The Spirit of God MUST NOT BE RESISTED when proffering his help to the work of faith 3/3

           Again, may be the Spirit of God goes yet further, and doth not only dart light into thy mind, hell-fire into thy conscience, but heaven-fire also into thy affections.  My meaning is, he from the word displays Christ so in his own excellencies, and the fitness of him in all his offices to thy wants, that thy affections begin to work after him.  The frequent discourses of him, and the mercy of God through him to poor sin­ners, are so luscious, that thou beginnest to taste some sweetness in hearing of them, which stirs up some passionate desires, whereby thou art in hearing the word often sallying forth in such‑like breathings as these, ‘O that Christ were mine!  Shall I ever be the happy soul whom God will pardon and save?’ Yea, possibly in the heat of thy affections thou art cursing thy lusts and Satan, who have held thee so long from Christ; and sudden purposes are taken up by thee that thou wilt bid adieu to thy former ways, and break through all the entreaties of thy dearest lusts, to come to Christ.  O soul! now the kingdom of God is nigh indeed unto thee.  Thou art, as I may so say, even upon thy quickening, and therefore, above all, this is the chief season of thy care, lest thou shouldst miscarry.  If these sudden desires did but ripen into a deliberate choice of Christ; and these purposes settle into a permanent resolution to re­nounce sin and self, and so thou cast thyself on Christ; I durst be the messenger to joy thee with the birth of this babe of grace—faith I mean—in thy soul.

           I confess, affections are up and down; yea, like the wind, how strongly soever they seem to blow the soul one way at present, [they] are often found in the quite contrary point very soon after.  A man may be drunk with passion and affection, as really as with wine or beer.  And as it is ordinary for a man to make a bargain, when he is in beer or wine, which he re­pents of as soon as he is sober again; so it is as ordi­nary for poor creatures, who make choice of Christ and his ways in a sermon—while their affections have been elevated above their ordinary pitch by some moving discourse—to repent of all they have done a while after, when the impression of the word, which heated their affection in hearing, is worn off.  Then they come to themselves again and are what they were —as far from any such desires after Christ as ever. Content not therefore thyself with some sudden pangs of affection in an ordinance, but labour to pre­serve those impressions which then the Spirit makes on thy soul, that hey be not defaced and rubbed off —like colours newly laid on before they are dry—by the next temptation that comes.  This is the caveat of the apostle, Heb. 2:1, ‘Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip’—or run out as leaking vessels.  May be, at present, thy heart is melting, and in a flow with sorrow for thy sins, and thou thinkest, Surely now I shall never give my lust a kind look more—indeed one might wonder, to see the solemn mournful countenances under a sermon, which of these could be the man or woman that would afterwards be seen walking hand in hand with those sins they now weep to hear mentioned—but, as thou lovest thy life, watch thy soul, lest this prove but ‘as the early dew,’ none of which is to be seen at noon.  Do thou therefore as those do who have stood some while in a hot bath, out of which when they come they do not presently go into the open air (that were enough to kill them), but betake themselves to their warm bed, that they may nourish this kindly heat; and now while their pores are open, by a gentle sweat breathe out more effectually the remaining dregs of their distemper.  Thus betake thyself to thy closet, and there labour to take the advantage of thy present relenting frame for the more free pouring out of thy soul to God, now the ordinance hath thawed the tap; and, with all thy soul, beg of God he would not leave thee short of faith, and suffer thee to mis­carry now he hath thee upon the wheel, but make thee a ‘vessel unto honour;’ which follows as the third direction

The Spirit of God MUST NOT BE RESISTED when proffering his help to the work of faith 2/3

 God makes short work with some in his judiciary proceedings.  If he finds a repulse once, sometimes he departs, and leaves a dismal curse behind him as the punishment of it.  ‘I say unto you, That none of those men which were bidden shall taste of my supper,’ Luke 14:24.  They were but once invited, and, for their first denial, this curse [is] clapped upon their heads.  It is not said they shall never come where the supper stands on the board, but they shall never ‘taste.’  Many sit under the ordinances, where Christ in gospel-dishes is set forth admirably, but, through the efficacy of this curse upon them, never taste of these dainties all their life.  They hear precious truths, but their hearts are sealed up in unbelief, and their minds made reprobate and injudicious, that they are not moved at all by them.  There is a kind of frenzy and madness I have heard of, in which a man will dis­course soberly and rationally, till you come to speak of some one particular subject that was the occasion of his distemper, and first broke his brain; here he is quite out, and presently loses his reason, not able to speak with any understanding of it.  O how many men and women are there among us—frequent at­tenders on the word—who, in any matter of the world are able to discourse very understandingly and ration­ally; but, when you come to speak of the things of God, Christ, and heaven, it is strange to see how soon their reason is lost and all understanding gone from them!  they are not able to speak of these matters with any judgement.  Truly I am afraid, in many —who have sat long under the means, and the Spirit hath been making some attempts on them—It is injudiciousness of mind in the things of God is but the consequence of that spiritual curse which God hath passed upon them for resisting these essays of his Spirit.

           I beseech you, therefore, beware of opposing the Spirit.  Doth he beam any light from his word into thy understanding, whereby thou, who wert before an ig­norant sot, comest to something of the evil of sin, the excellency of Christ, and canst discourse rationally of the truths of the Scripture?  Look now to it, what thou canst with this candle of the Lord is lighted in thy mind; take heed thou beest not found sinning with it, or priding thyself in it, lest it goes out in a snuff, and thou, for ‘rebelling against the light,’ com­est at last to ‘die without knowledge,’ as is threatened, Job 36:12.  If the Spirit of God goes yet further, and [so] fortifies the light in thy understanding that it sets thy conscience on fire with the sense of thy sins, and apprehensions of the wrath due to them; now, take heed of resisting him when in mercy to thy soul he is kindling this fire in thy bosom, to keep thee out of a worse in hell, if thou wilt be ruled by him.  Thou must expect that Satan, now his house is on fire over his head, will bestir him what he can to quench it; thy danger is lest thou shouldst listen to him for thy pres­ent ease.  Take heed therefore where thou drawest thy water with which thou quenchest this fire; that it be out of no well, but out of the word of God.  In thinking to quiet thy conscience, thou mayest quench the Spirit of God in thy conscience; which is the mis­chief the devil longs thou shouldst pull upon thy own head.  There is more hope of a sick man when his disease comes out, than when it lies at the heart and nothing is seen outwardly.  You know how Hazael helped his master to his sad end, who might have lived for all his disease.  ‘He took a thick cloth, and dipped it in water, and spread it on his face, so that he died;’ and it follows, ‘and Hazael reigned in his stead,’ II Kings 8:15.  Thus the wretch came to the crown.  He saw the king like to recover, and he squat­ted his disease, in all probability, to his heart by the wet cloth, and so by his death made a way for himself to the throne.  And truly Satan will not much fear to recover the throne of thy heart—which this present combustion in thy conscience puts him in great fear of losing—can he but persuade thee to apply some carnal coolings to it, thereby to quench the Spirit in his convincing work.  These convictions are sent thee mercifully in order to thy spiritual delivery, and they should be as welcome to thee as the kindly bearing pains of a woman in travail are to her.  Without them she could not be delivered of her child, nor without these, more or less, can the new creature be brought forth in thy soul

The Spirit of God MUST NOT BE RESISTED when proffering his help to the work of faith 1/3

  Second Direction.  Take heed of resisting or op­posing the Spirit of God when he offers his help to the work. If ever thou believest, he must enable thee; take heed of opposing him.  Master workmen love not to be controlled.  Now, two ways the Spirit of God may be opposed.  First. When the creature waits not on the Spirit, where he ordinarily works faith.  Second. When the creature, though he attends on him in the way and means, yet controls him in his work.

           First.  Take heed thou opposest not the Spirit by not attending on him in the way and means by which he ordinarily works faith.  Thou knowest where Jesus used to pass, and his Spirit breathe, and that is in the great gospel ordinance—the ministry of the word. Christ’s sheep ordinarily conceive when they are drinking the water of life here.  The hearing of the gospel it is called, Gal. 3:2, ‘The hearing of faith;’ because by hearing the doctrine of faith, the Spirit works the grace of faith in them.  This is the still voice he speaks to the souls of sinners in.  ‘Thine eyes shall see thy teachers: and thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it,’ Isa. 30:20.  Here are God and man teaching togeth­er.  Thou canst not neglect man's teaching, but thou resist the Spirit’s also.  It was for some­thing that the apostle placed them so near, I Thes. 5:19, 20.  He bids us ‘quench not the Spirit;’ and in the next words, ‘Despise not prophesyings.’  Surely he would have us know that the Spirit is dangerously quenched when prophesying, or preaching of the gospel, is despised. Now the most notorious way of despising prophesying or preaching, is to is to turn our back off the ordin­ance and not attend on it.  When God sets up the ministry of the word in a place, his Spirit then opens his school, and expects that all who would be taught for heaven should come thither.  O take heed of play­ing the truant, and absenting thyself from the ordin­ance upon any unnecessary occasion, much less of casting off the ordinance.  If he tempts God that would be kept from sin, and yet will not keep out of the circle of the occasion that leads to the sin; then he tempts God as much that would have faith, and pre­tends his desire is that the Spirit should work it, but will not come within the ordinary walk of the Spirit where he doth the work.  Whether it is more fitting that the scholar should wait on his master at school to be taught, or that the master should run after the his truant scholar at play in the field to teach him there, judge you?

