03.08. CHAP. VIII. The term or end of religion, eternal life
CHAP. VIII.
TAe term or end of religion, eternal life, considered in a double notion — First, As it signifies the essential happiness of the soul — Second, As it takes in many glorious appendixes — The noble and genuine breathings of the pious soul after, and springing up into, the former — The argument drarvn from the example of Christ — Moses and Paul moderated — It ends in a serious exhortation made to Christians, to live and love more spiritually, more suitably to the nature of souls, redeemed souls, resulting from the whole discourse,
I AM now come to the last thing whereby this most noble principle is described, namely, the term or end of it; and that is said here, in the text, to be “everlasting life.” This is the highest pitch of perfection, unto which the new creature is continually growing up; which the Apostle Paul hath expressed with as much grand eloquence, as words are able to magnify it, calling it, “the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:” this is that unbounded ocean, which this living fountain, by so many incessant issues, and unwearied streamings, perpetually endeavours to empty itself into, or rather to embosom itself in. Now, what this is, we must confess with the Apostle John, and indeed we have more reason to make such a confession than he had, that it doth not yet appear, namely, neither fully nor distinctly: but yet, since I am thus cast upon the contemplation of it, it will be a suitable and agreeable matter to enquire into it; and though it surpass the power and skill of all created comprehensions to take the just dimensions, and faithfully give in the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of it; yet we may attempt to walk about this heavenly Jerusalem, as the Psalmist speaks of the earthly, “and tell the towers thereof, mark her walls, consider her palaces,*” that we may tell it to the generation following.
1. Then, we will consider “eternal life” in the most proper notion of it, as it implies the essential happiness of the soul; and so it is no other than the soul’s pure, perfect, and established state. By a state, I do designedly undervalue that grosser notion of a place, as that which scarcely deserves to enter into the description of such a glory, or, at best, will obtain but a very low room there: by purity, I do purposely explode that carnal ease, rest, immunity, affluence of sensual delights, accommodated only to the animal life — which last Mahometans, and the former too many professed Christians, and the Jews almost, generally dream of, and judge heaven to be. By perfection, I distinguish it from the best state which the best men upon earth can possibly be in. So then I take eternal life in the primary and most proper notion of it to be the full, perfect, and everlasting enjoyment of God, communion with him, and a most blissful conformity of all the powers and faculties of the soul to that eternal goodness, truth, and love, as far as it is or may become capable of the communications of the Divinity. This life was, at the highest rate imaginable, purchased by our ever blessed Lord and Saviour in the days of his flesh, and here in the text promised to every believing soul. Now, inasmuch as we are ignorant both of the present capacity of our own faculties, how large they are, and much more ignorant, how much more large and ample they may be made, on purpose to receive the more rich and plentiful communications of the divine life and image, therefore can we not comprehend either the transcendent life, happiness, and glory, or that degree of sanctity and blessedness which the believing soul may be advanced to in another world. The Popish schoolmen do nicely dispute about the sight of God, and the love of God, to wit, in whether of these the formal blessedness of the soul consisteth, Ul separating those which God hath so firmly joined together, as if it were possible that either a blind love, or a jejune and unafFectionate speculation, could render a soul entirely happy, but it is much safer to say, that the happiness and eternal life of the soul standeth in the possession or fruition of God; and this doth necessarily import the proper perfection of every faculty. Nothing can be the formal happiness of a spirit that is either inferior or extrinsical to it; it must be something divine, and that wrought into the very nature and temper of it. I hesitate not to affirm, that if the soul of man could possibly be advanced, so as to receive adoration or divine power, yet if it were in the mean time void of divine dispositions, and a God-like nature; it would be ’far from being glorified, and made happy as to its capacity. What health is to the body, that is holiness to the soul; which haply the Apostle alludes to when he speaks of the “ spirit of a sound mind,’’‘2 Timothy 1:7.
2. There is another notion of “ eternal life” which some contend for, by which they mean not barely the essential happiness of the soul, but that with the addition of many suitable and glorious circumstances — the essential happiness of the soul, a3 it is attended with the appendixes of a glorified body, the beholding of Christ, the amicable society of angels, freedom from temptations, the knowledge of the secrets of nature and providence, and such like, to which may be also added, though of a lower degree, open absolution, or a visible deliverance of the saints out of the overthrow of the wicked, at the conflagration of the world, power over devils, eminence of place, enjoyment of friends, and such like.
Now, let us briefly consider what tendencies there are in the religious soul towards each of these. And here I must crave leave to speak jointly both of the end, and of the motion thereunto; though it may be thought that the former only falls fairly under our present consideration.
(1.) Then, I suppose, that “eternal life,’“ in the first sense of it, is intended here, to wit, the essential happiness of the soul, or its perfect and everlasting enjoyment of God. For the description is here made of religion itself in the abstract, or that principle of divine life, which Christ Jesus implanted in the soul; and being so considered, it is hard to conceive how that should spring up into any of these appendant circumstances, or into anything but the completion and perfection of itself; though the religious soul, taken in connection with them, possibly may. And, indeed, though we should allow, which we shall take into consideration under the next head, that many of those high scriptural phrases, which are brought to describe the future condition of believing souls, do principally respect the appendixes of its essential happiness, (as a kingdom, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens, an inheritance reserved, a place prepared, and the like,) yet it seems very unnatural to interpret this phrase, “life,” and “eternal hfe,” any otherwise than of that which I call the essential happiness of the soul: but if we interpret it of this, the sense is very fair and easy. Thus, this principle of divine life is continually endeavouring to grow up to its just altitude, to advance itself to a triumphant state, even as all other principles of life do naturally tend towards a final accomplishment, and ultimate perfection. Carnal self, or the animal life, may be indeed said to be a well of water too, poisonous water; but that springs up into a sensual life, popular applause, self-accommodations, or, if you will, in the Apostle’s phrase, into the fulfilment of the lusts of the flesh. This I speak only by way of illustrative opposition; for, to speak more properly, this corrupt principle hath in it the central force of death and hell, and is always tumbling downward; whereas this divine principle is always climbing upward: but they do both agree in this, that they both seek their own gratifications, and study to acquire their respective perfections. The everlasting and most glorious enjoyment of God is certainly most perfective of the soul; and therefore is most properly and most deservingly said to be its “ eternal life,” according to that of our Saviour, John 17:3. Now, this “eternal life”“ is not a thing specifically different from religion, or the image of God, or the divine life, but indeed the greatest height, and the greatest possible perfection of itself: even as the sun at noon-day is not a light really distinct from what it was in the first dawnings of the morning, but a different degree, and far more glorious state; which seems to be the very similitude whereby the Spirit of God illustrateth the matter in hand, Proverbs 4:18, or, as a man of perfect age is not a distinct species from a child, but much more complete and excellent in that species; to which the Apostle refers, treating of this subject, 1 Corinthians 13:11. Man hath not two distinct kinds of happiness in the two distinct worlds, that he is made to live in; but one and the same thing is his blessedness in both, which, as I said before, must needs be the enjoyment of God. The translation made of the text is very suitable to this notion, for this divine principle is said to spring up, not unto, but into, everlasting life, as if he should say, it springs up till it be swallowed up into the perfect knowledge, love, and enjoyment of God. Even as youth is swallowed up in manhood, so this grace is swallowed up in glory, and not so much abolished, as indeed perfected. By this phrase, the genius of true religion, and the excellent temper of the truly religious soul, is most livelily described. This is the soul, that, being in some measure delivered from its unnatural bondage, and freed from its unhappy confinement, now spreads itself in God, lifts up itself to him, stretches itself upon him, is not content with a heaven merely to come, but brings down a heaven into itself, by carrying up itself unto, and after, the God of heaven. God is become great, only great in the eye of such a Christian; he is indeed become all things to him. Whilst this principle is rightly and actually predominant in him, he knows no interest but to thrive and grow great in God; no will, but to serve the will, and comply with the mind of God; no end, but to be united to God; no business, but to display and reflect the glory and perfections of God upon the earth. The main business of his life, I say, is to serve him; the main ambition of his soul, to be like to him; and his m«im happiness in this world, to be united to him; and in the world to come, to be swallowed up in him: in this world, to know, and love, and rest, and delight in, and enjoy God more than all things, and in the world to come, to enjoy him more so. The gladsome growings up of the tender flowers to the friendly sun, being once powerfully attracted with his precious and benign influences, and the cheerful haste with which the sympathetic needle so amorously pursues the enchanting loadstone, being once rightly touched and affected with it, do a little, though but a little, resemble and represent the motions of a spirit impregnated with this divine principle, and strongly impressed with the image and stamp of God: he puts in his hand by the hole of the door, and the bowels of the espoused soul are presently moved, yea, melted for him. Song of Solomon 5:4. He casts the skirt of his garment, the mantle of his love, and presently the converted soul leaves all to follow him. Faith, hope, and love, are knitting and springing graces, and this eternal life is the end and perfection of them all; not that any one of them, I conceive, shall be utterly abolished, as some conclude concerning the two former, though without good ground, I think, from the Apostle’s words, 1 Corinthians 13:13. But faith will be ripened into the most firm and undisturbed confidence, affiance, and acquiescence in God; hope will be advanced into a more cheerful, powerful, and confident expectation, having for its object the perpetuation of the souFs felicity; and love will become much more loving, and more clearly distinguishable from the imperfect longings and languishings of this present state, when it shall flower up into pure delights and complacencies, resting and glorying in the arms of its adequate, satisfactory, and eternal object. The faith of the hypocrite, and indeed his hope too, is still springing up into self-preservation, deliverance, liberty, a splendid and pompous state of the church, (that is, of his own party) or some such thing as will gratify the animal life, and there it terminates; but the faith of the sincere and religious soul springs up into eternal life; it knows no term but “ the salvation of the soul,” 1 Peter 1:9, as his hope knows no accomplishment but a state of God-like purity and perfection, 1 John 3:3. The mere natural man lives within himself, within a circle of his own, and cannot get out; whether he eat, or drink, or pray, or be zealous for the popular pulling down of the political Antichrist, he is still in his own circle, he is still sacrificing in all this to that great helluo the animal life, as I have already made evident: but the pious soul is disinterested of self, and so is still contriving the advancement of a nobler life within itself, and moving towards God, as his supreme and all-sufficient good. Give him all that the whole world can afford, he cannot fix, nor settle, nor centre here: God hath put into him a holy restless appetite after a higher good, which he would rather be, than what he is. I know indeed that the soul that is thus divinely free may be hindered in its flight; but it will deliver itself from the clog at length.
You may choke and dam up the streamings of this fountain, perhaps, but they will burst out again; you may cast ashes upon this pure fire for a time, but it will flame out again: such a damp cannot arise, no, not from hell itself, as to extinguish it. The Philistines, I remember, stopped the wells of water which Abraham had digged in Gerar, “ and filled them with earth,’’ Genesis 26:15. But this well of water, which God diggeth in the holy and humble soul, cannot be stopped, neither by the devil, that king of Gerar, that is, of wanderings, Job 1:7, nor by any of his servants, but it will find vent upward: though you endpavour to fill it with, earth, which indeed is the likeliest to choke it, though you cast the dust and gravel of earthly pleasures, profits, or preferments into it, yet it is a well of living water, and will work its passage out. The hungerings of the pious soul are not, cannot be satisfied, till it come to feed upon the hidden manna, nor its thirstings quenched, till it come to be swallowed up in the unbounded ocean of life and love. But I find I cannot divide “ springing up” from “eternal life,” nor pursue the term of religion, but I must also take in the notion of the religious soul, whereby he pursues it, which I have already handled in my discourse; therefore I will quit this bead, and take a short view of the second.
(2.) The secondary and more improper notion of “ eternal life,” I mentioned, was that which takes in the circumstances or appendixes of it. And here we must needs allow, that the Holy Scriptures do openly avouch some of these circumstances, as those especially of the first class that I named, of some of which it seems to make great account; and possibly the Scripture may somewhere or other imply all the rest, even those of the inferior rank. Again, we will allow, that many of those phrases which the Scripture uses to describe the blessed state of the other world, do principally respect these appendixes of the souFs essential happiness; such perhaps are the “crown of righteousness*” mentioned by the Apostle Paul. “ The prize of the high calling,” mentioned by the same Apostle. “ The house which is from heaven.” “A kingdom, an incorruptible inheritance, a place prepared, mansions, a reward, praise, and honour, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ,” 1 Peter 1:7. And that “glory, honour, and peace,” spoken of by the Apostle, Romans 2:10. These are all Scripture descriptions of the other state, and I suppose we may grant them to have a peculiar reference to this secondary essential happiness of the soul: though I know not any necessity there is to be so liberal in our concessions; for it may be fairly said concerning all, or most of them, that the design of these phrases is not so much to establish this less proper notion, or to point out the circumstances of the glorified state, as to insinuate iiow much more ample and glorious the state shall be than this in which we now are; as a prize is looked upon as somewhat more excellent than what is done or expended to acquire it, (it must needs be so esteemed by runners or wrestlers); a kingdom is a more glorious state than that of subjection, and an inheritance is incomparably more ample than the pension that is allowed the heir in his minority. But these things being conceded, it doth not appear how far, or under what notion, the religious soul, as such, doth spring up into these additional glories, and thirst after them. I know there are many that speak very highly of these appendixes, and allow the pious soul a very high and irrespective valuation of them; and this they principally infer from the example of Christ himself, as also of Moses and Paul. Give me leave, therefore, to suggest something, not to enervate, but to moderate the argument drawn from these persons; and after that, I shall briefly lay down, what I conceive to be most scriptural and rational in this matter.
1. As for the example of Christ, it seems to make not much for them in this matter. For though the text is very plain, that “for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross,”’ and this joy seems plainly to be his session “at the right hand of God;’’ yet, if by this joy we understand a moie full and glorious possession of God, and a more excellent exaltation of his human nature, to a more free fruition of the divine, then it cannot be applied to anything but the springing up of the gracious soul into its essential happiness; which I have already contended for, as being the proper genius of such a soul: or if by this joy and throne we understand the power that Christ foresaw he should be vested with, of leading captivity captive, trampling under feet the powers of hell and darkness, and procuring gifts for men, which seems to me to be most likely, then it belongs not at all to men, neither can this example be exhibited for imitation. As for the instance of Moses, who is said to have had “ respect to the recompense of the reward.”
It is not yet granted, that that “recompense of reward” relates principally to these appendants of the souPs essential happiness, neither can it, I suppose, be evinced: but, though I should also allow that, which I incline to do, yet all that can be inferred from it is but a respect that Moses had, as our translation well renders it, or some account which he in his sufferings made of this recompense; which was a very warrantable contemplation. The Apostle Paul, indeed, doth openly profess that he looked for, and desired the coming of Christ from heaven, upon the account of that glorious body which he would then clothe him with, and so he might, and yet not desire it principally and primarily, but secondarily, and with reference. And this leads me to the general answer that I was preparing to give, which is this: — some of these circumstances which I have named, especially that of the glorified body, may be reduced to the essential happiness of the soul, or included in it, so that the soul could not otherwise be perfectly happy. It is the opinion of all divines, I think, that a Christian is not completely happy, till he consist of a soul and body both glorified. And, indeed, considering the dear affection, and essential aptitude, that God hath planted in the human soul for a body, we cannot well conceive how she should be perfectly happy without one: and this earthly body is, alas! an unequal yoke-fellow, in which she is half stifled, and rather buried, than conveniently lodged; so that it seems necessary, even to her essential happiness, that she should have some more heavenly and glorious body, wherein she may commodiously and pleasantly exert her innate powers, and whereby she may express herself in a spiritual and nobler manner, suitable to her own natural dignity and vigour, and to her infinitely amiable, and most beloved object.
Concerning the rest of the circumstances which cannot be thus reduced, I conceive that such of them as are necessary to the essential happiness of the soul, by way of subserviency, may be eyed, and desired, and thirsted after, secondarily, under this notion only, as being subservient to that essential blessedness. I confess, I do not understand under what other notion a religious soul can lift up itself to them; I mean, not so far forth as it is holy and religious, and acts suitably to that divine principle which the Father of spirits, or rather the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, hath implanted in it. And if there be any other circumstance which cannot be reduced to one of these kinds, I suppose it may be reckoned amongst the objects and gratifications of the animal life, and not to make up any part of the godly man’s heaven, or that eternal life which religion springs up into: for I easily imagine, that a fleshly fancy may verily be mightily elated with the desire of such a heaven as is suitable to it; and that a mere animal man may be as heartily desirous to be in such a kingdom of God, as he hath shaped out to himself, as he is utterly unwilling that the true kingdom of God, such as the Apostle describes, Romans 14:17, consisting in “righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost,” should be in him. If our continual cry be after safety, self-preservation, liberty, redemption, and deliverance from those things only that oppress and grieve our fleshly interest, and our thirstings principally terminated in knowledge, though it be of God himself, freedom from condemnation, power over devils, yea, or any visible pomp, glory, or splendour, though it be of ever so ethereal and heavenly a nature, what do we more than others? what is all this more than may naturally spring up from the animal life, and may be ultimately resolved into what is carnal?
Wherefore, as a result from the whole discourse, especially from this last part of it, let me earnestly entreat of all the professors of this holy religion which the blessed Messiah, Christ Jesus, hath so dearly bought for the world, and so clearly revealed in it, not to value themselves by anything which the power of natural self-love may exert or desire, perform or expect, nor by anything below the image of God, and the internal and transforming manifestations of Christ Jesus in them; the perfection of which is eternal life, in the most proper and true notion of it. I know that I have often suggested the same lesson in this short treatise, but I know also, that I can never inculcate it often enough; nay, the eloquence of angels is not sufficient to imprint it upon the hearts of men. Possibly it may startle some hypocritical professors, and carnal gospellers, (God grant it may effectually!) and make the ears of many that hear it to tingle, but yet I will proclaim it, “It is possible for a man to desire not only the things of this world, which St. James speaks of, (James 4:3,) but even heaven itself, to consume it upon his lusts; and he may as truly be making provision for the flesh to fulfil it in the lust thereof, in longing after a kind of self-salvation, as in “ eating, and drinking, and rising up to play.”
Certainly a true christian spirit, rightly invigorated and actuated by this divine and potent principle, christian religion, cannot look upon heaven as merely future, or as something perfectly distinct from him; but he eyes it as life, eternal life, the perfection of the purest and divinest life communicable to a soul, and is daily thirsting after it, or rather, as it is in the text, “springing up into it.” I know that heaven sometimes is called a rest, in opposition to the dissatisfaction of the uncentred and unbelieving soul; but, in opposition to a sluggish, inert, and dormant rest, it is here said to be life, eternal life. Let us show ourselves to be living Christians, by springing up into the utmost consummation of life: let it appear that Christ Jesus, the Prince of life, who was manifested on purpose “ to take away our sins,” hath not only covered our shame, and, as it were, embalmed our dead souls, to keep them from putrefaction, and strewed them with the flowers of his merits, to take away their noisome smell from the nostrils of his Father, but hath truly advanced, reinstated, and made the souls flourish that sin had so miserably degraded and deflowered. Deliver yourselves, O immortal souls! from all those unsuitable and unseemly cares, studies, and joys; from all those low and particular ends and lusts, which do not only pinch and straiten, but even debase and degrade you. Let it not be said, that the king of Sodom made Abraham rich; that your main delight, happiness, and contentment, is derived from any prosperous, plentiful, peaceable, pompous state, anything that may be called a self-accommodation, either in the world that now is, or that which is to come; but from the righteousness of faith, and your vital union with the Father and the Son; to whom, in the unity of the Spirit, be honour and glory, world without end. Amen. ON COMMUNION WITH GOD, BY SAMUEL SHAW.
’ Our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.”
These words express the way of a Christian”’s living, and that kind of converse whereby a good man is distinguished from all other men. A good man is not differenced from other men by anything without him, any church privileges which are common to hypocrites and sincere Christians; any external visible performances, in which the disciples of the Pharisees may be more abundant and more specious than the disciples of Christ, much less by any corporeal or temporal enjoyment or ornament, strength, beauty, riches, descent, &c. nor by any carnal relation, though it were to Abraham, as the Jews boasted of their father Abraham, but by something internal, substantial, by a relation to God; the character of a good man must be drawn from his correspondence to the chief good, and the happiness of a soul must be judged of by its relation to life, and love, and blessedness itself.
Things external, corporeal, temporal, make some difference amongst men, but it is only nominal and titular in comparison: by these, men are said to be rich or poor, noble or ignoble; but men are really and substantially differenced by the relation that they have to God; by this, they are good or bad, godly or wicked. This is the most certain and proper criterion of a good man, namely. Communion with God: in all other things he may be like other men, but in this he differs from and excels them all. This is a character proper or peculiar to them; for it agrees to every good man, to none but a good man, and always to him, as we shall see hereafter. The ground of my discourse then shall be this short and plain proposition, namely, “ A pious man hath communion with God." In order to the more distinct handling hereof, I must premise a few things briefly.
1 “ That the gracious and loving God made nothing miserable of all that he made.”’ There are no slaves born in this great house of the world.
He made all things out of himself, and he hath no idea of evil in himself, so that it was not possible that he should make anything evil or miserable.
Every thing was good, Gen i. and so in some sense happy. He was free to make the world, but making it he could not make it evil or miserable. Every thing is the product of Almighty love and goodness.
2. “ The happiness of every creature consists in its acting agreeably to that nature that God gave it, and those ends which he propounded to it, and suitably to those laws which he gave to all for which laws were contrived with the greatest suitableness to those natures, and subserviency to those ends. Every creature is in its khid happy, whilst it acts agreeably to that nature which the wise Creator implanted in it; as the sun runs its race without ceasing, and rejoices so to do, and is, in some sense, happy in so doing. Departing from that nature it ’ becomes miserable, as the earth bringing forth briers and thorns, instead of those good fruits which it was appointed to bring forth, is said to be cursed, Genesis 3:17-18.
3. ’ The happiness of the creature is higher or “ lower, greater or less, according as it comes nearer to God, or is farther off from him,” according as it receives more or less from him, according to what communion it hath with him. The life and happiness of the sun is much lower than that of a man, because it cannot enjoy such high and excellent communications from, or communion with God, as man doth.
4. “ There can be no communion without likeness.’“ The sun shines upon a stone wall, as well as upon man; but a stone wall has no communion with the sun, because it hath no eyes to see the light of it, as man hath; nor can receive the benign influences of its heat, as the herbs do. A log of wood lieth in the water as well as the fish, but it hath no communion with the water, nor receives any advantage by it as the fish doth. God is present, according to his infinite essence, with the devils as with the angels; but they have no likeness in nature to him, and so no communion with him, as these have.
