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     Sixth Instance.  Thou livest up to thy hopes when, with thy rejoicing of hope, thou preservest an awful fear of God.  ‘The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear him, in those that hope in his mercy,’ Ps. 147:11.  We too often see that children forget to pay that respect and reverence which is due to their par­ents, when once the estate is made sure into them. And truly, though the doctrine of assurance cannot be charged with any such bitter fruit to grow naturally from it, as the Remonstrants and Papists would have us believe; yet we are too prone to abuse it; yea, the best of saints may, after they have the love of God with eternal life passed over to them under the privy-seal of hope’s assurance, be led so far into tempta­tion, as to fall foully, and carry themselves very undu­tifully.  Witness David and Solomon, whose saddest miscarriages were after God had obliged them by opening his very heart to them in such manifestations of his love to them, as few are to be found that had the like.  Both father and son are checked by God for this, and a blot left upon their history, on purpose to show what a sad accent this gave to their sin—that they fell after such discoveries of divine love made to them—and also to leave us instances not barely of human frailty, but of grace’s frailty in this life (and that in the most eminent saints, such as were penmen of holy writ), that when our hope grows into greatest assurance, and this assurance spreads itself into high­est rejoicing from the certainty of our expected glory, we should yet nourish a holy fear of God in our hearts, lest we grow crank and forget God in the abundance of our peace.  This holy fear will be to our joy as the continual dropping of water on the iron work in the fuller’s wheel—which keeps it from firing; or, as the pericardium with which the God of nature hath moated about the heart in our bodies, that by the water of it, the heart, which is perpetually in motion, might be kept from being inflamed into a distempered heat.

           The devil is pleased if he can at any time get a saint to sin, but he glorieth most when he can lay them in the dirt in their holiday clothes, as I may so say, and make them defile themselves when they have their garments of salvation on, I mean those which God hath in some more than ordinary discovery of himself clothed them withal.  If at such a time he can be too hard for them, then he hath, he thinks, a fair occasion given him to go, and insultingly show God what pickle his child is in, and hold up the Christian’s assurance and comfort mockingly—as they their brother’s coat to their father—besmeared with the blood and filth of some beastly sin he hath thrown him into, and ask God, ‘Is this the assurance thou hast given him of heaven? and this the garment of sal­vation which thou didst put on him?  See where he hath laid it, and what a case he hath made it in.’  O what gracious soul trembles not at the thought of putting such blasphemy into the mouth of the devil to reproach the living God by! That, Christian, is the be­loved child, and shall be most made of by his heav­enly Father, who sits not down to loiter in the sun­shine of divine love, but gathers up his feet the nimb­ler in the way of duty, because his God is so kind to make his walk more cheerful and comfortable than others find it, and who loseth not his reverential fear of God in God’s familiarity with him.  Moses is a rare instance for this.  Did ever the great God treat a mor­tal man, a saint in flesh, with the like familiarity and condescension, as he did that holy man, with whom he spake mouth to mouth, and before whom he caused all his goodness to pass? Ex. 34:6.  And how bears he this transcending act of grace?  Doth he grow bold, and forget his distance between God and him, by this low stoop of the divine Majesty to converse with him in such a humble manner, if I may so say? No; his heart was never in all his life more filled with the reverence of God than now.  He trembled, in­deed, and quaked more, it is very likely, on Mount Sinai; but his filial fear was as conspicuous now as then.  It is true, this extraordinary manifestation of those soul-ravishing attributes of God’s love and goodness—especially his pardoning mercy to him that knew himself a sinner, and at that time made much more sensible thereof by the terror which the dreadful promulgation of the law had left on his spirit—could not but exceedingly heighten his joy, and overrun his soul with a sweet love to so gracious a God.  Yet, was not Moses' awful fear of God drowned or lost in the high tide of these sweeter affections; for it follows, ‘and Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped,’ ver. 8.  This favourite of heaven, mark how he shows his fear of God most, when God expresseth his love to him most.

