Four characters of truth of heart or sincerity 3/5

(b) The true heart shows its plain-dealing with itself, as in searching, so in judging itself, when once testimony comes in clear against it, and conscience tells it, ‘Soul, in this duty thou betrayedst pride, in that affection, frowardness and impatience.’  Such a one is not long before it proceeds to judgment, and this it doth with so much vehemency and severity, that it plainly appears zeal for God—whom he hath dishonoured—makes him forget all self-pity.  He lays about him in humbling and abasing himself, as the sons of Levi in executing justice on their brethren who knew ‘neither brother nor sister’ in that act. Truly such an heroic act is this of the sincere soul judging itself.  He is so transported and clothed with a holy fury against his sin, that he is deaf to the cry of flesh and blood, which would move him to think of a more favourable sentence.  ‘I have sinned,’ saith David, ‘against the Lord,’ II Sam. 12:13; in another place, ‘I have sinned greatly, and done very foolishly,’ II Sam. 24; in a third, he, as unworthy of a man’s name, takes beast to himself—‘so foolish was I, and ignor­ant: I was as a beast before thee,’ Ps. 73:22.  But with a false heart—if conscience checks him for this or that, and he perceives by this inward murmur in his bosom which way the cause will go, if he proceeds fairly on to put himself upon the trial—the court is sure to be broken up, and all put off to another hearing, which is like to be at leisure; so that, as witnesses, with delays and many put-offs, grow at last weary of the work, and will rather stay at home than make their appearance to little purpose, so conscience ceaseth to give evidence where it cannot be heard, can have no judgment against the offender.

(2.) Particular.  A true heart is plain as with itself so with God also.  Several ways this might appear. Take one for all; and that is in his petitions and requests at the throne of grace.  The hypocrite in prayer juggles, he asks what he would not thank God to give him.  There is a mystery of iniquity in his praying against iniquity.  Now this will appear in two particu­lars, whether we be plain-hearted or not.

(a) Observe whether thou beest deeply afflicted in spirit when thy request is not answered, or regard­est not what success it hath.  Suppose it be a sin thou prayest against, or some grace thou prayest for; what is thy temper all the while thy messenger stays, especially if it be long?  Thou prayest, and corruption abates not, grace grows not.  Now thy hypocrisy or sincerity will appear.  If thou art sincere, every moment will be an hour, every hour a day, a day a year, till thou hearest some news from heaven.  ‘Hope deferred’ will make ‘the heart sick.’  Doth not the sick man that sends for the physician think long for his coming?  O he is afraid his messenger should miss of him, or that he will not come with him, or that he shall die before he bring his physic.  A thousand fears disturb him, and make him passionately wish he were there.  Thus the sincere soul passeth those hours with a sad heart that it lives without a return of its request. ‘I am a woman,’ said Hannah to Eli, ‘of a sorrowful spirit,’ I Sam. 1:15.  And why so?  Alas, she had from year to year prayed to God, and no answer was yet come.  Thus saith the soul, ‘I am one of a bitter spirit, I have prayed for a soft heart, a believing heart, many a day and month; but it is not come.  I am afraid I was not sincere in the business.  Could my request so long have hung in the clouds else?’  Such a soul is full of fear and troubles—like a merchant that hath a rich ship at sea, who cannot sleep on land till he sees her, or hears of her.  But if, when thou hast sent up thy prayer, thou canst cast off the care and thoughts of the business, as if praying were only like children’s scribbling over pieces of paper—which when they have done, they lay aside and think no more of them—if thou canst take denials at God’s hands for such things as these, and blank no more than a cold suitor doth when he hears not from her whom he never really loved—it breaks not thy rest, embitters not thy joy—if so, a false heart set thee on work.  And take heed that, instead of answering thy prayer, God doth not answer the secret desire of thy heart, which should he do, thou art undone for ever.

(b) Observe whether thou usest the means to obtain that which thou prayest God to give.  A false heart sits still itself, while it sets God on work; like him that, when his cart was set in a slough, cried, Jupiter, help! but would not put his own shoulder to the wheel.  If corruptions may be mortified and killed for him, as Goliath was for the Israelites—he like them looking on, and not put to strike stroke—so it is; but for any encounter with them, or putting himself to the trouble of using any means to obtain the victory, he is so eaten up with sloth and coward­ice, that it is as grievous he thinks, as to sit still in slavery and bondage to them.  But a sincere soul is conscientiously laborious.  ‘Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens,’ Lam. 3:41. That is, saith Bernard, oremus et laboremus—let us pray and use the endeavour.  The hypocrite’s tongue wags, but the sincere soul’s feet walk, and his hands work.

(3.) Particular. The sincere soul discovers its plainness and simplicity to men.  ‘We have had our conversation’ among you, saith Paul to the Corinth­ians, ‘in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom.’  The Christian is one that cannot subject his heart to his head—his conscience to his policy. He commits himself to God in well-doing, and fears not others, if he be not conscious to himself; and therefore he dares not make a hole in his conscience to keep his skin whole, but freely and openly vouch­eth God without dissembling his profession; while the hypocrite shifts his sails, and puts forth such colours as his policy and worldly interest adviseth.  If the coast be clear, and no danger at hand, he will appear religious as any; but no sooner he makes discovery of any hazard it may put him to, but he tacks about, and shapes another course, making no bones of juggling with God and man.  He counts that his right road which leads to his temporal safety. But quite contrary is the upright, ‘The highway of the upright is to depart from evil,’ Prov. 16:17.  This is the road that this true traveler jogs on in, and if he be at any time seen out of it, it is upon no other account, than a man that hath unwillingly lost his way—never quiet till he hath strike into it again.