5. “God hath given a more large and excellent capacity to man, than to any other of his creatures upon earth.”“ God hath endued man with reason, and so made him capable of a higher life, and a more excellent communion with his Maker than all the rest. Of all sublunary creatures, the rational soul only is capable to know, love, serve, enjoy, imitate God, and so to have a glorious communion with him. The sun, in all its glory and brightness, is not so excellent a being as any soul of man upon this account. And although man, by his fall, lost his actual communion with God, yet he is a reasonable creature still; he hath not lost his capacity of receiving influences from him, and enjoying communion with him. The world, when it is at the darkest, is yet capable of being enlightened.
6. “ When the nature of man is, by divine grace, healed of its distemperedness, and restored to its former rectitude, to act suitably to the end for which it was made, and to spend itself upon its proper object, then man comes to have right communion with God, and to be happy.”“ All rational souls are capable of holding communion with God, but all do not hold communion with him; but they that express the purity and holiness of the divine life, that know God, and live like him, these are his children. Matthew 5:45, and those only do rightly and really converse with him: when the Spirit of God informs these rational souls, and communicates the strength of a divine life through them, and stamps the lively impressions of divine perfections upon them, rendering our hearts, wills, and ways, conformable to that glorious pattern, that infinite good, then do we enjoy a proper communion with him, and are truly blessed; though we are not completely blessed, till this conformity be perfected according to what those souls are, or may be capable of This is the true and proper notion of man’s communion with God, and relation to him, which we cannot fully describe, till we more fully enjoy. That soul that truly lives and feeds upon God, does taste more than it can tell; and yet it can tell this, that this is the most high, excellent, noble, glorious life in the whole world. This communion, as also the intimateness and closeness of it, are described variously in the Holy Scriptures, by the similitude of members being in the body; of branches being in the vine; by being formed according to God’s image, changed into his image; by God’s dwelling in the soul, and the soul in him; by Christ’s being formed in the soul; by the soul’s having Christ; by Christ’s supping with the soul, and the soul with him. Because nothing is more our own, nor more one with us, than that which we eat and drink, being incorporated into us; therefore is this spiritual communion between God and the pious soul, ofttimes in scripture described by our eating and drinking with him. Thus God was pleased to allow his people under the law, when they had offered up a part of their beasts in sacrifice to him, to sit down and feast upon the rest, as a token of that familiarity and oneness that was between him and them. By the like action, our Saviour shadowed out the same mystery, when, in the sacrament of his supper, he appointed them to sit down to eat and drink with him, to intimate their feeding upon him, and most close communion with him: yea, the state of glory, which is the most perfect communion with God, is thus shadowed out too. Matthew 8:11. Revelation 19:9. And, which is worth noting, I think the sacramental eating and drinking hath some reference to that most intimate communion of the saints with God in glory. Our Saviour himself seems to imply as much in that speech of his, Luke 22:30, “ That ye may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom:” in which words he seems plainly to allude to the sacramental eating and drinking which he had a little before instituted. Which makes some to believe that that gesture is to be retained in that ordinance, which is most proper and usual to express familiarity and communion; and to take away that gesture, is to destroy one great end of our Saviour, in appointing this supper, which was to represent that familiar communion which is between himself and every believing soul. I will not here examine the validity of their argument, which, possibly, if pressed home, might introduce a rudeness into the worship of God, under pretence of familiarity: but it seems very plain, that the nature of that ordinance doth shadow out the intimate communion between God and a pious soul.
I have already, in part, anticipated myself, and showed you wherein the soul’s communion with God consists: but yet, to give you a more distinct knowledge of this great mystery, I shall unfold it in these three following particulars: —
1. “A pious soul hath communion with God in his attributes.” When the soul of man is moulded and formed into a resemblance of the divine nature, then hath it a true fellowship with him. Now, this communion with God in his attributes is to be seen two ways.
(1.) “When the soul is, in its measure, according to the capacity of a creature, all that which God is.” This is the communion which the angels have with God. Their beholding the face of God, is not to be understood of a mere speculation, or an idle gazing upon Deity; but they see him, by receiving his image upon themselves, and reflecting his glory and brightness; they partake of the goodness, purity, holiness, wisdom, righteousness of God, which makes them such glorious spirits; and the want of this makes the other, whom we call devils, to be what they are. Thus, good men shall have communion with God, they shall see God. Yea, thus they have communion with him in some measure, they do not only see God in the world, as the devils do, or see him in the Word, as many hypocritical and wicked men do, but they see him in themselves, in the frame of their own souls; they find themselves moulded into his image, and a resemblance of him drawn upon them. This is a beatifical vision of God, true and real, though not full and complete. This is set out in scripture, by being “ holy as God is holy,” “perfect as God is perfect.”“ This our Saviour exhorts us to seek after, “Take my yoke upon you, learn of me; for I am meek and lowly;’“ and the Apostle, “Be ye followers of God, as dear children.” When the nature and perfections of God, his holiness, goodness, righteousness, wisdom, kc. are copied out upon our natures, and the same spirit is in us, which was in Christ Jesus, then have we a true communion with God, which blessed communion, when the soul becomes all that which God is, is by a conformity of nature.
(2.) “ When the soul, in its actions as a creature, doth rightly answer to the attributes of the Creator.” As when the soul doth answer the goodness of God with suitable affections of love and joy, and delight; when the soul doth correspond to the sovereignty and wisdom of God by the acts of self-denial and resignation; and doth converse with the righteousness of God by patience and a holy acquiescence. When the soul doth rightly exert those acts which are proper and suitable to the nature of God, then it may be said to hold communion with him in his attributes; when the actions and motions of the soul do correspond to the divine nature and attributes.
Now, this suitableness of the soul, I mean especially with reference to the incommunicable attributes of God, where there is no place for imitation, though it hold good in the rest also.
2. “A pious soul hath communion with God in his word.”“ To read, profess, or hear his word, is not to hold a communion with God therein: many do so that are strangers to God: a man may read my letters, and yet correspond with my enemy. That son, in the gospel, that heard his father’s command, and answered, “I go, sir,’’ but went not, had no right communion with his paternal authority. But when the soul is ennobled into such a frame as this word doth require, then it holds communion with God in his word; for example, when the soul puts forth those acts of humiliation, holy fear and reverence, godly trembling, which do suit the nature of a divine threatening; when the soul answers the command of God with suitable resolutions, repentings, reformations, and real obedience; when it entertains the promise with suitable acts of holy delight, joy, refreshment, recumbency, and acquiesces in the same, then doth it truly converse with God in his Word.
3. “ A pious soul hath communion with God in his works.” And that is, when the soul doth answer the several providences of God with suitable and pertinent affections and dispositions. The pious soul doth not only eye and observe the hand of God in all things that fall out, but doth comply with those providences, and is moulded into that frame, and put upon those duties, which such providences do call for. Then doth the soul rightly hold communion with God in his works, when it is humbled under humbling providences, is refreshed, strengthened, and grows up under prosperous providences, as they did. Acts 9:31, who having rest given them, were edified, comforted, multiplied, &c. When the soul doth rightly comport with every providence, and the will is moulded into the will of God, then do we hold communion with him in his works. This theme is large, because the works of God are manifold, of creation, redemption, preservation, works towards other men, and towards ourselves, both towards our outward and inward man. A pious soul hath communion with God in all these; in the sense that I named even now, though perhaps not equally in all, yet sincerely and truly. By what hath been said, you understand that right fellowship with God is not a bare communion of names. To have the name of God called upon us, and to be called Christians, or the people of God, or to name the name of God, to profess it, to cry. Lord, Lord, doth not make any one really and truly the better man, doth not make a soul rightly happy. It is not enough to cry, “Tlie temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord,” with those in Jeremiah 7:4, to make our “ boast in the law,’’ with those in Romans 2:23 to call ourselves “ the children of Abraham,’’ as the Jews did in John the Baptist’s time, Matthew 3:9 - These privileges and professions are extrinsical to the soul, and do nothing to the true ennobling of it. But right fellowship with God is a communion of hearts and natures, of will and affections, of interest and ends; to have one heart and will, the same interest and ends with God, is to be truly godly: a God-like man is the only godly man; a Christ-like nature brought into the soul, doth only denominate a man a true Christian. It is not speaking together, but loving and living together, that brings God and the soul into one: ’’ I live, yet not I, but Christ that liveth in me.” And thus, I suppose, you have a fair account why ths Apostle James, chap. ii. does so much prefer works before *faith, (for indeed faith is nothing worth, save only that faith which joins the soul to the object, and makes the thing believed one’s own,) as alsOy why the Apostle prefers love before a faith of miracles, 1 Corinthians 13:2. Though, indeed, a justifying faith is the most admirable, that faith which unites the soul and God together is more excellent, and, indeed, more wonderful than the faith that removes mountains. When I consider the proper happiness and perfection of a soul, and the nature of this true blissful communion with God, I cannot but wonder how it is possible, that men should take their communion with God to consist in an overly acquaintance with him, profession of him, performances to him. I am confident it is not possible, that men should have any true feeling of happiness in such acquaintance, any more than a man can be really filled with the seeing or craving of meat which he eats not.
Before I apply the doctrine, give me leave to lay down some rules or positions, tending further to explain and clear it.
1. This must be held, which I touched upon before, that “ there can be no communion between God and man^ but by a likeness of nature, a new, a divine principle planted in the soul.” A beast hath no communion with a man, because reason, the ground of such communion, is wanting. Of all the creatures, there was none found that could be a help meet for Adam, that could be taken into the human society, till Eve was made, who was a human person. So, neither can there be any conjunction of the soul with God, but by oneness of spirit, “ He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.”
2. “ There can be no communion with God but by a mediator,” and no mediator but Christ Jesus, who is God-man. “Two cannot walk together,”“nor hold communion, “ except they be agreed; and there can be no agreement made between God and man but by Christ Jesus. Therefore it is said, ** Our communion is with the Father and the Son,” with the Father by the Son: and faith, whereby the soul and God are united, is still said to be “ faith in Christ,” as we find in the scriptures.
3. “ There can be no perfect communion with God in this life.” Our communion with heaven, whilst we are upon earth, is imperfect; our resemblance to God is scant and dark in comparison of what it shall be. We know but in part, love but in part, enjoy but in part; we are but in part holy and happy. There can be no perfect communion with God, till there be a perfect reconciliation of natures as well as persons; and that cannot be whilst there is anything unlike to God in the soul, whilst any impure thing dwells in the soul which cannot truly close with God, nor God with that. The Holy Spirit can never suffer any defiled thing to unite itself with it: “ It is not lawful for any impure thing to mix itself with pure divinity,” saith Socrates the heathen. “What communion hath righteousness with unrighteousness.’^” saith the Apostle; and so far as a righteous man is in any part unrighteous, so far is he a stranger to God. The unregenerate part of a regenerate man hath no more communion with God than a wicked man, than the devil himself hath; no more than darkness hath with light.
4. “ Our communion with God must be distinguished from the sense and feeling of it.” Many have run upon sad miscarriages, (and those indeed extremes,) whilst they place communion with God in the sense and feeling of it, in raptures of joy, extacies and transports of soul; which, indeed, if they be real, are not so much it, as the flower of it, something resulting and separable from it. Communion with God cannot be lost in a saint, for then he is no saint; for it is the proper characteristic of a saint to have communion with God; and a saint under desertion, hath communion with God even then as really, though not so feelingly as at any other time, so far as he is sanctified. But the sense of this communion may be very much, if not altogether lost, and oftentimes is lost.
5. “A souFs communion with God cannot be interrupted by any local mutations.” It is a spiritual conjunction, and is not violated by any confinement; the walls of a prison cannot separate God and the pious soul; banishment cannot di’ive a soul from God. The blessed angels, those ministering spirits, when they are despatched into the utmost ends of the world upon the service of God, are even then beholding the face of God, and do enjoy as intimate communion with him as ever. The case is the same with all pious souls, whose communion with God does not depend upon any local situation; it is not thousands of miles that can beget a distance between God and the soul. Indeed nothing but sin does it, or can do it. “ Your iniquities have separated between you and your God;”’ nothing but sin is contrary to this divine fellowship, and BO nothing but that can interrupt this spiritual society. To speak properly, sin does not so much cause the souFs distance from God, as itself is that distance. Man and wife remain one, though at a hundred miles’ distance; and believing souls do maintain a certain spiritual communion one with another, though in several parts of the world. The society and communion of pious souls one with another, so far as it is spiritual, cannot be interrupted by bodily distance; much less, then, the fellowship of God with the pious soul, who carries about with him, and in him, a divine nature, the image of God, a holy, God-like disposition whithersoever he goes.
S. “ This communion with God which I have been speaking of, is much better than all outward acts and enjoyments, duties and ordinances whatsoever, though they be ever so many or specious.”
God himself long since decided this matter, that a broken and contrite heart is better than all sacrifices.
Psalms 51:17; that to obey was better than sacrifice, 1 Samuel 15:22; that mercy was better than sacrifice, Hosea 6:6; that to do justly, love mercy, and to walk humbly with God, was to be preferred before “ thousands of rams, and ten thousands of rivers of oil,”’ Micah 6:7-8. It holds in reference to gospel duties, though they may seem more spiritual than the oblations of the law. A real soul-communion with God, a communion of hearts and natures, of wills and affections, of interests and ends, is infinitely more excellent than all hearing, praying, celebration of Sabbaths or sacraments, James 1:25, as the end is more excellent than the means, for so stands the case between them.
Yea, I will add, (though some proud and wanton spirits have made strange work with it, yet) it is a sure and most excellent doctrine, that this spiritual communion is a continual sabbath, (a sabbath of communion is much better than a sabbath of rest;) this is the sabbath that the angels and saints in heaven keep, though they know no such thing as a first day in the week, have no reading, preaching, or praying, amongst them. This is a continual praying, and effectual way of praying in silence. A right active appropriating faith, does virtually contain a prayer in it; right believing is powerful praying. The knees, eyes, and tongues, bear the least share in prayer, the whole of the work lies upon the soul, and particularly upon faith in the soul, which is indeed the life and soul of prayer. Faith can pray without words; but the most elegant words, the phrase of angels, is not worthy to be called prayer without faith. I speak not so much of faith inditing a prayer, or giving life to it, as of its being virtually prayer, if not something more; for, indeed, faith is a real bringing down of that God, and drawing in of those influences into the soul, which prayer only look up for.
Communion with God is a continual fast; it is that spiritual and most excellent way of fasting, whereby the soul, emptying itself of itself, and all iself-fulness, self-sufficiency, self-confidence, receives of the fulness of God alone, and is filled therewith. A soul communing rightly with God, is a soul emptied of, and, as it were, fasting from itself; which is the most excellent way of fasting.
It is a continual thanksgiving; and indeed the best way of thanksgiving in the world. To render up ourselves to God purely and entirely, to reflect the glory of God in a holy and God-like temper, is a real and living thank-offering. This is that hallelujah, so much spoken of, which the angels and saints in glory do sing perpetually: what other adjunct of it there may be, I will not here dispute. This communion of hearts and wills is a constant and most excellent celebration of sacraments. The soul that is really baptized into the Spirit of the Lord Jesus, and feeds upon God, and is one with him, keeps a continual sacrament; without which, the sacramental eating and drinking is but a jejune and dry devotion. In a word, it is not possible for anything that is extrinsical to the soul to make it happy; but the soul that is advanced into the noble state of communion with God, is made partaker of a new nature, and is truly happy.
Nay, further, I will add, that this communion with God is not only better than all duties and ordinances, but even better than all revelations, evidences, discoveries that can be made or given to the soul from without; a manifestation of God, that is, of a divine life in the soul, is much better than such a manifestation as Moses had of his glory in the cleft of the rock, Exodus 34:1-35. Many say, O if we might but be assured of the love of God, of the pardon of sin, of an interest in Christ, we should be happy! why, I will tell you, if you had a voice from heaven, saying that ye were the beloved children of God, as Christ had; an angel sent from God to tell you that ye were beloved and highly favoured of God, as his mother Mary had, yet were communion with God to be preferred before these, for these things could not make a soul happy without real communion with God, but communion with God can and doth make a soul happy without these, and to this purpose, I suppose, I may apply that famous speech of our Saviour’s by way of allusion, “ It is more blessed to give, than to receive,”“ to give up one’’s self, one’’s heart, will, interests, and affections, to God, than to receive any external discoveries and manifestations from him. Why do we so earnestly seek after signs from without us, of God’s presence with us, as if there were anything better or more desirable to the soul than Immanuel, God with us, or, as the Apostle speaks, “ Christ in us the hope of glory?’“* He that desires any other evidence of grace, but more grace, does not only light up a candle to see the sun by, but indeed he acts like one that thinks there is something better than God himself; though I do not say that all do think so who are covetous of such manifestations. But this I will say, and you may do well to meditate upon it, that holy longings after a true and spiritual communion with God, do certainly spring from a divine principle in the soul; whereas a thirst after assurance of God’s love, and reconciliation of our persons with him, may be only the fruit of self-love and interest. — “ Let me die the death of the righteous! ’’ you know whose wish it was.
7. “ Though communion with God do concern the whole soul, and all the faculties, affections and motions of it,*” it is God’s spreading his influences, and exercising his sovereignty over all the powers of the soul, and their mutual spending of themselves upon him, and conforming to him, “ yet the great acts of the soul, whereby it chiefly holds communion with God, are loving and believing.”“ Love is the joining and knitting of the soul to God; faith is the soul’s labouring after more intimate conjunction with him, a drawing in influences from him, and participations of him into the soul. We may say that faith fetches in supplies from heaven, and love enjoys them; faith draws in sweetness and virtue from Christ, and love feeds upon it. Certainly these two eminent graces grow, live, and thrive together, and are inseparable companions. It is somewhat difficult to distinguish them, or to assign to each its proper place and work in the soul; they seem mutually to act, and to be mutually acted on by each other; perhaps the Apostle might have respect to this mystery, when he speaks so doubtfully, Galatians 5:6, “ Faith which worketh by love,” which words may signify either ’faith acting by love,’ or ’faith acted on by love.”* We know, indeed, that in the state of perfect communion, which we call glory, love shall abide and flourish more abundantly, and there shall be no room for faith there, as to the principal acts of it; but which of them hath the greater part in maintaining our communion with God in this world, is not easy, nor indeed needful to determine. The pious soul is the most proper temple wherein God dwelleth, according to that, “ Ye are the temple of the livhig God:” faith and love are the Jachin and Boaz, the two great pillars which keep up the soul as a temple; take away these and it remains a soul indeed, but the soul does not remain a temple to the Lord. In a word, these two are the souFs principal handmaids which she useth about this blessed guest; faith goes out and brings him in, and love entertains him; by faith she finds him whom she seeks, and by love she kisses him whom she finds, as the spouse is described. Song of Solomon 8:1.
8. “ The communion that is between God and the pious soul is altogether different from that communion that is between creatures.” Here I might show you how it exceeds and excels that, in many respects: but I shall not insist upon any of those particulars, nor indeed upon any of those many differences that are between them, save only upon this one: The communion that is between creature and creature is perfect in its kind, and so, consequently, gives mutual satisfaction; I mean, it terminates the expectations, so that nothhig remains to be enjoyed in them more than what is enjoyed. The creature is shallow, and soon is fathomed, we soon come to the bottom of it: a finite can grasp a finite being, and enjoy it, as I may say, all at once. A man may come so near to his friend, that he can come no nearer, enjoy him as fully as he is capable to enjoy, or the other to be enjoyed: created sweetness may be exhausted to the very bottom. But the souFs communion with God does not give it any such satisfaction, though indeed, in some sense, it gives a satisfaction of a much higher and more excellent kind. I told you before, that the soul’s communion with God is imperfect in this life; and therefore it must needs follow, that it cannot satisfy; that is, not terminate and fill up the desires of it. Communion with God is maintained by faith and love, which proves it to be very sweet; but it also admits of hope, which proves it to be not satisfactory; for where there is yet any place left for hope, there is no full or satisfactory enjoyment. This may serve as a certain mark, whereby to judge of the truth of that communion with God; it is not glutting to the soul, but will certainly manifest itself in incessant hungering, poor in the midst of riches; the soul is in the midst of plenty, and yet cries out, as if it were ready to starve for want. When I consider the temper of some perfectionists, who cry down duties and ordinances, as low and unprofitable rudiments, and boast of their full and inaccessible attainments, and compare it with the temper of the great Apostle, who did not reckon that he had attained, but still followed after that he might apprehend, who forgot the things that were behind, and reached forth unto those things that were before, pressing towards the mark, &c. I am ready to cry out, either this man is not an Apostle, or these men are not what they pretend; but an Apostle he was, and had intimate communion with his Lord; and therefore, I confess, I cannot allow these men so high a place, in my opinion, as they have in their own.
God is infinite; and, therefore, though the soul be ever grasping, yet it can never comprehend; the soul however finds him to be infinitely good, and so cannot cease grasping at him either. The pious soul sees that there is yet much more to be enjoyed of God, and in him; and, therefore, though it be very near to him, yet cries out, and complains of its distance from him; — “ Oh when shall I come and appear before him! “ though it be united to him, yet it longs to be still more one with him, and to be in a closer conjunction. The pious soul forgets, with Paul, what it hath received, not through disingenuity and unthankfulness, but through a holy ardour and covetousness: all that he hath of God seems little, because there is yet so much to be had. Though the pious soul do drink of the fountain, yet that is not enough, it would lie down by it; though it do lie down by it, yet it is not satisfied either, except it may bathe itself, and even be swallowed up therein.
Behold a paradox! the pious soul is most thirsty though, according to Christ’s promise, it thirsts no more: it is most restless, though, according to his promise, it have rest. It is proper to God alone to rest in his love, for the creature cannot in this imperfect state: by this we know that we are not yet in heaven; for it is a state of perfect rest, not sloth, or cessation, but satisfaction. Faith is the fever of the soul, rendering it more thirsty by how much the more it drinks in of the water of life, the living streams that flow forth from the throne of God and of the Lamb. As the waters of the sanctuary are described by the prophet, growing deeper and deeper, Ezek. xlvii. so hope, which is the soul’s appetite, grows larger and larger, and cannot be satisfied till the souPs capacity be filled up. The doctrinal part being thus briefly despatched, it will be easy to infer some things by way of corollary. I shall content myself with three only amongst many.
1. “All wicked men are strangers to God.”
