APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 6/6

Answer Fifth. If thou wouldst attain to divine knowledge, wait on the ministry of the word.  As for those who neglect this, and come not where the word is preached, they do like that one should turn his back on the sun that he may see it.  If thou wouldst know God, come where he hath appointed thee to learn.  Indeed, where the means is not, God hath extraordinary ways, as a father, if [there is] no school in town, will teach his child at home, but if there be a public school, thither he sends him.  God maketh manifest, saith Paul, the savour of his knowledge by us in every place, II Cor. 2:14.  Let men talk of the Spirit what they please.  He will at last be found a quencher of the Spirit, that is, a despiser of prophecy; they both stand close together, I Thes. 5:19,20, Quench not the Spirit.  Despise not prophesying.  But it is not enough to sit under the means.  Woeful experience teacheth us this.  There are some no sun will tan, they keep their old complexion under the most shin­ing and burning light of the word preached, as ig­norant and profane as those that never saw gospel-day; and therefore if thou wilt receive any spiritual advantage by the word, take heed how thou hearest.

1. Look thou beest a wakeful hearer.Is it any wonder he should go away from the sermon no wiser than he came, that sleeps the greatest part of it away, or hears betwixt sleeping and waking?  It must be in a dream sure, if God reveals anything to his mind to him.  So indeed God did to the fathers of old, but it was not as they profanely slept under an ordinance.  O take heed of such irreverence.  He that composeth himself to sleep, as some do, at such a time, or he that is not humbled for it, and that deeply, both of them betray the base and low esteem they have of the ordinance.  Surely thou thinkest but meanly of what is delivered, if it will not keep thee awake, yea, of God himself, whose message it is.  See how thou art reproved by the awful carriage of a heathen, and that a king.  Ehud did but say to Eglon, I have a message from God unto thee, and he arose out of his seat, Judges 3:20.  And thou clappest down on thy seat to sleep.  O how darest thou put such an affront upon the great God?  How oft did you fall asleep at dinner, or telling your money?  And is not the word of God worth more than these?  I should wonder if such sermon-sleepers do dream of anything but hell-fire.  It is dangerous, you know, to fall asleep with a candle burning by our side—some have been so burned in their beds; but more dangerous to sleep while the candle of the word is shining so near us.  What if you should sink down dead like Eutychus? here is no Paul to raise you as he had; and that you shall not, where is your security?
2. Thou must be an attentive hearer.He that is awake, but wanders with his eye or heart, what doth he but sleep with his eyes open?  It were as good the servant should be asleep in his bed, as when up, not to mind his master’s business.  When God intends a soul good by the word, he draws such a one to listen and hearken heedfully to what is delivered, as we see in Lydia, who, it is said, attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul; and those, Luke 19:48, ‘The people were attentive to hear him.’ They did hang on him, as you shall see bees on some sweet flower, or as young birds on the bills of their dams as they feed them, that is, the soul which shall get light and life by the word.  Hear ye children, and attend to know understanding, Prov. 4:1.  Labour therefore in hearing the word to fix thy quicksilver mind, and set thyself to hear, as it is said Jehoshaphat did to pray; and that thou mayest, before thou goest, get thy heart into some deep sense of thy spiritual wants, especially of thy ignorance of the things of God, and thy de­plored condition by reason of it: till the heart be touched, the mind will not be fixed.  Therefore you may observe, it is said, God opened the heart of Lydia, that she attend, Acts 16:14.  The mind goes of the will’s errand; we spend our thoughts on what our hearts propose.  If the heart hath no sense of its ig­norance, or no desires after God, no wonder such a one listens not [to] what the preacher saith, his heart sends his mind another way.  They sit before me as my people, saith God, but their heart goeth after their covetousness.  They do not come out of such an in­tent or desire to hear for any good to their souls; then they would apply themselves wholly to the work.  No, it is their covetousness that hath their hearts, and therefore as some idle servant, when he hath waited on his master [and] brought him to his pew, then he goes out to his good fellows at the alehouse, and comes no more till sermon be almost done.  So do the thoughts of most when they go to the ordinance; they slip out in the street, market, or shop; you may find them anywhere but about the duty before them, and all because these have their hearts more than God and his word.
3. Thou must be a retentive hearer.Without this the work will ever be to begin again.  Truths to a forgetful hearer are as a seal set on water, the impression lasts no longer than the seal is on; the ser­mon once done, and all is undone.  Be therefore very careful to fasten what thou hearest on thy memory, which that thou mayest do,

(1.) Receive the truth in the love of it.  An affec­tionate hearer will not be a forgetful hearer.  Love helps the memory.  ‘Can a woman forget a child, or a maid her ornaments, or a bride her attire?’  No, they love them too well.  Were the truths of God thus pre­cious to thee, thou wouldst with David think of them day and night.  Even when the Christian, through weakness of memory, cannot remember the very words he hears, to repeat them, yet then he keeps the power and savour of them in his spirit.  As when sugar is dissolved in wine, you cannot see it, but you may taste it; when meat is eaten and digested it is not to be found as it was received, but the man is cheered and strengthened by it, more able to walk and work than before, by which you may know it is not lost; so you may taste the truths the Christian heard in his spirit [and] see them in his life.  Perhaps if you ask him what the particulars were the minister had about faith, mortification, repentance, and the like, he cannot tell you; yet this you may find, his heart is more broken for sin, more enabled to rely on the promises, and now weaned from the world.  As that good woman answered one, that coming from ser­mon, asked her what she remembered of the sermon; [she] said she could not recall much, but she heard that which should make her reform some things as soon as she came home.