Four characters of truth of heart or sincerity 2/5

2. Character.  A sincere heart is a plain heart, a simple heart, sine plicis—a heart without folds.  The hypocrite is of the serpent’s brood.  He can, as the serpent, shrink up, or let himself out for his advantage—unwilling to expose himself much to the knowledge of others.  And he has reason to do so. For he knows he hath most credit where he is least known.  The hypocrite is one that ‘seeks deep to hide his counsel,’ Isa. 29:15; ‘their heart is deep,’ Ps. 64:6; their meaning and intent of heart lies nobody knows how far distant from their words.  A sincere heart is like a clear stream in a brook; you may see to the bottom of his plots in his words, and take the measure of his heart by his tongue.  I have heard say that diseases of the heart are seen in spots of the tongue, but the hypocrite can show a clear tongue and yet have a foul heart.  He that made that proverb, loquere ut te videam—speak that I may see you, did not think of the hypocrite, who will speak that you shall not see him.  The thickest clouds that he hath to wrap up his villany in, are his religious tongue and sandy profession.  Wouldst thou know whether thou hast a true heart in thy bosom? look if thou hast a plain-dealing heart.  See them joined, II Cor. 1:12, for Paul and the rest of the faithful messengers of Christ, had their conversation among the Corinthians ‘in simplicity and godly sincerity.’  They had no close box in the cabinet of their hearts, in which they cunningly kept anything concealed from them of their designs, as the false apostles did.  Now this plain dealing of the sincere heart appears in these three particulars.

(1.) Particular. A sincere heart deals plainly with itself, and that in two things chiefly.

(a) In searching and ransacking its own self.  This it doth to its utmost skill and power.  It will not be put off with pretenses, or such a mannerly excuse as Rachel gave Laban, when at the same time she sat brooding on his idols.  No, an account it will have of the soul, and that such a one as may enable it to give a good account to God, upon whose warrant it does its office.  O the fear which such a one shows lest any lust should escape its eye, and lie hid, as Saul in the stuff; or that any, the least grace of God, should be trodden on regardlessly by belying ir denying it! When David found his thoughts of God, which used to recreate him, and be his most pleasing company, occasion some trouble in his spirit—‘I remembered God, and was troubled,’ Ps. 77:3—this holy man, wondering what the matter should be, do but see what a privy search he makes.  He hunts backwards and forwards, what God's former dealings had been, and ‘communes with his heart, and makes diligent search’ there, ver. 6; never gives over till he brings it to an issue; and finding the disturber of his peace to be in himself, he is not so tender of his reputation as to think of smothering the business or smoothing it over, but attacks the thief, indicts his sin, and confesseth the fact, to the justifying of God, whom before he had hard thoughts of.  ‘And I said, This is my infirmity,’ ver. 10; as if he had said, ‘Lord, now I see the Jonas that caused the storm in my bosom, and made me uncomfortable in my affliction all this while; it is this unbelief of mine that bowed me down to attend so to the sorrow and sense of my present affliction, that it would not suffer me to look up to former experiences, and so, while I forgat them, I thought unworthily of thee.’  Here was an honest plain-dealing soul indeed.  What akin art thou, O man, to holy David? is this thy way in of searching thy soul? dost thou do it in earnest, as if thou wert searching for a murderer hid in thy house; as willing to find out thy sin, as ever Papist in Queen Mary’s days was to find Protestants—to discover whom they would run their swords and forks into beds and hay­mows, lest they should be there?  Or, when thou goest about this work, art thou loath to look too far, lest thou shouldst see what thou wouldst willingly overlook? or afraid to stay too long, lest conscience should make an unpleasing report to thee?  

Tertul­lian said of the heathen persecutors, noluerunt audire, quod auditum damnare non possint—they would not let the Christians be heard, because they could not then easily have had the face to condemn them, their cause would have appeared so just.  The contrary here is true.  The hypocrite dares not put his state upon a fair trial, because then he could not handsomely escape condemning himself.  But the sincere soul is so zealous to know its true state, that when he hath done his utmost himself to find it out, and his conscience upon this privy search clears him, yet he contents not himself here; but jealous lest self-love might blind his eyes, and occasion too favourable a report from his conscience, he calls in help from heaven, and puts himself upon God's review.  ‘Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? Ps. 139:21. His own conscience answers to it: ‘I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies,’ ver. 22. Yet David, not wholly satisfied with his own single testimony, calls out to God, ‘Search me, O God, and know my heart;...see if there be any wicked way in me,’ ver. 23,24.  And wise physicians will not trust their own judgments about the state of their own health; nor sincere Christians themselves about their souls’ welfare.  It is God that they attend to.  His judgment alone concludes and determines them.  When they have prayed and opened their case to him, with David, they listen what he will say.  Therefore you shall find them putting themselves under the most searching ministry, from which they never come more pleased than when their consciences are stripped naked, and their hearts exposed to their view; as the woman of Samaria, who commended the sermon, and Christ that preached it, for this unto her neighbours, that he had told her all that ever she had done, John 4:29.  Whereas a false heart like not to hear of that ear.  He thinks the preacher commits a trespass when he comes upon his ground, and comes up close to his conscience; as if he could, he would have an action against him for it.  This stuck in Herod's stomach, that John should lay his finger on his sore place. Though he feared him, being conscious, yet he never loved him, and therefore was soon persuaded to cut off his head, which had so bold a tongue in it, that durst reprove his incestuous bed.