We know, indeed, that God, according to his infinite essence, is present with all his creatures; not only men, but even devils too, have their being in him, he hath spread his omnipotence, as the foundation whereupon the whole creation doth stand; he reared up the world in himself, and in him it doth subsist at this day. However angels and men have sadly fallen from God, yet they may be truly said to live in him still; and althouorh all wicked souls do straggle oii from God, as to their dispositions and affections, ingrafting themselves into another stock by sin and wickedness, yet they cannot possibly straggle from him as to their subsistence, as the Apostle teaches the Athenian philosophers, “ He is not far from every one of us,”“ though few feel after him or find him. And it may be truly said, in some sense, that all the creatures, yea, the very worst of them, have a communion with God; all partake of him; no creature hath anything of its own really distinct from him. Every thing that hath a being, hath a relation to that infinite and Supreme Being; and every living thing may be rightly said to have communion with him who is life itself And all those several excellencies that are in the creatures, flow out from God, who hath impressed various prints of his own beauty and perfection upon every thing that he hath made. God’s making of a thing is no other than the communicating of himself thereunto. And, therefore, when you look into the world, do not view any creature in the narrow point of its own being, but in the unbounded essence of God, and therein love and admire it.
But, upon the immortal soul of man, God hath copied out his divine perfections more clearly and gloriously, than upon any other creature in this world. God could not make a rational soul, without communicating of his own infinite wisdom, power, life, freedom to it; so that there is more of the divine nature to be seen in the understanding and will of any one man, than in the whole fabric of heaven and earth.
Notwithstanding this, wicked men are strangers to God. They live and move in God indeed, but they know it not, they consider it not; they act as if they had no dependence upon him, no relation to him. Though they have some kind of communion with God, as creatures, yet this makes them not at all happy: for they are departed from God in their affections and dispositions; they have degenerated from that subserviency and subordination to the divine will, which is the proper perfection of the creature, and are “ alienated from the life of God,’’ as the Apostle speaks. It is not the souFs moving in God, that makes it truly and happily nigh unto him, but its moving towards God, as the chief object, and according to the will of God, as the chief rule; and therefore wicked men, who pitch upon other objects, and walk by other laws, even the lusts and ordinances of their own flesh and fancy, are properly strangers to God, and miserable. He is not properly said to know God, who hath a notion of him formed in his head, but he whose heart and will are moulded into a conformity to God, and a delight in him; so that a wicked man though he know, and believe, and tremble, as much as any of the devils, yet not loving nor delighting in God, as his chief good, not being conformed to his image, as the highest and purest perfection, may be truly said to be estranged from him; which is a state of hell, and death, and darkness. This is the man, who, though not in words, yet, interpretatively, and really saith unto God, “ Depart from me, I desire not the knowledge of thy ways,’’ with them in Job 21:14.
These do really exempt themselves from the dominion of Christ, and do really, though not audibly, say with them in the gospel, “ We will not have this man to reign over us.’’ However men pretend, and boast of their relation to, and acquaintance with God, certainly all that live a mere sensual life, nonconformists to the image of God, are truly said to be strangers to him, and in a state of non-communion with him, 1 John 1:6; 2 Corinthians 6:14
2. “ The life of a true Christian is the most high and noble life in the world;” it exceeds the life of all other men, even of the greatest men. The character that is here given of the good man is the highest that can be given of any man, or indeed of any creature. It is the highest glory and excellency of the creature, to partake of the life of God, of the perfections of the Creator; and such is the description that the Spirit of God here makes of the religious man. What an unreasonable and senseless reproach is that which this wicked world doth cast upon religion, calling it a low and despicable thing; and upon religious and pious men, calling them low-spirited, silly people. Can a man be better spirited, than with the Spirit of God? Can anything more truly ennoble a soul than a divine nature? Can a man be raised any higher than unto heaven itself.’ So noble is the godly soul. “ The way of life is above to the wise;” and, consequently, all wicked men lead a low life, and are bound under chains of death and darkness: the righteous man is of a high and divine original, born of God, born from above; and therefore is more excellent than his neighbour, than any of his neighbours, even a king himself being judge, Proverbs 12:26. What a hellish baseness is that sinful gallantry of spirit, what a brutishness is that sensuality of living, which the degenerate sons of Adam do so much magnify!
True goodness and excellency of spirit must be measured by the proportion that it bears to the Supreme Good, the infinite pattern of all perfection.
What excellent persons were those renowned saints of old, of whom the Apostle says, that “ the world was not worthy,’“* however they were thought not worthy to live in the world! What a noble and generous spirit of true christian valour, patience, meekness, contempt of the world, and self-denial, was that, which was to be seen in the blessed apostles, however they were esteemed as the filth and sweepings of the world, the “ offscouring of all things!’ To which of the noble, wise, mighty men of the world, as such, did God ever say. These are the men that have fellowship with me, these are the men that lead a noble and divine life? No, no, “ not many noble are called;’’ and when they are called, they are made more noble than ever they were by birth or descent, by places of preferment or command. The life of every wicked man, of what rank soever he be in the world, is but a low life, a life in most things common to the very beasts with him; if the main of his business and dehght be to eat, and drink, and work, and sleep, and enjoy sensual pleasures, what doth he? what enjoyeth he more than the beasts that perish? But the life of the meanest soul, that hath true and spiritual communion with God, is a life common to him with the blessed angels, those sons of the morning, the flower of the whole creation. That life which hath self for its centre, must needs be a penurious, and indeed a painful life: for how can the soul of man possibly feed to the full upon such spare diet, such scant fare as it finds at home? Nay, indeed, how can it choose but be in pain and torture, whilst it stretcheth itself upon self-sufficiency, or creature fulness, which is not at all commensurate to it? But the jsoul that rightly stretches and spends all its facul* ties upon the infinite and blessed God, finds all its capacities filled up to the brim with that fountain of goodness, and itself perfectly matched with a suitable and satisfactory object. This is the true and only nobleness of spirit, when all the powers and faculties of this immortal soul are exalted and advanced into a true and vital sympathy and communion with the chief Good, formed according to his will, conformed to his image. And O that wisdom might be more “justified of licr children!” O that the life of God did but clearly manifest itself, and shine forth in the lives of those that call themselves Christians! Alas, that ever God himself should suffer reproach, by recason of the low-spiritedness and laziness of his servants! For this cause is religion evil spoken of The Lord awake and enable us to express and show forth the divine life with all power and vigour, to live as high as the calling wherewith we are called, and so roll away this reproach!
3. “ The life of a Christian is not a heavy sluggish thing, but active and vigorous,” as the phrase ’ communion with God,” imports. Religion is a communication of life and vigour from Him, who is life itself; which makes the truly God-like soul to be quick and powerful in its motions. Every thing is by so much the swifter and stronger in its motions, by how much the nearer it is to its centre, as philosophy tells us. Certainly by how much the nearer any man is gotten to God, who is the centre of souls, by so much the more does he covet after more intimate communion with him, and the more eagerly lay hold upon him. Communion does necessarily imply re-action or reflection: the soul that receives of God, and his fulness, will certainly be emptying itself into him again. Communion, in the very force of the phrase, implies a mutualness; we cannot suppose a soul partaking of God, but it must needs mutually render up itself to him again.
There can be no commerce nor correspondence without returns: but what return can the pious soul make unto God? Why, it renders up its whole self to him. Faith is a giving grace as well as a receiving, it gives the soul back to Christ, as well as takes Christ into the soul; it draws in strength and grace from God, and reciprocally spends the whole powers of the soul upon him. The happiness of a real Christian doth not consist in cessation and rest; the soul itself being a powerful and active being, the happiness of it, the very rest of it, must also be active and vigorous. Where there is communion, there must needs be quick and lively returns, reciprocations, reflections, and correspondencies; the drawings of God are answered with the soul’s running. The motion of Christ’s fingers begets a motion in the Christian’s soul: “ My Beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him.”“ These are the divine and harmonious responses which are made and maintained in the godly soul, the temple of the living God. O shake off that lazy and drowsy spirit, which hath so benumbed many in this cold and stupid age of the world; work out your salvation with care and diligence. If your religion be nothing but a spiritual kind of sleep, your heaven will prove to be nothing but a pleasant kind of dream.
Communion with God speaks something divine, active, vigorous. The life of a Christian doth not consist only in cessation from evil, reformation from sin, or dying thereunto; mortification is but one part of regeneration. It is the conceit, and, I doubt, the deceit, of many nominal Christians, that if they can but keep up an indifferent even spirit and conversation, free, from gross and scandalous sins from day to day, they are happy enough; their utmost ambition is to be innocent and harmless. This indeed is necessary and praiseworthy; but surely the happiness of a soul lies higher: thus happy are all the creatures that keep in the station, and keep up the order prescribed them of God: thus happy is the sun in the firmament, running its race continually, and never departing from the office which is assigned to it. But the soul of man is capable of a higher kind of happiness, namely. Communion with God; which is, when the faculties thereof being awakened, refined, and acted on by the Spirit of God, do reciprocally act, and spend themselves upon him, longing to be perfectly swallowed up in him, and to be all that which God himself is, as far as the creature is capable to drink in the perfections of the Creator, and become one with his Maker. This is that truly noble and divine life, which is here called communion with God, which the high-spirited and generous soul labours yet more and more to be growing up into, and perfected in. Keep yourselves, with David, from your iniquities; it is something to be freed from the guilt and power of sin; but there is somewhat higher than this, a more excellent attainment, a more divine accomplishment: go on therefore with the same David, and aspire after this pure and blissful state, this heaven upon earth, waiting for the more ample and glorious manifcstations of God to you and in you, more than they that watch for the morning, as he did. This inference was only of instruction, but the sweetness and needfulness of the subject almost prevails with me to turn it into an earnest exhortation, but that I would not anticipate myself. Therefore I proceed to the next way of improving this doctrine, which shall be by way of conviction or reprehension.
1. Our fellowship is — it reproves them that can take up with a shall be — a heaven to come. I am now speaking, not to the worst of men, whose very souls are swallowed up in sensual enjoyments, and imprisoned in their senses: for these men either think of no heaven at all, or else they place their heaven and happiness in the enjoyment of themselves or of the creature. Nor yet do I speak to those men who, being persuaded of a future state, do indeed wish for a heaven to come, but then it is a poor kind of low and earthly heaven, consisting in ease, rest, safety, freedom from troubles or torments, which is the best happiness which most men understand, the highest heaven that any carnal mind can see or soar up to. But I am speaking to a better and finer sort of souls than these, that are verily possessed with a sense of a pure and spiritual heaven in the world to come; yea, they are so overpowered with the foresight of it, as that they do earnestly expect and wish for it; yea, the hopes of it do sustain and strengthen their hearts under the manifold temptations and persecutions of this present world; they are so verily persuaded of the truth of it, and of their own title to it too, that they are content to abide this long and disconsolate night of dimness, and anguish, and frightfulness, merely in expectation of the dawning of that day, that clear and bright day of their glorious and everlasting redemption. And herein I am far from blaming them, nay, I must needs commend their magnanimous faith and self-denial. But, in the mean time, they dwell too much upon heaven as a future state, and comfort themselves only in a happiness to come, not longing and labouring to find a heaven opened within themselves, a beginning of eternal bliss brought into themselves: they are too well content with a certain reversion, and do not eagerly enough endeavour after present possession, to be actually instated in so much of the inheritance of souls as may fall to their share even in this lower world; this slothful temper and inactivity I do condemn wherever it is found; yea, though it be in my own soul. Every thing in the world, by a natural principle, thirsts after its proper rest, and a happiness suitable to the nature of it; no creature can be content, though it may be constrained, to be at a distance from its centre, but is still carried out towards its own perfection. And why then should a pious soul, who is God’s only new creature in the world, be content with a state of imperfections? why should not he as eagerly covet, and as earnestly pursue the most intimate and close communion and conjunction with his God, as they do with their respective centres? Can any earthly, sensual, unregenerate man be content with an inheritance in reversion, so as to suspend his minding and following of the world till hereafter? Can any ambitious spirit, who places his main happiness and contentment in popular estimation, and worldly greatness, be content to stand gazing at preferments; will he be willing to sit still, and wait till they drop into his mouth? No, no, there is a raging thirst in the soul, which will not suffer it to be at rest, but is still awakening and provoking all the powers of the whole man, till they arise and fetch in water to quench it. And therefore we read of men making haste to be rich, and hastening after another god; which eager and ardent passions towards earthly objects, you may see lively described in the instances of Ahab, Amnon, and Haman, in the holy scriptures. And is there any reason to be given, why that new nature and divine principle which God putteth into regenerate souls, should not carry them as hastily and forcibly to a present fruition of their proper object and happiness, (so far as at present it maybe enjoyed) as that corrupt and degenerate nature doth hurry on those in whom it ruleth, towards the satisfaction of their brutal lusts.? Divines speak sometimes of making heaven and eternal life present to ourselves, and say that this is the work of faith; which is a high and excellent doctrine, but, I doubt, not thoroughly understood by ordinary Christians. To make heaven present to one’s self, is not only to insist upon a state of future happiness in frequent meditations, to think much of it, neither is this that noble employment of saving faith; but the life and power of faith is most eminently exerted in drawing in participations of life and grace from Christ, and in a real bringing down of God and heaven into the soul. The truth is, heaven is a state of perfect communion with God, a state of love, joy, peace, purity, freedom; and as far as any soul is in such a state upon earth, so far he is above the earth, and may be said to be in heaven. Therefore a right active soul, that truly understands its proper and spiritual heaven and happiness, so far as he is thus active and sensible, cannot be content to stay for all his happiness tiU the world to come; cannot be content to be unhappy, no, not for an hour, but is still growing up in God, and springing up into everlasting life.
2. It reprehends those that make a stir about the kingdom of Christ in the world, and men’s being brought into the communion of the church, but advance not his kingdom in their own souls, nor long to have their ov/n souls advanced into that noble state of communion with “ the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.”“ There is, doubtless, a generation of such popular Christians, who, being strangers to the life, and power, and spirit of true religion, do endeavour to pass off themselves on the world, and commend themselves to the charity of their brethren, by a pretended zeal for the kingdom of Christ in the world, and the glorious manifestation of it, as they speak. I know, indeed, that it is worthy the cares, and prayers, and utmost diligence of every serious Christian, to spread and propagate the knowledge of the gospel, to pour out the ointment of Christ’s name far and near. A more pure and spiritual administration of all gospel ordinances throughout the world is highly desirable; yea, and I think an indifferent and careless disposition towards the worship of God argues much of an earthly and atheistical mind. But I fear that kingdom of Christ, and those glorious manifestations and discoveries which are so much pretended to by many, if they should be thoroughly examined, would be, at length, resolved into nothing else but the advancement of some one party or interest above all the rest, or the exchanging of an old form or dress of religion for a new one; and that this zeal would be found little better than the blazings of self-love, a fire kindled not by a coal from the altar, but by a spark of their own. But, be it so, that this disposition of theirs is sincere and spiritual; should not this charity begin at home? The most proper kingdom of Christ is that whereby he ruleth in the hearts of men; the most excellent worship is when the soul itself becomes a temple for the living God to dwell in, and to receive and reflect the manifestations of his glory; when a fire of divine love is kindled in it, and therein it doth offer up, not bulls and goats, no, nor prayers and meditations, so much as itself unto God; which is a reasonable service, as the Apostle speaks, far more glorious than either the Mosaical or Evangelical dispensation, if you consider it in the letter only.
Whatever men may pretend, no man can be truly and rightly studious of the advancement of the kingdom of God in the world, that hath not first felt the mighty power and blessed effects of it in his own soul. Communion with the church is only so far to be valued, as it is in order to a real and spiritual communion with God; which communion with God, if we do indeed sincerely wish to others, we shall more abundantly labour to promote in ourselves. I cannot believe that he doth heartily seek the happiness of others, who himself sits still, and is content to be miserable, especially when their happiness and his is one and the same.
3. It condemns them as not Christians, whose fellowship is only with their fellow-creatures. We have seen that it is the character, the distinguishing character of a pious man, to have fellowship with God. It must needs follow, then, that those degenerate souls that rise no higher than the world, that converse only with self or any other creature, are verily strangers to true Christianity, whatever their confidence or presumption may be. Christians, tell not me what you profess of Christ, what you believe of the gospel, what orthodox opinions you hold, what an honest party you side with, how many and specious duties you perform, no, nor what hopes or wishes you have of going to heaven; but, tell me where is your principal communion; what do you mainly mind, follow, converse with; what pattern do you conform to; what rule do you live by; what object do you ultimately aim at? The whole world of worldly men doth hasten after another god, as the Psalmist phrases it, though not all after the same god: they spend their souls, indeed, upon various objects, and use difierent methods to obtain rest, but yet all their happiness and contentment is ultimately resolved into creature-communion. That dreadful sentence, which the Apostle delivers universally concerning all men, is to be limited to all wicked men only, and of them it is undoubtedly true: “All seek their own, and none the things of Jesus Christ.’“
And, of all these, that of the Psalmist’s “many” is to be understood: “ There be many that say. Who will show us any good.?” that is, any creaturegood, as the words following do explain it. All unregenerate souls are bound up in the creature, some creature or other; and therefore the noblest of them, whatever boasting they may make, are low and ignoble; their main converse is but with their fellow-creatures, and indeed creatures much inferior to themselves: “ Corn and wine,”’ says the Psalmist; “ earthly things,” says the Apostle, — “ who mind earthly things.” In a word, though it be true what the Apostle says in one place, that all men in the world do live in God, yet it is also true, that most of men, as the same Apostle speaks elsewhere, do “live without God in tlic world,” have their hearts staked down to one creature or other, and so fall short of this honourable character which the Apostle here gives of good men: “ Our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.” And now I shall conclude the remainder of this discourse, with a humble request, and earnest expostulation.
“Reckon not upon any happiness below this communion.” There are many things which a Christian may take to be comforts; but only one, this one, that he ought to take to be the happiness of his life. I design not to speak anything to the prejudice of natural or civil ornaments or accomplishments, much less to the disparagement of any of those endowments or employments which are, in a sense, spiritual, commonly called gifts and duties: but, I must confess, it is one of the great wonders of the world to me, to see such a noble and intelligent being, as the soul of man is, attending to, and pursuing after, things either extrinsical or inferior to itself, in the mean time carelessly forgetting, or wilfully rejecting its main happiness, principal end, and proper perfection. As for those sensual persons, those mere animals, whose souls are incarnate in their senses, and seem to perform no higher office in the world than the souls of beasts, that is, to carry about their bodies; who value themselves by their bodies, or, which is baser, by the apparel that clothes them or the estates that feed them: I shall not now trouble myself about them, but leave them to be chastised by Seneca or Plutarch, or indeed any ordinary philosopher. I shall rather apply myself a little to a sort of higher spirited people, whom by a condescension of charity we call Christians, who, valuing themselves by external professions, privileges, performances, may indeed be said to be somewhat more scrupulous and curious, but no less mistaken than the former: for if the grosser sort of sensualists do deny, and professedly abjure their own reason, and the finer sort of hypocrites do more cunningly bribe theirs, each method amounts to no more than a cheat, and both parties will be alike miserable, save that the latter will be somewhat more tormented in missing a happiness which he looked and hoped for. It is not proper to my present discourse, to speak so highly and honourably of these externals of Christianity, nor to press them so zealously, as I do at all times when I have occasion; for I verily value all ordinances of Christ, and duties of God’s worship, at a high rate; nay, I know not any serious and truly pious soul in the world, but is of this same opinion with me; but, I must confess, I think it is one of the greatest and most pernicious cheats in the world, for men to feed upon the dish instead of the meat, to place their happiness in those things which God hath only appointed to be means to convey it. This was the great destruction of the Jewish church; by this they perished: thus they are every where described in Scripture, as a people resting in their privileges and performances, boasting of their sacrifices and temple-service; they made account of a strange kind of flesh-pleasing heaven, something distinct from them, and reserved for them, to be given them by way of reward for the righteousness which themselves had wrought by the power of their own free will (which free will, they say, is an effect of man’’s fall, but they make it a cause of man**s rise; for now he can purchase and merit a happiness, which happiness is also more illustrious than that given of mere grace;) which righteousness, if we look either into their own writings, or God’’s writings concerning them, we shall find was nothing else but a strict observance of the precepts of the law, according to the letter and external dispensation of it. Such a low and legal spirit was generally found amongst the Jews; I wish the greatest part of us, who are in profession and name evangelical, be not found as truly legal in spirit and temper as they were. If we cry the gospel of Christ, the gospel of Christ, with the same spirit, as they cried, “ the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord,” our confidence will as surely betray us into final misery as theirs did. True, indeed, prayers, sacraments, sermons, are somewhat finer words than the old obsolete ones, the law, sacrifices, ceremonies; but, alas! they are but words; at least they are not gods, not more fit to terminate our devotions and affections than these. I beseech you, therefore, Christians, be not mistaken in this matter. True Christianity is not a notion, but a nature; that is not religion which is wrapped up in books, or laid up in men’s brains, but it is laid in the very constitution of the soul, a new principle implanted by God, in the highest powers of the soul, refining and spiritualizing all the faculties thereof, and rendering them as like to God himself, as such a creature can resemble its Creator.
It is a truth, as clear as the sun is clear, that nothing can make a soul truly happy, but what is wrought into the nature of it, and that must be somewhat more excellent than itself, and be nothing less than something divine, even the image of the blessed God. If you be Christians, in deed and in truth, value all the ordinances of God, and the duties of the Christian religion, but value not yourselves by these, or your happiness by these. Attend upon them all for the maintaining and increasing of real fellowship with God; for though these be not it, yet they are the way wherein it pleases God to give it. Drink the sincere milk of the word, but let it be only with a holy design of growing thereby, of growing up into God, and a divine life. Away with those low and base thoughts of happiness; the happiness of a soul is a high and excellent, indeed a divine thing; it is in some sense common to God and the soul; God is happy in himself alone, and the soul can only be happy in him. What contentment, what real happiness. Christian, can the rising of thy party in the world, or the rising of thy name in the country, bring thee, if, in the mean time, thou thyself harbourest any carnal will, self-interest that doth rise up in opposition to the pure and perfect will and nature of God? how art thou happy in thy prayers, if thou cast sin out of thy mouth, and, in the mean time, a fountain of iniquity be springing up in thy heart! What avails it towards a state of perfection, to be of the most orthodox opinions, the most honest society, the fairest profession, the most popular and sanctimonious form, or the most plausible performances either, the soul being, in the mean time, alienated from the life of God, and feeding upon some earthly trash or other, which destroys the native powers and vigour of it, and keeps it under a perpetual languor? even just so much as a silken stocking upon a gouty leg, or a princely diadem upon an aching head, avails towards a state of ease and soundness and good temperature of body. Let nothing limit your ambition, but a state of God-like perfection, let nothing set bounds to your loving and longing souls, but a real fruition of God himself; nay, let not that bound them either, but the more you enjoy, see, and taste, the more let your love be strengthened, after the manner of fire, which, the more it is fed, the more hungry and devouring it grows. In a word, let nothing satisfy you lower than the highest character that can be given of mortal man, to be men “ after God’s own heart,” to have God dwelling in you, to be filled with his fulness, to have this real and excellent “commnuion with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.’’ To whom be all honour, praise, and glory, for ever and ever. THE ANGELICAL LIFE, BY SAMUEL SHAW.
