Human Nature

Human Nature in its Fourfold State by Thomas Boston on this date of May 24th, 2004. We are moving to the section of the book called, How the Branches are Taken out of the Natural Stock and Engrafted into the Supernatural Stock. Section 4. I am to show how the branches are cut off from the natural stock, the first atom engrafted into the tree vine of Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks to the husbandman not to the branch it is cut off from its natural stock, and grafted into a new one. The sinner in his coming off from the first stock is passive, and neither can nor will come off from it of his own accord, but clings to it till almighty power make him to fall off. John 6.44 No man can come unto me except the Father which is sent me draw him. In chapter 5.40 You will not come to me that you might have life. The engrafted branches are God's husbandry. 1 Corinthians 3.9 The planting of the Lord. Isaiah 61.3 The ordinary means he makes use of in this work is the ministry of the word. 1 Corinthians 3.9 We are laborers together with God, but the efficacy thereof is holy from him, whatever the minister's parts or piety be. Verse 7 Neither is he that planteth anything, neither is he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase. The apostles preached to the Jews, yet the body of that people remained in infidelity. Romans 10.16 Who hath believed our report? Yea, Christ himself, who spoke as never man spake, says concerning the success of his own ministry, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for naught. Isaiah 49.4 The branches may be hacked by the preaching of the word, but the stroke will never go through till it be carried home by the omnipotent arm. However God's ordinary way is, by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. 1 Corinthians 1.21 The cutting off of the branch from the natural stock is performed by the pruning knife of the law in the hand of the Spirit of God. Galatians 2.19 For I through the law am dead to the law. It is by the bond of the covenant of works, as I said before, that we are knit to our natural stock. Therefore as a wife unwilling to be put away pleads and hangs by the marriage tie, so do men by the covenant of works. They hold by it, like a man who held a ship with his hands, and when one hand was cut off held it with the other, and when both were cut off held it with his teeth. This will appear from a distinct view of the Lord's works on men and bringing them off from the old stock, which now I offer in the following particulars first. When the Spirit of the Lord comes to deal with a person to bring him to Christ, he finds him in Laodicea's case, in a sound sleep of security, dreaming of heaven in the favor of God, though full of sin against the Holy One of Israel. Revelation 3.17 Thou knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. Therefore he darts in some beams of light into the dark soul and lets a man see that he has lost a man, if he turn not over a new leaf, and betake himself to a new course of life. Thus by the Spirit of the Lord, acting as a spirit of bondage, there is a criminal court erected in the man's breast, where he is arraigned, accused and condemned for breaking the law of God, convinced of sin and judgment. John 16.8 And now he can no longer sleep securely in his former course of life. This is the first stroke which the branch gets in order to cutting off. Secondly, hereupon the man forsakes his former profane courses, his lying, swearing, Sabbath-breaking, stealing, and such like practices, though they be dear to him as right eyes, he will rather quit them than ruin his soul. The ship is like to sink, and therefore he throws his goods overboard, that he himself may not perish. Now he begins to bless himself in his heart, and look joyfully on the evidences for heaven, thinking himself a better servant to God than many others. Luke 18.11 God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, and so on. But he soon gets another stroke with the acts of the law, showing him that it is only he that does what is written in the law that can be saved by it, and that his negative holiness is too scanty a covering from the storm of God's wrath. Thus, although his sins of commission only were heavy on him before, his sins of omission now crowd into his thoughts, attended with a train of law curses and vengeance. In each of the ten commands discharges thunder claps of wrath against him for his omitting required duties. Thirdly, upon this he turns to a positively holy course of life. He not only is not profane, but he performs religious duties. He prays, seeks the knowledge of the principles of religion, strictly observes the Lord's Day, and, like Herod, does many things and hears sermons gladly. In one word, there is a great conformity in his outward conversation to the letter of both tables of the law. There is a mighty change upon the man, which his neighbors cannot miss taking notice of. Hence he is cheerfully admitted by the godly into their society as a praying person, and can confer with them about religious matters. He ain't about soul exercises, which some are not acquainted with, and their good opinion of him confirms his good opinion of himself. This step in religion is fatal to many, who never get beyond it. But here the Lord gives the elect branch a further stroke. Conscience flies in the man's face for some wrong steps in his conversation, the neglect of some duty, or commission of some sin, which is a blot in his conversation. And then the flaming sword of the law appears again over his head, and a curse rings in his ears, for he that continueth not in all things written in the law to do them. Galatians 3.10 Fourthly, on this account he is obliged to seek another Saul for his sore. He goes to God, confesses his sin, seeks the pardon of it, promises to watch against it for the time to come. His soul finds ease, and thinks he may very well take it. See, in the Scripture it says, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. 