¦ ; _____ • . . C . ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦.-¦¦¦ . ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦- ¦¦-¦>'¦'¦¦¦:.- ¦ ¦ ¦'.¦•.¦¦''¦¦'.•.¦..-¦:•. YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY NICHOL'S SERIES OF STANDARD DIVINES. PUEITAN PEEIOD., THE WOEKS OF THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D. YOL. VI. COUNCIL OF PUBLICATION. W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Professor of Theology, Congregational Union, Edinburgh.. JAMES BEGG, D.D., Minister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgh. THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, University. Edinburgh. D. T. K. DRUMMOND, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh. WILLIAM H. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church History, Reformed Presbyterian. Church, Edinburgh. ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of Broughton Place United Presby terian Church, Edinburgh. ©rneral GrfcST PREFACE. The great and mysterious truth of the trinity of persons in one God, which is the foundation of our Christian faith, and which, though not contrary to our reason, is so much ahove it, that we could never have had a thought of it, if God had not revealed it to us in his word, is not a mere speculative notion, but a truth, in which the faith and practice of a Christian is con cerned ; insomuch as it is necessary that every one who is saved should believe that there are three persons, one and the same infinite, eternal God, blessed for evermore. For how can we believe that God hath chosen any of mankind, to make them unchangeably and for ever happy ; that the same God hath redeemed and doth sanctify these his elect, if we do not believe that this one and the same God is three persons, to whom these works, so necessary to our salvation, are in the holy Scriptures distinctly attributed ? How can we trust in the God of all grace, and his infinite mercies, and adore and love him for that great and indeed unspeakable love, in sending his only-begotten Son to die for us ? And how can we act faith on our blessed Redeemer, as having voluntarily come into the world to accomplish the work which his Father sent him to do, unless we have distinct thoughts of the person of the Father sending, as distinct from the person of the Son sent by him ? And these persons are equally God ; for any one inferior could no more have redeemed us than he c6uld_a^e elected or created us. But they are not so many several Gods ; therefore they are one and the same God, equal in all perfections and glory. The author hath discoursed of the work of God the Father in the second volume of his Works ; and of the work of God the Son in the third, with great clearness of light from the Scripture, and consequently with as great a strength of evidence to every spiritual mind. In the discourses of this fifth volume he as clearly and evidently describes in all its glory the work peculiar to the Spirit, in healing and restoring our depraved, wretched natures, by making them alive unto God, and sanctifying them in likeness to him. It is a work which demonstrates him to be true God, as well as the Father and Son are ; for life is that which God only can give, and a creating power is as necessary to produce a spiritual as a natural life. Nay, of the two it is more difficult * This preface to the fifth volume of Goodwin's Worts, as published by his son, is given here, as being mainly applicable to the contents of this volume.— Ed. VI (though nothing is so to God) to raise a dead soul than a dead body. It is also as much a work of God to make us partakers of the divine nature (2 Pet. i. 4), as it was to make Adam at first after his own image. That none may think these truths to be merely niceties or abstruse controversies, and an inquiry into them needless, the author hath made, through all the discourses, proper and pertinent uses, naturally flowing from the doctrines ; which may evince, that as all the truths of the gospel have in their own nature a fitness and a proper tendency to strengthen our faith, and to im prove our holiness, and to make us not only wiser but better, so God hath revealed them as needful to be known by us for these purposes. And as the gospel is peculiarly suited to raise and tune our hearts to thankful strains and cheerful praises of our Lord Jesus Christ (and in honouring him we honour the Father also), so this doctrine of the work of the Holy Spirit in our salvation, which is pure gospel too, is adapted to excite us to give that glory to him which is due ; and in honouring him, we honour both the Father and the Son. I have given on the other side of this leaf a catalogue of the MSS. in this volume, that the reader may be satisfied that he hath all which I promised in the proposals ; and also may see that I present him with several other discourses, which I did not offer in them. I am, Thine entirely in the service of the gospel, THO. GOODWIN. A CATALOGUE of the Manuscripts in the Discourse of the Work of the Holy Spirit in our Salvation, directing in what part of the volume the several MSS. are printed. 1. A general and brief scheme of the whole work committed to the Holy Spirit in bringing us to salvation, in an enumeration of all particulars, and what is the glory due to him for it, is contained in Book I., Chap. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. P 2. Of the gift of the Holy Ghost to us.— How he is at first given to the elect when called, and what is his indwelling within us for ever Chap. 8, 9, 10.. 3. How the work of regeneration, or the first application of salvation to us, is in a peculiar manner attributed to the Holy Ghost. Chap. 7. 4. That there are two states and conditions God carries the elect through— 1. The state of nature. 2. The state of grace.— And how the new birth is the passage between these two states, from which the neces sity of regeneration is demonstrated. Book IL, Chap. 1, 2, 3. 5. That God, for holy and just ends, permits the generality of his elect that live to riper years, to abide some time in that estate of nature, and then renews and turns them. Chap. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. A CATALOGUE, &C. vii 6. The necessity of regeneration demonstrated by arguments drawn from the nature of reconciliation with God. — That all which God and Christ have done towards their reconciliation to us, will not benefit us unless we be reconciled to God. — This work of regeneration set forth under the notion of reconciliation to God, and some differences of a counterfeit work and a saving work discovered thereby, with an exhortation to be reconciled to God. Book HI. throughout. 7. The necessity of the new birth, and some brief explication of the nature of the thing begotten in it, as the similitude of begetting again imports. Book IV., Chap. 1. 8. The eminency of mercy and grace discovered in this work, compara tively with other works wrought in us. Book IX., Chap. 1, 2, 3. 9. The divine power put forth by God in a saving work of regeneration. Chap. 4, 5. 10. Of the new creature, or the thing begotten in us by the Spirit ; that beside his indwelling in us, and his acting of our spirits, there are permanent or abiding principles inwrought in the soul ; that is, spiritual habiliments, or dispositions so to act. Book V., Chap. 1, 2. 11. The nature or kind of the thing begotten in us, as it is set forth under the notion of Spirit ; that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit, John iii. 6. Book IV., Chap. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 12. That this new creature is a change of the heart. Book V., Chap. 4. 13. That it is a different and higher principle than natural conscience, in its greatest elevation of light. Book VE. throughout. 14. That this new creature is peculiar only to the elect, and is a thing specially different from the common work of the Spirit in temporaries. Book VI., Chap 13, and Book VH. throughout. 15. That the virtual cause of regeneration, is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Book IX., Chap. 6. IG. Of the three parts of regeneration, and the new creature. 1. Humilia tion for sin, and the necessity thereof. 2. Faith in Christ for justi fication. 3. Turning from sin unto God. Book VIII. throughout. 17. The nature and way of conversion illustrated from an instance of what it was in Job's time, Job xxxiii., and in the instance of Paul's con version. Chap. 3. 18. Of one eminent disposition of a man born again, which is to desire and endeavour to convert others to God. Book X., Chap. 7. 19. Of the distinguishing character of this new creature, or of a man born again : which is for a man to make God his chiefest good, and God's glory his utmost end. Chap. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. CONTENTS, THE WOEK OF THE HOLT GHOST IN OUE SALVATION. BOOK I. Page A general and brief scheme of the whole of the work committed to the Holy Spirit in bringing us to salvation, in an enume ration of all particulars, and of the glory due unto him for it. The work of the Holy Spirit in the unction of Jesus to be our Saviour ...... 5 Chapteb I. ...... 3 ' Some general observations premised out of John xiv., xv., xvi. Chapter II. ...... . 7 Some further observations touching the coming of the Holy Ghost. His signal coming at Pentecost. The great change made in the world thereby. ¦ Chapter _I. ....... 10 Of the works of the Holy Ghost upon Christ our Saviour. Chapter IV.. ........ 13 His operations upon the church, and that, first, as collec- tively taken. Chapter V. ...... . 16 His operations in every part and member of the church. Chapter VI. ' . . . . . . 39 The uses of the precedent doctrine. . Chapter VII. . ... . . . 47 The Holy Ghost the author of regeneration, or the first ap plications of salvation to us. Chapter VIII. ...... 51 The Holy Ghost the gift of God the Father to us, in and by Jesus Christ. This inestimable gift bestowed freely by the pure mercy, grace, and love of God. CONTENTS. Chapter IX. ... . . , PAgg We not only partake of the effects of the Holy Spirit's ope rations in us, but also of his person dwelling in us. Chapter X. The uses of the foregoing doctrine. 67 BOOK II. That there are two states or conditions through which God carries - the elect: the state of nature, and the state of grace. That the new birth is the passage between them, which evidenc- eth the necessity of the new birth, or regeneration. The reasons why God hath so ordered it, that the generality of the elect, who live to riper years, should for some time re main in that state of nature before he renews them. The uses of the doctrine, . . . 73 Chapter I. yg The words of the text, Tit. iii. 4-7, explained ; the elect in a state of sin and wrath before they are brought into a state of grace. Chapter H. . . . . . 73 By the new birth, an elect soul is translated from a state of sin and wrath into a state of grace. — Whether^we are re generated or no. The state ,of the unregenerate alterable. Chapter HI. ....... 85 All God's elect do not, before their regeneration, remain in that state of sin and wrath. Chapter IV. ....... 88 Reasons why God suffers his elect, grown unto riper years, to continue for some time in a state of sin. Chapter V. . ... . . . . 95 The same continued. Chapter VI. ....... 101 The uses of the foregoing doctrine. Chapter VII. . . . . . . 109 The same continued. Chapter VIII. ...... Ill The same continued. BOOK III. The necessity of regeneration demonstrated by this argument, that all that God and Christ have done towards their recon ciliation to us will profit us nothing, unless we be reconciled to God. And how conversion is set forth under the notion of reconciliation as on our part, . . , . 117 X contents. Pagh Chapter I. . . . . . • - H7 Reconciliation to God necessary if ever we be saved ; proved from God's design in his reconciliation to us, to glorify his holiness, &c. Chapter II. . . . . • : . . " ^® Evinced from Christ's design in his work of reconciliation. Chapter III. . . . . . .125 Necessary for us to be convinced that we are enemies to God ; that our estate is dangerous ; that yet God is appeasable ; that there is a Mediator by whom the soul may come to God ; that we must also seek God and his favour in Christ ; and seek him with confession of, and mourning for, sin. Chapter IV. . ... . . .129 Wherein our reconciliation to God consists. Chapter V. . . . . . . . 140 The application or uses of the foregoing doctrine. BOOK IV. Of the work which the Holy Spirit effecteth in us, as it is ex pressed under the notion of our being begotten unto God, and of a new birth, from which the necessity of regeneration is further demonstrated. Of the nature of the thing begotten in us, as it is set forth under the notion of Spirit, John iii. 6, 151 Chapter I. . . . . . . . 151 The necessity of the new birth demonstrated, and the nature of it described, from the notion of our being begotten unto God, 1 Peter i. 3-5. Chapter II. . . . . . . . 158 Exposition of John iii. 5. Chapter IH. ....... 162 The. same continued. Chapter IV. . . . . . . . 164 What it is to have the heart elevated, and suited to all things spiritual, as spiritual. Chapter V. . . . . . . . 167 Suitableness of the mind to spiritual things, the great dis tinguishing character of one that is born of the Spirit, John iii. 5, from others who are not so. Chapter VI. ....... 174 How we may discern, value, and love spiritual things, purely as spiritual, and yet view them as blessings to us ; and regard and affect our own interest and benefit in them. Chapter VII. ...... 178 The blessings which we have by Christ purely spiritual ; how a spiritual heart considers and affects them in their pure spirituality. contents. xi Page Chapter VIII. ...... 183 How a spiritual heart is affected to inherent graces and holy duties. BOOK V. Of the work of the Holy Ghost in us, as it is represented to us under the notion of a new creature. That besides the Holy Spirit's indwelling in us, and his motions and actings of our spirits, there are permanent or abiding principles wrought in our souls, which dispose them for holy actions, and give spiritual abilities for the performance of them. That this new creature is a change of the heart. That it is a con formity to the image of our Lord Jesus Christ, . . 187 Chapter I. . . . . . • • 187 Exciting and moving grace not all that the Spirit doth for us to enable us to the performance of holy actions. Works of grace inherent. Opinions of the popish doctors, of the Anninians, and of some enthusiastics, considered. Chapter II. . . . . ¦ • 191 The Holy Ghost, when he makes us new creatures, works in us fixed and abiding principles of a spiritual life. Chapter III. . ... . . .201 The same continued. Chapter IV. . . . • .203 Necessary, and congruous to the nature of things, that such inward permanent principles should be wrought in us by the Holy Ghost. Chapter V. . . • • • . . • • 211 The new creature wrought in us by the Spirit of God, a change of heart. Chapter VI. . • • ¦. ¦ 217 The new creature in us a conformity to the image of Christ. BOOK VI. That the work of grace wrought in us by the Spirit of God in " regeneration, is a different and higher principle than natural conscience in its greatest elevation of light. The deficiency of natural conscience shewed, and the mistakes of men about it detected, . Chapter I. . • • • • All men under a covenant of works, or a covenant ol grace. Two principles of actions, Rom ii. 14, 15 and Jer. xxxi. 31-33 explained. The principle by which the law of God reigns over men is conscience. Notions of the philoso phers among the heathens. 231 231 o xii contents. Page Chapter II. . . . . . . . 238 Natural light of conscience in unregenerate! men hath a great influence on their actions. Chapter III. . ..... 245 Men are apt to regard the natural light of conscience, and the influence of it, to be the effects of true grace. Chapter IV. . . .... 252 Wherein natural conscience falls short of true grace. Chapter V. . . . . . . < 262 What goodness, and of what kind, is to be acknowledged to be in this light from God vouchsafed to natural conscience. Chapter VI. . . .... 268 What is necessary to make conscience a good and holy con science. Chapter VII. . ..... 278 Natural conscience deficient in that which is necessary to make it really holy. Chapter VEIL ...... 283 Grounds of the mistake in judging the acting of natural con science to be the workings of a principle of true grace. Chapter IX. ..... 289 Natural conscience may approve of the law, and command the duties enjoined. Chapter X. . . . . . . . 296 Though natural conscience may prevail with men to do the duties required, yet not for conscience sake,. in the sense which the Scripture gives. Chapter XI. ....... 301 Another deficiency in natural conscience. Chapter XII. ...... 304 The deficiency of natural conscience in another of its effects. Chapter XIII. ...... 319 The highest degree to which a temporary believer can pos sibly attain falls short of that saving work wrought in a sincere believer. BOOK VII. Of the difference of the works on temporary believers, and those truly called, and that they differ in their nature and kind, . 324 Chapter I. . . . . . _ 324 Distinction between temporary professors and those truly called. Chapter II. . Usefulness of this doctrine concerning temporary believers to many holy ends and purposes. 826 contents. xiii Pagb Chapter III. . ..... 335 A genuine saving work of grace specifically distinct from that which is in a temporary believer. Chapter IV. . ."'.,.. 345 The same continued. BOOK VIII. That there are three parts of our regeneration. 1. Humiliation for sin, and the necessity thereof in order to faith. 2. Faith in Christ for justification. 3. Turning from sin unto God, or holiness of heart and life, proved from the work which our Lord Jesus Christ ascribes to the Holy Ghost, John xvi. 7-11, from the instances of conversion in the time when Job lived, and of the conversion of the apostle Paul. Of the subservience of humiliation unto faith. Objections answered. Of our turning from sin unto' God, or of holi ness in heart and life, ..... 359 Chapter I. . . . . . . . 359 Conviction of sin, humiliation for it, faith in Jesus Christ, sanctification, or amendment of heart and Hfe, the parts of our conversion to God, John xvL 7-11. Chapter H. . . . . . . . 361 To convince us of sin, and to humble us in the sense of it, is the work of the Holy Ghost in converting us to God. Chapter HI. ...... 366 Instances of conversion in the time of Joh. Instance of the apostle Paul's conversion. . Chapter IV. . . . . .382 Use and subservience of conviction of sin, and humiliation for it, to induce the soul to believe on Jesus Christ for salvation. Chapter V. . . . . . . . 385 Answers to several objections made against the usefulness of conviction and humiliation. Chapter VI. ...... 389 Of the last part of our conversion, which is our turning from our evil thoughts and ways unto God. BOOK IX. Of the eminency of mercy and grace discovered in this work of regeneration, comparatively with other works wrought in us. Of the greatness of the power which God manifests in regenerating us. Of the influence which Christ's resurrec tion hath on our regeneration, .... 405 Chapter I. . . . • ¦ • • 405 The eminent mercy of God towards us in our regeneration. Chapter II. . . . ¦ • • • 41° The same continued. xiv contents. Paotc Chapter HI. ...... 416 The same continued. Chapter IV. . . . • . _ . 425 An exceeding greatness of God's power apparent in our regeneration. Chapter V. . . . • • • ¦ 443 The same continued. Chapter VI. ...... 455 The virtual cause of regeneration is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. BOOK X. Of the two essential properties of inherent holiness and sanctifica tion. That a regenerate man makes God his chiefest good. That he also sets up God and his glory as his chiefest end. A trial of difference between a regenerate and unregenerate man herein. That there is also an eminent disposition in the new'creature, inclining a regenerate man, earnestly to desire and endeavour to convert others to God, . . 459 Chapter I. . . . . . . . 459 Every man hath something which he makes his chiefest good. Two chief treasuries in which the good things of men are laid, viz., heaven and earth. Chapter II. ...... 464 In what things we take most pleasure and delight. Chapter III. ...... 470 By what things the comfort of our lives is principally main tained and upheld. Chapter IV. ...... 475 What are the things which we value as our dearest treasures. Chapter V. . . . . . . . 489 The account upon what it is that we most value ourselves, and other men. Chapter VI. ...... 497 How the new creature makes God and his glory its utmost end. Chapter VH. ...... 509 One eminent disposition immediately flowing from the new creature, is a desire to convert, ajad beget others, to God. OF THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST (the third person op the trinity) IN OUR SALVATION VOL VI. OF THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST IN OITR SALVATION. BOOK I. A general and brief scheme of the whole of that work committed to the Holy Spirit in bringing us to salvation ; in an enumeration of all particulars, and of the glory due unto him for it. — The work of the Holy Spirit in the unction of Jesus to he our Saviour. CHAPTER I. Some general observations premised out of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth chapters qf St John's Gospel. There is a general omission in the saints of God, in their not giving the Holy Ghost that glory that is due to his person, and for his great work of salvation in us, insomuch that we have in our hearts almost lost this third person. We give daily in our thoughts, prayers, affections, and speeches, an honour to the Father and the Son ; but who almost directs the aims of his praise (more than in that general way of doxology we use to close our prayers with, ' All glory be,' &c.) unto God the Holy Ghost ? He is a person in the Godhead equal with the Father and the Son ; and the work he doth for us in its kind is as great as those of the Father or the Son. Therefore, by the equity of all law, a proportionable honour from us is due to him. God's ordination amongst men is, that we should ' render to all their due, honour to whom honour is due,' Rom. xiii. 1. To the magis tracy (which there he speaks it of) according to their place and dignity ; and this he. makes a debt, a due, ver. 8. And the like is enjoined con cerning ministers, that are instruments of our spiritual good, that we should ' esteem them very highly for their work's sake,' 1 Thes. v. 13. Let the same law, I beseech you, take place in your hearts towards the Holy Ghost, as well as the other two persons of the Trinity. The Holy Ghost is indeed the last in order of the persons, as proceeding from the other two, yet in the participation of the Godhead he is equal with them both ; and in his work, though it be last done for us, he is not behind them, nor in the work of the holy ghost [Book I. the glory of it inferior to what they have in theirs. And indeed he would not be God, equal with the Father and the Son, if the work allotted to him, to shew he is God, were not equal' unto each of theirs. And indeed, no less than all that is done, or to be done in us, was left to the Holy Ghost's share, for the ultimate execution of it ; and it was not left him as the re fuse, it being as necessary and as great as any of theirs. But he being the last person, took his own lot of the works about our salvation, which are the last, which is to apply all, and to make all actually ours, whatever the other two had done afore for us. The scope of this treatise is to set forth this work to you in the amplitude of it, to the end you may accordingly in your hearts honour this blessed and holy Spirit. And surely if to neglect the notice and observation of an attribute of God, eminently imprinted on such or such a work of God's, as of power in the creation, justice in governing the world, mercy in bearing with sinners, grace in our salvation ; if this be made so great a sin (Rom. i.) then it must be deemed a greater diminution to the Godhead to neglect the glorifying one of these persons, who is pos sessed of the whole Godhead and attributes, when he is manifested or in terested in any work most gloriously. In prosecution of my design, to persuade you to honour the Holy Ghost as you do the Father and the Son, I shall consider the 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters of John, and make some general observations upon various passages in those chapters serving to this purpose ; and we shall see therein ' what a valuation the Father and the Son, the other persons with him, have in those chapters put upon him and his work, and what a great and singular matter they make of his work, and what divine esteem of hisi person, as by Christ's speeches scattered up and down therein appears. Though the Father himself doth not immediately speak, yet the Son doth in his name, as well as in his own. And you may well take their judgments, for they are sharers and co-rivals with him in point of glory about our salvation ; the work of which I shall only treat of. There are these general observations which I shall make upon the whole series of the aforesaid chapters, which serve the design of my discourse. Obs. 1. First, Our Saviour had abundantly in all his former sermons discoursed both his work and hand in our salvation, as also his Father's ; and now at last, just when he was to go out of the world, he then, and not till then, doth more plainly and more fully discover to them this third per son, that had an after- work left to him, who to that end was to come when he should be gone, and was to come visibly upon the stage, to act visibly a new scene of works, left by the Father and himself unto him : John xiv. 16, * I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter.' He had said, chap. viii. 17, that ' the testimony of two men' (or persons) ' is true ; ' and that he himself was one witness of those two there spoken of, and his Father another : ver. 18, ' I am one that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me.' And he tells iys here, you see, that there is yet another, distinct from the Father and himself ;,for in his saying, ' I will pray the Father to give you another Comforter,' he must mean a third person, distinct from them both, to be that other. And more over this Spirit, as another person, is said likewise to be a third witness of, and unto Christ ; John xv. 26, and so is to be joined as a person, and third witness with these two : ' When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me ; ' like as of the Father and himself, the same had been spoken in that chap. viii. ver. 18, last cited. And the Chap. I.] in our salvation. 5 coherence with ver. 17 argues their being witnesses alike, to be distinct persons each from other, for, ver. 17, he allegeth the law, < It is written in your law, that the testimony of two men is true.' For therein lies the validity of their testimony, that they must be two men or two persons that make up a legal testimony. And in this 15th chap. ver. 26, there is the Holy Ghost as a third witness brought into court to testify with both ; and therefore he is a person if a witness, for there are three persons if three witnesses, and the law itself he cites says, < Under the mouth of two or three witnesses shall the matter be established,' Deut. xix. 15, and Matt. xviii. 