’— “ Are as the angels of God in heaven. The doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the great things of the christian religion, as they were accounted strange things by all the world when they were first published and preached, so indeed by none less entertained, or rather more opposed, than by the wisest of men living in that age, namely.
Scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, who were the “ disputers of this world,*” as the Apostle’s phrase is: a thing of wonderful observation, not only to us in our day, but even to our blessed Lord himself in the days of his flesh, who fetches the cause of it from heaven, and adores the infinite wisdom of God in it — “ I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.”“ Amongst other set disputations that the Sadducees held with our Saviour, the one in this chapter is very famous; where they dispute against the resurrection of the dead, by an absurd argument grounded upon an instance of a woman that had been married to seven husbands successively. Now, say they, if there be a resurrection, whose wife shall she be then? Our Saviour answers by destroying the ground of their argument, and showing that they disputed upon a false supposition; for, saith he, “ In the resurrection there shall be no marrying; but men shall be as the angels of God.” In which words this doctrine is plainly laid down, (for I shall not meddle with the controversy,)
“ That the glorified saints shall be as the angels of God in heaven.” The other evangelists lay down the same truths, see Mark 12:25, Luke 20:36. In the explication of which point I will shew, I. Negatively, wherein the saints shall not be like the angels. II. Affirmatively, wherein the saints shall be like unto them, or, as St. Luke hath it, equal to them.
I. Negatively.
1. “ The glorified saints shall not be like the angels in essence.” The angelical essence, and the rational soul are, and shall be different. Souls shall remain souls still, keep their own essence: the essence shall not be changed; souls shall not be changed into angelical essences.
2. “ They shall not be wholly spirits without bodies,.” as the angels. The spirits of just men now made perfect, are like to the angels in this sense than they shall be after the resurrection; for now they are spirits without bodies: but the saints shall have bodies, not such as now, corruptible, not in anything defective, not needing creature-supplies, but incorruptible, glorious bodies, in some sense spiritual bodies; which are described by three characters — incorruptible, (somewhat more than immortal,) glorious, powerful. Neither doth their having bodies any whit abate their perfection or glory, nor render them inferior to the angels; for even the glorious Redeemer of the world hath a body, who is yet superior to the angels; and he shall change the vile bodies of the saints, and make them like unto his glorious body.
3. “ Neither have we any ground to believe that the saints shall be altogether equal to the angels in dignity and glory f but rather, that as man was at first made a little lower than the angels, so that he shall never come to be exalted altogether so high as they; for it seems, that the natural capacity of an angel is greater than of a man, and so shall continue, for they are a distinct kind of creatures. As a beast cannot become so wise and intelligent as a man, for then he would cease to be a beast; so neither can a man become so powerful and capable as an angel, for then he would cease to be a man.
II. Affirmatively. The glorified saints shall be like the angels of God in heaven, 1st. In their qualities; that is,
1. “ In being pure and holy.” Whether they shall be equal to them in positive holiness or not, I know not; whether they shall understand, and know, and love God, in all degrees, as much as the angels; it seems rather that they shall not, because, as I said before, their capacity shall not be so large. But if in this they be not altogether equal to the angels, yet it implies no imperfection; for they shall be positively holy, as far as their nature is capable, and so shall be perfect in their kind — “ The spirits of just men made perfect:*” they shall in this be like unto the angels^ if not equal to them, yea, like unto God himself in it — “ Be ye holy, as I am holy.” But as to negative holiness, the saints shall be even equal to the angels of God in heaven, that is, they shall have no more sin, no more corruption than they have: they shall be as perfectly freed from all iniquities, imperfections, and infirmities, as the ang-els. What can be cleaner than that which hath no uncleanness at all in it? Why, so clean shall all the saints be — “ No unclean thing shall enter into heaven.” They shall be without all kind of spot or blemish, which is a perfect negative holiness; more cannot be said of the angels in this respect. As branches of this: —
2. “ As the holy angels do reverence the divine Majesty; they cover their faces with their wings, crying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, so shall the glorified saints.” You may see what sweet harmony they make, consenting together to give the glory pf all to God, The saints stood and cried.
Salvation to our God who sittetli upon the throne, and to the Lamb;’’ the angels stood round about, saying, “ Amen, amen.”’
3. “In their readiness to do the will of God, and execute his commands;”*’ therefore the angels are described to have wirig^ — “with twain they did fly.”
How God shall please to employ angels or saints in the world to come, is not for us to enquire; but they shall be alike ready to do his will, and serve his pleasure, whatever it shall be. Even whilst the saints are imperfect on earth, they can cry, “ Here am I, send me:”“ how much more ready shall they be then, when all their fetters are knocked off!
4. They shall be as the angels, “ in their cheerful and unwearied execution of the will of God.” So the angels are, and so shall the saints be. The spirit shall then be more willing, and the flesh shall be no more weak, as it is now; for when it is raised again, it shall be in power. More things of this nature might be added, but 1 pass lightly over them; because, although they be true, yet they are not principally looked at in this text: therefore I come to the second thing wherein the glorified saints shall be like unto the angels, and that is. In their way of living. They shall be like the angels, that is, saith one truly, living like the angels. How is that? our Saviour tells us, neither marrying, nor being given in marriage; it is added presently in Luke 20:36, “ For neither can they die any more.’’ If there be no dying, there will be no need of propagation; and if no need of propagation, then why should they marry? The angels are single, and know no other conjunction but with God in a spiritual manner; no more shall the saints. But what great matter is that to be like the angels in what perfection is that? Many saints, yea, and sinners too upon earth, are so like the angels, nay, and the devils too. Therefore you must know that our Saviour under this phrase of not marrying, doth comprehend all manner of creature-converse, all kind of living upon, and delighting in the creature, by a synecdoche of the part, as is ordinary in scripture; “I have not given upon usury,” saith the prophet, “ yet the people curse me,”“ that is, I have had no dealing in the world, no negociation. By one kind he understands the whole, Ezekiel 25:4, where, by eating their fruits, and drinking their milk, is understood the possession of all that was theirs; and in many other places the Spirit of God uses this tropical way of speaking. The angels of God neither marry, nor are given in marriage, that is, they live not upon any created good, delight not in any created comfort, but live entirely upon God, converse with him, are everlastingly beholding his glory, and delighting themselves in him. Thus shall the glorified saints live for ever: their bodies shall not need nor use created supplies, food, physic, raiment, &c. which things in this animal state they stand in need of, Matthew 6:32. But that is not all: for their souls shall not any longer desire, nor hanker after any created thing, but, as the angels, shall be possessed of God, filled with the fulness of God; all their powers and faculties are perfectly refined and spiritualized, abstracted from all created things, eternally rejoicing and delighting themselves in the contemplation and participation of the supreme and infinite Good: for during this earthly and imperfect state, not only the bodies of good men feed upon, and are sustained by the creatures, in common with other men, but even their souls do taste too much of worldly contentments, and drink too deep of earthly pleasures and creature comforts: even the most refined souls upon earth, though they do not properly feed upon any thing below God, yet do oft dip the end of their rod in this honey that lies upon the earth, with Jonathan; do use their earthly enjoyments, and delight in them in a way too unspiritual, having abstracted them from God, and loving them with a distinct love. But in the resurrection it shall not be so; for the holy souls shall be perfectly conformed to the holy God, shall feed upon him singly, live upon him entirely, be wrapt up in him wholly, and be satisfied with him solely and everlastingly, and so shall they be equal to the angels. The creature, although it does not fill any truly sanctified soul upon earth, yet it hath some room there; but then it shall be perfectly cast out, and the soul shall be filled with all the fulness of God. The crcature is now much in some pious souls, and something in all of them; but then it shall be nothing at all to them, or in them, but God shall be all in all, all things in all of them; as the way of the saints’* living, and their glorified state is described — “ that God may be all in all.’’ “ They shall inherit all things:”’ but how is that? why, see the explication of it in the following words, “ He that overcometh shall inherit all things, and I will be his God.’“ God will be their God; God shall be unto them instead of all things. In that *tate there shall no need of sun or moon; by which excellent and useful creatures the whole creation seems to be understood; for they that shall live above the sun and moon, shall certainly live above all things that are below these: but how then? why it follows, “ The glory of God shall enlighten them, and the Lamb shall be their light.” “ And there shall be no night there, and they need no candle, neither light of the sun: for the Lord giveth them light.*”
All happiness is derived into them from God, and therefore there shall be no night, no want of any creature comfort to them; neither shall they desire anything more of the creature whether small or great, whether candle or sun. For explication of this their blessed life, let me allude to that of our Saviour — “ The fowls of heaven neither sow nor reap, yet God feedeth them;” so the saints in heaven neither want nor desire any created good, for they feed upon God the supreme and infinite Good: and again, “ The lilies neither toil nor spin, and yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these/’ These blessed souls have no respect at all to things terrene and created; yet they are so filled and adorned with the glory of the infinite Majesty, that Solomon in all his glory was nothing in comparison of them. In a word, the state of the glorified saints and angels is set out by our Saviour in the same manner, by one and the same description, and that is the seeing of God: the life of angels is called a continual beholding of the face of God, and the state of the saints’ glory and happiness is also a seeing of God — “ They shall see his face, and his name shall be in their foreheads.” Now, this phrase, the seeing of God, applied both to the saints and angels, doth place their happiness in God alone, excluding the creature; and it doth import the fulness and clearness, and certainty of their bliss.
Thus I have showed you, in what sense, though I am not able to show you in what degree, the glorified saints shall be like the angels of God in heaven: their way of living upon the blessed God alone, shall be the same with that of the holy angels.
APPLICATION. From the discovery of the future state of the saints, I find myself furnished with reasons for,
1. Reproof against the carnal conceits that many Christians have of heaven. Christians do I call them! nay, herein they seem rather Mahometans, who place heaven in the full and lasting enjoyment of all creature-comforts, nay, indeed of sinful and abominable pleasures, as one may read in their Alcoran. It may be, few Christians are altogether so sensual; but, sure I am, the far greater sort of Christians, so called, are very gross and carnal, at least, very low in their conceits of the state of future happiness. Heaven is a word as little understood as holiness; and that, I am sure, is the greatest mystery in the world. It would be tedious to run through the various apprehensions of men in this matter, and indeed impossible to know them. The common sort of people understand by heaven either just nothing but a glorious name, or at best but a freedom from bodily torment: as nothing of hell affects them but that dreadful word Jire^ so nothing of heaven but the comfortable word rest or safety.
Others, it may be, think there is something positive in heaven, and they dream of an honourable, easy, pleasant life, free from such kind of toils, labours, pains, persecutions, reproaches, and penuries, which men are subject to in this life; this is a true notion, but much below the nature of that happy state. Others are yet more highly affected with the words of glory and glorious, and seem to be much ravished with them, but are like men in a maze or wonderment, who admire something that they understand not, and are altogether confounded m their own apprehensions of it; as if a man should be mightily taken with such a fine name as Arabia the Happy, and by a blind fervour of mind should desire to go and visit it. Others rise yet higher in their apprehensions of heaven, and look upon it as a holy state, but that holiness is negative, a perfect freedom from sin, and all temptations to it: and indeed this is a precious consideration, and that wherein many a weary soul finds much rest: but yet this amounts not to the life of angels; it is a lower consideration of heaven than what our Saviour here presents us with. The state of the glorified saints shall not only be a state of freedom from temporal pains, or eternal pains, or a freedom from spiritual pains and imperfections, but a state of perfect positive holiness, pure light, ardent love, spiritual liberty, holy delights; when all created good shall perfectly vanish, all created love shall be swallowed up, the soul shall become of a most God-like disposition, shining forth in the glory that he shall put upon it, glorying in nothing but the blessed God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in his divine image and perfections, and wrapt up entirely into his infinite fulness to all eternity: which hath made me oft times to nauseate, and indeed to blame the poor low descriptions of the kingdom of heaven which I have found in books and sermons, for too dry, yea, and gross; which describe heaven principally as a place, and give it such circumstances of beauty, firmness, security, light, and splendour, pleasant society, good neighbourhood, as they think will most commend an earthly habitation. True indeed the Holy Ghost in scripture is pleased to condescend so far to our weak capacities, as to describe that glorious state to us by such things as we do best understand, and are apt to be most taken with, and do most gratify our senses in this world; as a kingdom, paradise, a glorious city, a crown, an inheritance; but yet it is not the will of God that his enlightened people should rest in such low notions of eternal life; for in other places God speaks of the state of glory according to the nature and excellency of it, and not according to the weakness of our understanding, and describes it at another rate, calling it the life of angels; as the beholding of God — a coming unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ — God’s being all things in us — it is called a knowing of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ. In a word, which is as high as can be spoken, higher indeed than can be perfectly understood, it is called a being like unto God — “We shall be like unto him.” But this use is not so much for reproof, as it is for information.
2. Here is matter of reproof, yea, and of just indignation, against the gross, low, sensual, earthly life of professors, who yet hope to be the children of the resurrection, and to be as the angels of God in heaven. What! hope to be like them then, and yet altogether unlike them now! I speak not in a passion, but out of a just indignation that I have conceived against myself, and against the generality even of saints themselves. I am not going to speak of covetousness commonly so called; there is a sin much like to it, which is not indeed a single sin, but an evil and unseemly temper, which is earthlymindedness, or minding of earthly things; or if you will, because I would not be misunderstood, a living upon the creature, or a loving of the creature with a distinct love. Oh! the insensible secrecy, and insuperable power of this creature-love! I cannot sufficiently exclaim against it. Why do we spend noble affections upon such low and empty nothings? Are we called with such a high calling, think you, that our conversation should be so low.? Is the fulness of the fountain yours, and do ye yet delight to sit down by and bathe yourselves in the shallow streams? Is your life hid with Christ with God? why then do you converse as if your life were bound up in the creature? Have you laid lip your treasure in the blessed God.? what do your hearts, then, so far from it? Is your happiness in heaven? why then is not your conversation there too? Do ye count it your bliss to see God? what then mean those fond glances that ye cast upon created comforts, and that impure love which you bestow on things below? I mean not only the “ bleatings of the sheep, and the lowings of the oxen,’’ I speak not of the grosser sort of earthly-mindedness, sensuality, or covetousness, hut of that more refined and hidden creature-love, a loving of friends, relations, health, liberty, life, and that not in God, but with a love distinct from that love wherewith we love God. To love all these in God, and for his sake, and as flowing from him, and partaking of him, and with the same love wherewith we love God himself, is allowed us; but to love them with a particular love, as things distinct from God, to delight in them merely as creatures, and to follow them as if some good, or happiness, or pleasure, were to be found in them, distinct from what is in God, this is a branch of spiritual adultery, I had almost said idolatry. To taste a sweetness in the creature, and to see a beauty and goodness in it, is our duty; but then, it must be the sweetness of God in it, and the goodness of God which we ought alone to taste and see in it. As we say, “ the wife shines with the rays of her husband;”“ so more truly every creature shines but by a borrowed light, and commends to us the goodness, and sweetness, and fulness of the blessed Creator. You have heard that the glorified souls shall live upon God alone entirely, wholly, eternally; and should not the less glorious souls, I mean gracious souls, do so too, in some degree? yea, even we who are upon earth, and do yet use creatures, should behold all the scattered beams of goodness, sweetness, perfection, that are in these creatures, all united and gathered up in God, and so feeding upon them only in God, and upon God in all of them. It is the character of wicked and godless men, that they set up and drive a trade for themselves; live in a way distinct from God, as though they had no dependence upon him; they love the world with a predominant love; they enjoy creature-comforts in a gross, unspiritual manner; they dwell upon the dark side of their mercies; they treasure up riches, not only in their chests, but in their hearts; they feed upon the creature, not only with their bodies, but their very souls do feed upon them: and thus, in a word, they “live without God in the world.” All this is no wonder; for that which is of the earth must needs be earthly; but is it iiot a monstrous thing, that a heavenly soul should feed upon earthly trash? I speak without any hyperbole; the famous king of Babylon, forsaking the society of men, and herding himself with the beasts of the earth, and eating grass with the oxen, was not so absurd a thing, nor half so monstrous or unseemly, as the children of the Most High God forsaking the true bread of souls, and feeding upon the low fare of carnal men, even created sweetness, worldly goods: nay, a glorious star falling from its own sphere, and choking itself in the dust, would not be such an eminent piece of baseness; for what is said of the true God in one sense, is true of the truly godly in this sense — “ He that cometh from heaven is above all;’“ that is, above all things that are below God himself
3. Shall this life of angels be also the life of saints? this may then serve as a powerful consideration to mortify in us the love of this animal life, to make us weary of this low kind of living, and quicken us to long after so blessed a change. Well might the Apostle say indeed, that to die was gain; for is not this gain, to exchange an animal for an angelical life? a life which is in some sense common to the very beasts with us, for that which in some sense may be called the life of God? For as the blessed and holy God lives upon his own infinite and selfsufficient fulness, whithout being beholden to anything without himself, so shall the saints live upon him, and upon the self-same infinite fulness, and shall not need any creature-contributions. The Apostle indeed saith, that “ the last enemy to be destroyed is death;” which is true of enemies without us; and it is true with respect to Christ, who shall make a general resurrection from the dead, for that is the proper meaning of it; but it is true also, that the last enemy to be overcome within us is the love of life, therefore it is said, that a man will part with anything to keep his life, Job 2:4; and we do generally excuse the matter, and cry. Oh! life is sweet, life is precious. It must be confessed, and it may be granted; I believe that there is an inclination of the soul to the body, arising from that dear and inconceivable union that God himself hath made of them, which is purely natural, some say altogether necessary for the maintaining of man in this complex state, and not in itself sinful: possibly there may not be found a man upon earth so holy and mortified, in whom this is not found; certainly it is the last hinderance to be removed out of the wiiy of our perfect happiness. This, although in itself natural, yea necessary, and without blame, yet in the inordinateness of it, ordinarily, if not constantly, becomes sinful. I count him the most perfect man in the world, who loves not his own life with an inordinate sinful love; who loves it only in God, and not with a creature-love distinct from God.
There are two ways whereby this natural and lawful love of life becomes sinful — immoderateness and inordinateness. Immoderateness is, when men love their lives at that rate, that they are filled with unreasonable and distracting fears, cares, and thoughts about them; when the whole business of life is almost nothing else but a studiousness to preserve the being of life. Inordinateness is, when men, though they do not love their lives at that excessive rate, yet do love hfe as a creature-good, not in God, nor in order to him, but love it for itself, as something out of God. Every carnal man in the world is guilty of the latter, and I doubt but few saints are altogether free from the guilt of it. Now, that this immoderate love of life ought to be subdued in Christians, all men almost will grant: if any will not grant it, we can easily prove it from the command of God — “ Take no thought for your life.” —
“ Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.”“* Both which words in the most favourable interpretation that can be given of them, do, in the judgment of all, forbid immoderation: nay, a mere philosopher would inforce this from mere moral considerations, which I cannot now stand upon. But this inordinate love of life, as it is a more secret evil, a more refined corruption, is harder to be discovered, and men are loth to be convinced of the evil of it. Now, this particular distinct loving of life not as in God, but in itself, as a creature-good, is clearly condemned in that first and great commandment — “ Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind;’“ as if he should say, God the supreme, infinite, perfect, original, essential, self-sufficient Good, is to be loved in the highest, and purest, and strongest manner, that the heart of men is capable to love; and all other things only in him, and under him, and as being of him, and for his sake. Let it be allowed that life is good; yet it must be added, that it is but a created good: let it be allowed that life is comfortable; yet it must be acknowledged, that man’s chief comfort and happiness doth not stand in this animal life. So then, life itself is to be loved in God, who is the fountain and spring of life; it is to be loved in the quality of a created good, and no otherwise.
Now, created goods are to be loved only in the Creator, as coming from him, as partaking of him, as leading to him. Argue the case a little thus: The soul of man is allowed to love its body with which the great God hath united it, and to love union with this body, which union we call life; but this body being a creature, and a creature much inferior to itself, and much more ignoble than itself, cannot in reason be judged to be the fit and adequate object of its strongest and best affections: that must needs be something more excellent than itself; and that cannot be anything in this world, for this world hath nothing so noble, so excellent in it as the soul of man; it must needs be the Creator himself Well, seeing God is the supreme, self-sufficient, perfect Good, he is to be loved with all the strength and powers of the soul, singly and entirely: and the will of God being God himself, is not only to be submitted to, or rested in, but to be chosen and loved above all created things, yea, even above life itself, the best of creatures. So then, if it be the will of God to call for our lives, we ought readily to give them up; because we ought to love the will of God much “more than our lives. I pray you be impressed with this, that the will of God being pure, holy, and perfect, should not only be submitted to, or rested in, but even loved and chosen above all creatures. Now, the will of God is not that only whereby he teaches men, and prescribes laws to them, but that whereby he rules and governs the world, and disposes of men in any condition of life, or takes away their lives from them. The eternal Fountain of goodness can send forth nothing but what is perfectly good; and that which is perfectly good ought to be loved with a universal, pure, and, as far as possible, perfect love. This you will say, perhaps, is a high and a hard saying; but let it not seem impossible for a man to love his own life only in God, and in subordination to him; for this God requires, and he requires not things impossible —
“ If any man come after me, and hate not his own life, he cannot be my disciple;” that is, not simply hate it, but in comparison of me and my will. It is not then impossible, nay, you see it is a necessary duty, without which we cannot be Christ’s disciples. The saints of old found it possible. Holy Paul gives this answer readily — “ I am ready to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus;” and “’ I count not my life dear unto me, so that I might finish my course with joy.”“ It is witnessed of the whole army of martyrs that ’’they loved not their lives unto the death:’’ that is, they did not value them in respect of God and his truth. Neither let any one flatter himself, and say. Yea, if I were called to die for God, I would rather do it than deny him; for the will of God is as much to be eyed in his sending for us by a natural death as by martyrdom, and a not giving up our lives to him at any time, is as truly to deny him and his will, as not to give them up at the stake when we are called to it. Besides, how shall we imagine that he that is unwilling to die in his bed should be willing to die at a stake.