1 John 1.9 Now considering that he grasps at a privilege, which is theirs only, who are grafted into Christ, and under the covenant of grace, in which the branches yet growing on the old stalk cannot plead. And here sometimes there are formal and express vows made against such and such sins, and binding to such and such duties. Thus many go on all their days knowing no other religion than to perform duties, and to confess and pray for pardon of that wherein they fell, promising themselves eternal happiness, though they are utter strangers to Christ. Here many elect ones have been cast down wounded, and many reprobates have been slain, while the wounds of neither of them have been deep enough to cut them off from their natural stalk. But the Spirit of the Lord gives a yet deeper stroke to the branch which is to be cut off, showing him that as yet he is but an outsized saint, and discovering to him the filthy lusts lodged in his heart, which he took no notice of before. Romans 7.9 When the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. Then he sees his heart a dunghill of hellish lusts, filled with covetousness, pride, malice, filthiness, and the like. Now as soon as the door of the chambers of his imagery is thus opened to him, and he sees what they do there in the dark, his outside religion is blown up as insufficient, and he learns a new lesson in religion, namely, that he is not a Jew which is one outwardly. Romans 2.28 Fifthly, upon this he goes further, even to inside religion, sets to work more vigorously than ever, mourns over the evils of his heart, and strives to bear down the weeds which he finds growing in that neglected garden. He labors to curb his pride and passion, and to banish speculative impurities, prays more fervently, hears attentively, and strives to get his heart affected in every religious duty he performs, and thus he comes to think himself not only an outside, but an inside Christian. Wonder not at this, for there is nothing in it beyond the power of nature, or what one may attain to under a vigorous influence of the covenant of works. Therefore another yet deeper stroke is given. The law charges home on the man's conscience that he was a transgressor from the womb, that he came into the world a guilty creature, and that in the time of his ignorance, and even since his eyes were opened, he has been guilty of many actual sins, either altogether overlooked by him, or not sufficiently mourned over. For spiritual sores, not healed by the blood of Christ, but skinned over some other way, are easily irritated, and soon break out again. Therefore the law takes them by the throat, saying, Pay what thou ow'st. Sixthly, then the sinner says in his heart, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. And so falls to work to pacify an offended God, and to atone for those sins. He renews his repentance, such as it is, and spares patiently the afflictions laid upon him. Yea, he afflicts himself, denies himself the use of his lawful comfort, sighs deeply, mourns bitterly, cries with tears for a pardon, till he has wrought up his heart to a conceit of having obtained it. Having thus done penance for what is past, he resolves to be a good servant to God, and to hold on an outward and inward obedience for the time to come. But the stroke must go nearer the heart, yet ere the branch fall off. The Lord discovers to him in the glass of the law how he sins in all he does, even when he does the best he can, and therefore the dreadful sound returns to his ears. Galatians 3.10 Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things, and so on. When you fasted and mourned, says the Lord, did you at all fast unto me? Even to me? Will muddy water make clean clothes? Will you satisfy for one sin with another? Did not your thoughts wander in such a duty? Were not your affections flat in another? Did not your heart give a lustful look to such an idol? And did it not rise in a fit of impatience under such an affliction? Should I accept this of your hands? Cursed be the deceiver which sacrificeth to the Lord a corrupt thing. Malachi 1.13-14 And thus he becomes so far broke off that he sees he is not able to satisfy the demands of the law. Seventhly, hence like a broken man who finds he is not able to pay all his debt, he goes about to compound with his creditor. And being in pursuit of ease and comfort, he does what he can to fulfill the law. And wherein he fails, he looks that God will accept the will for the deed. Thus doing his duty, and having a will to do better, he cheats himself into a persuasion of the goodness of his state, and hereby thousands are ruined. But the elect get another stroke, which loosens their hold in this case. The doctrine of the law is borne in on their consciences, demonstrating to them that exact and perfect obedience is required by it, under pain of the curse, and that it