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           Fourth Instance.  Let thy hope of heaven master thy fear of death.  Why shouldst thou be afraid to die, who hopest to live by dying?  Is the apprentice afraid of the day when his time comes out?—he that runs a race, of coming too soon to his goal?—the pilot troubled when he sees his harbour?—or the betrothed virgin grieved when the wedding‑day approacheth? Death is all this to thee.  When that comes, thy in­den­ture expires, and thy jubilee is come.  Thy race is run, and the crown won—sure to drop on thy head when thy soul goes out of thy body.  Thy voyage, how troublesome soever it was in the sailing, is now hap­pily finished, and death doth but this friendly office for thee, to uncover and open the ark of thy body, that it may safely land thy soul on the shore of eter­nity at thy heavenly Father’s door—yea, in his sweet embraces, never to be put to sea more.  In a word, thy husband is come for thee, and knocks with death’s hand at thy door, to come forth unto him, that he may perform his promise, which, in the day of thy be­trothing, he made to thee; and thou lovest him but little, if thou beest not willing to be at the trouble of a remove hence, for to enjoy his blissful presence, in his Father’s royal palace of heaven, where such prep­aration is made for thy entertainment, that thou canst not know here, though an angel were sent on purpose to inform thee.

           O what tongue can express that felicity which infinite mercy bespeaks, infinite wisdom deviseth, in­finite merit purchaseth, and infinite power makes ready!  I have read that the Turks say, ‘They do not think we Christians believe heaven to be such a glori­ous place as we profess and talk of; for if we did, we would not be so afraid to go thither, as we see many that profess themselves Christians to be.’  It cannot be denied, but all inordinate fears of death betray great unbelief and little hope.  We do not look upon death under a right notion, and so we start at it; which, were we by faith but able to see through, and assure ourselves it comes to do us a good turn, we should feel as comfortably on the thoughts of it, as now we are scared at the apparition of it.  The horse eats that hay in the rack, which he is afraid of when a little lies at a distance on the road; because there he knows it, but on the way he doth not.  Christian, un­derstand aright what message death brings to thee, and the fear of it will be over.  It snatcheth thee in­deed from this world's enjoyments, but it leads thee to the felicities of another incomparably better.  And who, at a feast, will chide the servant that takes away the first course, of which enough is eaten, to make room for the second to be set on, that consists of far greater delicacies?

           Fifth Instance.  Then thou comportest with thy hope when thou livest in the joy of thy hope.  A sad uncheerful heart does not become a lively hope.  Let him follow his master with a heavy countenance, that looks to get nothing by his service.  Thou art out of this fear, and therefore wrongest both thyself and thy God too by thy disconsolate spirit. ‘Whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end,’ Heb. 3:6.  Christ takes no more delight to dwell in a sad uncheerful heart, than we in a dark melancholy house.  Open thy shuts therefore, and let in the light which sheds its beams upon thee from the promise, or else thy sweet Saviour will be gone.  We do not use to entertain our friends in a dark room, or sit by those that visit us, mopish and melancholic, lest they should think we are weary of their company.  Christ brings such good news with him, as may bespeak better welcome with thee than a dejected countenance and a disconsolate spirit.  I tell thee, Christian, could such a message be carried to the damned as might give them any hope—though never so little—of salvation, it would make hell itself a lightsome place, and tune those miserable souls into a rejoicing temper in the midst of their present tor­ments.  Blush then, and be ashamed, O ye drooping saints! that a few thin clouds of some short afflictions, coming over your heads, should so wrap you up in the darkness of your spirits, as that the hope of heaven, whither you look at last to come, should not be able, in a moment, to dispel and turn your sorrow into a ravishment of joy and comfort.

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           Thou hast not, Christian, a weightier argument to knock down all temptations to sin, nor a more honourable way to get the victory of them, than by setting thy hope to grapple with them.  I confess it is well when this enemy is worsted, what hand soever he falls by; though it be the fear of hell that clubs it down in the lives of men, it is better than not at all.  Yet I must tell you, that as the Israelites’ state was poor and servile, when they were fain to borrow the Philis­tines’ grindstone ‘to sharpen every man his axe and mattock,’ I Sam. 13:20, so it speaks the Christian to be in no very good state as to his spiritual affairs when he is fain to use the wicked man’s argument to keep him from sinning, and nothing will set an edge upon his spirit to cut through temptation, but what the un­circumcised world themselves use. Thou, Christian, art of a nobler spirit, and more refined temper than these, I trow. And as we have a finer stone to sharpen a razor with that we use for a butcher’s knife, so, certainly, a more spiritual and ingenuous argument would become thee better, to make thee keen and sharp against sin, than what prevails with the worst of men sometimes to forbear at least acting their wicked­ness.  Go thou, Christian, to thy hope, and while the slavish sinner scares and terrifies himself from his lust with fire and brimstone, do thou shame thyself out of all acquaintance with it from the great and glorious things thou lookest for in heaven. Is it a sin of sensual pleasure that assaults thy castle?  Say then to thy soul, ‘Shall I play the beast on earth, that hope to be such a glorious creature in heaven?’  Shall that head be found now in a Delilah’s lap, that ere long I hope to be laid in Abraham’s bosom?  Can I now yield to defile that body with lust and vomit, which is the gar­ment my soul hopes to wear in heaven?  O no! Avaunt, Satan!  I will have nothing to do with thee, or anything that will make me unmeet for that blessed place and holy state I wait for.