Four characters of truth of heart or sincerity 1/5

GUYS I AM SO SORRY....

My son was on his third brain surgery because his brain cancer came back  third time.  So, life as we know it has been a blurr for me. With the cancer coming back the third time, I can see changes in his behavior toward our Lord. So, please pray that God would open his eyes and soften his heart. Pray for repentance, pray for understanding and pray for salvation. Thanks so much for understanding.

Third.  I will lay down such positive discoveries of sincerity as no hypocrite ever did or can reach to. Having broken the flattering glasses wherein hypo­crites use to look, till they fall in love with their own painted faces, and conceit themselves sincere; as also those which disfigure the sweet countenance and natural beauty of the sincere soul, so as to make it bring the grace of God which shines on it into question; I now proceed to draw a few lineaments, and lay down some undoubted characters of this truth of heart, and godly sincerity, whereby we may have the better advantage of stating to everyone his own condition.

1. Character.  A sincere heart is a new heart.  Hypo­crisy is called ‘the old leaven;’ ‘purge out there­fore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump,’ I Cor. 5:7.  Dough once soured with leaven, will never lose the taste of it.  Neither will corrupt nature cease to be hypocritical, till it cease to be corrupt nature.  Either the heart must be made new, or it will have its old quality.  There may be some art used to conceal it, and take away its unsavouriness from others, for a while, as flowers and perfumes cast about a rotten carcass may do its scent; yet both the rotten carcass and the corrupt heart remain the same.  They say of the peacock, that roast him as much as you will, yet his flesh, when cold, will be raw again.  Truly, thus let a carnal heart do what it please—force upon itself never such a high strain of seeming piety, so that it appears fire-hot with zeal, yet stay a little, and it will come to its old complexion, and discover itself to be but what it was, naught and false.  ‘One heart,’ and a ‘new heart,’ both are covenant mercies, yea, so promised, that the ‘new’ is promised in order to the making of the heart ‘one:’ ‘And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart,’ &c. Eze. 11:19.  God prom­iseth he will give them one spirit, that is a sincere spirit to God and man; contrary to a divided heart, a heart and a heart, the mark of hypocrisy.  But how will he give it?  He tell them, ‘I will give you a new spirit,’ and how will he do that?  ‘I will take away the heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh;’ upon which words one very well thus glosseth, ‘I will give you one heart; which that I may so do, I will cast it anew; and that I may do this also, I will melt and soften it; as one that having many pieces of old silver, or plate lying by him, which he intends to put into one bowl, first resolves to cast it anew, and to that end throws it into the fire to melt, and so at last shuts up all in one piece.’  Indeed, by nature man’s heart is a very divided and broken thing, scattered and parcel­led out, a piece to this creature, and a piece to that lust.  One while, this vanity hires him, as Leah did Jacob of Rachel; anon, when he hath done some drudgery for that, he lets himself out to another. Thus divided is man and his affections.  Now, the elect —whom God hath decreed to be vessels of honour, consecrated for his holy use and service—he throws into the fire of his word, that, being there softened and melted, he may by his transforming Spirit cast them anew, as it were, into a holy oneness; so that he who was before divided from God, and lost among the creatures and his lusts, that shared him among them, hath now his heart gathered in from them all to God. It looks with a single eye on God and acts for him in all it doth.  If therefore thou wouldst know whether thy heart be sincere, inquire whether it be thus made new.

           Hath God thrown thee into his furnace? did ever his word, like fire, take hold upon thee, so as to soften thy hard heart and melt thy drossy spirit, [so] that thou now seest that desperate hypocrisy. pride, unbelief, and the like, which before lay hid like dross in the metal, before the fire finds it out? and not only seest it [hypocrisy, &c.], but seest it sever and separ­ate from thy soul, [in such a way] that thou who be­fore didst bless thyself as in a good condition, now bewailest thy folly for it, heartily confessing what an unsavoury creature thou wert to God in all thou didst. The things which appeared so gaudy and fair in thy eye—thy civil righteousness, keeping thy church, slub­bering over a few duties in thy family—that for them thou thoughtest heaven was, as it were, in mortgage to thee; dost now lament to think how thou didst mock God with these hypocritical pageants abroad, while thy lusts were entertained within doors in thy bosom, there sucking the heart-blood of thy dearest affections?  In a word, canst thou say that thou art not only melted into sorrow for these, but that thou findest thy heart, which was so divided and distracted betwixt lusts and creatures now united to fear the name of God?  Hast thou but one design—that, above all, thou pursuest, and that, viz. to approve thyself to God, though with the displeasing of all be­side? one love—how thou mayest love Christ, and be beloved of him.  If the streams of thy affections be thus, by the mighty power of God renewing thee, gathered into this one channel, and with a sweet violence running this way, then blessed art thou of the Lord.  