is a doing and not the wishing to do which will avail. Wishing to do better will not answer the law's demands, and therefore the curse sounds again. Cursed is everyone that continueeth not to do them, that is, actually to do them. In vain is wishing, then, easily. Being broken off from all hopes of compounding with the law, he falls a borrowing. He sees that all he can do to obey the law, and all his desires to be and to do better, will not save his soul. Therefore he goes to Christ, entreating that his righteousness may make up what is wanting in his own, and cover all the defects of his doings and sufferings. So God, for Christ's sake, may accept them, and thereupon be reconciled. Thus doing what he can to fulfill the law, and looking to Christ to make up all his defects, he comes at length to sleep in a sound skin again. Many persons are ruined this way. This is the error of the Galatians, which Paul in his epistle to them disputes against. But the Spirit of God breaks off the sinner from this hold also, by bringing home to his conscience that great truth in Galatians 3.12. A garment pierced up of sundry sorts of righteousness is not a garment meet for the court of heaven. Thus a man is like one in a dream, who thought he was eating, but being awakened by a stroke. Behold, his soul is faint, his heart sinks in him like a stone, while he finds that he can neither bear his burden himself alone, nor can he get help under it. Ninthly, what can he do whom us needs pay, and yet has not enough of his own to bring him out of debt, nor can borrow so much, and to beg he is ashamed? What can such an one do, I say, but sell himself as a man under the law, that was waxen poor, Leviticus 25.47? Therefore the sinner beat off from so many holds, attempts to make a bargain with Christ, and to sell himself to the Son of God, if I may so speak, solemnly promising and vowing that he will be a servant to Christ as long as he lives, if he will save his soul. Here the sinner often makes a personal covenant with Christ, resigning himself to him on these terms, yea, and takes a sacrament to make the bargain sure. Hereupon the man's great care is how to obey Christ, keep his commands, and so fulfill his bargains. In this the soul finds a false, unsound peace for a while, till the Spirit of the Lord gives another stroke to cut off the man from this refuge of lies. Likewise, and that happens in this manner, when he fails of the duties he engaged to perform and falls again into the sin he covenanted against, it is powerfully carried home on his conscience that his covenant is broken. So all his comfort goes and tears a fresh seed on his soul as one that has broken covenant with Christ. Commonly the man, to help himself, renews his covenant, but breaks it again as before. And how is it possible it should be otherwise, seeing he is still upon the old stock, thus the work of many all their days is to their souls is nothing but a making and breaking such covenants over and over again. Objection. Some persons will say, Who liveth and sinneth not? Who is there that felleth not of the duties he is engaged to? If you reject his way as unsound, who then can be saved? Answer. True believers will be saved, namely, all who do by faith take hold of God's covenant. But this kind of covenant is men's own covenant devised of their own heart, not God's covenant revealed in the gospel of his grace. And the making of it is nothing else but the making of a covenant of works with Christ, confounding the law and the gospel, a covenant he will never subscribe to, though we should sign it with our heart's blood. Romans 4, 14-16 For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect. Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed. Chapter 11, 6 And if by grace, and it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, and it is no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. God's covenant is everlasting, once in, never out of it again, and the mercies of it are sure mercies. Isaiah 55, 3 But that covenant of yours is a tottering covenant, never sure, but broken every day. It is a mere servile covenant, giving Christ service for salvation. But God's covenant is a filial covenant, in which the sinner takes Christ, and is salvation freely offered, and so becomes the Son. John 1, 12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God. And being become a son, he serves his Father, not that the inheritance may become his, but because it is his through Jesus Christ. See Galatians 4, 24 And downward. To enter into that spurious covenant is to buy from Christ with money. But to take hold of God's covenant is to buy of him without money and without price. Isaiah 55, 1 That is to say, to beg of him. In that covenant men work for life. In God's covenant they come to Christ for life, and work from life. When a person under that covenant fails in his duty, all is gone. The covenant must be made over again. But under God's covenant, although the man fail in his duty, and for his failure, falls under the discipline of the covenant, and lies under the weight of it, till such time as he has recourse anew to the blood of Christ for pardon, and renew his repentance, yet all that he trusted to for life and salvation, namely the righteousness of Christ, still stands entire, and the covenant remains firm. See Romans 7, 24-25, 8 Verse 1 Now though some men spend their lives in making and breaking such covenants of their own, the