Why sincerity covers the saint’s uncomelinesses

           Fourth Inquiry.  Now follows the fourth query.  Whence is it that sincerity thus covers the saint’s uncomelinesses.

           Reason First.  It flows from the grace of the gospel-covenant, that relaxeth the rigour of the law, which called for complete obedience; by resolving all that into this of sincerity and truth of heart.  Thus God, when entering into covenant with Abraham, ex­presseth himself, ‘I am the Almighty God; walk be­fore me, and be thou perfect’ or sincere, Gen. 17:1.  As if God had said to him, ‘Abraham, see here what I ex­pect at thy hands,’ and what thou mayest expect at mine.  I look that thou shouldst ‘set me before thee,’ whom in thy whole course and walking thou wilt sincerely endeavour to please and approve thyself to, and at my hands thou mayest promise thyself what an ‘Almighty God can do,’ both in protecting thee in thy obedience, and pardoning of thee, where thou fallest short of perfect obedience.’  Walk but in the truth of thy heart before me, and in Christ I will accept thee and thy sincere endeavour, as kindly as I would have done Adam, if he had kept his place in innocency, and never sinned.  Indeed, a sincere heart by virtue of this covenant might—I mean the covenant would bear him out and defend him in it, relying on Christ —converse with God, and walk before him with as much freedom, and more familiarity, by reason of a nearer relation it hath, than ever Adam did, when god and he were best friends.  ‘If our heart condemn us not, then,’ saith the apostle, ‘we have confidence to­wards God,’ I John 3:21; —we have a boldness of face.  And it is not the presence of sin in us, as the covenant now stands, that conscience can, or, if rightly informed concerning the tenure of it, will condemn us for.  Paul’s conscience cleared him, yea, afforded matter of rejoicing, and holy glorying, at the same time he found sin stirring in him.  No, con­science is set by God to judge for him in the private court of our own bosoms, and it is bound up by a law, what sentence to give for, or against, and that is the same, by which Christ himself will acquit or condemn the world at the last day.  Now when we go upon the trial for our lives, before Christ’s bar, the great inquest will be, whether we have been sincere or not; and as Christ will not then condemn the sincere soul, though a thousand sins could be objected against it, so neither can our hearts condemn us.

           But here it may be asked, how comes God so favourable in the covenant of the gospel, to accept an obedience so imperfect at his saints’ hands, who was so strict with Adam in the first, that the least failing, though but once escaping him, was to be accounted unpardonable?  The resolution of this question takes in these two particulars.

1. In the covenant God made with mankind in Adam, there was no sponsor or surety to stand bound to God for man’s performance of his part in the cov­enant, which was perfect obedience, and therefore God could do no other but stand strictly with him; because he had none else from whom he might recover his glory, and thereby pay himself for the wrong man’s default might do him; but in the gospel-covenant there is a surety—Christ the righteous —who stands responsible to God for all the defaults and failings which occur in the Christian’s course.  The Lord Jesus doth not only take upon him to dis­charge the vast sums of those sins, which he finds them charged with before conversion; but for all those dribbling debts, which afterward, through their infirm­ity, they contract.  ‘If any man sin, we have an Advo­cate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins,’ I John 2:1, 2, so that God may without impeachment to his justice cross the saints’ debts, which he is paid for by their surety.  It is mercy indeed to the saints, but justice to Christ, that he should.  O happy conjunction where mercy and justice thus conspire and kiss each other!
2. God did, and well might, require full and perfect obedience of man in the first covenant, be­cause he was in a perfect state, of full power and abil­ity to perform it, so that God looked to reap no more than he had planted.  But in the gospel-covenant God doth not at first infuse into the believer full grace, but true grace; and accordingly he expects not full obedi­ence, but sincere.  He considers our frame, and every believer is, if I may so say, rated in God’s books as the stock of grace is, which God gives to set up withal at first.

           Reason Second.  The second reason may be taken from the great love he bears, and liking he takes, to this disposition of heart; upon which follows this act of grace, to cover their failings where he spies it.  It is the nature of love to cover infirmities, even to a multitude.  Esther transgressed the law, by coming into Ahasuerus’ presence before she was sent for; but love soon erected a pardon-office in the king’s breast, to forgive her that fault; and truly she did not find so much favour in the eyes of that great monarch, as the sincere soul doth in the eyes of the great God.  He did not more delight in Esther’s beauty, than God doth in this; ‘such as are upright in their way are his delight,’ Prov. 11:20.  His soul closeth with that man as one that suits with the disposition of his own holy nature—one whose heart is right with his heart.  And so, with infinite content to see a ray of his own excel­lency sparkle in his creature, he delights in him, and takes him by the hand, to lift him up into the bosom of his love, a better chariot, I trow, than that which Jehu preferred Jehonadab to, for his faithfulness to him.  You seldom find any spoken of as upright in the Scripture, that are passed over with a plain naked in­scription of their uprightness; but some circumstance there is, which, like the costly work and curious engraving about some tombs, tell the passenger, they are no ordinary men that lie there.  God, speaking of Job’s uprightness, represents him as a nonesuch in his age.  ‘None like him in the earth, a perfect man, and upright.’  Mention was before made of his vast estate, and in that also he was a nonesuch.  But when God comes to glory over Satan, by telling what a servant he had to wait on him, he doth not count this worth the telling the devil of.  He sayeth not, ‘Hast thou consid­ered my servant Job, that there is none so rich?’ but, ‘none so upright,’ Job 1:8.