Thou art the sincere soul in his account, though much corruption be found in thee still, that is royling thy stream, and endeavouring to stop the free course of thy soul God-wards.  This may put thee to some trouble.  As the mountains and rocks do the river water running to the sea, causing some windings and turnings in its course, which else would go the nearest way, even in a direct line to it; so thy re­maining corruptions may now and then put thee out of thy way of obedience.  But sincerity will, like the water, go on its journey for all this, and never leave till it bring thee, though with some compass, to thy God, whom thou hast so imprinted in thy heart, as that he can never be forgot by thee.  But if thou never hadst the hypocrisy of thy heart thus discovered and made hateful to thee, nor a new principle put into thy bosom, to turn the tide of thy soul contrary to the natural fall of thy affections; only thou, from the good opinion which thou hast of thyself—because of some petty flourishes thou makest in profession—takest it for granted thou art sincere, and thy heart true; I dare pronounce thee an unclean hypocrite.  The world may saint thee, possibly, but thou wilt never, as thou art, be so in God's account.  When thou has tricked and spruced up thyself never so finely, into the fashion of a Christian, still thou wilt have but a saint’s face, and a hypocrite’s heart.  It is no matter what is the sign, though an angel, that hangs without, if the devil and sin dwell within.  New trimmings on an old garment will not make it new, they only give it a new look.  And truly it is no good husbandry to bestow a great deal of cost in fining up an old suit that will drop in a while to tatters and rags, when a little more might purchase a new one that is lasting.  And is it not better to labour to get a new heart, that all thou doest may be accepted and thou saved, than to loose all the pains thou takest in religion, and thyself also, for want of it?

SECOND APPLICATION: The grounds on which a weak Christian argues against his own uprightness, and their falsity 3/3

To apply the first—

           (1.) We must distinguish between conscience proceeding by a right rule in its judgment, and con­science proceeding by a false rule.  Then conscience proceeds by a right rule, when it grounds its charge upon the word of God; for, being but an under officer, it is bound up to a law by which it must proceed.  And that can be no other than what God appoints it, who gives it commission, and puts it in office.  And that is the word of God, and that only. So that we are to give credit to our conscience’s com­manding or forbidding, condemning or acquitting us, when it can show its warrant from the word of God for these; otherwise, as subjects that are wronged in an inferior court and cannot have justice there, may appeal higher, so may and ought we, from conscience, to the word of God.  And you must know conscience is a faculty that is corrupted as much as any other by nature, and is very oft made use of by Satan to deceive both good and bad, godly and ungodly.  Many that now {know?} their consciences, they say, speak peace to them, will be found merely cheated and gulled when the books shall be opened.  No such dis­charge will then be found entered in the book of the word, as conscience hath put into their hand.  And many gracious souls, who passed their days in a continual fear of their spiritual state, and were kept chained in the dark dungeon of a troublesome con­science, shall then be acquitted, and have their action against Satan for false imprisonment, and abusing their consciences to the disturbing their peace.  And now let me ask thee, poor soul, who sayest thy con­science checks thee for a hypocrite, art thou a con­victed hypocrite by the word?  Doth conscience show thee a word rom Christ’s law that proves thee so? or rather, doth not Satan abuse thy own fearfulness, and play upon the tenderness of thy spirit, which is so deeply possessed with the sense of thy sins, that thou art ready to believe any motion in thee that tells any evil of thee?  I am sure it is oft so.  The fears and checks which some poor souls have in their bosoms, are like those reports that are now and then raised of some great news, by such as have a mind to abuse the country.  A talk and murmur you shall have in every one’s mouth of it, but go about to follow it to the spring-head, and you can find no ground of it, or author of credit that will vouch it.  Thus here: —a bruit there is in the tempted Christian’s bosom, and a noise heard as it were continually whispering in his ears, ‘I am a hypocrite, my heart is naught; all I do is dissembling;’ but when the poor creature, in earnest, sets upon the search to find out the business—calls his soul to the bar, and falls to examine it upon those interrogatories which the word propounds for trial of our sincerity—he can fasten this charge from none of them all upon himself, and at last comes to find it but a false alarm of hell, given out to put him to some trouble and affrightment for the present, though not [to] hurt him in the end.  [It is] like the politician’s lie, which, though it be found false at last, yet doth them some service the time it is believed for true.  As one serious question, such as this, seriously put to a gross hypocrite. is able to make him speechless, viz. —What promise in all the Bible hast thou on thy side for thy salvation?—so it is enough to deliver the troubled soul from his fears of being a hypocrite, if he would but, as David, ask his soul a Scripture reason for his disquietments—‘Why art thou cast down, O my soul, and why art thou disquieted within me?’ The sincere soul hath firm ground for his faith at bottom, however a little dirt is cast by Satan over it, to make him afraid of venturing to set his foot on it. But we must also distinguish,