terror on the breaking of them wearing weaker and weaker by degrees, till at last it creates them little or no unevenness, yet the man in whom the good work is carried on, till it be accomplished in cutting him off from the old stock, finds these covenants to be as rotten cords broken at every touch, and the terror of God being thereupon redoubled on his spirit, and the waters at every turn getting in unto his very soul, he is obliged to cease from catching hold of such covenants, and to seek help some other way. Tenthly, therefore the man comes at length to beg at Christ's door for mercy, but yet he is a proud beggar standing on his personal worth. For as the papists have mediators to plead for them with the one only mediator, so the branches of the old stock have always something to produce, which they think may commend them to Christ, and engage him to take their cause in hand. They cannot think of coming to the spiritual market without money in their hand. They are like persons who have once had an estate of their own, but are reduced to extreme poverty and forced to beg. When they come to beg, they still remember their former character, and though they have lost their substance, yet they retain much of their former spirit. Therefore they cannot think that they ought to be treated as ordinary beggars, but deserve a particular regard, and if that be not given them, their spirits rise against him to whom they address themselves for supply. Thus God gives the unhumbled sinner many common mercies, and shuts him not up in a pit according to his deserving, but all this is nothing in his eyes. He must be set down at the children's table, otherwise he reckons himself hardly dealt with and wronged. For he is not yet brought so low as to think God may be justified when he speaks against him, and clear from all iniquity when he judges him according to his real demerit. Psalm 51, 4 He thinks, perhaps, that even before he was enlightened he was better than many others. He considers his reformation of life, his repentance, the grief and tears which his sin has cost him, his earnest desires after Christ, his prayers and wrestlings for mercy, and uses all these now as bribes for mercy, laying no small weight upon him in his addresses to the throne of grace. But here the Spirit of the Lord shoots a sheaf of arrows into the man's heart, whereby his confidence in these things is sunk and destroyed. And instead of thinking himself better than many, he is made to see himself worse than any. The naughtiness of his reformation of life is discovered. His repentance appears to him no better than the repentance of Judas. His tears, like ethos, and his desires after Christ to be selfish and loathsome, like those who sought Christ because of the loaves John 6, 26. His answer from God seems now to be, Away, proud beggar, how shall I put thee among the children? He seems to look sternly on him for his lighting of Jesus Christ by unbelief, which is a sin he scarce discerned before. But now at length he beholds it in its crimson colors, and is pierced to the heart as with a thousand darts, while he sees how he has been going on blindly, sinning against the remedy of sin, and in the whole course of his life trampling on the blood of the Son of God. And now he is in his own eyes a miserable object of law of vengeance, yea, in gospel vengeance too. Eleventhly. The man being thus far humbled will no more plead he is worthy for whom Christ should do this thing, but on the contrary looks on himself as unworthy of Christ, and unworthy of the favor of God. We may compare him in this case to the young man who followed Christ, having a linen cloth cast about his naked body, who when the young man laid hold of him left the linen cloth and fled from them naked. Mark 14, 51 and 52. Even so the man had been following Christ in the thin and cold garment of his own personal worthiness. But by it, even by it, which he so much trusted to, the law catches hold of him to make him prisoner, and then he is fain to leave it and flees away naked, yet not to Christ, but from him. If ye now tell him he is welcome to Christ, if he will come to him, he is apt to say, Can such a vile and unworthy wretch as I be welcome to the Holy Jesus? If a plaster be applied to his wounded soul, it will not stick. He says, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. Luke 5, 8. No man need speak to him of his repentance, for his comfort he can quickly espy such faults in it as make it not, nor of his tears, for he is assured they have never come into the Lord's bottle. He disputes himself away from Christ and concludes now that he has been such a slighter of Christ, and is such an unholy and vile creature, that he cannot, he will not, he ought not come to Christ, and that he must either be in a better case, or else he will never believe. Hence he now makes his strongest efforts to amend what was amiss in his way before. He prays more earnestly than ever, mourns more bitterly, strives against sin and heart and life more vigorously, and watches more diligently, if by any means he may at length be fit to come to Christ. One would think the man is well humbled now, but all a devilish pride lurks under the veil of this seeming humility, like a kindly branch of the old stalk. He adheres still, and will not submit to the righteousness of God. He will not come to the market of free grace without money. He is bid into the marriage of the king's