(2.) Meditate on what thou hearest.  By this David got more wisdom than his teachers.  Observe what truth, what Scripture is cleared to thee in the sermon more than before, take some time in secret to converse with it, and make it thereby familiar to thy understanding.  Meditation to the sermon in what the harrow is to the seed, it covers those truths, which else might have been picked or washed away.  I am afraid there are many proofs turned down at a ser­mon, that are hardly turned up, and looked on any more, when the sermon is done; and if so, you make others believe you are greater traders for your souls, than you are indeed.  It is as if one should come to a shop and lay by a great deal of rich ware, and when he hath done goes away, and never calls for it.  O take heed of such doings.  The hypocrite cheats himself worst at last.

(3.) Discharge thy memory of what is sinful.  We wipe our table-book and deface what is there scrib­bled, before they can write anew.  There is such a contrariety betwixt the truths of God, and all that is frothy and sinful, that one puts out the other.  If you would retain the one, you must let the other go.

APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 5/6

Question.  But how may an ignorant soul attain to knowledge?

Answer First. Be deeply affected with thy ignor­ance.  Some are blind, as Laodicea, and know it not, Rev. 3:17.  As ignorance blinds the mind, so pride is a blind before their ignorance, that they know it not. These have such a high opinion of themselves that they take it ill that any should suspect them as such. These of all men are most out of the way to knowl­edge; they are too good to learn of man, as they think, and too bad to be taught of God.  The gate into Christ's school is low, and these cannot stoop. The Master himself is so humble and lowly, that he will not teach a proud scholar.  Therefore first become a fool in thine own eye.  A wiser man than thyself hath confessed as much: ‘I am more brutish than any man, and have not the understanding of a man.  I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowl­edge of the holy,’ Prov. 30:2, 3.  When thou art come to thyself to own and blush at the brutish ignorance of thy mind, thou art fit to be admitted into Christ’s school.  If they be ashamed, then show them the pattern of the house, Eze. 43:10.

Answer Second. Be faithful with that little knowledge thou hast.  Art thou convinced this is a sin, and that is a duty?  Follow the light close, you know not what this little may grow to.  We use to set up our children with a little stock at first, and as they use it, so we add.  The kingdom of God comes of small beginnings.  God complains of Israel, they were brutish in their knowledge, Jer. 10:14.  He doth not say, brutish in their ignorance; had they sinned be­cause they did not know better, this would have excused à tanto [by so much], but they did that which was brutish and unreasonable, as their worshipping graven images, notwithstanding they knew to the con­trary.  That man shall not excel in knowledge who prostitutes it to sin: ‘If they obey not, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge,’ Job 36:12.  A candle pent up close in a dark lantern, sweals out apace; and so doth light shut up in the conscience, and not suffered to come forth in the conversation.  Those heathens that are charged for holding ‘the truth in unrighteousness,’ Rom. 1:18, the next news you hear from them is, that they became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened, ver. 21.

Answer Third.  Ply the throne of grace.  He is the best student in divinity that studies most upon his knees .  Knowledge is a divine gift; all light is from heaven.  God is the Father of light, and prayer puts the soul under the pupilage of God.  If anyone lack wisdom, let him ask it of God.  This is more than naked knowledge; wisdom how to use it.  Study may make one a great scholar in the Scriptures, but prayer makes a wise Christian, as it obtains sanctified knowledge, without which it is no perfect gift, but—a gift and no gift.  Pray then with an humble boldness.  God gives it all to ask, and that—candidly, liberally; not like proud man, who will rather put one to shame, who is weak for his ignorance, than take the pains to teach him.  Thy petition is very pleasing to God.  Remember how Sol­omon sped upon the like occasion, and promise thy­self the same success.  Christ's school is a free school; he denies none that come to him, so they will submit to the orders of the school; and though all have not an answer in the same degree of knowledge—it is not needful that all should be Solomons in knowledge, except all were to be Solomons in place; yet the meanest disciple that Christ sends forth, shall be furnished with saving knowledge enough to fir him for his admittance into heaven's academy.  Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and after bring me to glory.

Answer Fourth.  Thou must bestow some time for thy diligent search after truth.  Truth lies deep, and must be digged for.  Since man was turned out of paradise, he can do nothing without labour except sin (this follows his hand indeed), but this treasure of knowledge calls for spade and mattock.  We are bid ‘search the Scriptures.’  Again, it is said that ‘many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be in­creased,’ Dan. 12:4—a metaphor from merchants, who bestir themselves to get an estate, run to and fro, first in one land, then in another; wherever they hear of anything to be got, thither they post, though to the ends of the earth.  Thus must the soul run from one duty to another, one while read, and anon meditate of what he hath read, then pray over his meditations, and ask counsel after all.  What is the meaning of this, and how understand you that?  [Not the school of Epicurus, but intercourse with him, made great men. There is more light got sometimes by a short conference with the preacher, than by his whole sermon.  Be sure thou compass all the means for knowledge within the walk of thy endeavour.  In this thy search for knowledge observe three things.