           (2.) We must distinguish between a conscience rightly informed, and a conscience misinformed.  A conscience may be regular, so as to choose the right rule, but not rightly informed how to use this rule in his particular case.  Indeed, in the saint's trouble of spirit, conscience is full of Scripture, sometimes, on which it grounds its verdict, but very ill interpreted; ‘O,’ saith the poor soul, ‘this place is against me:’—‘Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord im­puteth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile,’ Ps. 32:2.  ‘Here,’ saith he, ‘is a description of a sincere soul, to be one in whose spirit there is no guile.  But I find much guile in me.  Therefore I am not the sincere one.’  Now this is a very weak, yea, false inference.  By a spirit without guile, is not meant a person that hath not the least deceitfulness and hypocrisy remaining in his heart.  This is such a one, as none, since the fall, but Christ himself, was ever found, walking in mortal flesh.  To be without sin, and to be without guile, in this strict sense, are the same;—a prerogative here on earth peculiar to the Lord Christ; ‘who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth,’ I Peter 2:22.  And therefore, when we meet with the same phrase attributed to the saints —as to Levi, ‘Iniquity was not found in his lips,’ Mal. 2:6, and to Nathanael, ‘Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile,’ John 1:47—we must sense it in an inferior way, that may suit with their imperfect state here below, and not put that which only was Christ’s crown on earth, and is the glorified saint's robe in heaven, to wear on the weak Christian while militant on earth—not only with a devil without, but a body of sin within him.  Wipe thine eyes again, poor soul, and then, if thou readest such places wherein the Spirit of God speaks so highly and hyperbolically of his saints’ grace, thou shalt find he doth not assert the per­fection of their grace as free from all mixture of sin; but rather, to comfort poor drooping souls and cross their misgiving hearts—which from the presence of hypocrisy are ready to overlook their sincerity as none at all—he expresseth his high esteem of their little grace by speaking of it as if it were perfect, and their hypocrisy as none at all.  O Christian, thy God would have thee know that thou dost not more overlook thy little grace for fear of the hypocrisy thou findest mingled with it, than he doth thy great corruptions, for the dear love he bears to the little, yet true grace he sees amidst them.  Abraham loved and owned his kinsman Lot when a prisoner carried away by those heathen kings.  So does thy God [love and own] thy grace, [as] near in blood to him, when it is sadly yoked by the enemy in thy own bosom; and, for thy comfort know, when the book shall be opened, the word too, and also the judgment of thy own con­science in the great day of Christ.  Christ will be the interpreter of both.  Not the sense which thou hast in the distemper of thy troubled soul, when thou readest both with Satan’s gloss put upon them, shall stand; but what Christ shall say.  And to be sure he hath al­ready declared himself so great a friend to weak grace, when on earth, by his loving converse with his dis­ciples, and [the] free testimony he gave to his grace in them—when God knows they were but raw and weak Chris­tians, both as to their knowledge and practice —that, poor soul, thou needst not fear he will then and there condemn, what here he commended and so dearly embraced.  Yea, he that took most care for his little lambs how they might be used gently, when he was to go from them to heaven, will not be unkind himself to them, at his return, I warrant thee.

SECOND APPLICATION: The grounds on which a weak Christian argues against his own uprightness, and their falsity 2/3

3. False Ground.  ‘I fear,’ saith the poor soul, ‘I am a hypocrite, because I have such a divided heart in the duties I perform.  I cannot, for my life, enjoy any privacy with God in duty, but some base lust will be crowding into my thoughts when I am at prayer, hearing of the word, or meditating.  Now I am lift up with a self-applauding thought, anon cast down to the earth with a worldly thought.  What with one and another, little respite have I from such a company. And do such vermin breed anywhere but in the dung­hill of a false hypocritical heart?’

           Answer.  Woe were it to the best of saints, if the mere rising and stirring of such thoughts as these, or worse than these, did prove the heart unsound; take heed thou concludest not thy state therefore, from the presence of these in thee, but from the comportment and behaviour of thy heart towards them.  Answer therefore to these few interrogatories, and possibly thou mayest see thy sincerity through the mist these have raised in the soul.

           (1.) Interrogatory.  What friendly welcome have such thoughts with thee, when they present them­selves to thee in duty?  Are these the guests thou hast expected and trimmed thy room for?  Didst thou go to duty to meet those friends, or do they unmannerly break in upon thee, and forcibly carry thee—as Christ foretold of Peter in another case—whither thou wouldst not?  If so, why shouldst thou bring thy sincerity into dispute?  Dost thou not know the devil is a bold intruder, and dares come where he knows there is none will bid him sit down?  And that soul alone he can call his own house, where he finds rest, Luke 11:24.  Suppose in your family, as you are kneel­ing down to prayer, a company of roisters should stand under your window, and all the while you are praying, they should be roaring and hallooing, this could not but much disturb you; but would you from the disturbance they make, fall to question your sin­cerity in the duty?  Truly, it is all one whether the dis­turbance be in the room, or in the bosom, so the soul likes the one no more than he doth the other.