           Second.  Take heed that in thy attendance on the word thou dost not control the Spirit in those several steps he takes in thy soul in order to the pro­duction of faith.  Though there are no preparatory works of our own to grace, yet the Holy Spirit hath his preparatory works whereby he disposeth souls to grace.  Observe therefore carefully the gradual ap­proaches he makes by the word to thy soul, for want of complying with him in which he may withdraw in a distaste and leave the work at a sad stand for a time, if not quite give it over, never more to return to it. We read, Acts 7:23, how ‘it came into the heart of Moses to visit his brethren the children of Israel’ —stirred up no doubt by God himself to the journey. There he begins to show his good-will to them, and zeal for them, in slaying an Egyptian that had wronged an Israelite; which, though no great matter towards their full deliverance out of Egypt, yet ‘he supposed’ (it is said, ver. 25) ‘his brethren would have un­derstood,’ by that hint, ‘how that God by his hand would deliver them.’  But they did not comply with him, nay, rather opposed him; and therefore he with­drew, and they hear no more of Moses or their deliv­erance for ‘forty years'’ space, ver. 30.  Thus, may be, the Spirit of God gives thee a visit in an ordinance —directs a word that speaks to thy particular condi­tion.  He would have thee understand by this, sinner, how ready he is to help thee out of thy house of bond­age—thy state of sin and wrath —if now thou wilt hearken to his counsel and kindly entertain his mo­tions.  [But], carry thyself rebelliously now against him, and God knows when thou mayest hear of him again knocking at thy door upon such an errand.

DIRECTIONS TO UNBELIEVERS for attaining faith 2/2

 Here thou bearest false witness against God himself, and tellest a lie, not to the Holy Ghost, as Ananias did, but a lie of the Holy Ghost; as if not a word were true he saith in the promises of the gospel.  If ‘he that believeth setteth to his seal that God is true,’ judge you whether the unbe­liever makes him not a liar?  Hast thou been a mur­derer, yea, had thy hand in the blood of saints—the best of men?  This is a dreadful sin, I confess.  But by thy unbelief, thou art a more bloody murderer by how much the blood of God is more precious than the blood of mere men.  Thou killest Christ over again by thy unbelief, and treadest his blood under thy feet, yea, throwest it under Satan's feet to be trampled on by him.

           Question.  But how can unbelief be so great a sin, when it is not in the sinner’s power to believe?

           Answer.  By this reason the unregenerate person might wipe off any other sin and shake off the guilt of it with but saying, ‘It is not my fault that I do not keep this commandment or that, for I have no power of myself to do them.’  This is true; he cannot per­form one holy action holily and acceptably. ‘They that are in the flesh cannot please God,’ Rom. 8:8. But, it is a false inference, that therefore he doth not sin because he can do no other.

1. Because his inability is not created by God, but con­tracted by the creature himself.  ‘God hath made man up­right; but they have sought out many in­ventions,’ Ecc. 7:29.  Man had not his lame hand from God.  No, he was made a creature fit and able for any service his Maker would please to employ him in. But man crippled himself.  And man’s fault cannot preju­dice God’s right.  Though he hath lost his ability to obey, yet God hath not lost his power to command. Who, among ourselves, thinks his debtor discharged, by wasting that estate whereby he was able to have paid us?  It is confessed, had man stood, he should not, indeed could not, have believed on Christ for salvation, as now he is held forth in the gospel; but this was not from any disability in man, but from the unmeetness of such an object to Adam’s holy state. If it had been a duty meet for God to command, there was ability in man to have obeyed.
2. Man’s present impotency to yield obedience to the commands of God, and in particular to this of believing—where it is promulgated—doth afford him no excuse; because it is not a single inability, but complicated with an inward enmity against the com­mand. It is true man can not believe.  But it is as true man will not believe.  ‘Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life,’ John 5:40.  It is possible, yea, ordinary, that a man may, through some feebleness and deficiency of strength, be disabled to do that which he is very willing to do; and this draws out our pity.  Such a one was the poor cripple, who lay so long at ‘the pool,’ John 5:5.  He was willing enough to have stepped down if he could have but crept thither; or that any other should have helped him in, if they would have been so kind.  But, what would you think of such a cripple that can neither go himself into the pool for healing, nor is willing any should help him in; but flees in the face of him that would do him this friendly office?  Every unbeliever is this cripple.  He is not only impotent himself, but a resister of the Holy Ghost that comes to woo and draw him unto Christ.  Indeed, every one that believes believes will­ingly.  But he is beholden, not to nature, but to grace, for this willingness.  None are willing till ‘the day of power’ comes, Ps. 110:3, in which the Spirit of God   ov­ershadows the soul, and by his incubation, as once upon the waters, new‑forms and moulds the will into a sweet compliance with the call of God in the gospel.

DIRECTIONS TO UNBELIEVERS for attaining faith 1/2

But possibly thou wilt ask now, how thou mayest get this precious grace of faith?  The answer to this question, take in these following directions.  First. Labour to get thy heart convinced of, and affect­ed with, thy unbelief.  Second. Take heed of resisting or opposing his help to the Spirit of God, when he offers his help to the work.  Third. Lift up thy cry aloud in prayer to God for faith.  Fourth. Converse much with the promises, and be fre­quently pondering them in thy musing thoughts.  Fifth. Press and urge thy soul home with that strong obligation that lies on thee, a poor humbled sinner, to believe. The unbeliever must get his heart convinced of its unbelief 

           First Direction. Labour to get thy heart con­vinced of, and affected with, thy unbelief.  Till this be done, thou wilt be but sluggish and slighty in thy en­deavours for faith.  A man may be convinced of other sins and never think of coming to Christ.  Convince a drunkard of his drunkenness, and upon leaving his drunken trade his mind is pacified; yea, he blesseth himself in his reformation, because all the quarrel his conscience had with him was for that particular sin. But, when the Spirit of God convinceth the creature of his unbelief, he gets between him and those bur­rows in which he did use to earth and hide himself. He hath no ease in his spirit from those plasters now, which formerly had relieved him, and so kept him from coming over to Christ.  Before, it served the turn to bring his conscience to sleep when it accused him for such a sin, that he had left the practice of it; and, for the neglect of a duty, that now he had taken it up without an inquiry into his state, whether good or bad, pardoned or unpardoned. Thus many make a shift to daub and patch up the peace of their con­sciences, even as some do to keep up an old rotten house, by stopping in, here a tile and there a stone, till a loud wind comes and blows the whole house down.  But, when once the creature hath the load of its unbelief laid upon his spirit, then it is little ease to him to think he is no drunkard as he was, no atheist in his family—without the worship of God—as he was.  ‘Thy present state,’ saith the Spirit of God, ‘is as damning, in that thou art an unbeliever, as if thou wert these still.’  Yea, what thou wert, thou art; and wilt be found at the great day, to be the drunkard and atheist, for all thy seeming reformation, except by an intervening faith thou gainest a new name.  What though thou beest drunk no more? yet the guilt re­mains upon thee till faith strikes it off with the blood of Christ.  God will be paid his debt; by thee, or Christ for thee; and Christ pays no reckoning for unbelievers.

           Again, as the guilt remains, so the power of those lusts remains, so long as thou art an unbeliever —however they may disappear in the outward act. Thy heart is not emptied of one sin, but the vent stopped by restraining grace.  A bottle full of wine, close stopped, shows no more what it hath in it than one that is empty.  And that is thy case.  How is it possible thou shouldst truly mortify any one lust, that hast no faith, which is the only victory of the world? In a word, if under the convincement of thy unbelief thou wilt find—how little a sin soever now it is thought by thee—that there is more malignity in it than in all thy other sins.  Hast thou been a liar? That is a grievous sin indeed.  Hell gapes for every one that loveth and telleth a lie, Rev. 22:15.  But know, poor wretch, the loudest lie which ever thou toldest is that which by thy unbelief thou tellest.