son, where the bridegroom himself furnishes all the guests with wedding garments, stripping them of their own, but he will not come because he wants a wedding garment, although he is very busy in making one ready. This is sad work, and therefore he must have a deeper stroke, yet else he is ruined. This stroke is given him with the acts of the law in its irritating power, thus the law girding the soul with cords of death, and holding it in with the rigorous commands of obedience, under the pain of the curse, and God in his holy and wise conduct withdrawing his restraining grace. Corruption is irritated, lusts become violent, and the more they are striven against, the more they rage like a furious horse checked with the bit. Then corruptions set up their heads, which he never saw in himself before. Here oftentimes atheism, blasphemy, and in one word horrible things concerning God, terrible thoughts concerning the faith arise in the breast, so that his heart is a very hell within him. Thus while he is sweeping the house of his heart, not yet watered with gospel grace, those corruptions which lay quiet before in neglected corners fly up and down in it like dust. He is one who is mending a dam, and while he is repairing breaches in it, and strengthening every part of it, a mighty flood comes down, overturns his works, and drives all away before it, as while what was newly laid is what was laid before. Romans 7, 8-13 This is a stroke which goes to the heart, and by it his hope of making himself more fit to come to Christ is cut off. Lastly, now the time is come when the man between hope and despair resolves to go to Christ as he is, and therefore like a dying man stretching himself just before his breath goes out, he rallies the broken forces of his soul, tries to believe, and in some sort lays hold on Jesus Christ. And now the branch hangs on the old stalk by one single tack of a natural faith, produced by the natural vigor of one's own spirit under a most pressing necessity. Psalm 78, 34 and 35 When he slew them, then they sought him, and they returned and inquired early after God. And they remembered that God was their Rock, and the High God their Redeemer. Hosea 8 verse 2 Israel shall cry unto me, My God, we know thee. But the Lord never failing to perfect his work, fetches yet another stroke, whereby the branch falls quite off. The Spirit of God convincingly discovers to the sinner his utter inability to do anything that is good, and so he dies. Romans 7 verse 9 That voice powerfully strikes through his soul. How can ye believe? John 5 44 Thou canst no more believe than thou canst reach up thy hand to heaven, and bring Christ down from thence. Thus at length he sees that he can neither help himself by working nor by believing, and having no more to hang by on the old stock, he therefore falls off. While he is distressed thus, seeing himself like to be swept away with the flood of God's wrath, and yet unable so much as to stretch forth a hand to lay hold of a twig of the tree of life, growing on the bank of the river, he is taken up, and engrafted in the true vine, the Lord Jesus Christ, giving him the spirit of faith. By what has been said upon his head, I design not to rack or distress tender consciences, for though there are but few such at this day, yet God forbid I should offend any of Christ's little ones. But alas, a dead sleep has fallen upon this generation. They will not be awakened. Let us go ever so near to the quick. Therefore I fear that there is another sort of awakening abiding this sermon-proof generation, which shall make the ears of them that hear it tingle. However, I would not have this to be looked upon as a sovereign God-stinted method of breaking off sinners from the old stock. But this I assert as a certain truth, that all who are in Christ have been broken off from all these several confidences, and that they who have never been broken off from them are yet in their natural stock. Nevertheless, if the house be pulled down, and the old foundation raised, it is much the same, whether it was taken down stone by stone, or whether it was undermined, and all fell down together. Now it is that the branch is engrafted in Jesus Christ. And as the law in the hand of the Spirit of God was the instrument to cut off the branch from the natural stock, so the gospel in the hand of the Holy Spirit is the instrument used for engrafting it in the supernatural stock, 1 John 1.3. That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that you also may have fellowship with us. And truly our fellowship is with the Father and with the Son, Jesus Christ. The gospel is a silver cord let down from heaven to draw perishing sinners to land. And though the preaching of the law prepares a way of the Lord, yet it is in the word of the gospel that Christ and the sinner meet. Now as in the natural grafting, the branch being taken up is put into the stock, and being put into it becomes one with it, so that they are united. Even so, in the spiritual engrafting, Christ apprehends the sinner, and the sinner being apprehended of Christ apprehends him, and so they become one. Philippians 3 verse 12. First Christ apprehends the sinner by a spirit, and draws him to himself. 