1. The end thou proposest, that it be pure and holy; not merely to know, as some do, who labour for knowledge, as many for estates, and when they have got it, look on their notions, as they on their bags of money, but have not a heart to use their knowledge for their own or others’ good; this is a sore evil. Speculative knowledge, like Rachel, is fair, but bar­ren.  Not to be known and admired by others for thy stature in knowledge above thy brethren, verily, it is too base an end to aim at, in seeking knowledge, especially such as is the knowledge of God in Christ. To see a heathen study for knowledge in philosophy, and then carry all his labour to this market, and think himself rewarded with obtaining the name for a wise man, is, though base, yet more tolerable; but for one that knows God, and what it is to enjoy him, for such a one to content himself with a blast or two of sorry man's vain breath, this is folly with a witness.  Look thou fliest higher in thy end than so.  Labour for knowledge, that thou mayest fear God whom thou knowest.  Thus David, ‘Teach me, O Lord, the way of thy statutes; and I shall keep it unto the end,’ Ps. 119:33.  The Word of God is called a light unto our feet, not to our tongues, merely to talk of, but [to our] feet to walk by.  Endeavour for it, not that thou mayest spread thy own name, but celebrate God’s.  As David promiseth, when he understands the precepts of God, then he will talk of his wondrous works, he will trumpet the fame of them, and thereby awaken others to inquire after God.
2. When thy end is right set, then thou must be constant in thy endeavour after it.  The mysteries of Christ are not learned in a day.  Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord, Hosea 6:3.  Some are in a good mood, may be, and they will look into the Bible, and read a chapter or two, and away they go for a week, and never practice it more, like some boys [who] if at school one day, truant all the week after; is it any wonder such thrive not in knowledge?  It is a good speech of Bernard: The study of the word, and the reading of it differ as much as the friendship of such who every day converse lovingly together, doth from the acquaintance one hath with a stranger at an inn, or whom he salutes as he passeth by in the street.’  If you will get knowledge indeed, you must not only salute the word now and then, but walk with it, and enter into daily converse with it.  The three men, who were indeed angels, that stood by Abraham, as he sat at his tent door, were reserved and strange, till Abraham invited them into his tent, and enter­tained them friendly, Gen. 18:2; and then Christ, who was one among them—as appears by the name Jehovah, given him in several verses, and also by what he promised he would do for Sarah, ver. 10, not what God would do, which if a created angel, he would —begins to discover himself to Abraham, and [to] reveal his secrets to him.  That soul above others shall be acquainted with the secrets of God in his word, that doth not slightly read the word, and as it were compliment with it, at his tent-door, but desires more intimacy with it, and therefore entertains it within his soul by frequent meditating of it.  David compares the word for sweetness to the honey and the honey-comb.  Indeed it is so full, that at first reading some sweetness will now and then drop from it, but he that doth not press it by meditation, leaves the most behind.
3. Be sure thou takest the right order and meth­od.  Arts and sciences have their rudiments, and also their more abstruse and deep notions, and sure the right end to begin at is first to learn the principles.  He, we say, is not likely to make a good scholar in the university, that never was a good grammar-scholar.  And they cannot be solid Christians, that are not in­structed in the grounds of Christianity.  The want of this is the cause why many are so unsteadfast.  First of this way and then of that, blown like glasses into any shape, as false teachers please to breathe.  Alas! they have no center to draw their lines from.  Think it no disgrace you who have run into error, and lost yourselves in the labyrinths of deep points, which now are the great discourse of the weakest professors, to be set back to learn the first principles of the oracles of God better.  Too many are, as Tertullian saith in another case, more tender of their reputation than their salvation: who are more ashamed to be thought ignorant, than careful to have it cured.

APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 4/6

Perhaps, when the physician gives them over for dead, then we must come and close up those eyes with comfort, which were never opened to see Christ in his truth, or be counted cruel, because we will not sprinkle them with this holy water, and anoint them for the kingdom of heaven, though they know not a step of the way which leads to it.  Ah, poor wretches! what comfort would you have us speak to those, to whom God himself speaks terror?  Is heaven ours to give to whom we please? or is it in our power to alter the laws of the Most High, and save those whom he condemns?  Do you not re­member the curse that is to fall upon his head ‘that maketh the blind to wander out of the way?’ Deut. 27:18.  What curse, then, would be our portion, if we should confirm such blind souls, that are quite out of the way to heaven, encouraging you to go on and ex­pect to reach heaven at last, when, God knows, your feet stand in those paths that lead to eternal death? No, it is written, we cannot, and God will not reverse it; you may read your very names among those damned souls which Christ comes in flaming fire to take vengeance on, who, the apostle tells us, are such ‘that know not God, and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ II Thes. 1:8.  And therefore, in the fear of God, let this provoke you, of what age or sex, rank or condition soever in the world, to labour for the saving knowledge of God in Christ, whom to know is life eternal.

Are you young?  Inquire after God betimes, while your parts are fresh, and memory strong, before the throng of worldly cares divert you, or lusts of youth debauch you.  The feet of those lusts which have buried millions of others in perdition, stand ready to carry you the same way, if preventing grace come not and deliver you out of their hands, by seasoning your minds with the knowledge of God. This morning's draught may prevent thy being in­fected with the ill savours thou mayest receive from the corrupt examples of others.  Nay, how long thy stay may be in the world thou knowest not—see whether thou canst not find graves of thy length in the burial-place; and if thou shouldst die ignorant of God and his law, what would then become of thee?  The small brush and the old logs, young sinners and those that are withered with age, meet and burn to­gether; or if thou shouldst stay a while longer here, may be because thou wilt not learn now, God will not teach thee then; or if thou shouldst in thy old age get acquaintance with God, yet it is sad to be sowing thy seed, when thou shouldst be reaping thy sheaves; learning to know God, when thou mightest be com­forting thyself from the old acquaintance thou hast enjoyed with him.