Exhortation to unbelievers, to obtain ‘the shield of faith

Exhortation to unbelievers, to obtain ‘the shield of faith

           Is faith so precious a grace?  Let it provoke you, who want it, to get it.  Can you hear of this pearl and  not wish it were yours?  Wherefore hath the Spirit spoken such great and glorious things of faith in the Word but to make it the more desirable in your eye? Is there any way to get Christ, but by getting faith? or dost not thou think that thou needest Christ as much as any other?  There is a generation of men in the world would almost make one think this was their judgment, who, because their corruptions have not, by breaking out into plague-sores of profaneness, left such a brand of ignominy upon their name as some others lie under, but their conversations have been strewed with some flowers of morality, whereby their names have kept sweet among their neighbours; and, therefore, they do not at all listen to the offers of Christ, neither do their consciences check them for this neglect.  And why so?  Surely it is not because they are more willing to go to hell than others; but because the way they think they are in will bring them in good time to heaven, without any more ado. Poor deluded creatures!  Is Christ then sent to help only some more debauched sinners to heaven, such as drunkards, swearers, and of that rank?  And are civil, moral men, left to walk thither on their own legs?  I am sure, if the word may be believed, we have the case resolved clear enough.  That tells of but one way to heaven for all that mean to come there.  As there is but ‘one God,’ so but ‘one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,’ I Tim. 2:5.  And if there is but one bridge over the gulf, judge what is like to become of the civil, righteous man, for all his sweet-scented life, if he miss this one bridge, and goes on in the road he hath set out in for heaven?  O remember, proud man, who thou art, and cease thy vain attempt.  Art thou not of Adam’s seed?  Hast thou not traitor’s blood in thy veins?  If ‘every mouth be stopped,’ Rom. 3:19, 20, how darest thou open thine?  If ‘all the world become guilty before God,’ that ‘by the deeds of the law no flesh can be justified in his sight,’ where then shalt thou stand to plead thy innocency before him who sees thy black skin under thy white feathers, thy foul heart through thy fair carriage? It is faith on Christ that alone can purify thy heart.  Without it thy washed face and hands—exter­nal righteousness I mean—will never commend thee to God.  And therefore thou art under a horrible de­lusion if thou dost not think that thou needest Christ and a faith to interest thee in him, as much as the bloodiest murderer or filthiest Sodomite in the world. If a company of men and children in a journey were to wade through some brook, not beyond a man’s depth, the men would have the advantage of the chil­dren.  But if to cross the seas, the men would need a ship to waft them over, as well as the children.  And they might well pass for madmen, if they should think to wade through, without the help of a ship, that is offered them as well as the other, because they are a little taller than the rest are.  Such a foolish, desper­ate adventure wouldst thou give for thy soul, if thou shouldst think to make thy way through the justice of God to heaven, without shipping thyself by faith in Christ, because thou art not so bad in thy external conversation as others.  Let me therefore again and again beseech all that are yet destitute of faith, to endeavour for it, and that speedily.  There is nothing deserves the precedency in your thoughts before this.  David resolved not to ‘give sleep to his eyes, or slum­ber to his eyelids, till he find out a place for the Lord, an habitation for the mighty God of Jacob,’ Ps. 132:4, 5.  The habitation which pleaseth God most is thy heart; but it must be a believing heart, ‘That Christ may dwell in your heart by faith,’ Eph. 3:17.  O how dare yo sleep a night in that house where God doth not dwell? and he dwells not in thee, if thou carriest an unbelieving heart in thy bosom. There is never a gospel sermon thou hearest, but he stands at thy door to be let in.  Take heed of multiplying unkindnesses in denying him entertainment.  How knowest thou but God may, finding thy heart shut so oft by unbelief against his knocks, suddenly seal thee up under final unbelief?

True faith is UNIFORM

 

Third Property. True faith is uniform.  As sin­cere obedience doth not pick and choose—take this commandment, and leave that—but hath respect to all the precepts of God; so, faith unfeigned hath re­spect to all the truths of God.  It believes one promise as well as another.  As the true Christian must not have ‘the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ James 2:1, so, not with respect to truths.  To pretend to believe one promise, and to give no credit to another, this is to be partial in the promises, as the priests are charged to be in the duties of the law, Mal. 2:9.  The honour of God is as deeply engaged to perform one promise as another.  Indeed, as the breach of but one command­ment would put us under the guilt of the whole; so God's failing in one promise—which is blasphemy to think—would be the breaking of his whole covenant. Promises are copulative as well as commands; and therefore, neither can God keep one, except he per­form all; nor we believe one, except we believe all. God hath spoken all these words of promises, as he did those of precepts; his seal is to all, and he looks that we should compass all within the embraces of our faith. David bears witness to the whole truth of God, ‘Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever,’ Ps. 119:160.  Try now thy faith here.  Possibly, thou pre­tendest to believe the promise for pardon, and art oft pleasing thyself with the thoughts of it; but, what faith hast thou on the promise, for sanctifying thy nature and subduing thy corruptions?  May be thou mindest not these, improvest not these.  This fruit may hang long enough on the branches of the promises before thou gatherest it.  The other is for thy tooth, not these; whereas true faith would like one as well as the other.  See how David heartily prays for the perform­ance of this promise, ‘Be merciful unto me, as thou usest to do unto those that love thy name.  Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have do­minion over me,’ Ps. 119:132, 133.  David would not lose any privilege that God hath by promise settled on his children.  ‘Do with me,’ saith he, ‘as thou usest to do.’  this is no more than family fare—what thou promisest to do for all that love thee; and let me not go worse clad than the rest of my brethren.  May be thou fanciest thou hast a faith for the eternal salva­tion of thy soul. But, hast thou faith to rely on God for the things of this life? A strange believer, is he not, that lives by faith for heaven, and by his wits and sin­ful policy for the world?  Christ proves that they, John 5:44, did not believe on him, because they durst not trust him with their names and credits.  If we cannot trust him with the less, how can we in the greater?

           I deny not, but he that hath a true faith, yea, a strong faith for heaven, may be put to a plunge and his faith foiled about a temporal promise; but we must not from an hour of temptation, wherein God leaves his most eminent saints to humble them, judge of the constant ordinary frame of the believer’s heart. Though Abraham dissembled once to save his life, which he thought in some danger for his wife's beauty; yet he did, at other times, give eminent testimony that he trusted God for his temporal life, as well as for his eternal salvation. I do not therefore bid thee question the truth of thy faith for every fainting fit that comes over it, as to the good things of the promise of this life.  A man may, in a time of war, have some of his estate lie under the enemy’s power for a time, and he, so long, have no profits from it; but still he reckons it as his estate, is troubled for his present great loss, and endeavours, as soon as he can, to re­cover it again out of his enemy’s hand.  So, in the hurry of a temptation, when Satan—the soul’s great enemy—is abroad, and God withdraws his assistance, the believer may have little support from some partic­ular promise; but he ever counts that as his portion as well as any other, mourns he can act his faith no more upon it, and labours to reinforce his faith with new strength from heaven when he can, that he may be able to live upon it, and improve it more to his com­fort.  So that still it holds true, if we believe not God for this life, neither do we for the other.  In a word, may be thou pretendest for a faith for thy temporals, and seemest to trust God for things of this life; but art a mere stranger to those prime acts of faith, whereby the believing soul closeth with Christ, and receiveth him as his Lord and Saviour, and so seals to the cov­enant that in the gospel is tendered to poor sinners. Canst thou so far fight against thy own reason, as to think that any temporal promise belongs to thee with­out these?  What gives the woman the right to her jointure^[6] but her marriage covenant?  And what gives the creature a true claim to these promises, or any other in the covenant of grace, but its union to Christ, and accepting of him as he is offered?  The first act of God's love to the creature is that whereby he chooseth such a one to be his, and sets him apart, in his un­changeable purpose, to be an object of his special love in Christ, and therefore called ‘the foundation,’ as that on which God lays the superstructure of all other mercies: ‘The foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his,’ II Tim. 2:19.  First, God chooseth a person to be his, and on this foundation he builds, and bestows all his further cost of mercy upon the creature, as one that is his.  So on the creature's part, fist, faith closeth with Christ, severs him in his thoughts from all others, and chooseth him to be his Saviour, in whom alone he will trust, and whom alone he will serve; which done, then it trades with this promise and that, as the portion which falls to him by marriage with Christ.  And therefore see how preposterous thy course is, who snatchest these promises to thyself, before there hath passed any good-will from thee to Christ.