           (2.) Interrogatory.  Dost thou sit contented with this company, or use all the means thou canst to get rid of them, as soon as may be?  Sincerity cannot sit still to see such doings in the soul; but, as a faithful servant when thieves break into his master’s house, though [so] overpowered with their strength and mul­titude, that he cannot with his own hands thrust them out of doors, yet he will send out secretly for help, and raise the town upon them.  Prayer is the sincere soul's messenger.  It posts to heaven with full speed in this case; counting itself to be no other than in the belly of hell with Jonah, while it is yoked with such thoughts, and as glad when aid comes to rescue him out of their hands, as Lot was when Abraham re­covered him from the kings that had carried him away prisoner.

           Objection.  But may be thou wilt say, though thou darest not deny that thy cry is sent to heaven against them, yet thou hearest no news of thy prayer, but continuest still pestered with them as before, which increaseth thy fear that thy heart is naught, or else thy prayer would have been answered, and thou delivered from these inmates.

           Answer.  Paul might as well have said so when he besought the Lord thrice, but could not have thorn in the flesh plucked out, II Cor. 12:8.  He doth not by this show thee to be a hypocrite, but gives thee a fair advantage of proving thyself sincere—not much un­like his dealing with the Israelites, before whom he did not, as they expected, hastily drive out the na­tions, but left them as thorns in their sides.  And why?  Hear the reason from God's own mouth, ‘That through them I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the Lord to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it, or not,’ Judges 2:22.  Thus God leaves these corruptions in thee, to prove whether thou wilt at last fall in and be friends with them, or maintain the conflict with them, and continue praying against them; by which perseverance thou wilt prove thyself to be indeed upright.  A false heart will never do this.  He is soon answered that doth not cordially desire the thing he asks.  The hypocrite, when he prays against his corruption, goes of his conscience’s errand, not his will’s; just as a servant that doth not like the message his master sends him about, but dares not displease him, and therefore goes, and may be knocks at the man's door whither he is sent, yet very faintly—loath he should hear him.  All that he doth is that he may but bring a fair tale to his master, by saying he was there.  Even so prays the hypocrite, only to stop the mouth of his conscience with his flam, that he hath prayed against his lust.  Glad he is when it is over, and more glad that he returns re infectâ—the matter being unaccomplished.  Observe therefore the behaviour of thy heart in prayer, and judge thyself sincere, or not sincere, by that, not by the present success it hath.  God can take it kindly that thou askest what at present he thinks it better to deny than give.  Thou wouldst have all thy corrup­tions knocked down at one blow, and thy heart in a posture to do the work of thy God, without any stop or rub from lust within, or the devil without; wouldst thou not?  God highly approves of your zeal, as he did of David’s, who had a mind to build him a tem­ple; but as he thought not fit that the house should in David’s time be reared—reserving it for the peaceful reign of Solomon—so neither doth he, that this thy request should be granted in this life, having reserved this immunity as an especial part of the charter of the city that is above, which none but glorified saints, who are inhabitants there, enjoy.  He hath indeed taught us to pray, let thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven; but we must expect the full answer to it when we come there.  But learn therefore, poor soul, to take this denial as David did his.  Because God would not let him build the house in his days, he did not therefore question the love and favour of God, neither did he desist from preparing materials for it, but did what he might towards it, though he might not what he would.  Far be it from thee also, that thou shouldst for this either cast away thy confidence on God, or lay aside thy endeavour for God, in mortify­ing thy corruptions, and adding to the store thou hast at present of his graces, which, though now imperfect and unpolished, he will make use of in the heavenly building which he intends thee for, where all the broken pieces, as I may so say, of our weak graces shall be so improved by the power and wisdom of God, that they shall make up one glorious structure of perfect holiness, more to be admired by angels in heaven, for the rare workmanship of it, than Solo­mon’s temple was on earth by men when in its full glory.

4. False Ground.  ‘Oh but,’ saith the tempted soul, ‘I have sometimes inward checks from my own conscience that this duty I did hypocritically, and that, in that action, much falseness of heart dis­covered itself.  And if my heart condemn me, how can it be otherwise but I must needs be a hypocrite?’

           Answer.  I shall help to resolve this by laying down two distinctions, and applying them to the case in hand.  (1.) We must distinguish between conscience proceeding by a right rule in its judgment, and conscience proceeding by a false rule.  (2.) We must distinguish between a conscience that goes by a right rule, and is also rightly informed how to use it; and a conscience that judgeth by a right rule, but is not rightly informed in its use.

SECOND APPLICATION: The grounds on which a weak Christian argues against his own uprightness, and their falsity 1/3

           Second. I will lay down the grounds of the weak Christian’s fear for his being a hypocrite, and the weakness of them; in other words, the false grounds from which sincere souls do many times go about to prove themselves hypocrites, yea, for a while conclude they are such.

1. False Ground.  ‘Sure I am a hypocrite,’ saith the poor soul, ‘or else I should not be as I am.  God would not thus follow me on with one blow after another, and suffer Satan also to use me as he doth.’  This was the grand battery Job’s friends had against his sincerity, and sometimes Satan so far prevails as to make the sincere soul set it against his own breast, saying, much like him, ‘If God be with us, why is all this befallen us?’—if God be in us by his grace, why appears he against us?