           When God speaks to Caleb’s uprightness, see to what a height he exalts him.  But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath fol­lowed me fully, him will I bring into the land, &c, Num. 14:24.  As if God had said, Here is a man I do not count myself disparaged to own him for my ser­vant and special favourite; he is one that carries more worth in him than the whole multitude of murmuring Israelites besides.  He had ‘another spirit’—that is, for excellency and nobleness, far above the rest.  And wherein did this appear?  The next words resolve us, ‘He hath followed me fully.’  Now that which gained him this great honour from God’s own mouth, we shall find to be his sincerity, and especially in that business when he went to search the land of Canaan.  Joshua 14:7, compare with ver. 9.  He had great temptations to tell another tale.  The Israelites were so sick of their enterprise, that he would be the welcomest mes­senger that brought the worst news, from which they might have some colour for their murmuring against Moses, who had brought them into such straits; and of twelve that were sent, there were ten that suited their answer to this discontented humour of the people; so that by making a contrary report to theirs, he did not only come under suspicion of a liar, but hazard his life among an enraged people.  Yet such was the courage of this holy man, faithfulness to his trust, and trust in his God, that he saith himself, Joshua 14:7, he ‘brought him’—that is, Moses, who had sent him—‘word again, as it was in his heart,’ that is, he did not for fear or favour accommodate himself, but what in his conscience he thought true, that he spake; and this, because it was an eminent proof of his sincerity, is called by Moses, ver. 9, following God fully;’ for which the Lord erects such a pillar of re­membrance over his head, that shall stand as long as Scripture itself.

           To gove but one instance more, and that is of Nathaniel, at first sight of whom, Christ cannot forbear, but lets all about him know how highly he was in his favour.  ‘Behold,’ saith he of him, ‘an Is­raelite indeed, in whom there is no guile,’ John 1:47.  Christ’s heart, like the babe in Elizabeth’s womb when Mary saluted her—seemed thus to leap at the coming of Nathaniel, yea, comes forth in this expres­sion, not to flatter him into an over-weening conceit of himself—Christ knew what an humble soul he spake to—but to bear witness to his own grace in him, especially this of sincerity—that knowing what a high price and value heaven sets upon the head of this grace, they might, like wise merchants, store them­selves with it more abundantly.  His simplicity of heart made him ‘an Israelite indeed.’  Many goodly shows and pompous outsides were to be seen among the Pharisees, but they were a company of base pro­jectors and designers.  Even when some of them came to Christ, extolling him for his sincerity, ‘Master, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in truth,’ Matt. 22:16, then did they play the hypocrites, and had a plot to decoy him by his glozing speech into danger; as you may perceive, ver. 15—they came that ‘they might entangle him.’  But good Nathaniel had no plot in his head in his coming, but to find the Messias he looked for, and eternal life by him, and therefore, though he was for the present wrapped up in that common error of the times, that no prophet could come out of Galilee, John 7:52—much less so a great one as the Messias, out of such an obscure place in Galilee as Nazareth—yet Christ, seeing the honesty and uprightness of his heart, doth not suffer his ignor­ance and error to prejudice him in his thoughts of him.

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 But as God hath strange punishments for the wicked, so he hath strange expressions of love and mercy for sincere souls.  He loves to outdo their highest expectations, kiss, robe, feast, all in one day, and that the first day of his return, when the memory of his outrageous wickednesses were fresh, and the stinking scent of the swill and swine from which he was but newly come hardly gone!  What a great favourite is sincerity with the God of heaven!  (2.) Again, God’s mercy is larger to his children, than their charity is towards one another.  Those whom we are ready to unsaint for their failings that appear in their lives, God owns for his perfect ones, because of their sincerity.  We find Asa’s failings expressed, and his perfection vouched by God together, as I may say, in a breath, II Chr. 15:17.  It was well that God cleared that good man, for had but the naked story of his life, as it stands in the Scripture, been recorded, without any express testi­mony, of God’s approving him, his godliness would have hazarded a coming under dispute in the opinion of good men; yea, many more with him—concerning whom we are now put out of doubt, because we find them canonized for saints by God himself—would have been cast, if a jury of men, and those holy men too, had gone upon them.  Elijah himself, because he saw none have such zeal for God and his worship, as to wear their colours openly in a free profession, and hang out a flag of defiance against the idolatry of the times, by a stout opposing it as he did—which might be their sin—makes a sad moan to God, as if the apostasy had been so general, that the whole species of the godly had been preserved in his single person.  But God brings the holy man better news, ‘I have left seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed down to Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him,’ I Kings 19:18.  As if God had said, ‘Com­fort thyself, Elijah.  Though my number be not great, yet neither is there such a dearth of saints as thou fearest in this ungodly age.  It is true their faith is weak, they dare not justle with the sins of the age as thou dost, for which thou shalt not lose thy reward; yet those night-disciples, that for fear carry their light in a dark lantern—having some sincerity, which keeps them from polluting themselves with these idolatries —must not, shall not be disowned by me.’  Yea, God who bids us be most tender of his lambs, is much more tender of them himself.  Observable is that place, I John 2:12-14.  There are three ranks of saints, ‘fathers,’ ‘young men,’ ‘little children.’ and the Spirit of God chiefly shows his tender care of them; as by mentioning them first, ver. 12, so by leaving the sweet promise of pardoning mercy in their lap and bosom, rather than in either of the other.  ‘I write unto you, little children, for your sins are forgiven you for my name’s sake.’  But are not the fathers’ sins, and young men’s also forgiven?  Yes, who doubts it?  But he doth not so particularly apply it to them, as to these; because these, from the sense of their own failings —out of which the other were more grown—were more prone to dispute against this promise in their own bosoms.  Yea, he doth not only in plain terms tell them their sins are forgiven, but meets with the secret objection which comes forth from trembling hearts in opposition to this good news, taken from their own vileness and unworthiness, and stoops its mouth with this, “forgiven for my name’s sake’—a greater name than the name of their biggest sin, which discourageth them from believing.

