is truly rendered that is a suffering of the losse of all things carnall and transitory through that Princely power of the spirit that reigns in the kingdome of God that so Christ his suffering in the flesh may be as full and compleat as that in the spirit that so the form of the Cherubims on each end of the Mercy-seate may answer one to another from between which the Oracle of God ever utteteth it selfe and else-where expresseth not it selfe in the Sanctuary and hence is Christ said to come or spring up in this place and that is the third point unto what this suffering tends and whereunto it serves and that is to the coming of the Lord. 3. The word translated coming signifies to spring grow up or ascend teaching us hereby that this is the way of the resurrection of Christ and his ascention into all spirituall and heavenly glory for he gives himselfe unto death in respect of any life of the spirit being or existing in the world or any glory of his presence in point of his divine grace ever to appeare there that is in the wicked and this is as a compleat and unvaluable ransome whereby he purchaseth unto himselfe miserable and fraile flesh in that way of his Saints to be possessed for ever in the power of his spirit in all the fruits of righteousnesse being cloathed thereupon with the glory of the sons of God and heyrs of his Kingdom this patience therefore is to the coming of the Lord into unity and brother-hood with fraile man The argument then stands thus If Christ suffer death in the spirit in the men of the world freely giving up himselfe thereunto without resistance to an eternall separation of his spirit and glory of his power from that which he himselfe is namely man Do you in like manner suffer your selves to be deprived of all the excellency glory of this world and freely lay down your life in respect of any living thereunto without resistance for it is not unto separation or departure but to the springing up and coming of the Lord that you may ascend into that which he is in himselfe namely into the state and condition of an only son Let the world take notice that if the Son of God give it its full scope without resistance to set up and exalt it selfe in riches power policy and all wantonnesse and lasciviousnesse what a shame is it to the world to deny him liberty and freedome in his Saints to exercise himselfe in all his vertues offices and operations of his spirit in his house and kingdome but they must be judging him to be factious seditious pernicious erroneous and blasphemous and that by such as are most properly sealed up unto carnall and humane principles in Schools of humane learning so as they dare not give an Exposition upon the word of God but so as it may be consonant to the rules of humane Art unlesse they receive it at second hand by some approved Author that passeth for currant in the state where they live While the world walks and works in this sphear we shall see nothing among the sons of the mighty but meerly Babels confusion For the most curious Artist destitute of the spirit of God exercising in the word of God brings forth the greatest confusion for he is bound to preserve and maintayn the flesh which in all poynts lusteth against the spirit and is contrary thereunto So that it is the division of language for his tongue is divided from God in all expressions if hee be understood according to his true intent 4. The amplification follows by an elegant allusion to a Husbandman with respect to his seed-time and harvest We all know of what nature the patient waiting of a husband-man is with respect to his seed-time and harvest Let us therefore take out the meaning of the allusion wherein is contayned a mystery implyed in this word Behold noting unto us the appearance of a signe or wonder as was formerly sayd of the same phrase Now the Husband-man is the Son of God who sowes good seed in his field But the enemy in this his sleep of death unto the spirit in the men of the world or man of sin sowes tares for it is the word of God that is sown in the world but being received and formed by the would composed of the principle and dictates of humane wisdome which hath in it the very characters of the letter of the Scriptures which is the compleat form of the law of sin and death even as the wisdome of the spirit hath in is the compleat form of the law of the spirit of life and being received and formed in that mould it becomes a pernicious and unfruitfull tare In like manner as the spirit of the creature being cast into that mould of wholsome Doctrine doth through that wisdom of God become in it the true seed of immortality to increase with the increasings of God In the allusion or metaphor we have to consider 1. A wonder noted in the word Behold 2. A patient waiting or abiding The husband-man waiteth 3. For what that is for the precious fruits of the earth 4. The time is with long patience 5. The meanes of receiving them and that is The former and latter raine FIrst for the word Behold
well as that of the Sonne of God who is the Lord our righteousnesse the very kingdome it selfe and the inlet thereinto also Yea there is a faith of Devils as well as the faith of the Sonne of God as the Apostle declares Thou beleives there is one God thou dost well the Devil also beleives and trembles The phrase of Scripture therefore without the scope and intent thereof is the common deceipt of all the world where the Scriptures are read and the rest have the substance thereof written in their hearts So that no humane learning which is but the Dilucidation or Lucifer of those principles can possibly give light to lead to the true knowledge of the Scriptures The mis-apprehending of this point running away with the phrase as men by their Concordance heap up phrases of Scripture to confirm their doctrine whereas every one is of severall interpretation never minding the intent but onely the sound of words is the very cause of all the principalities powers the rulers of the darknesse of this world and spirituall wickednesse or wicked spirits as the word is in high places which are so elevated consecrated and judged of such necessity in the world for from hence ariseth the unction of the King as being set in that office and roome of that King of Salem Prince of peace and from this is the Bishop consecrated and installed as bearing the office and place of that great Bishop and feeder of our soules and out of this mistake ariseth all those offices and officers respectively standing in relation to the one and to the other whereby the pure word of eternity comes to be prostrated and adulterated by bringing it into copulation with vanishing things which perish in the use Submitting it unto the glory of the creature and not the creature to the glory of him who is God blessed for ever Amen Note here that the laws and orders of men in the world standing upon the letter of the Scripture in sound of word and not in the sence in the history which alters in form and not in the mystery that abides for ever hence it is that they are built upon the sands as Christ reports And when any people comes to see into the defects of the foundation which another people stand upon they encourage themselves to pull down the building of another to make their own more firme so that which the world takes to be the strength and safety of it selfe comes in few years to be the depopulating and ruine thereof For it is as possible to give as good ground and argument for one way and order set up upon the sayd principles as for another as for water in baptisme and men of ripe years as wine in the supper and infants counted the seed of the Church debarred and for the cutting off the fore-skin of the flesh as wel as either of them both and upon this ground comes in that continued work and great imployment of reformation in the world and shall never be accomplished by the change of titles of officers and formes of institutions so long as they are placed upon the same foundation namely the bare letter of the Scripture but the best perfection it will be brought unto is to persecute Joseph for interpretting the dream In this point of the letter or phrase of the Scripture and the true intent and scope thereof consists that threefold temptation brought in by Satan against Christ and Christ his effectuall answer thereunto in the one stands the subtilty of the Devill and in the other the wisdome and minde of the Son of God 2. And hence he brings in the direction leading us to the Prophets as to a pattern how to come to the true knowledge of the minde of God that is to the true interpreters of the Scriptures for the Hebrew word Nabi and the Greek Prophetes signifies speaking interpretting and uttering words and Oracles that come immediately from God So that we have no true example copy extract draught or pattern of the law of God the order and composure of the kingdome of God but by having recourse to the true interpretation of the word of God And there is no true Prophesie of any private interpretation but holy men of God speak as they are moved by the spirit of God that is there is no true interpretation given of any part of the word of God when it is bounded to any particular time or age or confined to any particular time or age or confined to one particular person alone but as the spirit of God remains the same in its motion so doth the word of God in its expression and creating virtue accompanying the same in Christ and it is a thing too sublime to be congealed into inke too secret and hidden to be printed upon paper too precious to be piled up in Libraries and of too prince-like a spirit to enter into contract with or be subservant unto any school of humane learning For it is the spirit of the Sonne onely that knows the minde of the father and it is he and not another that must reveale it unto us So that if ever we receive that fiery law of the spirit we must ascend into the mount of God namely into the height of the condition of him who sits at the right hand of God being that whereby he manifests his wisdome and skill power and glory even as a man manifests his art and skill by his right hand which no art power nor policy of man can ever reach or attaine unto This pattern is set before us in the Prophets onely or in that one great Prophet in the interpretation and unfolding of the word of God or in the translation of the originall language that is in declaring how the things of God are transformed through the carnall conceptions of men into the principles and rudiments of the creature and so is in them become a profane Grecian which makes the Son of God so complaine that his vissage is marred more then any man and his forme more then the sons of men And this is a language will speak in Cain and all his posterity when inke and paper shall vanish as smoke There is also a skil to translate the spirit of man into the principles and excellencies of the Sonne of God as being thereby become that holy Hebrew of Heber yea the seed of Abraham and Sonne of God to speak according to that voyce of the blood of sprinkling which hath in it power to passe over the destroying Angell for ever if these were as truly translated or interpretted in the world as the letters and sillables of the Bible are into our native tongue wee should see more eminent and excellent Schollars appeare then now we do 1. And here the Prophets are described to be such as speak in the name of the Lord that is in the power and authority of the Sonne of God for to speak in the name of God is to speak in
the authority and power of God which comprehends not onely speech but action also that is those signes and wonders and mighty works which accompany the preaching of the Gospel in the confirmation of it testifying the presence of God accompanying the word making it good by act and deed according to the expressions thereof For the word of God is never truly uttered without the appearance of a signe and wonder and a great work no lesse then such as holds proportion with God for the confirmation of the same Now we know a wonder is a monster in nature such as no nature in its proper instinct brings forth it goes beyond the bounds abilities and precincts of any naturall confines whatsoever and without such works signes or wonders the Gospel is never truly preached for if it should Christs promise would faile but heaven and earth shall faile before that one jot or tittle of the word of God come to corruption So that there is no speech or doctrine of the Gospel but in its expression it frames constitutes and brings forth a work of such nature as no simple nature whatsoever can bring forth therefore a wonder and a signe to be admired yea truly miraculous for no nature can reach thereunto in the utmost extent thereof For as it is true that there is no operation of the spirit of God in the way of Christ but it is above and goes beyond the nature of the creature having the power and glory of the Creator in it nor is it attainable by any or by all creatures So it is true also that there is not any work or operation of the Gospel which the divine nature simply and abstractively considered can be sayd to be in any capacity or possibility to attaine thereunto but the possibility of God to do all things stands in his making himself to be such a one otherwise it is unattaniable in the nature divine simply and singly considered because there is no work of the Gospel without man considered in it no more then there is a Christ without mans nature who is the subject matter of the Gospel And as Christ is not without mans nature no more is any work of the Gospel for as the divine nature cannot of it selfe simply and solely considered dye nor ascend neither descend being incomprehensible No more can the humane nature considered simply in it selfe have in it eternal life comprehend all things or be omnipotent but in that unity of the Gospel the Sonne of God they are all brought to passe and all in act and being in that one Christ nothing in him therefore whatsoever but being set forth and brought to light there appear a wonder a miracle is wrought a signe set up for the confirmation of the Gospel such as no nature simply considered can attaine unto or bring forth so that if the true word of the Prophet or of interpretation be spoken this true and miraculous work must enevitably appear transcending all nature in the utmost capacity thereof And therefore that saying holds firme that we have a Meditor made higher then the heavens a work and wonder above all nature simply and solely considered and therefore Christ is that new creature yea the beginning or head of the creation of God for God is one in the work not onely in making but as one made in Christ And thus the Prophets are invested with power and authority to speak in the name of the Lord not onely in word but in work also a signe and wonder accompanying the word at all times which makes them most noble and God-like to the cutting off of the spirit of Princes becoming terrible to the Kings of the earth 2. Whence he brings in the second description of a true Prophet as the means whereby this power and authority is attained and that is through suffering affliction and long patience By suffering affliction in this place we are to understand a being cut off from being supported by any earthly power carnall policy or any temporall glory whatsoever with respect to friends or alies or any earthly relations which fade and vanish away which human spirits seek unto and rely upon for the promoting of themselves For onely in the losse and laying aside all these things a true Prophet comes to be invested into the power wisdome and excellency of the Son of God in whom is found all friendship all offices and all relations whatsoever not onely compleated but also eternized to abide for ever in whose power and authority by this means they go forth By this means it was that Moses became so great a deliverer for he refusing to be called the Son of Pharaohs daughter choosing rather to suffer adversity with the people of God in the losse of all such kinde of glory as Pharaohs Court afforded became an effectuall instrument to manifest that power and glory throughout all the land of Aegypt in the deliverance of Gods chosen and overthrow of his enemies Again take Eliah for an instance in this point comprehending all the Prophets as he did in his appearance with Christ in the transfiguration and you shall finde him complaining that he is left alone as cut off from all relations from carnall apostatized Israel and his life sought after to be taken away also by the policy and power of the whole kingdome of Israel under the Government of that wicked Ahab For a true Prophet is to endure hardnesse as a good souldier of Jesus Christ and no man that warreth intangleth himselfe with the affaires of this life that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a souldier For no superiority dignity or advance no place of office or atendance no conjunction or relation of this life but must suffer wrack and ruine in the true prosecution of the authority and spirit of a Prophet otherwise the name of God is not called upon as Christ witnesseth saying For whosoever of you he be that forsakes not all that he hath he cannot be my Disciple The bond of family with respect to wife and children must give way to this the bond of trade and imployment must give way to this the bond of office and place to uphold this tottering temporary order amongst men must give way to this the bond and tye to particular congregations of tittuler Pastor Teacher or in any other way hireling ministry which are much alike to family cares relations and employments to maintain a temporary credit and lively-hood in this life the power and spirit of Eliah breaks them to peeces if the spirit of God breath it snaps them all like Sampsons bands which were but as flax when it smels the fire though the world in the losse of the lock by its Dla's who hath bewitched them to stand ingaged unto it contrary to the expresse word of Christ which sayth If any man come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters yea and his own life