           Third Instance.  Let thy hope of heaven moder­ate thy affections to earth.  ‘Be sober, and hope,’ saith the apostle, I Peter 1:13.  You that look for so much in another world, may very well be content with a little in this.  Nothing more unbecomes a heavenly hope than an earthly heart.  You would think it an un­seemly thing for some rich man, that hath a vast es­tate, among the poor gleaners at harvest‑time, as busy to pick up the ears of corn that are left in the field, as the most miserable beggar in the company.  O how all the world would cry shame of such a sordid‑spirited man!  Well, Christian, be not angry if I tell thee that thou dost a more shameful thing to thyself by far; if thou, that pretendest to hope for heaven, beest as eager in the pursuit of this world's trash as the poor carnal wretch is who expects no portion but what God hath left him to pick up in the field of this world. Certainly thy hope is either false, or at best very little. The higher that the summer sun mounts above the horizon, the more force it bears both to clear and also heat the air with his beams.  And if thy hope of salva­tion were advanced to any ordinary pitch and height in thy soul, it would scatter these inordinate desires after this world with which now thou art choked up, and put thee into a greater heat of affection after heaven, than now thou feelest to things below.

           I remember Augustine, relating what sweet dis­course passed once between his mother and himself concerning the joys of heaven, breaks forth into this apostrophe, ‘Lord, thou knowest quàm viluit nobis in illo die hic mundus—how vile and contemptible this sorry world was in our eye in that day when our hearts were warmed with some sweet discourse of that bless­ed place.’  And I doubt not but every gracious person finds the same by himself; the nearer to heaven he gets in his hopes, the further he goes from earth in his desires. When he stands upon these battlements of heaven, he can look down upon this dunghill world as a nigrum nihil, a little dust‑heap next to nothing.  It is Scultetus’ observation, that though there are many blemishes by which the eminent saints and servants of God recorded in Scripture are set forth as instan­ces of human frailty, yet not one godly man in all the Scripture is to be found, whose story is blotted with the charge of covetousness.  If that hold true, which, as yet, I am not able to disprove, we may wonder how it comes about that it should, now‑a‑days, be called the professors’ sin, and become a common charge laid by the profane upon those that pretend to heaven more than themselves.  O woe to those wretched men who, by their scandalous practices in this kind, put the coal into wicked men’s hands, with which they now black the names of all the godly, as if to be covetous were a necessary consequent of profession.

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           First Instance.  In your company.  Man is a so­ciable creature—made for fellowship.  And what com­pany is fit for thee to consort with, but those of the same breeding and hopes with thyself?  The saints are a distinct society from the world.  ‘Let ours also learn to maintain good works,’ Titus 3:14.  ‘Ours,’ i.e. of our fellowship.  And it becomes them to seek their com­pany among themselves.  That of Peter and John is observable, ‘being let go, they went to their own com­pany,’ Acts 4:23.  When among the ungodly world they made account they were not in their own company, and therefore stayed no longer than needs must among them.  There were enough surely in the land of Canaan with whom Abraham might have associ­ated; but he knew they were not company for him to be linked to in any intimacy of acquaintance, and therefore it is said of him, that ‘he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise,’ Heb. 11:9.  We find him indeed confederate with Mamre, the Amorite, and Eshcol, and Aner, his brethren, Gen. 14:13, which presup­poseth more than ordinary acquaintance.  But these, in all probability, were proselytes, and had, by Abraham’s godly persuasions, renounced their idolatry, to worship with him the true God.  And we may the ra­ther be induced to think so, because we find them so deeply engaged with Abraham in battle with those idolatrous neighbour princes, which, had they them­selves been idolaters, it is like they would not have done for a stranger, and him of a strange religion also. We find how dearly some of the saints have paid for their acquaintance with the wicked, as Jehoshaphat for his intimacy with Ahab, and many others.  And if, knowing this, we shall yet associate ourselves with such, we cannot in reason look to pay less than they have done; yea, well, if we come off so cheap, because we have their follies recorded to make us wiser.