Now, this duty of being mortified to the love of this animal life, being so difficult, yet so necessary, and so noble, how doth it become every saint to study to attain to this perfection? which, that we may, let us press upon ourselves this consideration, this doctrine, that the glorified saints shall live as angels of God in heaven. We know that if this body were broken down, this low Ufe cut off, we should live like angels, not being beholden any more to poor creatures for help or comfort, but should be filled with the fulness of God, filled with his image and glory, and live upon him entirely for evermore.
Yea, I may add, that this very living above our own lives merely at the will of God, is a participation of the angelical life even in this world; therefore labour to be mortified to that love of this life which is here upon earth, yea, to be weary of it, yea, almost ashamed of it.
4. Shall we thus live the lives of the angels, subsisting in God, feasting upon him, filled with him to all eternity? this may moderate our sorrow which we conceive for the loss of any created good, houses, lands, husband, wife, children, &c.; yet a little while and we shall not miss them, shall not need them, shall not desire them any more. The blessed angels live a glorious life, and they have none of these, but are perfectly satisfied in the enjoyment of God alone; they have no wives nor children, yet they want none; and yet a little while, and we shall have none either, neither shall we want them, having all things in the God of all things: they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are in conjunction with the Father, with love, and goodness, and truth itself; and so they have no want of anything. If you have no candles left in the house, yet it is towards day-break, and the sun will rise upon you, and you shall need none, and yet have light enough too. In a word, learn to live independent of them whilst you have them, and you will be the better able to live without them when they are removed.
5. I come now to the fifth and last use that I shall make of this doctrine; and oh that you and I may make this happy use of it! Shall the saints be as the angels of God in their way of living upon God, and enjoying all happiness in him alone for ever? shall this certainly be our life in heaven? oh! then, labour to begin this life upon earth. If you cannot perfectly transcribe, yet, at least, imitate that angelical kind of life. Though you are here imprisoned in a body of earth, and oft cumbered and clogged with bodily infirmities, and called to tend upon bodily necessities, yet, as far as this animal state will permit, live upon God. Do not excuse nor vindicate that low kind of earthly life, do not justify your living below and besides God, but stir up yourselves to behold where your happiness lies, and live not willingly below it. Certainly a pious soul hath more than bare hope in this world. God the blessed, infinite, and communicative Good, hath not locked himself so far out of sight, but that he gives his people a comfortable beholding of him even whilst they are in their pilgrimage; and what Solomon saith of the life of the godly, he means of their present life. “ The way of life is above to the wise f their living not only shall be, but is now above; it is a high way of livings, They are certainly a puny sort of meclianical Christians, that think and talk only of a heaven to come, and dream of a happiness without them, and distinct from them. The truly religious and God-like soul cannot so content himself, but being spirited and principled from above, is carried out after the infinite and almighty Good, as a thing is carried towards its centre; and hastens into his embraces as the iron hastens to the loadstone, and longs to be in conjunction with it.
If therefore ye be from heaven, live above all earthly things: “ If ye be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above.”’ If ye be born of God, live upon God. Deny self, live besides self, that is, live not to the service of your senses, to the lust of the flesh, to the lust of the eye, to the pride of life; let not your souls be servants to your sins, no, nor to your senses; that were for servants to ride on horseback, and princes to walk on foot. Live above self, that is, let your souls quit all their own interest in themselves, and entirely resign themselves to God, as to all points of duty and service. But that is not all; neither is that it which I urge you to from these words; but live above the creature, and whatsoever is in it, namely, delighting in God, conversing and communing with him alone as the chief Good; desire not any creature any further than as it may help you forward to the Creator; neither delight in it any further than as it either represents some of the divine perfections, witnesses something of divine love, or leads to some divine participation or communion. Seeing we shall come to live upon God, and delight in God alone, without any creature, let us now live upon, love God alone in very creature.
Now, to give you a more distinct knowledge of this high and noble life, I will explain it in some particulars, negatively and affirmatively.
I. Negatively.
1. “ Live not upon self I speak not of living unto self, but live not upon self, self-excellencies, self-sufficiencies, any created accomplishments, which was the life of the Stoics, those great philosophers, who placed happiness in the enjoyment of themselves, which they called “ independence of all things.” To enjoy one’s self indeed is a high duty, a noble privilege, a duty of the gospel — “ Possess ye your souls.” But how must we enjoy ourselves, why, only in God. He enjoys himself,
(1.) Not who, in a sullen melancholy, retires to a solitary and monastic life, as many of the sourer sort of Papists do.
(2.) Nor he who, in a proud mood, disdains the perfections of God shining forth in other men; and hiding himself from them through envy, contents himself to sit and admire his own personal accomplishments, as many humourists do.
(3.) Nor he who finding nothing without him, and knowing nothing above him to give his soul her full rest, settles upon a foundation of his own, and admires a self-sufficiency in the temper of his own spirit, a little subdued by philosophical precepts, as the Stoics did — But he who enjoys himself in God, that is, who doth not view himself in the narrow point of his own being, but, taking a view of himself in the unbounded essence of God, loves, and enjoys, and values himself, and all his personal excellencies as he is in God, and partakes of his perfections. To live in a way of self-converse is below the end of man’s creation, who was made for a hiorher s:ood; and hereby a man shall never obtain true happiness, for it is peculiar to God alone to be happy in himself “ In a word, a soul that confines itself to itself, and lives, and moves, and rejoices only within the narrow cell of its own particular being, deprives itself of that almighty and original goodness and glory that fills the world, and shines through the whole creation.”
2. “ Live not upon any creature without yourselves.” Self indeed is a creature; but yet for clearness in proceeding we shall distinguish them.
Now, this is the life of the greatest part of men, they live beside God, and move only within the sphere of the creature. You will easily understand that I speak not of the body’s living upon the creature, for so God hath appointed that it shall live; and yet as to this too, I say with our Saviour, “ Man liveth not by bread alone;” but I speak of the soul of man living upon the creature as its highest, good, and feeding upon it as its best fare: they rise up early, and sit up late, and God is not in all their thoughts: they are filled with domestic and foreign comforts, but behold not the Father of lights from whom all these descend: they live upon the good things of the world, yet live without God in the world. Now, by these men,
(1.) I do not mean those heathens that in the most idolatrous manner do, in the literal sense, set up the creatures for gods.
(2.) Nor those Christians that in a most gross manner make idols of the creatures, and place their happiness in them.
(3.) No, nor only those earthly professors, who follow the world too eagerly, and have such a deep and rooted respect for it, that they can be ordinarily content to suffer creature-employments to justle God and duties out of their hearts and houses, whose worldliness is apparently too hard for their religion. Who then? shall we come any nearer? yes.
(4.) Those are guilty of creature-converse who do not enjoy all creatures in God; who love anything in any creature with a distinct love, who do not love it only in God; who love silver, gold, houses, lands, trading, friends, with a particular over-weening love. Oh take heed of this creaturelove, of valuing any created thing any otherwise than in God, any otherwise than as being from God, partaking of him, and leading to him.
3. “ Live not upon ordinances.’^ These are God’s institutions, love them, cleave unto them, attend upon them, let no temptation cause you to leave them; but live not upon them, place not your religion, place not your hope, your happiness in them, but love them only in God; attend upon them, yet not so much upon them, as upon God in them; lie by the pool, but wait for the angel; love not, no, not a divine ordinance for its own sake. Why, who doth so? alas! who almost doth not?
(1.) Thus did they in Ezekiel 33:32, who delighted in the prophet’s eloquence, and in the rhetoric of his sermons, as much as in a well-tuned voice and harmonious music: and so do thousands in England, who read the Bible for the style or the story’s sake, and love to sit under learned and elegant discourses, more for accomplishment than for conversion: and swarms of priests, who preach themselves more than Christ Jesus, even in his own ordinances; as a proud boy rides a horse into the market, to set forth himself more than his m-aster’s goods.
(2.) But there are many not so gross as these, who do yet use ordinances in a way very gross and unspiritual, placing their devotion in them, and sinking their religion into a settled course of hearing or praying; who will wait upon God, as they call it, at some set and solemn times, new moons, and Sabbaths, it may be evening and morning; but religion must not be too busy with them, nor intermeddle in their ordinary affairs, or worldly employments; it hath no place there; they do not count it a garment for every day’s wear.
(3.) And not only these, but even almost all men are too apt to seek rest in duties and ordinances, or, at least, to be pretty well satisfied with the work done, whether they have conversed with God there or not. Oh, if you love youi souls, seek your happiness higher! Conversing with divine ordinances, I confess, is honourable and amiable, but it is too low a life for an immortal soul.
II. Affirmatively.
Let nothing satisfy you but God himself; take up with no pleasure, no treasure, no portion, no paradise, nay, no heaven, no happiness, below the infinite, supreme, and self-sufficient Good. Let your eye be upon him, and his all-filling fulness; let your desire be unto him, and to the remembrance of his name; follow hard after to know the Lord, and to enjoy the Father through his Son Jesus Christ; let your fellowship be with the Father, and with the Son, by the Spirit, “ O love the Lord, all ye his saints;”” “ love him with all your soul, and with all your strength;”“ “ yea, and keep yourselves always in the love of God; persevere and increase in the love of God;’’ “ Keep yourselves in the love of God.” Oh sweet duty! Oh amiable, pleasant task! Oh^ sweet and grateful command! Away, ye crowd of creatures, I must keep my heart for my God: away, ye gaudy suitors, away, ye glittering toys, there is no room for you; my whole soul, if its capacity were ten thousand times larger than it is, were too scant to entertain the supreme Good, to let in infinite goodness and fulness. Oh charge it upon yourselves with the greatest vehemence! Love the Lord, O my soul, keep thyself in the love of God; let the love of God constrain you, and keep yourselves under the most powerful constraints of it. In a word, live upon God as upon uncreated life itself, drink at the fountain, feed upon infinite fulness, depend upon almighty power, refer yourselves to unsearchable wisdom, and unbounded love; see nothing but God in the creature, taste nothing but God in the world, delight yourselves in him, long for communion with him, and communications from him, to receive of his fulness grace for grace. Then do we live most like angels, when we live most purely in God, and find all the powers of our souls spending themselves upon him; and oiurselves, our life, and all the comforts of it, flowing from him, and again swallowed up in him. But because we are yet in the body, I shall explain it in these following particulars: —
1. “ Converse with God in all your self-excellencies.” I bade you before not converse with these; now, I say, converse with God in these. Thus do the angels; they know nothing that they have of their own, they enjoy nothing distinct from God, they are excellent creatures, excellent in knowledge, power, hoHness, &c.; yet they enjoy all their excellencies in God, and ascribe them all to him, and so let us labour to do.
(1.) View yourselves not in your own particular beings, but in the essence of God; look upon yourselves as being and subsisting in the midst of an infinite essence, in which the whole creation is, as it were, wrapt up, and doth subsist.
(2.) And whatever excellency you find in your souls or bodies, look not upon it as your own; maintain’not a mine and thine, a distinction of interests between God and yourselves, but look upon all as God’s, and enjoy it in him.
(3.) When you find yourselves tempted to cast a fond and unchaste look upon the beauty, strength, activity, or temper of your own bodies, upon the ingenuity, wisdom, constancy, courage, composedness of your own souls, take heed of settling into a selfish admiration of any of them, but enjoy them in God, and say, This, O my body, this, O my soul, is no other than the portraitiu-e of the blessed God; these created excellencies are broken beams of the infinite, unspotted, uncreated perfections. Having once attained to this, we shall no longer covet to be admired, desire to be commended, fret at being undervalued; I mean, not in a selfish manner, but rather break out in a spiritual passion with the Psalmist, “ O that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men! “
(4.) Nay, let me add, when you find yourselves ready to put your own stamp upon God’s best coin, to look upon supernatural gifts and graces with a sinfijl, selfish admiration, remember that you have them only in Christ Jesus, and enjoy them in your head; labour to enjoy grace itself only in Christ, as the Apostle, “ I, yet not I, but Christ in me;”“ “ I labour, yet not I, but the grace of God.’’ So ought we to glory: I believe, I love, I am patient, penitent, humble; yet not I, but the grace of God that is with me, Christ Jesus that dwelleth in me. And indeed a pious man, who thus lives at the very height of his own being, yea, and above it too, knows best how to reverence himself, yea, and to love himself too, and yet without any self-love: for he loves himself in God, and his own endowments as divine ornaments.
2. “ Converse with God, and live upon him in the excellencies of all other creatures, and in all your creature-enjoyments.” We cannot live without creatures, as the angels do indeed, but let us come as near them as we can, which is by living above creatures: place your happiness in God, and your hearts upon him; labour to find God all things to you, and in you, and to be filled with his fulness; labour to get your understandings filled with the knowledge of God, your wills filled with his divine will, your hearts filled with his infinite goodness and sweetness, your memories filled with the remembrance of his name, your whole souls filled with his holy and pure image, filled with the fruits of his Holy Spirit: nay, let these very bodies be filled not only with his good creatures, but more especially with his good-will in the creatures. It is said indeed of the sensual epicures of the world, that their bellies are filled with God’s hid treasures, that is, with rare and precious delicacies: but how much better doth God fill the souls of his saints with his hid treasures, when he feedeth them with his divine favour, and dippeth his hand with them in the dish? This is meat indeed which the saints eat of, which other men, though they feed at the same table, know not of. The glorified saints shall be satisfied wholly and perfectly with the divine image shining gloriously on them, and in them; to which purpose that of the Psalmist may be accommodated, “ I shall be satisfied when I awake with his likeness.” Well, we cannot be so satisfied in this life it seems: however, though we cannot be so satisfied with it, yet let us not be satisfied without it, nor satisfied with anything besides it. Resolve, holy soul. Well, if I must not be fully satisfied with the image of my heavenly Father till I awake, I will lie down, and fall asleep hungry as I am then; for I will not fill my mouth with chaff, nor my soul with the husks that the swine do eat. But, in the mean time, get what you can of God out of creature-eny oyments.
(1.) Enjoy all things for God, and that these two ways:
(i.) Use all for him. Those riches, honours, interest, friends, which are clogs upon the heels of others, let them be as heels to you to carry you heaven-ward; let your souls be winged with those very enjoyments, wherewith the wings of others are pinioned; and that which is fuel to their worldly lusts, let it be as fuel to feed and nourish your spiritual love. To use what we have for God, is the only way of not abusing it; this is one way of enjoying all for God, to use all for him: and yet there is something higher in that phrase of enjoying all for God, than this, namely, (ii.) Value no creature-comfort any further than as it leads to God; and this in a double sense too.
1. Value things to -be good only by this, by their leading you unto God. Now, God being the supreme and infinite Good, anything is so far good as it leads to the enjoyment of him. Now, the enjoyment of God is only in being like to him; holiness is his image; so then, every thing is good that tends to sanctification, and to make men partakers of a divine nature. We are usually mistaken in the true notion of good and evil, of mercies and judgments, judging according to the taste, as foolish patients do; but God’s thoughts are not as our thoughts. Measure all things by the proportion they bear, and the tendency they have to the supreme Good: and call not anything evil that brings nearer to him, nor anything good that draws off from him. 2. When you have found a thing that is really good, tending and leading to the chief Good, and to the possession of him; labour to enjoy it, and rejoice in it only under this notion, as such; when you love it, let it be with a pure spiritual love; and so order your delight in it, that it may be said, you do rather rejoice in the end of it, than in the enjoyment of it.
(2.) Another way of living upon God in the creature is, to enjoy all things as partaking of him.
“ Every good and perfect gift is from above.”
Every beam of created light floweth out of the Father of lights. When the blessed and glorious God framed this stately fabric of the visible world, because there was nothing better in the world than himself, he was pleased to copy out himself in it, and to spread his own infinite perfections over it, and through it, so that every particular good is a blossom of the first goodness; every created excellency is a dark draught of God, and a broken beam of this infinite Sun of righteousness. Oh labour to do so! look upon the perfections which you find here below, not so much as the perfections of this or that particular being, but as they are so many drops risen out of the Fountain of all perfections, in whom they all meet, and are concentrated. It is well expressed by one, “ In a particular being, love the imiversal Goodness;” let the whole world be as the garden of God to you, where every creature is a flower, from which you may drink something of the divine sweetness. Alas! at what a low and sensual rate do we live, when we rejoice in creatures, either as they are excellent, or as they are ours? whereas indeed neither of these is true; for they are not excellent, but God is £xcellent in them; and how can we call anything our own, when God made both us and all things for himself? Oh! how injurious it is to the blessed God, when we rob him of his own perfections that he hath imprinted upon the creature, by loving it, and delighting in it, not as in him, but as something distinct from him! nay, we are then injurious to ourselves, as we shall see by and by. Labour to enjoy and to converse with God in the creatures. “ O how precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God! cried David, when he had been meditating of the creature’’s excellencies.
Labour to abstract your minds from terrene things even in the enjoyment of them, and call upon yourselves to love, and live, and feed upoil God in them; live not upon the dark side of your mercies, but upon the representations of God in them. Is there anything good? oh, this is a taste of infinite goodness! Is there anything sweet? oh, how sweet is the God that made it so! Is there anything lovely? it is a picture of him whose name is Love. Is anything firm, stable, lasting? it is a shadow of that glorious Essence with whom there is no shadow of change. Have you anything strong? it arises out of that God with whom is everlasting strength. Doth any creature give rest, ease, refreshment? it springs out of the all-satisfying fulness of God. In a word, labour to climb up by every created excellency, as by so many beams, to the Father of lights: let all the world be to you as God^s temple, and be ready to say of every place as Jacob, “ How dreadful is this place! surely this is none other but the house of God;” that God who runs through all created beings, and from himself derives several prints of beauty and excellency all the world over. But especially take heed of your own created comforts, that they do not insensibly lead away your hearts, and ensnare you into a sinful, particular, distinct love of them; which is a sin soon committed, hardly discerned, and most hardly reformed. If any be freed from these inordinate affections, sure they are but few; and those few have come dearly by it; as one said in another case. With a great sum they have obtained this freedom; they have paid for it, not with the foreskins of the Philistines, but with the lives of what they so loved, there being no way to cure this evil distemper, but cutting off the member infected with it, the part that it fed upon. As a branch of this head, let me add, Labour to live upon God in the excellencies of other men; value them, and all their accomplishments, only in God, as he that did admire God, and enjoy God in them. Wherever you see wisdom, goodness, ingenuity, holiness, justice, or any other accomplishment, say, here and there is God. And this is the honest way of making ourselves masters of whatever is another man’s, and enjoying it, as truly as he himself doth, yea, as truly as if it were our own; when we behold all these beams, as coming from the same Fountain of lights, and do love them all in him, with a universal love. This is the rare art of having nothing, yet possessing all things; of being rich, though one have nothing; and of being wise, though one know nothing.
(3.) The last way of living upon God in the creature is, to taste and feed upon the love of God in them, not only his common bounty, but his special love in Christ. The good will of God gives a sweet relish to every morsel, as I hinted before.
Even in the midst of all your delightful, pleasant, sweet enjoyments, let your souls be more affected with this than with them; let this be as the manna lying upon the top of all your outward comforts, which your spirits may gather up and feed upon. But this I touched upon before, therefore I shall add no more concerning it. Thus I have shown you how you may imitate the life of angels, in living upon God, even whilst you live in the body. To this I may add another particular or two.
3. “Converse with God, and live upon him in all his ordinances.” Let communion with God be your drift in every duty, and the very life and soul and sweetness of every ordinance. You never read of a soul more thirsty after ordinances than David, as might appear abundantly; yet if you look well into the expressions, you will find, that it was not so much after them, as after God in them; not after the dead letter, but after the livinj? God — “ Mv soul thirsteth for God, for the living God;” “ My heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God,’ Let the word, preached or read, be as a voice from heaven talking with you; let your conference be a comment upon that word; let meditation be as a kind of bringing down God into your souls, and prayer as a raising up of your souls into God, nothing but faith and love put into praises. And so of all the rest.
4. “ Converse with God in all his providences; prosperity, adversity, plenty, penury, health, sickness, peace, and perplexity. This is a large theme, but as to prosperity, I have spoken something already, under that head of conversing with God in creature-enjoyments; as for adversity, I have said much more in a large discourse to describe and commend the art of conversing with God in afflictions.
Briefly at this time, converse not with losses, wants, afflictions, but with God in them; and that not only with the justice, righteousness, severity, and sovereignty of God in them, but with the goodness and mercy of God in them. They are dark providences, we had not need to dwell altogether on the dark side of them. If all the ways of the Lord towards his people be mercy and truth, then his roughest and most dark ways are so too: if God be wholly love, then his very corrections proceed not from hatred: if it be his name to be good, and to do good, where have we learned then to call his afflicting providences evils, and to divide evil, which is but one, even as God is one, into sin and affliction?
Surely we speak as men; and if God call them so, he speaks after the manner of men, as he often doth. If the governing will of God be pure, perfect, and infinitely good and righteous, ought we not to converse with it in a free and cheerful manner, yea, and to love it too? In a word, pore not upon creature-changes, nor the uncertain wheels of motion, that are turning, up and down we know not how, nor how oft; but fix yourselves upon that all-seeing Eye, that imbounded Understanding, that unsearchable and infinite Goodness, which pervades the whole universe, and sits in all the wheels of motion, governing all the strange motions of the creatures in a wonderful and powerful manner, and carrying them all in their several orbs to one last and blessed end.
Thus imitate the angelical life, even whilst you are in the body: converse with God in self-excellencies, in the creature excellencies, ordinances, providences; and yet labour to be more like him still, to abstract your mind from all these, and all material and sensible things, and to converse with God without the help of any creature, I mean in the Spirit, and by a secret feeling of his almighty goodness, and energy of grace, and the communications of a divine life in your souls. In a word, if you would taste of heaven, whilst you are upon earth, labour above all things for a true conjunction of your hearts with God, in a secret feeling of his goodness, and a reciprocation of love to him; and to find the holy and blessed God exercising his grace and power upon all the faculties of your souls, and rendering them like unto himself, and all these powers of tlic soul mutually spending themselves upon him freely and entirely, as upon the chief Good, which is their proper and full object. Seeing the saints in glory shall be like unto the angels of God in their way of living in and upon God alone, receive, I pray, this exhortation, which I have so largely prosecuted, and labour to begin that life, as far as you can, upon earth. Is there not reason for such an inference? doth it not now flow naturally from the doctrine? If you think it does not, I will add two or three particulars to strengthen this inference, or at least to clear it.