may marry but so as though he had no wife he may use the world but as though it were of no use unto him at all and he may buy but so as one that never intends to possesse for he makes no store or treasure of any thing that is of a perishing nature no not of the worlds ordinances of Christ as they call them being of such nature as are onely comprized within the narrow confines of this mortall life which they cannot extend nor draw them out beyond and therefore things that perish as bodily exercises which profit not So that whatsoever a true Prophet makes use of in the world he abides under suffering of the losse of it and is disjointed from it in the enjoyment of it in point of that spirit wherewith the men of the world pursue and make use of the same thing becoming a pilgrim and stranger to whatsoever the common spirit of the sons of men account themselves at home in and is no more contracted or affianced unto the things of this life then he shall be when in respect of this mortall life he is no more to converse with these transitory things and affaires Whereupon he brings in the next words in way of answer to a question might arise as thus If the Saints of God suffer affliction under so long continued patience wherein then doth their rest and comfort consist the answer is Vers 11. Behold we count them happy that indure Ye have heard of the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord for the Lord is very pittifull and of tender mercy In which words observe these particulars 1. The esteem had of enduring and suffering Behold we count them hapy that endure 2. A pattern thereof propounded Ye have heard of the patience of Job 3. The end God aimes at and attains therein And have seen the end of the Lord. 4. The ground reason of the effecting and accomplishing thereof for the Lord is very pittifull and of tender mercy FIrst for the esteem and account had of suffering it is brought in by way of admiration and wonder Behold it is no lesse then a miracle that all happinesse should consist in durance and suffering for the Saints of God upon true account can sum up the blessed and hapy estate and condition in one continued act of suffering which all the world is so much afraid to undergo that is they suffer the losse of that exercise of spirit in its enjoyments wherein the honour riches praise and proper prosperity of all flesh doth consist naturally considered which is the desire and support of all the men of the world in the losse whereof the Saints are made partakers of that spirit and life of the Sonne of God which springs up and exerciseth its virtue and power in them wherein all true happinesse doth consist and exercise it selfe Which all carnall men decline detest and abhor for they will never accept nor receive Christ upon his own terms and conditions but contrarily reject and cast him off preferring the pleasures of sinne which are but for a season before those riches and treasures stored up for ever in that Son of God It is a wonder and miraculous that afflictions and sufferings which all men are so fearful of should be filled with the victory joy and tryumph of a Saviour therefore it is that the Apostle saith being well acquainted with this point God forbid that I should rejoyoe in any thing save in the crosse of our Lord Jesus Christ whereby the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world Yet all men cannot but have an honorable esteem and high account of an innocent suffering as having praise-worthinesse therein Behold wee count them happy that endure Yea the integrity of the silver tryed in the fining pot and the soundnesse and solidity of the gold in the fornace are precious in the sight of all men Who is the man but when the the suffering and the sufferer seem both to be removed out of the world will not seem to approve of the work Abrahams departure from his fathers house to go to a land he knew not whether and his abode in the same land as a stranger and sojourner not enjoying a foots breadth thereof as the martyr Stephen reports is approved as an excellent thing by all now in our dayes but would be counted great folly to give it a present being in a Prince to for sake his royalties to undergo the crosse of Christ So also his seed going down into Aegypt and suffering hard bondage under cruell task masters with their tediousnesse and dangerous travel in the wildernesse enduring so many cruell assaults of the heathen and in their entrance into the promised land by those seven nations greater and stronger then they The dispertions and persecutions of the Prophets Apostles together with the sufferings and death of Jesus born of the Virgin these being all taken onely as things past turned as into humane history out of which may be collected carnall experiments and policy who is the man that wil not lend an eare unto them and seem to approve them yea the very Scribes Pharises and hypocrits cannot but trumpet out the fame of the Saints in this point of suffering saying That if they had lived in the dayes of their fathers they would not have persecuted the Prophets as they did but in the mean time do nothing else but build the Sepulchres of the Prophets by their erecting of temporary ordinances carnal governments humane institutions and appointments formed and framed from the pattern of the bare letter of the Scripture under which they keep buried the very spirit and life of the Prophets Apostles and Christ him self stifling thereby the very virtue and power of those spirituall and heavenly appointments of the of God among the sons of men In those eternall extentions and operations thereof then the which a greater cruelty cannot be attempted or maintained for as the blood shed in all generations from Abel to Zacharias comes justly upon that present age people who thus deal with the Prophets even so that compleat power glory and presence of the Prince of peace and innocent Lamb of God which hath appeared in any or all ages of the world ought according to the law of truth justice and equity to be set forth made manifest and acknowledged in the present generation and age of the world who is Jesus Christ yesterday and to day and the same for ever though the world know him not nor will acknowledg him so to be Note for conclusion of this point that onely the sufferings of the Saints of God is an innocent suffering for they do not wrong unto use cruelty against or contradict any of the proper creatures or workmanship of God who is the Creator of all things For how soever it be true that the wisdome and subtilty of man be the proper instigator and stirrer up of all perscution and cruelty
the word by transforming it into the similitude of a creature and not into the glory of the Creator so that the imaginations and dictates of his own heart give a temporary forme unto an eternall word which is that carnall law of sin and death in himselfe subjecting himselfe thereunto so that whatsoever the letter saith which kils it saith it in him who is litterall and hath the power of engagement and binding that party over to the onely acknowledgement and practice thereof and so the word of God becomes a tormentor unto man for it being held or imprisoned in this unrighteousnesse or narrow and strait confines of humane principles and capacity and yet in it selfe infinite and eternal cannot possible move therein but must have respect unto its own nature which is infinite incomprehensible and eternall whereby the soule of the creature is set upon the rack hanged on the gibbet laid under an intolerable presse cast into the flames overwhelmed with the flouds being extended and intangled with that which is infinitely above as also below and beneath and in all respects beyond the reach of all humane abilities and so continually deviseth and frameth out more ways of torture and torment unto it selfe then ever mans heart in any tyrant could invent for the shame and horrour of the body In which respect that compleat condition ceaseth to be the state and condition or to be led by the proper principles of a meer creature or workmanship of God and becomes Shedim as the Caldean phrase is that is the destroyer of mankinde in humane and satanicall So that the dictates of such a heart are the proper suggestions of Satan and its operations the proper works of darknesse and the onely path wherein the wrath of the Almighty treads for ever Note also that there is in them who are under the law of the spirit a direct Antithesis unto this expressed of the wicked For the spirit of man being taken into unity with the word and so gathered up into the wisdome and power of God works nor moves not but by principles proper unto God which are of an eternall and incomprehensible nature and yet the spirit of the creature cannot move but with respect to the precincts of time in which it is but it goeth forth in and by eternall principles so that there is in the Son of God distinct operations yet every one of an eternal nature and race The one giving delight to the work through variety change of action and the other gives liberty ease and freedome unto the soule therein having so large roome and so spacious a sphear to walke and exercise it in the bounds whereof can never be troden out like the Sun in the firmament whose progresse none can hinder nor stop or prevent the health under its wings from the exercise of it self nor can any take out of order those fixed stars of the morning that fight from such an eminent and noble distance in their courses for the destruction of this wicked Sisera even those bright morning stars that sing together sons of God shouting for joy in those Nobles of Israel in laying of the first foundation of the earth so as it shall never be removed who are as far above the power and dominion of Satan as the heavens are above the earth out of the gun-shot of being insisted with any corrupt doctrine or of being hurt by any of the tyrannical practices of this present world Such is the state and condition of that mysticall body of our Lord Jesus the dictates of whose heart are the motions of that spirit of holinesse and power and his operations works of the Son of God And of such nature is the law of the spirit which is in Christ Jesus and of all such as are under command and in the authority thereof The Saints then or brethren of our Apostle know the patience of Job not at a distance but in the nearest conjunction so as being made one with it it being an entire and undivided crosse and suffering and is brought in the next sentence viz. And have seen the end of the Lord. Under the word seene is comprehended the exercise of all the sences which is usuall in Scripture as being filled in them all by the Crosse and sufferings of Christ as if he should say yee have seen ye have heard ye have tasted relished and felt the sufferings of Christ for his name is an oyntment poured out the sweet savour and scent whereof fills the whole house so that your hands have handled the word of life in this point as really as Thomas handled the humane body of Christ when he put his finger into the print of the nayles which fastned him to his Crosse for the confirmation of his faith of such reality is the Crosse of Christ as to make us to see touch and tast for our satisfaction the power and vertue of the Lord otherwise we can never handle the word of life to minister and serve in the same as Ministers of the Sanctuary and as able Ministers of the Gospel not of the letter but of the spirit for the letter kills but the spirit gives life So that our hearing or knowing of the patience of Job namely our being one with Christ in his Crosse alike as we are one with him in any other grace or vertue is that which opens unto us the scope of the Scriptures so that we see Gods end and aym in blasting unto us all carnall things is the same that appeared in Job to give double in that which never failes for we never read of any more losse unto Job but as though he were enriched for ever We see therefore Gods intent and end in the Crosse so as to make it our joy and consolation so that we rejoyce in persecution in tribulation and reproach knowing that Gods end herein is only to make his power manifest in us for in all these things we are more then conquerours knowing that our victory stands both in being the Rescuer and the rescued so that the glory and joy of them both is made one in us which no earthly Conquerour can attaine So that our laughter is that spiritull Isaac the joy of the whole earth for howsoever we know our selves in mans nature simply considered to be like Sarah barren of all the fruits of righteousnesse and destitute of that immortall seed of God and also our Lord simply considered to be past age for being brought forth and made manifest in time in one that is but of yesterdays continuance who in himselfe is that Ancient of dayes Yet the end and intent of the Lord in the conjunction of these by visiting of us in that way of the promise is the bringing forth of Isaac according to that time of life proper to the Son of God who is the joy and laughter of all that heare it so as to approve of it and give credit thereunto according to that unwavering faith