Three acts by which faith discovers itself in reference to prayer 3/3

3. Act.Faith hath a supporting act after prayer.

           (1.) It supports the soul to expect a gracious an­swer. ‘I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up,’ Ps. 5:3.  Or, ‘I will look’ for what, but for a return?  An unbelieving heart shoots at random, and never minds where his arrow lights, or what comes of his praying; but faith fill the soul with expectation.  As a merchant, when he casts up his estate, counts what he hath sent beyond sea, as well as what he hath in hand; so doth faith reckon upon what he hath sent to heaven in prayer and not received, as well as those mercies which he hath received, and are in hand at present.  Now this expectation which faith raiseth in the soul after prayer, appears in the power that it hath to quiet and compose the soul in the interim between the sending forth, as I may say, the ship of prayer, and its return home with its rich lading it goes for. And it is more or less, according as faith’s strength is. Sometimes faith comes from prayer in triumph, and cries victoria—victory.  It gives such a being and exis­tence to the mercy prayed for in the Christian’s soul, before any likelihood of it appears to sense and reason, that the Christian can silence all his troubled thoughts with the expectation of its coming.  So Hannah prayed, and ‘was no more sad,’ I Sam. 1:18. Yea, it will make the Christian disburse his praises for the mercy long before it is received.  Thus high faith wrought in David, ‘What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee;’ and in the next words, ‘In God I will praise his word,’ Ps. 56:3, 4; that is, he would praise God for his promise, before there were any performance of it to him, when it had no existence but in God’s faithfulness and David's faith.  This holy man had such a piercing eye of faith, as he could see the promise, when he was at lowest ebb of misery, so certain and unquestionable in the power and truth of God, that he could then praise God, as if the promised mercy had actually been fulfilled to him. But I would not have thee, Christian, try the truth of thy faith by this heroic high strain it mounts to in some eminent believers. Thou mayest be a faithful soldier to Christ, though thou attainest not to the degree of a few worthies in his army, more honourable in this respect than the rest of their brethren.

           (2.) There is a lower act of faith, which, if thou canst find, may certify thee of its truth: that, I mean, which, though it doth not presently, upon praying, disburden the soul of all its anxious disquieting thoughts, yet keeps the soul's head above their waves and gives a check to them, that they abate, though by little and little, as the stream in a channel doth at a falling tide.  When God took the deluge from the earth, he did not do it in a moment.  It is said, ‘The waters returned from off the earth continually,’ Gen. 8:3; that is, it was falling water from day to day, till all was gone.  Canst thou not find, Christian, that some of thy tumultuous disquieting thoughts are let out at the sluice of prayer, and that it is some ease to thy encumbered spirit, that thou hast the bosom of a gra­cious God to empty thy sorrowful heart into? and, though praying doth not drain away all thy fears, yet it keeps thee, doth it not, from being overflown with them, which thou couldst not avoid without faith?  A soul wholly void of faith, prays, and leaves none of its burden with God, but carries all back with it that it brought, and more too.  Calling on God gives no more relief to him, than throwing out an anchor that hath no hooks to take hold on the firm earth, doth the sinking ship.  If, therefore, poor soul, thou find­est, upon throwing thy anchor of faith in prayer, that it takes such hold on Christ in the promise as to stay thee from being driven by the fury of Satan’s affright­ing temptations, or thy own despairing thoughts, bless God for it.  The ship that rides at anchor is safe —though it may be a little tossed to and fro—so long as the anchor keeps its hold.  And so art thou, poor soul.  That faith will save from hell, that will not wholly free the soul here from fears

Three acts by which faith discovers itself in reference to prayer 2/3

2. Act. Faith puts forth an assisting act in prayer.  To instance only in two particulars.

           (1.) It assists the soul with importunity.  Faith is the wrestling grace.  It comes up close to God; takes hold of God, and will not easily take a denial.  It in­fires all the affections, and sets them on work.  This is the soul's eye, by which it sees the filth, the hell, that is in every sin.  And seeing affects the heart, and puts it into a passion of sorrow when the soul spreads its abominations before the Lord.  The creature now needs no onion to make it weep.  Tears come alone freely, as water from a flowing spring.  It makes a discovery of Christ to the soul in the excellencies of his person, love, and graces, from the glass of the promise, at the sight of which it is even sick with longing after them, and such pangs of love come upon it, as make it send forth strong cries and supplications for that it so impatiently desires.  Yea, further, faith doth not barely set the creature’s teeth on edge by displaying the excellency of Christ and his grace; but it supplies him with arguments, and helps the soul to wield and use them both valiantly and victoriously upon the Almighty.  Never could he tell what to do with a promise in prayer, till now that faith teacheth him to press God with it, humbly, yet boldly.  ‘What wilt thou do unto thy great name?’ Joshua 7:9.  As if he had said, ‘Thou art so fast bound to thy people by promise and oath, that thou canst not leave them to perish, but thy name will suffer with them.’  Faith melts promises into arguments, as the soldier doth lead into bullets, and then helps the Christian to send them with a force to heaven in a fervent prayer; whereas a promise in an unbeliever’s mouth is like a shot in a gun's mouth without any fire to put to it.  O how cold and dead doth a promise drop from him in prayer!  He speaks promises, but cannot pray prom­ises or press promises.  And therefore, try thyself not by naked praying, but by importunity in prayer; and that, not by the agitation of thy bodily spirits, but the inward working of thy soul and spirit, whether carried out to plead the promise and urge it upon God with an humble importunity, or not.

           (2.) Faith enables the soul to persevere in the work.  False faith may show some mettle at hand, but it will jade at length.  Will the hypocrite pray always? Job 27:10.  No; as the wheel wears with turning, till it breaks at last; so doth the hypocrite.  He prays himself weary of praying.  Something or other will in time make him quarrel with that duty which he never inwardly liked; whereas the sincere believer hath that in him which makes it impossible he should quite give over praying, except he should also cease believing. Prayer, it is the very breath of faith.  Stop a man’s breath, and where is he then? It is true the believer through his own negligence may find some more dif­ficulty of fetching his prayer-breath at one time than at another—as a man in a cold doth for his natural breath. Alas! who is so careful of his soul’s health that needs not to bewail this?  But for faith to live, and this breath of prayer to be quite cut off, is impossible. We see David did but hold his breath a little longer than ordinary, and what a distemper it put him into, till he gave himself ease again by venting his soul in prayer.  ‘I held my peace, even from good; and my sorrow was stirred.  My heart was hot within me, while I was musing the fire burned: then spake I with my tongue, Lord, make me to know mine end,’ Ps. 39:2.  Dost thou, O man, find thyself under a necessity of praying?  As the little babe who cannot choose but cry when it ails or wants anything—because it hath no other way to help itself than by crying to hasten its mother or nurse to its help—[so] the Chris­tian’s wants, sins, and temptations continuing to return upon him, he cannot but continue also to pray against them.  ‘From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee,’ saith David, Ps. 61:2.  Wherever I am I will find thee out.  Prison me, banish me, or do with me what thou wilt, thou shalt never be rid of me, ‘I will abide in thy tabernacle for ever,’ ver. 4.  But how could David do that when banished from it?  Surely he means by prayer.  The praying Christian carries a ‘tabernacle’ with him.  As long as David can come at the tabernacle he will not neglect it; and when he cannot through sickness, banishment, &c., then he will look towards it, and as devoutly worship God in the open fields as if he were in it.  ‘Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice,’ Ps. 141:2.  He speaks of such a time when he could not come to of­fer sacrifice at the tabernacle

Three acts by which faith discovers itself in reference to prayer 1/3

1. Act.Faith puts forth an exciting act, whereby it provokes the Christian and strongly presseth him to pray. And this it doth,

           (1.) By discovering to the creature his own beggary and want, as also the fulness that is to be had from God in Christ for his supply—both which faith useth as powerful motives to quicken the soul up to pray.  As the lepers said to one another, ‘Why sit we here until we die?  If we say, We will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there: come, and let us fall into the host of the Syrians,’ II Kings 7:3, 4.  Thus faith rouseth up the soul to prayer.  If thou stayest at thy own door, O my soul, thou art sure to starve and die. What seest thou in thyself but hunger and famine?  No bread there; no money to buy any in thy own purse.  Up therefore, haste thee to thy God, and thy soul shall live.  O sirs, are you pressed with this inward feeling of your own wants?  Press to the throne of grace as the only way left for your supply.  You may hope it is faith that sends you.  Faith is the principle of our new life.  ‘I live,’ said Paul, ‘by the faith of the Son of God,’ Gal. 2:20.  This life being weak, is craving and crying for nourishment, and that naturally, as the new-born babe doth for the milk.  If therefore you find this inward sense prompting and provoking of you to cry to God, it shows this prin­ciple of life—faith I mean —is in thee.

           Objection.  But, may not an unbeliever pray in the sense of his wants, and be inwardly pinched with them, which may make him pray very feelingly?