(1.) It is highly reasonable that we begin to be that which we expect to be for ever, to learn that way of living in which we hope to live to all eternity, so that I infer, upon as strong ground as the Apostle, “ He that hath this hope purifieth himself even as Christ is pure.”
(2.) If this be the life of angels, then it is the highest and noblest life that any created being is capable of. As by the bread of angels, and the tongue of angels, the most excellent food, and the most excellent language is understood in scripture, so must we understand this life of angels. Now, it is very suitable to the reasonable soul, that immortal, noble being, to aim at the highest and noblest life, “ What shall a man give in exchange for his soul?’’
(S.) This shall not only be our life in heaven, but itself is something of heaven, a beginning of heaven. This life is not a thing really distinct from life eternal — “ This is life eternal, to know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” “ Ye have eternal life.” Therefore we read of eternal life abiding in men, and not abiding in them — “ Whoso eateth my flesh hath eternal life.” A holy soul thus deified, thus living in and upon God, is as truly glorified upon earth, in some degree, as the world is enlightened by the morningsun, which is as truly enlightened, though not so gloriously, as by the sun in its greatest height. Oh low and ignoble spirits, who can be satisfied with a happiness which shall only be in the world to come!
Certainly it is true and proper speech to say, that a participation of God, is an anticipation of heaven; and to be like unto him, is to be with him. You see what reason I have to make such an inference, and to form it unto such an earnest exhortation; oh, therefore, I beseech you before God, and his holy angels, to endeavour to be like him, and to live like them?
Oh. Say not, How can men on earth live like angels.? Aiis. 1. But fall on and imitate them, though it be — with unequal steps; labour to be as angels, if you cannot be altogether equal to angels.
2. We are bidden to live the life of God — “ Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.” “ Be ye holy as I am holy.” If I speak high, how high speak these texts.
Oh. Say not. But how can this animal life permit this? Ans. 1. Thus men have lived in the body; thus lived Enoch, thus lived Paul, thus lived David, that man after God’s own heart, the greatest and most divine character that can be given of a mortal man, “ There is none upon earth that I desire besides thee.” 2. Cannot we live in the body, except we live to the body? You see saints upon earth live above other men upon earth; and yet a little more pains, take the other flight, and you may live above yourselves too, higher than you do.
I will only add a motive or two to this duty of living upon God.
1. “ The last enemy to be overcome is creaturelove. This is the last enemy that keeps the field, by which alone the greatest part of men do perish everlastingly: beat down this, and you win the day, and shall wear the crown; nay, the very conquest of it is a crown, as I said before.
2. “ To live upon God in the creature, is to enjoy the creature in the best sense.” You will lose nothing of the creature by this means, but shall enjoy it more fully than ever you did: for the creature is ten thousand times sweeter in God than it is in itself. Yea, in a word, this is the way to enjoy all the world, and to enjoy the accomplishments of all men, and all things, as much as if they were your own.
3. “ It is the way never to lose anything.” He that lives upon God, spends upon a stock that cannot be wasted, drinks at a fountain that cannot be exhausted. So much as we enjoy of God in the creature, we do not lose with it; and that which we do not so enjoy, we deserve to lose. This then is the secure and honourable life, in comparison of which the life of a prince is but a wallowing in the mire. “ Lord, give us evermore this bread,” and hearts to feed upon it. Amen.
COMMUNION WITH CHRIST, BY THE REV. JOHN FLAVEL.
Communion with Christ is frequent in the lips of many men, but a hidden mystery to the souls of most men. This atheistical age scoffs at, and ridicules it as enthusiasm and fanaticism; but the saints find that reality and incomparable sweetness in it,that they would not part with it for ten thousand worlds. When the Roman soldiers entered the temple at Jerusalem, and found no image there, as they used to have in their own idolatrous temples; they gave out in a jeer, that the Jews worshipped the clouds.
Thus profane atheists scoff at the most solemn, awful, and sweetest part of internal religion as a mere fancy; but the thing is real, sure, and sensible: if there be truth in anything in the world, there is truth in this, that there are real intercourses between the visible and invisible world; between Christ and the souls of believers, which we here call communion: “ Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Christ Jesus.’’ It is really and truly so, we impose not upon the world, we tell you no more than we have felt. The life of Enoch is called “ his walking with God.’’ O sweet and pleasant walk! all pleasures, all joys are in that walk with God. “ Blessed are the people that hear the joyful sound; they shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance.’’ The joyful sound there spoken of was the sound of the trumpet, which called the people to the solemn assemblies, where they walked in the light of God’s countenance, the sweet manifestations of his favour; and because the world is so apt to suspect the reality and certainty of this doctrine, the Apostle again asserts it, “Truly our conversation is in heaven.” We breathe below, but we live above; we walk on earth, but our conversation is in heaven. To open this point, three things must come under consideration.
I. What communion with Christ is.
II. That there is such a communion between him and believers.
III. The excellency of this communion.
First, What communion with Christ is, in the general nature of it. To open this it must be considered that there is a twofold communion.
1. A state of communion.
2. Actual communion. The first is fundamental to the second; we can have no actual communion with the Father, Son, or Spirit, till we be first brought into a state of communion. This state of communion is in scripture called jcotvovm, our fellowship or partnership with Christ: such a fellowship as merchants have in one and the same ship and cargo; where one hath more and another less, but, however, a joint, though unequal interest; one lives in one kingdom, another in another kingdom, but they are jointly interested in the same goods. This comparison must not be stretched beyond its intention, which is to show nothing but this, that Christ and believers are co-partners, or co-heirs in the same inheritance: hence they are called, his fellows; “ God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.” And again, “ If children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ.”’ Christ states his people, gives them a right and title not only to himself, but to those good things purchased by him, yea, and the very glory he now enjoys in heaven — “ The glory which thou gavest me, I have given them.”
It is true, there are some things in Christ which are peculiar to himself, and incommunicable to any creature, as his eternity, consubstantiality with his Father, &c. neither have we fellowship in his mediatorial works; we have the fruits and benefits of them, but no partnership with him in the glory and honour of them; that is peculiarly his own: and though it be said in the scriptures, that believers “ are righteous as he is righteous,’*’’ yet the meaning is not that they can justify others as Christ doth; no, they are justified by him, but cannot communicate righteousness to others as Christ doth to them. But there are other tilings wherein there is a partnership between Christ and his people; among others, they partake with him in the spirit of sanctification on earth, and glory in heaven: the same spirit of holiness which dwells in Christ without measure, is communicated by him to the saints in measure, “ He hath given us of his Spirit.” And as Christ communicates his Spirit to the saints, so he communicates the glory of heaven to them; not that they shall be as glorious in heaven as Christ is: no, he will be known among the saints in glory, as the sun is known from the lesser stars. Thus briefly of the state of communion, which is called in scripture “ our being made nigh,’ and indeed we must be made nigh before we can actually draw nigh. We must be put into a state of fellowship before ever we can have actual communion with God.
2. Beside this state of communion, there is also an actual communion which the saints have in this world wiUi the Father and the Son in the duties of religion. This is what I am here engaged to open, this is our supping with Christ, and his with us, and, for clearness”* sake, I shall open it.
First, Negatively, what it is not.
Secondly, Positively, what it is.
First, Negatively, what it is not; for I find persons are hugely apt to mistake in this matter, taking that for communion with God which is not so: and here l^t it be noted,
(1.) That communion with God doth not consist in the bare performance of religious duties. I do not say that men may have communion with God in this world without duties, it is a delusion of Satan to think so; but this is what I say, that communion with God consisteth not in the mere performance of duties. Communion and duties of religion are two things, separable one from the other.
Men may multiply duties, and yet be strangers to communion with God in them; even humiliation and fasting days may be kept by souls that are estranged from communion with the Lord — “ Speak unto all the people of the land, and unto the priests, saying. When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even these seventy years, did ye at all fast unto me, even unto me,? “ as if he should say. Had your souls pure intentions and respects in those duties to my glory? Had you special communion with me, or I with you in those duties? Did you ever feel your souls in these days w^ounded for sin? Or did you not fast out of custom, and mourn for company? God may be near in men’’s mouths, and at the same time far from their reins.
Religious words may flow cut of men’s lips when not one drop of religion touches their reins and hearts; that is, the secret, inward powers of their souls: you cannot therefore safely depend upon this, Christ rejects this plea. Get a better evidence of communion with God than this, or you will certainly come short of your expectation. “ I know you not,’’ saith Christ; there was never any spiritual acquaintance between your souls and me; I know you not in a way of approbation.
(2.) Neither do all stirrings and workings of the affections in duties infallibly evidence and prove communion between Christ and that soul; for it is possible, yea, common, to have the affections raised in a natural way, and by external motives in the duties of religion; this you see in that example, “ And lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but they do them not.’’ The sweet modulation of the prophets voice was like the skilful touch of a rare musical instrument, which in a natural way, moved and excited their affections. Thus John”’s hearers rejoiced in his ministry for a season. I confess this is very apt to cast souls into a mistake of their condition. They distinguish not between the influences that come upon their affections from without, from extrinsic things, and those that are purely inward, divine, and spiritual. But then.
Secondly, To show you positively what communion with God is. Here we must consider two things, 1. What things it presupposes in us.
2. Wherein the nature of it consists.
1. There are divers things prerequired and presupposed unto all actual communion with God in duties; and where these things are wanting, men have no communion with God. You may have pommunion with his people, and communion with his ordinances, but not communion with God and Christ in them. And these prerequisites are three:
(1.) Union with Christ is fundamentally necessary to all communion with him. All communion is founded in union; and where there is no union, there can be no communion. ’ You know,” saith an excellent person, ’ the member receives nothing from the head unless it be united to it; nor the branch from the root.’ “ All is yours, and ye are Christ’s;”’ ’here is a vast possession, but all founded upon union: as all communion is founded upon union, so all union terminates in communion: and the closer the union the fuller is the communion.’
Before our union with Christ we are strangers unto God — “ We live withovit God in the world; it is in Christ that we are made nigh; it is in the beloved we are made accepted. Whilst we are in the state of alienation from Christ, we have no more to do with the communications of joy and peace, with the seals and earnests of the Spirit, than a native Indian hath with the privileges of London. “ If any man open to me, (saith Christ) I will come in to him and sup with him, and he with me.”
(2.) Communion with God presupposes the habits of grace implanted in the soul by sanctifi cation; a sound and sincere change of heart. No sanctification, no communion; “ If we say we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth.” The Apostle gives the lie such bold pretenders. “ The Lord is nigh to all that call upon him, unto all that call upon him in truth;*” the latter clause restrains all spiritual communion unto upright souls. “ For an hypocrite shall not come before him.”
(S.) Communion with God doth not only suppose grace implanted, but also implanted grace excited, grace in act; for a man may have the habits of faith, love, and delight in him, and yet be without actual communion with God; for by this grace is awakened and put into act. A believer when he is asleep, and acts no grace, is in a state of communion with God; but if he will have actual communion, his faith, love, and delight must be awakened; they must not lie asleep in the habit. “ Thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee. Thy face. Lord, will I seek.”“ It was in order to actual communion with Christ that the church so earnestly begs fresh influences of the Spirit to excite her graces into act —
“ Awake, O north wind, and come thou south, blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.’“ And though believers are not so to wait for the influences of the Spirit, as in the mean time to neglect all proper outward means of exciting their own graces, engaging their hearts to approach unto God; yet certainly it is the work of God’s Spirit, and without him we can do nothing to any purpose. The seamen may trim the sails, weigh the anchor, put all into a sailing posture; but till a gale come from heaven there is little or no motion. The same Spirit that plants the habits, is he also that excites the acts of grace. These three things therefore are prerequisites unto all communion with God
2. Next let us consider wherein this heavenly privilege of communion with God doth consist; and more generally it will be found to lie in a spiritual correspondence between Christ and the soul. God lets forth influences upon our souls, and we, by the assistance of his Spirit, make returns again unto God. Communion is a mutual action; so in the text, “ I will sup with him, and he with me.” We cry to God, and God answers that cry by the incomes of spiritual grace upon the soul: “ In the day that I cried, thou answeredst me, and strengthenedst me with strength in my soul.’“’ More particularly, there are many ways and methods wherein men have this spiritual correspondence or communion with God, namely: —
First, In the contemplation of his attributes.
Secondly, In the exercises of our graces in religious duties.
Thirdly, In his various providences. In all these the saints have communion with him.
1. There is a sweet and sensible communion between God and his people, in the contemplation of the Divine attributes, and the impressions God makes by them upon our souls, whilst we meditate on them. As for instance.
(1.) Sometimes the Lord discovers and manifests to the souls of his people his immense greatness; the manifestation of which attribute makes an awful, humbling impression upon the soul, makes them seem as nothing to themselves. Thus when Abraham, that great believer, considered the greatness of that God with whom he had to do; that sight of God seems to reduce him to his first principles, to crumble him, as it were, into dust and ashes again —
“ I that am but dust and ashes have taken upon me to speak unto God.” He now looks upon himself as a heap of vileness and unworthiness; so David, “ When I consider the heavens, the work of thy hands, the moon and the stars which thou hast made,’^ (from hence he inferred the greatness of the Creator,) “ Lord, what is man that thou art mindful of him? “ as if he should say: When I consider what a great God the Creator of the world is, I am justly astonished that ever he should set his heart upon so vile a thing as man. When men compare themselves among themselves, and measure themselves by themselves, their spirits are apt to swell with pride; but would they look up to God, as these holy men did, they would admire his condescension. And this is communion with God in the meditation of his immense greatness.
(2.) The representations and meditations of the purity mid holiness of Gorf, working shame and deep abasement in the soul, for the pollutions and sinful filthincss that are in it. This is communion with God, and an excellent way of fellowship with him.
Thus, when a representation of God, in his holiness, was made unto the prophet, there we^e the seraphims, covering their faces with their wings, and crying one to another, saying, “ Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” The effect this produced, or the return made by the prophet to this manifestation of God in his holiness, was deep abasement of the soul for his unsuitableness to so holy a God; “ Then said I, woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips,” &c. And this is real communion with God in his holiness. Thus Job who had stiffly defended his own integrity against men, yet when God enters the lists with him, and he saw what a great and holy God he had to do with, cried out, “ Behold, I am vile, what shall I answer thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth. Once have I spoken, but I will not answer; yea, twice, but I will proceed no further C as if he should say, I have done, Lord, I have done; I could answer men, but I cannot answer thee: thou art holy, but I am vile.
(3.) There are sometimes representations of the goodness and mercy of God, made unto the souls of his people; when these produce an ingenuous thaw and melting of the heart, into an humble, thankful admiration of it, and an answerable care of pleasing him in the ways of obedience, then have men communion with God in his goodness. The goodness of God runs down to men in a double channel: his goodness to their bodies in external providences; his goodness to their souls in spiritual mercies. When thcrgoodness of God, either way, draws forth the love and gratitude of the soul to the God of our mercies, then have we real communion with him! Thus Jacob, “ And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac; which saidst unto me, return unto thy country, and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee. I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all the truth which thou hast showed unto thy servant, for with my stafl* I passed over this Jordan, and now I am become two bands.” Ah, Lord, I see a multitude of mercies round about me, and the least of them is greater than I. So David, “ And David the king came and sat before the Lord, and said, Who am I, O Lord God, and what is mine house, that thou hast brought me hither? And yet this was a small thing in thine eyes, O God, &c. what can David speak more to thee? ’’ You see in these instances, what effects the goodness of God, even in inferior, outward mercies useth to produce in sanctified hearts. But then, if you come to spiritual mercies, and ponder the goodness of God to your souls, in pardoning, accepting, and saving such vile, sinful creatures as you have been; this much more affects the heart, and overwhelms it with holy astonishment; as you see in Paul: “ The grace of our Lord was abundant: I was a persecutor, a blasphemer, yet I obtained mercy.’’ So Mary, that notorious sinner, when pardoning grace appeared to her, into what a flood of tears, into what transports of love did the sight of mercy cast her soul! She wept, and washed her Saviour’s feet with tears of joy and thankfulness. No terrors of the law, no frights of hell, thaw the heart like the apprehensions of pardoning mercy.
(4.) Sometimes there are special representations of the veracity and faithfulness of God, made unto his people, begetting trust and holy confidence in their souls; and when they do so, then have men communion with God in his faithfulness. Thus —
’ I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” There is a discovery of the faithfulness of God, and what follows upon this.’ “So that we may boldly say, the Lord is our God; we will not fear what man can do unto us.” Here is faithfulness in God, producing trust and confidence in the believer; this is that reciprocation, that sweet fellowship and communion between God and a believer, with respect to his fidelity. “ Behold, God is my salvation: I will trust, and not be afraid.” And truly, friend, this is what the Lord justly expects from thee, even thy trust and confidence in him, thy steady dependence on him, in return for all the discoveries of his faithfulness to thee both in his word and providences.
(5.) There are manifestations of the ange) and displeasure of God, by the hiding of his face from them, and the frowns of his providence: when these produce repentance, and deep humiliation for sin, an unquietness, a restlessness of spirit, till he restore his favour, and manifest his reconciliation to the soul; even here also, is a real communion between God and the soul: “ Thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled.” Nor will a gracious soul rest there, but will take pains to sue out a fresh pardon—
“ Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice; restore unto me the joys of thy salvation.’“’
I cannot here omit to detect a great mistake even amongst God’s own people; many of them understand not what communion there should be with God under the manifestations of his displeasure for sin: they know the affectionate meltings of their souls into love, praise, &c. to be communion with God; but that in the shame, grief, and sorrow produced in them by the manifestations of God’s displeasure, I say that even in these things there may be communion with God they understand not. But let me tell thee, that even such things as these are the choice fruits of the spirit of adoption, and that in them thy soul hath as real and beneficial communion with God as in the greatest transports of spiritual joy and comfort. O it is a blessed frame to be before the Lord, as Ezra was, after conviction of thy looseness, carelessness, and spiritual defilements, the consequence of those sins; saying with him — “ O my God, I am ashamed, and even blush to lift up my face unto thee.” Shame and blushing are as excellent signs of communion with God as the sweetest smiles.
Lastly, Tliere are representations and special contemplations of the omniscience of God, producing sincerity, comfort in appeals, and recourse to it in doubts of our own uprightness: And this also is a choice and excellent method of communion with God. (1.) When the omniscience of God strongly obliges the soul to sincerity and uprightness, as it did David, Psalms 139:11-12, compared with Psalms 18:23, “ I was also upright before him.”“ The consideration that he was always before the eye of God was his preservative from iniquity, yea, from his own iniquity. (2.) When it produceth comforts in appeals to it, as it did Hezekiah — ’^ Remember now, O Lord, that I have walked before thee in truth, and with a perfect heart.” So Job also appeals to this attribute — “ Thou knowest that I am not wicked.”“ So did Jeremiah — “ But thou, O Lord, knowest me, thou hast seen me, and tried my heart towards thee.”“ (3.) When we have recourse to it under doubts and fears of our own uprightness. Thus did David — “ Search me, O God, and try my heart; prove me, and see my reins: see if there be any way of wickedness in me.”“ In all these attributes of God, Christians have real and sweet communion with him. Which was the first thing to be opened, to wit, communion with God in the meditation of his attributes.
2. The next method of communion with God is in the exercises of our graces in the various duties of religion; in prayer, hearing, sacraments, &c. in all which the Sph-it of the Lord influences the graces of his people, and they return the fruits thereof in some measure to him. As God hath planted various graces in regenerate souls, so he hath appointed various duties to exercise and draw forth those graces; and when they do so, then have his people sweet actual communion with him. And,
(1.) To begin with the first grace that shows itself in the soul of a Christian, to wit, repentance, and sorrow for sin. In the exercise of this grace of repentance, ^the soul pours out itself before the Lord with much bitterness and brokenness of heart; casts forth its sorrows; which sorrows are as so much seed sown, and, in return thereto, the Lord usually sends an answer of peace — “ I said, I will confess my transgression, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.”“ Here is a voice of sorrow sent up, and a voice of peace coming down, which is real communion between God and man in the exercises of repentance.
(2.) As there are seasons in duty wherein the saints exercise their repentance, and the Lord returns peace; so likewise the Lord helps them in their duties to act i\\e\x faWi, in return whereunto, they find from the Lord inward support, rest, and refresliment. “ I had fainted unless I had believed.” And ofttimes an assurance of the mercies they have acted their faith about.
(3.) The Lord many times draws forth eminent degrees of our love to him, in the course of our duties; the licart is filled witli love to Christ. The strength of the soul is drawn forth to Christ in love, and this the Lord repays in kind, love for love —
“ He that loveth me, my Father will love him; and we will come and make our abode with him.*” Here is sweet communion with God in the exercise of love. O what a rich trade do Christians drive this way in their duties and exercises of graces?
(4.) To mention no more in the duties of passive obedience, Christians are enabled to exercise their patience, meekness, and long-suffering for Christ, in return for which, the Lord gives them the singular consolations of his Spirit, double returns of joy.
“ The Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon them.*” The Lord strengthens them with passive fortitude, with all might in the inner man, unto all long-suffering; but the reward of that long-suffering is joyfulness. This is the trade they carry on with heaven.
3. Beside communion with God in the contemplation of his attributes, and graces exercised in the course of duties, there is another method of communion with God in the way of his providences, for therein also his people walk with him. To give a taste of this, let us consider providence in a fourfold aspect upon the people of God: —
(1.) There are afflictive providences, rods and rebukes wherewith the Lord chastens his children, this is the discipline of his house; in answer whereunto gracious souls return meek and child-like submission, a fruit of the spirit of adoption; they are brought to accept the punishment of their iniquities. And herein lies communion with God under the rod; this return to the rod may not be presently made, for there is much stubbornness unmortified in the best hearts; but this is the fruit it shall yield; and when it doth, there is a real communion with God and the afflicted soul. Let not Christians mistake themselves, if when God is smiting, they are humbled, searching their hearts, and blessing God for the discoveries of sin made by their afflictions; admiring his wisdom in timing, moderating, and choosing the rod; kissing it with a child-like submission, and saying, it is good for me that I have been afflicted: that soul hath real communion with God, though it may be for a time without joy.
(2.) There are times when providefice straitejis the people of God; when the waters of comfort ebb and run very low, wants pinch; if then the soul returns fdial dependence upon fatherly care, saying with David, “ The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want;’’ it belongs to him to provide, and to me to depend: I will trust my father’s care and love.
Here now is sweet communion with God under pinching wants. The wants of the body enrich the soul, outward straitenings are the occasions of inward enlargements. O see from lience how good it is to have an interest in God as a Father whatever changes of providence may come upon you.