saith He that for sakes not father and mother wife and children for my sake and the Gospell is not worthy of mee And againe He that hates not father and mother wife and children brethren and sisters yea and his owne life also he cannot be my Disciple The reason hereof is because all naturall relations brought unto the highest pitch which they tend unto is to idolize the thing by setting it in the place of God requiring a due respect and observation thereof in the neglect or contempt of what ever might hinder the promoting thereof which cannot stand with a due observation and respect of that relation as it is ordered and eternized in Christ but must make a nullity of it for the coming of Christ in all things is glory to God in the highest and not to the things of the creature When the man called by Christ desired first to go and bury his father that the earthly relation may have chiefty and come in the first place Christ answers Let the dead bury their dead follow thou me intimating that these relations are dead and are to be buryed unto us in the call and relation of Christ For Christ is about his Fathers businesse not when he attends on Joseph and Mary but when he is disputing and convincing the Doctors of the carnall Temple at Jerusalem But earthly relations in their proper intent without which the life of it is let out ever set themselves in the first place for what is a Husband or a Wife unlesse they make each other the highest pitch of their love which is the pointed up pinacle which the Devill sets Christ upon according to the flesh wherein the strength of his temptations consists and where it takes it is the presumptuous sinne which our spirituali David is freed from for who dares not to love wife and children to the highest poynt thereof without feare of sinning being the proper sinew to â—ye them together and the life-blood in the veynes to give motion and agility in all conjugall respects making each other the object of desires hopes observation diligence care and motion that nothing no not life it selfe shall hinder or be thought too deare to maintaine the credite comfort and well-being of one another And here it is to be noted that when the Scriptures take up any of the Creatures in their nature relation operation or in any respect it is not done but with respect unto the wisdome and spirit of man for whose use all things were made and are and that to declare thereby either the mystery of God or the mystery of iniquity or both And that allusion cannot be of a capacity to signifie unto us the mind of God wrapt up therein whether a thing terrible to nature or lovely unlesse wee extend it unto the farthest poynt which it intends or inclines after and that is Satanicall as for example when it takes up a Lyon to expresse it self by a Dragon Tyger Wolfe Leopard Beare Fox or Serpent we must look unto the proper pursuit of the creature to the utmost extent of his disposition and practice which being centred in man as the scope and intent of all Gods works it must be found there in the greatest cruelty subtilty and tyranny which is no lesse then the Devill that roaring Lyon seeking whom he may devoure Againe when it takes up lovely relations as Husband to wife and wife to Husband Father to son and son to Father we must carry them unto that point which nature depraved pursues in this world For in the Kingdome of God there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage and then it idolizeth the party beloved sets it in the place of God and so becomes an idolatrous affection yea it is that love of the world which is enmity with God having the spirit of the Serpent in it and therefore to be hated For it swears and engageth unto the things of this world contrary to the charge of our Apostle given in this place and so is a true metaphor and in way of dissimilitude or antithesis holds direct proportion with the things of God and so fitly sets out the nature of the love of God in the Saints Whose temporary relations or lives are not deare unto them for the cause of Christ in mayntaining those that are reall and eternall in him and in this true sence of the height and intent of them are all hated for Christ and no bond at all to hinder them in their course in the promulgation of the Gospel For where find we any of the Prophets or Apostles of Christ entangled with wife or children friends or famlies as a tye to hinder them in the pursuit of the things of God Indeed the Apostle saith Have not we power to eate and to drinke to lead about a sister a wife and power not to worke as other Apostles brethren of the Lord or in brother hood of that Lordship over all things Yet did they practice or desist in doing or not in doing these things only as the progress and propagation of the Gospel might be furthered and promoted thereby But it is the policy and practice of the world to adjure conjure things so together by humane tyes and bonds knowing that all carnall relations flye for refuge unto a Diabolicall engagement even as every spiritual relation flyes to that bond and oath of God For thereby the spirit of the world sets persons and places together to claym mutuall interest to the neglect and vilifying of that bond of the spirit which is in Christ prostrating themselves to the service and use meerly of each other But the doctrine of Christ saith on this wise Yee have heard that it hath been said of old thou shalt not for sweare thy selfe but I say unto you sweare not at all that is take not an engagement upon thee so as to submit unto or be at the service and command of any thing whatsoever that is not the proper state place office relation operation or condition as it is founded in Christ or conducing thereunto By which and in whom we are made Lord of all things and so subject to none besides him alone For of him and through him and for him are all things and to him the glory of all appertains and belongs Therefore it is That the sabboth is made for man and not man for the sabboth for the sonne of man is Lord of the sabboth And hence it is that it is sayd that the woman was made for the man and not the man for the woman that is all things more weake and effeminate whatsoever they be are made to be subject and of the service of that masculine spirit of the man of God and not the man of God to be subject to any thing which hath not the strength and authority of the Son of God in it Now in that Christ was not made an high Priest but by an oath and yet gives strict charge not to sweare at all
unto them no more then that rich man could lay claym to the service of Lazarus so much as to bring him one drop of water to cool his tounge Christ renders a reason why we are not to swear by the earth namely because it is Gods footstool so the enemies of Christ are said to be made his footstool by the Psalmist for as the powers of the world are as the throne for the exercise of Gods displeasure so in the exercise and execution thereof they are troden down under his feete as such as are of base condition and off-spring whereon his feet are set as being victour and conqueror of them for ever therefore the promise is Thou shalt tread upon the Lyon and the adder the young Lyon and the Dragon shalt thou trample under feet 3. In the third place the prohibition is of universall extent comprehending all things contained in this heaven and earth as is described in which heaven the actions relations and constitutions are multiplied as the heavenly bodies in the visible heavens are in their constitutions motions operations and respects which are innumerable The things of the earth also in their severall forms kinds and virtues are all comprehended in these words Neither by any other oath the world therefore in its exalted and troden upon estates and conditions are as full of variety in the one and in the other and with respect to each other as the heavens and the earth are which are here elegantly alluded unto and yet true Christianity is free from being ingaged to any thing it selfe only excepted not consisting of any nor of all them for the Son of God not having a greater swears by himselfe and is ingaged to none besides the spirit and life of true religion is ingaged to nothing but it selfe and unto that upon oath wherever it appears And pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is to visite the fatherlesse and the widow according to their necessities and to keep our selves unspotted of the world that is it gives out it selfe and yeelds sufficient supply onely to the fatherlesse namely to such as are cut off from that race and stock of the men of the world and so are without father as Melchizedech is and ever was and will be and in that respect the Prophet saith For with thee the fatherlesse they finde mercy who are not propagated and borne of flesh nor of blood nor of the will of man but of God for that which is borne of the flesh is flesh but that which is borne of the spirit is spirit The state of the widdow also religion supplies and is ingaged unto as to it selfe whose covenant and contract with the things of this life is broken and altogether dissolved and made voyd who are come to that age and gravity of the Gospel as of threescore years and past that is past bringing forth according to the wisdome of the flesh who are such widows that bring forth in that kind as the Apostle saith wax wanton and will marry that is enter into contract and ingagements with the things of the world through their divorce from Christ Religion is in no sort obliged unto such but onely to the modesty and gravity of the former And therefore it is said to keep it self unspotted of the world it makes it selfe immaculate and undefiled by the estranging of it selfe from the proper operation of that spirit of the world in all things for it neither eates nor drinks marries nor yet gives in marriage upon the same grounds and principles which the men of the world do in so much that Christianity is that Virgin-like Espousall which conceives and brings forth by that spirit of purity not found elsewhere but onely in it selfe which the world stumbles at more then Joseph did at Mary before God resolved his doubt when he concluded to put her away and to have no fellowship with her which all the world not taught of God proceed unto concerning the Saints of God as ingaged thereunto by that spirit of uncleanesse whereupon our Apostle brings in the next point But let your yea be yea and your nay nay That is whatsoever you acknowledge your selves to be ingaged unto affirming it to be yea let that ingagement be acknowledged to be alwayes and in all things the same without denyall thereof in any thing whereinsoever it may be concerned as for instance if ever you were ingaged to God nothing else as men for the most part acknowledge traditionally they were in the creation of the first man Adam or if you acknowledge that hereafter you shall be ingaged onely to him and no other if you cannot make this yea that is to be always the same without any negation at all it is not the confession of faith no true profession of Jesus Christ yea it must be concluded upon and acknowledge both in the preter present and future tence or else it is not pure religion and undefiled before God even the Father because otherwise it is not the ingagement of the Son of God in whom alone all purity doth consist for if any thing at any time or time it selfe for one moment interpose between God and man between the Father and the Son it is not that unity and faith of the Son of God who never admits of any time or any thing to interpose between the Father and himselfe in that subsisting unity of his 2. This exhortation is laid down in way of negation let your nay be nay that is if ever you finde a time wherein you deny your selfe to be ingaged to Satan either in your creation or in Gods determination or if ever you expect a time or way and means wherein and whereby you shall be disingaged unto him and that fully and perfectly then let your nay be nay that is let it be resolved upon that you were never ingaged unto him neither are nor ever shall be at no time nor in any respect else it is not that disingagement of the Sonne of God for Satan never came to finde any thing in him bearing the least tincture of his nature or that held any correspondency with that evill one in any respect But I cannot but wonder many times when I think of that profession of Christ which is made in the world which for the most part is of such things as themselves cannot but acknowledg were never found in Christ as ignorance pride errour absence from God selfe-love enmity disobedience unbelief and the like at the least the relicks and remaynders of these to reside in the state of Christianity not knowing that these things are to be confessed upon that condition wherein the Sonne of God is transformed by the world unto and in it selfe another thing then by nature he is in which confession there is the vertue of transmission of all sin and unrighteousnesse into its proper place even as in the acknowledgment of the righteousnesse of God it is to be transmitted
received his Sonne as from the dead in his exercise of the Preists office in sacrificing and offering him up unto God This sicknesse therefore is as that of Lazarus whom Jesus loved for when his sister told Jesus that he was sick it is plaine by the record in computation of the time that he was then dead which Christ affirmes is not death but that way of the operation and manifestation of the glory of God which onely and for ever shineth and setteth forth it selfe through the death of the flesh that is the death of all humane and carnal reasonings resolutions and conclusions in point of the knowledge of Jesus Christ which sicknesse or death to all the legall and litteral services according to the carnall law is truly said to be not unto death because it is unto that eternall life of the Son of God and a sicknesse of this nature we are to understand in this place or else we carnallize the sicknesse as surely as Rome doth at this day the Eldership as also New-England more zealously then they and the reason is because the one is Hehetated with worldly pomp and the other is Persequentissimus but hath not yet attained thereunto And whereas it is said Is any sick among you or as the word may be read is any sick in you as speaking either of person or thing as the Psalmist hath a phrase help Lord for the fathfull faile that word faithfull is used in Scripture sometimes for a true or faithfull person and sometimes for a true thing as if he should say help Lord for trueths faile or fidelities faile So this word any may be taken for any person or any thing as if he had said is any thing in you sick or are you dead to any particular thing whatsoever which worldly men make their life and trade so that you cannot relish nor tast it no more then a sick or dead man can relish any food to quicken or enliven him be sure then to use the remedy prescribed unto you for your health and restoration and your dayes shall be renewed with Hezekiah and your life recovered with Lazarus and you shall be raised out of the grave of all sin and sorrow and that is to call for the Elders of the Church for they are the resurrection and the life in this point in which observe 1. What it is to call 2. Who these Elders be 3. What is the Church of which they are 1. Concerning the Call the same word is prefixed as before let him call it is of like Emphesis that is to say that through this sicknesse or death here spoken of it creates and gives being in that soule unto the life of the Son of God and that life is the light of men by vertue of which light he becomes a Seer for it hath the spirit of Prophesie in it whereby he discerns wherein true health doth consist and knows what the Eldership is and where to finde the true Church which is so controverted throughout the earth in all ages of this present world so that if this sick party had not perfect vision he might wander from mountaine to hill and from the flood to the worlds end before he could attaine the true knowledge thereof For some say lo here is Christ and some say lo there which we are not to beleive neither the one nor the other some say he is in the desert and some say he is in the mountain and some in the secret Chamber but as the lightning shineth from one end of heaven unto the other so is the coming of the Sonne of man that is to say all things that ever were or shall be proclaime his present abode in man-kinde either in point of his life or death in mercy or else in his severity and such are the confines of the Church it is not bounded within the circuit of time place or person no more then the Son of God is for his Spouse holds proportion with himselfe in all points therefore is she admired as one that looks forth as the morning faire as the moon clear as the Sun terrible as an Army with banners nay it is said to be his body the fulnesse of him that filleth all in all So that to form and fashion a Church of lesse comprehension then Christ will prove rather a Sinagogue of Satan or cage of unclean birds then the spouse of Christ so that our Chronologers deceive the world in framing a Christ onely by genealogie not knowing what the Prophet meaneth when he saith he was taken from prison from judgment and who shall declare his generation he was war cut off from the land of the living and made his grave with or in the wicked and in the rich in his death it seems Philip that man of war is not joyned to their Chariot as his name signifies And so they frame a Church not onely by seperation of themselves from others by some carnall and temporary ceremonies that they may say Stand by thy selfe I am holier then thou If these be their defences from the wicked they had need carry them along with them through death or else the fence being down they will go near to come over and feed with them in the same pasture But this is not all the seperation they make for they divide the word of God seperate it to form their Church saying that such portions of the word of God were for the form of the Church in such an age of the world for such people but now another portion of it gives the forme in our dayes as though the word of God were dead or falne asleep unto the world in some injunctions and promises but alive and awake in others whereas they may as wel change and alter the form and manner of the being of the Son of God as to change and alter the form and manner of being of the Church of God for the word of God in whatsoever it hath expressed is the will or law of God and the will of God cannot change and Christ is the end of the law so that if we fall short of him in any portion of the word of God as though he had been in it but now is passed over it or as though it intended him but yet hath not brought him forth we make it the word of man and not the word of God for mans reason is the proper word of man even as the wisdome of God in that wonderfull contriving of his Son is the word of God and therefore man is said to be made a living or a speaking soule or life of speech or reason whereby he transcends all other creatures excepting none for no Angel that is messenger or message was ever sent from God unto the world out of man-kinde It is true indeed that the word of God hath expressed it selfe as in divers Nations Jew and Gentile in differing generations or genealogies as Cain and Seth Abraham and Nahor