           Answer. We must distinguish of wants.  They are either spiritual or carnal.  It cannot be denied, but an unbeliever may be very sensible of outward carnal wants, and knock loud at heaven-gate for supply.  We find them ‘howling on their beds, and assembling themselves for corn and wine,’ Hosea 7:14.  There is the cry of the creature, and the cry of the new crea­ture.  Every creature hath a natural cry for that which suits their nature.  Hence, ‘The young lions roar after their prey, and seek their meat from God,’ Ps. 104:21. But, give the lion flesh, and he will not roar for want of grass; give the ox grass, and you shall not hear him lowing for flesh; so give the faithless, graceless person his fill of his carnal food—sensual enjoyments—and you shall have little complaint of spiritual wants from him.  They are therefore spiritual wants you must try your faith by.  If thou canst heartily pray for love to Christ, faith on him, or any other grace—feeling the want of them, as a hungry man doth of his food —thou mayest conclude safely there is this principle of new life, which, like the veins at the bottom of the stomach, by its sucking, puts thee to pain till it be heard and satisfied; for these graces being proper to the new creature, can be truly desired of none but one that is a new creature.

           (2.) Faith excites to prayer from an inward de­light it hath in communion with God.  ‘It is good for me,’ saith the psalmist, ‘to draw near to God.’  Now mark the next words, ‘I have put my trust in the Lord,’ Ps. 73:28.  We take delight to be often looking where we have laid up our treasures. This holy man had laid up his soul, and all he had, in God, by faith, to be kept safely for him; and now he delights oft to be with God.  He hath that which invites him into his presence with sweet content.  By faith the soul is contracted to Christ.  Now, being espoused to Christ, there is no wonder at all that it should desire com­munion with him.  And prayer, being the place of meeting where Christ and the soul can come the near­est on this side of heaven, therefore the believer is seen so oft walking that way.  Canst thou say, poor soul, that this is thy errand when praying—to see the face of God?  Can nothing less, and needest thou nothing more to satisfy, and recreate thy soul in prayer, than communion with God?  Certainly God hath thy faith, or else thou couldst not so freely bestow thy love on him and take delight in him.

True faith is prayerful

    Second Property.  True faith is prayerful.  Prayer, it is the child of faith; and as the child bears his father’s name upon him, so doth prayer the name of faith.  What is it known by but by ‘the prayer of faith?’ James 5:15.  Prayer, it is the very natural breath of faith. Supplication and thanksgiving—the two parts of prayer—by these, as the body by the double motion of the lungs, doth the Christian suck in mercy from God, and breathe back again that mercy in praise to God. But, without faith he could do neither; he could not by supplication draw mercy from God; ‘for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him,’ Heb. 11:6.  Neither could he return praises to God without faith.  David's heart must be fixed before he can sing and give thanks, Ps. 56.  Thanksgiving is an act of self-denial, and it is faith alone that will show us the way out of our own doors; and as the creature cannot pray—I mean acceptably—without faith, so with faith he cannot but pray. The new creature, like our infants in their natural birth, comes crying into the world; and therefore Christ tells it for great news to Ananias of Saul, a new-born believer, ‘Behold he prayeth.’  But is that so strange, that one brought up at the foot of Gamaliel, and so precise a Pharisee as he was, should be found upon his knees at prayer? Truly no, it was that his sect gloried in—their fasting and praying—and therefore, he, being strict in his way, was no doubt acquainted with this work as to the exterior part of it, but he never had the spirit of prayer, till he now had the Spirit of grace, whereby he believed on Jesus Christ.  And therefore, if you will try your faith, it must not be by bare praying, but by some peculiar characters which faith imprints prayer withal.  Now there are three acts by which faith dis­covers itself in reference to this duty of prayer.  1. Faith puts forth an exciting act, whereby it stirs up the Christian to pray.  2. Faith hath an assisting act in prayer.  3. Faith hath a supporting act after prayer.

Two Characters Distinguishing True Faith’s Obedience 2/2

2. Character.  The obedience of faith is full of self-denial.  Faith keeps the creature low; as in what he hath, so he doth.  ‘I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,’ Gal. 2:20.  As if he had said, ‘I pray, mistake me not; when I say, ‘I live,’ I mean, not that I live by myself, but Christ in me.  I live, and that de­liciously, but it is Christ that keeps the house, not I. I mortify my corruptions, and vanquish temptations, but I am debtor to Christ for the strength.’  None can write here, as one did under Pope Adrian’s statue —where the place of his birth was named, and those princes that had preferred him from step to step till he mounted the pope’s chair, but God left out of all the story—‘nihil hic Deus fecit’—God did nothing for this man.  No, blessed Paul, and in him every be­liever, acknowledgeth God for sole foun­der, and benefactor too, of all the good he hath and doth. They are not ashamed to acknowledge who they are beholden to for all.  ‘These are the children which God hath graciously given me,’ said Jacob. And these the services which God hath graciously assisted me in, saith Paul; ‘I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me,’ I Cor. 15:10. All is ex dono Dei—from the gift of God. O how chary are saints of writing themselves the authors of their own good works, parts, or abilities!  ‘Art thou able,’ said the king to Daniel, ‘to make known unto me the dream which I have seen?’ Dan. 2:26.  Now mark, he doth not say, as the proud astrologers, ‘We will show the interpretation,’ Dan. 2:4.  That fitted their mouths well enough who had no acquaintance with God, but not Daniel’s—the servant of the living God.  Though at the very time he had the secret revealed to him and could tell the king his dream, yet he was careful to stand clear from any filching of God's glory from him; and therefore he answers the king by telling him what his God could do rather than himself.  ‘There is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets,’ &c.  And what makes Daniel so self‑denying? Truly it was because he had obtained this secret of God by faith at the throne of grace; as you may perceive by chapter 2:15-17 compared.  That faith which taught him to beg the mercy of God, enabled him to deny himself, and give the entire glory of it from himself to God.  As rivers empty their streams again into the bosom of the sea, whence they at first received them; so men give the praise of what they do unto that by which they do it.  If they attempt any enterprise with their own wit or industry, you shall have them bring their sacrifice to their wit or net.  No wonder to hear Nebuchadnezzar—who looked no higher than himself in building his great Babylon—ascribe the honour of it to himself, ‘Is not this great Babylon, that I have built...by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?’ Dan. 4:30. But faith teacheth the creature to blot out his own name, and write the name of God in its room, upon all he hath and doth.  When the servants came to give up their accounts to their Lord, every one for his pound; those that were faithful to improve it how humbly and self-denyingly do they speak! ‘Lord, thy pound hath gained ten pounds,’ saith the first, Luke 19:16.  ‘Thy pound hath gained five,’ saith another, ver. 18.  Mark, not ‘I have gained,’ but, ‘thy pound hath gained ten and five.’  They do not applaud themselves, but ascribe both principal and increase to God; thy talent hath gained, that is, thy gifts and grace, through thy assistance and blessing, have gained thus much more.  Only he that did least comes in with a brag, and tells his Lord what he had done. ‘Behold, here is thy pound, which I have kept laid up in a napkin.’  Least doers are greatest boasters.

Two Characters Distinguishing True Faith’s Obedience 1/2

           Question.  But, you may ask, what stamp is there to be found on faith’s obedience which will distinguish it from all counterfeits—for there are many fair semblances of obedience, which the devil will never grudge us the having?

           Answer.  Take these two characters of the obedi­ence of faith.

1. Character. Faith’s obedience begins at the heart, and from thence it diffuseth and dilates itself to the outward man, till it overspreads the whole man in a sincere endeavour.  As in natural life, the first part that lives in the heart, so the first that faith sub­dues into obedience is the heart.  It is called a ‘faith which purifieth the heart,’ Acts 15.9.  And the believing Romans ‘obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered to them,’ Rom. 6:17.  Whereas a false faith, which apes this true faith—as art imitates nature—begins without, and there ends.  All the seeming good works of a counterfeit believer, they are like the beautiful colour in a picture’s face, which comes not from a principle of life within, but the painter’s pencil without.  Such were those, John 2:23, who are said to ‘believe on Christ,’ ‘but Jesus did not commit himself unto them,’ ver. 24.  And why? ‘for he knew what was in man,’ ver. 25.  He cared not for the painted porch and goodly outside: ‘for he knew what was in man,’ and by that knowledge he knew them to be rotten at core, naught at heart, before they were specked on the skin of their exterior conversation.

           Question (1.) But how may I know my obedience is the obedience of the heart?