16. We may also observe how industriously careful Christ is further to characterise this person of the Holy Spirit, the author of these works, and to describe who he was, and what manner of person, that they might be sure to mind him, and have a regard to him, and to know whom and to what name they were to be so much beholden. Thus, ver. 26, ' The Com forter, which is the Holy Ghost' (says he) ; and ver. 17, ' Even the Spirit of truth ; ' and chap. xv. 26, ' Whom.I will send unto you from the Father, who proceedeth from the Father.' Which last addition is to shew the divine procession of the Holy Ghost, and the original and the consubstan- tiality of his person, to be out of the substance of the Father, proceed ing from him ; as (1 Cor. ii. 12) the apostle signaliseth him, ' The Spirit that is out of God ; ' or (which is all one) that hath his subsistence, or his being a person, by proceeding from God the Father, and so being God with God, insomuch as it is not in anywise to be understood that he subsisted extra Deum, out of, or separate from God ; for he had said, ver. 11, that he is in God, even as the spirit of a man is said to be in him. Some would understand that speech of Christ's, ' Who proceedeth from the Father,' to be meant in respect of God's sending him forth to us, and his embassage to us. But that had been said by Christ in the words afore, ' Whom I will send from the Father ;' and therefore to intend the words after — ' Who cometh from the Father' — of an ambassador's sending, had been needless, for Christ had said that already ; and therefore if that had been all the meaning of that addition, he had but said the same over a second time. There is therefore, in those speeches, a manifest distinguishing be tween that dispensatory sending of him from the Father to them, and that substantial proceeding of his from the Father, as a third person ; and this is added to shew the original ground, why it must be from the Father that he sends him, and with his consent first had ; because his very person is by proceeding from the Father, and therefore this his office too. And there fore that latter is spoken in the present time, whereas that other speech of Christ's, ' Whom I will send from the Father,' is in the future ; because the Holy Ghost his dispensatory sending, both from the Father and from Christ, was yet to come ; whereas this personal proceeding of his from the Father was then, when he spake it, and is continually, and had been from eternity. Now the tendency of these reiterated designations of the person, doth manifest Christ's sedulous intention, and tender regard to, and for the honour of this, so great a person ; and to raise up in their hearts a valua tion of this person himself, that should be the Comforter ; and to make them careful to give glory to him, even the Holy Ghost, as a third person, and the Comforter. As likewise to assure them of his coming upon them, when himself was gone ; and that therefore they might honour him in his coming, for his work, as he would have them to honour himself for his own work, and coming in the flesh. It is as if he had said, I would not, for that honour I ever look for from yourselves, that you should so attribute THE work of the holy ghost [Book I. the comfort you shall have, or the revealing of truth to you (from which he is called ' the Spirit of truth'), so unto me or my Father alone, as to neglect or omit to give him his peculiar honour in it ; for it properly, and of due, belongs to him. You are and shall be beholden to me and my Father, for the sending of him ; but you are to be especially beholden to himself, for that work he doth in you, being sent by us. Be sure therefore to take notice of him and his person, distinct both from me and my Father. For it is ' another Comforter' (says he, ver. 16) ' which is the Holy Ghost,' (ver. 26), and therefore you ought as distinctly to glorify him as you would do us. Obs. 2. The second observation is concerning the particular works which Christ says are his, and for which we are to honour him. And an enumera tion of his works being the scope of this my discourse, we may find divers particulars that are the most eminent of them, named and specified in these chapters to our hand, which will sufficiently serve for me to take the men tion of them, for an example to me to proceed to specify other works that are attributed to him elsewhere. This I premise, because I would not be obliged to fetch each of them which I shall after name out of these chapters, and so to confine myself thereto. The particular eminent work indeed on which he insists in these chapters, is, that of being a Comforter to them ; for the occasion of these sermons was to relieve and pacify the apostles' minds, against his own leaving them, as they thought, desolate. But therewith he further brings in other works of his besides, and in effect that he should do all, that- they had need of his help in. He insinuates to them how much already themselves had been obliged unto him for his working hitherto in them, which he calls them to look back upon, for they had received them already in regenerating, con- ; verting and calling them out from the world (which was his first and great < work in them), and so distinguished them from the world.- Thus chap, j xiv. 16, 17, ' The Comforter, the Spirit of truth ; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him ;' that is, knows him not by experience of any saving work upon them, and so they cannot receive him as a comforter, because it is necessary they first receive him as a converter. ' But ye know him,' and have found him to have begotten you again ; ' for he dwelleth in you,' hath come and taken possession of you, and acted hitherto in you all that spiritual good that hath been found in you, and thereby hath taken everlasting possession of you, as it follows : ' and shall be in you,' to perfect all that is wanting, and that for ever, as verse 16. A second work there specified is, that he should be to them a ' Spirit of truth,' ' to lead them into all truth,' which, as a sacred depositum, he was by them, as apostles, to leave unto the rest of the world ; chap. xiv. 26, ' He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.' And not only so, but shall suggest new to you, chap. xvi. 12, 13, ' I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he shall not speak of himself ; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak.' A third work instanced in is, that ' He will shew you things -to come ;' and this to that end, that ye may teach and write them to others, chap. xv. 26, 27. He shall bear witness of me, and you shall bear witness of me. A fourth work specified is, to sanctify them against sin and corruption. This work is imported in his name, ' the Holy Spirit,' as the other, of lead ing them into all truth, is signified by that other title, ' the Spirit of truth ;' Chap. H.] in our salvation. 7 for he is termed the Holy Spirit, because he sanctifies : Rom. xv. 16, ' Being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.' Fifthly, He shall be a Comforter to you, against all sorrows, chap. xiv. 16, 17, 18. Sixthly, He shall assist and° direct you in all your prayers, and be the inditer of them for you ; and so effectually as to obtain what you shall ask, chap. xvi. 23, ' Verily, verily, whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you ; hitherto have you asked nothing in my name ;' for the Holy Ghost was not as yet given, as he in these chapters promiseth he should be. ' But in that day,' namely, when the Holy Ghost is come, ' ye shall ask in my name,' then (as in chap. xiv. 20). 'In that day,' — namely, when the Comforter is come, that word in that day refers there unto — ' ye shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me.' These works he specifies as to themselves. But withal, seventhly, he mentions his works upon the world, by their ministry, unto whom they were sent. He shall be a converter and con- vincer of the world ; that is, the glory of the conversion of the Gentiles is reserved for him, by your ministry : chap. xvi. verses 8, 9, ' When he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judg ment : of sin, because they believe not on me,' &c. To which three enumerations the total of the work of conversion is reduced, of which afterwards. Obs. 3. Thirdly, observe what Christ says, I myself must be gone (saith he) and disappear, to the end it may appear that all this whole work is his, not mine : ver. 7, ' If I go not away, the Comforter will not come.' He will not do these works while I am here, and I have committed all to him. That look, as my Father hath visibly ' committed all judgment unto me,' (John v. 22, 23, ' For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son ; that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father '), so here : I and my Father will send him, having com mitted all these things to him, that all men might honour the Holy Ghost, even as they honour the Father and the Son. Even as in like manner the reason why the Spirit was not sent, whilst Christ was on earth, was to shew that not the Father alone sent him, but that he came from Christ, aa well as from the Father. And so Christ, he went to heaven to shew that both Father and Son would send the Holy Ghost from thence, Acts ii. 32, 33, ' This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. There fore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this which you see and hear.' Thus wary and careful are every of the persons to provide for the honour of each other in our hearts. And as careful should we be to give it to them accordingly. CHAPTER II. Some further observations touching the coming of the Holy Ghost. — That he had a signal coming designed to him for his glory at the feast of Pentecost, as Christ had a visible coming in the flesh. — The great change made in the world thereby. Add to these observations out of those chapters, these also that follow, concerning this his coming promised in those chapters, but observed out of other scriptures. 8 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. -1. That a signal coming should be appointed to him, to the performance of his work, as well as unto Christ to perform his. This coming of his you have inculcated again and again in these chapters, in these words, 'When he is come,' and the like. Which imported that, although he was given to work regeneration in men afore, even under the Old Testament (as Neh. ix. 20, ' He gave them his good Spirit,' and many other places, shew), that yet to let all the world of believers take notice his coming, and his work, he must have a coming in state, in a solemn and visible manner, accom panied with visible effects, as well as Christ had, and whereof all the Jews should be, and were witnesses (thus Acts, chaps, ii. iv.), and it was also apparent throughout the primitive times, in outward signs and miracles, extraordinary gifts and conversions. And as Christ, though he was under the Old Testament present with that church and with the fathers — Acts vii. 37, 38, ' This is he that was in the church in the wilderness, with the angel which spake to Moses in the mount Sinai, and with our fathers' — yet had a visible coming in flesh to manifest his person ; that it was he who : had done all those works then, and came now to work more, and far greater works : so there was a visible coming of the Holy Ghost, both in the appear ance of him as a dove, descending on Christ at first, and afterwards in the resemblance of cloven tongues. And there was not a personal union of the Holy Ghost with that dove and those tongues, as in Christ's manifestation in the flesh there was between the eternal Son of God and human nature. Yet these'appearances of the Holy Ghost are to be understood by us as visible outward representa tions and discoveries of him to be the third person ; and that it had been he who was the author of all the whole work of application in the saints then under the Old Testanient ; as well as now of regeneration and sancti- 3 fication, and of comforting ; and that he had been indwelling in all saints afore this his conring, as well as after. And this his coming was as clearly prophesied of, and solemn promise made thereof, under the Old Testament, as there was of Christ's coming in the flesh. Which did so much heighten and raise up the expectations of all believers then about him ; as that upon which, and whereby, so great a change should be made in the church and world in the last days. This the apostle Peter commemorates and applies upon the Spirit's visible coming upon himself and the rest of his fellows : Acts ii. 16-18, ' This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel ; It shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh : and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams : and on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit ; and they shall prophesy ;' and so on. Yea, this coming of the Spirit I may farther call the great promise of the New Testament. For as Christ's coming was the great promise of the Old Testament, so the sending of the Spirit is entitled the 'promise of the Father' in the New : Luke xxiv. 49, ' And behold I send the promise! of my Father upon you.' And he is so styled, not only in that he had been promised in the Old Testament by the prophets (as in that of Joel ii. 28, 29, now cited), and in multitude of other prophecies of old ; but because that Christ himself did now de novo (as it were) pro mulge it as his promise, and the Father's ; and that upon this authority, that this Spirit proceeded from him, as well as from the Father, and that he was first to receive him from* us, and then shed him forth on us Acts * Qu. 'for'?— Ed. Chap. H.J in our salvation. 9 ii. 33, that so it might be made good, that ' all the promises are yea and amen in him ;' seeing this promise of the Spirit is given upon Christ's account, as he is the Son (according to that, ' God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts,' Gal. iii. 13, 14 compared), and also because now under the New Testament this promise was to be fulfilled in such a manner and measure as was never under the Old ; and so it becomes a pro mise proper to the New, that next great promise, which was to succeed that of Christ himself, the promise of promises ; the sole great promise now left to be given. God the Father had but two grand gifts to bestow ; and when once they should be given out of him, he had left them nothing that was great (comparatively) to give, for they contained all good in them ; and these two gifts were his Son, who was his promise in the Old Testa ment, and his Spirit, the promise of the New. And the Father doth honour himself to us by this title, that he is the promiser and giver of the Spirit ; and Christ himself, now when he is come, takes the honour too of that, to make, the sending of the Spirit his promise also, in saying, ' Behold I send him :' Luke xxiv. 49, and John xiv. 26, ' Whom my Father will send in my name.' And it is evident that our Saviour, in calling him ' the promise of the Father,' which was spoken by him after his resurrection, Luke xxiv. 49, doth refer to his own words and sermons uttered afore his resurrection, in 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters of John, rather than to the prophets primarily in his intention : Acts i. 4, ' Wait for the promise of the Father, which ye have heard of me.' Again, Christ had John the Baptist, who ' began the gospel,' to foretell his manifestation in the flesh, and to prepare the way for this Lord. And besides him, his angels did it. But the Holy Ghost hath Christ himself to foretell his coming upon flesh : and that to prepare the hearts of men for him whenever he should come. And, lastly, on purpose to honour his visible coming, he had answerably an extraordinary work left to him, upon that his visible coming : the conversion of the whole Gentile world ; and the raising and building of the churches of the New Testament was reserved of his glory. To believe in the Holy Ghost, and the holy catholic church, you know how near they stand together in the Creed. His visible coming at Pentecost was the visible consecration and dedication of that great temple, the mystical body of Christ, to be reared under the gospel (the several members of which body are called ' temples of the Holy Ghost,'* 1 Cor. iii. 16), as that appearance at Christ's baptism was the consecration of the head. Of this work of the Spirit, that of the psalmist, though spoken literally of the first creation, may yet be used in allusion, and is mystically applied by some of the fathers there unto : Ps. civ. 30, ' Thou sendest forth thy Spirit, they are created ; thou rene'west the face of the earth.' The whole earth was decked and adorned with a new array, when the Spirit of God moved upon that chaos ; and the whole face of the world was in that age of the gospel's promulgation no other than a chaos, void, and without all form ; ' all nations had walked in their own ways :' but the Spirit was sent forth, and lo this barren wil derness became a fruitful field all the world over. The feast of Pentecost was under the old law the feast of the first fruits, Lev. xxiii. 10. Thus it was in the type, and the apostles on that day re ceived for the church of the New Testament ' the first fruits of the Spirit,' Rom. viii. 23. And the sickle was then first put in, in the conversion of the three thousand out of all nations (whether Jews or Gentiles, or mixed * Te are the temples of the Holy Ghost. 10 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. with both) ; so to begin that great harvest, whereof these were the first fruits or seeds which consecrated the rest (as the first fruits did under the law) in after ages to come, as Christ told them that their fruit should re main, John xv. 16. And this coming of the Holy Ghost then, and converting such as were inhabitants out of all nations, was by Christ designed to be for the handsel of the conversion of all nations : Acts i. 8, ' Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you ; and ye shall be wit nesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth ;' charging them to stay at Jerusalem, and not to stir one foot out from thence, but ' wait first for the promise of the Father,' ver. .4. For it would have been a vain attempt to have endea voured to convert the world until the Holy Ghost had come upon them ; and hence it was that this his visible coming was reckoned by the chief apostle the first era, the beginning of the gospel, as the beginning of the creation described by Moses is of the world : Acts xi. 15, ' The Holy Ghost fell upon them Gentiles, as upon us at the beginning,' which refers to that at Pentecost. And this yet further answers the type, for the first giving of the law by Moses was on that day, the day of Pentecost ; and so this coming of the Spirit that day was justly reckoned the beginning of the gospel, although the account of the Christian world begins with the nativity of Christ. But the full revelation of the gospel and the mysteries thereof, and the conversion of the world of the Gentiles, this was ordained for the Spirit's glory, and reserved for his coming, John xvi. ; which conversion of the world is magnified as an after-sacrifice, as the saints' sufferings after Christ are styled the after-sufferings of Christ, Col. i., presented unto God by the Holy Ghost ; Christ offered up himself as that alone meritorious sacrifice, but this of the Gentiles did come after, a sacrifice sanctified by the Holy Ghost. The grace vouchsafed to the apostle for his poor instru- mentalness therein, he owns, whilst he yet gives the glory of it to the Holy Ghost ; which you may find in Rom. xv. 15, 16, ' To me this grace was given, that I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.' The Gentiles, you know, before had ever been esteemed unclean, and upon that account unmeet to be an offering unto God, as the law shews ; which that vision of all sorts of unclean beasts made to Peter in the sheet (Acts x.), and the comment thereupon which he makes that the Gentiles were meant, doth shew. But these were all purified by the Holy Ghost's converting of them, that thereby all difference was taken away ; and so much as those that were not to be conversed with by a Jew, were now offered up as a sacrifice to God. Thus Acts xv. 8, 9, ' God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did us ; and put no differ ence between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.' Thus much for some general observations premised. CHAPTER III. Of the works of the Holy Ghost upon Christ our Saviour. The summing up of the works of the Holy Spirit, and laying them alto gether in one heap, that we find scattered up and down in the Scriptures would, if we were able to recollect them all, and every particular, arise to a Chap. HI.] in our salvation. 11 very great bulk. I shall reduce them which I have gleaned as most eminent nnto these three heads, I. What work and use he is, and was of, to Christ our head. II. What to the church, taken collectively. III. What to every saint. And in the filling up of these, I shall not mention anything that may by consequence be argued his, but what the Scriptures do expressly attribute to him. I. I shall first describe his operations upon Christ our head. 1. It was the Holy Ghost that formed his human nature in the womb : Mat. i. 18, it is said that Mary ' was found with child of the Holy Ghost ' ; and ver. 20, ' That which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.' So then he made the man Jesus, both body and soul. 2. Some divines do further ascribe unto this Spirit the special honour of tying that marriage knot, or union, between the Son of God and that man Jesus, whom the Holy Ghost formed in the virgin's womb. Now if their meaning be that he, in common with the Father and the Son, did join in that great action, I grant it, according to the measure of that general rule, that opera ad extra sunt indivisa, all works outward, or that are wrought not within the Godhead itself (which admit some exception), all the three persons had a joint common hand in. But that which is my proper subject, is, what special honour in those works doth by way of eminency belong to the Holy Ghost in any of these works. And so considered, I have not found a ground why to attribute the personal union more particularly to the Holy Ghost ; but rather (according unto what occurs to my observation in the Scriptures, and to consonant reason), that action is more peculiarly to be attributed to the Son himself, as second person, who took up into one person with himself that human nature. The Father indeed sent the Son into the world, to take flesh ; and the Holy Ghost formed that flesh he assumed ; but it was the Son's special act to take it up into himself, and to assume it. So the apostle tells us, Heb. ii. 16, ' He took on him* the seed of Abraham ;' or he took to himself, assumpsit ad, which word denotes the very act of that union. And it was his own single act, and in reason it must have been so ; for it was an act of a person knowing, and actually in telligent in what he did, when it was done by him. And that thing he did was a taking to himself a foreign nature, to be one person with himself; as a person affording his own subsistence unto that nature, to be a person with himself. Himself must communicate that personality, and none other for him, for it is properly his own to bestow ; unto which that in chap. x. accords, ' When he comes into the world, he says, A hody hast thou pre pared me,' speaking to his Father, who prepared that body by the Holy Ghost ; and it was his Father's ordination he should take it ; but he, as a person existing afore he took it, as coming into the world by assuming it, says, ' Lo, I come to do thy will, 0 God,' as ver. 7 it is more expressly added. Rut, 3. It was the Holy Ghost had the honour of the consecration of him to be the Christ, and that by anointing him ' without'' or ' above measure,' as John the Baptist witnessed, John iii. 34. It was with power and all grace that he was anointed : Isa. xi. 2, ' The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, and the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counse and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.' What is Messiah, or Xgiarbg, but the Most Holy One anointed ? Dan. ix. Now, with * '~E'r,i'kup.l3a'virai. 12 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. what oil was Jesus anointed, and so made Christ ? Acts x. 38, ' God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost.' The Holy Ghost is that oil he is anointed with above his fellows ; and he hath his name of Christ, which is the chief name of his person, from the Holy Ghost, as lie hath that of Jesus for saving us, which is his work. Christ, the anointed, is the name that speaks all his offices. Kings, priests, and prophets, who were only his shadows, were anointed. And it is made the true, proper sign and token of his person's being the Son of God, that the Holy Ghost came visibly on him, and abode upon him : John i. 32-34, ' And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him. And I knew him not : but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw, and bare record, that this is the Son of God ; ' with which compare John vii. 38, 39, ' He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive : for the Holy Ghost was not yet given ; because that Jesus was not yet glorified);' whereupon, ver. 40, 41, 'Many of the people, when they heard that saying, Of a truth, said they, this is that Prophet ; others, This is the Christ.' This descending visibly of the Spirit (which was done first to him), was the highest evidence of these that could be, excepting only that of the Father : ' This is my beloved Son.' The Baptist makes these his highest characters, that it was he baptized with the Holy Ghost as with fire ; and that he received the Spirit without measure, though he was personally full of grace and truth himself, as he was the Son of God. - 4. It was the Holy Ghost anointed him to all his offices, as first to be a prophet and preacher of the gospel, which was first spoken by the Lord, Heb. ii. Thus, Luke iv. 18 (and some think it was his first text), ' The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath sent me to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering sight to the blind, to set at Uberty them that are bruised.' Whether you take the words o5 'in-ADi antecedently or consequently, either that because by God he was designed to be a preacher, therefore the Spirit was on him ; or that because the Spirit was on him, he therefore was fitted to be a preacher, it comes all to one as to my purpose. The Spirit was he that made him a preacher of the gospel, to utter things which man never did, and to speak in such a manner as man never did. And this is evident by the context in that Luke iv., for it was his first sermon after his baptism, when the Holy Ghost had anew fallen on him, and he had returned 'full of the Holy Ghost,' as Luke iv. 1; and again in ver. 14 he returned (or went) 'full of the Holy Ghost' into Galilee, his ordinary standing diocese for his ordinary preach ing, as the evangelists shew. 5. The Holy Ghost anointed him with power to do all his miracles, and all the good he did ; so in Acts x. 38, ' He was anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power : going about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil ; ' whom it is expressly said he cast out ' by the Spirit,' Mat. xii. 28. 6. When Christ was dead, who was it raised him up from the grave ? Which work was so great a work, as God himself accounts it as a new begetting, or making him anew, and as it were a ' second conception of him, a new edition of his Son Christ : Acts xiii. 33, ' He raised up Jesus again ; as it is written in the second Psalm, Thou art my Son, this day Chap. IV.] in our salvation. 13 have I begotten thee.' God rejoiceth, as having but then recovered and found his Son, that was as it were lost in the likeness of sinful flesh. Now, who was the immediate cause of this new advancement, whereby he was horn into the other world ? The Holy Ghost : Rom. viii. 11, ' But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.' God by his Spirit raiseth up both Christ and us. 7. When he ascended, who filled him with that glory ? The Holy Ghost : Ps. xiv., he was ' anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows;' which oil, Acts x. 38, is said to be the Holy Ghost. 8. It was the Holy Ghost that solemnly anointed him as king in heaven : Acts ii. 33, ' Being at the right hand of God, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost,' &c. Peter's inference from this is, ver. 36, ' Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord, and Christ.' 9. It was and is the Holy Ghost that proclaims him Christ in all men's hearts. He sets the crown upon him there also, as well as in heaven, in so much that no man could ever come to acknowledge him the Christ but from the Spirit : 1 Cor. xii. 3, ' No man can say Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.' So as whatever right he had in his person, or by his Father's designation (of which in Acts ii. 36, Rom. xiv. 9), yet it is the Spirit that publicly proclaimed him such, brought him in all his subjects ; or, to use Christ's own words, ' He it is that glorifies me, shewing it to them,' John xvi. 14. All this he hath done to and for Christ our head. CHAPTER IV. His operations upon the church, the body of Christ ; and that first as col lectively taken, the whole thereof. II. Let us now consider the operations of the Holy Ghost in and upon the church, collectively taken, as the body of Christ. 