           Answer. This fire into which God casts thee, proves thou hast dross, and if, because thou art held long in the furnace, thou shouldst say thou hadst much dross, I would not oppose; but how thou shouldst spell ‘hypocrite’ out of thy afflictions and troubles, I marvel.  The wicked indeed make much use of this argument to clap ‘hypocrite’ on them; but the Christian, methinks, should not use it against himself.  Though the barbarians presently gave their verdict upon sight of the viper on Paul’s hand, that he was ‘a murderer,’ yet Paul thought not worse of him­self for it.  Christian, give but the same counsel to thyself, when in affliction and temptation, that thou usest to do to thy fellow-brethren in the same con­dition, and thou wilt get out of this snare.  Darest thou think thy neighbour a hypocrite merely from the hand of God upon him?  No, I warrant thee, thou rather pitiest him, and helpest him to answer the doubts that arise in his spirit from this very argument. It would make one smile to see how handsomely and roundly a Christian can untie the knots and scruples of another, who afterward, when brought into the like condition, is gravelled with the same himself.  He that helped his friend over the stile is now unable to stride it himself.  God so orders things that we should need one another.  She that is midwife to others can­not well do that office to herself; nor he that is the messenger to bring peace to the spirit of another, able to speak it to his own.  The case is clear, Christian. Affliction cannot prove thee a hypocrite, which wert thou without altogether, thou mightest safer think thou wert a bastard.  The case, I say, is clear, but thy eyes are held for some further end God hath to bring about by thy affliction.  But may be thou wilt say, it is not simply the affliction makes thee think thus of thyself; but because thou art so long afflicted, and in the dark also, as to any sense of God's love in thy soul.  Thou hast no smiles from God's sweet coun­tenance to alleviate thy affliction, and if all were right, and thou a sincere child of God, would thy heavenly Father let thee lie groaning, and never look upon thee to lighten thy affliction with his sweet presence?  As to the first of these—the length of thy affliction.  I know no standard God hath set for to measure the length of his saints’ crosses by, and it becomes not us to make one ourselves.  This we do, when we thus limit his chastisements to time, that if they exceed the day we have writ down in our own thoughts—which is like to be short enough, if our hasty hearts may appoint—then we are hypocrites.  For the other; thou must know that God can, without any impeachment to his love, hide it for a while.  And truly he may take it very ill that his children, who have security given them for his loving them—besides the sensible manifestation of it to their souls—should call this in question, for not coming to visit them, and take them up in his arms when they would have him.  In a word, may be thy affliction comes in the nature of purging physic.  God may intend to evacuate some corruption by it, which endangers thy spiritual health and hinder thy thriving in godliness.  Now the manifestation of his love God may reserve, as physicians do their cordials, to be given when the physic is over.

2. False Ground.  ‘I fear I am a hypocrite,’ saith the tempted soul; ‘why else are there such decays and declensions to be found in me?  It is the character of the upright that he goes from strength to strength, but I go backward from strength to weakness.’  Some Christians—they are like those that we call close men in the world—if they lose anything in their trade, and all goes not as they would have it, we are sure to hear of that over and over again.  They speak of their losses in every company; but when they make a good market, and gains come in apace, they keep this to themselves—not forward to speak of them.  If Christians would be ingenuous, they should tell what they get as [well as] what they lose.  But to take it for granted that thou dost find a decay, and to direct our answer to it.

           Answer 1.  I grant it as true that the sincere soul grows stronger and stronger—but how?—even as the tree grows higher and bigger, which we know meets with a fall of the leaf, and winter, that for a while intermits its growth.  Thus the sincere soul may be put to a present stand by some temptation—as Peter, who was far from growing stronger when he fell from professing to denying Christ, from denying to swear­ing and cursing if he knew him.  Yet as the tree, when spring comes, revives and gains more in the summer than it loseth in the winter, so doth the sincere soul. Just as we see in Peter, whose grace that squatted in for a while came forth with such a force, shaking temptations, that no cruelty from men could drive it in ever after; [so will the sincere soul ever] end in settlement, according to the apostle’s prayer, ‘The God of all grace,...after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, established, strengthen, settle you,’ I Peter 5:10.

           Answer 2.  There is a great difference between the decay of a sincere soul and of a hypocrite.  The hypocrite declines out of an inward dislike of the ways of God.  Hence they are called ‘backsliders in heart,’ Prov. 14:14.  So long as they served his lust, and contributed any help to the obtaining his worldly interest, so long he had a seeming zeal; but the argument taken away, he begins to remit by degrees, till he comes to be key-cold, yea, as heartily sick of his profession as Ammon of Tamar.  When the hypocrite begins to fall, he goes apace.  Like a stone down the hill he knows no ground but the bottom.  Now speak freely, poor soul.  Darest thou say there is an inward dislike to the ways of God.  May be thou dost pray not with that heat and fervency which thou hast; but is it because thou dost not like the duty as formerly? Thou dost not hear the word with such joy; but dost thou not therefore hear it with more sorrow?  In a word, canst thou not say with the spouse, when thou sleepest thy ‘heart waketh,’ Song. 5:2; that is, thou art not pleased with thy present declining state, but heartily wishest thou wert out of it—as one that hath a great desire to rise and be at his work—his heart is awake—but is not able at present to shake off that sleep which binds him down.  This will clear thee from being a hypocrite.