(3.) Tliere are seasons wherein the Lord exposes his people to imminent and visible dangers, when to the eye of sense there is no way of escape. Now when this produces trust in God, and resignation to the pleasure of his will, here is communion with God in times of distress and difficulty. Thus David, “ At what time I am afraid I will trust in thee as if he should say. Father, I see a storm rising, thy poor child comes under his Father ’’s roof for shelter; for whither should a distressed child go but to his Father? And then, as to the issues and events of doubtful providences, when the soul resigns and leaves itself to the wise disposal of the will of God, as David — “ Here am I, let him do with me as seemeth good in his sight.’“ This is real and sweet communion with God in his providences. And so much for the nature of communion with God.
Secondly, In the next place I shall evidence the reality of communion with God, and prove it to be no fancy. I confess it grieves me to be put upon the proof of this, but the atheism and profaneness of the age we live in seems to make it necessary; for many men will allow nothing for certain but what falls under the cognizance of sense. And O that they had their spiritual senses exercised! then they would sensibly discern the reality of these things. But to put the matter out of question, I shall evidence the truth and reality of the saints’ communion with God divers ways.
Evidence 1. From the saints’ union with Christ.
If there be a union between Christ and believers, then of necessity there must be n communion between them also. Now the Avhole word of God which you profess to be the rule of your faith, plainly asserts this union between Christ and believers; a union like that between the branches and the root, or that between the head and the members.
Now if Christ be to believers as the root to the branches, and as the head to the members; then of necessity there must be a communion between them, for if there were not a communion, there could be no communications; and if no communications, no life. For it is by the communication of vital sap and spirits, from the root and from the head, that the branches and members subsist and live.
Evid. There is a cohabitation of Christ with believers; he dwells with them, yea, he dwells in them — “ I will dwell in them, and walk in them.” The soul of a believer is the temple of Christ: yea, his living temple. And if Christ dwell with them; yea, if he dwell in them and walk in them, then certainly there must be communion between him and them; if they live together they must converse together. A man indeed may dwell in his house, and yet cannot be said to have communion with it; but the saints are a living house, they are the living temples of Christ; and he cannot dwell in such temples, capable of communion with him, and yet have no communion with them.
Evid. 3. The reality of communion between God and the saints is undeniably evinced from all the spiritual relations into which God hath taken them.
Every believer is the child of God and the spouse of Christ. God is the believer’s Father, and the church is the Lamb’s wife. Christ calls the believer not only his servant, but friend; henceforth I call you not servants, but friends, &c. Now, if God be the believer’s Father, and the believer be God’s own child, certainly there must be communion between them. If Christ be the believer’s husband, and the believer be Christ’s spouse, there must be communion between him and them. What, no communion between the Father and his children, the husband and the wife.^ We must either renounce and deny all such relations to him, and therein renounce our Bibles; or else yield the conclusion, that there is a real communion between Christ and believers.
Evid. 4. The reality of communion with God evidently appears from the institution and appointment of so many ordinances and duties of religion, on purpose to maintain daily communion between Christ and his people. As to instance but in that one institution of prai/er, a duty appointed on purpose for the soul’s meeting with God, and communion with him: “ Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.” Now, to what purpose can it be conceived such an ordinance is appointed for the soul’s drawing nigh to God, and God to it; if there be no such thing as communion to be enjoyed with him? If communion with God were a mere phantom, as the carnal world thinks it to be, what encouragement have the saints to bow their knees to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? But surely there is an access to God in prayer — “ In whom we have boldness, and access with confidence.” Access to what? If God be not there, and that there can be no communion with him, what means that access?
“ I will meet with you, saith the Lord, and I will commune with you in every place where I record my name.” Certainly duties had never been appointed, but for the sake of God’s communing with us, and we with him.
Evid. 5. This is yet further evidenced from the mutual desires both of Christ and his people to be in sweet and intimate communion one with the other. The scripture speaks much of the saints’ vehement desires of communion with Christ, and of Christ’s desires after communion with the saints, and of both jointly. The saints’ desires after communion with him are frequent in all the scriptures, see Psalms 113:1-3; Psalms 119:20; and the like throughout the New Testament. And Christ is no less desirous, yea, he is much more desirous of communion with us than we are with him. Consider that expression of his to the spouse — “ O thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to thy voice: cause me to hear it.” As if he should say, O my people, you frequently converse one with another, you talk daily together; why shall not you and I converse one with another: you speak often to men, O that you would speak more frequently to me! “ Let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for thy voice is sweet, and thy countenance is comely.”“ And then these desires are mutually expressed one to another — “ Surely ““’ (saith Christ) “ I come quickly, amen: even so come, Lord Jesus,’“ saith the church. Now if there be such vehement mutual desires after communion between Christ and his people in this world; then certainly there is such a thing as real communion between them, or else both must live a very restless and dissatisfied life.
Evid. 6. The mutual complaints that are found on both sides of the interruption of communion, plainly prove there is such a thing. If God complain of his people for their estrangements from him, and the saints complain to God about his silence to them, and the hidings of his face from them; surely then there must be a communion between them, or else there could be no ground of complaint for the interruptions of it. But it is manifest God doth complain of his people for their estrangements from him — “ Thus saith the Lord, I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, and the love of thy espousals.
What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me?’“* as if he should say, You and I have been better acquainted in days past; what cause have I given for your estrangements from me? And thus Christ in like manner complains of the church of Ephesus; after he had commended many things in her, yet one thing grieves and troubles him — “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. And then on the other side, when the Lord hides his face, and seems to estrange himself from his people; what sad lamentations and moans do they make about it, as an affliction they know not how to bear? Thus Heman, “ Lord, why castest thou off my soul? Why hidest thou thy face from me? So David, “ Hide not thy face from me: put not thy servant away in anger.^’ This is what they cannot bear.
Emd. 7. The reality of communion with God is made visible to others, in the sensible effects of it upon the saints that enjoy it. There are visible signs and tokens of it appearing to the conviction of others. Thus that marvellous change that appeared upon the very countenance of Hannah, after she had poured out her heart in prayer, and the Lord had answered her; it is noted, “ She went away, and her countenance was no more sad.^’ You might have read in her face that God had spoken peace and satisfaction to her heart. Thus, when the disciples had been with Christ, the mark of communion with him was visible to others — “ Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, they marvelled, and took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus.’’ It is sweet, Christian, when the heavenly cheerfulness, and spirituality of thy conversations with men, shall convince others that thou hast been with Jesus.
Evid. 8. We may prove the reality of communion with God, from the impossibility of sustaining those troubles the saints do without it. If prayers did not go up, and answers come down, there were no living for a Christian in this world. Prayer is the out-let of the saints’ sorrows, and the in-let of their supports and comforts. Say not, other men have their troubles as well as the saints, and yet they make a shift to bear them without the help of communion with God. It is true, carnal men have their troubles, and those troubles are often too heavy for them. “ The sorrows of the world work death;” but carnal men have no such troubles as the saints have, for they have their inward, spiritual troubles, as well their outward troubles. And inward troubles are the sinking troubles; but this way the strength of God comes in to succour them: and except they had a God to go to, and fetch comfort from, they could never bear them: “ I had fainted unless I had believed.” Paul had sunk under the buifetings of Satan, unless he had gone once and again to his God, and received this answer, “ My grace is sufficient for thee.”
Evid. 9. We conclude the reality of communion with God, from the end of the saint’s vocation.
We read frequently in scripture of effectual calling; ROW what is that to which God calls his people, out of the state of nature, but unto fellowship and comniunion with Jesus Christ? “ God is faithful, by whom ye are called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.’ They are called, you see, into a life of communion with Christ; therefore certainly there is such a communion, else the saints are called to the enjoyment of a fancy, instead of a privilege, which is the greatest reproach that can be cast upon the faithful God that called them.
Evid. 10. Lastly, In a word, the characters and descriptions given to the saints in scripture, evidently prove their life of communion with God. The men of this world are manifestly distinguished from the people of God in scripture; they are called, “ The children of this world;’ ’ the saints, “ The children of light.” They are said to be “after the flesh,” saints to be “ after the Spirit.” They “ mind earthly things,” but the saint’s “ conversation is in heaven.” By all which it undeniably appears that there is a reality in the doctrine of communion between Christ and his people. We are not imposed upon, it is no cunningly devised fable; but a thing whose foundation is as sure as its nature is sweet.
Thirdly, In the last place, I shall show you the transcendent excellency of this life of communion with God: it is the life of our life, the joy of our hearts; a heaven upon earth, as will appear by these twenty excellencies thereof following: —
1 Excellency. It is the assimilating instrument whereby the soul is moulded and fashioned after the image of God. This is the excellency of commanion with God, to make the soul like him. There is a twofold assimilation, or conformity of the soul to God, the one perfect and complete, the other inchoate and in part. Perfect assimilation is the privilege of the perfect state, resulting from the immediate vision and perfect communion the soul hath with God in glory — “When he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”
Perfect vision produceth perfect assimilation; but the soul’’s assimilation or imperfect conformity to God in this world, is wrought and gradually carried on, by daily communion with him. And as our communion with God here, grows up more and more into spirituality and power, so in an answerable degree doth our conformity to him advance: “ But we all, with open face, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord.
All sorts of communion among men have an assimilating efficacy; he that walks in vain company is made vainer than he was before; and he that walks in spiritual, heavenly company, will be ordinarily more serious than he was before. But nothing so transforms the spirit of a man as communion with God doth. Those are most like unto God that converse most frequently with him. The beauty of the Lord is upon those souls; it forms the spirit of a man after the divine pattern. That is the first excellency of communion with God, it assimilates them to God.
2 Ecellency. It is the beauty of the soul, in the eyes of God and all good men; it makes the face to shine. No outward splendor attracts like this; it makes a man the most desirable companion in the whole world: “ These things have I written unto you, that you might have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.’“ This was the great and only inducement the Apostle makes use of to draw the world into fellowship with the saints, that their fellowship is with God. And if there were ten thousand other inducements, yet none like this. You read of a blessed time, Zechariah 8:1-23. when the earth shall be full of holiness; when the Jews, that are now as a lost generation to the eye of sense, shall be called, and an eminent degree of sanctification shall be visible in them; and then see the effect of this, Zechariah 8:23, “ In those days, ten men shall take hold, out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirts of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.”“ This is the powerful attractive, “ the Lord is with you C it is the effect of communion with God, which makes the righteous more excellent than his neighbour. What a vast and visible difference doth this make between one man and another! How heavenly, sweet, and desirable are the conversations and company of some men! How frothy, burdensome, and unprofitable is the company of others! and what makes the difference but only this, the one walks in communion with God, the other is alienated from the life of God.
3 Excellency. It is the centre which rests the motions of a weary soul: it is the rest and refreshment of a man”’s spirits — “ Return unto thy rest, O my soul.”“ When we attain perfect communion with God in heaven, we attain to perfect rest, and and all the rest the spirit of man finds on earth, is found in communion with God. Take a sanctified person, who hath intermitted for some time his communion with the Lord, and ask him. Is your soul at rest and ease ’’^ He will tell you, no! The motions of his soul are like those of a member out of joint, neither comely nor easy. Let that man recover his spiritual frame again, and, with it, he recovers his rest and comfort. Christians, you meet with variety of troubles in this world; many a sweet comfort is cut off, many a hopeful project dashed by the hand of providence; and what think you is the meaning of those blasting, disappointing providences? Surely this is their design and errand, to disturb your false rest in the bosom of the creature; to pluck away those pillows you were laying your heads upon, that thereby you might be reduced unto God, and recover your lost communion with him; and say, with David, “ Return unto thy rest, O my soul.” Sometimes we are settling ourselves to rest in an estate, in a child, or the like; at this time it is usual with God to say, go, losses, smite and blast such a man’’s estate; go, death, and take away the desire of his eyes with a stroke, that my child may find rest no where but in me. God is the ark; the soul, like the dove Noah sent forth, let it fly where it will, it shall find no rest till it come back to God.
4 Excellency. It is the desire of all gracious souls throughout the world. Wherever there is a gracious soul, the desires of that soul are working after communion with God. As Christ was called, “ The desire of all nations,”“ so communion with him is “ the desire of all saints;” and this speaks the excellency of it — “ One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I might dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to see the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple; that is, to enjoy communion with him in the public duties of his worship. “ One thing have I desired,” that is, one thing above all other things; such a one, as, (if God shall give me,) I can comfortably bear the want of all other things. Let him deny me what he will, if so be he will not deny me this one thing; this one thing shall richly recompense the want of all other things. Hence the desires of the saints are so intense and fervent after this one thing, in such expressions as the following — “ My soul panteth after thee, O God f’ and “ My soul fainteth for thy salvation.’“ No duties can satisfy without it, the soul cannot bear the delays, much less the denials of it. They reckon their lives worth nothing without it. Ministers may come, ordinances and sabbaths may come; but there is no satisfaction to the desires of a gi-acious heart, till God comes too; “ O when wilt thou come unto me?”
5 Eoocelleficy. As it is the desire, so it is the delight of all the children of God, both in heaven and earth. As communion with the saints is the dclisht of Christ — “ Let me hear thy voice:”“ and again —
“ The companions hearken to thy voice; cause me to hear it:” so communion with Christ is the delight of his people. “ I sat under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet unto my taste.”’“’
It is the pleasure of Christ to see the yearning countenances, the blushing cheeks, the dropping eyes of his people upon their knees; and it is the delight of the saints to see a smile upon his face, to hear a voice of pardon and peace from his lips. I must tell you, Christians, you must look for no such delights as these, in any earthly enjoyment, none better than these, till you come home to glory; communion with God then appears most excellent, in as much as it is found to be the desire and delight of all gracious souls.
6 Excellency. It is the envy of Satan that which cuts and grates that wicked spirit. O how it grates, and galls that proud and envious spirit, to see men and women enjoying the felicity and pleasure of that communion with God, from which he himself is fallen and cut off for ever! to see the saints imbosomed in delightful communion with Christ, whilst himself feels the pangs of horror, and despair! this is what he cannot endure to behold. And therefore you should find in your experience, that times of communion with God are usually busy times of temptation from the devil. “ And he showed me Joshua the high-priest standing before the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him.” It is well for thee. Christian, that thou hast an Advocate standing at God’s right hand to resist, and frustrate his attempts upon thee; otherwise Satan would this way destroy your communion with God, and make that which is now your delight, to be your terror. Many ways doth the devil oppose the saint’’s communion with God; sometimes he labours to divert them from it: this business shall fall in, or that occasion fall out, on purpose to divert thy soul’s approach to God; but if he cannot prevail there, then he labours to distract your thoughts, and break them into a thousand vanities; or if he succeed not there, then he attacks you in your return from duty, with spiritual pride, security, &c. these fierce oppositions of hell discover the worth, and excellency of communion with God.
7 Exccellency. It is the end of all ordinances, and duties of religion. God hath instituted every ordinance and duty, whether public or private, to beget and maintain communion between himself and our souls. What are ordinances, duties, and graces, but perspective glasses to give us a sight of God, and help us to communion with him? God never intended his ordinances to be our rest, but mediums, and instruments of communion with himself, what is our true rest. When we go into a boat, it is not with an intention to dwell, and rest there, but to ferry us over the water, where our business lies. If a man miss of communion with God in the best ordinances, or duty, it yields him little comfort. He comes back from it, like a man that hath travelled a great many miles to meet a dear friend, upon special and important business; but met with disappointment, and returns sad and dissatisfied. God appoints ordinances to be meeting-places with himself in this world — “ Thou shall put the mercy-seat above upon the ark, and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee; and there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee, from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubims.” It was not the sight of the golden cherubims, or of the ark overlaid with pure gold, that could have satisfied Moses, had not the special presence of God been there, and he had had communion with him. “ O God, (saith David) my soul thirsteth for thee, that I might see thy beauty, and thy glory, so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary.’^ ]\Iagnificent structures, artificial ornaments of the places of worship, are of little account with a gracious soul; it is the presence of God, and communion with him, which is the beauty and glory the saints desire to behold,
8 Excellency, It is the evidence of our union with Christ and interest in him. All union with Christ must evidence itself by a life of communion with him, or our pretensions to it are vain and groundless. There be many of you (I wish there were more) enquiring after evidences and signs of your union with Christ; why here is an evidence that can never fail you: do you live in communion with him? May your life be called a walking with God, as Enoch’s was? Then you may be sure you have union with him, and this is so sure a sign, as death itself (which uses to discover the vanity of false signs) will never be able to destroy. “ Remember now, O Lord, (saith Hezekiah) that I have walked before thee in truth, and in a perfect heart.”“ professors! it will be a dreadful thing (whatever ungrounded hopes and false comforts you now have) to find them shrinking away from you, as certainly as they will do at death; and all upon this account:
1 have been a man of knowledge, I have been frequent in the external duties of religion, but my heart was not in them; I had no communion with the Lord in them, and now God is a terror to my soul. I am going to his awful bar, and have not one sound evidence to carry along with me. This is a remarkable place — “ If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit;” that is, let us evidence the life of grace in us by exercising that grace in a life of communion with God. When all is said, this is the surest evidence of our union with Christ; and no gifts or performances whatsoever can amount to an evidence of our union with Christ without it.
9 Excellency. It is ease in all pains, sweet and sensible ease to a troubled soul. Look, as the bleeding of a vein cools, eases, and refreshes a feverish body; so the opening of the soul by acts of communion with God, gives sensible ease to a burdened soul: griefs are eased by groans heavenward. ]\Iany souls are deeply laden with their own fears, cares, and distresses; no refreshment for such a soul, no such anodyne in the whole world as communion with God is. How did troubles boil in David’s soul? night and day God’s hand was heavy on him; his soul, as Elihu speaks, was like bottles full of new wine; he must speak to God that he may be refreshed: and so he did, and was refreshed by it.
“ I said, I will confess uiy transgressions unto the Lord, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.’
It would grieve one to see how many poor distressed souls carry their troubles up and down the world, making their complaints to one another; but no ease. Away to thy God, poor Christian, get thee into thy closet, pour out thy soul before him; and that ease which thou seekest in vain elsewhere, will there be found, or no where.
10 Excellency. It is food to the soul, and the most delicious, pleasant, proper, and satisfying food that ever it tasted; it is hidden manna. “ By these things, O Lord, do men live, and in them is the life of their soul.” A regenerate soul cannot live without it; their bodies can live as well without bread or breath as their souls without communion with God: it is more than their necessary food. Here they imd what they truly call marrow and fatness.
O the satisfaction and support they draw out of spiritual things by thoughts and meditations upon them! — “ To be spiritually minded is life and peace/’ The delicacies upon princes’ tables are husks and chaff to this. Crows and vultures can live upon the carrion of this world, but a renewed soul cannot subsist long without God. Let such a soul be diverted for a time from its usual refreshments this way, and he shall find something within paining him like the sucking and drawing of an empty stomach. It is angeFs food, it is that your souls must live upon throughout eternity, and most happily too.
11 EoDcellency. It is the guard of the soul against the assaults of temptation. It is like a shield advanced against the fiery darts of that wicked one. Your safety and security lie in drawing nigh to God — “ They that are far from thee shall perish: but it is good for me to draw near to God.” It is good indeed; not only the good of comfort, but the good of safety is in it — “ The beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety by him.’“* You know the gracious presence of God is your shield and safety; and if you will have the Lord thus present with you in all your fears, straits, and dangers, see that you keep near to him in the duties of communion: “ For the Lord is with you whilst you are with him.
12 Excellency. It is the honour of the soul, and the greatest honour that ever God conferred on any creature. It is the glory of the holy angels in heaven, to be always beholding the face of God. O that God should admit poor dust and ashes unto such a nearness to himself! to walk with a king, and have frequent converse with him, put a great deal of honour upon a subject; but the saints walk with God; so did Enoch, so do all the saint?.
“ Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Christ Jesus.’’ They have liberty and access with confidence; the Lord, as it were, delivers them the golden key of prayers by which they may come into his presence on all occasions with the freedom of children to a father.
13 Excellency. It is the instrument of mortification, and the most excellent and successful instrument for that purpose in all the world — “ This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the works of the flesh.” Walking in the Spirit is the same thing with walking in communion with God. Now, saith that apostle, if you thus walk in the Spirit, in the actings of faith, love, and obedience, throughout the course of holy duties, the effect of this will be, that ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh. He doth not say. You shall not feel the motions of sin in you, or temptations to sin assaulting you; but he saith. You shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh, sin shall not have dominion over you; this will let out the life-blood of sin. A temptation overcome this way is more effectually subdued than by all the vows, resolutions, and external means in the world: as a candle that is blown out with a puff of breath may be rekindled by another puff, but if it be quenched in water it is not so easily lighted again; so it is here: you never find that power or success in temptations when your hearts are up with God in their exercises of faith and love, as you do when your hearts hang loose from him, and dead towards him. The schoolmen assign this as one reason why the saints in heaven are impeccable, no sin can fasten upon them, because, say they, they there enjoy the beatifical vision of God. This is sure, the more communion any man hath with God on earth, the freer he lives from the power of his corruptions.
14 Excellency. It is the kernel of all duties and ordinances: words, gestures, &c. are but the integuments, husks, and shells of duties. Communion with God is the sv/eet kernel, the pleasant and nourishing food which lies within them: you see the fruits of the earth are covered and defended by husks, shells, and such like integuments; within which lie the pleasant kernels and grains, and these are the food. The hypocrite who goes no further than the externals of religion, is therefore said to feed on ashes, to spend his money for that which is not bread, and his labour for that which satisfieth not. He feeds but upon husks, in which there is but little pleasure or nourishment. What a poor house doth a hypocrite keep? Words, gestures, ceremonies of religion, will never fill the soul; but communion with God is substantial nourishment.
“ My soul (saith David) shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, whilst I think and meditate on thee. It would grieve one’s heart to think what airy things many souls satisfy themselves with; feeding like Ephraim upon the wind, well contented if they can but shufHe over a few heartless, empty duties; whilst the saints, feeding thus upon hidden manna, are feasted, as it were, with angel’s food.
15 Excellency. It is the light of the soul in darkness; and the pleasantest light that ever shone upon the soul of man. There is many a soul which walketh in darkness; some in the darkness of ignorance and unbelief, the most dismal of all darkness, except that in hell. There are others who are children of light in a state of reconciliation, yet walk in the darkness of outward afflictions, and inward desertions and temptations; but as soon as ever the light of God’s countenance shines upon the soul in the duties of communion with him, that darkness is dissipated and scattered; it is all light within him and round about him — “ They looked unto him and were enlightened;” they looked, there is faith acted in duty; and were enlightened, there is the sweet effect of faith. The horrors and troubles of gracious souls shrink away upon the rising of this cheerful light. As wild beasts come out of their dens in the darkness of the night, and shrink back again into them when the sun ariseth; so do the fears and inward troubles of the people of God when this light shines upon their souls. Nay more, this is a light which scatters the very darkness of death itself It was the saying of a worthy divine of Germany upon his death-bed, when his eye-sight was gone, being asked how it was within? “ Why,” said he, “ though all be dark about me,’’ yet, pointing as well as he could to his breast, “ Mc sat hicis, here is light enough.’’