1. He was the first founder of the church of the New Testament. The apostle, writing to the Ephesians, who (as you know) had formerly gloried of their temple of Diana as one of the seven wonders of the Gentile world, sets before them, chap, ii., an infinitely far greater and more glorious temple, whereof they themselves, he tells them, were a part, even the church universal of the New Testament, consisting of Jew and Gentile : Eph. ii. 21, 'A building fitly framed together, that groweth up into an holy temple in the Lord.' But then, who is the builder and framer of this fabric, age after age, till all is perfect ? And through whom also is it that this temple, when built, is consecrated unto God for a mansion-house or habitation, who hath the whole world to dwell in ? The 22d verse shews both, 'In whom' (namely, Christ) 'ye' (Ephesians) 'are also builded up together for an habitation of God through the Spirit ; ' which in the coherence with the former, is as if he had said, He that made you, the Ephesians, a church (which was as a particular member of that uni versal body), as ' members in particular,' 1 Cor. xii. 27, the same Spirit was the builder of that great cathedral in which are comprehended all par ticular churches as smaller oratories ; so as he is the great founder of all, 14 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. both in the whole, yea, of every member that worships therein. Thus, in ver. 18, 'Through him' (namely Christ) 'we have both' (Jew and Gen tile) ' access to God ' (but) ' through the Spirit.' Yea, he is the soul of this one body ; Eph. iv. 4, ' There is one body and one Spirit.' Christ bears the relation of head to this body ; but who is the universal soul, which is in all, and every part of it ? It is the Holy Ghost ; and oh ! how glorious a church and body shall Christ have, when all are met and set to gether, and filled full of this Spirit at the latter day ! Eph. v. 27. _ At that day it is he will ' present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing.' Thus spake the husband, the head, of this spouse. But who is the soul that gives this beauty, that formed this symme try of all the members, and adds life to all ? The Holy Ghost. And now, let us think what a mighty and vast work this of forming and building the universal church is, whereof this Holy Spirit is the former and effecter. There was a perfect pattern and platform of the whole and every member thereof in God's breast, an idea also in Christ's (as appears by the last- cited Eph. v.) which this Spirit will bring in the end the whole unto, and frame each living stone in the building to bear a due, suitable, and comely proportion in the whole, and each to other. And this is, and hath been providentially a-doing and a- framing in every part thereof, in all and every age, and hath been wrought from the beginning of the world, in the several parcels apart, even as each piece of tapestry in hangings use to be wrought in little bits and small parcels, which, when finished, are then at last set together. ! And this Spirit, who is the dedolator, the architectonical master-workman^! hath in his eye every degree of grace he works in every of these members' hearts who is a stone in this building, according to the pattern which the Father and Christ have in their idea and model, of every particular, as also of the whole, and exactly frames each and the whole unto their mind, and misseth not the least of the set proportion in the pattern, which, in so long, so various, and multifarious a work to do (as this therefore must be sup posed), what infinite wisdom and power doth it require, and argues him to be God, that is in God, as the spirit of a man within him, and ' searcheth the deep things of God.' 2. All the means of the church's edification (as the word, ministry, and all gospel ordinances) all which are the goods and chattels, the household- stuff of the church universal ('Paul andApollos are theirs'), these are all of him, and blessed by him. He wrote the Scriptures, 2 Peter i. 21, gave the prophecies, 1 Peter i. 11, revealed the gospel, Eph. iii. 5, in such a manner and measure, and with such an enlargement as never before, to the sons of men. The care of all that great affair of the ministry, and the work thereof, is incumbent on him, lies on his hands to manage. In the New Testament we find him once immediately speaking in his own person, and taking on him as a person (as the Father had done afore when he said, ' This is my i well-beloved Son ') ; and the occasion was particular about the execution of this work of the ministry, it is in Acts xiii. 2, ' The Holy Ghost said, Sepa rate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them.' In which effort of his, he speaks as one entered upon an office or work committed to him, and betrusted with him. And it is as if he had said, this is my work proper to me, I am the immediate governor and adminis trator herein ; for all that any way concerns the edification of the church is committed to my management and care. And he says he had designed) Paul and Barnabas to one part, as Peter and John to another, Gal. ii.,- Chap. IV.] in our salvation-. 15 yea, all their gifts are his, in him, and he as a person that is the sovereign thereof, ' distributes them as he will,' 1 Cor. xii. 4, 7. He makes minis ters, John xx. 22. And that power to declare that sins are forgiven, and so set free men's consciences, is from their having received the Holy Ghost first, ' Christ breathed on them, and said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost ; ' and then adds, ' Whose sins ye remit, are remitted.' And as he makes ministers, so he sends out ministers, Acts xiii. 4 ; and in vain it is for them to go until he comes upon them. The apostles are, therefore com manded to stay going forth into the world till they should have received the Holy Ghost, Acts i. 8. He appoints the place and people any of them should go unto, and forbids and hinders where they should not be usefully employed. He gives them orders : he bids Philip go to the eunuch, Acts viii. 29 ; and Acts xi. 12, he sends Peter to Cornelius ; and on the other side, he forbids to preach to such or such. Paul and Timothy were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach in Asia, Acts xvi. 6 ; and they again ' essayed to go into Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not,' ver. 7. And when they preach, it is he prompts them with their sermons, Mark xiii. 11. The apostles 'spake as the Spirit gave them utterance,' and when tbey spake, they spake apophthegms, as the word is, weighty sayings : 1 Cor. ii. 13, ' Which things we speak, not in the words which man's wis dom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth ; comparing spiritual things with spiritual ; ' that is, suiting expressions to the gravity and weight of the things deUvered. He fires their tongues and hearts, that they should not speak mere empty and powerless words, nor shoot powder, but fiery bullets, such as have warmth and life in them. And when they preach, he makes their sermons to be the ministration of the Spirit, to convey himself unto their hearts, and to make the gospel ' the power of God unto salvation.' All the power of sermons is from the Holy Ghost : 1 Thes. i. 5, ' Our gospel was not in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost ; ' 1 Peter i. 11, 12, the gospel is said to have been preached 'with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven,' who waiteth and watcheth when ye come to sermons, and at the speaking such a word as will do your hearts good, he falls upon you : Acts x. 44, ' Whilst they were speaking these words, the Holy Ghost fell on them.' I might shew the same in all the ordinances, but of them after. For a conclusion. It may be truly said (as it hath been by some of the ancients) that as Christ was the fulfiller of the law, and the end of the law (Rom. x.), so that the Spirit is the complement, the fulfiller, and maker good of aU the gospel, * otherwise all that Christ did would have profited us nothing, if the Holy Ghost did not come into our hearts and bring all home to us. Christ made his wiU by his death, Heb. ix ; but the Spirit is his administrator. Christ's blood and purchase gave us, by his redeem ing* us, jus ad rem ; but the Holy Ghost, by applying it, only jus in re ; he gives us possession, livery, and seisin. Himself is-the Arrha : the earnest and the investiture of aU is by him. The promises had been but as blanks else to us ; but it is the Holy Ghost is the sealer of us by them, the verifier of them, 2 Cor. i. 20, 22. Christ also came, and delivered his commands to his apostles, to teach his church to do them, as in Mat. xxviii. 20 ; but withal it is expressly said of him, and that after his being risen again, that he gave those his commands to them by the Holy Ghost, Acts i. 2. And then again, those great truths he uttered only by word of mouth ; but it was the Holy Ghost which recovered them when they were almost lost, * Christus legis, &piritus evangelii complementum. — Tertul. 16 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. and in a manner clean gone out of the apostles' weak and shallow memories and understandings. And he it was that added a thousand more truths to them, which Christ never uttered ; to whom therefore Christ refers them : John xvi. 12, 13, ' I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth ; for he shaU not speak of himself ; but whatsoever he shaU hear, that shaU he speak.' Only by the way, let ministers and Christians take notice what is the glory of the ministry, even the Holy Ghost. Thus Paul himself, 1 Cor. ii. 4, ' My speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. ' The phrase, 2 Cor. in. 6, is, 'He hath made us able ministers of the Spirit.' The words in that text are indeed ' ministers of the New Testament,' but it follows in the same verse, ' not of the letter, but of the Spirit.' And this New Testament) * or the gospel, says the apostle, ver. 3, is ministered by ns ' with the Spirit of the living God.' Our abilities Ue in our being made more or less instru ments, by whom the Holy Ghost is pleased to communicate himself. Acts xi. 24 it is said, Barnabas was ' a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost,' in his own person ; ' and much people was added to the Lord.' A preacher, in the primitive language, is termed, ' He that ministereth the Spirit,' Gal. ui. 2, 5. And therefore value ministries ,by this ; and let ministers seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit. It is still prefaced of their preaching, such or such an one was filled with the Holy Ghost, and spake, as Acts iv. 8, and Acts ii. 3, 4. i CHAPTER V. His operations in every part and member of the church and body qf Christ. III. It is next to be considered what the Holy Ghost doth in every part and member of this body of Christ, the church ; what he doth for every particular saint. For look, what he is to, and in the church universal, that he is first unto, and in, every saint in particular ; for it is the particular \ individualsaint that makes up the church universal ; even as reason is first ' and principally in every particular and individual man ; and by means thereof it is that reason is found, and so abounds in a body or assembly of men. They meeting together, every one severally brings a portion of it with him thereunto ; so as the main of his work lies and consists in what he doth in and to every member. And when he faUs upon assemblies of saints as met, yet it is so as he fails on the whole, by visiting the particular souls so assembled, and out of respect unto each single soul ; as when the rain falls upon a field of corn, it falls upon the whole for every particular blade's sake, watering every stalk at its root, and so aU grow up togethei_ Hence therefore, Acts ii., where the fulfilling of those promises made in the 14th and 15th chapters of John, were in the first fruits of them accom plished, it is expressly indigitated that ' the Spirit sat upon each of them :' ver. 3, ' And they were all ' (that is, every one of them) ' fiUed with the Holy Ghost ;' as organ pipes use to be with the common blast of the beUows that breathes wind into them, though by the difference of the pipes there is a differing sound. And thus the Holy Ghost, doth, as one Spirit, inform ; and inspire the whole body of Christ, as the soul doth the whole body of a man. Eph. iv. 4, ' There is one body, and one Spirit,' and the Spirit is Chap. V.] in our salvation. 17 the same in every member. Now consider with yourselves, if there were but one common soul (as some have feigned to be in the system of the world) which acted, and enlivened every man and thing in the world, you would acknowledge that it must be a mighty, vast, and burthensome work which is incumbent upon that great soul (whatever it were), and which it under goes at every moment. But thus it is in reality with this great Spirit, the soul of the whole church, who both informs and enliveneth the whole, and every member of it. What therefore is next to be considered, is the activity of this Holy Spirit upon us, and in working in us. 1. First, in general ; he worketh no less than all that is wrought, 1 Cor. xii. 11, ' But all these worketh that one and self-same Spirit, dividing to every man severaUy as he will.' As of Christ, who is the Word, it is said in the point of the first creation (John i. 3), that ' without him there was not anything made that was made ;' so of the Spirit in this new creation we may say, that without him there is not anything wrought in us that is wrought. But let us consider particularly his works. (1.) In regeneration, which is his prime work in us. He is the author of all the principles or habits of grace, of that whole new creature, of that workmanship created to good works, the spiritual man, which is caUed spirit; that divine nature, which is the mass and lump of aU things pertaining to life and godliness ; that which is born of the Spirit, John iii. 6 ; the image of Christ, which is styled ' Christ formed in us,' Gal. iv. 19. That divine nature is the image drawn. But who is the immediate former, the limner? It is the Spirit of God; 2 Cor. iii. 18, ' We are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.' And that place shews that not only the first draught of that image is of his drawing, the ground colours, but all the additional lines that follow after, to perfect it all along, from one end of the work to the other. For he attributes that continual change wrought after conver sion, in every degree of it, ' from glory to glory,' unto this Spirit. And therein he so speaks of himself and these believing Corinthians, yea, all believers. ' We are thus changed ' aU along by beholding, &c. All the changes into that image are by the Spirit of the Lord. No hand hath skill or power to add to this work ; none able to mingle colours orient and lively enough but he. In the same chapter the beUeving Corinthians are declared to be ' the epistle of Christ,' so far as they were or shewed themselves Christians in reality. And Christ and his graces are the perfect original and exemplar ; and these Corinthians, so far as they had advanced in Chris tianity, were for essential parts the entire copy, which in some degree does express to the life that original. And there is not a letter or tittle added in the copy which is not found in him, 2 Cor. iii. 3, ' For ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ, ministered ' (indeed says the apostle) ' by us ' (as the pens), ' but written with the Spirit of the living God ; not with ink, nor in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart :' unto the draught of the least line of which no art or pencil of man can reach, or hath colours orient enough to write it. For all and every tittle, every stroke, is no other than an inward living disposition of heart, like unto the divine life and nature of Christ, the Son of the living God, and therefore requires the living power of the Spirit of the living God (as he is there styled) to concur to the creating of it ; Ps. li. 10, 11, ' Create in me a clean heart, 0 God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from vol. vi. B ir 18 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me.' For as he vouch safes to become the ink, so he bears the part of a hand, too, of a ready writer. The Spirit is the finger of God (Mat. xii. 28, compared with Luke xi. 20), the sole artist that guides those pens that cast this ink, as there also (in ver. 6) it foUows : ' God hath made us able ministers of the New Testament ; not of the letter ' (for even that New Testament hath also letter to men unregenerate, and is but the dispensation of a notion), ' but of the Spirit,' or power. Let us go. over the particular actings of the soul, which are as a drawing, out of those created principles, whether at or in our first conversion or afterwards ; and we shaU find that each and every particular thereof are attributed to this Spirit. [1.] Hast thou seen thy sinful condition, and been humbled, as to hell, for it ? It is the Spirit's proper work, for which he was sent. Thus says Christ, John xvi. 8, ' When he is come he shaU convince the world of sin.' And he says it to his apostles, when he was to send them into the world to convert men. And this is the first work of the three there rehearsed, that the Holy Spirit beginneth with, in conversion, viz., a conviction of a state of sin and unbelief. As it foUows, ' of sin, because they beUeved not on me,' and consequently, of damnation, as having lived without God and Christ in the world ; and this work, though it may seem too low for him, yet he is pleased to bear a'title from it, and is termed a Spirit of bondage to us, as causing us to see our bondage to sin, and death, and hell : Rom. viii. 15, 'For ye have not received the Spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.' It is one and the same Spirit there spoken of, in respect of two contrary operations, who hath the title there, of both. It is the Holy Ghost who is that Spirit of adoption there spoken of, whereby we (afterwards) cry, Abba, Father. This you may also see, Gal. iv. 6, and in tbe next ver. 16 of that Rom. viii. It is the Spirit who also ' witnesseth to us that we are the sons of God ;' and by the opposition it will follow that if the Holy Ghost be the Spirit of adoption spoken of, that he also was that Spirit of bondage ; inas much as he doth discover to us our bondage ; even as he is termed the Spirit of adoption, because he testifies our sonship. And the discovery of this our bondage is an infinite favour. For do not the great and wise ones of the world go hoodwinked quick to hell in a moment, and know not whither they are going until they are there ? And of thyself thou couldst never have been thoroughly convinced of that ; for the heart is deceitful above measure, who can know it ? None without the light of this Spirit. For it is the spirituality of the law whereby he instructs men to know wisdom in the hidden point of their corrupt nature, as David, confessing it, speaks, Ps. li., 5th and 6th verses compared together, 'Behold, I was shapen in iniquity ; and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts ; and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.' And without the light of which law the same David likewise confesseth, Ps. xix. 12, ' Who can understand his errors ? cleanse thou me from secret faults.' By which secret sins he understands the im mediate ebullitions of corrupt nature. And it is he that ' searcheth the deep things of God,' 1 Cor. ii. 10 ; the hidden wisdom, ver. 7 ; hid in God, Eph. iii. 9 ; and reveals it to us, ver. 5. It is he, the same Spirit, that searcheth the deep deceitfulness of men's hearts, and reveals it to them i which David caUed wisdom in the hidden part. And it is thou (says he to God) that makest me to know it ; that is, thou by thy Spirit, who Chap. V.] in our salvation. 19 knowest all things, 1 Cor. ii. 10. And this for him to vouchsafe to do for him, to take the same pains to do it, as ever mother or schoolmaster took to teach a child from his alphabet to read, is an act of infinite grace. It is he that gives thee eyes to see, and an heart to understand, who holds the candle to thee, and points with his finger to every sin. Let us all consider the" unpleasingness of this work, which were it not that it is neces sary for his saving thee, he who is the Holy Spirit would never rake into such foul and filthy jakes and dunghills of lusts and by-ends,, unbelief and presumptions. This must needs be a loathsome work to him, by reason of the objects he is exercised in, and tedious in itself. And this is the entrance into conversion. [2.] It is this Spirit whieh works repentance upon this discovery of sin, and turns our hearts from sin to God effectually. John the Baptist came preaching ' the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.' Now by what, or whose power was it, that repentance was wrought in the hearts of multitudes that were his hearers ? It was the Holy Spirit. ' He shaU come ' (says the prophet) ' in the spirit and power of Elias,' Mai. iv. 6. The spirit of EUas was the Holy Ghost, resting on him (2 Kings ii. 15), as he did on the Baptist : Luke i, 15, ' He shall be fiUed with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb.' And it is spoken to signify the power that should accompany his ministry, to work repentance, as it follows in the next verse ; ' And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord his God.' And thereupon it is, that this prophecy of Malaehi's is alleged, ver. 17, ' He shall come in the spirit and power of EUas, and turn the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just.' So as that which is spoken of Paul's ministry among the Thessalonians, 1 Thes. i. 5, that it came ' not in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost,' might (though in a lower degree) be said of his. And yet the first and eminent effect of his ministry was seen in the working of repentance, as it is often said, in Acts 13th and 19th chapters. It may likewise be observed, as serving to th's purpose, that when Christ gave that new commission to his apostles, to preach repentance in his name unto aU nations, for the remission of sins (as in Luke xxiv. 47),|he withal renews ' the promise of the Father,' which was the Holy Ghost ; ver. 49, ' Behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you.' And why is that annexed to the former, as the preface thereto, ' And behold^ shews, but because the giving of the Holy Ghost, ,even after Christ's ascension, was to work repentance in men's hearts by that their preaching ? Yea, and he commands them (as with a caution, in the foUowing words), that they should tarry in the city of Jerusalem, until they were endued with power from on high. Without whom, and the power of whom, their preaching repentance would have had no efficacy at all, to move men to turn unto God ; but through whose operation God gave Israel, Acts v. 31, 32, yea, and the Gentiles, repentance unto life, Acts xi. 18. [3.] The work of faith is of his operation ; and therefore he is styled ' The Spirit of faith,' 2 Cor. iv. 13. And the same Spirit that wrought faith in the New Testament, is said to have done it in the Old, as that place shews ; 2 Cor. iv. 13, ' We having the same Spirit of faith,' &c. ; the same which David and they in the Old Testament had. It is therefore also, that to be fuU of the Holy Ghost and of faith are joined ; Acts vi. 5, ' Stephen, a man full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost :' also Barnabas is said to be ' a man full' of the Holy Ghost, and of faith,' Acts xi. 24. Let us view some special acts of faith, and see how the working of them is ascribed to the Holy Ghost. 20 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. First ; He gave thee a spiritual sight of Christ and God's free grace, which drew thy heart unto them. He gave thee a sight of God's free grace, when thou hadst seen thy sins and thy undone condition, and thy heart was thrown off the hinges of thy former hopes on self-righteousness, and the bladders of presumptions upon God's mercy upon false grounds pricked and fallen ; and thou wert left utterly at the loss, and knewest not what to do to be saved. Who was it opened to thee the first ' door of hope ' (Hosea ii.), and gave thee the first ken, hint, and glimpse of grace and mercy ; and that God would abundantly and freely pardon thee, if thou wouldst seek him and ply thyself to him ? Who was it then that laid before thee that aU-sufficient righteousness of faith ; and that did set thy heart on work to seek it ? Even the good Spirit, who is therefore called ' The spirit of grace and supplication,' Zech. xii. 10. He became a Spirit of grace, in making a discovery of that rich and free grace in God's heart to be inclining towards thee, and therewith became the Spirit of supplication in thee, inflaming thee, as a condemned man for life, to seek after that grace and pardoning mercy in God. And from thence he led thee to the cross of Christ, and made and set such a lively picture of him, as crucified before thine eyes (Gal. iii. 1), as all angels and men could never have pourtrayed, no more, yea, infinitely far less, than they can the sun. It was he, the same Spirit of grace, that did it ; and so it follows, Zech. xii. 10, ' And they shall look upon him whom they have pierced.' Thus also, John xvi. 8, it is said, ' When he is come, he shall convince the world of righteousness ' (which Christ there enumerates as the Spirit's second work in calUng us) ; even of that all-sufficient right eousness of Christ, offered up for satisfaction to the Father ; who was ' made sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.' And when j the word of faith sounded in thy heart and ears, thou hadst not eyes to see it ; therefore this ' fountain for sin and uncleanness to wash in ' must be ' opened' (as it is said, Zech. xiii. 1), or men descry it not. Thou wert ready to perish for thirst, as Hagar was, Gen. xxi., and lifted up thy voice and weptest. But as God opened her eyes, and she saw a well (ver. 19) just by her : so did the Spirit thine, to spy out Christ and his righteousness, which is hid unto the world. As I heard one say on his deathbed, Oh ! where had I been if I had not spied out Christ ! It was this Spirit of grace who caused thee to look towards him, and first set thy eyes and heart to see him, and look on him that was pierced, as aU that are saved should be brought to do, as they did on the brazen serpent, John iii. 14, 15. Secondly ; When thou didst find (being come to this fountain) that the weU was deep, and thou hadst not wherewith to draw ; and while thou wert but looking down into it, with a longing eye after it; but couldst not reach into it, to wash thyself in it ; but layest as that poor impotent man did at the" pool, utterly without strength (as John v.) to have stepped in : it was then the Holy Ghost sprinkled of it upon thy heart, and caused thine iniquity to pass away (1 Pet. i. 2) ; ' Through sanctification of the Spirit, and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.' The blood indeed is the blood of Jesus, but the sprinkling (in that place) is attributed to the Spirit, as well as obedience. It was Christ shed that blood (it is therefore there called the blood of Jesus Christ), but it is the Spirit that sprinkleth it, and he sprinkleth it with both hands, on thy heart, to wash away thy spots ; and therefore in ver. 22 they are said to have 'purified their souls in obeying I the truth, through the Spirit :' which is spoken of the obedience of faith Chap. V.] in our salvation. 