Are you old and ignorant?  Alas, poor creatures! your life in the socket, and this candle of the Lord not set up and lighted in your understanding! your body bowing to the dust, and nature tolling the pass­ing bell, as it were, and you, like one going into the dark, know not whither death will lead you or leave you.  It is like the infirmities of age make you wish your bones were even laid at rest in the grave; but if you should die in this condition, your poor souls would even wish they were here again with their old burdens on their back.  Aches and diseases of old age are grievous, but damned souls would thank God if he would bless them with such a heaven as to lie in these pains, to escape the torments of the other.  O bethink you before you go hence!  The less time you have, the more diligence you must use to gain knowl­edge.  We need not be earnest, one would think, to bid the poor prisoner learn his book, that cannot read, when he knows he shall be hanged if he read not his neck-verse.  It is not, indeed, the bare know­ing the truths of the gospel saves; but the gross ignorance of them, to be sure, will damn souls.

Are you poor?  It is not your poverty is your sin or misery, but your ignorance where the true treasure lies.  Were you God’s poor, rich in knowledge and faith, you were happy—‘Better is a poor and a wise child than an old and foolish king, who will no more be admonished,’ Ecc. 4:13—yea, so happy, that did the princes of the world understand themselves aright, they would wish themselves in your clothes, how rag­ged soever they are, rather than be in their own robes. There are better making for you in heaven, which you shall put on, when theirs shall be pulled off to their shame.  It will not then trouble you that you were, while in the world, poor; but it will torment them they were so rich and great, and so poor to God and beggarly in their souls.

Are you rich?  Labour for the knowledge of the Most High.  Solomon had more of the world’s trea­sure than a thousand of you have, and yet we find him hard at prayer, tugging with God for knowledge, II Chr. 1:10.  All these outward enjoyments are but vaginœ bonorum[the shells of blessings], as afflic­tions are vaginœ malorum [the shells of evils].  I am afraid that many men think themselves privileged by their worldly greatness from this duty, as if God were bound to save them because rich.  Alas, sirs, there are not so many of you like to come there.  I must confess, it would make one tremble to think what a small number those among the great ones that shall be saved, are summed up into, Not many great, not many rich.  Why so few saved?  Because so few have saving knowledge.  O the atheism, the ignorance, the sottish barbarism that is to be found even in those that the world applaud, and even worship, because of their lands and estates, who yet are not able to give any account of their faith?  A poor leather-coat Chris­tian will shame and catechize a hundred of them.  If heaven were to be purchased with house and lands, then these would carry it away from the poor disciples of Jesus Christ—they have their hundreds and thousands lying by them for a purchase always, but this money is not current in heaven’s exchange.  ‘This is life eternal, to know thee, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.’

APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 3/6

Now a minister may be accessory to the ignorance of his people

           First. By his own ignorance.  Knowledge is so fundamental to the work and calling of a minister, that he cannot be one without it.  ‘Because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children. Hosea 4:6.  The want of knowledge in a minister can be such a defect, as cannot be supplied by anything else.  Be he never so meek, patient, bountiful, unblamable, if he hath not skill to divide the word aright, he is not cut out for a minister.  Everything is good, as it is good for the end it is appointed to.  A knife, though it had a haft of diamonds, yet if it will not cut, it is no knife.  A bell, if not sound, is no bell.  The great work of a minister is to teach others, his lips are to preserve knowledge, he should be as conversant in the things of God as others in their particular trades.  Ministers are called lights.  If the light then be darkness, how great is the darkness of that people like to be?  I know these stars in Christ’s hands are not all of the same magnitude.  There is a greater glory of gifts and graces shining in some than [in] others; yet so much light is necessary to every minister, as was in the star the wise men saw at Christ's birth, to be able out of the word to direct sinners the safe and true way to Christ and salvation.  O sirs, it is a sad way of getting a living by killing of men, as some unskilful physi­cians do; but much more to get a temporal livelihood by ruining souls through our ignorance.  He is a cruel man to the poor passengers, who will undertake to be pilot, when he never so much as learned his compass.

           Second. By his negligence.  It is all one if the nurse hath no milk in her breasts, or having [it], draws it not forth to her child.  There is a woe to the idle shepherd, Zech. 11:17; such as have mouths, but speak not; lips, but not to feed the people with knowledge.  It shall be the people's sin, if they feed not when bread is before them, but woe to us if we give them not meat in due season.  O sirs, what shall we say to our Lord that trusts us, if those abilities which he hath given us as market-money to buy bread for our people, be found wrapped up in a napkin of sloth? if that time wherein we should have been teaching and instructing them, shall appear to be wasted in our pleasures, or employed about our car­nal profits.  That servant shall have but a sad wel­come of his master when he comes home, that shall be found out of the way with the key, and the family starving in meantime for want of provision.