3. Sincerity keeps up the soul’s credit at the throne of grace, so that no sinful infirmity can hinder its welcome with God.  It is the regarding of iniquity in the heart, not the having of it, [that] stops God’s ear from hearing our prayer.  This is a temptation not a few have found some work to get over—whether such as they who see so many sinful failings in them­selves, may take the boldness to pray, or, without pre­suming to expect audience, when they have prayed; and it sometimes prevails so far, that because they cannot pray as they would, therefore they forbear what they should—much like some poor people that keep from the congregation because they have not such clothes to come in as they desire.  To meet with such as are turning away from duty upon this fear, the promises—which are our only ground for prayer, and chief plea in prayer—are accommodated, and fitted to the lowest degree of grace; so that, as a picture well drawn faceth all in the room alike that look on it, so the promises of the gospel-covenant smile upon all that sincerely look to God in Christ.  It is not said, ‘If you have faith like a cedar,’ but ‘if you have faith as a grain of mustard-seed, ye shall say unto this moun­tain, Remove hence to yonder place, and it shall re­move,’ Matt. 17:20.  Neither is justifying faith beneath miraculous faith in its own sphere of activity.  The least faith on Christ, if sincere, as truly removes the mountainous guilt of sin from the soul, as the strong­est.  Hence all the saints are said to have ‘like precious faith,’ II Peter 1:1.  Sarah’s faith, which in Genesis we can hardly see—as the story presents her —wherein it appeared, obtains an honourable mention, Heb. 11:11, where God owns her for a be­liever as well as Abraham with his stronger faith.  What love is it the promise entails the favours of God upon?  Is it not, “grace be with them that love our Lord Jesus’ {not} with a seraphim’s love, but with a sincerelove, Eph 6:24.  It is not ‘Blessed they who are holy to such a measure;’—this would have fitted but some saints.  The greatest part would have gone away and said, ‘There is nothing for me, I am not so holy.’ But that no saint might lose his portion, it is, ‘Blessed are they which hunger and thirst after righteousness;’ and this takes in all the children of God, even to the least babe that is newly born this day to Christ.  The new convert hungers after holiness and that sincerely.  And wherefore all this care so to lay the promises, but to show that when we go to make use of any promise at the throne of grace, we should not question our welcome, for any of our infirmities, if so be, this stamp of sincerity is upon our hearts?  Indeed, if sin­cerity did not thus much for the saint, there could not be a prayer accepted of God, at the hands of any saint that ever was or shall be on earth to the end of the world, because there never was nor shall be such a saint dwelling in flesh here below, in whom eminent failings may not be found.  The apostle would have us know that Elijah, who did as great wonders in heaven and earth too by prayer, as who greatest? yet this man —God could soon have picked a hole in his coat.  Indeed, lest we attribute the prevalency of his prayers to the dignity of his person, and some eminency which he had by himself in grace above others, the Spirit of God tells us, he was of the same make with his poor brethren.  ‘Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed,’ &c., James 5:17, 18. A weak hand with a sincere heart is able to turn the key in prayer.

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           Third Inquiry. How doth sincerity cover the saint’s sinful uncomeliness?  I shall answer to this —First. Negatively, and show how it doth not. Second. Affirmatively—how it doth.

           First. Negatively—how sincerity doth not cover them, and that in several particulars.

1. Sincerity doth not so cover the saint’s failings, as to take away their sinful nature.  Wandering thoughts are sin in a saint, as well as in another.  A weed will be a weed wherever it grows, though in a garden among choicest flowers.  They mistake then, who, because the saint’s sins are covered, deny them to be sins.
2. It doth not cover them so, as to give us the least ground to think that God doth allow the Chris­tian to commit the least sin more than others.  In­deed, it is inconsistent with God’s holiness to give, and with a saint’s sincerity to pretend such a dispen­sation to be given them.  A father may, out of his love and indulgence and love to his child, pass by a failing in his waiting on him, as if he spills the wine, or breaks the glass he is bringing to him, but sure he will not allow him to throw it down carelessly or willingly. Though a man may be easily entreated to forgive his friend, that wounded him unawares, when he meant him no hurt, yet he will not beforehand give him leave to do it.
3. It doth not cover them so, as that God should not see them, which is not only derogatory to his omniscience, but to his mercy also, for he cannot par­don what he doth not first see to be sin.  God doth not only see the sins of his children, but their failings are more distasteful to him than others’, because the persons in which they are found are so dear, and stand so near to him.  A dunghill in a prince’s cham­ber would be more offensive to him, than one far off from his court.  The Christian’s bosom is God’s court, throne, temple; there he hath taken up his rest forever.  Sin there must needs be very unsavoury to his nostrils.
4. It doth not so cover them, as that the saints need not confess them—be humbled under them, or sue out a pardon for them.  A penny is as due debt as a pound, and therefore to be acknowledged.  Indeed, that which is a sin of infirmity in the committing, be­comes a sin of presumption by hiding of it, and hard­ening in it.  Job held fast his integrity throughout his sad conflict, yet those failings which escaped him in the paroxysm of his afflictions brought him upon his knees: ‘I abhor myself,’ saith he, ‘and repent in dust and ashes,’ Job 42:6.
5. It doth not so cover them, as if our sincerity did the least merit and deserve that God should for it cover our other failings and infirmities.  Were there such a thing as obedience absolutely complete, it could not merit pardon for past sins; much less can an imperfect obedience, as sincerity is in a strict sense, deserve it for present failings.  Obedience le­gally perfect is no more than, as creatures, we owe to the law of God; and how could that pay the debt of sin, which of itself was due debt, before any sin was committed?  Much less can evangelical obedience —which is sincerity—do it; that falls short by far of that obedience we do owe.  If he that owes twenty pounds merits nothing when he pays the whole sum, then surely he doth not, that of the twenty pounds he owes pays but twenty pence.  Indeed, creditors may take what they please, and if they will say half satisfies them, it is discharge enough to the debtor.  But where did ever God say he would thus compound with his creature?  God stands as strictly upon it in the gospel-covenant to have the whole debt paid, as he did in the first of works.  There was required a full righteousness in keeping, or a full curse for breaking of the law.  So there is in the evangelical; only here the wards of the lock are changed.  God required this at the creature’s hand in the first covenant to be personally performed or endured; but in the gospel-covenant he is content to take both at the hands of Christ our surety, and impute these to the sincere soul that unfeignedly believes on him, and gives up himself to him.