           Answer.  If it comes from love then it is the obedience of the heart.  He commands the heart that is the master of its love.  The castle must needs yield when he that keeps it, and hath the keys of it, submits.  Love is the affection that governs this royal fort of man's heart. We give our hearts to them we give our love to.  And indeed thus it is that faith brings the heart over into subjection and obedience to God, by putting it under a law of love; ‘faith worketh by love,’ Gal. 5:6.  First, faith worketh love, and then it worketh by it.  As first the workman sets an edge on his tools, and then carves and cuts with them; so faith sharpens the soul’s love to God, and then acts by it.  Or, as a statuary, to make some difficult piece, before he goes about it, finding his hands numb with cold, that he cannot handle his tools so nimbly as he should, goes first to the fire, and, with the help of its heat, chafes them till they of stiff and numb become agile and active, then to work he falls; so faith brings the soul—awk and listless enough, God knows, to any duty—unto the meditation of the peerless, matchless love of God in Christ to it; and at this fire faith stays the Christian's thoughts till his affections begin to kindle and come to some sense of this love of God, and now the Christian bestirs himself for God with might and main.

           Question (2.)  But how may I know my obedience is from love?

           Answer. I will send to St. John to be resolved of this question, ‘For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous,’ I John 5:3.  Speak, soul, what account have you of the commandments?  Do you look upon them as an iron chain about your legs, and think yourselves prisoners because you are tied to them? or do you value them as a chain of gold about your neck, and esteem yourselves favourites of the King of heaven, that he will honour you to honour him by serving of him?  So did as great a prince as the world had: ‘Who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly,’ I Chr. 29.  Not, ‘Who am I, that I should be a king over my people?’ but ‘that I should have a heart so gracious to offer willingly with my people.’  Not, ‘Who am I, that they should serve me?’ but, ‘that thou wilt honour me with a heart to serve thee with them?’  The same holy man in another place speak of sin as his prison, and his obedience as his liberty: ‘I will walk at liberty: for I seek thy precepts,’ Ps. 119:45.  When God gives him a large heart for duty, he is as thankful as a man that was bound in prison is when he is set at liberty, that he may visit his friends and follow his calling.  The only grievous thing to a loving soul is to be hindered in his obedience.  This is that which makes such a one out of love with the world, and with being in it —because it cumbers him in his work, and many times keeps him from it.  As a conscionable faithful servant, that is lame or sickly, and can do his master little service, O how it grieves him!  Thus the loving soul bemoans itself, that it should put God to so much cost, and be so unprofitable under it.  Speak, is this thy temper?  Blessed art thou of the Lord!  There is a jewel of two diamonds, which this will prove thou art owner of, that the crown-jewels of all the princes of the world are not so worthy to be valued with, as a heap of dust or dung is to be compared with them. The jewel I mean, is made of this pair of graces —faith and love. They are thine, and, with them, God and all that he hath and is.  But, if the commandments if the commandments of God be ‘grievous,’ as they are to every carnal heart, and thou countest thyself at ease when thou canst make an escape from a duty to commit a sin, as the beast doth when his collar is off and he in his fat pasture again; now thou art where thou wouldst be, and can show some spirits that thou hast.  But when conscience puts on the trace again, thou art dull and heavy again.  O, it speaks thee to have no love to God, and therefore no faith on God, that is true.  That is a jade indeed who hath no mettle but in the pasture.

GROUNDS OF SUSPICION which lead to a believer’s denying his faith 3/4

3. Character.The doubtings of a truly believing soul make him more inquisitive how he may get what he sometimes he fears he hath not.  Many sad thoughts pass to and fro in his soul whether Christ be his or no, whether he may lay claim to the promise or no; and these cause such a commotion in his spirit, that he cannot rest till he come to some resolution in his own thoughts from the word concerning this great case.  Therefore, as Ahasuerus, when he could not sleep, called for the records and chronicles of his kingdom, so the doubting the doubting soul betakes himself to the records of heaven—the word of God in the Scripture—and one while he is reading there, another while looking into his own heart, if he can find anything that answers the characters of Scrip­ture—faith, as the face in the glass doth the face of man.  David, Ps. 77, when he was at a loss what to think of himself, and many doubts did clog his faith —insomuch that the thinking of God increased his trouble—did not sit down and let the ship drive, as we say, not regarding whether God loved him or no. No; he ‘communes with his own heart, and his spirit makes diligent search.’  Thus it is with every sincere soul under doubtings.  He dares no more sit down contented in that unresolved condition, than one who thinks he smells fire in his house dares settle himself to sleep till he hath looked into every room and cor­ner, and satisfied himself that all is safe, lest he should be waked with the fire about his ears in the night.  The poor doubting soul [is indeed] much more afraid, lest it should awake with hell‑fire about it; whereas a soul in a state and under the power of unbelief, is secure and careless.  The old world did not believe the threatening of the flood, and they spend no thoughts about the matter.  It is at their doors and windows before they had used any means how to escape it.
4. Character.  In the midst of the true believer’s doubtings there is an innitency of his heart on Christ, and a secret purpose still to cleave to him.  At the same time that Peter's feet were sinking into the waters, he was lifting up a prayer to Christ; and this proved the truth of his faith, as the other its weak­ness.  So Jonah, he had many fears, and sometimes so predominant, that as bad humours settle into a sore, so they gathered into a hasty unbelieving conclusion, yet then his faith had some little secret hold on God. ‘Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple,’ Jonah 2:4.  And, ‘When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord,’ ver. 7.  Holy David also, though he could not rid his soul of all those fears which got into it through his weak faith, as water into a leaking ship, yet he hath his hand at the pump, and takes up a firm resolution against them.  ‘What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee,’ Ps. 56:3.  The doubting Christian sinks, but, as a traveller in a slough where the bottom is firm, and so recovers himself.  But the unbeliever, he sinks in his fears, as a man in a quick-sand, lower and lower till he be swallowed up into despair.  The weak Chris­tian’s doubting is like the wavering of a ship at anchor —he is moved, yet not removed from his hold on Christ; but the unbeliever's, like the wavering of a wave, which, having nothing to stay it, is wholly at the mercy of the wind.  ‘Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed,’ James 1:6. 

           Third Ground of Suspicion.  O but, saith another, I fear mine is a presumptuous faith, and if so, to be sure it cannot be right.

           Answer.  For the fuller assoiling [i.e. clearing] this objection, I shall lay down three characters of a presumptuous faith.

           1. Character.  A presumptuous faith is an easy faith.  It hath no enemy of Satan or our own corrupt hearts to oppose it, and so, like a stinking weed, shoots up and grows rank on a sudden.  The devil never hath the sinner surer than when dreaming in this fool’s paradise, and walking in his sleep, amidst his vain fantastical hopes of Christ and salvation. And therefore he is so far from waking him, that he draws the curtains close about him, that no light nor noise in his conscience may break his rest.  Did you ever know the thief call up him in the night whom he meant to rob and kill?  No, sleep is his advantage. But true faith he is a sworn enemy against.  He persecutes it in the very cradle, as Herod did Christ in the cratch;^[8] he pours a flood of wrath after it as soon as it betrays its own birth by crying and lamenting after the Lord.  If thy faith be legitimate Naphtali may be its name; and thou mayest say, ‘With great wrestlings have I wrestled with Satan and my own base heart, and at last have prevailed.’  You know the answer that Rebecca had when she inquired of God about the scuffle and striving of the children in her womb, ‘Two nations,’ God told her, ‘were in her womb.’  If thou canst find the like strife in thy soul, thou mayest comfort thyself that it is from two con­trary principles, faith and unbelief, which are lusting one against another; and thy unbelief, which is the elder —however now it strives for the mastery—shall serve the younger.

The properties of true faith, when it is wrought

           Second Direction.  We know what faith is, and how to judge of it, from its properties when it is wrought in us buy the Spirit.  We shall content ourselves by noticing three.

  First. True faith is obediential.  Second. It is prayerful.  Third. It is uni­form in its acting.