           Third. By his unedifying preaching; when he preacheth unsound doctrine, which doth not perfect the understanding, but corrupt it.  Better he did leave them in simple ignorance, than colour their minds with a false dye; or when that he preacheth is frothy and flashy, no more fit to feed their souls, than husks the prodigal’s belly, which, when they know, they are little the wiser for their soul’s good.  Or, when his discourses are so high flown, that the poor people stand gazing, as those who have lost the sight of their preacher, and at the end of the sermon cannot tell what he would have.  Or, those who preach only truths that are for the higher form of professors, who have their senses well exercised; excellent, may be, for the building up three or four eminent saints in the congregation; but in the meantime, the weak ones in the family—who should indeed chiefly be thought on, because least able to guide themselves, or carve for themselves—these are forgotten.  He, sure, is an unwise builder that makes a scaffold as high as Paul’s steeple, when his work is at the bottom, and he is to lay the foundation, whereas the scaffold should rise as the building goes up.  So Paul advanceth in his doc­trine, as his hearers do in knowledge: ‘Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection,’ Heb. 6:1.  ‘Let us;’ it is well, in­deed, when the people can keep pace with the preacher.  To preach truths and notions above the hearer’s capacity, is like a nurse that should go to feed the child with a spoon too big to go into its mouth.  We may by such preaching please ourselves and some of higher attainments, but what shall poor ignorant ones do in the meantime?  He is the faithful steward that considers both.  The preacher is, as Paul saith of himself, a ‘debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians, both to the wise and to the unwise,’ Rom. 1:14.  [He is] to prepare truths suitable to the de­gree of his hearers.  Let the wise have their portion, but let them be patient to see the weaker in the family served also.

   Fourth. A minister may be accessory to the igno­rance of his people, when through the scandal of his life he prejudiceth his doctrine; as a cook, who, by his nastiness, makes others afraid to eat what comes out of his foul fingers.  Or he may be so, when, through his supercilious carriage, his poor people dare not come to him.  He that will do any good in the min­ister’s calling, must be as careful as the fisher, that he doth nothing to scare souls away from him, but all to allure and invite, that they may be toled  within the compass of his net.

           Use Third. [To the ignorant.]  Is the ignorant soul such a slave to Satan?  Let this stir you up that are ignorant from your seats of sloth whereon, like the blind Egyptians, you sit in darkness, speedily come out of this darkness, or resolve to go down to utter darkness.  The covering of Haman’s face did tell him that he should not stay in the king's presence.  If thou livest in ignorance, it shows thou art in God’s black bill.  He puts this cover before their eyes in wrath, whom he means to turn off into hell: ‘If our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost,’ II Cor. 4:3.  In one place sinners are threatened, ‘they shall die without knowledge,’ Job 36:12; in another place, they shall die in their sins, John 8:21.  He, indeed, that dies without knowledge, dies in his sins; and what more fearful doom can the great God pass upon a creature than this?  Better die in a prison, die in a ditch, than die in one’s sins.  If thou die in thy sins, thou shalt rise in thy sins; as thou fallest asleep in the dust, so thou awakest in the morning of the resur­rection; if an ignorant Christless wretch, as such thou shalt be arraigned and judged.  That God whom sin­ners now bid depart from them will then be worth their acquaintance—themselves being judges—but alas! then he will throw their own words in their teeth, and bid them depart from him, he desires not the knowledge of them.  O sinners, you shall see at last, God can better be without your company in heaven, than you could be without his knowledge on earth.  Yet, yet it is day, draw your curtains, and be­hold Christ shining upon your face with gospel-light. Hear wisdom crying in the streets, and Christ piping in your window in the voice of his Spirit and messen­gers, ‘How long, ye simple ones, will ye love sim­plicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?  Turn you at my reproof: be­hold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you,’ Prov. 1:21-23.  What can you say, sinners, for your sottish ignorance?  Where is your cloak for this sin?  The time hath been when the word of the Lord was precious, and there was no open vision, not a Bible to be found in town or coun­try; when the tree of knowledge was forbidden fruit, and none might taste thereof without license from the pope.  Happy he that could get a leaf or two of the Testament into a corner, afraid to tell the wife of his bosom!  O how sweet were these waters, when they were forced to steal them! but you have the word, or may, in your houses; you have those that open them every Sabbath in your assemblies; many of you, at least, have the offers of your ministers, to take any pains with you in private, passionately  beseeching you to pity your souls, and receive instruction; yea, it is the lamentation they generally take up, [that] you will not come unto them that you may receive light. How long may a poor minister sit in his study, before any of the ignorant sort will come upon such an errand?  Lawyers have their clients, and physicians their patients; these are sought after, and called up at midnight for counsel; but alas! the soul, which is more worth than raiment and body too, that is neg­lected, and the minister seldom thought on, till both these be sent away.  

APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 2/6

           

(2.) You deal unrighteously with God, that train not up your children in the knowledge of God. Because your children, if you be Christian parents, are God’s children, they stand in a federal relation to him, which the children of others do not; and shall God's children be nurtured with the devil’s education?  Ignorance is that which he blinds the minds of the children of disobedience withal.  Shall God’s children have no better breeding?  The chil­dren of a Jew God made account were born to him, ‘Thy sons and thy daughters whom thou hast born unto me,’ Eze. 16:20.  God had by the covenant which he made with that people, married them unto him­self, and therefore as the wife bears her children to her husband, they are his children.  So God calls the children of the Jews his, and complains of it as a hor­rible wickedness in them, that they should not bring them up as his, but offer them up to Moloch; they have ‘slain my children,’ saith God, ver. 21.  And are not the children of a Christian his children, as well as the Jews’ were?  Hath God altered or recalled the first covenant, and cut off the entail, and darest thou slay not only thy children, but the Lord’s also?  And is not ignorance that bloody knife that doth it?  ‘My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge,’ Hos. 4:6. Do you not tremble to offer them, not to Moloch but [to] the devil, whom, before, you had given up to God, when you brought them to that solemn ordin­ance of baptism, and there desired before God and man that they might become covenant-servants to the Lord? and hast thou bound them to him, and never teach them, either who their Lord and Master is, or what their duty is as his servants?  Of thy own mouth God will condemn thee.