           Second. Positively—how sincerity doth cover the saint’s uncomelinesses.

1. Sincerity is that property to which pardoning mercy is annexed.  True, indeed, it is Christ that cov­ers all our sins and failings, but it is only the sincere soul over which he will cast his skirt.  ‘Blessed is he...whose sin is covered; blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity,’ Ps. 32:2.  None will doubt this; but which is the man? the next words tell us his name—‘and in whose spirit there is no guile.’  Christ’s righteousness is the garment that cov­ers the nakedness and shame of our unrighteousness, faith the grace that puts this garment on.  But what faith? none but the ‘faith unfeigned,’ as Paul calls it, II Tim. 1:5.  ‘Here is water,’ saith the eunuch, ‘what doth hinder me to be baptized?’ Acts 8:36.  Now mark Philip’s answer, ver. 37, ‘If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest;’ as if he had said, Nothing but a hypocritical heart can hinder thee.  It is the false heart only that finds the door of mercy shut.  He that promiseth to cover the sincere soul’s failings, threat­ens to uncover the hypocrite’s impiety.  ‘He that per­verteth his ways shall be known,’ that is, to his shame, Prov. 10:9.
2. Where sincerity is, God approves of that soul, as a holy righteous person, notwithstanding that mix­ture of sin which is found in him.  As God doth not like the saint’s sin, for his sincerity, so he doth not unsaint him for that.  God will set his hand to Lot’s testimonial that he is a righteous man.  Though many sins are recorded in the Scripture which he fell into —and foul ones too—yet Job is regarded perfect, because the frame of his heart was sincere, the tenure of his life holy; and he was rather surprised by his sins as temptations, than they entertained by him upon choice.  Though sincerity doth not blind God’s eye that he should no see the saint’s sin, yet it makes him see it with a pitiful eye, and not a wrathful; as a hus­band knowing his wife faithful to him in the main, pities her in other weaknesses, and for all them ac­counts her a good wife.  ‘In all this,’ saith God, ‘Job sinned not.’  And at the very close of his combat, God brings him out of the field with his honourable testi­mony to his friends that had taken so much pains to bring his godliness in question; that his servant Job had ‘spoken right of him.’  Truly God said more of Job than he durst of himself.  He freely confesseth his unadvised froward speeches, and cries out, ‘I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.’  God saw Job’s sins attended with sincerity, and therefore judged him perfect and righteous.  Job saw his sincerity dashed with many sad failings, and this made him, in the close of all, rather confess his sins with shame, than glory in his grace.

           God’s mercy is larger to his children, than their charity is many times to themselves and their breth­ren.  (1.) To themselves.  Do you think the prodigal —the emblem of a convert—durst have asked the robe, or desired his father to at such cost for his en­tertainment, as his father freely bestowed on him? No sure, a room in the kitchen, we see, was as high as he durst ask.  To be among the meanest servants of the house—poor soul! he could not conceive he should have such a meeting with his father at first sight.  A robe! he might rather look for a rope, at least a rod.  A feast at his father’s table!  O, unlooked for wel­come!  I doubt not but if any had met him on his way, and told him that his father was resolved as soon as he came home, not to let him see his face, but presently pack him to bridewell, there to whipped and fed with bread and water for many months, and then perhaps he would at last look on him and take him home—I doubt not but, in his starving condition, this would have been good news to him.

What uncomeliness sincerity covers

           Second Inquiry. What uncomeliness doth sin­cerity cover?  I answer, all, especially what is sinful.

           First kind of uncomeliness.  There are several external temporal privileges, in which if any fall short —such excellency does this vain world put in them, more than their intrinsical worth calls for—they are exposed to some dishonour, if not contempt, in the thoughts of others.  Now where sincere grace is, it af­fords a fair cover to them all, yea, puts more abun­dant honour on the person, in sight of God, angels, and men also if wise, than the other can occasion contempt.