           O consider, Christian, whither thou art going in thy hopes!  Is it not to heaven? and do not men seek for such company as go their way?  And are the wicked of thy way?  When heaven’s way and hell’s meet in one road, then, and not till then, can that be. And if thy companion will not walk in heaven-way, what wilt thou do that walkest with him?  It is to be feared thou must comply too much in his way.  In a word, Christian, thy hope points to heaven; and is it not one thing thou hopest for, when thou comest there, to be delivered from all company with the wicked? and what thou then hopest for, doth thou not now pray for?  Sure enough thou dost, if a true saint. Whatever is the object of a saint’s hope is the subject of his prayer.  As oft as thou sayest, ‘Thy kingdom come,’ thou prayest thus much.  And will hoping and praying to be delivered from them, stand with throw­ing thyself upon them, and intimate familiarity with them?

           Second Instance.  Then thou comportest with thy hopes of salvation, when thou labourest to be as holy in thy conversation as thou art high in thy expec­tation.  This the apostle urgeth from the condescency of the thing: ‘What manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness; looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God,’ II Peter 3:11, 12.  Certainly it becomes such to be holy even to admiration, who look for such a blessed day! We hope then to be like the angels in glory, and therefore should, if possible, live now like angels in holiness.  Every believing soul is Christ’s spouse.  The day of conversion is the day of espousals, wherein she is contracted and betrothed by faith to Christ; and as such, lives in hope for the marriage-day, when he shall come and fetch her home unto his Father’s house—as Isaac did Rebecca into his mother’s tent —there to cohabit with him and live in his sweet em­braces of love, world without end.  Now, would the bride have her bridegroom find her, when he comes, in her fluttery and vile raiment?  No, sure.  ‘Can a bride forget her attire?’ Jer. 2:32.  Was it ever known that a bride forgot to have her wedding‑clothes made against the marriage‑day? or to put them on when she looks for her bridegroom’s coming?  Holiness is the ‘raiment of needle-work,’ in which, Christian, thou art to be ‘brought unto thy king and husband,’ Ps. 45:14.  Wherefore is the wedding-day put off so long, but because this garment is so long a making?  When this is once wrought, and thou ready dressed, then that joyful day comes: ‘The marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready,’ Rev. 19:7.

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Second Duty.  Live up to thy hopes, Christian. Let there be a decorum kept between thy principles and thy practices, thy hope of heaven and walk on earth.  The eye should direct the foot.  Thou lookest for salvation; walk the same way thy eye looks.  This is so often pressed in the word, as shows both its ne­cessity and difficulty.  Some times we are stirred up to act ‘as becometh saints,’ Rom. 16:2; Eph. 5:3.  Sometimes ‘as becometh the gospel of Christ,’ Php. 1:27. Sometimes ‘as becometh those who profess godli­ness,’ I Tim. 2:10.  There is a JΠBDXB@<—a decorum, and comely behaviour, which, if a Christian doth not observe in his walking he betrays his high calling and hopes unto scorn and contempt.  To look high, and to live low, O how ridiculous it appears to all men! When a man is dressed on purpose to be laughed at and made a jeering‑stock, they put on him some­thing of the king and something of the beggar, that, by this patchery of mock‑majesty with sordid baseness to­gether, he may appear the greater fool to all the company.  And certainly, if the devil might have the dressing of a man, so as to cast the greatest shame and ignominy upon him, yea, upon Christ and the profession of his gospel, he could not think of a read­ier way than to persuade a wretch to pretend to high and glorious hopes of heaven, and then to have noth­ing suitable to the high‑flown hopes in his conversa­tion, but all base and unworthy of such royal claims. If ye should see one going into the field with a helmet of brass on his head, but a wooden sword in one hand, and a paper shield on the other, and the rest of his armour like to these, you would expect he was not likely to hurt his enemies, except they should break their sides with laughing at him.  Such a goodly spec­tacle is the brag professor, who lifts up his head on high with a bold expectation of salvation, but can show never a grace beside to suit with the great hope he hath taken up; he may make the devil sport, but never do him any great hurt, or himself good.

Question.  But may be you will ask, How is the Christian to live up to his hopes?