True faith is obediential:

           First Property. This choice excellent faith is an obediential faith; that is, true faith on the promise works obedience to the command.  Abraham is fa­mous for his obedience; no command, how difficult soever, came amiss to him.  He is an obedient servant indeed, that, when he doth but hear his master knock with his foot, leaves all and runs presently to know his master’s will and pleasure.  Such a servant had God of Abraham: ‘Who raised up the righteous man from the east, called him to his foot,’ Isa. 41:2.  But what was the spring that set Abraham’s obedience a going?  See for this, Heb. 11:8 ‘By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheri’tance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.’  As it is impossible to please God without faith, so it is impossible not to desire to please God with faith.  It may well go for an idol faith, that hath hands but doth not work, feet, but doth not walk in the statutes of God.  No sooner had Christ cured the woman in the gospel of her fever, but it is said, ‘She arose, and ministered unto them,’ Matt. 8:15.  Thus the believing soul stands up and ministers unto Christ in gratitude and obedience. Faith is not lazy; it inclines not the soul to sleep, but work; it sends the creature not to bed, there to snort away his time in ease and sloth, but into the field. The night of ignorance and unbelief, that was the creature's sleeping time; but, when the Sun of righteousness ariseth, and it is day in the soul, then the creature riseth and goeth forth to his labour.  The first words that break out faith’s lips, are those of Saul in his hour of conversion: ‘Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?’ Acts 9:6. Faith turns the Jordan, and alters the whole course of a man.  ‘We were,’ saith the apostle, ‘foolish’ and ‘disobedient,’ ‘but after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,’ Titus 3:3, 4, then the case was altered, as it follows.  And, therefore, take your foul fingers off the promise, and pretend no more to faith, if ye be chil­dren of Belial—such whose necks do not freely stoop to this yoke of obedience. The devil himself may as soon pass for a believer as a disobedient soul.  Other things he can show as much as you.  Dost thou pre­tend to knowledge? thou wilt not deny the devil to be a greater scholar than thyself, I hope, and that in Scripture  knowledge.  Dost thou believe the Scripture to be true? and doth not he more strongly?  Dost thou tremble? he much more.  It is obedience he wants, and this makes him a devil, and it will make thee like him also.

The Spirit’s Particular Addresses To The Soul When Working Faith In It 2/2

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2           (3.) The convinced sinner doth not only condemn himself for what he hath done and is, but he despairs of himself as to anything he can now do to save himself.  Many, though they go so far as to con­fess they are vile wretches, and have lived wickedly, and for this deserve to die; yet, when they have put the rope around their  neck by a self-condemning act, they are so far from being convinced of their own im­potency, that they hope to cut the rope with their re­pentance, reformation, and I know not what bundle of good works, which they think shall redeem their credit with God and recover his favour, which their former sins have unhappily lost them.  And this comes to pass, because the plough of conviction did not go deep enough to tear up those secret roots of self-confidence with which the heart of every sinner is woefully tainted.  Whereas every soul, thoroughly convinced by the Spirit, is a self-despairing soul; he sees himself beyond his own help, like a poor condemned prisoner, laden with so many heavy irons, that he sees it is impossible for him to make an es­cape, with all his skill or strength, out of the hands of justice.  O friends! look whether the work be gone thus far in your souls or no.  Most that perish, it is not their disease that kills them, but their physician. They think to cure themselves, and this leaves them uncurable.  Speak, soul, did the Lord ever ferret thee out of this burrow where so many earth themselves? Art thou as much at a loss what to do, as sensible for what thou hast done?  Dost thou see hell in thy sin and despair in thyself?  Hath God got thee out of this Keilah, and convinced thee if thou wouldst stay in the self-confidence of thy repentance, reformation, and duties, they would all deliver thee up into the hands of God's justice and wrath, when they shall come against thee?  Then, indeed, thou hast escaped one of the finest snares that the wit of hell can weave.

           (4.) The convinced sinner is not only convinced of sin, so as to condemn himself, and despair of himself, but he is convinced of a full provision laid up in Christ for self-condemned and self-despairing ones.  ‘He shall convince the world of sin, and of righteousness,’ John 16:9, 10.  And this is as necessary an antecedent for faith as any of the former.  Without this, the soul convinced of sin is more like to go to the gallows with Judas, or fall on the sword of the law—as the jailer attempted to do on his when he thought his condition desperate—than think of com­ing to Christ.  Who will go to his door that hath not wherewithal to relieve him?

3. The third and last faculty to be dealt with is the will,and on this, for the production of faith, the Spirit puts forth an act of renovation, whereby he doth sweetly, but powerfully, incline the will, which before was rebellious and refractory, to accept of Christ, and make a free deliberate choice of him for his Lord and Saviour.  I say a ‘free’ choice, not only cudgelled into him with apprehensions of wrath, as one may run under an enemy’s pent-house in a storm, whose door he would have passed by in fair weather, and never looked that way.  Speak, soul, dost thou please thyself in choosing Christ? dost thou go to Christ, not only for safety, but delight?  So the spouse: ‘I sat under his shadow with great delight,’ Song 2:3.  I say a ‘deliberate’ choice, wherein the soul well weighs the terms Christ is offered on, and when it hath considered all seriously, likes them, and clos­eth with him.  Like [as it was with] Ruth, who when Naomi spake the worst she could to discourage her, yet liked her mother’s company too well to lose it for those troubles that attended her.  Speak, soul, hath the Spirit of God thus put his golden key into the lock of thy will, to open the everlasting door of thy heart to let Christ the King of glory in?  Hath he not only opened the eye of thy understanding, as he awaked Peter asleep in prison, and caused the chains of senselessness and stupidity to fall off thy conscience, but also opened the iron gate of thy will, to let thee out of the prison of impenitency, where even now thou wert fast bolted in; yea, brought thee to knock at heaven-door for entertainment, as Peter did at the house of Mary, where the church was met.  Be of good comfort, thou mayest know assuredly that God hath sent, not his angel, but his own Spirit, and hath delivered thee out of the hand of sin, Satan, and justice.

The Spirit’s Particular Addresses To The Soul When Working Faith In It 1/2

1. The Spirit makes his approach to the under­standing, and on it he puts forth an act of illumination.The Spirit will not work in a dark shop; the first thing he doth in order to faith, is to beat out a window in the soul, and let in some light from heaven into it.  Hence, believers are said to be ‘renewed in the spirit of their minds,’ Eph. 4:23, which the same apostle calleth being ‘renewed in knowledge,’ Col. 3:10. By nature we know little of God, and nothing of Christ or the way of salvation by him.  The eye of the creature therefore must be opened to see the way of life, before he can by faith get into it.  God doth not use to waft souls to heaven, like passengers in a ship, who are shut under the hatches, and see nothing all the way they are sailing to their port.  If [it had been] so, that prayer might have been spared which the psalmist, inspired of God, breathes forth in the behalf of the blind Gentiles ‘That thy way may be known upon earth, thy saving health among all nations,’ Ps. 67:2.  As faith is not a naked assent without affiance  and innitency on Christ; so neither is it a blind as­sent without some knowledge.  If, therefore, thou continuest still in thy brutish ignorance, and knowest not so much as who Christ is, and what he hath done for the salvation of poor sinners, and what thou must do to get interest in him, thou art far enough from believing.  If the day be not broken in thy soul, much less is the Sun of righteousness arisen by faith in thy soul.
2. Again, when the Spirit of God hath sprung with a divine light into the understanding, then he makes his address to the conscience, and the act which passeth upon that is an act of conviction;‘he shall convince the world of sin,’ &c, John 16:8.  Now this conviction is nothing but a reflection of the light that is in the understanding upon the conscience whereby the creature feels the weight and force of those truths he knows, so as to be brought into a deep sense of them.  Light in a direct beam heats not, nor doth knowledge swimming in the brain affect.  Most under the gospel know that unbelief is a damning sin, and that there is ‘no name’ to be saved by but the name of Christ; yet how few of those know this con­vincingly, so as to apply it to their own consciences, and to be affected with their own deplored state, who are the unbelievers and Christless persons?  As he is a convicted drunkard in law, who, in open court, or before a lawful authority, upon clear testimony and deposition of witnesses, is found and judged to be such; so he, scripturally, is a convinced sinner, who, upon the clear evidence of the word brought against him by the Spirit, is found by his own conscience —God’s officer in his bosom—to be so.  Speak now, poor creature, did ever such an act of the Spirit of God pass upon thee as this is? which that thou mayest the better discern of, try thyself by these few characters of a convinced person.

           (1.) A sinner truly convinced is not only convinced of this sin or that sin, but of the evil of all sin. It is an ill sign when a person seems in a passion to cry out of one sin, and to be senseless of another sin. A parboiled conscience is not right, soft in one part, and hard in another.  The Spirit of God is uniform in its work.

           (2.) The convinced sinner is not only convinced of acts of sin, but of the state of sin also.  He is not only affected [by] what he hath done—this law bro­ken, and that mercy abused by him—but with what his state and present condition is.  Peter leads Simon Magus from that one horrid act he committed to the consideration of that which was worse—the dismal state that he discovered him to be in.  ‘I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity,’ Acts 8:23.  Many will confess they do not do as they should, who will not think by any means so ill of themselves that their state is naught—a state of sin and death; whereas the convinced soul freely puts himself under this sentence of death, owns his condition, and dissembles not his pedigree.  ‘I am a most vile wretch,’ saith he, ‘a limb of Satan, full of sin as the toad is of rank poison.  My whole nature lies in wickedness, even as the dead rotten carcass doth its slime and putrefaction.  I am a child of wrath, born to no other inheritance than hell-flames; and if God will now tread me down thither, I have not one righteous syllable to object against his proceedings, but there is that in my own conscience which will clear him from having done me any wrong in my doom.’