1. Beauty.  This is the great idol, which the whole world wonders after, as they after the beast, Rev. 13, which, if God denies, and confines the souls of some to a more uncomely house—body I mean —than others, this their mean bodily presence prejudiceth them in the esteem of others.  Now grace, if it be but graced with sincerity, shines through the cloud that nature hath darkened the countenance withal.  A man’s wisdom maketh his face to shine, Ecc. 8:1.  Who, that hath the use of his reason, would not prize and choose the vessel in the cellar full of gen­erous wine, before a gilt tun that hangs up empty at the door for a sign?  If sincere grace fills not the heart within, the beauty with which nature hath gilt the face without, makes the person but little worth.  A beau­tiful person without true grace, is but a fair stinking weed—you know the best of such a one, if you look on him furthest off; whereas a sincere heart, without this outward beauty to commend it, is like some sweet flower not painted with such fine colours on the leaves—better in the hand than eye, to smell on than look on.  The nearer you come to the sincere soul, the better you find him.  Outward uncomeliness to true grace, is but as some old mean buildings you sometimes see stand before a goodly, stately house, which hide its glory only from the traveller that passeth by at some distance, but he that comes in sees its beauty, and admires it.  Again,
2. A mean parentage and inglorious descent is much despised in the world.  Well, how base soever the stock and ignoble the birth be, when grace un­feigned comes, it brings arms with it—it clarifies the blood, and makes the house illustrious.  ‘Since thou wast precious in my eye, thou hast been honourable,’ Isa. 43:4.  Sincerity sets a mark of honour; if you see this star shining, though over a mean cottage, it tells thee a great prince dwells there, an heir of heaven. Sincerity brings the creature into alliance with a high family—no less than that of the high God; by which new alliance his own inglorious name is blotted out, and a new name given him.  He bears the name of God, to whom he is joined by a faith unfeigned; and who dares say that the God of heaven's child, or Christ’s bride, are of an ignoble birth?  Again,
3. A low purse, as well as a low parentage, ex­poseth to contempt, yea more.  Some, by their purse, redeem themselves in time, as they think, from the scorn of their mean stock.  The little spring from whence the water came, by the time it hath run some miles, and swelled into a broad river, is out of sight and not inquired much after.  But poverty, that itself sounds reproach in the ears of this proud world.  Well, though a man were poor, even to a proverb, yet if a vein of true godliness, sincere grace, be but to be found running in his heart, here is a rich mine, that will lift him up above all the world's contempt.  Such a one may possibly say he hath no money in his house, but he cannot say that he hath no treasure —that he is not rich—and speak true.  He sure is rich, that hath a key to God’s treasury.  The sincere soul is rich in God; what God hath is his, ‘all is yours, for ye are Christ’s.’  Again,
4. In a word, to name no more, parts and en­dowments of the mind,these are applauded above all the former by some.  And indeed these carry in them an excellency, that stands more level to man’s noblest faculty—reason—than the other.  These others are so far beneath its spiritual nature, that—as Gideon’s soldier’s, some of them, could not drink the water till they bowed down on their knees—so neither could man take any relish in these, did he not first debase himself far beneath the lofty stature of his reasonable soul.  But knowledge, parts, and abilities of the mind, these seem to lift up man's head, and make him that he loseth none of his height; and therefore none so contemptible by the wise world, as those that are of weak parts and mean intellectual abilities.  Well, now, let us see what cover sincerity hath for this na­kedness of the mind, which seems the most shameful of all the rest.  Where art thou, Christian, that I may tell thee—who sits lamenting, and bemoaning thy weak parts, and shallow understanding—what a happy man thou art, with thy honest sincere heart, beyond all compare with these, whose sparkling parts do so dazzle thine eyes, that thou canst not see thy own privilege above them?  Their pearl is but in the head, and they may be toads for all that; but thine is in the heart.  And it is the pearl of grace that is ‘the pearl of great price.’  Thy sincere heart sets thee higher in God’s heart, than thy weak parts do lay thee low in their deceived opinion.  And thou, without the abilities of mind that they have, shalt find the way to heaven; but they, for all their strong parts, shall be tumbled down to hell, because they have not thy sin­cerity.  Thy mean gifts do not make thee incapable of heaven's glory, but their unsanctified gifts and endow­ments are sure to make them capable of more of hell’s shame and misery.  In a word, though here thy head be weak and parts low, yet, for thy comfort know, thou shalt have a better head given thee to thy sincere heart, when thou comest to heaven, but their knowing heads shall not meet with better hearts in hell, but be yoked eternally to their own wicked ones in torment.  But enough of this.

           Second kind of uncomeliness. I come to the sec­ond kind of uncomeliness which sincerity covers, and that is sinful.  Now this sinful uncomeliness must needs be the worst, because it lights on the most beautiful part—the soul.  If dirt thrown on the face be more uncomely than on another member—because the face is the fairest—then, no uncomeliness like that which crocks and blacks the soul and spirit, because this is intended by God to be the prime seat of man’s beauty.  Now that which most stains and deforms the soul, must be that which most opposeth its chief perfection, which, in its primitive creation, was, and can still be, no other than the beauty of holi­ness drawn on it by the Holy Spirit’s curious pencil. And what can that be but the soul-monster which is called sin?  This hath marred man’s sweet counten­ance, that he is no more like the beauty God created, than dead Sarah’s face was like that beauty which was a bait for the greatest princes, and made her husband go in fear of his life wherever he went.  Nay, it is no more like the beauty God created, than the foul fiend, now a cursed devil in hell, is like to the holy angel he was in heaven.  This wound which is given by sin to man’s nature, Christ hath undertaken to cure by his grace in his elect.  The cure is begun here, but not so perfected, that no scar and blemish remains; and this is the great uncomeliness which sincerity lays its finger on and covers.  But here the question may be as follows.

Evangelical truth and uprightness

Second kind of sincerity. We proceed to the sec­ond kind of truth of heart or uprightness, which I called an evangelical uprightness.  This is a plant found growing only in Christ’s garden, or the inclo­sure of a gracious soul.  It is by way of distinction from that I called moral, known by the name of a ‘godly sincerity,’ or the sincerity of God.  Our re­joicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, we have had our conversa­tion in the world, II Cor. 1:12.  Now in two respects this evangelical sincerity may be called godly sincerity.  1. Because it is of God.  2. Because it aims at God, and ends in God.