Jacob and Esau and the like as teaching higher and more transcendant things thereby Therefore to rest in these as being the intent and scope of the Scriptures without seeing and acknowledging the life and death of Christ in them both according to the flesh and also according to the spirit we may by as good skill of interpretation center and terminate the minde of God in making any or all those visible creatures in heaven and in earth in that proper work without having any respect at all unto man therein and make them the utmost and extreamest point of Gods thoughts and intent which were no better then to disinherit the Son of God making a bastard and no Son of him being they were all made to do service unto him and to stand up and jointly and skilfully point as with the finger to direct either to his perpetuall life or death as being the reality and substantiality of them all the forme of a Church therefore as constituted into particulers now in the world is of no more weight or worth in a Christian minde then any other order wherein men are conversant in wayes of civillity so called for if once we finde the substance by the light of that day that springs from on high the darknesse of night and shadow flye away So as nothing looks amiable upon us but onely glory in the highest and peace in the earth to that man of good will who dwels in the bush It is the spirit of Prophesie therefore or of true interpretation that cals in the Eldership w ch sees this sicknes or death to be that renovation of the health life of man-kinde in Christ from that carnall life which the world lives from living unto earthly and transitory things to live unto heavenly and everlasting things such as abide for ever therefore it is said that fifteen years are added unto the life of Hezekiah which number consists of ten and five ten hath in it the mystery of eternity as hath been declared and five hath in it the mystery of multiplication signifying that variety and uncountable wayes of health and life which in all respects and ways of relation are multiplied and exercised in that mysticall body and state of Christ Therefore no speech of the multiplication of any of Gods works till the fifth day to shew the mystery of this number therefore it is that Joseph brings five of his brethren before Pharoah to signifie the multiplication of blessings upon the land by all the family seeing so manny had come upon it by his being there as one the like is in Benjamins messe sent in by Joseph five times so much as any of the rest to shew the multiplication of his love to that his brother who only came of the beloved Rachel together with himselfe In the recovery out of this sicknesse or renewing of life from the dead we are to consider what Christ saith viz. Except the wheat corne dye it multiplies not that is except Christ the seed of God dye he multiplies not in which we are to know that divine nature simply considered in it selfe is not the seed of God no more then the seed of mankinde is simply in the male but respectively in male and female else it produceth not to multiply its kinde and every tree hath seed in it selfe therefore the man is not without the woman nor the woman without the man in the Lord. They are but one tree that is one estate and condition even so the seed of God is whole Christ God and man made one and this wheat corne or seed must dye or else it brings not forth the true kinde and off-spring of the Son of God that is it must be sick and dye to all carnall and corruptible things or else it never brings forth that multiplyed fruit of the spirit which is in Jesus Christ To conclude this point to call in this place for the Elders is not meant the mendicimonium of a man without magnanimity and courage as one crouching unto a course and carnall Elder made with hands that is set up and created by men who can come unto the assembly and a private person but before it be dissolved is a pulick person a reverend Elder But this call is an anthetique and princely summons of a royall Prophet for this sicknesse hath in it the virtue and voyce of a summons to convent the true physitian multiplyed into an holy and honourable Eldership the consultation and practice of whom is the cure of the soule even as the life and frolick presumption of the arme of flesh hath in it a sufficient summons to bring in the works of unrighteousnesse to that appearance of Antichrist who is that poysonfull dragon and destroyer of the soule Yea this call is the voyce of the spouse being dead to her first husband and having forgotten her fathers house in the forsaking of all her kindred through which her speech becomes sweet and her countenance comely for ever 2. The second point is who these Elders are They are not the Elders of particular Congregations composed and ordered by man under that deceivable terme of reformed Churches as in these days which are but like to the sheards of a potters vessell which cannot be set together or sodred no more then they can ever bring themselves into unity for the spirit of that kingdome is divided in it selfe and therefore can never stand in the way of that resurrection by Christ but are in the way of that apostacy and fall of man from his Creator endeavouring still to become as Gods by the wisdome of the flesh We must observe then for the clearing of this point who they are which our Apostle writes unto in this Epistle and that is to the twelve Tribes in their dispertion and scattering from Israel as carnally considered for otherwise the Saints are never dispersed from the house and temple of God And this scattering is not into any particuler country or kingdome as into Assyria Babylon Caldea or the like but over the whole earth even upon the breadth of the land of Emanuel therefore they are said to be scattered abroad as having no confines set Neither doth he write to people as of one age or tract of time but as unto such as shall live in all ages of the world for as the word of God in the beginning went not out as to create the Sun for one age of the world but for all ages even so the word of the kingdome the Gospel of God goeth not forth to the dispersed and outcasts of Israel that is from the wisdome power and policy of the arme of flesh in one place or one age but so as every word of God in its true intent concerns and fiâ—s all places and ages of the world both in respect of the word of the curse and of the blessing so that to expound the word of God as fitting for one time place age or person and not for
but is unmeasurable in all its operations whether in prayer or in prophesie for they are so neare in allyance that that which is the spirit of Prophesie in Eliah in the history in his shutting up of the heavens and restraining them from raine and also in the opening of them to give rayn in abundance is sayd here by our Apostle in this Chapter to be prayer Prayer therefore and Prophesie are of like nature and of like fame in the the house of God so that to prefer one before the other or to contayne the one harder to be attayned then the other or that one is of more use in the Church then the other is not according to the judgment of God but only in humane wisdome and the Serpents subtilty and policy that things are so carryed in the world to lead men along in blindnesse by speaking of the word of God in such unknown languages which are not to be heard in the house of God for there is no office of Christ whatsoever or exercise of his spirit that one ought to be preferred before another only the call of God makes every one chief and principall in its time and season If men would well consider this they might as well lay out money upon their children in the Schools to learn them to pray as to teach them to preach in case the Spirit of God might be bought for money But the poynt is that true Prayer and Prophesie do give and proclaym a like honour vertue and power to Christ in whomsoever he appears and they are so near a kin that the Apostle appoynts one and the same law in the exercise of them both that is in prayer and prophesie the man is to be uncovered and in prayer and prophesie the woman is to be covered And it is â—suall in Scripture to use one phrase that signifies both as in the Psalms Let God arise prayer-wise or as the word may be as truly read God will arise or God shall arise and his enemies shall be scattered prophetically The reason is because none but a Seer can be a supplicant if he behold not the thing by the spirit of interpretation or prophesie to give a true form unto it he can never sue for it because he knows not what it is To conclude this point this act of the Elders may either be taken to pray with him or prophesie with him for we see the spirit of God useth them indifferently the one for the other as in that instance of Eliah which he brings in in teaching this doctrine for the one is as healthfull and necessary for the recovery and well-being of the soule as the other and of as wonderfull and miraculous effect for remission and confirmation and cannot be in exercise by any either the one or the other but as it is accompanyed with the holy oyle even that annoynting which teacheth all things and hath no need to be taught of man that is it hath no need of humane skill which fals infinitely short of that which it brings the soule unto and instructs and teacheth it in and that leads us to the second poynt in the exercise of the Elders They annoynt him with oyle 3. This sick party therefore or all such as are dead to the law of the letter or carnall command that is to the word of God as it is formed and fashioned through the wisdome art and skill of humane principles which the Schools of Learning among the sons of men in the world are only exercised in and conversant about or else they should undermine their owne foundations and so let fall their building for Gods wisdome once layd in the descention of the Son of God overthrows it all as it comes of the Serpent and so is Satanicall folly But we must know that the Eldership of Israel consists of the first-born of God and no other unto whom the Scriptures look in the first-born of every Tribe or family of Israel to instruct us in that family which the Apostle speaks of that the whole every part thereof is named or hath its renown and authority only of and from the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ as Paul affirms to the Ephesians as being of no other but of his true and proper off-spring so as to make a difference of the sons of God none excepted as one being of greater eminency birth breeding or excellency then another is to cast reproach upon that one only father of whom every one is named that appertayns to that family as though he were not of like power and glory with respect unto them all or as though he changed his act in producing of his only son which tends to nothing else but to make the seed of the bond-wman heire with the seed of the promise and guil efully to give the wicked interest in the promise whereas the word of the curse is only their inheritance But the children of this off-spring having the name of this one Father called upon them or they called by his name holy and blessed for ever every one as a first-born of God bearing his name and authority is King Priest and Prophet by vertue thereof in the family and there cannot be any inferiour among such as to whom God communicates himselfe in the whole off-spring nor can one be in account and reckoning before another For of his owne will begate he us by the word of truth that we should be the first fruits of him who is no lesse then the eternall father So that it is impossible that this Eldership should appear and not be annoynted with the holy oyle for it is their proper patrimony and birth-right and therefore they ever appeare invested therewith which ever carries in it the same vertue of healing this sick party in all ages and times of the world and a like miraculous recovery and restauration where-ever they are called for by the spirit of true interpretation or prophesie for they cannot with-hold but must impart to every one in the family that which themselves are blessed withall For none can know what is the right of the first-born of God and be possessed therewith but he must freely impart it to every one in the family For the Spirit of Christ is ever like it selfe in all ages only men deceive themselves by mistake of the variety of figures wherein God in one Christ or holy annoynting commends himselfe unto us doting upon the shadow wherein the substance is wrapped up as under Moses vale and they see it not nor can endure the glory and shine thereof But to whomsoever Christ unveyles himselfe hee imparts whole and compleat salvation to every one else it cannot be the salvation of God for he or it cannot be divided and therefore the holy unction is alike shed forth to every one in this Kingdome and they that have it must of necessity annoynt every one into whose fellowship they are called according to the nature of the call of