21 for justification, as well as sanctification ; as the parallel words of the same apostle, in Acts xv. 8, 9, compared, shew : ' God giving unto them the Holy Ghost, even as he did to us, and put no difference between us and them,, purifying their hearts by faith.' And in 1 Cor. vi. 11, justification as well as sanctification is attributed to the Spirit : ' But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.' ' But ye are washed,' that is the general ; '_ but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified ' (two distinct benefits), 'justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.' Both of these are by both Christ and the Spirit ; as justification is in the name of the Lord Jesus, so is sanctification too ; and by the like reason they were both justified ' by the Spirit of our God.' It is Jesus Christ's name affords the merit and virtue for both, but the Spirit is the applier of them and all other blessings. Thirdly ; And when thou hast been brought to close with Christ for justi fication and righteousness, who was it brought thee to the Father to be justified by him also (' who justifies the ungodly,' Rom. iv. 5), and who gave thee access to him, when thou stoodest trembling, not daring to approach to a consuming fire, and everlasting burnings ? It is ' through Christ we have access ' (manuduction) ' by one Spirit unto the Father,' Eph. ii. 18. It is both through Christ, and by the Spirit, who leads us, as well as Christ. And indeed, Christ leads us to the Father (as it were) with one hand, and the Holy Ghost by the other. Yea, it was this Spirit that taught thee to call God Father (Rom. viii. 15, Gal. iv. 6), and therewith to seek adoption from him. Fourthly; When thou art once justified by faith, and hast that righteous ness imputed to thee, who is it hath hitherto kept, and continues to keep thine heart fixedly to wait for, and hold to that righteousness alone for thy salvation ? And who is it withholds thee from betaking thyself to any other for justification ? Who settles thy hopes solely on it ? It is even this Spirit : Gal. v. 5, ' For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.' Justification by faith (as we know) is the eminent subject of that epistle ; and these words come in in the midst of many other lesser additional persuasives, which he useth last, after the doctrinal argu ments in the former chapters, tending all to this, that they should stand fast in that liberty which ver. 1 of this chapter begins with, and which the righteousness of Christ endows us with ; and that they should renounce that of works in the point of justification. We, says he, that is, the generality of beUevers, Jew and Gentile, of weak and strong faith, we aU do steer this way ; and therefore you that turn aside „ the works of the law for your justification do sever yourselves from the faith common to the church. With which accords that of the apostle Peter, 2 Peter i. 1, 'To them that have obtained like precious faith with us ' (apostles, namely), 'through the righteousness' (iv dixaiaduvp) 'of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.' This was the true and common faith of apostles, and all in those times. Do wait (says, he), that is, we not only did rely upon that righteousness wholly for our first justification (as the papists distinguish), being necessi tated unto that alone then, because as then we had no other works to rely upon, but of nature and unregeneracy (which upon conversion are discovered to be dead works), but ever since we abide by it, and depend upon that alone for our justification afterward, and that now, when we vhave other manner of works\pf true holiness and sincerity renewed in us, and which 22 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. increase more and more in us ; which (if any works could or might) would entice us over to join them with Christ, as a ground of our confidence for justification. But we are immoveably constant unto this righteousness by faith, and the hope that is from it, for time to come ; and this continuaUy, aU along the remainder of our lives. ' Do wait,' says he, ' for the hope of the righteousness by faith.' Those words, of righteousness by faith, are a distinction, severing it from that of works, and is an indigitation that he meant that to be the righteousness, which had been the subject of his dis course. For otherwise, that word, to wait, did sufficiently import that by faith they were expectants of it, without that addition. Those words, for the hope of righteousness, are an extensive speech, and spoken in many respects, especially three. 1. It respects a waiting for justification stiU to come upon us, from that righteousness. Hope is of what is yet to come ; and we not only lay hold on that righteousness to be justified by it at present, but we wait for the hope of justification by it for ever. For we are to be justified continually all along the remainder of our lives ; for it is actus continuus or perpetuus ; and therefore our hopes of justification are to be continued and kept up, and we depend wholly on that righteousness which is by faith, as weU as when we Were converted at first, or do at this day. It is called an ' everlasting right eousness,' Dan. ix. 24. And it is but one and the same righteousness first and last which we wait for. 2. We wait for that eternal life (which is frequently termed our hope, and the hope of glory), both after death and at the day of judgment, as the con junct consequent of this righteousness ; for glory is an inheritance entailed upon that righteousness of justification, as the holy apostle informs us : Tit. iii. 7, ' That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs accord-| ing to the hope of eternal life.' And at that day it is that justification and forgiveness of sins is with the solemnity of those words (' Come ye and inherit,' &c.) finally to be pronounced, and admission thereupon is to be given into eternal glory. 3. Among the persons here expressed by the word we, whose example he presseth upon these unsettled Galatians, it falls out tUat there are true believers who have sought God much and long, for the justification by faith through Christ's righteousness, and the assurance of it ; and God hath been pleased to defer the manifestation of it to their souls. And there were others that had obtained an assurance of it in some good degree, and yet either through sins renewed, and other sad and dark temptations, have been weakened in their faith about it. And in that case there are other ways for reUef and comfort besides this of the righteousness of faith, that are ready to offer themselves unto such souls, or otherwise are apt to faint in waiting* (as the Psalmist speaks of himself), and to have their souls ' made sick,' (as Solomon speaks of ' hope deferred '), and are ready to grow weary, and give over waiting for the Lord any longer. Now in such a case, who is it that giveth those poor souls (who make the greatest number of believers) patience of hope to wait ? Lam. iii. 29, ' He putteth his mouth in the dust, if so be there may be hope,' and causeth them to wait (as there it is also said), and causeth them to wait on till God shall reveal himself to their souls (which is the thing I cited this place for, and have opened as I have done). It is even the Spirit. And for his great honour, it is added by the apostle, ' We, through the Spirit, wait.' It is one of his greatest works in us to hold our hearts constantly fixed to this righteousness, and to settle our whole expectation upon it, and. to continue so to do, that we may look Chap. V.] in our salvation. 23 unto no other righteousness for justification and salvation. These Galatians having at their first calling embraced Christ nakedly, and him alone, for justification, as ver. 7 and 8 insinuates, ' Ye did run well,' says he ; ' who did hinder you, that ye should not obey the truth ? This persuasion cometh not of him that calleth you.' One true cause that so many of them after ward had fallen to the doctrine of works was that they would not wait by pure faith, at which this place also glanceth. They would see something in themselves, as a ground of a believing on Christ, and so had recourse to themselves, to their own doings and actings, for a foundation of it ; at least to join them in commission with Christ to justify them. A new convert in Christianity, such an one especially, is in a great danger of thus diverting ; for the spirit that is within us would of itself go that way, unless power - fuUy detained from it by this other blessed Spirit in us. The law is in grafted in every man by nature, and was in pure nature of innocency, which knew no other way for justification but by a man's own righteousness, and it was the law of nature to be thereby justified. And this new nature that is begotten in a Christian is, in the groundwork of it, materially a con formity to the same law ; and the law is continued under grace to be a tutor to instruct it how to walk in truth of holiness. And hence the heart is apt to listen to the other dictates of it even in the point of justification also. And again it is man's own righteousness which Paul, after many years' ex perience ot the righteousness of faith, was yet by reason of the propensity of nature to it, afraid to be found in, Phil. iii. And the dispositions of righteousness that are renewed in us, and the duties we perform, do often offer their help to supply the room of faith, giving us confidence ere Christ comes. And Christ, to try us, stays often long (as Samuel did his coming to Saul) ere he reveals himself. > And as Abraham, waiting long for a child, turned aside to Hagar, so do we to works. Now in all these hazards, who took thee by the hand, and taught thee the way of sheer faith, and then afterward the way of bare waiting upon God ? Who instructed thee by a strong hand, and would not suffer thee to go in the way of the law, but strengthened and secretly supported thy spirit in waiting till God should ' rain down righteousness,' as the prophet speaks ? It was this good Spirit ; and nothing else could or had been able to have done it in thee, but that Spirit who moved on the chaos when it was darkness, and but one step from nothing, and newly come out of nothing, and ready to return unto nothing again ; and who by his almighty power upheld, hatched, and supported it from falling into nothing, Gen. i. It is the same good Spirit who enliveneth and inspiriteth such a soul in its confessions. It was he who fostered and maintained and kept up this resolved purpose in thy heart, to remain com fortless for ever, otherwise than by such comforts as Christ and his right eousness should afford thee. And though thou didst vehemently hunger- and thirst after righteousness of justification, as well as of sanctification, yet thou wouldst have starved rather than have lived upon thy own bread ; that is, have trusted to thine own righteousness ; and none but Christ, and his righteousness, who is 'the Lord our righteousness,' and his alone, "was it would satisfy thee ; yea, that none else should was the fixed resolve of thy heart. It is the Spirit guides and leads thee, thus ver. 18 of this 5th chapter, ' If ye be led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law,' which is spoken in point of justification. He took thee by the hand, and gently led thee the right way therein, as well as (according to what is spoken in respect of sanctification) he led thee to walk holily. The Spirit is the leader and con ductor in both, as the coherence with his former and his immediate fore- 24 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST LBoOK I. going discourse do shew, and do suit this of these works to be the scope of these words in common to either. Fifthly ; When thou didst attain unto joy and peace in believing, though Christ was the peace-maker, yet who was the peace-bringer ? It was the Holy Ghost : Rom. xv. 13, ' Now the God of hope fill you with aU joy and peace in beUeving, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.' AU that ' joy unspeakable and full of glory,' 1 Pet. i. 8, that ' peace which passeth all understanding,' Phil. iv. 7, whereby we 'glory in tribulation,' Rom. v. 2, and are ' more than conquerors,' Rom. viii. 37, to whom is it to be ascribed ? Whose operation is it ? The Holy Ghost's. It is particularly appropriated to him ; and therefore it is styled, ' joy in the Holy Ghost :' Rom. xiv. 17, ' The kingdom of God is not meat and drink ; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.' As God's kingdom consists of these things, so this joy is a peculiar belonging to his Spirit ; it is his jurisdiction, it is styled joy in the Holy Ghost ; when yet our joy is in God and in Christ objectively, yet in the Holy Ghost effi ciently, which is therefore elsewhere styled, ' The joy of the Holy Ghost :' so 1 Thess. i. 6. And the consolations we have are caUed ' The comforts of the Holy Ghost,' Acts ix. 31, as being the author and diffuser of them into our hearts, &c. In which sense our praying is in like manner said to be in the Holy Ghost (Jude, ver. 20), as the inditer of our prayers, Rom. viii. And it is also thus termed joy in the Holy Ghost, by way of a superlative eminency, in difference from all other joys which have ever entered into the heart of man ; and in compare to which aU. other joys are but as the crackling of thorns, the fuel they are fed with being earthy and terrene. It is a joy ' not as the world giveth' (saith Christ, speaking of his peace). And it therefore hath the peculiar character of glorious joy, as being joy of another kind, and also unspeakable for degrees and abundance ; ' more joy than when their corn and wine,' increasing never so much, afforded, Ps. iv. 7. We use to distinguish things that are excellent, by joining the name of the workman, author, or efficient, when in his work manship he transcendeth all other artists. And so it is in this. AU the sweetmeats of heaven (and this joy is the taste of the hidden manna), he hath the keeping and delivery of them out, where and when he wiU. And* not only so, but he tempers them, and aU the cordials out of God the Father's love, and Christ's heart and blood, and mingleth his own love with theirs, and puts them into our hearts, conveying them in promises of the word, and fitly and seasonably applies them, and reserves them for us as we need. And though Christ bequeatheth that peace and joy as his last legacy, he being the purchaser of it by his death, yet it is the Holy Ghost that is his administrator and executor of it, to perform it, and execute his wiU. He it is that maketh known to us that love which hath lain hid in the heart of God the Father towards a particular soul, in choosing him at first, and then giving him to Christ, and giving his Son to die for him. It is he who displays that love which is laid out in infinite wisdom, contriving and ordering all about every man's particular salvation who is saved. It is he Ukewise that takes of Christ's, and shews and brings home his love in giving himself for every such soul, and causeth it to ' know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge ;' which he did vouchsafe to our apostle ;i ' Who loved me' (says he), ' and gave himself for me,' Gal. ii. 20. He shews these things (as Christ's word is), and tells over the stories of them in a way of application and comfort to a man's own heart in particular • and withal, lets in the taste of them ; ' and makes the loves of aU the three pass Chap. V.] in our salvation. 25 through and through us, even through our very inwards, as oil that soaks into the bones, and refresheth the marrow within them, even this ' oil of gladness,' which is purely of his making. And he gives an immediate taste of that love fresh out of the heart of God and Christ, i.nd causeth every faculty in its kind to taste how good the Lord is. He gives us a relish of the sweetness, of the deliciousness of loves ; loves, in the plural, as it is expressed in Cant. v. 1 ; which we are made abundantly to drink and taste of, as it is said Cant. v. 1. In Rom. v. 5, you have it thus expressed, ' Hope maketh not ashamed ; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us.' Given us he had been afore, to endow us with justifying faith, and all those glorious fruits of it, which he setly had enumerated ; as peace with God, ver. 1 ; access by faith into grace, ver. 2 ; rejoicing in hope of the glory of God; glorying in tribulation; and patience working experience ; and experience, hope : and that hope rising up, in the end, to a steadiness, solidity, and constancy, as never to be confounded ; no, not in a man's own apprehension or fears. And this hope is wrought by shedding the love of God abroad in the heart, so as never to be violated or temerated by prevailing doubtings any more. And this he reckons last, as the sum, the complement of all the foregoing privi leges. And this last, as well as all those other, are the effects of the Spirit given us ; for he working those other first, and then this of shedding the love of God over and above. Now that wherein this love of God and Christ materially or objectively doth consist, the apostle tells us in the foUowing 6th, 7th, and 8th verses, that ' God himself hath commended his love to us, that when we were enemies, Christ died for us ;' than which there cannot be a higher strain or note that love could reach unto. Yet the coherence of this place shews, that if the material part of this love should be declared in words never so illustriously, without the power of the Holy Ghost accom panying it, and his shedding that love abroad in the heart ; yea, if these very words were used, whereby God himself commends his love by the Holy Ghost himself, as the penman of them ; yea, if these words were preached and enlarged upon by the apostles themselves, ay, and by all the angels in heaven too (if they were sent by God to do it), yet they would avail nothing upon our hearts to affect them therewith, without a transcend ent operation of this blessed Spirit, whose work and office is to be ' the Comforter.' Yea further, where this Holy Spirit doth, by this and such like words as those, setting forth the love of God and Christ, perfume and bedew the souls of believers in his ordinary dispensation of faith with the consola tions of the Almighty, more or less ; yet the text in Rom. v. 5 means and intends, by that shedding abroad God's love, a higher communication of the love of God than those more commonly vouchsafed. And as there is promised a pouring forth of this Spirit, so there is a pouring forth joys in the Holy Ghost more extraordinary, which in its measure doth exceed the dispensings by the ordinary light of faith believers are accustomed unto. And the reason for this latter dispensation may be resolved unto this, that this Holy Spirit ' searching the deep things of God,' and knowing the height, depth, breadth, and length of his love, to the extremest dimensions of it, and coming immediately upon men's souls from out of the heart of God and Christ, is enabled from thence to bring this their love warm im mediately out of their hearts and convey it into ours, and give us a true and native original taste of and from the things themselves, and the sweet ness thereof. And so he sheds it abroad (as the word here is) into every chink and cranny of the soul, thirsting after this love, and brings it as fresh 26 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. as the mother's milk comes out of the dug into the child's mouth or stomach ;. and his love so shed into us by the Holy Spirit, is digested or turned into love in us, and returned on our parts towards God and Christ again. This is another manner ,of thing than all the words that ever have ^ been or can be uttered ; yea, though penned by the Holy Ghost himself, , speaking the greatest things that can be uttered of this love, and enlarging our minds to the most extensive conceptions of the dimensions of this love, so far as words or arguments by words will avail to do it, though uttered by the tongues of men or angels. But, when the Spirit by the word (for I speak not of revelations without that word, or besides it), shall add his con diment and seasoning to that love of God set forth in the word, with diffusing joy which passeth understanding, this doth infinitely surpass even such joys ; as he doth sometimes unto some saints vouchsafe. Sixthly ; If we consider all the feUowship and communion we have with the persons of the Father and- the Son, we shall find that this Holy Spirit is the introducer of us into it, and the manager and transacter of it in us, and for them with us. ' Our fellowship is with the Father, and with the Son,' 1 John i. 3. By means of which it is that our joy mentioned is a full joy, ver. 4. And all this fellowship is through the help and manifestations;! of the Holy Ghost: Phil. ii. 1, ' If there be any comfort in love' (which is peculiarly attributed to the Father) ; ' If any feUowship of the Spirit,' who communicates both these. This place seems to speak, in the matter of it, somewhat parallel to that of the same apostle : 2 Cor. xiii. 14, ' The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all.' Now it is the love of the Father which ordained Christ and salvation for us ; it is the grace of Christ which works our salvation by redemption ; as you read how grace is in that sense and respect attributed unto Christ, 2 Cor. viii. 9. But yet it is the Holys Ghost impacts and conveys all things that the Father or Son hath. He takes i them and reveals them to us, and so glorifies them both unto us : John xvi. 14, 15, 'He shall glorify me,' said Christ, 'for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine : therefore, said I, he shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you.' In saying, All that the Father hath are mine, he doth plainly affirm that it is the Spirit that shews all that is the Father's to us, as well as Christ, and what is Christ's. And in that renowned place in the gospel of John, where Christ promiseth that ' he and his Father will come to us, and make their . abode with us,' and that he ' will manifest himself to us,' John xiv. ver. 21-23. Yet in the verse 20 immediately foregoing, Christ says, 'At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you ; ' in that day, namely, when he should give and send his Spirit, as by this verse, being compared with verse 16, appears. And therefore it is, that that fulness of joy which ariseth from the communion with these persons is termed, 'joy in the Holy Ghost' (that is, through the Holy Ghost) ; and the communion of the Holy Ghost, although the objects of that joy are the love and persons of the Father and Son. Seventhly ; All the evidence and witnessing of all or any grace wrought in us (though not accompanied with joy unspeakable and full of glory), as a love in us to God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, they are all of his working, and from him. Do our own consciences witness to any eminent holy disposition that ia written in our hearts, such as the apostle professeth he found in his own heart, even to a willingness to be accursed from Christ, for the glory of Chap. V.] in our salvation. 27 God, and the salvation of his own countrymen the Jews ? The evidence of this to his conscience, was from the Holy Ghost, without whose testi mony joined to that of his conscience, his conscience would not have wit nessed it. Natural conscience witnesseth the things of the law naturally in man, Rom. ii., yet gracious dispositions it cannot. Here the apostle him self speaketh himself concerning this matter : Rom. ix. 1-3, ' I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost. I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kins men according to the flesh.' When he says, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, he speaks it not only because the Holy Ghost was he that had wrought that grace in him, but that, in point of his conscience witness ing of it, it was the Spirit who was the cause of that witness. Conscience indeed was the faculty that was the substance that witnessed this to his soul, but it was in (that is, from) the Holy Ghost so testifying with it. And therefore if that or any other grace in us be evidenced to us, it is he that is the eminent witness, and causeth that grace to speak so loud as to witness it : Rom. viii. 16, ' The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.' It may be read ' witnesseth to our spirit,' and ' witnesseth with ow: spirit.' And though man hath a reflecting faculty as a man, which (1 Cor. ii.) the apostle indigitates, ' None knoweth the things of a man, but the spirit that is in man,' yet the discerning the things of God, and of his supernatural working in a man, the apostle in the same place attributes to the Spirit, as the person who works all, and makes all in us, and also reveals all that to us which he worketh. He writes first all graces in us, and then teacheth our consciences to read his handwriting, which we could never do without his light. In 1 John v. ver. 6 and 7, you read of six witnesses, ' three in heaven,' and ' three on earth,' Who are witnesses of two things : 1, Christ to be the Son of God; 2, To believers' hearts of their own salvation, as in* ver. 1, ' Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God,' which also is evident by compar ing ver. 13, where both these two are put together, as the things believers might know, through what he had written in this epistle, especially now last written in those immediate foregone verses. Now you find there in these 6th and 7th verses, that the Spirit, or the Holy Ghost, is men tioned in either catalogue ; first, among the witnesses in heaven, ' The Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost;' and yet again this Spirit, that is a witness in heaven, is yet numbered with those that bear record on earth, too. Ver. 8, ' The Spirit, the water, and the blood ; ' and he, the first, and as the principal of these on earth, is set before water and blood. One among other reasons I have apprehended for this, is that he efficiently is the grand witness with those other two on earth in their witnessing ; and to whatsoever they bear their testimony, this Spirit joins with them in it, and brings home their testimony into our hearts ; as without whom and which their witness would be of no force. As, for example, if Christ's blood, when believed on, witnesseth to our hearts, by giving our hearts ease and peace, it is because this Spirit joins with it in its testimony. If water, or the new creature (begotten of water and this Spirit,_ the holy Spirit working as water in cleansing us), if that do testify to us,_it is in _ virtue of the Holy Ghost's conjecture with it, and irradiation of it, and it is that which gives its validity of testimony to it : as Rom. viii. 16, ' He witnesseth with our spirits ; ' that is, our graces (or that which is born of the Spirit, which is spirit), and in the same 1 John v. 6, the apostle resolves _ all into this, as the foundation of the other's testimonies, ' It is the Spirit that 28 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK'L beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.' It is he therefore that bears the name of witness, scar' sgo^v, as being the ' Spirit of truth,' as Christ also caUs him. And truly in that Rom. vni., where it is rendered, ' The Spirit witnesseth with our spirits,' the Holy Ghost, in the original, hath iso composed the words, that they import his witnessing to our spirits as well as with our spirits ; and that witnessing with hath a respect to the_ witness of the other two persons, the Father and Christ, as with whom this Spirit. ;j should witness to our spirits ; they aU three, the witnesses in heaven, con joining their testimonies together to persuade our spirit (that is, our souls and graces in them), ' that we are the children of God.' And if so under stood, then the witnessing both of the Father and of Christ unto our salva tion is eminently attributed to the Spirit, who only is named, as also in witnessing the truth by Christ, and the especial honour thereof is given: to him, which accords with that fore-cited speech of Christ, John xvi. 14, 15. And thus he is the great witnesser, both of heaven and of earth, to this of our being the sons of God. Eighthly; As thus in respect of evidencing our graces to us, and his join ing with God the Father and Christ in their testimonies also to us, the Spirit doth the work so as to lead us into aU truths of the word and secrets of God whatever, which in this life are revealed ; it is he whom God sends to discover and convince us of them all : 1 Cor. ii. 10, ' He searcheth aU the deep things of God.' He is the keeper of all those archives of eternity, and they are all committed to his custody, and he lets us into the view of them, and reveals what is revealed of them unto us ' as he wUl.' There is not a thing that God hath prepared for us that love him, ver. 9 (which is spoken of the hidden things of the gospel, ver. 7), but he is the manifested of it to one or other of the saints ; it is he leads into all truth : 2 Tim. i. 13 and 14, ' Hold fast the form of sound words, which is in Christ Jesus.' But, alas ! might they say of ourselves, we are apt to let them slip and leak out.(as Heb. ii. 1), and to be ' carried away with every wind of doctrine,'^ Eph. iv. (this we are prone to be), therefore he adds, ver. 14, ' That good thing ' (so he caUs the truth of the doctrine of wholesome words, for bonum et verum convertuntuf), ' keep by the Holy Ghost which dweUeth in us.' Who also brings them home to our remembrance when we have forgotten them, John xiv. 26. And as these matters, in point of faith, and assurance, and joy, and all communion with God the Father and the Son, are transacted by this Spirit, together with the revelation of aU truths, so, Ninthly ; If we view all and the whole of the work and works of sanctifi- tion that are wrought in us, or proceed from us, it wiU appear that it is he that works them all in us and for us. This is the third part of the appli cation of salvation to us ; according to that distribution which Christ makes, John xvi. 8, 11, and which he attributes to the Spirit, 'when he is come, he shaU convince the world of judgment,' that is, of true holiness, sancti' fication, and reformation of heart and life ; as in the Old Testameirl frequently, and in the New, that word judgment is used, as Mat. xn. 20. That Christ shaU ' bring forth judgment to victory,' citing ver. 18 out of the Old, viz., out of Isa. xiii. 1, 'He shall shew judgment to the GentUes.';J And in respect of his working herein, he hath this denomination madtf' appropriate to him, viz., ' a Spirit of judgment,' purging away the filth of sin in his people, Isa.1 iv: 4. And hoUness is called ' the sanctification of the Spirit,' 1 Peter i. 2, and 2 Thess. ii. 13. And for this cause he bears the name of the Holy Spirit, as the eminent efficient of holiness in us. Chap. V.] in our salvation. 