1. Because it is of God.  It is his creature —begotten in the heart by his Spirit alone.  Paul, in the place forementioned, II Cor. 1:12, doth excellently derive its pedigree for us.  What he calls walking in ‘godly sincerity’ in the first part of the verse, he calls ‘having our conversation by the grace of God’ in the latter part; yea, opposeth it to ‘walking with fleshly wisdom in the world’—the great wheel in the moral man’s clock.  And what doth all this amount to, but to show that this sincerity is a babe of grace, and calls none on earth father? But this is not all.  This ‘godly sincerity’ is not only of divine extraction—for so are common gifts that are supernatural—the hypocrite’s boon as well as the saint’s—but it is part of the new creature, which his sanctifying Spirit forms and works in the elect, and none besides.  It is a covenant-grace. ‘I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you,’ Eze. 11:19.  That ‘one heart,’ by which the hypocrite is so often descried in the word.
2. Because it aims at God, and ends in God.  The highest project and ultimate end that a soul thus sincere is big with, is how it may please God.  The disappointment such a godly sincere person meets with from any other, troubles him no more than it would a merchant who speeds in the main end of his voyage to the Indies, and returns richly laden with the prize of gold and silver he went for, but only loseth his garter or shoe-string in the voyage.  As the master's eye directs the servant's hand—if he can do his business to his master's mind, he hath his wish, though strangers who come into the shop like it not—thus ‘godly sincerity’ acquiesceth in the Lord’s judgment of him.  Such a one shoots not at small nor great, studies not to accommodate himself to any, to hit the humour of rich or poor; but singles out God in his thoughts from all others, as the chief object of his love, fear, faith, joy, &c.; he directs all his endeavours like a wise archer at this white, and when he can most approve himself to God, he counts he shoots best. Hear holy Paul speaking, not only his own private thoughts, but the common sense of all sincere be­lievers: ‘We labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him,’ II Cor. 5:9.  The world’s true man is he that will not wrong man.  Though many go thus far, who can make bold with God, for all their demure carriage to man; some that would not steal the worth of a penny from their neighbour, yet play notorious thieves with God in greater matters than all the money their neighbour hath is worth.  They can steal that time from God—the Sabbath-day I mean—to gratify their own occasions, which he hath inclosed for himself, and lays peculiar claim to, by such a title as will upon trial be found stronger, I trow, than we can show for the rest of the week to be ours.  Others will not lie to man possibly in their dealing with him—and it were better living in the world, if there were more of this truth among us—but these very men, many of them, yea, all that are not more than morally upright, make nothing of lying to God, which they do in every prayer they make, promising to do what they never bestow a serious thought how they may perform. They say they will sanctify God's name, and yet throw dirt on the face of every attribute in it; they pray that the will of God may be done, and yet, while they know their sanctifi­cation is his will, they content themselves with their unholy hearts and natures, and think it enough to beautify the front of their lives—that part which faceth man, and stands to the street, as I may so say—with a few flourishes of civility and justness in their worldly dealings, though their inward man lies all in woeful ruins at the same time.  But he is God’s true man that desires to give unto God the things that are God's, as well as unto man the things that are man's—yea, who is first true to God and then to man for his sake.  Good Joseph—when his brethren feared as strangers to him (for yet they knew no other) [that] they should receive some hard measure at his hands —mark what course he takes to free their troubled thoughts from all suspicion of any unrighteous deal­ing from him.  ‘This do,’ saith he, ‘and live; for I fear God.’ Gen. 42:18—as if he had said, ‘Expect nothing from me but what is square and upright, for I fear God.  You possibly think because I am a great man, and you poor strangers where you have no friends to intercede for you, that my might should bear down your right; but you may save yourselves the trouble of such jealous thoughts concerning me, for I see one infinitely more above me, than I seem to be above you, and him I fear—which I could not do if I should be false to you.’  The word II Cor. 1:12, for sincerity is emphatical, "—a metaphor from things tried by the light of the sun, as when you are buying cloth, or such like ware, you will carry it out of the dark shop and hold it up to the light, by which the least hole in it is discovered; or, as the eagle, say some, holds up her young against the sun, and judg­eth them her own if able to look up wishly against it, or spurious if not able. Truly that is the godly sincere soul, which looks up to heaven and desires to be determined in his thoughts, judgment, affections, and practices, as they can stand before the light which shines from thence through the word—the great lu­minary into which God hath gathered all light for guiding souls, as the sun in the firmament is for di­recting our bodies in their walking to and fro in the world.  If these suit with the word, and can look on it without being put to shame by it, then on the sincere soul goes in his enterprise with courage; nothing shall stop him.  But if any of these be found to shun the light of the word—as Adam would, if he could, the seeing of God—not being able to stand by its trial, then he is at his journey's end, and can be drawn forth by no arguments from the flesh; for it goes not on the flesh's errand but on God’s, and he that sends him shall only stay him.  Things are true or right as they agree with their first principles.  When the counter­pane agrees with the original writing, then it is true. Now the will of God is standard to all our wills, and he is the sincere man that labours to take the rule and measure of all his affections and actions from that. Hence David is called ‘a man after God's own heart,’ which is but a periphrasis of his sincerity, and is as much as if the Spirit of God had said he was an up­right man—he carries on his heart the sculpture and image of God's heart, as it is engraved on the seal of the word.  But enough for the present.  This may serve to show what is evangelical uprightness.

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 [A twofold caution.]