16 Excellency. It is liberty to the straitened soul, and the most comfortable and excellent liberty in the whole world. He only walks at liberty that walks with God — “ I will walk at liberty, for I seek thy precepts.”
Wicked men cry out of bands and cords in religion, they look upon the duties of godliness as the greatest bondage and thraldom in the whole world — “ Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us;” as if he should say, away with this strictness and preciseness, it extinguishes the joy and pleasure of our lives; give us our cups instead of Bibles, our profane songs instead of spiritual psalms, our sports and pastimes instead of prayers and sermons.
Alas, poor creatures, how do they dance in their shackles and chains! when, in reality, the sweetest liberty is enjoyed in those duties at which they thus snuff. The law of Christ is the law of liberty; the soul of man never enjoys more liberty than when it is bound with the strictest bands of duty to God.
Here is liberty from enthralling lusts, and from enslaving fears: “ The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.’’ And here is freedom indeed: “ If the Son make you free, then are ye free indeed.” And here is freedom from fears, Luke 1:74-75. Those that will not endure any restraint from their lusts, will have their freedom to sin; a freedom they shall have, such as it is: “ When ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.” Let none therefore be prejudiced at the ways of duty and strict godliness — “ The law of Christ is the perfect law of liberty;” not liberty to sin, but liberty from sin.
17 Excellency. It is a mercy purchased by the blood of Christ for believers, and one of the principal mercies settled upon them by the new covenantgrant. A peculiar mercy, which none but the redeemed of the Lord partake of; a mercy which cost the blood of Christ to purchase it. I do not deny but there are thousands of other mercies bestowed upon the unregenerate; they have health, wealth, children, honours, pleasures, and all the delights of this life; but for communion with God, and the pleasures that result therefrom, they are incapable of these. No supping with Christ, upon such excellent privileges and mercies as these, till the heart be opened to him by faith; you cannot come nigh to God, until you be first made nigh by reconciliation.
What would your lives. Christians, be worth to you, if this mercy were cut off from you? There would be little sweetness or savour in all your outward mercies, were it not for this mercy that sweetens them all. And there is this difference, among many others, between this mercy and all outward mercies: you may be cut off from the enjoyment of those, you cannot from this; no prison can keep out the Comforter. O bless God for this invaluable mercy.
18 Excellency. It is natural to the new creature; the inclination and instinct of the new creature leadeth to communion with God. It is as natural to the new creature to desire it, and work after it, as it is to the new-born babe to make to the breast — “ As new-born babes desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.”
There is a law upon the regenerate part, which inwardly and powerfully obliges it to acts of duty, and converse with God in them. Communion with God is a thing that ariseth out of the principles of grace. You know all creatures in this lower world act according to the laws of nature; the sun will rise, and the sea will flow at their appointed times; and the gracious soul will make towards its God in the times and seasons of communion with him.
They are not forced on to those duties by the frights of conscience, and the fears of hell, so much as by the natural inclination of the new creature.
Two things demonstrate communion with God to be congenial with the regenerate part, called the hidden man of the heart, namely: (1.) The restlessness of a gracious soul without it, Song of Solomon 3:2. The church, in the first verse, had sought her beloved, but found him not. Doth she sit down satisfied in his absence? No; “I will rise now, and go about the city, in the streets, and in the broad ways; I will seek him whom my soul loveth.” (2.) The satisfaction and pleasure, the rest and delight which the soul finds and feels in the enjoyment of communion with God, plainly show it to be agreeable to the new nature — “ My soul shall be satisfied when I think on thee.’“ And when it is thus, then duties become easy and pleasant to the soul: “ His commandments are not grievous.” Yea, and such a soul will be constant and assiduous in those duties. That which is natural, is constant as well as pleasant. What is the reason hypocrites throw up the duties of religion in times of difficulty, but because they have not an inward principle agreeable to them? The motives to duty lie without them, not within them.
19 Excellency. It is the occupation and trade of all sanctified persons, and the richest trade that was ever carried on by men. This way they grow rich in spiritual treasures; the revenues of it are better than silver and gold. There be many of you have traded long for this world, and it comes to little; and had you gained your designs you had gained but trifles. This is the rich and profitable occupation — “ Our conversation is in heaven.” Our commerce and trade lies that way, so that word signifies.
There be few Christians that have carried on this soul-enriching trade any considerable time, but can sliow some spiritual treasures which they have gotten by it — “ This 1 had, because I kept thy precepts.” As merchants can show the gold and silver, the lands and houses, the rich goods and furniture, which they have gotten by their successful adventures abroad; and tell their friends, so much I got by such a voyage, and so much by another: so Christians have invaluable treasures, though their humility conceals them, which they have gotten by this heavenly trade of communion with God. Their souls are weak, and by communion with God they have gotten strength: “I cried, and thou strengthenedst me with strength in my soul.” They have gotten peace by it, a treasure inestimable: “ Great peace have they that love thy law and nothing shall offend them.” They have gotten purity by it, “ They do no iniquity that walk in thy ways.” O what rich returns are here! nay, they get sometimes full assurance by it. The riches of both the Indies will not purchase from a Christian the least of these mercies. These are the rich rewards of our pains in the duties of religion; “In keeping thy commandments there is great reward.”
20 Excellency. It is oil to the wheels of obedience, which makes the soul go on cheerfully in the ways of the Lord — “ Then will I run the ways of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.” No7i tardat uncta rota^ — Oiled wheels run nimbly. How prompt and ready for any duty of obedience, is a soul under the influence of communion with God! Then, as Isaiah, having gotten a sight of God, “Here am I, Lord, send me.”
Now the soul can turn its hand to the duties of, First, Active; and Secondly, Passive obedience.
First, Hereby the soul is prepared and fitted for the duties of active obedience, to which it applies itself with pleasure and delight — “ Then will I go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy;” or, as it is in the Hebrew, “ the gladness of my joy.”“ It goes to prayer as a hungry man to a feast, or as a covetous man to his treasures — “ I have rejoiced in the way of thy commandments as much as in all riches.”
Secondly, It prepares the soul for passive ohedience: makes a man to rejoice in his sufferings. It will make a Christian stand ready to receive any burden or load that God shall lay upon his shoulders, and even be thankful to be so employed —
“ This joy of the Lord is their strength.” A Christian, under the cheerful influences of near communion with God, can, with more cheerfulness, lay down his neck for Christ, than other men can lay out a shilling for him. In all these twenty particulars, you have an account of the excellency of this privilege; but O how short an account have I given of it! What remains, is the application of this point, in a double use: —
I. Of information.
II. Of exhortation.
I. For information in the following inferences: —
Inference 1. How sure and certain a thing it is, that there is a God, and a state of glory prepared in heaven for sanctified souls.
These things are undeniable. God hath set them before our spiritual eyes and senses: beside the revelation of it in the gospel, which singly makes it infallible; the Lord, for our abundant satisfaction, hath brought these things down to the touch and test of our spiritual senses and experiences. You that have had so many sights of God by faith, so many sweet tastes of heaven in the duties of religion, O what a confirmation and seal have you of the reality of invisible things! You may say of heaven, and the joys above, as the Apostle did of him that purchased it — “ That which our eyes have seen, and our ears have heard, and our hands have handled,’’ &c. For God hath set these things in some degree before your very eyes, and put the first-fruits of them into your own hands. The sweet relish of the joy of the Lord is upon the very palate of your souls. To this spiritual sense of the believing Hebrews, the Apostle appealed, when he said, “ Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better, and an enduring substance.”“ This knowing in ourselves is more certain and sweet than all the traditional reports we can get from the reports of others — “ Whom having not seen ye love; whom, though now you see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory.’“
There is more of heaven felt and tasted in this world than men are aware of; it is one thing to hear of such countries as Spain, Italy, Smyrna, by the discourses and reports we heard of them in our childhood, and another thing, to understand those countries by the rich commodities imported from them, in the way of our trade and commerce. O did we but know what other Christians have felt and tasted, we should not have such staggering thoughts about invisible things! but the secret comforts of religion are, and ought to be for the most part inclosed things. Religion lays not all open; the Christian life is a hidden life.
Infer. 9,. If such a height of communion with God be attainable on earth, then most Christians live below the duties and comforts of Christianity.
Alas, the best of us are but at the foot of this pleasant mount Pisgah. As we are but in the infancy of our graces, so we are but in the infancy of our comforts. What a poor house is kept by many of God’s own children; living between hopes and fears, seldom tasting the riches and pleasures, the joys and comforts of assurance! and will you know the reasons of it? There are five things which usually keep them poor and low as to spiritual joys and comforts. (1.) The incumbrances of the world, which divert them from, or distract them in their duties of communion with God, and so keep them low in their spiritual comforts: they have so much to do on earth, that they have little time for heavenly employments. O what a noise and din do the trifles of this world make in the heads and hearts of many Christians! How dear do we pay for such trifles as these? (2.) A spirit of formality creeping into the duties of religion, impoverishes the vital spirit thereof, like the wanton embraces of the ivy, which binds and starves the tree it clasps about. Religion cannot thrive under formality; and it is difficult to keep out formality in a settled course of duty, and much more when duties are intermitted. (3.) The business of temptations pestering the minds of many Christians, especially such as are of melancholy constitutions. How importunate and restless are these temptations with some Christians? They can make little comfort or advantage out of duty, by reason of them. (4.) Heart-apostacy, inward decays of our first love, is another reason why our duties prosper so little — “ Thou hast left thy first love.” You were not wont to serve God with such coldness. (5.) In a word, spiritual pride impoverishes our comforts; the joys of the Spirit, like brisk wines, are two strong for our weak heads. For these causes, many Christians are kept low in spiritual comforts.
Infer. 3. How sweet and desirable is the society of the saints! it must needs be desirable to walk with them, who walk with God. No such companions as the saints. What benefit, or pleasure can we find in converses with sensual worldlings? All we can carry out of such company is guilt or grief. “ All my delight (saith David) is in the saints, and in the excellent of the earth, which excel in virtue;” and their society would certainly be much more sweet, and desirable, than it is, did they live more in communion with God than they do.
There was a time when the communion of the saints was exceeding lovely: the Lord restore it to its primitive glory and sweetness.
Infer. 4. What an unspeakable mercy is conversion, which lets the soul into such a state of spiritual pleasure?
Here is the beginning of your acquaintance with God, the first tale of spiritual pleasures, of which there shall never be an end. All the time men have spent in the world in an unconverted state, hath been a time of estrangement and alienation from God; when the Lord brings a man to Christ, in the way of conversion, he then begins his first acquaintance with God. “ Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace, thereby good shall come unto thee.” This is your first acquaintance with the Lord, which will be a growing thing; every visit you give him in prayer, increaseth your acquaintance, and begets more intimacy, and humble, holy familiarity between him and you. And, O what a paradise of pleasure doth this let the soul into! the life of religion abounds with pleasures, ’* All his ways are ways of pleasantness, and his paths are peace.” Now you know where to go, and unload any trouble that presseth your hearts, whatever prejudices and scandals Satan and his instruments, cast upon religion; this I will affirm of it, that that man must necessarily be a stranger to true pleasure, and empty of real comfort, who is a stranger to Christ, and the duties of communion with him.
It is true, here is no allowance for sinful pleasures, nor any want of spiritual pleasures. Bless God, therefore, for converting grace, you that have it, and lift up a cry to heaven for it, you that want it.
Infer. 5. Lastly, If there be so much delight, and pleasure in our imperfect, and often interrupted communion with God here; O then, what is lieaven! what are the immediate visions of his face in the perfect state?
“ Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.’“ You have heard glorious, and ravishing reports in the gospel, of that blessed future state, things which the angels desire to look into. You have felt, and tasted joys unspeakable, and full of glory, in the actings of your faith and love upon Christ; yet all that you have heard, and all that you have felt and tasted in the way to glory, falls so short of the perfection and blessedness of that state, that heaven will, and must be a great surprise to them that have now the greatest acquaintance with it.
Though the present comforts of the saints are sometimes as much as they can bear, for they seem to reel and stagger under the weight of them — “•’ Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples, I am sick of love.” Yet, I say, these high tides of pleasant joy, are but shallows to the joys of his immediate presence. And as they run not so deep, so they are not constant and continued as they shall be above — “ Ever with the Lord.” And thus much for information.
II. Use, for exhortation. The last improvement of this point will be by way of exhortation.
First, To believers.
Secondly, To unbelievers.
First, Is this the privileged state, into which all believers are admitted by conversion? Then strive to come up to the highest attainment of communion with God in this world, and be not contented with just so much grace as will secure you from hell; but labour after such a height of grace and communion with God, in the exercise thereof, as may bring you into the suburbs of heaven on earth.
Forget the things that are behind you, as to satisfaction in them, and press toward the mark, for the prize of your high calling. It is greatly to your loss, that you live at such a distance from God, and are so seldom with him; think not the ablest ministers, or choicest books will ever be able to satisfy your doubts and comfort your hearts, whilst you let down your communion with God to so low a degree. O that you might be persuaded now to hearken obediently to three or four necessary words of counsel.
1 Counsel. Make communion with God the very scope and aim of your souls in all your approaches to him in the ordinances and duties of religion.
Set it upon the point of your compass, let it be the very thing your souls design; let the desires and hopes of communion with God be the thing that draws you to every sermon and prayer. “ One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may see the beauty of the Lord, and enquire after him in his temple.” That was the mark David aimed at; and men’s success in duties is usually according to the spiritual aims and intentions of their hearts in them: both sincerity and comforts lie much in men’’s ends.
2 Counsel. In all your approaches to God, beg and plead hard with him for the manifestations of his love, and further communications of his grace.
“ Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice; have mercy also upon me, and answer me. When thou saidst, seek ye my face, my heart said unto thee, Thy face. Lord, will I seek. Hide not thy face far from me, put not thy servant away in anger.”*”
How full and thick of pleas and arguments for communion with God was this prayer of David? Lord, I am come, in obedience to thy command; thou saidst, “ Seek ye my face,’’ thou biddest me come to thee, and wilt thou put away thy servant in anger? Thou hast been my help, I have had sweet experience of thy goodness, thou dost not use to put me off, and turn me away empty.
3 Counsel. Desh-e not comfort for comforfs sake; but comforts and refreshments for service and obedience”’ sake; that thereby you may be strengthened to go on in the ways of your duty with more cheerfulness — “ Then will I run the ways of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.’“’ As if he should say, O Lord, the comforts thou shalt give me, shall be returned again in cheerful services to thee. I desire them as oil to the wheels of obedience, not food for my pride.
4 Counsel. As ever you expect to be owners of much comfort in the ways of your communion with God, see that you are strict and circumspect in the course of your conversation. It is the looseness and carelessness of our hearts and lives which impoverishes our spiritual comforts. A little pride, a little carelessness, dashes and frustrates a great deal of comfort, which was very near us, almost in our hands; to allude to that, Hosea 7:1, “ When I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim was discovered.” So here, just when the desire of thy heart was come to the door, some sin stept in the way of it. “ Your iniquities (saith God) have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you.” The Comforter, the Holy Spirit, is sensible and tender; he hatli quick resentments of your unkindnesses and offences. As ever, therefore, you expect comfort from him, beware of him, and grieve him not.
Secondly, In the last place, this point speaks necessary counsel and advice to unbelievers; to all that live estranged from the life of God, and have done so from the womb. To you the voice of the Redeemer sounds a summons once more —
“ Behold, I stand at the door and knock.” O that at last you might be prevailed on to comply with the merciful terms propounded by him. Will you shut out a Saviour bringing salvation, pardon, and peace with him! Christ is thy rightful owner, and demands possession of thy soul, if thou wilt now hear his voice, thy former refusals shall never be objected. If thou still reject his gracious offers, mercy may never more be tendered to thee; there is a call of Christ which will be the last call, and after that no more. Take heed what you do; if you still demur and delay, your damnation is just, inevitable, and inexcusable.
Hear me, therefore, you unregenerated souls, in what rank or condition soever providence hath placed you in this world, whether you be rich or poor, young or old, masters or servants, whether there be any stirrings of conviction in your consciences or not. For however your conditions in this world differ from each other at present, there is one common misery hanging over you all, if you continue in that state of unbelief you are now fixed in. And 1. Hearken to the voice and call of Christ, you that are exalted by providence above your poorer neighbours; you that have your heads, hands, and hearts full of the world; men of trade and business, I have a few solemn questions to ask you this day.
(1.) You have made many gainful bargains in your time, but what will all profit you if the agreement be not made between Christ and your souls? Christ is a treasure which only can enrich you, Matthew 13:44. Thou art a poor and miserable wretch, whatever thou hast gained of this world, if thou hast not gained Christ, thou hast heaped up guilt with thy riches, which will more torment thy conscience hereafter, than thy estate can yield thee comfort here.
(2.) You have made many insurances to secure your floating estates, which you call policies; but what insurance have you made for your souls? Are not they exposed to eternal hazards? O impolitic man! to be so provident to secure trifles, and so negligent in securing the richest treasure.
(3.) You have adjusted many accounts with men, but who shall make up your accounts with God, if you be Christless? “ What shall it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his own soul.^” Say not, you have much business under your hands, and cannot allow time; you will have space enough hereafter to reflect upon your folly.
2. You that are poor, and mean in the world, what say you, will you have two hells, one here, and another hereafter? No comfort in this world, nor hope for the next? Your expectations here laid m the cUisfc, and your hopes for heaven built upon the sand? O if you were once in Christ, how happy were you, though you knew not where to fetch your next bread! “ Poor in the world, but rich in faith; and heirs of the kingdom which God hath promised.” O blessed state! If you had Christ, you had then a right to all things; you had then a father to take care for you. But to be poor and Christless, no comfort from this world, nor hopes from the next; this is to be truly miserable indeed. Your very straits and wants, should prompt you to the great duty I am now pressing on you; and methinks it should be matter of encouragement that the greatest number of Christ’s friends and followers, come out of that rank and order of men to which 3’’ou belong.
S. You that are seamen, floating so often upon the great deeps, you are reckoned a third sort of persons between the living and the dead; you belong not to the dead, because you breathe, and scarcely to the living, because you are continually so near death. What think you, friends, have you no need of a Saviour? Do you live so secure from the reach and danger of death? Have your lives been so pure, righteous, and innocent, who have been in the midst of temptations in the world abroad?
Ponder that scripture, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, “Be not deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,”’ &c. ponder it, I say, and think whether you have not as great and pressing a necessity of Jesus Christ, as any poor souls under heaven?
You have had many temporal salvations from God, great and eminent deliverances, and will these satisfy you? Is it enough that your bodies are delivered from the danger of the sea, though your souls sink, and perish in the ocean of God’s wrath for ever? If you will yet accept Christ upon his terms, all that you have done shall be forgiven. The Lord now calls to you in a still voice; if you hear his voice, well; if not, you may shortly hear his voice in the tempestuous storms without you, and a roaring conscience within you. Poor man, think what an interest in Christ will be worth, wert thou now (as shortly thou mayest be) floating upon a piece of wreck, or shivering upon a cold and desolate rock, crying, Mercy, Lord, mercy! Well, mercy is now offered thee, but in vain wilt thou expect to find it, if thou continue thus to despise and reject it.
4. You that are aged and full of days, hearken to the voice of Christ, God hath called upon you a long time: when you were young you said, it is time enough yet, we will mind these things when we are old, and come nearer to the borders of eternity. Well, now you are old, and just upon the borders of it; will you indeed mind it now. You have left the great concernments of your souls to this time, this short, very short time: and do the temptations of your youth take hold upon your age?
What I delay and put off Christ still as you were wont to do? Poor creatures, you are almost gone out of time, you have but a short time to deliberate; what you do must be done quickly, or it can never be done. Your night is even come upon you when no man can work.
5. You that are young, in the bud or flower of your time, Christ is a suitor for your first love; he desires the kindness of your youth; your spirits are vigorous, your hearts tender, your affections flowing and impressive, you are not yet entered into the incumbrances and distracting cares of the world.
Hereafter a crowd and thick succession of earthly employments and engagements will come on; sin will harden you by custom and continuance. Now is your time; you are in the convertible age; few that pass the season of youth (comparatively speaking) are brought over to Christ afterwards. It is a rarity, the wonder of an age, to hear of the conversion of aged sinners. Besides, you are the hopes of the next generation: should you be Christ-neglecting and despising souls; how bad soever the present age is, the next will be worse. Say not we have time enough before us, we will not quench the sprightly vigour of our youth in melancholy thoughts, remember there are skulls of all sizes in Golgotha; graves of all lengths in the church-yard: you may anticipate those that stand nearer the grave than you seem to do. O you cannot be happy too soon. As young as you are, did you but taste the comforts that be in Christ, nothing would grieve you more than that you knew him no sooner. Behold he standeth at thy door in the morning of thy age, knocking this day for admission into thy heart.
6. You that have had some slight, ineffectual and vanishing convictions upon you formerly; the Lord Jesus once more renews his call: Will you now at last hear his voice? It is an infinite mercy to have a second call. I doubt not but there are many among you, whilst you have sat under the word, have had such thoughts as these in your hearts, Sure my condition is not right, nor safe; there must another manner of work pass upon my soul, or I am lost for ever. External duties of religion I do perform, but I am a stranger to regeneration. Such inward convictions as these were the knocks and calls of Christ, but they passed away and were forgotten. your convictions are dead, and your hearts the more hardened; for it is in putting a soul under conviction as it is in putting iron into the fire, and quenching it again, which hardens it the more. You have been near the kingdom of God, but the more miserable for that, if you be shut out at last. The quickening of your convictions is the right way to the saving of your souls. The Lord make you this day to hear his voice.
7. Such as have come hither upon vain or vile accounts, for mere novelty or worse ends; to catch advantages, or reproach the truths of God; scoffing at the most solemn and awful voice of Christ. The word that you have slighted and reproached, the same shall judge you in that great day, except the Lord will give you repentance unto life, and make the heart tremble under it that hath scoffed at it.
“ Be not mockers, lest your bands be made strong.”
8. To conclude; let all whose hearts the Lord hath opened this day, for the enjoyments of the gospel, the blessed instrument of their salvation, bless the Lord that hath made it a key by regeneration to open the door of salvation to your souls. And as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him.