29 And accordingly as men have grown up into, and increased more and more in, holiness, they have been said to be filled with the Holy Ghost, as, Luke i. 41, it is said of Elizabeth the mother, and her child the Baptist ; and his eminent holiness is expressed by this, ' He shaU be filled with the Holy Ghost even from his mother's womb,' Luke i. 15. And the same strain of speech goes on in the New Testament : Acts vi. 3, ' Choose men full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom.' Of Barnabas it was said, ' A good man, and full of the Holy Ghost,' Acts xi. 28; and the super-excelling fulness and eminency of Christ's graces is set out by this measure, that he had ' the Spirit above measure ; ' for this Spirit's indwelling in him was the fountain and standard of his infinitely transcending holiness. Let us go over the several particulars of that work. 1. Habitual holiness, and all the principles of holiness. I have shewn afore that they are wholly of his operation, and this our baptism (which is the seal of regeneration, or of the new creature) doth signify in a special manner. The letter of that word Bdxru imports not simply to wash, or to be washed, but to be dyed also. It is also taken from the dyer's vat, into which what clothes are dipped they carry away in them a new habitual tincture. The Holy Ghost takes a man's heart, and dyes it anew, changeth it. As a cloth goes into the vat of one colour and comes out of it of another, ' so is he who is born of the Spirit : ' he goes wholly flesh, comes out spirit in a good degree, ' which two are contrary,' Gal. v. 2. Mortification of sin and to the world, is ascribed to the Spirit : Rom. viii. 13, ' For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die ; but if ye, through the Spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.' It was prophesied by Malachi, Mai. ii. 2, 3, that Christ coming after the Baptist, should ' purify the sons of Levi ' by ' fuller's soap, and the refiner's fire.' Now who is that refiner's fire but this Spirit ? as appears by comparing Isa. iv. 4, where he is styled ' the Spirit of burning,' and ' the Spirit of judgment ;' the Spirit of burning,' consuming and purging out our dross and filth ; and there also is the prophecy of Christ's coming to ' baptize with the Holy Ghost and with fire,' as the Baptist expounded it ; the Holy Ghost, as it is spoken, partly because what remaining filth his baptism of water had not cleansed out, Christ's Spirit, as fire, should do it ; for, Num. xxxi. 23, tbe fire is made a stronger purifier than water ; and even of the Baptist himself and. his ministry (the Spirit of God accompanying it), it was foretold by Isaiah, chap, xl., that the glory and beauty of the whole creation should be blasted, and caused to fade and wither, as flowers of the grass are by a wind, in and to new converts' hearts, and deading their souls, being deadened unto it, when the voice of the crier should come and preach repentance to the people, and the glory of the Lord (Christ, namely) should be revealed. The grass withered, and the flower faded (ver. 7) in such men's hearts as were savingly wrought upon by his voice and cry. And how came this to pass ? It is added, ' The Spirit of the Lord hath blown upon it.' And the apostle Peter expounding this prophecy, says, That all believers wrought upon by his and the apostle's ministry, had ' purified their souls,' 1 Peter i. 22, by the preaching of the gospel, and then referreth us unto this very place in Isaiah, ' Being born again ;' ver. 23, ' For all flesh is as grass, and the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof faUeth away ; but the word of the Lord endureth for ever ; and this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you, ver. 24 and 25. 3. There is in Scripture ascribed to the Holy Ghost the implantation of 30 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK ]f| all the contrary graces, which are so often compared to flowers and the gardens of them, and unto trees in orchards and beds of spices, planted artificially by a florist (which is an aUusion the Holy Ghost delights to use in that book of Canticles) ; the fruits and flowers whereof shall never fade (as the flower of grass doth), but grow up, and flourish to eternal life; which flowers, &c, because»planted in her heart, the spouse there calleth her garden — ' upon my garden ' — as also Christ caUs it his garden, and both in that one verse, Cant., iv. 16, which, as appears by ver. 12, was her own self. ' An enclosed garden is my sister, my spouse,' says Christ of her, ' a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.' And ver. 13 and 14, ' Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon ;' which is certainly an enumeration of particular graces in their distinction and variety, if we knew how aptly to apply those similitudes in each to what is proper to each. But however, it serves in general to instruct us, that there is such a variety of graces in our hearts, as here of trees in the spouse's heart, * and that the heart of every saint is an orchard to such spiritual plants growing therein ; and in like manner, a garden to a like variety of flowers, as in ver. 12. And various graces are meant by either. And the planting and bringing forth these are all ascribed to the Holy Spirit, as Christ's chief planter. Thus I understand that fore-cited ver. 12, ' A garden enclosed, a spring shut up,' to intend that she had two things enclosed in her heart. (1.) All sorts of graces, planted as in a garden, as the effects. (2.) The indwelling of the Spirit, as the spring and producer of all these flowers, and accordingly in ver. 15 she is said to be 'a fountain of gardens, a well of living water, and streams from Lebanon.' Now that well of living water is apparently the Spirit : John iv. 14, ' But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst'; but the water that I shall give him, shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life f which is interpreted to be the Holy Ghost (John vii. 38, 39), which comes as a spring from Lebanon, that is, from that high mountain, even front: heaven, from the throne of God and of the Lamb, as Rev. xxi. 1, ' And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb,' which wateretn these flowers ; which well the church hath in her belly, as Christ's word is in that of John the Evangelist, chap. vii. 38. And all these plants in Christ's garden, which is the soul of a believer, are of the Spirit's bringing forth and setting ; for as the earth, watered with fructifying water, brings forth plants as at the first creation, so the soul, bedewed with the Spirit, brings forth ' trees of righteousness, of the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified,' Isa. lxi. 3 ; which (as appears by comparing ver. 1) is recorded as the effect of Christ's having this Spirit given him : ' The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, to preach the gospel,' whereof this is made the immediate effect, viz., ih% communicating the same Spirit unto his members, for this end, to plant in them trees of righteousness. Thus it is ascribed unto this Spirit, and ver. 11 of the same chapter it is added, ' For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth the things that are sown in it to sprint forth, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth'before all nations.' In a word, he is styled the Spirit of grace, Heb. x. 29 as the eminent efficient of all our graces ; and therefore, they that apostatise are said to do despite unto this Spirit, as he is the efficient of all graces and gracious workings. * Qu. ' garden' ? — En. Chap. V.] in our salvation. 31 4. As the planting, so the drawing them forthwith into act, both bud and fruit, and causing them to grow, is his work also. (1.) The drawing them forth into act, or the acting of them, or the caus ing them to shoot forth, is ascribed to him. He is that wind which, blow ing upon our graces, causeth them to flow out, even as his blowing upon the flower of the grass (as you heard out of Isa. xl.) withers and mortifies the flowers or glories of this world to new converts. And this follows in the next words of the same chapter : Cant. iv. 16, ' Awake, 0 north wind; and come, thou south ; blow upon my garden,' says the spouse, ' that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.' There are two prayers in those word: the first to the Spirit, ' Come, thou south wind, and blow ;' and the second to Christ himself, ' Let my beloved come into his garden ' when it shall be thus blown upon. First, the wind there apparently is the Holy Ghost, Ezek. xxxvii. 3d, 14th verses compared with 5th, 6th : ' As the wind bloweth where it listeth, so is he that is born of the Spirit.' The Spirit is a quick ening wind (the breath of the living God and of Christ), who coming upon a man doth regenerate him, and infuse a new spirit into him, as Christ had there said. And after he is thus quickened and born, a soul new born of the Spirit, then by blowing thereon the same Spirit doth cause him to operate and act as such a new creature, who is so high born, should in some measure do. Insomuch as aU and the whole of him who is truly born again is from this Spirit, not only his first begetting, but his after actings ; which latter Christ also involves in saying, ' so is he that is born of the Spirit,' supposing him first to have been begotten anew. If any shall object, that the Spirit is but one and the same Spirit, viz., the person, and how can he be termed both the north wind and the south wind, which are not only diverse, but blow contrary ways ? the answer is, It is true the person of the Holy Ghost is one and the same person, as in himself considered, but his being said to be a wind is in respect of his operations upon us ; and so his blasts may blow several ways, not only in these two points of the compass there mentioned, but several others ; and in this respect he is said to be ' seven spirits,' Rev. i. 7, from whom grace is there prayed for as weU as from Christ and the Father. And even the natural wind in the air is one and the same wind for the substance of it, whilst yet it turneth itself about, as God pleaseth, unto several quarters, from north to south, &c. And this objection is preoccupated by the apostle : 1 Cor. xii. 3, 4, ' Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit ; ' and so on, ver. 6-8, and ' there are differences of administra tions,' &c. NW, both these contrary winds are needful "to cause the several graces in believers to flow forth : ' Come,' says the spouse, praying to this Spirit, ' come, and blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out.' So then the Spirit's operations upon those graces is the blowing upon them ; and their exerting that hidden virtue or active power that lies latent in them, through the excitement and actings of the Holy Ghost, is that their flowing forth. And it is as if she had said, I indeed have these plants and graces habitually rooted in me by thee, 0 holy and blessed Spirit ; but I am utterly unable so much as so give forth the least scent or virtue of them (which other plants naturally do) without thy breath ing on them, and moving and impregnating of them. Yet even earthly plants yield their fragrancy of themselves yet more strongly and abundantly when the wind drives them to and fro, and exhales the scent out of them ; but 32 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK L.V| she, in the sense of her utter inability, prays to the Spirit to come and in fluence her. And from hence, by the way, we may dbserve an instance of a warrant to pray distinctly to the person of the Spirit ; as if it had been said by her, Awake, and come, thou Holy Spirit. As Ukewise to pray distinctly to the person of Christ, as she also doth in these next words, ' Let my be loved come ; ' and that is, Then be thou also pleased to come and visit thy garden, when first thy Spirit, sent by thee, hath drawn out and educed from out of those plants that are growing therein, those pleasant savours so pleasing to thee, which these my graces, when thus' acted by the Spirit, do afford. And indeed the many former prayers and petitions, ever and anon found up and down in this book of the Canticles, do put it out of all question that it is useful for us thus to pray to each person. There is not so much as the least good thought, nor the least bud which we with all our inherent graces are able to bring forth, unless this Holy Spirit efficaciously blows upon us, 2 Cor. iii. 6. It is the Spirit (says he) who is _Mi>, that quickens and gives life ; and he speaks this of the Holy Spirit joining with the gospel, even the Spirit of the living God, whom he had under that title mentioned afore in ver. 3. And that his quickening relateth unto all and everything of the Spirit of life within us, even unto the production of but one, a single individual one action, though it also be but the least good thought, is expressly said in ver. 5 : ' Not that we are suffi-. cient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves ; but our sufficiency is of God ; ' that is, unless God (the living God) by his living Spirit (as in ver. 3) do form it in us, and although the matter of a good thought were cast into our minds, yet as seed thrown into a barren soil, it would sow this in our hearts, it would instantly become a dead work, such as all the works of unregenerate men are, Heb. vi. 1. So that our eyes should be fixed upon and entirely ascribe all that is good in us to this Spirit as the author. And though we and our wills do concur in the acting also, yet he is the efficient of that concurrence in us, causing us to do ; yea, and is the cause of every degree of that goodness in our actings, ' dividing to every man severally as he wiU,' 1 Cor. xii. 11. 3. The Spirit produceth all the spiritual strength we receive, when our hearts are ready to be overborne with temptations, or a lust ; or when we' want strength to do such and such a work or duty ; to suffer, that we may be able to endure in such a trial. It is the Spirit gives strength to the inner man (Eph. iii. 16, compared with Coloss. i. 10 and 11), likeas the Spirit fell on Samson, and gave him strength, who of himself was other? wise but as other men. It was he made EUas so bold and courageous, and the prophet Amos* after him, chap. iii. 8, ' Truly,' says he, ' I am full of power, by the Spirit of the Lord, and of judgment, and of might, to declare to Judah his transgression, and to Israel his sin.' The like he gave the Baptist to tell Herod of his sin, which cost him his life. It was because he came in the power and spirit of Elias. Take the weakest heart that is, as weak as water (as the prophet speaks), and let the Spirit join with it, and mingle himself therewith, and it is too hard and strong for aU the worl&i it will snap asunder tentations, as Samson did his withs. There is, *; supply of the Spirit, Phil. i. 10, comes in with fresh forces, when we are near to a yielding up the fort, and being led captive, and so he rescues and delivers us. In all our walkings with God, he is our guide and faithful. companion, to see to us and keep us out of harm's way. And often when * ' Micah.'— En. Chap. V.] in our salvation. 33 we stumble, he puts under his hand, as the psalmist's word is. And a little help keeps up a man that is falling or reeling, or to recover him again when he is falling. And thus the apostle seems to intend that speech, ' who helpeth our infirmities,' Rom. viu. And those infirmities there are not to be limited to the infirmities that belong to and accompany our prayers only, but which accompany us in all our ordinary walkings. The word ,: as it was styled in that psalm, ' The day of his power ; ' not of man's will. ' Christ's power had the day of it in overcoming man's will. And whereas it is said, that ' God worketh in us to will and to do,' it is not by his giving in power only to will or to do, but to will, Ti 6'iXeiv, the act of will ing, lb 6'sXeiv; and the giving this was the Spirit's gift. So in those con-. verts it was by the Spirit (as Ps. ex. compared with Acts ii. will inform^ lis), who is indeed the power of the Most High, Luke i. 35. And to cause us to do, and therefore to will, is expressly attributed to this Spirit in Ezek. xxxvi., where, first, it is said, ' A new heart also wih I give you, and a new spirit I will put within you : and I will take- away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh ; ' which words' denote the creating of those principles of spiritual Ufe and habitual graces ; and then it is added, ver. 27, ' I wUl put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments and do them.' What is this other but the same with that in the Philippians, to ' work in us to will and to do ' ? For if to do, then to be sure to will. And this promise of the covenant (and it is the covenant of grace is there promulged) is to work in us an evangelical obedience unto aU the commandments, which begins first with to will, and then follows to do, according unto that of the apostlei? ' Not to do, but to be willing,' 2 Cor. viii. 10. ¦'"'- 6. As all the principles and the production of the acts and fixing the will, so our whole growth in grace, from first to last, is attributed to this Spirit also : Isa. xliv. 3, 4, ' I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground : I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring : and they shall spring up as the grass, as wUlows by the water courses,' or streams. There are two things that cause the springing up of grass and growth in wiUows. 1. Sufficiency and plenty of water, either rain from heaven or streams of rivers, when trees (as willows) are seated by them. 2. The sun and the sweet influences thereof, Deut. xxxii. And for this latter we have elsewhere our Lord Christ compared to the sun in this very respect: Mai. iv. 2, ' But unto yon that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings ; and ye shaU grow up as calves in the stall ;' as the sun cause- trees and plants to grow, so beasts too, which latter allusion he prosecutes there. But in that of Isa. xliv. he compares the Spirit to the floods and the rain, which, increasing the sap within the root and body of the trees, Chap. V.] in our salvation. 35 causeth them to grow up and bring forth fruits, even to old age : 'I will pour floods upon the dry ground : I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed.' 7. The acceptance of all these fruits by God, and of our persons by God for them, both all along, and speciaUy when all is finished and perfected, is by and from the Holy Ghost. Thus Rom. xv. 16 the apostle speaks, ' That the offerings up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.' In which words he sets out the great function and success of his gospel ministry, under allusions to the Levitical priesthood, as that which succeeded that of the law (Isa. Ixvi. 20), in declaring how there had been a far more excellent sacrifice offered up to God by his preaching than had been by them of old. Their sacrifices were but of beasts, but this was of men — the souls of men, which by his preaching had been converted to God, even an innumerable company of the Gentiles, which were the first fruits and foundation of the church of the New Testament. These sacrifices of the gospel also in number far exceed anyjjof the sacrifices of the Old Testa ment that were at any one time ever offered up ; yea, than there had been by Solomon, at the foundation and consecration of his new-built temple ; and yet all this was as the work but of one apostle. Of those Old Testa ment sacrifices, it is still noted how and what acceptableness they had with God, as Abel's, Heb. xi. ; as Noah's, Gen. viii. 20, 21, ' God smelt a sweet savour ;' and of Solomon, testified by fire coming down from heaven. Now of this great New Testament oblation here, that which gave the accept^ ableness is expressly said to be the being sanctified by the Holy Ghost, * as the cause that rendered them acceptable ; and our translators favour it, if not imply it, in rendering it, ' Being sanctified by the Holy Ghost ;' that is, in that, or because, it was sanctified by the Holy Ghost, and therefore accept able. As for the apostle's own part, he professeth himself but the poor instrument ; so in the following 18th verse; and that it was Christ, and his Spirit, had wrought all by him. And as he wrought nothing in those Gentile hearts, so the acceptation of what was wrought was much less from any consideration whatever in him to make this sacrifice accepted by the holy God. Far be that from the least of our thoughts ; for it is to be attributed unto Christ as the worker of it, ver. 18, and unto the Spirit, in this 16th verse, and unto the Spirit as well as unto Christ. Neither is our sanctifi cation, simply in itself, and abstractly considered, as it is in us, of force and virtue alone, to cause this acceptation. This the confessions of David and Daniel, &c, abundantly do declare. It is the matter indeed, or thing, that is accepted, but not the ground or cause of the acceptation. And therefore that word Iv, in (as in the original), which is translated by the Holy Ghost, is, not added barely to shew that the Holy Ghost was the author of this and all other sanctification that is accepted, but that it might be noticed that it was he who was and is the main and principal cause of that acceptation ; and for which it hath a due value with God, even for this reason, that our sancti fication is the work of the Holy Ghost. As we esteem the work for the workman's sake, so doth God our works for the Holy Ghost's sake, as the worker of it. If it be said that our good works and holiness have their acceptation from Christ ; it is granted, as most true, our persons are accepted in his person, as ' the beloved,' Eph. i. 6, and our works in his works of mediation, the Bole meritorious cause of that acceptation, and as by way of mediation be tween God and us, insomuch as Christ is said to be made sanctification * Acceptationis istius oblationis sive victimae, causam tribuit sanctifieationi. — Rolloc in verba. 36 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. itself to us, 1 Cor. i. 30, as if it were no sanctification in the sight of God, that is not made accepted for such in Christ. And by him we offer up our sacrifices to God ; and God is weU pleased with them, Heb. xiii. 15 and 16. And upon such an account the Holy Ghost is not the cause of this kind of acceptation. This honour is Christ's alone ; yet so as there is left room for this Holy Spirit to have the glory of procuring acceptation to our good works another way, namely, in that he is the efficient of them, and in that they are his works in us. Yea, and our persons also are in such a like respect accepted in and for the Holy Ghost, in that we are the temples of the Holy Ghost, and he dweUs in us ; and God hath respect to the temple for his sake that dweUs therein. Therefore give and acknowledge that honour to the Spirit, for his work and interest, as weU as to the Son for his. If we have recourse to the metaphor the apostle began with, and continues along to the end of the verse, viz., that the Gentiles were made a sacrifice and an offering to God, and had their lusts slain by the gospel^the sword of the Spirit, as the sacrificing knife, and this by the Holy Ghost, accord ing to that in chap, viii., ' You by the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body,' we may extend the allusion to the acceptation of a sacrifice. There were two things made the sacrifice acceptable, viz., the altar upon which the offering was made, which Christ teacheth us, ' The altar sanctifies the gift ;' and that most fitly represented Christ's part in our acceptation : Heb. xiii. 10, ' We have an altar,' namely Christ, by whom we offer our sacrifice of praises, and by whom they are accepted, ver. 12, 15, 16. But then there was fire also, which came forth immediately from the Lord, and consumed the burnt offering that was upon the altar. So it was at first in Moses's time, Lev. ix. 24 ; and the second time fire came down from heaven, and did the Uke in Solomon's time, 2 Chron. vii. 1, when the temple was finished and conse crated. This signified the Holy Spirit, who comes out from God, ro •?nevp,a rb ix rov ®iov, 1 Cor. ii. 12, even as that fire came forth from the Lord, and came upon the apostles to convert the world, like fire ; according to the promise that they should be ' baptized with the Holy Ghost, as with fire.' And he is termed the ' Spirit of burning,' Isa. iv. 4, as the sacrifices are termed burnt-offerings and fire -offerings. And as the fire caused the sacri fice to ascend in smoke (and therefore the Hebrew word for a burnt-offering is Gnolak, ascension), and consumed the offering to ashes, so doth this Spirit cause our sacrifice, as well as the altar : Ps. xx. 3, ' The Lord accept thy burnt sacrifice.' It is in the Hebrew, ' The Lord shall turn to ashes,' "which our translators rightly translate accept, from the wonted speech of Moses's law, which informs us that the smoke which ascended from the sacrifice by reason of the fire, is termed up and down in the Levitical law ' a rest before the Lord,' and ' a savour of rest,' Lev. vi. 15 ; which the paraphrasts do in terminis, in our own phrase and words, render ' a favour able acceptation with the Lord ;' and this sweet savour is expressly attributed to the fire, as that which did thus sanctify the offering, and the acceptation of the sacrifice, its being a fire-offering. He puts it upon account, Lev. i. 9 and 13. It is a burnt offering (says the text there), ' an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the Lord,' as if he would have said, it is therefore of a sweet savour because made by fire. So then as Christ af" the altar and mediator, gives, an acceptation, so the Spirit, as the fire that consumes the sacrifice, and causeth it to ascend in smoke, causeth the accepta tion also ; but either upon differing accounts, as was explained. 8. The whole edification of every saint, by the means of grace, which are the ordinances and other means whatsoever, all flow from the benign Chap. V.] in our salvation. 37 influences of this Spirit accompanying them, and bedewing men's hearts by them. And for the proof of this in general, you have that passage, Acts ix. 31, ' Then had the churches rest, and were edified, walking in the fear of the Lord.' And so it is said of churches walking in all the order and ordinances of Christ ; as of the Colossian church it is spoken (chap, ii.) that they did so ; 'in the comfort of the Holy Ghost,' as the author of that edifi cation and comfort by those ordinances. I shall instance particularly in the main ordinances of our salvation, and shew how our profiting by them is from the Spirit. In the preaching of the word we receive not only the fruits of the Holy Spirit, but the Spirit himself, by the hearing of faith, that is, by the hear ing the gospel preached, which is the doctrine of truth : ' Our gospel came not to you in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost,' 1 Thess. i. 5 ; 'I create the fruit of the lips, peace, and teach thee to profit,' namely, by the Ups of those who by office are said to ' preserve knowledge,' Mai. ii. 7. All which profiting is attributed to the Spirit : 1 Cor. xii. 7, ' But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.' *It is the profit both of a man's self and others. And the Holy Spirit's care is very great herein ; he is the Providore General, to oversee the overseers of the flock, and to see to it, provide the fittest stewards for every flock : Acts xx. 28, ' The flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you over seers.' And he furnisheth them with such gifts as shall best serve and most suitably agree unto their capacities, and the bore of their understand ings, and to work on their hearts ; and in providential grace disposeth of them and their gifts as shall be most agreeable to their spirits and spiritual condition. As some ministers are fitted for the profiting of the weak, so others to the wise ; even as the apostle says he was a debtor to both, Rom. i. And then he takes a further special care of their forehand medi tations and preparations, to suggest such materials and notions for their sermons as shaU be a food most convenient for men's souls. They are ' stewards, that give meat in due season,' Mat. xxiv. 45. He fills the breasts of ministers (their spiritual nurses) with consolations and other truths, suitable to the temper and constitution of their stomachs, and in- structeth them to speak words in season ; and this very often unknown to themselves that speak them, they not having any aim at thee or any other man in particular in such passages, which also are utterly unexpected to or perhaps not prayed for by him whom yet they greatly concern, when yet the Holy Ghost knew whom to direct those passages unto, and had set up thy heart as the mark to shoot those arrows into it. 9. And lastly, to draw to a conclusion, and it is indeed the happy con clusion and crown of the whole work of the Spirit upon us, for we are now come to the brink of eternity, the consummation of all. (1.) With respect to death, this Holy Spirit, the Comforter, all our life long feeds and maintains by fiuth, more or less, a lively hope within them that are regenerate : 1 Pet. i.' 3, ' Blessed be God, that hath begotten us again to a lively hope ; ' which, according to the degree of it in any, allays that fear of death, the king of sorrows, Job xviii. 