Caution. To the sincere Christian.  May there be found a kind of uprightness among men that are carnal and destitute of God's sanctifying grace?  O then look you to it, in whose hearts dwells the Spirit of grace, that you be not put to shame by those that are graceless, which you must needs be when you are taken tardy in those things that they cannot be charged for.  Many among them there are, that scorn to lie.  Shall a saint be taken in an untruth?  Their moral principles bind them over to the peace, and will not suffer them to wrong their neighbour; and can cheating, over-reaching oppression follow a saint’s hand?  Except your righteousness exceeds their best, you are not Christians.  And can you let them exceed you in those things, which, when they are done, leave them short of Christ and heaven?  It is time for the scholar to throw off his gown, and dis­claim the name of an academic, when every school-boy is able to dunce and pose him; and for him also to lay aside his profession, and let the world know what he is, yea, what he never was, who can let a mere civil man, with his weak bow only backed with moral principles, outshoot him that pretends to Christ and his grace.  I confess it sometimes so falls out, that a saint under a temptation may be outstripped by one that is carnal in a particular case; as a lackey, that is an excellent footman, may, from some prick or pres­ent lameness in his foot, be left behind by one that at another time should not be able to come near him. We have too many sorrowful examples of moral men’s outstripping even a saint at a time, when under a temptation.  A notable passage we meet with con­cerning Abimelech’s speech to Sarah, after her dissembling and equivocating speech, that Abraham was her brother.  ‘And unto Sarah he said’—that is, Abimelech said to her—‘Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver; behold, he is to thee a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with thee, and with all other,’ Gen. 20:16. 

Now mark the words which follow. ‘Thus she was reproved.’  How? where lies the reproof.  Here are none but good words, and money to boot also.  He promiseth protection to her and Abraham—none should wrong him in wronging her—and tells her what he had freely given Abraham. Well, for all this, we shall find sharp reproof, though lapped up in these sweet words, and silvered over with his thousand pieces.  First. She was reproved by the uprightness of Abimelech in that business wherein she had sinfully dissembled.  That he who was a stranger to the true God and his worship, should be so square and honest, as to deliver her up untouched, when once he knew her to be another man’s wife, and not only so, but instead of falling into a passion of anger, and taking up thoughts of revenge against them, for putting this cheat upon him—which, having them under his power, had not been strange for a prince, to have done—for him to forget all this, and rather show such kindness and high bounty to them, this must needs send a sharp reproof home to Sarah’s heart.  Especially it must, considering that he a heathen did all this; and she—one called to the knowledge of God, in covenant with God, and the wife of a prophet—was so poor-spirited, as, for fear of a danger which only her husband, and that without any great ground, surmised, to commit two sins at one clap—dissemble, and also hazard the loss of her chastity.  The less of the two was worse than the thing they were so afraid of.  These things, I say, laid to­gether, amounted to such a reproof, as no doubt made her, and Abraham too, heartily ashamed before God and man.  

Again, Abimelech in calling Abraham her ‘brother,’ not her husband, did give her a smart rebuke, putting her in mind how with that word he had been deceived by them.  Thus godly Sarah was reproved by a profane king.  O Christians, take heed of putting words into the mouths of wicked men to reprove you withal!  They cannot reprove you, but they reproach God.  Christ is put to shame with you and by you.  For the good name’s sake of Christ —which cannot but be dearer to you, if saints, than your lives—look to your walking, and especially to your civil converse with the men of the world.  They know not what you do in your closet, care not what you are in the congregation, they judge you by what you are when they have to do with you.  As they find you in your shop, bargains, promises, and such like, so they think of you and your profession.  Labour therefore for this uprightness to man; by this you may win some, and judge others.  Better vex the wicked world with strict walking, as Lot did the Sodomites, than set them on work to mock, and reproach thee and thy profession by any scandal, as David did by his sad fall.  They that will not follow the light of thy holiness, will soon spy the thief in thy candle, and point at it.

           2. Caution.  The second word of caution is to those that are morally upright and no more.  Take heed this uprightness proves not a snare to thee, and keeps thee from getting evangelical uprightness.  I am sure it was so to the young man in the gospel.  In all likelihood he might have been better, had he not been so good.  His honesty and moral uprightness were his undoing, or rather his conceit of them, to castle him­self in them.  Better he had been a publican, driven to Christ in the sense of his sin, than a Pharisee kept from him with an opinion of his integrity.  These, these are the weeds, with which, many, thinking to save themselves by them, keep themselves under water to their perdition.  ‘There is more hope of a fool,’ Solomon tells us, ‘than of one wise in his own conceit;’ and of the greatest sinner, than of one con­ceited of his righteousness.  If once the disease take the brain, the cure must needs be the more difficult. No offering Christ to one in this frenzy.  Art thou one kept from these unrighteous ways wherein others walk?  May be thou art honest and upright in thy course, and scornest to be found false in any of thy dealings.  Bless God for it; but take heed of blessing thyself in it.  There is the danger.  This is one way of being ‘righteous overmuch’—a dangerous pit, of which Solomon warns all that travel in heaven road, Ecc. 7:16.  There is undoing in this overdoing, as well as in any underdoing.  For so it follows in the same verse, ‘why shouldst thou destroy thyself?’  Thou art not, proud man, so fair for heaven as thou flatterest thyself.  A man upon the top of one hill may seem very nigh to the top of another, and yet can never come there, except he comes down from that where he is.  The mount of thy civil righteousness and moral uprightness, on which thou standest so confidently, seems perhaps level in thy proud eye to God’s holy hill in heaven; yea, so nigh that thou thinkest to step over from one to the other with ease.  But let me tell thee, it is too great a stride for thee to take.  

Thy safer way and nearer, were to come down from thy moun­tain of self-confidence—where Satan hath set thee on a design to break thy neck—and to go thy ordinary road, in which all that ever got heaven went.  And that way is just by labouring to get an interest in Christ and his righteousness—which is provided on purpose for the creature to wrap up his naked soul in, and to place his faith on; and thus thy uprightness, which before was but of the same form with the heathen’s moral honesty, may commence, or rather be baptized Christian, and become evangelical grace. But let me tell thee this before I dismiss thee, that thou canst not lay hold of Christ’s righteousness till thou hast let fall the lie—thy own righteousness —which hitherto thou hast held so fast in thy right hand.  When Christ called the ‘blind man’ to him, it is said that ‘He, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus,’ Mark 10:50.  Do thou so, and then come and welcome.