unto thee arise take up thy bed and go thy way into thine house So that to preach the Gospel to the restauration of the soule from the policy that is from the fear terrors and tremblings of the law as at Mount Sinai to bring it unto Zion giving strength to take up that and carry it unto its proper place as that man carried his bed into the proper place which is his house which before had carried him extravagantly and diseasedly abroad wheresoever the Gospel exerciseth its power to raise up any to walk in the way of God before others in prayer or prophesie or any appointment of God according to the nature and season of it as that man is said to walk before them all to their admiration wheresoever the Gosplel is ministred to that effect there is also in that ministration power to forgive sin for the one is of like case and of like difficulty as the other is yea they are both in one act for he that can preach the Gospel to carry sin into its proper place which must be done or else the Gospel is not truly preached he must of necessity remove it from the chosen of God which is the true remitting and passing of it over unto another He that hath power therefore to preach the Gospel to the healing of the Conscience of the palsie sicknesse or tremblings of the law in the dead works thereof or works of death that man hath power to forgive sins on earth for they are inseperable and Christ in that place alluded unto makes them one for first he saith son thy sins be forgiven thee and in the rehearsall of it he saith his speech was arise take up thy bed and walk go thy way into thy house And we know that Christ saith to his Disciples whose sins ye remit they are remitted and whose sins ye retaine they are retained And again what ye binde on earth is bound in heaven and what ye loose on earth is loosed in heaven to walk and work therefore in the things of God according to the power intended by the word of God are of greater concernment then they would think for to preach the Gospel in the revelation of the minde and will of God as to an onely Son or to present our supplications to God as a father from the minde and disposition of an onely son are of no lesse authority and power then to to give sins for to pray with the spirit and to pray with the understanding also that is to pray according to the mystery of Christs meditation and yet with that wisdome and skill of expression as to unfold and explaine it in the minds of others that they may ascend up unto God together therewith as Manoa's Angel in the flame of the sacrifices this and to pardon sin are of like power skill and authority and a like weight lies upon both to whomsoever communicates in them For to pardon sin is not to change or alter the minde of God toward that party but to explaine and interpret the minde of God concerning that party which minde and will of God is the same in that one faith of the Son of God to all the chosen of God and wheresoever it is rightly unfolded and made manifest in the proclamation of peace and reconciliation of God and man in one if the Son of peace be there he accepteth and receivet the same as the right of his inheritance If the Elders pray or prophecy unto health therefore they pray or prophesie to the remission of sins in whomsoeve commucates in the same his sins are forgiven him To conclude this point it concerns us then to know what sin is that we may rightly conceive of it as it is pardonable and also as it not pardonable for there is a sin saith the Apostle John which is not unto death or which is not in death that is it is not in that way of death and there is a sin that is in death I do not say that you shall pray for it that is you shall not pray for the pardon of it because it is not to be pardoned for where Christ is once crucified in the spirit he never is to live in that heart according to the spirit no more then where he is once crucified in the flesh he never lives in that heart according to the flesh Therefore in the next place he exhorts us unto the confession of our faults in the true acknowledgement of them one to another Vers 16. Confesse your faults one unto another and pray one for another that ye may be healed the effectuall fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much In these observe 1. An exhortation consisting of two parts 1. To confesse faults one to another 2. To pray one for another 2. The end wherefore That ye may be healed 3. A reason ground or cause drawn from the nature of prayer which is two-fold 1. It is effectuall 2. It is fervent 4. The qualitie of the person praying that is A righteous man 5. The issue or event of such prayer It avayleth much 1. ANd first for confession of faults sins or oberations from a law For where no law is there is no transgression for sinne is the transgression of a law or as the word is the withoutnesse of a rule Now there is the law of the flesh or carnall commandement which is the law of sinne and death and there is the law of the spirit or power of faith which is the perfect rule of righteousnesse or law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus Now the carnall commandement or perfunctory and fading ordinances may be broken yea abrogated and nayled to the crosse as that which is against us and yet forgiven for every breach or piercing through of the sonne of man that is mans institutions and appoyntments composed by that carnall law shall be forgiven or are forgiven for the disannulling of mans wisdome and in that respect to become a foole is the establishment of Gods wisdome in the removall of all guilt and condemnation from the soule And there is the law of the spirit or of that holy Ghost which if a man speake a word against intentionally or blaspheme and pierce through that is abrogate or make a nullity of it It shall never be forgiven neither in this world nor in the world to come that is neither in the present mind and conscience of him that so doth nor in that holy mind and judgment of Christ from passing sentence against it being so remote and at such a distance from it and contrary unto it for the abrogation of the law of the spirit is no lesse then to disannull that wisdome of God in Christ by which device only the sin and guilt of the sons of men is taken away and no other way for else-where the redemption of the soule ceaseth for ever Confession of sins then one to another This phrase one to another is of like nature as
when Moses cast down his rod on the earth of Aegypt it became or as the word is it was to a Serpent when it was on the ground it was a Serpent a quite contrary thing then when it is in his hand or Ministry the one declaring the Dragons fury in that government of Pharaoh in Aegypt and the other that rod or scepter in the rule of Christ as that Shepheard and feeder of Israel as the word rod signifies a Scepter So that when we confes sin that is the breach of the law of the spirit in the world through the observation of the carnall command where Christ is bereaved of all his proper vertues operations of his spirit it is unto another that is that state is become another thing as Moses rod was then the son of God for it is that son of perdition even Sathan himselfe though under the figure of an Angell of light in the eye of the men of the world Again when we confesse sin that is the breach or abrogation of the law or carnall command that Christ is bereaved and dispoyled of all glory power and vertue of the arm of flesh so that his own arm saves and gets the victory not by might nor by power but by my spirit saith the Lord of hosts We confesse this sinne against the carnall command unto the unity of the spirit and the fulfilling of the law of Christ or of that rule of righteousnesse that is by faith in him which is to another that is to another thing state and condition then that of the letter that stands in outward observations temporary engagements and performances and this is that one and alone good thing desirable that Christ of God that carrieth and abideth for ever To confesse sin therefore or to make profession of any thing that is to praise or acknowledge it is to give the thing its nature and properties unto the utmost extent and so it must be here to an utter contrariety vast and perpetuated distance of the law of the flesh and that of the spirit otherwise we contradict the command of God by plowing with an oxe an asse together by wearing a garment of linnen and woollen and by sowing our field with two kinds of seed Quest Here ariseth a necessary question Whether in the acknowledgment of the nullity of the law of the carnall commandement unto that unity that is in Christ a Christian doth not thereby reckon and accâ—unt all the vertue of the Son of God to be his own proper portion and patrimony as also whether in acknowledgement of the nullity of that law of the spirit unto the unity of the harlot he doth not as necessarily reckon unto himself as his due and proper right and inheritance all those vicious abominations that rest and abide in the bosome of that man of sinne which is Antichrist Answ To which we answer that there is a like truth and reality in the acknowledgment of the one as there is in the other taken in a due respect as the mind of God commends the same unto us where he saith So then with my minde I my selfe serve the law of God but with my flesh the law of sin For a Christian must be plain down-right and reall in his acknowledgments before God whether of sin or of the fruits of righteousnesse yea in the root and originall both of the one and of the other Object But a Christian by faith professing the fruits of righteousness and fountaine out of which they flow is endewed with the life and spirit of them according to their native property in that blessed subject of Christianity else his confession of them is but as a fire paynted upon a wall or the picture of a man carved out of wood or stone that wants soule and spirit the ground of motion and operation For what is it to professe or acknowledge the love of God unlesse it be kindled in our hearts to a flame that many waters cannot quench neither the world drown or to confesse the power of Christ unlesse through him we be able to do all things or to praise the Kingdome Priesthood and propheticall office of Christ unlesse we have the power of rule reconciliation and interpretation in us Will it not then also follow that if he deale faithfully and sensibly in the confession of sin as that he hath not the understanding of a man that he persecuted the Church of God that he is the chiefe of sinners that the terrours of the Almighty are upon him that out of the belly of Hell he cries unto God that he is shut up and cannot come out If he deale playnly in that and be reall will it not follow that he hath in him the vicious desire of the flesh the state of the Devill if he be the chiefe of sinners and partaker of the terrors of Sathan sensibly if he cry out of the womb of hell that if the creature man participate of joyes celestiall and eternall in confession and acknowledgment of them So the creature or man must partake of all abominations of sinne and state and condition of the Devill if he be reall also therein in his acknowledgments Answ We answer in the name of God that no such consequence follows upon a reall confession of sin But through the wisdome and device of God it proves an eternall separation of the spirit of a Christian from all such sins and sorrows justly and really acknowledged in and upon man-kind or that matter whereof a Saint doth consist and this is proved by a true and reall distribution of man or of the creature according to the word of the Lord gone out in the disposing of it as a reall subject of mercy and severity of love and wrath We are to take a man in a two fold respect according to the intention and expression of the word of God which rightly judgeth and determineth all things 1. As it speaketh on this wise All power is given unto him in heaven and in earth because he is the son of man Againe whether is it easier to say Arise take up thy bed and walke or to say thy sins are forgiven but that ye might know that the sonne of man hath power to forgive sins So also blessed is the man or oh how happy it is and well for us that man going right forward not turning aside to the right hand nor to the left The Hebrew word Ashrei imports that simple and immixt condition of man which is only found in that man of God Christ Jesus who is God blessed for ever being that beginning head or fountaine of the creation of God that new creature and in this sence is man or the Creature considerable in the answer of this objection 2. We are to take man also in another sence infinitely remote from this where it is said man being in honour abideth not but is like the beast that perisheth and wo unto that man by whom the Son of man
to emulate decline and reject in all things the spirit that giveth life And at that Judgment-seat behold the summoning in and the assembling of all sin in the fight of God by the crucisication of Christ together with the manner of Gods execution of wrath for your acquittance and escape For in that throne is all sin summed up as in that King of Tyrus for corrupting the wisdome and prophaning the holy things of God see Ezek. 28. Againe in the acknowledgement of the breach and nullity of the law of the flesh appeal to the law of the spirit for it is the perfection and fulfilment thereof for the disjunction from all carnal and diabolicall things is the conjunction of God and man in Christ the crucification of Christ by the ministry of the letter in the world is the raising of him up from that death in the ministry of the spirit in the Saints for it is impossible that the Sonne of God should be held of death so as not to live his proper and native life If we expect unity with all the excellencies and virtues of God we must be loosned and disunited from all carnall relations and bonds and we must either have unity with all the things proper unto God or none for he cannot be devided therefore we must admit of a totall seperation from all carnal things that is such as fade have an end however we know that all things are lawful with due respect unto Gods call in the use of them yet are we not to be brought under the power of any thing as by a bond subjected unto it but to use the world as though we used it not to marry as though we married not and to buy as though we possessed not for the Son of God never acknowledged conjugation or copulation by any carnall tie or bond therefore when his mother told him at the feast that they had no wine he saith unto her woman what have I to do with thee mine houre is not yet come as to have my works and times set and appointed unto me by vertue of any earthly or temporary relation therefore shee bids the servants look unto his time and his command saying what soever he commands you that doe Where the force of earthly relations takes place of the spirit of Christ that state or place of honour shall never succeed well Againe when one told Jesus that his mother and his brethren stood without to speak with him he answered and said to him that told him Who is my mother and who are my brethren and he streched forth his hand towards his Disciples and said behold my mother and my brethren for whosoever shall do the will of my father which is in heaven the same is my brother and sister and mother all relations centred in one also when his mother found him in the Temple Questioning the Doctors saying why hast thou thus dealt with us behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing but he answers how is it that yee sought me wist you not that I must be about my fathers businesse as acknowledging none but that one father of eternity and in such relations stands the band of a Christian and therein is the acknowledgement of his ingagements But from this point it will be gathered by carnall spirits as of old then let us do evill that good may come thereby whose damnation is just if this be true then let us endeavour to undermine extirpate root out and bring to nought all naturall relations and consociations amongst the sons of men 1. To which we answer that no such consequence followes upon the spirit of Christianity for the abrogation of the law of the flesh is to repeal and abolish it compleatly and it confists of an affirmative and negative part the affirmative is to set up adorne and maintain all things honourable in the fight of man according to the nature manner and constitution of the place where it is exercised and to avoyd and abandon the contrary shame and this is but one administration or law for they are inseperably joyned together even as the honourable sentence of the Judge of a Size unto death and the shamesull office of the hang-man are but one administration So that from the office of the Judge you bring in the office of the Hang-man and from the act of the hang-man you include the office of the Judge or else the law is not compleated in that point right so in the abolishing and disannulling of the law of the flesh that it takes not hold as being any yoak or bond upon the Saints it is compleatly repealed and made voyd both in respect of all things that the world makes and accounts honourable and likewise of all things that are dishonourable and shamefull in the same account so that it becomes nothing else but a provocation unto them to guard and fortifie themselves against the one and the other for they are one intire and undivided law or administration The Saints therefore cannot go about to establish that which they abolish for the shamefull acts of the world are nulled unto them as well as the honourable no more then the wicked in making voyd unto themselves the law of the spirit can possibly go about to set up or advance the crosse of our Lord Jesus in the true vertue and power of it 2. We answer that to such a conclusion from our freedome from the carnall command or way of the letter of the Scripture is to lay a hard thought and deep censure upon the spirit and power of God for shall the wisdome and institutions of man that shall vanish and come to naught have power in them to provoke to dilligence to preserve in peace to keep in temporance chastity gravity and moderation in all things and shall not the spirit of God or law of that spirit be sufficiently wise and able to preserve men in modestety chastity gravity and moderation in all things with wisdome care and deligence to use the creature of what kinde soever according to time place and occasion as becomes the nature end and use thereof without lisentious and lascivious liberty surely those that so judge never found nor felt the virtue life liberty and power of the spirit of our only Lordship and salvation Jesus Therefore the reason of our thus appealing follows Namely that yee may be healed The spirit of God makes this manner of appeal the possession to purge out all superfluous humors the soveraign salve to cure all deseases the cordiall medicine against all crudities of soule and peccant humours of spirit this is health to thy navell and marrow unto thy bones If when we see the breach os the law of the spirit of Christ we carry it unto the law of the flesh and observe how that is onely established thereby and when we observe the repeal of the law of the flesh as made of none effect we carry it up into the law of the