14 ; the fear of which all men (which have not this Spirit) are subject unto the bondage of all their lifetime, Heb. ii. 15 ; from the dominion of which bondage the Spirit of adoption frees us, Rom. viii. 15, so as to have our spirits supported by. faith, so far as ordinarily to be able (when put to it in earnest) to venture or cast our souls into the hands of God as a Father. And this the Scrip tures attribute unto this good Spirit. In the 2d Corinthians, 4th and 5th 38 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. chapters, the apostle treats of a believer's dying, and comforts himself and them against it ; for upon occasion, as the times then were, he and other saints were in continual hazard of death; as ver. 11, 'For we that live are always delivered unto deatli for Jesus' sake.' Now, from whence or from whom had he and they supports and reliefs against this, but from the Spirit, his working and upholding faith in them ? ' We having the same Spirit of faith, according as it is written,' &c, and pertinently quotes a saying of David's under the Old Testament in the 116th Psalm, where he had been under apparent apprehensions of death, as in the third verse, upon occasion of which David had uttered that speech, ' I believed, there fore have I spoken,' ver. 10 ; and spoke it, as it were, in defiance of death and all the fears of it, and dangers about it. Now, whence had David this confidence ? From the Spirit, says the apostle, as who wrought and main-, tained that faith in him. Thus it was in the Old Testament, 'and we' (says he, under the New Testament), 'having the same Spirit of faith,' we, upon the view of such apparent dangers of death, believe and therefore speak, with a far greater confidence, by how much the Spirit that is in the New exceeds in his comforts the same that was in the Old ; but, from the same Spirit, both. And what spake he by this Spirit of faith ? It foUows in ver. 14, ' We knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus ; ' this they spake and believed, and comforted themselves with against dying. Again, in the 5th chapter, what made him confident of a house in heaven when this earthly tabernacle should be dissolved ? Even this, and above aU this, that God hath given us the earnest of his Spirit, ver. 5, to bind the promise of eternal life. And from thence it is (says he) that 'we are always confident,' &c, ver. 6; always, which extends both to aU along our lives, and also at our deaths. Which is a second thing, that when we come to die, or that the time of death approacheth, and is coming upon us, this Spirit it is given to sup* port us. For if always, as the apostle even now said, and at all other times of our lives, and upon other occasions of fears and distress, he is given to help our infirmities, Rom. viii. 28, then especially when we are weakest, as at death (to be sure) we shaU be, when our flesh fails, &c, Ps. Ixxiii. 26. (2.) And at the last day of the world, who is it shall raise thee up, having kept thy bones, dwelt in thy dust aU this while, as Christ's Godhead did his body, which therefore though in the grave David caUs the 'Holy One'? Ps. xvi. It is this Spirit: Rom. vni. 11, 'But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dweUeth in you.' It is brought in as the comfortable consequent of this Spirit dwelling in us ; and having raised thee, leaves thee not, but is the author of all thy glory and communion with Father, Son, and himself for ever, 1 Pet. iv. 14. He is in that respect termed the Spirit of glory ; not of grace only, but of glory: 'Blessed are ye, for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth on you ; ' that is, you possess for ever this fountain of all glory, this Spirit of God, therefore the promise of the Spirit is made ade quate to the whole blessing (as being the mass of blessings) which was given to Abraham : Gal. iii. 14, ' That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles though Jesus Christ ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.'' The whole is termed the promise of the Spirit. Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 39 CHAPTER VI. The uses of the precedent doctrine. Use 1. Let me a little affect your hearts with the love of the Spirit, from and upon occasion of all that hath been said. There is a daily intercourse with, and meditation of, the love of the Father and the love of Christ. There is a fellowship of the Father, and a fellowship of the Son, in the souls of every believer. But the Holy Ghost, though he hath been uni- versaUy aknowledged as a person equal to either, yet we do not hold and pursue after fellowship with him as a distinct person ; nor is his love in what he hath done for us set on as a seal upon our hearts. Whereas the Scriptures (though more sparingly, because it was he who wrote them) do urge obligations upon us, drawn from him, as well as the other two persons. If we believe he is a person in the Trinity, let us treat with him as a person, apply ourselves to him as a person, glorify him in our hearts as a person, dart forth beams of special and peculiar love to, and converse with him as with a person. Let us fear to grieve him, and also believe on him, as a person ; which our very Creed directs us to. Do you profess to hold communion and converse with the saints ? I beseech you, have it with the maker of them, the Holy Ghost ; and this not at second hand, by having feUowship with those he dwells in, but immediately also with himself. Because the Spirit is intimior intimo, is so nearly and intimately united to us, dwells in us as our own souls do in us, therefore we converse not with him (as we do seldom with our own souls), but are most of all stran gers thereto. Also because his work is but new beginning, and as yet imperfect, and but a foundation of that buUding in eternity to be raised : whereas Christ hath perfected his, hath ' perfected for ever those that are sanctified' (Heb. x. 14), by one offering once made ; it is therefore we dis cern not (mind, not) the Holy Ghost, or his works, as we do Christ and his. But what says the apostle, Rom. xv. 30, ' Now I beseech you, bre thren, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me,' &c. You see he adjures them by the Spirit, and his love, and their love unto the Spirit, as well as for Christ's sake. The occasion was, ' that ye would pray for me,' says he, that that work of the ministry (which is properly the Holy Ghost's work, Acts xiii. 2), may prosper in my hand. And if you profess love to the Spirit, whose work it is, and so consider his love to you, who hath done so much for you, his honour in this work will be dear to you. And inasmuch as he had urged them just before, ' for the Lord Christ's sake,' and then subjoins, ' for the love of the Spirit,' surely he must mean in like connection of sense, that for the Spirit's sake also, and for his love's sake towards them, who had borne no less love to them than Christ had done, they would do what he exhorted them to. Sure his exhortation faUs not lower, nor runs in a lower way, to mean only the love which they bore to the Spirit, but it means that love which the Spirit himself bore to them, and which is equal to that of Christ. And the edge of his persuasive farther lies in this, and is as if he had said, Seeing that when we exhort you for Christ's sake, it useth to take with you, to move and prevail with you ; so when we urge you by the love of the Spirit, it wiU have no less effect, if you do but consider all he hath done for you, or is to you. Now when he moves them for Christ's 40 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. sake (as in the first place he doth), the meaning is to obtest them by all the love that Christ had borne them, and by what he had done for them. When, therefore, he adds, ' and for the love of the Spirit' (the Spirit being a per son we are obliged to, as well as unto Christ), can you think he had not this as his more especial aim, to move them in Uke manner by this very love of the Holy Ghost, who indeed deals altogether in the affairs of love from the Father and the Son ? He proceeds from them by way of love, and love in them mutuaUy each to other is the original of his person. And as he is the love that is between them both, so it is he who sheds abroad the love of both into our hearts ; and it is he who is grieved, as a friend or , person that loves us (as Eph. iv. 30), when we sin, or neglect that duty which is his care and charge to work in us. And as this is the apostle's scope, so this love of his ought to be very dear unto us ; for if we single out any thing earnestly to entreat some other thing from another, that thing we entreat them by must be supposed to be most precious to us. Again, when, Rom. viu., he hsd insisted on this, that there is the Spirit of Christ in us, or we are none of his, he then begins the enumeration of many great things this Spirit doth for us throughout that chapter, by those arguments persuading us not to live after the flesh, but after the Spirit. In the midst of these persuasives he comes in with this, ' Wherefore, brethren, we are debtors, but not to the flesh.' Those words make two entire sentences, one affirmative, that ' we are debtors ;' the other negative, ' but not to the flesh ; ' we are not debtors to the flesh. Now to whom is it he affirms we are debtors ? Evidently the Spirit, as not only the words of opposition, ' not to the flesh' (which two are in this chap ter set as avrixh,u,evot, as contraries and opposites, as everywhere else), but as the coherence and the illation — ' therefore we are debtors' — shew. It was this Spirit he had last spoken of, the Spirit that dwelleth in us as a guide and leader, actor and informer of us, as the soul in our souls : ver. 11, ' _ the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dweUeth in you.' And from thence he infers, 'therefore we are debtors.' To whom but to him ? Debtors unto what ? To live after the Spirit and not after the flesh : so ver. 12, 13, ' Not to the flesh, to live after the flesh ; for if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die : but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.' The obligation here, you see, runs in the Spirit's name, the arrest is at his suit. Debtors then we are, and infinitely indebted to him, and this for dweUing in us ; and because we are led and guided by him, as a person that loves us, are we wonderfully beholden unto him. And those next words, ' As many as are led by the Spirit,' directs us to treat with him as with a person, a fami liar, a friend, that walks with us, takes us by the hand, talks to you, adviseth you as the Spirit of counsel (as, Isa. xi. 2, he is called), continually speaking m us, ' This is God's way, walk in it.' Again, when we read 2 Cor. xiii. 14, ' The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you' : that Konwiu, which we translate communion, doth it not, and may it not, import the fellowship and converse that the Holy Ghost vouchsafes to us with himself, as weU as that with the Father and the Son ? 1 John i. 4. The word in both places is one and the same. And when he moves them (Phil. ii. 1) by all these considerations, ' If there be any consolation in Christ, any fellowship of the Spirit,' &c, why should we not interpret ' fellowship of the Spirit' for con verse and intercourse had by us from him as a person, as well as consola- Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 41 tion in Christ, is that which is in the person of Christ ? Out of such an experimental sense of sweet familiarity and converse had with the Spirit of God, doth that speech of Holy David seem to proceed, Ps. cxliii. 10, ' Thy Spirit is good, lead me.' Methinks he speaks so feelingly of him, and of that sweetness he had found in him as a friend, as if he had said, I have found his counsel and converse so good, 0 give me more of them. And when he bids us grieve him not (Eph. iv. 30), doth it not import one whom we converse with daily, that is full of love and kindness to us, full of ten derness, whose love we should ftake in, and consider, and have a wary, watchful regard to, and grieve with him if we offend him ? I cannot enlarge upon the work he hath done and is to do for us, which yet is proper to this occasion. I shall only instance in what, in the doctrinal part, I have been so large in, and in that which, Rom. viii. 11, 12, the apostle putteth this very obligation upon ; our being debtors to the Spirit. He had in that chapter spoken much and great things about the Spirit's indwelling in us, and the fruits thereof: and he spoke thus, ver. 11, ' If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised Jesus from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Christ's love was in dying, the Spirit's is shewn in his indwelling in us. His inference from thence is, ver. 12, ' Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.' But that the greatness of his love and grace may appear unto us, and we may put a due value upon it, let us compare it with the love of Christ him self in being incarnate, and dwelling in our nature for us. You account it infinite love in him to leave the bosom of his Father, to come down from heaven, and become one person with a man, to be made flesh, and so to be made less than his Father in that respect. Yea, and this love is the greater, inasmuch as he assumed this nature as clothed with all infirmities of flesh and blood, the likeness of sinful flesh, and dwelt among us, and endured such contradictions of sinners, as the apostle speaks. And this union was the foundation of aU his work and satisfaction for us. And herein God commended his love, as Heb. ii. you have it set forth. And yet set this grace of the Holy Ghost's indwelling in us by it, and it riseth up unto an equaUty ; and though it fall lower in some respects, yet exceed ing that of Christ in others, the scales will be acknowledged even. It fallSjlower in this, that the union between him and us is not personal, as that of Christ's is with his human nature ; but yet it is as near it as possibly may be, for it is an immediate union of our persons to and with his person, so as to have an eternal right personal to each other, and ever lastingly to dwell each in other. And it indeed was well for us we had not a personal union with the Spirit ; for our defilements (if remaining) would then have defiled and been imputed unto his person. In other things it is equal ; For, 1. Both are said to come aUke down from heaven ; the Spirit (1 Pet. i. 12) as well as Christ. 2. He indwells in us for ever, as was shewn. He is in us ; and shall be with us married as indivisibly without all divorce, as the Son of God and that human nature also are. Yea, and as Christ continued his union with the body in the grave, so those words (Rom. viii. 11), ' The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by his Spirit that dwelleth in you,' import, that the Spirit continueth his union and relation to the body (which, 1 Cor. vi. 19, is also called his temple) even within the grave, and fallen to dust. 42 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. But, 3. In these things the love shewn by the Spirit in such his union with us doth exceed. . . , (1.) That though indeed the Son of God dwelt and dwells thus intimately in a human nature, yet it is a nature made holy, harmless, separate from sin and sinners, Heb. vii. But this good Spirit's lot and part is to come at first into hearts full of all defilements, into rags of uncleanlmess, into flesh that is and hath whoUy corrupted itself. Of old this was made a wonder by Solomon ; ' WUl God in very deed dwell on earth, in a house which I have built for him, whom the heaven and the earth cannot contam ?' 2 Chron. vi. 18. But here is a wonder of wonders, that the holy God (as the Spirit is) should dwell in hearts so unholy and unclean, and make them his temples (as 1 Cor. vi. 19). . (2.) Christ indeed dwelt among us, and conversed with sinful men, whereby he suffered daily such contradictions of sinners. But it was a contradiction merely from without, and yet this grated on his spirit (nothing more), insomuch as it is said he pleased not himself in the best of his com pany, Rom. xv. 3. But the union of the Holy Ghost, and his indwelling in us, is in our sinful hearts ; so as often, where his indweUing is mentioned, it is inserted (Gal. iv. 6), ' He sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts.' 2 Cor. i. 22, ' He hath given the earnest of his Spirit into our hearts.' _ John vii. 38 ; this spring of living water is said to be in the belly, environed about with mud. All which imports a nearer union than that of Christ within us ; to which this limitation is added, ' He dwells in our hearts by faith.' But of the Spirit it is said everywhere that he dwells in us. It is originally his title, 2 Tim. i. 14, to be styled, ' He that dweUs within us.' Now the contradiction which he by reason of this near inhabitation endures must needs be much greater and quicker to his sense, from those he dwells thus within, and hath entered into, and hath undertaken such a conjunction withal, than that of outward converse, which Christ only endured. For if what Christ says in another case be true, what is from without should offend ; then how much more that which is from within, the person one dwells withal ? And in this respect he alone of all the three persons is said to be grieved, having taken on him the part of an intimate friend. A father (as God the Father) is offended, but a famihar friend is grieved. It argues a nearer striking home at the heart. And in this respect he hath had an hard task of it, and this from the beginning of the world. He hath been burdened, and felt the weight of the old world (Gen vi.), ' My Spirit shall not always strive with man therein.' And yet he reUeves himself by bringing the flood upon them after an hundred and twenty years. But against these he thus indwells in, whom he regenerates, he hath no reUef ; for he hath eternally undertaken for them. And is it nothing, think you, to have his work continually spoiled? Never to find the soul as he left it ? To have that heart he dweUs in con tinually resisting and contradicting of him ? To have that unspun in the night which he hath woven in the day ? To have made a good prayer in us, and that swept away, as if it were but a cobweb, by lust that riseth?;i To have his greatest enemy, the devil, blaspheme him and his graces, in his own house, in his own hearing ? If Lot's righteous soul was vexed, or our own graces within us troubled ; then how much more is the author of all grace, dwelling in us, insomuch as he is weary of this world, and the course held in this respect ? And to that account I have sometimes in my thoughts cast that speech, Rev. xxii., where we find some outcries for Christ's coming, that he would Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 43 come quickly. * The Spirit says, Come ' (speaking to Christ), as well as * the bride says, Come.' She, that she may enjoy her husband ; he, that he may be eased. He groans to be unburdened of this conflict with sinful hearts he dweUs in (as our souls are said to do, 2 Cor. v.), as having so long borne the trouble and grief of this work, which till there is an end of all by Christ's coming, he is designed unto. Vse 2. There is another use of this doctrine, which I urge to nnregene- rate men. Well, God by his providence hath brought thee once more to the word, which the apostle calls the ministration of the Spirit. Now con sider, though thou hast been never so empty, dry, and barren of goodness, and art now in thy filthiness, thou mayest carry home the Spirit with thee, and therein thou art passive ; but if thou dost, it will cost thee something in his workings on thee ; he will work strangely on thy heart. Thou mayest now begin to be possessed of the richest gift God hath to bestow. Thou earnest to see fashions, a reed shaken with the wind, as John's hearers did ; but thou standest in the wind of the Spirit, and he may seize upon thee, and save thee ; for he comes upon men without preparation, and then works aU. I shaU open but two or three scriptures to this purpose. In Isa. xliv. 3, there is the promise of the Spirit (which in Gal. iii. is said'to have been made to Abraham and his seed), ' I wUl pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the diy ground ;' which Isaiah himself in terprets, ' I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring ; and they shall spring up ' (as herbs, namely) ' among the grass,' &c. ' One shaU say, I am the Lord's,' &c. And this scripture also did our Saviour Christ aUude to in the promise of his Spirit to the woman of Samaria : John iv. 14, ' But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into eternal life.' He alludes also to the same scripture in what he says to his disciples : John vii. 37-39, ' If any man thirst, let him come to me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of Uving water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him should receive : for the Holy Ghost was not yet given ; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.' The promise in each refers to both places : and yet the occasion was differing, though of one and the same Spirit. If you observe the purport and occasion of the promise of the Spirit in the 4th of John, it was when our Saviour was treating with the woman of Samaria, a great sinner, ver. 18; utterly ignorant, ver. 10, 23; a flouter of him, ver. 15; and as yet (when Christ spake these words) purely in her natural estate. And therefore this promise of the Spirit here all acknowledge to be the Spirit of regeneration, to work conversion at the first ; to become, as at the first he doth, a well of water springing up to eternal life. Now this was at first poured upon a dry ground, in respect to any such work ; utterly dry, utterly barren, that hath not so much as a desire or thirst after this Holy Spirit, to ask him, as she had not, ver. 10, ' If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.' And upon this ignorant, barren soul doth Christ pour out his Spirit whilst he is speaking with her ; and which was the strangeness of it, thqugh poured from without, yet soaking into her, it began (as Christ pro mised) to become a spring in her heart, which other water poured from with out on earth doth never become, bubbling up all that which tended to eternal life. And the promise of the Spirit as regenerating at the first, and to that 44 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I, end poured out on such souls as here, was part of Isaiah's scope. He had a further also, for it is pouring ' water upon dry ground,' causing herbs to come up where barrenness was (ver. 4), to the end that men that are Gen tiles, and strangers to the commonwealth of Israel (as this Samaritan was) might ' call themselves by the name of Jacob, and subscribe unto the Lord, and surname themselves by the name of Israel,' ver. 5. And the first thing we see God doth (as Christ also in the 4th of Johnfpromiseth) to such sons, is to pour out his Spirit on them in that very condition, and he becomes a spring within them of all goodness, even then when there is not a drop afore, nor any preparation to it. And again the prophet Isaiah, prophesy ing of times when Christ should be on earth, thus speaks, chap. xxxv. ver. 5, 6, ' Then the eyes of the blind shaU be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing.' Then foUoweth the very same promise, that ' in the wilderness waters should break out, aud streams in the desert, and the parched ground shall becomefa pool.' Which promise, as Christ inter preted, so he also made it good, fulfilling of it in this Samaritan, the first fruits of Gentile converts ; and this he did whilst he was speaking it to her. Ezekiel speaks to the same purpose and effect (chap, xxxvii.), though under another allusion, of men not only dead, but consumed to bone, and those bones dry ; and a wind came from God upon them, even when in this estate, and made them alive. And what is the moral of it ? The Spirit of God (whom Christ compares to the wind, John ui., and who, Acts ii., came as a rushing wind), the Spirit of the Uving God (as in 2 Cor, iii. 3) came upon these men, and made them alive, even when dead and dry bones. Thus it is said, ver. 14, ' I will put my Spirit in you, and ye shall live.' He puts his Spirit into us, not only pours him on us ere we have the least of life, who therefore must needs come on us, yea, into us when we are dead. He gets into us, and becomes a spring in our beUies, in the heart of this barren earth when it is dry. Use 3. Is it the Spirit of God who is the author of conversion ? Then ament and bewail the hardness of thy heart, which though it hath so often had good motions put into it by the Spirit (which motions, for aught thou knowest, are the beginnings of this work, and leaders unto repentance), yet it hath not followed them, but given a deaf ear unto them. 1. Consider the heinousness of the sin. It is that which Stephen up braided the Jews with : Acts vii. 51, < Ye stiffnecked, who evermore resist the Holy Ghost.' It is the sin for which our Saviour chiefly wept over Jerusalem, Luke xiii. 34. Consider that it is to oppose the Holy Ghost in his own proper work and office, and in as much as in you lies to put him out of office. And though it be not always that sin against the Holy Ghost, which is unpardonable (for many have afterwards repented of this), yet it is a sin against the Holy Ghost. For as the Scripture, though it makes indeed but one o Avri^iorbs, ' that antichrist, the man of sin and son of perdition,' the pope, the greatest arch-heretic that ever was, or wiU be, yet every petty popeling and less notorious heretic is an antichrist, ' for there be many antichrists now in the world' (says the apostle of his times, before the great antichrist was risen). So it is in this case : though the Scripture makes but one sin against the Holy Ghost, xar' Igo^i*, yet the resister of the least motion of the Spirit leading to repentance is a sinner against the Holy Ghost, and there be many such sinners. I appeal to many of you j how often hath the Holy Ghost come and viewed you ? How often hath he come to your hearts when ye were alone, and even unto your bedside Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 45 beseeching you, and ye have put him off ! And you may judge of the greatness of this sin, to resist the least good motion (which is a step to the other), in that the Scripture makes the full act (or grosser act, as I may call it) of that sin to be, in isto genere in that kind, the greatest and the only unpar donable one. Now we measure sins in the act they tend to ; as murder being a great sin, and the act thereof more heinous than of other sins, therefore thoughts of murder and revenge are worse than any other sinful thoughts. And if you will put this sin of resisting the motions of the Spirit into the balance of the sanctuary, and rightly weigh it with other ways of sinning, I dare affirm it, that the resisting the least good motion tending to conver sion is greater than many of those grosser acts against the law of God. And these motions resisted do heighten and aggravate all our other sins com mitted before and after them. For they tend to turn us from them by causing us to repent of all sins past, and preventing sins to come. More over this sin is a sin against the gospel (for the gospel is the ministration of the Spirit, and so of these good motions of the Spirit), and sins against the gospel are greater than those against the law. And therefore (Heb. ii. 23) the very neglecting the salvation of the gospel is made a crime deserv ing a sorer punishment than any breach of the law. And how much sorer punishment does it deserve to despise it when it is brought home to us by the Holy Ghost, and by him set on upon our hearts ? If barely to hear the word, and not be moved by it, be a sin, and a heinous one, then to be moved by it and to neglect it is a greater ; for it is despising of the greater mercy, and it is against the Spirit of grace in the gospel. 