SECOND APPLICATION: The grounds of a hypocrite’s profession and their falsities 2/2

3. False Ground.  ‘Sure,’ saith another, ‘I am not a hypocrite; for I perform secret duties in my closet. The hypocrite is nobody, except on the stage.  That is the brand of the hypocrite—he courts the world for its applause, and therefore does all abroad.’

           Answer.  Though the total neglect of secret du­ties in religion speaks a person to be a hypocrite, yet the per­forming of duties in secret will not demon­strate thee a sincere person.  Hypocrisy is in this like the frogs brought on Egypt.  No place was free of them, no, not their bed-chambers.  They crept into their most inward rooms.  And so doth hypocrisy into closet duties, as well as public.  Indeed, though the place be secret where such duties are performed, yet the matter may be so handled, and is by some hypo­crites, that they are not secret in their closets; like the hen that goes into a secret place to lay her egg, but by her cackling, tells all the house where she is, and what she is doing.  But where this is not, it is not enough; for we must not think but some hypocrites may and do spin a thread finer than other.  In all arts there are some exceed others, and so in this trade of hypocrisy. The gross hypocrite whose drift is to deceive others, his religion commonly is all without doors; but there is a hypocrite that labours to keep a fair quarter with himself, and is very desirous to make conscience on his side, to procure which, he will go to the utmost link of his chain, and do anything that may not sep­arate him and his beloved lusts.  Now secret prayer and other duties may be so performed, as that they shall not more prejudice a man's lusts than any other. It is not the sword, though very sharp, that kills, but the force that it is thrust withal.  Indeed, there are some secret duties, as examination of our hearts, trying of our ways, and serious meditation of the threatenings of the word against such sins as we find in our own bosoms, which with close application of them to ourselves would put sin hard to it.  But the hypocrite can lay this sword so easily and favourably on, that his lusts shall not cry ‘Oh!’ at it, therefore still there needs a melius inquirendum—a further search before thou canst come off.

4. False Ground.  ‘Sure I am not a hypocrite, for I do not only pray, and that in secret too, against my sins, but I also fight against them, yea, and that to good purpose, for I can show you the spoils of my vic­tories, that I have got over some of them.  There was a time I could not by the ale-house, but my lust bade me stand, and pulled me in; but now I thank God, I have got such a mastery of my drunken lust, that I can pass by without looking in.’

           Answer. It is good when thou dost say, and I wish all thy drunken neighbours could speak as much, that—when the magistrate will not, or cannot, spoil that drunken trade—they that keep those shops for the devil, might even shut up their windows for want of customers; but is it not pity that what is good should be marred in the doing?  Yet it is too common, and may be thy case.

1. Let me ask thee, how long it hath been thus with thee? Lusts, as to the actings I mean, are like agues, the fit is not always on, and yet the man not rid of his disease.  And some men’s lusts, like some agues, have not such quick returns as others.  The river does not move always one way.  Now it is com­ing, anon, falling water; and, though it doth not rise when it falls, yet it hath not lost its other motion. Now the tide of lust is up, and anon it is down, and the man recoils and seems to run from it; but it returns again upon him.  Who would have thought it to have seen Pharaoh in his mad fit again, that should have been with him in his good mood, when he bid Moses and the people go?  But alas! the man was not altered.  Thus, may be, when a strong occasion comes, this, like an easterly wind to some of our ports, will bring in the tide of thy lust so strongly, that thy soul that seemed as clear of thy lust as the naked sands are of water, will be in a few moments covered, and as deep under their waves as ever.  But the longer the banks have held, the better; yet, shouldst thou never more be drunk as to the outward fulfilling of the lust, would this not be enough to clear thee from being a hypocrite?  Therefore,
2. Let me ask thee what was the great motive to take thee off? That which keeps thee from the ale-house now, may be as bad, in some sense, as that which heretofore drew thee to it.  It is ordinary for one lust but to spoil another’s market.  He that should save his money from guzzling it down his throat, to lay in more finery on his back, what doth this man, but rob one lust to sacrifice it to another? Whether was it God or man, God or thy purse, God or thy pride, God or thy reputation, that knocked thee off?  If any but God prevailed with thee, hypo­crite is a name will better now become thee than when in the ale‑house.  Again, if God, what apprehen­sion of God were they that did it?  Some, the wrath of God for some particu­lar sin hath so shaked them, that, as one scared with an apparition in a room, cares not for lying there any more, so they dare not, at least for a long time, be acquainted with that practice again.  And as it is not the room but the apparition, that the one dislikes, so it is not the sin, but the wrath of God that haunts it, which the other flees from.  In a word, may be thou hast laid down this sinful practice; but didst thou hate it and love God, and so leave it?  Thou art become strange to one; have you not got acquaintance with another the room of it?  Thou hast laid down the commission of an evil; but hast thou taken up thy known duty?  He is a bad husbandman that drains his ground, and then neither sows nor plants it.  It is all one if it had been under water, as drained and not improved.  What if thou cease to do evil, if it were possible, and thou learnest not to do well?  It is not thy fields being clear of weeds, but fruitful in corn, that pays thy rent and brings thee in thy profit; nor thy not being drunk, unclean, or [guilty of] any other sin, but thy being holy, gracious, thy having faith unfeigned, pure love, and the other graces, which will prove thee sound, and bring in evidence for thy interest in Christ, and through him, in heaven.