Page images
PDF
EPUB

8. The weak beleever hath not fuch cheerful expectations,nor quiet fubmiffions as the strong believer.

The ftrong believer is at it as the Church in Micah, My God will hear me, and if he denies a particular good, yet he can fit down and fing; when he is going to prayer he chears up his heart with a confidence on God, and when be findes God determining and revealing his will, there he bleffeth God, and follows his calling. But the weak believer is apt to foreftal a mercy, he cannot fee a plain way for his grant, nor an eafily quiet heart after his denial.

[ocr errors]

9. The efficacy of temptations doth more intangle the weak beLever then the ftrong, like the weaker veffel at fea amidst the greater waves; Satan doth coufen his foul with ease, and ever and anon difrobes him of his comforts like a lewd fubtile enemy, he forceth the weak believer often to try and clear his title, and increaseth mistakes in all paffages 'twixt God and the foul.

1. If he doth caft himself on mercy, then it is prefumption; If he holds off, then it is infidelity and rejecting of Chrift.

2. If he doubes, then it is despaireanda forfaking of God.

3. If he finnes, then it is unpardonable, because fince knowledge and mercy. da bax

4. If he findes distractions induvie, then this is hypocrifie in the heart.s htt

25.

5. If he meets with bellish suggestions (of which-Satan is only the Author) Othen, who could be in Chrift and have fuch abominable thoughts! most thing pa

6. If the Ordinances do not presently comfort, O then, they are fealed up,and there is no faichelle the Word would profit...

7. If every corruption be not fubdued in every degree and motion and at, O then, vertue is not gone from Christ,the heartis ftill nought, and the faith unfound..

8. If not the fame constant tenor of (mart affections, why then, there was never any true love of God, no reverence of him now, nor fear, nor duties, but the foul is dead, utterly hardened, and God hath no pleasure in it.

X 2

9.If

9. If God doth answer the foul, yea, but that is but an imagination. If he doth not answer, why? then it is cleare that God neither doth, nor will ever regard you.

10. If do not go to the Sacrament, why? then thou flighteft Chrift, and his blood: If I go and come away with tears, O then thou waft unbeleeving, or elle chou hadst been fent away with joy and increase.

11. IfI do not put on for grace, then thou art wicked: IfI put on for grace, then thou art fo wicked that God will not be fow it on thee. Thus doth Satan involve, and diftreffe,and fet the foul of a weak Believer (like a man at chefle) forward and backward; she makes him to fufpect every mercy, and every grace, and every affection,and every duty, and every promife, and every Ordinance;fo violently doth heiffe,though he cannot yo tally fink the heart of a weak believery 1, 1950 bra hot and as prilag in

[ocr errors]

do gridd Motives to strive to greaten thy faith b

I,

TH His, is a figde of trub. True grace is tifing, dead things do moulder, and artificial things remaine the fame, bat the living childe is growing to a full ftature Phil. 3. Not as though we had already attained the graine of mustard-feed grows, and the /moaking flax will flame. Prefumption hath all its perfections at first.

2. This is a right answer of great means. To whom much ia given, of them much is required. Pharaohs leane kine ate called ill-favoured, because in a great and large pasture. All is not right when the breasts are full, and the child is still weak. The Gospel fhould be revealed from faith to faith, Rom, 1.

3. The greater faith is, the greater perfection: every degree of farther grace is like a ftar of greater magnitude, which differ in glory from another, an addition of faith to fanh is an adding to the treasury, an enriching of the foul, a farther clarifying of it. The leffe of grace, the more of corruption,and the more of corruption the more of imperfection.

4. The greater faith, the greater comfort; the Minde will have fewer doubts, will bath fewer fears, Confcience more settledness,the foul more fights of God,and taftes of Chrift. Experiences in life, and confidence in death.

5. The greater faith will be the greater belp in times of defertion, in times of tryal, in times of temptation, in times of affliction, and greater help to all active duty, and paffive changes. Thou knoweft not what may befall thee in evil times,then thou wouldest be able to commit, to fubmit, to conquer, to fuffer, to do much better, if thy faith were much greater.

[ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors]

CHAP. XVI.

Exhortations to labour for Sa-
ving faith.