1 Corinthians 12.13 For by one spirit we are all baptized into one body. The same spirit which is in the mediator himself, he communicates to his elect in due time, never to depart from them, but to abide in them as a principle of life. Thus he takes hold of them by his own spirit, put into them, and so the withered branch gets life. The soul is now in the hands of the Lord of life, and possessed by the spirit of life. How can it then but live? The man gets a ravishing sight of Christ's excellency in the glass of the gospel. He sees him a full, suitable, and willing Savior, and gives a heart to take him for, and instead of all. The spirit of faith furnishes him with feet to come to Christ, and hands to receive him. What by nature he could not do, by grace he can, the Holy Spirit working in him the work of faith with power. Secondly, the sinner thus apprehended apprehends Christ by faith, and is one with the blessed stock. Ephesians 3.17 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. The soul that before tried many ways of escape, but all in vain, now looks with the eye of faith, which proves a healing look. Is Aaron's rod laid up, and the tabernacle butted and brought forth buds? Numbers 17.8 So the dead branch, apprehended by the Lord of life, put in two, and bound up with the glorious quickening stock. By the spirit of life buds forth an actual believing on Jesus Christ, whereby this union is completed. We, having the same spirit of faith, believe 2 Corinthians 4.13 Does the stock and the graft are united? Christ and the Christian are married, faith being the soul's consent to the spiritual marriage covenant, which as it is proposed in the gospel to mankind, centers indefinitely. So it is demonstrated, attested, and brought home to the man in particular by the Holy Spirit. And so he being joined to the Lord is one spirit with him. Hereby a believer lives in and for Christ, and Christ lives in and for the believer. Galatians 2.20 I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. Hosea 3.3 Thou shalt not be for another man, so will I also be for thee. The bonds then of this blessed union are the spirit on Christ's part and faith on the believer's part. Now both the souls and bodies of believers are united to Christ. He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit. 1 Corinthians 6 verse 17 The very bodies of believers have this honor put upon them that they are the temple of the Holy Ghost. Verse 19 And the members of Christ. Verse 15 When they sleep in the dust, they sleep in Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 4.14 And it is in virtue of this union they shall be raised up out of the dust again. Romans 8.11 He shall quicken your mortal bodies by a spirit that dwelleth in you. In token of this mystical union, the church of believers is called by the name of her head and husband. 1 Corinthians 12 12 For as by the body is one and hath many members, so also is Christ. Application From what is said, we may draw the following inferences. 1. The preaching of the law is most necessary. He that would engraft must needs use a pruning knife. Sinners have many shifts to keep them from Christ, many things by which they keep their hold of the natural stock. Therefore they have need to be closely pursued and hunted out of their skulking holes and refuges of lies. 2. Yet it is the gospel that crowns the work. The law makes nothing perfect. The law lays open the wound, but it is the gospel that heals. The law strips a man, wounds him, and leaves him half dead. The gospel binds up his wounds, pouring in wine and oil to heal them. By the law we are broken off, but it is by the gospel we are taken up and implanted in Christ. 3. If any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of his. Romans 8.9 We are told of a monster in nature, having two bodies, differently animated, as appeared from contrary affections at one time and at the same time. But so united that they were served with the selfsame legs. Even so, however men may cleave to Christ, call themselves of the holy city, and stay themselves upon the God of Israel, Isaiah 48.2, and may be bound up as branches in him, John 15.2, by the outward ties of sacraments. Yet if the spirit that dwells in Christ dwells not in them, they are not one with him. There is a great difference between adhesion and engrafting. The ivy clasps and twists itself about the oak, but it is not one with it, for it still grows on its own root. So to allude to Isaiah 4.1, many professors take hold of Christ, and eat their own bread, and wear their own apparel, only they are called by his name. They stay themselves upon him, but grow upon their own root. They take him to support their hopes, but their delights are elsewhere. 4. The union between Christ and his mystical members is firm and indissoluble. Were it so that the believer only apprehended Christ, and Christ apprehended not him, we could promise little on the stability of such a union. It might quickly be dissolved. But as the believer apprehends Christ by faith, so Christ apprehends him by his spirit, and none shall pluck him out of his hand. Did the child only keep hold of the nurse, it might at length weary, and let go its hold, and so fall away. But if she have her arms about the child, it is in no hazard of falling away, even though it be not actually holding by her. So whatever sinful intermissions may happen in the exercise of faith, yet the union remains sure by reason of the constant indwelling of the spirit. Blessed Jesus, all the saints are in thy hand. Deuteronomy 33.3 It is observed by some that the word Abba is the same whether you read it forward or backward. Whatever the believer's case