 Fourth. Consider, you who are parents, that by not instructing your children, you entitle yourselves to all the sins they shall commit to their death.  We may sin by a proxy, and make another’s fact our own. ‘Thou hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon,’ II Sam. 12:9.  So thou mayest pierce Christ, and slay him over and over with the bloody sword of thy wicked children, if thou beest not the more careful to train them up in the fear of God. There might be something said for that heathen who, when the scholar abused him, fell upon the master and struck him.  Indeed it is possible he might be in the most fault.  When the child breaks the Sabbath, it is his sin, but more the father's, if he never taught him what the command of God was.  And if the par­ent be accessory to the sin of the child, it will be hard for him to escape a partnership, yea, a precedency in the punishment.  O what a sad greeting will such have of their children at the great day! will they not then accuse you to be the murderers of their precious souls, and lay their blood at your door, cursing you to your face that taught them no better?  But, grant that, by the interposition of thy timely repentance, thou securest thy soul from the judgement of that day, yet God can scourge thee here for the neglect of thy duty to them.  How oft do we see children be­come heavy crosses to such parents?  It is just that they should not know their duty to thee, who didst not teach them their duty to God.  Or if thou shouldst not live so long as to see this, yet sure thou canst not but go in sorrow to thy grave, to leave chil­dren behind thee that are on their way to hell.  Some think that Lot's lingering so long in Sodom, was his loathness to leave his sons-in-law behind him, to perish in the flames.  No doubt, good man, it was very grievous to him, and this might make him stay pleading with them, till the angel pulled him away. And certainly nothing makes holy parents more loath to be gone out of this Sodomitical world, than a de­sire to see their children out of the reach of that fire, before they go, that God will rain upon the heads of sinners.  You know not how soon the messenger may come to pluck you hence.  Do your best while you are among them to win them home to God.

           Use Second. To the ministers of the gospel.  Let this stir up your bowels of compassion towards those many ignorant souls in your respective congre­gations, who know not the right hand from the left. This, this is the great destroyer of the country, which ministers should come forth against with all their care and strength.  More are swept to hell with this plague of spiritual darkness than [with] any other.  Where the light of knowledge and conviction is, there com­monly is a sense and pain that accompanies the sin­ner when he doth evil, which forceth some, now and then, to inquire for a physician, and [to] come in the distress of their spirits to their minister or others for counsel.  But the ignorant soul feels no such smart. If the minister stay till he sends for him to instruct him, he may sooner hear the bell go for him, than any messenger come for him.  You must seek them out, and not expect they will come to you.  These are a sort of people that are afraid more of their remedy than of their disease, and study more to hide their ig­norance, than how they may have it cured, which should make us pity them the more, because they pity themselves so little.  I confess, it is no small unhap­piness to some of us, who have to do with a multi­tude, that we have neither time nor strength to make our addresses to every particular person in our con­gregations, and attend on them as their needs require, and yet cannot well satisfy our consciences otherwise. But let us look to it, that though we cannot do to the height of what we would, we be not found wanting in what we may.  Let not the difficulty of our province make us like some, who when they see they have more work upon their hands than they can well des­patch, grow sick of it, and sit down, out of a lazy despondency, and do just nothing.  He that hath a great house running to ruin, and but a small purse—it is better for him to repair now a little, and then a little, than [to] let all fall down, because he cannot do it all at once.  Many ministers may complain of their predecessors, that they left them their people more out of repair than their houses, and this makes the work great indeed; as the Jews did, who were to revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish, before they could build the wall; yet it went up, because the people had a mind to work, Neh. 4.  O if once our hearts were but filled with zeal for God, and com­passion to our people’s souls, we would up and be doing, though we could but lay a brick a day, and God would be with us.  May be, you who find a people rude and sottishly ignorant, like stones in the quarry, and trees unfelled, shall not bring the work to such perfection in your days as you desire; yet as David did for Solomon, thou mayest, by thy pains in teaching and instructing them, prepare materials for another who shall rear the temple.  It is very ordinary for one minister to enter into the labours of another, to reap those by a work of conversion, in whom a former minister hath cast the seed of knowledge and conviction.  And when God comes to reckon with his workmen, the ploughman and the sower shall have his penny, as well as the harvest-man and reaper.  O it is a blessed thing to be, as Job saith he was, ‘eyes to the blind,’ much more to blind souls.  Such are the ministers God himself calls pastors after his own heart, that feed his people with knowledge and under­standing, Jer. 3:15.  But woe to those that are accessory to their people’s ignorance.  Now a minister may be accessory to the ignorance of his people—

APPLICATION - Against The Rulers of The Darkness of This World 1/6

 Use First. This speaks to you that are parents. See what need you have of instructing your children, and training them up betimes in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.  Till these chains of dark­ness be knocked off their minds, there is no possi­bility of getting them out of the devil's prison.  He hath no such tame slave as the ignorant soul.  Such a one goes before Satan—as the silly sheep before the butcher—and knows not who he is, nor whether he carries him.  And can you see the devil driving your children to the shambles, and not labour to rescue them out of his hands?  Bloody parents you are, that can thus harden your bowels against your own flesh.  now the more to provoke you to your duty, take these considerations.