Fto beleeve in the Lord Jesus Christ be the way to be faved; Then be exhorted to labour for, and to get this faving faith. Let not the confolations of God feeme small unto thee, faid he to Job; fo fay I, let not the falvation of thy foul feem a light thing unto thee. If a man were wounded deeply, and there were but one plaifter which could cure, and this were prefented unto him, would he not put out his hand to receive and apply it, the love of life would eafily incline him.

Why?brethren, not a man of us but hath a deadly wound by finne, and there is no remedy for the finful foul, but in the blood of Chrift: O,if the love of life will conftraine us much, let the love of eternal life, the love of our fouls, of our falvation perfwade us much more to get faith, which gets Chrift, who gets (alvation for our fouls.

of 4..

There are divers things which I will touch upon in the finish- 4. Brauches.. ing of this Ufe, viz

X 3

1. The

I.

1. The Motives to perfwade and draw the heart to put out for this faving faith in the Lord Jefus Chrift.

2. The impediments and hindrances, which ftop the foul from believing on the Lord Jefus Chrift, which we mult affay to anfwer and remove, as he did the body of Afabel which stayed the people in their purfuit.

3. The means or adjuments, and furtherances to breed this believing quality in the foul.

4

4. Therefolutions or answerings of feveral doubtful grounds and arguments which intangle the heart of a fenfible finner, and which he holds out as ftrong pretences, why he should not by faith close with Jefus Chrift.

Now that great and holy God, who is the Author of faith, and finifher thereof, whofe word is the word of faith, and by whofe Almighty working the hearts of men are perfwaded to believe, let him fo direct me in fpeaking, and all of us in hearing, that after all his gracious and manifold revelations and offers of our Lord Jefus Chrift, our unbeleeving hearts may be fubdued,and true faith may be wrought in us all to receive the Lord Jefus Chrift to our eternal (aluation.

A twofold indelity.

[ocr errors]

SECT. I.

Firft the Motives.

speak this day to an understanding and fenfible people, to whom the doctrinal parts of our natural mifery, and of our purchased felicity are not hidden myfteries, and therefore I traft that the fucceeding arguments and motives fhall finde little ftop in your understandings, but fhall the more easily and powerfully paffe down into your hearts and affections, to perswade and excite you to lay out all your ftrength, and that fpeedily, to get this faith in the Lord Jefus Chrift: Thus

then

First, fadly and seriously confider the ftate of Pofitive infides lity. Divines obferve a twofold infidelity.

One is Negative, which is amongst the Heathens to whom

Christ is not revealed, and therefore they do not believe; it confifts both in the abfence of the quality of faith, as also in the object and doctrine of faith. This Sunne of the Gospel hath not rifen unto them, and therefore they fit ftill in the regi ons of darknee, and (for ought we know) in the valley of

death.

Another is Pofitive, which is incident unto us Chriftians, to whom the arm of the Lord is revealed; Chrift is manifefted as the body of the Sun by the beams of light, fo he by the brightneffe and evidence of the Gospel, and yet the foule knows him not, receives him not, doth not take him both as Lord and Saviour.

Of this there are feveral degrees, and all of them fearfully dangerous, to fpeak the truth plainly, dam

nable.

1. A careleffe neglecting of the Lord of life, a not minding of that fingular mercy and goodneffe which God hath treasured in Chrift, and reveales and offers to finful

men,

2. A flighting of him and his excellencies, which is a preferring, as it were, Barrabas before him; a bestowing of our hearts, and studies, and labours, and delights, and fervices, not on him, but either on our finnes, or upon the world, in the rivers of its pleasures, and in the mountaines of its profits.

3. Arefafing of his Articles and Covenants, which is a break-ing off, and vile difliking of those tearms upon which be offers himself to be ours: we would bring him to termes of competition with finne, or the creature; we would abridge his holy and Lordly Scepter, like what we pleafe, do what we list, have him to be our Saviour, and finne to be our Ruler, we would bestow our fafeties on him, and cur (ervices upon the world, we will not freely and fully confent to all that he is, nor fubmit to all that he propofeth, or may befall us with him and for him: And fo like the vaine Merchant, we miffe the pearle,, because we will not go to the price. We enjoy our felves ftill, and our finnes, and our world too, but we forfake our mercies for lying vanities, the foul is Chriftleffe ftill, becaufe thus fordidly unbeleeving:

1. But.c

« PreviousContinue »