all the Sains of God that ever lived or shall viz. For thy sake are we killed all the day long and counted as sheep for the slaughter There is none of those severall afflictions which the Saints of God have undergone but rightly understood one of them is as extensive as another and it must needs be so for the sufferings of the Saints is the Crosse of Christ and not the crosse of any particular creature but of the son of God therefore he saith In all their afflictions he was afflicted and therefore he saith also in the behalf of the believers and prayers in Damascus Saul Saul why persecutest thou mee Therefore it is when the Corinthians seemed to cleave one to one man and another unto another though all sound men and good one is of Paul another of Apollo another of Cephas and another of Christ that he calls them carnall because they take not every way or manner of the administration of the grace of the Gospel to be the same universally through the whole body what saith he Is Christ divided was Paul crucified for you or were you baptized into the name of Paul I thanke God that I performed no such particular act but to such as understood the mystery of it for that is the effect of his speech and cause of thanksgiving The ground of these particular and nominall Religions as Independent Presbyterian Anabaptist Papist Generallist for they all stand on one root is because they limit and infringe the grace of the Gospel both in way of the sentence of absolution and condemnation mincing and fashioning things according to the judgment or discerning of man and not according to the light and revelation of the Son of God Hence they are affected with manlike expressions and so cleave unto man and not unto the Son of God and if the mind of God be expressed unto them they hammer it into their own shape as the Corinthians did and so make rents and schismes Now the grace of the Gospel in whatsoever it expressed it self as King or Priest Prophet or Victor father or son Master or servant Lord or Disciple Apostle or follower is as that leaven which the woman hid in three pecks of meal whereby the whole lump was leavened or like that unction poured on Aarons head which run down unto the coller or hem of his garment for the oyle contayned in that honourable vessell of the Gospel filleth compleatly all vessels that are brought into unity or love with it Of such nature and extent are all things appertaining unto the Gospel and so the afflictions of the Saints the Crosse of Christ takes not its latitude nor longitude from the dimentions of a creature but holds correspondency with the son of God for the crosse of Christ is of the same extent and continuation that his Crown and kingdome is By this we may take notice of what nature the Crosse of Christ is that it stands not in or consists of any temporary relation or operation of the creature active or passive but is the proper suffering of the son of God in the wicked as deprived of all livelihood and proper operations of the spirit in all wayes of motion and relation and in the Saints in being deprived of all livelihood and proper operations of the flesh in all the wayes of its motion and relation It would seem a great cross to a man if the world were vacant of a rationall spirit and none but beasts to converse with of no lesse but infinitely greater is the disproportion of the wisdome of God in a Christian and the wisdome of this world in the wicked yea if they be as crafty as Achitophel or as subtill as the Serpent the wisest beast of the field Yea in the world we have lost our proper life spirit and power and all vertue proper to a Christian in poynt of heavenly things Further it would seem a great affliction and suffering unto us to see the world take all our strength our wisdome honour riches peace friendship c. and leave us nothing but that wee should depart from and forsake father mother wife children c. and thus it is with a Christian The world ingrosseth power authority wisdome riches c. and leaves us as the scum and out-sweepings of all things Nay we forsake our nearest relations in all respects as the law of the flesh in its true sense calls for and go to a place we know not whether by any wisdome or understanding of the creature which can never be done but by the instinct and operation of the spirit of God opening unto us the power wisdome riches and all relations that are reall substantiall and eternall And if the spirit of God be there it never appears but in the faith and unity of Christ therefore they are the proper sufferings of Christ and not of any particular creature And when we know and judge of the sufferings of the Saints wee shall not lament if the world take all temporary things from us nor rejoyce in what it can cast upon us for God forbid that I should rejoyce in any thing save in the crosse of our Lord Iesus Christ whereby the world is kill'd and crucified in me and I in the world If once we know how to loose our lives in the world in all things of the spirit and how to loose our lives in our selves and body mysticall in all things pertayning to the flesh we shall then take is lightly in whatsoever the world can give or take away from us By the nature of these sufferings we know of what spirit and power of what nature vertue and comprehension this act of Eliah is which is the third point And hee prayed Whence we note That the act or spirit of prayer hath in it sufficient honour power and authority to memorize and register the name of a christian for ever that it shall never be put out but continue in the records of the house of God For 1. Prayer hath in it the vertue and power of prophesie for in the history treating of the act of Eliah he prophesies unto Ahab saying As the Lord liveth there shall be no raine nor dew for these years but according to my word So that this prayer comprehends the whole Prophesie of Eliah and Eliah is brought in as comprehending all the Prophets as Moses comprehending the whole law in the transfiguration of Christs appearing in the same form and glory that Christ doth so that all prophesie and noble acts of the Prophets are involved in the spirit of prayer By the spirit of God in this place his reproof of Ahabs wickednesse his slaying of all the false prophets of Baal his bringing fire from heaven to slay Captayns with their fifties his dividing of the waters with his mantle his giving of his spirit to Elisha his binding up and flopping the bottles of heaven and loosing of them at his pleasure his rebuking the earth and drying it up to
dust that it cannot yeeld fruit his ascending up into heaven in a fiery Chariot The spirit of God is pleased to commend all his honourable deeds unto the world in this one act of prayer to stand and to be as his memoriall for ever Prayer therefore is garnished with all the ornaments of a Prophet oâ— God and cannot be lesse then a most honcurable monument and memorizing of the Saints where-ever it is found extant 2. Prayer hath all the vertues and ornaments of Priest-hood in it Never was Aaron fitted and adorned with greater variety of vestments and vertues to minister before God in the holy place and according to the variety and change of the multitude of sacrifices and offerings then the spirit of prayer contayns in it and according to occasion puts on and brings forth when the vertue power of our great high Priest after the order of Melchisedech is brought in it is all summed up in the spirit of prayer as he saith also in another place Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech who in the dayes of his flesh when he offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and teares unto him or in him that was able to save him from death and was heard in that which be feared That is he was heard in all things or for the accomplishment and bringing to passe all things that concern life and salvation Now that all things that concern the Kingdome of God is involved in this prayer is thus proved The word translated feared is in the Greek dispaired about which men have much contended how it may be said of Christ But the thing is really and substantially to be considered though men do wrest and bend mince and strayn the word to suit it to humane reason For it is as true that the Son of God in and by the spirit of the world and principles proper to humane wisdome doth dispair and relir quish all hope and expectation of being delivered or set at liberty from that infinite wrath and displeasure of Almighty God as it is true that the son of sorry man is in and by the spirit of God and principles proper to the wisdome of God established and confirmed in the love power truth righteousnesse and glory of God and of his Kingdome everlastingly If men be ignorant hereof how Christ is said to feare or dispayr in all things they may talk of eternall life but they know not how a creature can live eternally and be possessor of all things Want of this knowledg breeds your Mortallists that know not by vertue of what the soule becomes eternall either in life or death as also your Generallists that say God will save all whereas there may be as reall and undenyable arguments used upon like ground that God will destroy all and so they must be left to the height of their doctrine which will amount to no more then the condition of a beast yet doth it make them such men as it had been good for them they had never been born For the rest that have gotten a tract of salvation and damnation by tradition from schools books naturall phylosophy and observation not having the knowledg of the nature of this Priest-hood comprized in the spirit of intercession They believe such things but they must not be curiously searcht into that is we cannot know them of these we say as the mind without knowis not good so these mens faith is dead For wilt thou know oh empty man that faith without works is dead For the spirit of God never works in way of life but in its own light therefore ignorance in any point must be voyd of the work of faith and so of the saving vertue that is in the life of Christ But prayer comprehending the whole Priest-hood of Christ is a work of that honour and power as to memorize the name of a Saint for ever and to set him up as a monument of the wisdome and mercy of God 3. Prayer is a work that comprehends the Kingly authority of Christ for when the Apostle Paul had shaken off the traditions and rudiments of the carnall Jew the power of the high Priest in that prosecuting spirit of binding and imprisoning all that were of the way of Jesus calling on the name of the Lord and when the Lord would proclaim him and make it manifest that he was a chosen vessell fitted to beare his name or carry his authority before the Gentiles Kings and the children of Israel Yea when he would put all that honour upon him which the Psalmist foretells saying There is little Benjamine their ruler the head of the Tribe a Prince of God he comprehends and concludes all in this act of prayer to give satisfaction to Annanias behold he prayeth As if he should say it is enough to know that miraculous change from Saul unto Paul from the service of the Synagogue of the Jewes to be a ruler over Kings the Gentiles and children of Israel for the name of God is by his word advanced over all which he was to beare this is sufficient to give satisfation to all Behold he prayeth So that none can deny a Princely spirit of power and authority where the spirit of prayer bears sway and a princely excellency is of honour sufficient to eternize the record of a Christians name 4. There is in prayer the power of victor or a victorious renown consisting of the noblest conquest that ever was Jacob by prayer overcame the man that wrestled or combated with him which man is said to be an Angell but it is the Angell that blest him in the way and therefore is declared to be God for Jacob said I have seen God face to face in which act of prayer his name is changed from Jacob to Israel to declare a prince-like promise in prevailing with God as the Prophet explayns his name and act saying And by his strength he had power with God yea he had power over the Angell and prevailed he wept and made supplication hee found him in Bethel and there spake with us or in us for if the spirit of God had not spoke in our father Jacob and so in all of his race he had never prevailed Was ever the like Conquest made as to overcome omnipotency which could never be but through the requests of his owne spirit which he cannot deny but must yeeld himself over thereunto Prayer therefore consists of a combate which ever hath conquest therefore of sufficient honour and renown to memorize a Saint who-ever he be that exerciseth the design and skill thereof 5. Prayer hath salvation contained in it nay it is salvation For whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved or in the present tense as the word will admit is saved for he that thinks he knows Christ any otherwise then in the vertue of an office exercised in such a subsistance or by such a manner or subsisistance exercised in