2. Consider the danger of this sin. You have seen that, for the guilt of it, it is above committing gross sins against the law. And the danger of it is answerable ; for sins against the law God threateneth but conditionally with damnation, if men beUeve not, and repent not ; so as that repentance coming between they may escape. But this God threateneth, yea, and punisheth with impenitency itself (and that is the damning sin) for God useth ordinarily to punish sins in their own coin, according to their nature and kind ; and this he punisheth with impenitency, because it resists the work of repentance : ' I would have purged thee ' (says God in the prophet, unto the people of Israel), ' but thou wouldst not.' When God would they would not, and therefore God never after would. And when God hath used means, and comes unto us to cleanse us, and we would not, he says (as it is, Rev. xxii. 11), '- He that is filthy, let him be filthy stiU' ; and so we shall be long enough, for all him. For at length God grows peremptory; and never makes offer more. God commonly gives such up unto irre coverable hardness of heart and blindness of mind. And I appeal to their own consciences if they grow not harder after such resistings, as clay doth, the more the sun hath shone upon it, or as ice freezeth harder after it had begun to thaw. Consider but the reason of it. If a man sins against the law, he hath yet the court of the gospel to sue in, and so to obtain pardon ; as if a man be cast in one court, he hath a liberty to remove his suit from that court unto a higher ; but if he be condemned in the higher, then there is no going backward unto any lower court. So God hath given us two courts, that of the law and that of the gospel. Thou being an unclean or covetous person, or a drunkard, goeth to the law, and that condemns thee. Then the Spirit offers thee to remove thy suit to the highest court of the gospel, and upon faith and repentance to bring thee a pardon. Thou neglects this, and so the gospel itself presently condemns thee ; for there, ' he that believes not is condemned already,' John iii. 18. And if mercy and 46 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. the offers of it condemn thee, I know not what can save thee ; for that ig the highest court, and go backward thou canst not. The work of the Spirit (as you heard) is the last act of man's salvation, and without it neither no evidence of thy election, nor redemption, are to be respected. And if thou run unto God's mercy (as that is the common shift, that God is merciful) or to Christ's redemption, in that he died for sinners, both these send thee to the Spirit. And the Spirit tells thee he hath offered salvation unto thee upon thy repenting many a time, and hath proffered to assist therein, and thou didst stiU refuse ; and how then canst thou expect salvation ? Ay, but thou wilt say, I hope the Spirit wiU offer again and again, and when I am on my deathbed, as well as now. I answer, 1. That it is a great hazard, for ' the Spirit blows when and where he listeth ;' and, it may be, he will never move thee more. And, 2. Consider whether thou hast any reason to expect this. For suppose thou shouldst have often, again and again, moved a friend of thine in a matter which concerns himself, and which thou hast most * benefit by, only out of love, thou hast thus moved him in it, and he stiU gives thee a con trary or froward answer, and goes on doing the contrary, wouldst not thou at last resolve, that seeing thou hast so often moved him in vain, hereafter thou wilt never speak of it to him more ? This is the case between the Spirit and thee. He hath often moved thee in a matter that concerns thine eternal wealth or wo, even to repent, but thou givest him a churlish answer, and goest still on in thine impenitency ; how then canst thou expect he should ever move thee again ? God comes at length to say of thee, as of those in Hosea vi. 4, who had had many good motions, which like the dew were dried up, and reformations which like a cloud passed away, ' 0 Ephraimj * what shall I do unto thee ? 0 Judah, what shall I do unto thee ? For *' your goodness is as a morning cloud ; and as the early dow it goeth away.' 3. Yet seeing this is thy plea, that thou hopest the Holy Ghost wiU move thee again, I charge thee, as thou tenderest thine own salvation, if that now or hereafter he doth move thee, to take the opportunity of time and tide. If by meditation, reading, or prayer, any sparks be kindled in thee, blow them up ; let those thoughts rest on thee ; welcome them, hug them, as the best guests that ever came to lodge in thine heart. ShaU an ambassador extraordinary be sent from the King of heaven unto thee with a message, and wilt thou not give him audience, but put him off from day to day, and tell him (as Felix did Paul) thou wilt hear him another time ? The best men are but green wood, on which, though fire do take hold, it is subject to die again ; and therefore, if thou hast but a few sparks, leave them not till they have taken hold, nor then 'till they are put into a flame. And above aU things, take heed of quenching them by carnal mirth, or company, or recreations, as men use to do. *Qu. 'no'?— Ed. Chap. VII.] in our salvation. 47 CHAPTER VII. How the Holy Ghost is the author of regeneration, or the first application of salvation lo us, in a more peculiar manner, comparatively to the other two persons. Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he savedus, by the washing of 'regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost ; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour. — Titus HI. 5, 6. Regeneration, you see, is attributed to the Spirit as the author. It is termed the ' renewing of the Holy Ghost ' and likewise the ' shedding forth the Holy Ghost ' is magnified as the rich gift and blessing of the New Testament. I have in a former discourse shewn how all the three persons have shared and distributed the whole work of our salvation amongst them, unto three several parts. 1. Election is appropriated to the Father. 2. Redemption to the Son. 3. Application of both to the Holy Ghost ; who accordingly doth bear several offices suited to these three works. That which now I have to do, is more particularly to demonstrate both the on and dibrj of this point of great moment ; both that and why this last part of salvation, viz., application, and so principally this of regeneration, is attributed to the Holy Ghost. I. I shall produce scriptures to demonstrate this point. 1. The first Scripture is John iii. 5, ' Except a man be born of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.' This scripture shews not only the necessity of being born again, but withal that it must be the Spirit, who must do it, or it will not be done. ' For no man can so much as say, Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Spirit,' 1 Cor. xii. 3. 2. The near kindred and dependence the new creature hath with and upon the Spirit, as the child begotten hath of and with its proper father, doth evidence the same truth. (1.) The new creature is in the same third of John, ver. 6, styled spirit (as elsewhere it is called a spiritual man, 1 Cor. ii.), ' That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.' It is therefore professedly baptized into the same name, because the father of this new birth and baptism is the Spirit. With men the begotten bears the name of the most immediate parent ; and so in this case, though this work of the Spirit be in common termed the divine nature (2 Peter i. 4) because it is the image of the Godhead, of which all three persons are partakers, yet to shew that in a more peculiar manner it is the child of the Spirit, it is called spirit. (2.) For the very same reason this Spirit of God, the author, relatively bears the name of Holy in the New Testament, where it is (though not first) yet more frequently used as his special title, to he called ' The Holy Ghost,' as our old EngUsh hath rendered it to us. Is not the Father holy, and the Son holy, and both equally holy with this Holy Spirit ? Yes, essentially and personally also in themselves ; ' Holy, holy, holy,' they are all pro claimed, Isa. vi. How came these other two to bear it, that he, the third person, should have the peculiar style of Holy? It is not neither in a peculiar, neither in a personal or essential respect, but relatively unto that 48 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. which is his proper and peculiar work, because he sanctifies and makes us holy, and so merits that name ; as Christ doth of our Saviour, and the Father of God the Father and Maker. And here let me return to the necessity of this person's making us holy. As it is necessary for Christ to redeem us, there is an absolute necessity that we aU be a sanctified holy sacrifice offered up to God, if we look to be saved, or otherwise we must be made a sacrifice of his wrath, as Christ hath told us, Mark ix. 49. Where he having threatened, if lust be not killed, men shall be cast into the fire that is unquenchable (ver. 47, 48), he adds this as a reason, that every man is to be a sacrifice to God one way or other. According to the old law some sacrifices were consumed with fire, as the burnt-offerings ; some seasoned with salt, to sink up the corrupt moisture in them, Lev. U. 13. One sort of these sacrifices all men must become ; if not sanctified by the Spirit, so as to have salt in them, then with hell-fire, which also is a sacri fice to God. Now Christ for our redemption offered up himself a sacrifice to God, for a sweet smelling savour, Eph. v. 2 ; and it was necessary he should be so. And to that end he sacrificed himself, as in his sacrificial prayer he speaks, John xvii. 19. And it is as necessary, if we be saved, that our persons be offered up unto God as a sacrifice also, Rom. xu. 1, even a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. It was necessary, therefore, we should have a sanctifier of us to be an offering unto God, as well as a redeemer, that offered up himself for us. And who is that ? You are directed to him in Rom. xv., ' This is the issue of my ministry,' (says Paul, speaking of his converting the nations, ver. 18, 19) ' that the Gentiles ' (being converted) ' might be an offering acceptable, being sancti fied by the Holy Ghost.' Else never to be acceptable to God. Christ was sanctified immediately by himself, by the personal union with the Son of God — ¦' I sanctify myself '¦ — even as he also ' offered up himself by the eternal Spirit,' or Godhead dwelling in him, Heb. ix. ; but we by the Holy Ghost. And as in that other speech, ' That which is born of the Spirit is spirit,' the new creature bears his name ; so here, he is called the Holy Spirit, or bears the name of holy, because the sanctifier of us : ' Being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.' 3. The work of conversion, not only in the whole, but in every part thereof, is attributed to him, John xvi. 8, 9, 10. It is (as I hinted afore, and shall shew hereafter) divided into three parts. 1. Conviction of sin. 2. Of righteousness for justification. 3. Of judgment, hoUness, and refor mation ; and the Spirit is there made the author of these three. And according to this division of the parts thereof, he hath titles also given him, as in relation to his immediate working of these three. (1.) He condescends to be termed ' the Spirit of bondage ;' I say, he con descends but to the work and name ; for otherwise, and in himself, he is ' the free Spirit,' (Ps. li. 11, 12), and deUghts in comforting us, not in grieving us. And he is therefore also called ' the Comforter ;' but yet to affect our salvation, and the effectual appUcation of it to us, he (contrary to his nature) becomes our jailor, takes the keys of death and damnation into his custody, and shuts up our spirits under the law, as it is a school* master to Christ, rattles the chains, lets us see the sin and punishment we deserve. He convinceth of sin, John xvi., and becomes a ' Spirit of bond age,' Rom. viii. 15. (2.) But then, secondly, in regard of the reveaUng God's love to us and Christ and his righteousness, by whom we are adopted, and by which justi fied, he is called in the same place ' the Spirit of adoption,' < the Spirit of Chap. VH.] in our salvation. 49 faith,' as some interpret, 2 Cor. iv.,13. Barnabas was ' full of the Holy Ghost, and of faith,' Acts xi. 24. (3.) In regard of sanctifying us, and convincing of judgment, he is in the Old Testament enstyled the ' Spirit of judgment,' Isa. iv. 4, in respect of washing away the filth of sin : ' When the Lord shaU have washed away the filth of Zion, by the Spirit of judgment,'. &c. And in the New he is entitled ' the Spirit of grace :' Heb. x. 29 ' Have done despite to the Spirit of grace,' that is, to him as going about to work grace and holiness in the heart. The sin against the Holy Ghost, which is there described, not being against the person of the Spirit, so much as against him in his workings ; and that in his working grace and sanctifying, as in the words afore you have it. And as to grace in the general, as he is the author of every parti cular grace, so in the head himself, therefore much more in the members. The prophet, speaking of the Messiah in Isa. xi. 1, ' The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,' and shall be in him, in respect of his effects upon him, ' the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord.' There is the like reason he should be denomi nated from every other grace. He is in one chapter, John xiv., termed ' The Spirit of truth,' ver. 17, who reveals all truth to the understanding ; ' The Holy Spirit,' who sanctifies the will, the chief subject of holiness; ' The Comforter,' who fills the heart with joy and peace in believing ; which is therefore usually styled 'joy in the Holy Ghost,' in multitudes of places; that phrase speaking him not so much the object of it (which is rather Christ, 1 Peter i. 8, ' In whom believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorious ; ' and God, Rom. v. 11) as the author of it : Rom. xv. 13, ' Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.' II. I shall now, secondly, give the reasons why this work is committed to him, and is his lot. These reasons are not of logical demonstration, but harmonious, by comparing spiritual things with spiritual, and by the suiting of one thing with another, in which the strength of divine reason lies ; for divinity is a wisdom, not an art. 1. This operation of the Spirit is in a correspondency to the creation of the first man, who was a type of what was to come : Job xxxiii. 4, ' The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.' It is evident he speaks of the new creation, in allusion to the old: ver. 1-3, ' My word shall be of the uprightness of my heart, and my lips shaU utter knowledge thereby ; ' and then adds, ' The Spirit of God hath made me,' that is, hath given me a sincere heart, an iUuminated mind, put the words of life into me. To have spoken of his first creation only, he being a man fallen from it, had been a poor argument to persuade Job of the truth of his heart, and the truths he went about to utter. And yet, too, he as evidently alludes to the first creation : Gen. ii. 7, ' The Lord formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of Ufe, and man became a living soul.' Now, in this new creation, we being dead in sins and trespasses, it is the Spirit of God that giveth life, 2 Cor. iii. 6 ; who, as in respect of giving us this new- life, is caUed « the Spirit of the living God,' ver. 3 ; and in the Old Testament, Ezek. xxxvii. 13, 14, ' I wiU bring you out of your graves, I wiU put my Spirit in you, and you shall live,' which you find in the 36th chapter, ver. 27. And it is observable that the first visible giving the Holy Ghost, which was after Christ's resurrection, to enable them to be ' ministers, not of the letter, but of the Spirit,' which should give life to them, and to others by vol. vi. D 50 THE work OF THE holy ghost ' [BooE^ffl them, was the ceremony of breathing on them : ' And he said, Receive the Holy Ghost,' John xx. 22. We had his blood that ran in his veins first, and it is efficacious to wash away the guilt of sin. We have his breath next, which comes out of the inwards of him, which conveys his Spirit, which conveys himself into our inwards, as it is in the prophet, and gives us life. And as life comes with, the breath of God breathed at first, and goes away with it, so doth spiritual life upon the going or coming of the Holy Ghost upon us. 2. It is the Spirit that converts and regenerates us, and forms the new creature in us, in a conformity to our head Christ. The Holy Ghost was, 1. The immediate former of the human nature of Christ in the womb ; 2. The uniter of that nature to the Son of God ; 3.- The sanctifier thereof, with aU graces dwelling therein above all measure. (1.) He was the former of the human nature- of Christ in the womb: Mat. i. 18, ' She was found with chUd of the Holy Ghost ; ' and ver. 20, ' that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost ; ' which was in his forming and fitting that matter into a man, which the prolific virtue use- to do. , (2.) He was the uniter of it to the divine, and sanctifier of it with aU graces, both which you have expressed in another place : Luke i. 35', ' And the angel answered and said to her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee : therefore also that holy thing that shall be born of thee shaU be caUed the Son of God.' Now, we being to be made as comformable to Christ as is possible, it was correspondent that the same person who was designed to form Christ's body for the Godhead to dwell in all its fulness should form Christ in us', that God and Christ may dwell in us : 1 Cor. in. 16, ' Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?' That same person that made that happy match, the personal union be* tween Christ's human nature and the divine, the same person makes the union between Christ and our souls ; and so we become one spirit with the Lord, 1 Cor. vi. 17. The same person that made the man Christ partaker of the divine nature maketh us also. There is a higher correspondency yet. The Holy Ghost is vinculum Trinitatis, the union of the Father and the Son; as proceeding from both by way of love ; and who so meet to be the union of God and man in Christ, of Christ and men in us, as he that was the bond of union among themselves ? (3.) In respect of sanctifying that human nature of Christ, it was the Holy Ghost who made him Christ, that anointed him with himself, and all his graces : Isa. xi. 2, ' The Spirit of the Lord shaU rest upon him, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.' The graces of Christ, as man, are attributed to this Spirit, as the immediate author of them ; for although the Son of God dwelt personaUy in the human nature, and so advanced that nature above the ordinary rank of creatures, and raised it up to that dignity and worth,, yet all his habitual graces, which even his soul was fuU of, were from the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit is therefore said to be ' given him without measure.' And this inhabitation of the Holy Ghost did in some sense and degree concur to constitute him Christ, which, as you know, is the anointed . one of God : Acts iv. 27, ' Thy holy chUd Jesus, whom thou hast anointed.' Anointed with what ? Acts x. 88, ' God anointed Jesus with the Holy Ghost.' Now, then, if the Spirit made him Christ, and concurred in this respect to make him the anointed of God, much more is it he that makes us Christians. Chap. V_L] in our salvation. 51 8. Consider what this application of salvation unto us is. It is the reve lation of the mind and love of God and Christ unto us, and the things of both. He that doth this must ' take of mine,' says Christ ; and in doing so he must take of my Father's also, for all the Father hath or doth is Christ's. You have both in one place : John xvi. 14, 15, ' He shall glorify me : for he shall receive of mine, and shew it to you. All things that the Father hath are mine.' Great persons woo not by themselves, but employ ambassadors and ministers of state ; and so doth Christ. Now, who should do this but the Spirit, who knows the heart and mind of God ? 1 Cor. ii., ' We have received the Spirit who is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given us of God ; ' that is, by our having him from God, who knows aU that is in God, which is the reason there given ; ver. 10, ' God hath revealed them to us by his Spirit : for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God ; ' which he confirms and illustrates by a similitude fetched from our own bosoms : ver. 11, ' For what man,' that is, what other man, ' knows the things of a man' (that are in his own breast), ' save the spirit of a man that is in him ? Even so the things of God knows no man,' or angel, 'but the Spirit of God;' who being the Spirit of counsel (Isa. xi. 2) even to Christ himself, helped him to all God's secretB ; and he also being privy and overhearing (as John xvi. 13), aU that the Father and Christ have intended to us, and spoken about us, was only fit to reveal them unto us. And thus by him we come to have the very mind of God and Christ. The grace of Christ, and the love of God the Father, are revealed to us by the communion of the Holy Ghost, 2 Cor. xiii. 14. CHAPTER VIII. How the Holy Ghost is the gift of God tlie Father to ws,. in and by Jesus Christ. — That this inestimable gift is bestowed freely, by the pure mercy, grace, and love of God. Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration,, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour. —Tit. IH. 5, 6. We have seen, in a short but comprehensive view, the operations of the Holy Ghost in the great work of our salvation. The next prospect of him is, as he is the gift of God, conferred on us for this end and purpose. To open this to our sight, I offer these following considerations. 1. That it is God the Father who, is the donor, or the bestower of him on us. This is plainly expressed by the words of the text, which declares that he sheds the Spirit on us. 2. This gift of the Spirit is in and through Jesus Christ, our Saviour and mediator. 3. This gift of the Spirit is be stowed, not according to the covenant of works, but of grace and free love. For those words, ' not according to works,' and the other words of the text, which speak of the appearance of the love and kindness of God, refer as well to this rich shedding forth the Holy Ghost upon us as unto saving us through regeneration, and renewing us. 4. The condition of the persons to whom he is given is altogether unworthy. When we were in our disobedience, serving our lusts, the Holy Ghost was poured out, and renewed us. 52 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. 1. The donor of bestower of the Holy Ghost is God the Father through Christ. As the Father is the original of the persons in the Trinity, so of this great gift. Therefore Christ (John xv. 26) when he speaks of ' send ing the Spirit from the Father,' adds, as the reason why he should be sent from the Father, that ' he proceeds from the Father' (his subsistence doth), naming him as the fountain both of himself and the Spirit also. He is termed the Spirit of God, roD 0soD, 1 Cor. ii. 11, in the same sense that we say the spirit of a man (as in the same verse) ; for as God is a Spirit, Isa. xlviii. 16, ' The Lord God and his Spirit,' says the prophet there; but the apostle further adds, ver. 12, the Spirit, t* too &iov, who personaUy is from God, whom therefore we have and receive from God : 1 Cor. vi. 19, ' The Holy Ghost which we have,' airo &iou. This gift is therefore espe cially attributed to the Father, and termed by Christ ' the promise of the Father,' Acts iv., Luke xxiv. 49, ' the Spirit of the Father,' Mat. x. 20j from whom Christ, as God-man, received the Spirit first. The Holy Ghost was sent down by the Father upon Christ as a dove in his baptism : ' God anointed Jesus with the Holy Ghost,' Acts x. 38. And when Christ ascended into heaven he received him from the Father, Acts ii. 33, and so he shed him forth on us. And therefore Christ also, as mediator, was to pray the Father to give the Spirit, John xiv. 16 : 'I wiU pray the Father, and he shaU give you another Comforter,' &c. Yet so as, 2dly, even the Father himself sends him not, but in and through Christ : John xiv. 26, ' The Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name.' ' Through Christ our Saviour,' says the apostle, Tit. iii. 6. Which imports not barely the Son's concurrence, as second per- . son, in sending him as weU as the Father, even as his person proceeded*] from both (as John xv. 26, ' whom I will send unto you') ; but further, that Christ, as a redeemer, had a virtual meritorious influence or hand herein ; so as for his sake, and through his purchase and intercession, the Father sends him. Christ purchased not only all the graces of the Spirit for us, but the Spirit himself (whom we had forfeited) to dweU in us. We have an express scripture, Gal. in. 13, 14, ' Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us : for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree : That the blessing of Abraham might jcome on the GentUes through Jesus Christ ; that we may receive the pro mise of the Spirit through faith.' Where there are two ends adequately and alike made of Christ's being made a curse for us: 1. That we might receive the blessing of Abraham ; 2. That we might receive the promise of the Spirit. And, forasmuch as the gift of the Spirit comes under a pro mise, as well as other blessings, it must needs come under the purchase, of Christ's blood, which confirmed all the promises ; and this, as aU the rest of the promises are, ' yea and amen in him.' And to this end it is observ able, that he breathed not the Spirit until after his resurrection ; but then he did, John xx. 22, ' And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost.' He had not shed his blood until now, and therefore breathed not the Holy Ghost untU now. But Christ having died, and having, as the Lamb slain, purchased the Spirit- arid being ascended up to the throne of God, he, as the Lamb, now sheds forth the Spirit : John vn. 38, 39, ' He that believeth on me, as the scrip ture hath said, out of his belly shaU flow rivers of living water. But this" spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive ; for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.' He compares the Spirit, as communicated to us, to a spring of Uving water. Chap. VHL] in our salvation. 