Answer.  I answer, in general, he is to be careful to do nothing in which he may not freely act his hope, and from the promise expect that God will, for Christ’s sake, both approve the action, and reward his person for it.  Ask thy soul this question seriously before thou engagest in any work, ‘May I hope that God will bid me good speed?  Can I look for his countenance in it, and his blessing on it?’  It is very unworthy of a Christian to do anything sneakingly, as if he were afraid God or his conscience should be privy to his work.  ‘Whatsoever is not of hope is sin, because it cannot be of faith.’  O how would this hedge in the Christian’s heart from all by-paths!  Pos­sibly thou hast a grudge against thy neighbour.  The fire is kindled in thy heart, though it flames not presently out into bitter words and angry behaviour; and thou art going to pray.  Ask now thy soul, wheth­er God will accept that sacrifice which is kindled with such strange fire?  Yea, bid thy soul bethink herself how thy hopes of pardoning and saving mercy from God can agree with thy wrathful unforgiving spirit towards thy brother?  Certainly, as the sun cannot well be seen through a disturbed air, so neither can the eye of hope well see her object—heaven’s salva­tion—when the soul is tumultuous and roiled with anger and unchristian passion.

But, to instance in some particulars wherein you must comport with your hopes of salvation.

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        SECOND POINT OF IMPROVEMENT.  Exhortation to those who have this helmet of hope.   For exhortation of you, believers, who upon trial are found to have this helmet of hope.  Several duties are to be pressed upon you as such.  First. Be thankful for this unspeakable gift.  Second. Live up to your hopes.

Duties which possession of the helmet of hope involves.   First Duty.  Be thankful for this unspeakable gift.  I will not believe thou hast it if thy heart be not abundantly let out in thankfulness for it.  Blessed Peter cannot speak of this but in a doxology.  ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which hath begotten us again unto a lively hope,...to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away,’ I Peter 1:3, 4.  The usual proem to Paul’s epistles is of this strain, Col. 1:5; Eph. 1:3.  Hast thou hope in heaven?  It is more than if thou hadst the whole world in hand.  The greatest monarch the earth hath will be glad, in a dying hour, to change his crown for thy helmet.  His crown will not procure him this helmet, but thy helmet will bring thee to a crown, when he shall have none to wear—a crown, not of gold, but of glory, which once on shall never be taken off, as his is sure to be.  O remember, Christian, what but a while since thou wert—so far from having any hope of heaven, that thou wert under a fearful expec­tation of hell and damnation.  And are those chains of guilt with which thy trembling conscience was weighed down unto despair, taken off, and thy head lift up to look for such high preferment in the celes­tial court of that God whose wrath thou hadst, by thy horrid treasons, most justly incensed against thee? Certainly, of all the men in the world, thou art deep­est in debt to the mercy of God.  If he will be thanked for a crust, he looks, sure, thou shouldst give him more for a crown.  If food and raiment, though coarse and mean—suppose but roots and rags—be gratefully to be acknowledged; O with what ravishment of love and thankfulness are you to think and speak of those rarities and robes with which you hope to be fed and clad in this heavenly kingdom! especially if you cast your eye aside, and behold those that were once your fellow-prisoners—in what a sad and dismal condition they continue—while all this happiness has befallen you!  It could not, sure, but affect his heart into ad­miration of his prince's mercy and undeserved favour to him, who is saved from the gibbet only by his gra­cious pardon, if, as he is riding in a coach towards his prince's court—there to live in wealth and honour —he should meet some of his fellow‑traitors on sleds, as they are dragging full of shame and horror to exe­cution for the same treason in which they had as deep a hand as any of them all.  And dost thou not see, Christian, many of thy poor neighbours, with whom haply thou hast had a partnership in sin, pinioned with impenitency and unbelief, driving apace to hell and destruction, while thou, by the free distinguishing mercy of God, art on thy way for heaven and glory? O down on thy knees, and cry out, ‘Lord, why wilt thou show thyself to me, and not to these?’  How easy had it been, and righteous for God, to have directed the pardon to them, and the warrant for damnation unto thee!  When thou hast spent thy own breath and spir­its in praising God, thou hadst need beg a collection of praises of all thy friends that have a heart to contribute to such charitable work, that they would help thee in paying this debt; and get all this, with what in heaven thou shalt disburse thyself to all eternity, in better coin than can be expected from thee here—where thy soul is embased with sinful mix­tures—it must be accounted rather an acknowledg­ment of what thou owest to thy God, than any pay­ment of the least part of the debt.