           First. Your relation obligeth you to take care of their precious souls.  It is the soul [that] is the child, rather than the body; and therefore in Scripture put for the whole man.  Abraham and Lot went forth with all the souls they had gotten in Haran, Gen. 12; so, all the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt, that is, all the persons.  The body is but the sheath; and if one should leave his sword with you to be kept safely for him, would you throw away the blade, and only pre­serve the scabbard?  And yet parents do commonly judge of their care and love to their children by their providing for the outward man, by their breeding, that teaching them how to live like men, as they say, when they are dead and gone, and [to] comport themselves to their civil place and rank in the world.  These things, indeed, are commendable; but is not the most weighty business of all forgotten in the meantime, while no endeavour is used that they may live as Christians, and know how to carry themselves in duty to God and man as such?  And can they do this without the knowledge of the holy rule they are to walk by?  I am sure David knew no means effectual without this, and therefore propounds the question, ‘Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way?’ and he resolves it in the next words, ‘by taking heed thereto according to thy word,’ Ps. 119:9.  And how shall they compare their way and the Word together, if not instructed?  Our children are not born with Bibles in their heads or hearts.  And who ought to be the instructor, if not the parent, yea, who will do it with such natural affection?  As I have heard some­times a mother say in other respects, Who can take such pains with my child, and be so careful as myself, that  am its mother?  Bloody parents then they are who acquaint not their children with God or his Word.  What do they but put them under a necessity of perishing, if God stir not up some to show more mercy than themselves to them?  Is it any wonder to hear that ship to be sunk or dashed upon the rock, which was put to sea without card or compass?  No more is it, they should engulf themselves in sin and perdition, that are thrust forth into the world—which is a sea of temptation—without the knowledge of God or their duty to him.  In the fear of God think of it, parents.  your children have souls, and these God sets you to watch over.  It will be a poor account at the last day, if you can only say, Lord, here are my children, left them rich and wealthy. The rust of that silver you left them will witness your folly and sin, that you would do so much for that which rusts, and nothing for the enriching their minds with the knowl­edge of God, which would have endured for ever. Happy if you had left them less money and more knowledge.

           Second. Consider it hath ever been the saints’ practice to instruct and teach their children the way of God.  David we find dropping instruction into his son Solomon: ‘Know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind,’ I Chr. 28:9. Though a king, he did not put it off to his chaplains, but whetted it on him with his own lips.  Neither was his queen Bathsheba forgetful of her duty, her gracious counsel is upon record, Prov. 31; and that she may do it with the more seriousness and solemnity, we find her stirring up her motherly bowels, to let her son see she fetched her words deep, even from her heart: ‘What, my son? and what, the son of my womb? and what, the son of my vows?’ ver.2.  Indeed that counsel is most like to go to the heart which comes from thence.  Parents know not what impression such melting expressions of their love mingled with their instructions, leave with their children.  God bids draw forth our souls to the hungry, that is more than draw forth our purse, which may be done, and the heart hard and churlish.  Thus we should draw forth our souls with our instructions. What need I tell of Timothy’s mother and grand­mother, who acquainted him with the Scripture from his youth?  And truly, I think that man calls in ques­tion his own saintship, that takes no care to acquaint his child with God, and the way that leads to him.  I have known some that, though profane themselves, have been very solicitous their children should have a good education; but never knew I saint that was regardless whether his child knew God or not.

           Third. It is an act of great unrighteousness not to instruct our children.  We read of some who hold the truth in unrighteousness.  Among others, those parents do it that lock up the knowledge of these sav­ing truths from their children, which God hath im­parted to themselves.  There is a double unrigh­teousness in it.

1. They are unrighteous to their children,who may lay as much claim to their care of instructing them, as to their labour and industry in laying up a temporal estate for them.  If he should do unrigh­teously with his child, that should not endeavour to provide for his outward maintenance, or having gath­ered an estate, should lock it up, and deny his child necessaries, then much more he that lives in ignor­ance of God, whereby he renders himself incapable of providing for his child’s soul, but most of all, he that having gathered a stock of knowledge, yet hides it from his child.
2. They are unrighteous to God.

           (1.) In that they keep that talent in their own hands which was given to be paid out to their chil­dren.  When God revealed himself to Abraham, he had respect to Abraham’s children, and therefore we find God promising himself this at Abraham’s hands, upon which he imparts his mind to him concerning his purpose of destroying Sodom, ‘Shall I hide from Abraham,’ saith God, ‘that thing which I do?  I know him that he will command his children, and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord,’ Gen. 18:17, 19.  The church began at first in a family, and was preserved by the godly care of par­ents in instructing their children and household in the truths of God, whereby the knowledge of God was transmitted from generation to generation, and though the church is not confined to such strait limits, yet every private family is as a little nursery to the church.  If the nursery be not carefully planted, the orchard will soon decay.  O could you be willing, Christians, that your children, when you are laid in the dust, should be turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine, and prove a generation that do not know God?  Atheism needs not be planted; you do enough to make your children such, if you do not endeavour to plant religion in their minds.  The very neglect of the gardener to sow and dress his garden, gives advantage enough to the weeds to come up. This is the difference between religion and atheism, Religion doth not grow without planting, but will die even where it is planted, without watering; atheism, irreligion, and profaneness are weeds [that] will grow without setting, but they will not die without plucking up.  All care and means are little enough to stub them up.  And therefore you that are parents, and do not teach your children, deal the more unrighteously with God, because you neglect the best season in their whole life for planting in them the knowledge of God, and plucking up the contrary weeds of atheism and irreligion.  Young weeds come up with most ease. Simple ignorance in youth becomes wilful ignorance, yea, impudence in age; you will not instruct them when young, and they will scorn that their ministers should, when they are old.