such an office that man may come to be deceived as the Jewes of old were and Jewish Gentiles are at this day and so persecute Christ in stead of receiving him when or in whomsoever he appeareth Let those of that carnall opinion that Christ shall come and reign upon the earth as a great Monarch for a thousand yeares look into this point for Christ was never known but in an office as aforesayd and every office of the spirit in its proper way and manner of working comprehends whole Christ Now the office of intercession is a work of the spirit for we know not how to pray as we ought but the spirit maketh intercession for us or in us therefore it comprehends whole Christ for he cannot be divided and it being the spirit of the Saviour must have yea be salvation for where Christ the Son of God is there is salvation In what grace vertue or office soever he appears in or by that tradition of tying salvation to believing alone is ridiculous for can there be more in faith then in love which is the fulfilling of the whole law yea of that law of the spirit of life in Christ and are not we saved by hope Doth not Timothy save himselfe and them that hear him by preaching sound doctrine Now to take faith according to that dismition the Apostle gives saying It is the subsistance of things hoped for So faith is in every vertue office and exercise of Christ for the subsistance is the being of God and man in one and that is to be held and had of Christians in all things that can be sayd of Christ therefore we acknowledg nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified There is both the unction and crucification in every thing a Christian knows but there is no unction but in the nature divine nor slaying in a Christan but of the flesh which twayn are never separated neither in love nor hope gentlenesse mercy kindnesse wisdome truth patience and whatsoever can be named of Christ it is the subsistance of twayn made one new man that compleats it and therefore salvation is in all Christs excellencies and they are all as things hoped for because they are ever to come that is not only in present being and exercise but shall for ever spring up unto a Christian out of that living and everlasting fountain All things of salvation therefore are in prayer for prayer consists of necessity and supply but all necessities and all supplies are in prayer therefore prayer contayns whole Christ which is compleat salvation therefore a work of honour to eternize the memory of a Saint This point may fence a Christian from discouraging drooping thoughts apt to sieze upon all all flesh thinking himselfe of no use in his age nor of any performance befitting such a name or calling as to be entitled a Son of God being destitute of any power or authority wisdome or policy device or invention art or science such as the sons of men have gathered and encroached unto themselves in all ages By sword stratagems by Schools and Seminaries by money and friendship by travell and humane experiments and observations Poor heart that thou art with respect unto the world canst thou pray be of good comfort it countervayls all it is the renownedst act that ever was wrought in the world Get thee to thy Closet viz. shut up thy selfe from the common courses and customs of this world and pray unto thy father in secret or according unto or in that secret and hidden mystery of Christ which is as secret and hidden from the world as thy selfe is hid from the wayes of the world in this thy closet or chamber of presence And thy father which seeth in seecret that is which beholds and approves of this mystery of God in thee will reward thee openly that is will make it manifest that the reward or end of thine estate and practice is to be made manifest to the Son of God and that the Heyr-ship and inheritance of the Kingdome of God appertayns and belongs unto thee 2. Again let such weigh this point that hold themselves free from believing any doctrine in the world till they see it accompanyed with miraculous works viz. works in like manner and form as they have beene done formerly as to heale the sicke restore the lame open the eyes of the blind and raise up the dead all these are taken in a bodily and corporeall respect These men do not consider that the famous and miraculous works that Elia did all of them are included in his prayer and that is as miraculous as any of them the miracles that Christ did they are all included in his prayers supplications and teares with strong cryes which is no lesse miraculous then any of the rest The wonders of Paul in doing and suffering are all comprized in this Behold he prayes Now the miraculous vertue and power of prayer consists not in words or any outward expression or bodily exercise in a form of words but in humble petition a lawfull suing out of right a just and legall appeale and judgement given according to the nature of the case propounded in which all accord and agree together to compleat the mystery and miracle of prayer having all these things in it whereby according to the law of the spirit our right of inheritance is faithfully sued out Note further that it is no more the form visible of any miracle that ever was wrought that is the proper seal to confirm the Gospel no more then the Ministry of the Letter that kills is the proper path of the spirit that gives life But it is the scope drift ayme and end of the miracle in what it poynts unto in that great and miraculous workmanship of Christ the son of the living God which is the true and proper seale of the Gospel and wheresoever that is effectually wrought there it is felt and approved and there only the Gospel or glad tidings of salvation is really and miraculously confirmed by a signe and wonder passing infinitely all momentany and corporeall respects But these men think they honour the Gospel and lift it up to its proper height and ancient dignity In thus concluding their opinion is no lesse honourable then that of those that have resolved and decreed that the pattering over the words of that prayer which Christ taught his Disciples as a spell is an effectuall ordinance in the house of God never looking at the life spirit and proper power of prayer only the form of words So these look at the form of the miracle wrought as it appears to a naturall eye as the other appears to the ear and never look at the true wonder and signe only sound in the son of man and else-where centred is no better then the magick of Aegypt for they may as well gape after the outward forms of words to be the prayer of the Gospel as the outward form of the work to be
as things of old from eternity and new as in present use fitting and beseeming the present oration and opportunity This phrase therefore is like that where the Apostle saith My little children of whom I travell in birth againe till Christ be formed in you not as though they had now defaced Christ who before was formed in them but he declares hereby the effect of his doctrine from which some were turned aside unto the rudiments of the Law as unto another Gospel which he saith is not another but the same Gospel perverted by false Teachers telling them that some are entangled with the yoke of bondage thereby for he that is bound to any particular of the carnall commandement as to be circumcised or any outward form of bodily action He is bound to keepe the whole law and shews that such have abolished Christ and are faln from grace such effect he shews his Doctrine had of some as a savour of death unto death but there were others unto whom hee there speaks on whom his doctrine had a more noble effect as being a savour of life Therefore he saith My little children of whom I travell in birth againe or I have brought you forth not in a second act but in another manner and way namely to the forming of Christ in you or framing you into the similitude of the Son of God once and for ever Even so it is here He prayed againe that is the spirit of intercession hath a secondary or other manner of effect then that which is before specified not another prayer but another manner of wonder accomplished by the same prayer for now the heavens gave raine and the earth brings forth her fruit We are to know then that as the Gospel opens the treasuries of the Kingdome of God unto an abundant freedome liberty and plenty of the going forth and exercise of the spirit of grace in the Saints even as water poured upon the thirsty and floods upon the dry ground through that office of intercession peculiar unto our Eliah without any hinderance or engagement of any bond of the flesh when through the spirit of prayer that cloud of witnesse or rayn of liberality ariseth as a hand or administration thereof even as the word of the Lord is sayd to come by the hand of Haggie and by the hand of Malachie and by the hand of all the Prophets which so covereth the heavens as no parching sun of the beams of mans wisdome and device taketh place no more then they doe in those over-shadowings of the Virgin by that holy spirit of God in the production of Christ Even so doth Prayer set at liberty the works of the flesh in the men of the world by opening the sluces and flood-gates thereof unto condemnation and destruction for the waters of the great deep mystery or bottomlesse pit are opened for the destruction of the world as well as the flood-gates of heaven for the safety of Noah and his houshold in bearing up the Ark fifteen cubits above the great mountayns of the States of this earth or of the world And this prayer doth not simply accidentally but ministerially and effectually in the same sence That the Gospell is a savour of death unto death Not only by gleaning of all the fruits of righteousnesse out of the wisdome of the Serpent or men of the world which centred in the Saints are the proper cause of the transcendencies of their estate above all humane excellencies so doth it also gleane all the vicious desires of the flesh out of that state and condition of Christ centring them in that state of unbeliefe whereby man descends infinitely beneath a state of simple humane or properties of a meer creature and by fashioning and corrupting the holy things of God becomes satanicall and diabolicall and such as seek to finde an excellent or commendable betwixt these twayn it cannot be better described or diciphered for the solidity of it then by that partition that divides Purgatory and Hell in those of that mercinary conceipt The abundance of spirit therefore in the Saints and that plenty of the spirit of the Prince of the power of the ayre which now works in the children of disobedience hold proportion in way of Antithesis otherwise an infinite and an eternall wrath could not take place in the wicked as an infinite and eternall glory doth in the Saints For he made but one speaking of that state of Christ with an elegant allusion unto the high Priest and wherefore but one seeing he had abundance of spirit namely that there might be a holy seed that whatsoever the fruits are that are by one Lord Jesus Christ of the same nature and dignity are all the fruits of happinesse produced and brought forth by that one mystical and spirituall body and so in a diameter respect are all the fruits of sin in the wicked This plenty in this two-fold respect is signified by warning given to Ahab to betake himselfe to his Chariot for I heare a noyse of much raine which Ahab flyes from as a terrible thing as it contayns the spirit of Eliah betaking himselfe to Chariot and horse in the furnitures of this world and Eliah flyes from it as it hath the spirit of Ahab and Jezebel as that which brings destruction upon them only hee betakes himselfe to the strength of Gods spirit to take the gates of Iesreel The plenty of Eliah's spirit is seen and taught in that duration and plenty in the cruse of oyle and barrell of meale raising up the womans sonne from death to life and annoynting Hazael and Jehu for the ruine of Ahabs house Elisha to be a Prophet in his stead and in the destruction of all those false Prophets of Baal And the plenty of the rayn of that spirit of wickednesse appears in Ahab and Jezebel their cruelty towards the Prophet of God their miserable and horrible overthrow and in their desire and endeavour to nourish and maintayn such plenty of a false spirit of prophesie upon the face of the earth and in this plenty of rain seed-time and harvest are continued for the world sow unto the flesh and the flesh they reap and inherit corruption and the Saints sow unto the spirit and inherit everlasting life And from this power of prayer he assumes the power and vertue of doctrine in which he concludes the Epistle to shew that where the power and vertue of the one resides there is the power and vertue of the other The prayer of Faith is never without the spirit of Prophesie and prophesie according to the spirit is never without the life and power of prayer and where one of these is wanting they are both absent from that party in the true exercise of them for a formall prayer is never accompanyed with the life and power of sound doctrine but as they have composed a prayer by mans invention gathering up expressions sutable in the understanding of a man so do they compose a
then there could be no want to be supplyed so that the whole spirit of Christianity prayeth viz. God and man in unity so it is here the spirit that turns is God and man in unity and is as true a change from that which is and ever shall be Satanicall as the wicked erre from that which is and ever shall be holy and righteous and they are both of one and the same time in the rise of them For in the beginning was the word and that word is with God and is God And Satan is a lyar from the beginning and abode not in truth no more then Christs soule was left in hell or that holy one suffered to see corruption but was ever taught in the way of life and in that reall presence at whose right hand there is fullnesse of joy for evermore Therefore the Prophet saith that Christ comes meek and lowly saving himselfe that is compleatly and not apart only and therein the worth and dignity of salvation stands that it hath that weight substance of account and reckoning in it and upon this ground the Disciples are comforted against all feare whatsoever where it is said Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing and yet one of them falls not to the ground without the good will of your heavenly father of how much more worth are ye then many sparrows Can you set a price and rate of so mean a thing and doth God take care for the preservation of it Of what esteem price and respect then is the state of a Christian in which not a part but the compleat spirit of the Son of God is involved and by a ransome given and payd in the world proportionable thereunto purchased This point contains a mystery which the common Priest-hood of the world so far as I have heard or seen in books is altogether ignorant of though life and death yea the spring and originall fountaine of all things is involved in it So much for the proposition the injunction followes Le him know or acknowledge c. The word let is of like signification here that it is in the beginning Let there be light let us make man c. having the power of a command and vertue of propagation to bring forth being of the nature of the word Amen so be it or so it shall be without all gainsaying or contradiction having in it a creating power and vertue to give being to the thing uttered That is that the party thus turning or turned for both are true and the word implies both one that turns and one turned for both are in that state of Christ and he that preacheth any thing but Christ and him crucified he goes beyond our Apostle as far as the common apostacy The word Let then establisheth in the heart of him and no other that turneth a sinner from the errour of his way a certaine power of acknowledgment of such a condition or royall and noble acts which here follows but first see here the nature of the confession or acknowledgment of sin it is his way that turneth naturally but it is confessed to the change or converting it unto the state of the Sonne of God even as truth may be sayd to be their way naturally who are in errour but they have perverted the same into falshood turning the truth of God into a lye and his grace into wantonnesse so that their way with respect to that which they have perverted is holinesse and is and ever shall be so in Christ but there remayns nothing but sin and wickednesse in the perverters thereof So also a Christian may confesse that the evill of sin and errour is his way with respect to that which is converted and is and ever shall be so in the wicked but in that state of the turned and converted there is no sin nor errour to be found at all there is then a reality of the Saints confession of their sin but it is to the removing of it to another where it abides for ever as there is a reall confession of a holy one in the wicked but it is ever in removing it unto another which they are not which is the proper spirit of Python that unperswaded or unfaithed one as the Apostle gives the wicked the title of Apeitheis unperswaded or disobedient so that their acknowledgment of holinesse in another subsistance is the unfaithing or unbetrothing of the soule from God it is its proper and perpetuall divorce So that he that knows not how to clear the state of Christianity from sin and fill the world with wickednesse he will come to make a bankrupt-like account when ever his estate comes to be discovered Therefore the wealthy estate noble acts and royall prerogatives following are only entailed and made over to him that turns the sinner from the errour of his way errour collectively as all considered in one otherwise Christ is not cleered and made the holy one of God and then not risen from the dead We are yet in our sins the substance of the common doctrine at this day in the world The first point or act of honour given to him that turns is that he saves a soule from death not as the world thinks by preaching the terrours of the Law and frighting men from some grosse and bruitish acts they have thereby converted and saved souls the most part of those that thus save did strive to pluck men out of the hands of the Bishops that the people might be instruments to lift them up into the like seat if not worse no such conversion coms in here it is abhominable but it is a true and faithfull distribution and opening of Gods righteous and holy manner of working in the absolution of his holy son made sin in being acquit from all sin and the just condemnation of that wicked one who in being made Lucifer the morning starre became the Prince and power of darknesse From such an originall we must fetch salvation and destruction or else all our doctrine of the decree of election and reprobation will prove no better then reprobate silver not passing for currant in the Kingdome of God 1. But the thing to be acknowledged by such a one as turns or is turned is he saves that is the power and spirit of the Saviour is there when once we know of what nature the spirit of the world is namely that wee are of God and the world is of that wicked one then wee shall learn to acknowledg that salvation never appears but there is the Saviour wee thinke to honour Christ by binding him up in one individuall man in point of the mystery of the Gospel it is a carnall and humane honour not beseeming the Son of God the common Priest-hood hath blinded and besotted the world in this point setting up an idoll in mens minds and not the mystery of life that is by Christ but it is taken for blasphemy in these dayes to talk of the Son of God