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           But may be thou hast more yet to say for thyself than this comes to.  Thou art not only a knowing per­son but a reformed also; the pollutions in which once thou layest, now thou hast escaped; yea, thy reformation is embellished and set forth with a very gaudy profession of religion, both which have gained thee a very high opinion in the thoughts of all thy neigh­bours; so that if heaven might be carried by thy hands, thou couldst haply have a testimonial for thy unblam­able and saint-like behaviour among them; yet, let me tell thee, if thou meanest to be faithful to thy own soul, thou must not rest in their charitable opinion of thee, nor judge of thy hopes for heaven by what comes under their cognizance, to wit, the behaviour of thy outward man—for further their eye and observation reacheth not—but art to look inward to thy own bos­om, and inquire what spring thou canst find thereto have been the cause of this change and new motion that hath appeared in thy external conversation.  This, and this alone, must decide the controversy, and bring thy thoughts to an issue, what to judge of thy hope, whether spurious or legitimate.  It is not a new face that colours our outward behaviour, but a new principle that changeth the frame of the heart within, will evince thy hope to be good and genuine. ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope,’ I Peter 1:3.  The new birth entitles to a new hope. If the soul be dead, the hope cannot be alive.  And the soul may be dead, and yet put into a very handsome dress of external reformation and profession, as well as a dead body may be clad with rich clothes.  A beggar’s son got into the clothes of a rich man’s child, may as well hope to be heir to the rich man's land, as thou, by an external reformation and profession, to be God's heir in glory. The child's hopes are from his own father, not from a stranger.  Now, while thou art in a natural estate —though never so finished—old Adam is thy father; and what canst thou hope from him who proved worse than nought, and left his poor posterity noth­ing, except we should put a crazy mortal body, a sinful nature, and a fearful expectation of death tem­poral and eternal from the wrathful hand of a pro­voked God—which indeed he left all his children —into his inventory?  O sirs, how can you give way that any sleep should fall upon your eyes, till you get into this relation to God!  Hannah was a woman of a bitter spirit till she got a child from God; and hast not thou more reason to be so, till thou canst get to be a child of God?  Better a thousand times over that thou shouldst die childless than fatherless; my meaning is, that thou shouldst leave no child to inherit thy estate on earth, than to have no father to give thee an inher­itance in heaven when thou art taken hence.

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   Now, hope of the right make, is a rational well-grounded hope.  ‘Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you,’ I Peter 3:15. Alas! how can they give an ans­wer to others, that have not any to give to their own consciences to this question, ‘Why dost thou hope to be saved, O my soul?’  There is no Christian, be he never so weak in grace, but hath some reason bot­tomed on the Scripture—for other I mean not—for the hope he professeth.  Do you think, yea, can you be so absurd as to think, your own bold presumption, without any word of promise to build upon, can en­title your souls to the inheritance in God’s kingdom? Should one come and say your house and land were his, and show you no writing under your hand by which you did ever grant him a right thereunto, but all he can say is, he dreamed the last night your house and land were his, and therefore now he demands it; would you not think the man mad, and had more to the bedlam than to your estate?  And yet there are many hope to be saved, that can give no better reason than this comes to for the same, and such are all grossly ignorant and profane sinners.  As it is enough for a saint to end the trouble which his fears put him into, to ask his soul why it is disquieted within him, would he but observe how little reason his heart can give for the same; so [would it be enough] to dis­mount the bold sinner from his prancing hopes, if he might be prevailed with to call himself to an account, and thus to accost his soul sometimes, and resolve not to stir without a satisfactory answer.  ‘In sober sadness tell me, O my soul! what reason findest thou in the whole Bible, for thee to hope for salvation, what livest in ignorance of God, or a trade of sin against God?’  Certainly he should find his soul as mute and speechless as the man without the wedding garment was at Christ’s question.  This is the reason why men are such strangers to themselves, and dare not enter into any discourse upon this subject with their own hearts, because they know they should soon make an uproar in their consciences that would not be stilled in haste. They cocker their false hearts as much as David did his Adonijah, who in all his life never displeased him so much as to ask him, ‘Why dost thou so?’  Nor they their souls to the day of their death by asking them, ‘Soul, why hopest thou so?’  Or if they have, it hath been as Pilate, who asked Christ what was truth, John 18:38, but had no mind to stay for an answer.