be, the Lord is still to him Abba, Father. Lastly, they have an unsure hold of Christ, whom he has not apprehended by his spirit. There are many half-marriages here, where the soul apprehends Christ, but is not apprehended of him. Hence many fall away, and never rise again. They let go their hold of Christ, and when that is gone, all is gone. These are the branches in Christ that bear not fruit, which the husbandman taketh away. John 15.2 Question. How can that be? Answer. These branches are set in a stock by a profession, or an unsound hypocritical faith. They are bound up with it in the external use of the sacraments, but the stock, and they are never knit. Therefore they cannot bear fruit. And they need not be cut off, nor broken off. They are by the husbandman only taken away, or as the word primarily signifies, lifted up, and so taken away, because there is nothing to hold them. They are indeed bound up with the stock, but were never united to it. Question. How shall I know if I am apprehended of Christ? Answer. You may be satisfied in this inquiry, if you consider and apply these two things. First. When Christ apprehends a man by his spirit, he is so drawn that he comes away to Christ with his whole heart. For true believing is believing with all the heart. Acts 8.37 Our Lord's followers are like those who followed Saul at first, men whose hearts God has touched. 1 Samuel 10.26 When the Spirit pours in overcoming grace, they pour out their hearts like water before Him. They flow unto Him like a river. Isaiah verse 2 All nations shall flow unto it, namely to the mountains of the Lord's house. It denotes not only the abundance of converts, but the disposition of their souls in coming to Christ. They come heartily and freely as drawn with lovingkindness. Jeremiah 31.3 Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. Psalm 110.3 That is, free, ready, openhearted, giving themselves to thee as freewill offerings. When the bridegroom has the bride's heart, it is a right marriage. But some give their hand to Christ who gave Him not their heart. They that are only driven to Christ by terror will surely leave Him again when that terror is gone. Terror may break a heart of stone, but the pieces into which it is broken still continue to be stone. Terror cannot soften it into a heart of flesh. Yet terror may begin to work which love crowns. The strong wind, the earthquake, and the fire going before, the still small voice in which the Lord is may come after them. When the blessed Jesus is seeking sinners to match with Him, they are bold and perverse. They will not speak with Him till He has wounded them, made them captives, and bound them with the cords of death. When this is done, then it is that He makes love to them and wins their hearts. The Lord tells us, Hosea 2, 16-20, that His chosen Israel shall be married unto Himself. But how will the bride's consent be won? Why, in the first place, He will bring her into the wilderness as He did to people when He brought them out of Egypt. Verse 14 There she will be hardly dealt with, scorched with thirst, and bitten of serpents. And then He will speak comfortably to her. Or, as the expression is, He will speak unto her heart. The sinner is first driven, and then drawn to Christ. It is with the soul as with Noah's dove. She was forced back again to the ark, because she could find nothing else to rest upon. But when she returned, she would have rested on the outside of it, if Noah had not put forth his hand and pulled her in. Genesis 8, 9 The Lord sends the avenger of blood in pursuit of the criminal, who with a sad heart leaves his own city, and with tears in his eyes parts with his old acquaintances, because he dare not stay with them, and he flees for his life to the city of refuge. This is not all his choice. It is forced work. Necessity has no law. But when he comes to the gates and sees the beauty of the place, the excellency and loveliness of it charm him, and then he enters it with a heart in good will, saying, This is my rest, and here I will stay. And, as one said in another case, I had perished unless I had perished. Secondly, when Christ apprehends a soul, the heart is disengaged from and turned against sin, as in cutting off the branch from the old stalk, the great idol self is brought down. The man is powerfully taught to deny himself. So in the apprehending of the sinner by the Spirit, that union is dissolved which was between a man and his lusts, while he was in the flesh, as the apostle expresses it. Romans 7 5 His heart is loosened from them, though formerly as dear to him as the members of his body, as his eyes, legs, or arms, and instead of taking pleasure in them as before, he longs to be rid of them. When the Lord Jesus comes to a soul in the day of converting grace, he finds it like Jerusalem in the day of her nativity, Ezekiel 16 4, with his navel not cut, drawn as fulsome nourishment and satisfaction from his lusts. But he cuts off this communication, that he may set the soul on the breasts of his own consolations, and give it rest in himself. And thus the Lord wounds the head and heart of sin, and a soul comes to him, saying, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no prophet. Jeremiah 16 19 I have been reading from section 3 of Thomas Boston's Human Nature in this fourfold state. A more complete version is found through the Chapel Library in Pensacola, Florida. I am moving forward now to head number 4.