or a Saviour any where but as lockt up in a humane body in heaven that men may stand here in his room till he return from thence to suck up all the glory of the earth It was not so in ages past and men spirituall for Joshuah Moses Minister was called Jesus a Saviour as the Apostle interprets his name and the Lord acknowledgeth in raising up Judges in Israell that he raised up Saviours unto them And Paul was not affraid to tell Timmothie that in taking heed to himselfe that is how God hath composed salvation in his consisting in Christ and unto learning or doctrine that is how it ought to be layd out and distributed to others that in so doing he should be a Saviour of himselfe and them that heare him 2. A second point is what he saves that is a soule or a life this is not meant of the life of a meer creature but it is the life of the Son of God as our Apostle affirms Now I live yet not I but Christ lives in me and the life which I now live is by or in the faith of the sonne of God So that a Christians life is the life of Christ and there is no life of man-kind but either the life of the Saviour or else the life of Sathan that destroyer for heaven and earth conspire together in the making of man Let us speaking with respect to that plurality in our image that is in our image earthly as well as heavenly for there is a heavenly body and there is an earthly body and God is as just and righteous in the making of the one as of the other and every way as honourable the one in mercy and the other in severity And man cannot be known in a simple act of creation for that multiplies him not but propagation or generation must be brought in also else the son of God nor the seed of the Serpent can be known so both are brought forth in that first act of generation in Cain and Abel wherein the seed of the Serpent appears in the same act as in Jacob and Esau together with Christ in Abel dead by Caine in the spirit and in Seth that sett one in life for evermore who is set in the room of Abel crucified in the world So that the life of Christ and of Antichrist are both from one act even from as early dayes the one as the other and without the true knowledg of that we know neither of them and for other life in man-kind we know none worthy the name of life beyond other creatures but as it serves to the setting forth of the one or of the other of these and so they transcend the life of all other creatures as far as the image of God did the frame of any other creature or that earthly image descends below them all even to a bottomlesse pit which no other creature is subjected unto but only man 3. There is a third point what he saves from that is death namely a death that holds correspondency with that infinite and eternall life of the Son of God in way of Parathesis in all points for Christ is saved from whatsoever Sathan is hath or undergoes and Sathan is destroyed from whatsoever Christ is hath or is advanced unto therefore that conceit that Sathan was an Angell that is a meere creature at the first and in acceptation with God is a meer humane tradition and philosophicall fiction and is a point of greater concernment then men are aware of for it is as safe to say that the son of God was for a time out of the Fathers favour as to hold that the Devill at any time was in acceptation with God for whatsoever is out of Gods favour can never return into againe and what is accepted of him for a moment caâ— never be rejected 2. A second royalty or act of fame that is to be acknowledged by him who turns the sinner from the errour of his way changing him into truth it selfe that is the covering or hiding of a multitude of sins This is taken from the speech of Solomon Hatred stirreth up strife but love covereth all sins which our Apostle calls a multitude of sins the word signifies the deep of the troubled ocean intimating that huge multitude of torturing and troubling trespasses proper to that great gulfe of the bottomlesse pit Now to turn from the error of a mans way is to turn to truth and no man can turn to truth but by that unity that is in Christ none turns to truth but hee that becomes truth for there is no terme or title given in Scripture but being rightly interpretted and rightly applyed the truth substance and being of the thing is there for God useth no expression but he intends under that the truth and substance of the thing expressed To turn to truth is not only truth in word but truth in act also yea to be that very thing as Christ saith I am the way the truth and the life Now that unity that is in Christ is the fulfilment and compleating of the law of the Spirit for if the love of Christ be in us and constrayn us to all acknowledgments of him we know that love is the fulfilling of the Law and where the Law is fulfilled there sin utters not its voyce nor hath it a face to appear it is altogether hid and covered for ever Christ is the eâ—d and scope of the law for righteousnesse and more it aymes not at nor more it cannot require for it is the sonne of God that is justified who then shall condemn him The law is fully satisfied from what ground then shall any accuse yea our Apostle saith that the righteousnesse of the law is fulfilled in us that walke not after the flesh but after the spirit No hiding of sin therefore but by fulfilling of the law but what law not the law of the carnall commandement generally taught in the world by which no flesh can be justified but it is the law of the spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus or which consists in that unction office or spirit of the Saviour Againe how do the wicked hide righteousnesse that none appears in them but only the spirit of the wicked one namely by walking according to the law of the flesh For he that walks after the law of the flesh he cannot please God so that all righteousnesse is hid and covered in them yea even by fulfilling the law of the flesh for the more they conform themselves thereunto the more their condemnation doth appear for it is not because men cannot perform all the works of the law in that respect that they cannot be justified thereby but because they do any of them for it is against the nature of that law of the carnall Commandement and every part thereof to justifie for it is its proper nature and office to condemn for we may as well say that the law of the spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus is a law of sin and death as to say the law of the carnall command can give life or peace no not in the compleat performance of it For every part thereof is a breach of the law of the spirit And whatsoever is a breach of the law of the spirit is a crucifying of the Son of God afresh and putting of him to open shame so that every performance of the law of the flesh according to the intent thereof is a breach of the same law of the spirit and he that breaks one breaks all therefore all righteousness is hid and covered in the wicked even so the true keeping of the law of the spirit of faith in any part of it is a nullifying of the whole law of the carnall Command therefore no law of sin and death is found in them all sins and sorrows are hid and covered therefore the man is blessed whose trespass is forgiven whose sin is covered Blessed is the man and he only unto whom the Lord imputeth accounteth or reckoneth not iniquity and in whose spirit there is no guile Amen By Sam Gorton Professor of Christ FINIS
doctrine from Libraries School-distinctions and from a serious observation of the carriage and demeanour of one creature towards another only bringing God into the account by turning the glory of the incorruptible God into the similitude of a corruptible man and of birds four-footed beasts and of creeping things It is not Universities books and Libraries that can transfer the spirit of the Scriptures no nor the skill in those Languages wherein they were originally written without the same spirit comment upon them in our hearts by which they were first indited It is the spirit that indited them that gives the meaning of them and not the hand that writes or translates no more then paper and inke can doe it Without which spirit let us use all meanes and industry that possible we can it is but to pick at the bark and rinde of truths and cracking of a shell voyd and destitute of any kernell better then a gale of bitterness to be found in it and such as compose their Sermons of such stuffe their prayers are no better however they may shew the zeale of Baals Priests in the uttering of them But true prayer carries the force of the Doctrine of the Gospel in it by judging of the want and supply according unto God and true doctrine hath the power of prayer going forth in it for the effectuall performance of the things that are taught and neither the one nor the other consist of any form or statue that any book or Library can possibly bring and represent unto us for the visions and operations of God are never found in the same form and time as at another all circumstances duely weighed and considered Yet may we not deny but the same words may be used often and again in prayer or doctrine but with a various respect as this wonder of Eliah is brought in with respect to years months dayes and poynts of time so Christ prayed in the same words thrice but with variety and eternity of respect for the cup for ever passeth by him and toucheth him not as man is eternally saved in that blessed condition of the Son of God and it takes effect at the Sonne of God is transformed by the world into the cursed state and condition For if we make the death of Christ according to the true mystery of it wherein salvation doth consist to be of lesse continuance then eternity wee shall annihilate Christ and make salvation it selfe of no longer continuance for if Christ once dye unto the flesh in the godly he never lives unto it any more And if he once be dead in the wicked in respect of his proper spirit and life it is never repaired in them agayn for then there were not eteranll perdition which the word of God hath commended unto us upon like grounds of certainty that it hath done everlasting life That word translated was dead and is alive is read is dead and is alive as the same word I am an Apostle is used in the present tence Doctrine and prayer are inseparable companions even as Kingdome and Priest hood are as here in the way of Christ even so in the world in the way of Antichrist and thus the connexion of the next point is brought in Vers 19 20. Brethren if any of you have erred from the truth and one hath converted him c. In which words observe 1. A proposition consisting of two points As 1. Errour from the truth 2. A restauration 2. Observe an injunction and that hath two parts also 1. To acknowledge or make a confession of an estate or act 2. The party that is so to do and that is He that hath turned from errour 3. The state and condition or act done and that consists of two things 1. Death 2. The hiding of a multitude of sins BUt first observe the terme or appellation he gives as before he hath done Brethren By brethren here is meant a like brother-hood as in Esau and Jacob which are often so called Was not or is not Esau Jacobs brother saith the Lord Yet I have loved Jacob and hated Esau and layd his mountaine wast for ever So the Apostle hath respect to the wicked as brethren in a true sence to the godly because they consist of the same matter and substance that is God and man made one in the wisdome of the flesh as the Saints consist of God and man made one but according to the wisdome of the spirit If one of you or if any of you If one of you that is as a Nation considered collectively in Esau as the Oracle said to Rebecka Two nations are in thy womb or any of you that is distributively or distinctly and so it comprehends all the Apostates and Revolters from God or all vertues or excellencies in the Saints from which they are fallen and have erred and gone astray If any that is man and man one or other or thing and thing one and other whatsoever is in the Son of God Erred from the trueth that is gone astray and wandred from that which is the reality and substance of all things which is Christ the Son of God And to erre in this place is not simply for a meer creature to declyne and go away from his Creator but to pervert mis-apply and wrongfully to interpret the very things of God themselves turning his glory into shame his truth into a lye therefore they erre from truth as having been in it for that which was is and ever shall be righteousnesse and holinesse of truth they have perverted unto prophanesse and wickednesse by interpreting the things of God to be such as the proper spirit of a creature naturally brings forth so that it is a diabolicall spirit which this errour is formed into The particle if is not here to be taken as making questions or doubt whether there be such a swerving from truth but as a certaine affirmation that such there are as the Apostle explayns the Prophets meaning where it is sayd Vnto whom I sware in my wrath if they shall enter into my rest which the Apostle expounds They shall not enter into his rest as an absolute certainty And so there is of one converting or turning from errour into truth in that wonderfull change that the Sonne of God makes in our nature for it is impossile that he should be held of death but as certainly as he layes down his life in the wicked so must he take it agayn in the godly otherwise there were an annihilation of him who is the Author and strength of all things which is impossible And in this change or turning we are not to take it as the simple and single spirit of a creature turned but the compleat spirit of him who is the Son of God for as the Apostle speaks of prayer We know not how to pray as we ought but the spirit maketh intercession for us It is not the spirit of God without the spirit of the creature for