           May be thou art an ignorant, soul, who knowest neither who Christ is, nor what in Christ hope is to fasten its hold upon; but only with a blind surmise thou hopest God will be better to thee than to damn thee at last.  But why thou thus hopest, thou canst give no reason, nor I neither.  If he will save thee as now thou art, he must make a new gospel for thy sake; for in this Bible it damns thee without hope or help.  The gospel is ‘hid to them that are lost,’ II Cor. 4:3.  But if knowledge will do it, thou haply canst show good store of that.  This is the breast-work un­der which thou liest, and keepest off those shot which are made at thee from the word, for those lusts which thou livest and liest in as a beast in his dung, defiling thyself with them daily.  And is this all thou hast to prove thy hopes for salvation for hopes true and solid? Indeed, many make no better use of their knowledge of the Scripture, than thieves do of the knowledge they have of the law of the land, who study it not that they mean to keep it, but to make them more cunning to evade the charge of it when called in question by it.  So many acquaint themselves with the word—especially those passages in it that display the mercy of God to sinners at the greatest breadth—that with these they may stuff a pillow to lay their wretch­ed heads on, when the cry of the abominations in which they live begins to break their rest.  God deliver you, my dear friends, from such a hope as this.  Sure­ly you mean to provide a better answer to give unto Christ at the great day than this, why ye hope to be saved by him; do you not?  Will thy knowledge, thinkest thou, be as strong a plea for salvation, as thy sins which thou wallowest in, against that knowledge, will be for thy damnation? If there be hope for such as thee, then come Judas and Jezebel, yea devils, and all ye infernal spirits, and strike in for this good com­pany for a part with them, for some of you can plead more of this than any of them all.

APPLICATION OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHRISTIAN HELMET, ALIKE TO THOSE WHO HAVE, AND TO THOSE WHO HAVE IT NOT 1/3

           Having shown now what the helmet of salvation is, and several of its offices to the Christian, we pro­ceed to bring out how its doctrine applies alike to those who have, and to those who have it not, and the several points of improvement which naturally flow from it.  These may be classed as four.  First. A trial of what metal our helmet of hope is made.  Second. An exhortation to those who, upon trial, find it genu­ine, in which two duties are pressed on them.  Third. Arguments why we should strengthen our hope, with directions how we may do so.  Fourth. An exhorta­tion to those who want this helmet of hope. 

FIRST POINT OF IMPROVEMENT Trial of what metal our helmet of hope is made.   For trial, whether we have this helmet of hope on our heads or no—this helmet, I say, commended to us in the text.  As for such paltry ware, that most are contended with for cheapness’ sake, it, alas! de­serves not the name of a true hope, no more than a paper cap doth of a helmet.  O, look to the metal and temper of your helmet in an especial manner, for at this most blows are made.  He that seeks chiefly to defend his own head—the serpent I mean—will aim most to wound yours.  None but fools and children are so credulous as to be blown up with great hopes upon any light occasion and slight ground.  They who are wise, and have their wits about them, will be as wary as how they place their hopes, especially for sal­vation, as a prudent pilot, that hath a rich lading, would be where he moors his ship and casts his anchor.  There is reason for our utmost care herein, because nothing exposeth men to more shame than to meet with disappointment in their hopes.  ‘They were confounded because they had hoped; they came thith­er and were ashamed,’ Job 6:20; that is, to miss of what they hoped to have found in those brooks.  But there is no shame like to that which  a false hope for eternal salvation will put sinners to at last; some shall rise ‘to shame everlasting,’ Dan. 10.  They shall awake out of their graves, and out of that fool’s paradise also, wherein their vain hopes had entertained them all their lives, and see, instead of a heaven they expected, hell to be in expectation of them, and gaping with full mouth for them.  If the servants of Eglon were so ashamed after their waiting awhile at their prince’s door, from whom they expected all their preferment, to find him, and their hopes with him, dead on the floor, Judges 3:25; O, whose heart then can think what a mixture of shame and horror shall meet in their faces and hearts at the great day, who shall see all their hopes for heaven hop headless, and leave them in the hands of tormenting devils to all eternity!  Hannibal’s soldiers did not so confidently divide the goldsmiths’ shops in Rome among themselves —which yet they never took—as many presumptuous sinners do promise themselves heaven’s bliss and happiness, who must instead thereof sit down with shame in hell, except they can, before they die, show better ground for their hope than now they are able to do.  O what will those fond dreamers do in the day of the Lord’s anger, when they shall see the whole world in a light flame round about them, and hear God —whose piercing eyes will look them through and through—calling them forth before men and angels to the scrutiny!  Will they stand to their hope, and vouch it to the face of Christ, which now they bless themselves so in?  Surely their hearts will fail them for such an enterprise.  None then will speak so ill of them as their own consciences shall do.  God will in that day use their own tongues to accuse them, and set forth the folly of their ridiculous hope to the confusion of their faces before all the world.  The prophet foretells a time when the false prophets ‘shall be ashamed every one of his vision, when he hath prophesied; neither shall they wear a rough garment to deceive, but he shall say, I am no prophet, I am an husbandman,’ &c., Zech. 13:4, 5.

