DIRECTIONS to believers for the preserving of faith 1/4

  First Direction.  That which was instrumental to beget thy faith will be helpful to preserve it—I mean the word of God.  As it was seed for the former pur­pose in thy conversion, so now it is milk for the present sustentation of thy faith.  Lie sucking at this breast, and that often.  Children cannot suck long, nor digest much at a time, and therefore need the more frequent returns of their meals.  Such children are all believers in this world.  ‘Precept’ must be ‘upon precept, line upon line, here a little, and there a little.’  The breast [must be] often drawn out for the nourishing of them up in their spiritual life, or else they cannot subsist.  It was not ordinary that Moses should look so well as he did after he had fasted so long, Ex. 34:28, 29.  And truly it is a miraculous faith they must have who will undertake to keep their faith alive without taking any spiritual repast from the word.  I have heard of some children that have been taken from their mother’s breast as soon almost as born, and brought up by hand, who yet have done well for their natural life.  But I shall not believe a creature can thrive in his spiritual life, who cast off ordinances, and weans himself from the word, till I hear of some other way of provision that God hath made for the ordinary maintenance of it besides this; and I despair of living so long as to see this proved. I know some, that we may hope well of, have been for a time persuaded to turn their backs on the word and ordinances; but they have turned well hunger-bit to their old fare again, yea, with Naomi's bitter com­plaint in their mouths, ‘I went out full, and the Lord hath brought me home again empty,’ Ruth 1:21.  And happy are them that they are come to their stomachs in this life, before this food be taken off the table, never more to be set on.  He that taught Christians to pray for their daily bread, did suppose they had need of it; and surely he did not mean only or chiefly corporal bread, who, in the same chapter bids them, ‘But seek ye first the kingdom of God,’ Matt. 6:33. Well, Christian, prize thou the word, fed savourily on the word, whether it be dished forth in a sermon at the public, or in a conference with some Christian friend in private, or in a more secret duty of reading and meditation by thy solitary self.  Let none of these be disused, or carnally used, by thee, and with God’s blessing thou shalt reap the benefit of it in thy faith. When thy stomach fails to the word, thy faith must needs begin to fail on the word.  O that Christians, who are so much in complaints of their weak faith, would but turn their complaints into inquiries why it is so weak and declining!  Is it not because faith hath missed its wonted meals from the word?  Thou, hap­ly, formerly broken through many straits to keep thy acquaintance with God in his word, and wert well paid for that time which thou didst borrow of thy other occasions for this end, by that sweet temper that thou foundest thy heart in to trust God and rely upon him in all conditions; but now, since thou hast dis­continued thy acquaintance with God in those ordin­ances, thou perceivest a sad change.  Where thou couldst have trusted God, now thou art suspicious of him.  Those promises that were able in a mutiny and hubbub of thy unruly passions, to have hushed and quieted all in thy soul at their appearing in thy thoughts, have now, alas! but little authority over thy murmuring unbelieving heart, to keep it in any toler­able order.  If it be thus with thee, poor soul, thy case is sad; and I cannot give thee better counsel for thy soul, than that which physicians give men in a consumption for their bodies.  They ask them where they were born and bred up, and to that their native air they send them, as the best means to recover them. Thus, soul, let me ask thee, if thou ever hadst faith, where it was born and bred up? was it not in the sweet air of ordinances, hearing, meditating, conferring of the word, and praying over the word?  Go, poor creature, and get thee as fast as thou canst into thy native air, where thou didst draw thy first Chris­tian breath, and where thy faith did so thrive and grow for a time.  No means more hopeful to set thy feeble faith on its legs again than this