Souls in A STATE OF IGNORANCE Are Subject To Satan’s Rule

Souls in A STATE OF IGNORANCE Are Subject To Satan’s Rule

 Doctrine Second.  Ignorance above other sins enslaves a soul to Satan.  A knowing man may be his slave, but an ignorant one can be no other.  Knowledge doth not make the heart good, but it is impossible that without knowledge it should be good. There are some sins which an ignorant person cannot commit, there are more which he cannot but commit; knowledge is the key, Luke 11:52; Christ the door, John 10.  Christ opens heaven.  Knowledge opens Christ.  In three particulars the point will appear more fully.  First. Ignorance opens a door for sin to enter.  Second. As ignorance lets sin in, so it locks it up in the soul, and the soul in it.  Third. as it locks it up, so it shuts all means of help out.

           First. Ignorance opens the door for Satan to enter in with his troops of lusts.  Where the watch is blind, the city is soon taken.  An ignorant man sins, and like drunken Lot, he knows not when the temp­ter comes, nor when he goes; he is like a man that walks in his sleep, knows not where he is, nor what he does.  ‘Father, forgive them,’ saith Christ, ‘they know not what they do.’  The apostle, I Cor. 15, having reproved the sensu­ality of some, ver. 32, who made the consideration of death, by which others are awed from sin, a provocative to sin, ‘Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die;’ he gives an account of this absurd reasoning: All have not the knowledge of God.  An ignorant person is a man in shape, and a beast in heart.  There is no knowledge in the land, saith the prophet, Hosea 4:1 and see what a regiment follows this blind captain, swearing, lying, killing, stealing, and what not.  We read, II Tim. 3:6, of some ‘laden with sins;’ ‘silly women,’ and such who never ‘come to the knowledge of the truth.’  Here are trees full of bitter fruit, and what dung shall we find at the root, that makes them so fruitful, but ignorance?

           Second. Ignorance, as it lets sin in, so it locks it up in the soul, and the soul in it.  Such a one lies in Satan's inner dungeon, where no light of conviction comes. Darkness inclines to sleep; a blind man and a drowsy conscience go together.  When the storm arose, the mariners who were awake fell a praying to their god, but the sleeper fears nothing.  Ignorance lays the soul asleep under the hatches of stupidity. God hath planted in the beast a natural fear of that which threatens to hurt it.  Go to thrust a beast into a pit, and it hangs back; nature shows its abhorrency. Man being of a nobler nature, and subject to more dangers, God hath set a double guard on him; as [he has] a natural fear of danger, so also a natural shame that covers the face at the doing of any unworthy action.  Now an ignorant man hath slipped from both these his keepers; he sins and blusheth not, because he knows not his guilt; he wants that magistrate within which should put him to shame.  Neither is he afraid, because he knows not his danger; and there­fore he plays with his sin, as the child with the waves, that, by and by, will swallow him up.  Conscience is god's alarm to call the sinner up.  It doth not always ring in his ear that hath knowledge, being usually set by God to go off at some special hour, when God is speaking in an ordinance, or striking in a providence; but in an ignorant soul this is silent.  The clock can­not go when the weights are taken off; conscience is only a witness to what it knows.

           Third. Ignorance shuts out the means of re­covery.  Friends and ministers, yea, Christ himself stands without, and cannot help the creature.  As such, threatenings and promises are of no use; he fears not the one, he desires not the other, because he knows neither.  Heaven’s way cannot be found in the dark, and therefore the first thing God doth, is to spring in with a light, and let the creature know where he is, and what the way is to get out of his prison-house, without which all attempts to escape are in vain.  There is some shimmering light in all.  Non dantur purœ tenebrœ [absolute darkness is not giv­en], I think, is good divinity as well as philosophy. And this night-light may discover many sins, produce inward prickings of conscience [for] them, yea, stir up the creature to step aside, rather than to drown in such broad waters.  There are some sins so cruel and costly, that the most prostrate soul may in time be weary of their service for low ends; but what will all this come to, if the creature be not acquainted with Christ, the true way to God, faith and repentance, the only way to Christ?  Such a one, after all this bustle, instead of making an escape from Satan, will run full into his mouth another way.  There are some ways which at first seem right to the traveller, yet wind about so insensibly, that when a man hath gone far, and thinks himself near home, he is carried back to the place from whence he set forth.  This will befall every soul ignorant of Christ, and the way of life through him.  After many years' travel, as they think, towards heaven by their good meanings, blind de­votions, and reformation, when they shall expect to be within sight of heaven, they shall find themselves even where they were at first, as very slaves to Satan as ever.