           Truly the most notorious false prophet that the world hath, and deceives most, is this vain hope which men take up for their salvation.  This proph­esies of peace, pardon, and heaven, to be the portion of such as [it] never once entered into God's heart to make heirs thereof.  But the day is coming, and it hastens, wherein this false prophet shall be con­founded.  Then the hypocrite shall confess he never had any hope for salvation but what was the idol of his own fancy’s making; and the formalist shall throw off the garment of his profession by which he de­ceived himself and others, and appear to himself and to all the world in his naked colours.  It behooves therefore everyone to be strict and curious in the search of his own heart, to find what his hope is built upon.

THREEFOLD ASSURANCE which hope gives the Christian when God delays to perform his promise 7/7

           Third Assurance.  Hope assures the soul, that while God stays the performance of one promise, he shall have the absence thereof supplied with the pres­ence of another.  And this is enough to quiet the heart of any that understands himself.  God hath laid things in such a sweet method, that there is not one point of time wherein the soul of a believer is left wholly des­titute of comfort, but there is one promise or other that stands to minister unto his present wants.  Some­times, haply, he may want what he strongly desires, yet even then care is taken for his present subsistence; one promise bears the Christian company while another comes.  And what cause hath the sick man to complain, though all his friends do not sit up with him together, if they take it by turns, and never leave him without a sufficient number to look to him?

           We read of a ‘tree of life,’ Rev. 22:2, ‘which bears twelve manner of fruits, and yieldeth her fruit every month,’ so that it is never without some hanging on it which is fit for the eater.  What can this tree be bet­ter conceived to be than Christ, who yields all manner of fruit in his promises, and comfort for all times, all conditions?  The believer can never come but he shall find some promise ripe to be eaten, with which he may well stay his stomach till the other—whose time to be gathered is not yet come—hangs for further ri­pening.  Here you see the Christian hath provision for all the year long.  When Christ returned to heaven he gave his disciples this to comfort them, that he would come again, and carry them with him unto his father’s house, where no he lives himself in glory, John 14:2, 3. This is sweet indeed.  But, alas! what shall they do in the meantime to weather out those many storms which were to intervene between this promise and the time when it shall be performed?  This also our Sav­iour considered, and tells them he does not mean to leave them comfortless, but gives them another promise to keep house with, in the meantime, i.e. a promise of his Spirit—who should be with them on earth, while [until] he took them to be with him in heaven, John 14:16.  The Christian is never at such a loss wherein hope cannot relieve it.  ‘Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is, for he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green, and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit,’ Jer. 17:7, 8.  These waters are the promises from which the be­liever draws continual matter of comfort, that as a tree planted by a river flourisheth, however the year goes, so doth he, whatever the temper of God’s ex­terior providence is. Possibly the Christian is in an afflicted state, and the promise for deliverance comes not, yet then hope can entertain him in the absence of that, at the cost of another promise—that though God doth not at present deliver him out of the afflic­tion, yet he will support him under it, I Cor. 10:13.  If yet the Christian cannot find this promise paid into such a height as to discharge him of all impatience, distrust, and other sinful distempers—which to his grief he finds too busy in him for all the promise —then hope hath another window to let out the smoke at, and that is by presenting the soul with those promises which assure the weak Christian that pardoning mercy shall cover those defects which as­sisting grace did not fully conquer.  ‘I will spare them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him,’ Mal. 3:1.  So, Micah 7:18‘Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever.’  And certainly God would not have suffered so much impatience to have broken out in Job, but that he would have something left for par­doning mercy to do at the close of all, to which that holy man should see himself beholden, both for his deliverance, and that honourable testimony also which God himself gave of him before his uncharit­able friends, who from his great afflictions, and some discomposure of spirit in them, did so unmercifully burden him with the heavy charge of being a hypocrite.