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Sincerity or truth of heart in all our ways covers all the Christian’s uncomeliness.  In handling this point, this is our method: First. We shall inquire, which is the truth and sincerity that covers the Christian’s uncomeliness.  Second. We shall inquire, what uncomelinesses they are that sincerity covers. Third. How sincerity covers them.  Fourth. Why sincerity doth this; or some account given for all this.

What is the truth which covers the Christian’s uncomeliness.

           First Inquiry. Which is that truth and sincerity that covers all uncomelinesses and deficiencies in the Christian.  Here we must distinguish of a twofold sincerity, one moral, another evangelical.

           [Moral truth and uprightness.]

           First kind of sincerity. There is a moral truth, and uprightness, which we may call a field flower, because it may be found growing in the wild and waste of nature.  It cannot be denied, but one that hath not a dram of sanctifying saving grace, may show some kind of uprightness and truth in his actions. God himself comes in as a witness for Abimelech, that what he did in taking Sarah, was in the uprightness of his heart: ‘I know,’ saith God, ‘that thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart,’ Gen. 20:6, that is, thou didst mean honestly as to this particular business, and didst not intend any wrong to Abraham, whose wife she was unknown to thee.  Joab, though a bloody man, yet dealt very uprightly and squarely with David concerning the rendition of Rabbah, when he had a fair advantage of stealing away the honour from his prince to himself.  Many such instances may be given of men that have been great strangers to a work of grace on their hearts; but this is not the uprightness that we mean in the point laid down.  It doth indeed render a person very lovely and amiable before men to be thus upright and honest in his dealings; but methinks I hear the Lord saying concerning such, as once he did to Samuel of Eliab, ‘Look not on their countenance,’  so as to think [that] these are they which he accepts.  No, he hath refused them; ‘for the Lord seeth not as man seeth,’ God’s eye looks deeper than man’s, I Sam. 16:7.  There are two great defects in this uprightness which God rejects it for.

1. Defect. It grow, not from a good root—a re­newed heart.  This is a hair on the moral man’s pen, which blurs and blots his copy, when he writes fairest. It is like the leprosy to Naaman; that same ‘but he was a leper,’ took away the honour of his greatness at court, and [of his] prowess in the field.  So here it stains the fairest actions of a mere moral man—‘But he is a Christless, graceless person.’  The uprightness of such does others more good in this world than themselves in another.  They are by this moral hon­esty profitable to those that have civil commerce with them; but it doth not render themselves acceptable to God.  Indeed, had not God left some authority in conscience to awe and keep men, that have no grace, within some bounds of honesty, this world would have been no more habitable for the saints, than the forest of wild beasts is now for man.  And such is the uprightness of men void of sanctifying grace.  They are rather rid by an overpowering light of conscience that scares them, than sweetly led by an inward prin­ciple inclining them to take complacency in that which is good.  Abimelech himself—for whom, as we heard, God so apologized—is yet let to know that his honesty in that matter came rather from God’s re­straint upon him, than any real goodness in him.  I also withheld thee from sinning against me; therefore suffered I thee not to touch her, Gen. 20:6.
2. Defect. This moral uprightness falls short of the chief end indispensably necessary to make a per­son upright indeed.  This is ‘the glory of God,’ I Cor. 10:31.  ‘Whatever ye do, do all to the glory of God.’ The archer may lose his game by shooting short, as well as by shooting wide.  The gross hypocrite shoots wide, the uprightest moralist shoots short.  He may, and oft doth, take his aim right as to the particular and immediate end of his action, but ever fails in regard of the ultimate end.  Thus, a servant may be faithful to his master, scorn to wrong him of a farth­ing, yea, cordially seek his master’s profit; and yet God may not be looked at or thought of in all this, and so all is worth nothing, because God, who is prin­cipally to be regarded, is left out of the story.  Ser­vants are commanded to do their ‘service as to the Lord and not to men,’ that is, not only, not chiefly to man, Eph. 6:7.  It is true, the master is to be looked at in the servant’s duty, but in this way, only as it leads to the glory of God.  He must not, when he hath de­sired to please his earthly master, sit down as at his journey’s end, but pass on—as the eye doth through the air and clouds to the sun where it is terminated —to God, as the chief end why he is dutiful and faithful to man.  Now no principle can lead the soul so high as to aim at God, but that which comes from God.  See both these excellently couched together. ‘That ye may be sincere,…being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God,’ Php. 1:10, 11.  Where you may observe: (1.) That the sincerity of the right stamp, is that which brings forth fruits of righteousness to the praise of God, that is, where the glory of God is the end of all our actions.  (2.) That such fruit cannot be borne, but ‘by Christ.’  The soul must be planted into Christ, before it can be thus sincere, to bear fruits of righteousness to the praise of God.  Hence these fruits of righteousness are said to be ‘by Jesus Christ.’ What men do by themselves, they do for themselves. They eat their own fruit, devour the praise of what they do.  The Christian only that doth all by Christ, doth all for Christ.  He hath his sap from Christ, into whom he is graffed, that makes him fruitful; and therefore he reserves all the fruit he bears for him. Thus we see how this mortal uprightness is itself fundamentally defective, and therefore cannot be that girdle which hides and covers our other defects.  Yet before I pass on to the other, I would leave a twofold caution for improvement of what hath been said con­cerning this uprightness.  The one is to the sincere Christian, the other is to such as have no more than a moral uprightness.