The Shield Of Faith’ Itself And How Its Truth May Be Judged Of

           By this time, possibly, you may be solicitous to know what your faith is, and how you may come to judge of the truth of it.  Now for your help therein, take these two directions.  One, taken from the manner of the Spirit’s working faith; the other, from the properties of faith, when it is wrought.

The manner of the Spirit’s working faith.

           First Direction.  We know what faith is, and how to judge of it, from the manner of the Spirit’s working it in the soul.  It is incomparably the greatest work that passeth upon the soul from the Spirit of Christ; it is called the ßB,D$V88T< µX(,2@H J­H *L<µ­,TH –LJ@Ø—‘The exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe,’ Eph. 1:19.  Oh, observe with what a heap of expressions the Spirit of God loads our weak understandings, that labouring under the weight of them, and finding the difficulty of reach­ing the significancy of them, we might be the more widened to conceive of that power which can never be fully understood by us—being indeed infinite, and so too big to be inclosed within the narrow walls of our understandings—power,’ ‘greatness of power,’ ‘exceeding greatness,’ and lastly, ‘exceeding greatness of his power,’ that is, of God.  What angel in heaven can tell us what all these amount to?  God, with reverence be it spoken, sets his whole force to this work.  It is compared to no less than ‘the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power,’ Eph. 1:20,21.  To raise anyone from the dead is a mighty, an almighty work; but to raise Christ from the dead, carries more wonder with it than to raise any other.  He had a heavier grave-stone to keep him down than any besides—the weight of a world’s sin lay upon him—yet notwithstanding this he is raised with power by the Spirit, not only out of the grave, but into glory.  Now the power God puts forth upon the soul in working faith, is according to this of raising Christ, for, indeed, the sinner's soul is as really dead in sin as Christ's body was in the grave for sin. Now, speak, poor creature, art thou any way acquainted with such a power of God to have been at work in thee? or dost thou think slightly of believing, and so show thyself a stranger to this mystery?  Cer­tainly, this one thing might resolve many—if they desired to know their own state—that they have no faith, because they make faith so trivial and light a matter, as if they were as easy to believe as to say they do; and it were of no more difficulty to receive Christ into their souls by faith, than to put a bit of bread into their mouths with their hand.  Ask some, wheth­er ever such a day or time of God’s power came over their heads, to humble them for sin, drive them out of themselves, and draw them effectually unto Christ? And they may answer you as those did Peter, when he asked—‘Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye be­lieved?  And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost,’ Acts 19:2.  So these might say, ‘We know not whether there be any such power required to the working of faith or no.’  But to descend into a more particular consideration of this powerful work of the Spirit upon the soul for the production of faith, it will be necessary to consider—O what posture the Spirit of Christ finds the soul in before he begins this great work! and then how he makes his addresses to the soul, and what acts he puts forth upon the soul for the working faith.

           First.  The posture of the soul when the Spirit begins his great work of grace in it.  The Spirit finds the creature in such a state as it neither can, nor will, contribute the least help to the work.  As the ‘prince of the world,’ when he came to tempt Christ, ‘found nothing in him’ to befriend and further his tempting design; so, when the Spirit of Christ comes, he finds as little encouragement from the sinner.  No party within the castle of the soul to side with him when he comes first to set down before it, and lay siege to it, but all the powers of the whole man in arms against him!  Hence it is that so many scornful answers are sent out to the summons that are given sinners to yield.  ‘He came unto his own, and his own received him not,’ John 1:11.  Never was a garrison more resolved to stand out against both the treaties and batteries of an assailing enemy, than the carnal heart is all means that God useth to reduce it into his obedience.  The noblest operations of the soul, they are ‘earthly, sensual, devilish,’ James 3:15, so that except heaven and earth can meet—sensual and spir­itual please one palate, God and the devil agree —there is no hope that a sinner of himself should like the motion that Christ makes, or that with any argument he should be won over to like it, so long as the ground of dislike remains in his earthly, sensual, and devilish nature.

           Second.  We proceed to show how the Spirit makes his addresses to the soul, and what acts he puts forth upon it for the working faith.  Now the Spirit’s address is suited to the several facilities of the soul, the principal of which are these three, understanding, conscience, and will. These are like three forts, one within the other, which must all be reduced before the town be taken—the sinner, I mean, subdued to the obedience of faith—and to these the Spirit makes his particular addresses, putting forth an act of almighty power upon every one of them, and that in this order.

Reasons Why We Should Be Serious In The Trial Of Our Faith 2/2

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2. Reason.  Consider the excellency of true faith makes false faith so much the more odious.  Because a king’s son is an extraordinary personage, therefore it is so high a crime for an ignoble person to counterfeit him­self to be such a one.  It is by that we ‘become the sons of God,’ John 1:12.  And what a high presumption is it then that, by a false faith, thou committest? Thou pretendedst to be a child of God, when no heaven-blood runs in thy veins, but hast more reason to look for thy kindred in hell and derive thy pedigree from Satan.  This passeth for no less than blasphemy in the account of the Scripture.  ‘I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan,’ Rev. 2:9.  God loathes such with his heart.  A false friend is worse than an open enemy in man’s judgment; and a hypocritical Judas more abhorred by God than a bloody Pilate. Either, therefore, get true faith, or pretend to none. The ape, because he hath the face of a man, but not the soul of a man, is therefore the most ridiculous of all creatures.  And of all sinners, none will be put more to shame at the last day than such as have aped and imitated the believer in some exterior postures of profession, but never had the spirit of a believer so as to perform one vital act of faith.  The psalmist tells us of some whose ‘image’ God will ‘despise,’ Ps. 73.20. It is spoken chiefly of the wicked man’s temporary pros­perity—which, for its short continuance, is compared to the image or representation of a thing in the fancy of a sleeping man, that then is busy and pl easeth us with many fine pleasing objects, but all are lost when our sleep leaves us—this God will despise at the great day; when he shall not give heaven and glory by the estates and honours that men had in the world, but tumble them down to hell if graceless, as well as the poorest beggar in the world.  But, there is another sort of persons whose image God will at that day despise more than these, and that is the image of all temporary believers and unsound professors, who have a fantastical faith, which they set up like an image in their imaginations, and dance about it with as many self-pleasing thoughts as a man doth that is dreaming himself to be some great prince; but this great idol shall then be broken, and the worshippers of it hissed down to hell with the greatest shame of any other.
3. Reason.  Consider that none stand at greater disadvantage for the obtaining of a true faith than he who flatters himself with a false one.  ‘Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit?  There is more hope of a fool than of him,’  Prov. 26:12, that is, there is more hope of persuading him.  Of all fools the conceited fool is the worst.  Pride makes a man incapable of receiving counsel.  Nebuchadnezzar’s mind is said to be ‘hardened in pride,’ Dan. 5:20.  There is no reasoning with a proud man.  He castles himself in his own opinion of himself, and there stands upon his defence against all arguments that are brought.  Bid a conceited professor labour for faith, or he is undone; and the man will tell you that you mistake and knock at the wrong door.  It is the ignorant person, or profane, you should go to on the errand.  He thanks God he is not now to seek for a faith, and thus blesseth himself in his good condition, when God knows ‘he feedeth on ashes: a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, Is there not a lie in my right hand?’ Isa. 44:20.  The ignorant profane person, like the psalmist’s ‘man of low degree,’ is plain ‘vanity.’  It is not hard to make themselves to acknowledge as much as that they have nothing, de­serve nothing, can look for nothing as they are but hell and damnation.  But, such as pretend to faith, and content themselves with a false one, they are like the ‘men of high degree’ ‘a lie,’ which is vanity as well as the other, but with a specious cover over it that hides it.  Therefore the devil is forward enough to put poor silly souls on believing, that he may forestall, if he can, the Spirit's market, and prevent the creature’s obtaining of a true faith, by cheating of it with a counterfeit.  It is like the wicked policy of Jeroboam, who, to keep the Israelites from going to Jerusalem, and hankering after the true worship of God there, set up something like a religious worship nearer hand, at home, in the ‘golden calves;’ and this pleased many well enough, that they missed not their walk to Jeru­salem.  O friends, take heed therefore of being cheat­ed with a false faith.  Every one, I know, would have the living child to be hers and not the dead one.  We would all pass for such as have the true faith and not the false.  But, be not your own judges; appeal to the Spirit of God, and let him, with the sword of his word, come and decide the controversy.  Which faith is thine, the true or false?