53 But not as then broke forth, as afterwards it should, because Christ had not died, and so entered into glory. Now compare with it Rev. xxii. 1 : ' And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceed ing out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.' This water of life issues, you see, from the throne of the Lamb, who in the 5th chap., ver. 6, appeared at the throne of God as the Lamb slain, and redeeming us with his blood, and as such doth shed forth the Spirit upon us ; and is even there also said to have all the fulness of the Spirit on him, ' who hath the seven Spirits ;' that is, the Holy Ghost in all the varieties of his gifts and graces, caUed seven from perfection. For that the seven Spirits are taken metony- micaUy for the Holy Ghost, is evident by chap, i., ver. 4 : ' John to the seven churches of Asia : Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come ; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne.' Hence also when we receive the cup in the Lord's supper, which is termed the communion of Christ's blood, 1 Cor. x., we are yet said to ' drink into one Spirit ;' for that blood is vehiculum Spi ritus, the Spirit runs in and with this blood. We therefore know whom we are beholden unto for the Spirit ; and whom to go unto for the Spirit, even to the Father, and to Christ, and to his blood ; and to the Father through Christ, who gives commission to the Spirit to work such and such mea sures of grace, at such times to faU upon us, and at such and such times to withdraw.Hence, 3dly, the Spirit is given us from mere grace and love, and not according to works ; so in the text those words, 'who not according to works, but mercy,' &c, refer as well to this shedding forth the Holy Ghost, as to his saving us by regeneration. You may therefore observe, 2 Cor. xiii. 14, that the grace of the Lord Jesus, and the love of God the Father, are put before communion of the Holy Ghost, as that which proceeds from both. ' The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.' Therefore, in scriptures, both the law, the preaching of it, and the works of it, are in express words excluded and shut out from having any influence to convey the Spirit to us, that we may never so much as think to obtain the Spirit thereby : Jer. xxxi. 32, ' I will make a new covenant, not according to the covenant I made with their fathers ; but this shall be my covenant, I will write my law in their inward parts.' Which, compared with Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27, is renewed with this addition, ' I wUl give you a new heart, and put my Spirit within you.' And you may compare with both, 2 Cor. iii. 3 : ' Ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God ; not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart ;' which clears both. Yea, so far forth as they in the Old Testament had the Spirit (as they had, Neh. ix. 20, ' Thou gavest them thy good Spirit to instruct them ;' and Hag. ii. 5, ' According to the word I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my Spirit remaineth with you') ; so much gospel was even then mingled with it, and running in the veins of it. It was fasdus mixtum, and so in the virtue thereof the Spirit was (though in a lesser measure) given. Therefore, when the gospel came to take place, then the preaching of the law, or ceremonies of it, did not convey the Spirit :_ to shew that it was purely upon the covenant of grace that the Spirit is given, 2 Cor. iii. 6-8, ' Who also hath made us able ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the Spirit : for the letter Mlleth, but the Spirit giveth life. But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stone, was glo- 54 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I.' rious, so that the chUdren of Israel could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance, which glory was to be done away, how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious ?' You see that the old covenant is the ministration' of the letter, and of death ; and the New Testament, in exclusion of that Old, hath alone obtained this more excellent name, ' the ministration of the Spirit.' As not the preaching of the law gave the Spirit, so, nor can any works of the law obtain the Spirit at God's hands. The text is as express for this as for the other : Gal. iii. 2, ' This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith ?' Paul useth that as argwmentiim palmarium against the law, Jas alone sufficient evidence. ' This one thing' (says he) ' I would learn of you,' and let that decide it, ' Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hear ing of faith ?' By Spirit he here means the Spirit of regeneration and sanctification ; for, ver. 5, he speaks of extraordinary gifts afterwards, and ver. 2, he speaks of that receiving which was general to aU believing Gala- tians, even common to all saints, to whose universal experience he appeals*. if ever any one of them had received him upon their doing. Now extraor-s dinary gifts were not common to aU saints, no, not in those days. And by ' the hearing of faith,' he means the doctrine of faith, the gospel ; and ver. 14-17, he asserts the Spirit to be given freely by the covenant of grace, which God afore the law did establish with Abraham, and in him together with Isaac (as the type) with Christ : Gal. iii. 14-17, ' That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. Brethren, I speak after the manner of men : Though it be but a man's covenant, yet if it be con firmed, no man disannulled or addeth thereto. Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many ;. but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. And this I say, that the covenant, which was confirmed before of God in«Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.' Yea (to end this), he makes it an evidence of not being under the law, if a man hath received the Spirit, and be led by him : Gal. v. 18, ' But if ye be led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law.' And for this also it is, that he is called ' the Spirit of grace,' Heb. x. 29, because given freely. He is ' the gift of grace,' Eph. Ui. 7, and so given upon the terms of the covenant of grace. Hence, from both these, appears the difference between Adam's having the Spirit in that estate of holiness, and the saints under the state of grace. Adam had the Spirit as weU as we, and the Holy Ghost was at the making of him, and wrote the image of God upon his heart : for where holiness was, we may be sure the Spirit was too. The Holy Ghost was at that consultation, — ' Let us make man,' — and one of the us spoken unto. Yea, and that Spirit that ' moved upon the waters,' who also is sent forth to ' renew the face of the earth' (Ps. civ.), the same Spirit was in Adam's heart to assist his graces, and cause them to flow and bring forth, and to move him to live according to those principles of Ufe given him. But there is this difference between that his having the Spirit, and ours, apparent from what hath already been said. 1. That he concurred with Adam, merely as the third person, who joined in all works, and so upon no further account than as he concurred in assisting all creatures else in their kind, to cause the earth to bring forth fruits according to their kind j and, indeed, he must necessarily have a Chap. VIII.] in our salvation. 55 hand in all works of creation and providence. Whereas we have the Spirit upon Christ's account, in his name, purchased by him, as whom he had first received, also purchased as the head of his church. And there fore it is ordinary in Scripture to term this Spirit as now dwelling in us, ' the Spirit of Christ,' Rom. viii. 9 ; 'the Spirit of the Son,' Gal. iv. 6. And, 2. Hence Adam retained the Spirit according to the tenor of the covenant of works (which is but that equal law of creation between God and the creature), whereby he held a continuance of the privileges given him at the creation, even as he did life in God's sight, upon works of obedience : ' Do this and live.' And as by one act of disobedience he forfeited life (' Cursed is he that continueth not in all things'), and so in like manner the Spirit was forfeit able by him upon the same terms. Even as in a man that comes from Adam, one mortal stab causeth the soul to depart, so here, one act of sin ning caused the soul* to depart ; for the bond of the union ceased. But as it would not be so in a man risen from the dead, and by the power of the second Adam, made a quickening Spirit ; no wounds would be mortal to such an one ; so here the gift of the Spirit to us is by promise, as Gal. iii. 14-17, the apostle argues. The gift of the Spirit, to a truly converted soul, is an absolute gift, and not upon conditions on our parts, but to work and maintain in us what God requires of us. The gift of the Spirit is not founded upon qualifications in us, to continue so long as we preserve grace in our souls, and do not sin it away. I wiU give you my Spirit to preserve you, and prevent your departing from me, Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27. ' I wUl give you a new heart,' but you would soon make it anjold one, as bad as ever ; to prevent this, it foUows, ' And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shaU keep my judgments, and do them.'' And so it is said in Jer. xxxii. 40, ' Ye shall not depart from me.' He comes by virtue of election on us, as he did on Christ, Isa. xiii. 1, ' Behold my elect in whom my soul delights, I have put my Spirit upon him.' Gal. iv. 6, ' Because ye are sons' (by election, namely, as it is said, Eph. i. 5, God ' having predestinated us to the adoption of children'), ' God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts.' And Mat. x. 20, ' The Spirit of your Father is in you ;' that is, God having taken on him the relation of your Father, thereupon bestoweth his Spirit on you. And therefore it is that so few of many that hear the same sermons receive the Holy Ghost ; for he comes on men by the grace of election, and so the Spirit picks and chooses (as God hath done), and rests on this soul, and not on that ; and so (as Isaiah says, Isa. xxvU. 12) they are gathered one by one. It goes as it were by lot, as it is (Acts viii. 21), spoken to Simon Magus, in relation to the Holy Ghost, v. 19. It hath the appearance of chance, because this man is taken, and not that ; when yet it is the eternal good pleasure of God that puts the difference. And the Spirit, that knows God's mind, seizeth on men accordingly ; and is said to be as the wind, that ' blows where it lists,' which is spoken of regeneration, John iii. 8. Hence it is that he is given to us for ever, and not to depart from us ; the reason is, because his person, is given without conditions, and to work aU conditions, he is so in us as to be with us for ever ; John xiv. 16, 17, ' I wUl pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever : even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him; but ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.' He came in * Qu. ' Spirit' ?— Ed. 56 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. Christ the head, to make his abode in him : John i. 33, ' And I knew him not : but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost.' Which was a ful- fiUing of that piece of the prophecy, Isa. xi. 2, ' The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him.' To which Peter alludes, speaking also of us, 1 Peter iv. 14, ' The Spirit of God resteth on you ;' and to signify this, when visibly he came upon the apostles, Acts ii. 3, ' it sat upon each of them.' Christ's abode among us is compared to the dwelling in a tabernacle : John xiv., eexrimew, ' He dwelt as in a tabernacle amongst us,' for he soon removed to heaven. But the Spirit dweUs in us as in the temple, which was, instead of that moveable habitation, a more fixed settled abode : 1 Cor. vi. 19, ' Ye are the temple of the Holy Ghost.' I go and come, says Christ, John xiv. 18, 19, but he shall be with you, and in you, v. 17, for ever. And there fore he is not only given as the earnest of our inheritance (Eph. i. 14, and 2 Cor. v. 5), a certain pawn that we shaU have heaven ; but he becomestK also from that time a spring in us never to be dammed up, a Uving foun tain of water, springing up into eternal life, as Christ himself speaks, com paring John iv. 14 with John vii. 38, 39. Now we do not say the spring shall continue whilst water is in the stream ; but water shaU continue in the stream, and bubble up whilst there is a spring. If indeed the spring could fail, the waters might faU. Now the Holy Ghost is given to become a perpetual spring, both of grace and glory. And accordingly also, 1 Peter i. 23, the Holy Ghost is said to be ' the incorruptible seed, of which we are begotten,' which some have understood to be meant of the word ; but that is put in besides, as the instrumental cause, in the words foUowLog,. ' by the word of God.' Nor is it the new creature which is there meant, for that is the thing begotten in us. But the principal cause of whom we are begotten is the Holy Spirit, John iii. 6, ' That which is begotten of the Spirit.' Now he is called the ' incorruptible seed,' because he is cast into the soul with the word, as the prohfic virtue in the word ; which is the seed materially, but the Spirit virtually. And this also shews the dif ference between this giving the Spirit by. virtue of election, and that com munication of him to temporary believers that faU away, who are said, Heb. vi., to be ' partakers of the Holy Ghost ; ' as Saul — ' The Spirit of the Lord came on Saul,' 1 Sam. x. 10, — but so as to depart away agairij 1 Sam. xvi. 14 ; thus on Balaam he did, Num. xxiv. 2, 3, and opened his eyes. The fundamental difference lies in the differing terms of the gift of the Spirit, insinuated here in the text : that many receive the Spirit, not from God as a Father, by virtue of election, or through Christ as a Saviour ; they receive not, as chUdren, the Spirit of God as from a Father ; as Rom. vUi. 14, 15 ; as also Mat. x. 20 ; and as Christ's speech also (in John 14th and 15th chapters, ' I will pray the Father,' &c), doth import ; but they receive him from God out of dominion and sovereignty, and from Christ as a Lord, who hath brought* even wicked men to serve him, 2 Peter ii. 1. This distinction of this double receiving the Spirit, the apostle in sinuates both in that Rom. viii. and Gal. vi. 7, 8. In that Rom. viii. 15, he speaks of a ' Spirit of bondage,' which, as servants, they in some measure or other had formerly received from God. Look in what state men stand to God, they answerably more or less have a portion of his Spirit on them. If they are only in the state of servants, they have a ' Spirit of bondage' working legally that fear of death which is in aU men : Heb. U. 15 ' And: * Qu. ' bought ' ?— Ed. Chap. VHL] in our salvation. 57 deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage.' The one place interprets the other. Those stirrings of guilt and condemnations which are in all men's hearts, are from workings of the Spirit in all men. The same Spirit that moved upon the waters, Gen. i., moves upon aU men's hearts. Now if men live under the preaching of the law and gospel, then the same Spirit falls with higher works upon the spirits of men unrenewed, yet still but upon the same account that is mentioned : Gen. vi. 3, ' My Spirit shaU not always strive with man, for that he also is but flesh.' He had spoken of the sons of God (ver. 2), that were the pro fessors of that age, who lived under Noah's ministry, ' a preacher of right eousness,' Heb. xi. 7. And he went with his ministry in a way of striving with and opposing men's corruptions in their hearts ; of which Peter, (1 Peter iU. 18), having said that Christ was ' quickened or raised by the Spirit,' he adds (ver. 19), 'by which Spirit also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison, which sometimes were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, whUe the ark was a pre paring, when few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water.' These men were corrupt, and remained flesh, and yet received the Spirit, striving with them from God, as the Lord and Judge of the world, who to men fallen gives his Spirit, as at first he did to Adam, with a new stock of gifts and motions, but deals with them therein but upon a covenant of works. It is a favour indeed to give him, as all outward gifts of the Spirit are, but their persons being under the covenant of works, and servants, their retain ing this Spirit is according to the terms thereof ; and so it proves in the issue, and their improving that gift is managed according to the dispensa tion of such a covenant. And so they, by opposing and resisting such strivings of the Spirit, God withdraws him. For he says, ' My Spirit shall not always strive.' He deals with them as with servants that are untoward and rebelUous : John viU. 35, ' The servant abides not in the house for ever ;' but as Hagar was turned out of doors, and inherited not, so it is here. ' But' (says Christ) ' a son abides for ever in the house,' and therefore they, as chUdren, receive ' the Spirit of adoption to cry, Abba, Father.' And the Spirit of Christ, as their head, remains in them, and they are overcome and led by the Spirit of God. These are sons ; and that they may abide in the house for ever, this Spirit abides in them for ever. You have the very same distinction of men receiving the Spirit as servants and as sons: Gal. iv. 6, 7, ' Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a Son, an heir of God through Christ.' The meaning is, they receive the Spirit as sons, not as servants, as others do. To which add ver. 22, 23, &c, where Hagar and Ishmael, and Sarah and Isaac, are made the types of these two conditions of men living in the church, as they did in Abraham's family ; and Christ, John viii., aUuded evidently unto it in that speech fore-quoted, verses 33, 34, 35, ' They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man ; how sayest thou, Ye shall he made free ? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house for ever, but the son abideth ever.' Both these, Uving under the means, had dealings with God : Gen. xxi. verses 17-20, ' And the angel of God caUed to Hagar out of heaven, and said unto her, What aUeth thee, Hagar ? Fear not ; for God hath heard the voice of the lad, where he is. Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand ; for I will make him a great nation. And God was with the lad, &c. But yet 58 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. this was but according to the covenant of works, whereof they were types. And their spirits used all gifts, motions, visions, &c, in such a way, and so at last the Spirit was withdrawn from them. And therefore let not that deceive you, that men that faU away are said to be ' partakers of the Holy Ghost,' &c, for they may be so when yet they are not sons. The Holy Ghost comes to some as a wayfaring man, for a night. But do you not feel that though he may withdraw many effects, yet still his person is in you, and works, even amidst your sinnings, to reduce you again to God, and suffers you not to be finaUy overcome, but frames your hearts so as you give yourselves up to be led by him, and you treat with God of his abode in you, and of your salvation, not upon a covenant of works, but grace. Look to your tenure, by which God guides your hearts to seek the Spirit and salvation. Every man's heart and spirit (as a pen in his hand) is guided to write his own deeds and terms he holds salvation on. Dost thou treat with God, as a son, upon mere terms of free grace, renouncing Ishmael's covenant and tenure, not daring to treat with God upon these terms, If I walk thus and thus, God will give and continue his Spirit to me? No; but thou sayest as David, ' Lord, give me thy constant Spirit,' to work all in me, to cause me to walk in thy statntes.- Ps. li. 10, 11, 'Create in me a clean heart, 0 God; and renew a right;. spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence ; and take not thy •¦:' Holy Spirit from me.' In the margin it is, ' a constant spirit within me ;' and if this is thy dependence and thy salvation, and if upon these terms thou holdest and retainest the Spirit, thou art a son. You esteem it in lands as a matter of great moment the tenure, whether it be freehold or copyhold. My brethren, know there is a freehold of the Spirit, and a copyhold ; and go over but thy prayers and the workings of thy spirit with God, and thou wilt easily see thy tenure. CHAPTER IX. That we not only partake of the effects of the Holy Spirit's operations in us, but also of his person dwelling in us. There is a gift of his person, first and chiefly, or primarily ; but second arily of his graces, to be wrought in us by him. And in this gift of his person doth consist the greatness, the richness of the gift. This is ex pressed in those words, ' Whom he shed on us richly,' Titus ui. 6. This, I say, is intended of his person first, and simply, and then of his graces and effects, as in the second place intended to us, as those which accompany the gift of his person, and as handmaids upon it, and do flow from and depend upon the bestowing and gift of himself. Thus there is the gift of the person of Christ to us and for us ; and there is the gift of all those benefits which he hath purchased ; but the gift of his person is, of the two, greater infinitely than that of his benefits, as the person is more worth than the dowry. And thus you are to look at the gift of the person of the Spirit more than all his xH'ePaTa> or gifts. Let us hear how the Scripture speaks to this great point, and sets a value and indigitation upon it as in distinction from his graces : Rom. v. 5, ' The love of God is shed abroadin our hearts, by the Holy Ghost which is given to us.' Here you may observe a set distinction made between this one effect of the Spirit in us viz., ' the shedding abroad the love of God in our hearts,' and the gift of Chap. IX.] in our salvation. 59 the person of the Spirit; and how there is brought in a manifest super- addition of the gift of his person over and above that effect of shedding God's love : ' by the Spirit,' says he, ' which he hath given us.' Thus he speaks of the gift of the person himself singly and apart, distinct from the other ; yea, and as being the foundation of it. Take this instance and comparison. God having given a wife to a man, by whom he hath had such and such chUdren, such and such an estate, benefits, and privileges ; when mention is made of any one of those good things that accrued by her, she, to heighten the mercy of the gifts, by the consideration of the person by means of whom the man hath them, might say, All these things are by the wife which God hath given thee. The same import you have in other such appendixes and additional clauses to the Uke purpose. Acts v. 32, ' And we ' (that is, apostles) ' are his witnesses,' (that is, Christ's) ' of these things ; and so is also the Holy Ghost,' (which manifestly refers to his person). The apostle adds, ' Whom God hath given to them that obey him ;' thus notably holding up unto their view the greatness of this gift. And indeed the pouring forth the Holy Ghost is all the discourse of the first ten chapters of the Acts. And therefore it is elsewhere called the ' gift of the Holy Ghost, Acts x. 45. SCt is not p^ag/o/tara (spoken of 1 Cor. xii.), gifts, in the plural, as speaking pf his graces, but it is ' the gift,' as one absolute, fuU, and entire gift, once given for aU ; his person containing virtually all other parcels and particular gifts, which he after works. The like addition to signify this you may observe, 1 Cor. vi. 19, ' Your bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, whom ye have of God,' This refers also manifestly to his person, as I shall have occasion further to shew ; and it comes in to mind them of the greatness of the gift, and the special favour of the donor, ' whom ye have pf God.' Again you have it, 1 Cor. ii. 12, ' We have received the Spirit which is of God, that we may know the free gift of God to us.' Here is a double gift, and both from God, distinguished, 1, The grace or gifts of God and his Spirit bestowed on^us, ra, ^agiedhra or ¦xagiep,ara ; and 2, The gift of the person of the Spirit distinct from these, whom we receive (says he) as given by God first, and so received by us. And he is given (as to other ends) so that we may know these things he gives us, or works in us, the gift of which is distinct from that of his person, which is set out further by this ro itnvpa, rov &iov. The Spirit is out of God himself, and proceed ing from him, and he is in God, as the spirit of a man in a man, ver. 11. The reason of this is, because the Spirit is given us by the covenant of grace, which covenant makes freely over all that is in God unto us, and for our good ; all, both attributes and persons in him, the donation thereof running thus, ' I will be thy God, and thou shalt be my people.' I use to say that the covenant of grace is in all the transactions a covenant Of persons. Consider that of election in the Father's hand ; he pitched not on quaUfications, but persons, afore they had done good or evil, Rom ix. 13. And therefore so long as the persons remain, his love remains ; and thence he works that in the person which may make him comely : Eph. i. 4, ' He hath chosen us in him, before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy, and without blame before him in love.' And Christ, when he comes, he gives his "person, ' He gave himself,' as everywhere it is said, both to us and for us ; and he died not for abstracted propositions, but persons. ' I lay down my life for my sheep, and I know them by name.' And when he applies his blood to us, he gives us himself, and the soul in the end seeks his person also, as Paul did, Phil. iii. 8. Thus answerably, in the third person, the gift of the Holy Ghost is the gift of his person to dwell in us. 60 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK L - The next thing to be considered is his coming upon us, and his dwelling in us. I have two assertions to add concerning this. 1. Concerning his coming upon us, and God's shedding him forth, my assertion is, that the first coming of the Holy Ghost is immediately upon us, as we are in our natural condition, in our uncleanness and poUution, without any preparation to make way for his coming upon us, or into us. He doth not work grace first, and then come into a man ; but he comes first and seizeth on a man, then works grace in him. And this the text in Tit, Ui. 6 insinuates ; when weighing the mercy thereof, the apostle says, ' He shed his Spirit upon us.' On us ; how qualified ? The fourth verse tells us, ' Us, when disobedient, serving divers lusts and pleasures.' And he then sent him to renew us, ver. 5. Such were the vessels when this pre cious liquor was first poured into them, and upon them. And his coming first thus on men when in their natural state, is exempUfied in the Corin thians ; yea, and pressed on them as a great point, which the apostle would have them seriously to mind and consider, to the end they might ascribe unto the Holy Ghost his due glory : 1 Cor. xii. 1-3, ' Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant. Ye know that ye were Gentiles, carried away unto those dumb idols, even as ye were led. Wherefore I wUl give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed : and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.' Being to treat of spiritual gifts in fused into the people of God, he prefaceth this, I would have you (says he) know and consider these things about them. 1st, That the author of them is wholly and entirely the Spirit of God. ' No man can say,' or confess out of conviction of judgment, ' that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.' And the embracing of this foundation of Christian religion was before any further spiritual gift was communicated unto you, but was in deed the foundation of bestowing it, ' for no man, speaking by the Spirit) calleth Jesus an execration.' Then, 2d, says he, I would have you remem ber the condition you were in when the Spirit of God began first to teach you this : you were aU idolaters, led away as brute beasts after dumb idols, when also you execrated and abominated our Jesus (as to this day the Jews and heathens do), when it was certain, therefore, that you had not the Spirit , of God in you ; ' for no man that hath the Spirit calleth Christ accursed,' as ye then did. So then, who was the first beginner of this great change and alteration but the Spirit of God ? And 3d, If this were your condi tion (as it was), what did or could the Spirit find in you, as preparatory and inviting of him thereunto ? Absolutely nothing at aU. The lowest and first step which can be supposed to be out of heathenism into Chris tianity, viz., the thoughts and profession that our Jesus is the Lord and Christ; even this first thought, which is the introduction to all, you, says the apostle, had from the Spirit of God first, as well as you have been enUghfc ened by him since. 4th, He would have them further consider that they, when they were thus idolatrous, were acted and possessed by another greater- spirit than their own, who invisibly was in them, and yet effectuaUy wrought in them, and had possession of their minds, fancies, and affections (which'- unless he had been in them he could not have), ' Even Satan, that evif spirit, the god of this world,' who (as it is said, 2 Cor. iv. 4) bUnded these heathens. This he clearly insinuates to them (and puts it in, as in oppo sition to their now having the Spirit of God) in these words, ' Ye were led after dumb idols.' Led, even as brute beasts are at the pleasure of them that possess them ; and led hy some other spirit than their own. It had Chap. IX.] in our salvation. 61 been impossible else that so many wise heathens should have worshipped dumb idols (as on purpose he terms them), themselves having reasonable souls, that thought and spake, which those idols, that had eyes and saw not, wanted. Now then the apostle would have them to consider that ere their judgments could be led to own Christ as Lord, this evil spirit must be dispossessed ; and another spirit, even the Spirit of God, come in his room, and possess their hearts, and so lead them into all the truth they then possessed ; without which they had never embraced the first element or principle of Christian verity. From which instance and experiment in the Corinthians, I infer, that the Spirit of God, when he converts men to things spiritual, comes upon a man when a heathen, suppose, as then the world went, or on us, when unregenerate. And it is confirmed by this, that the Holy Ghost reveals not any truth, or works any saving good, but a man first hath him sent down into his heart. He is first sent and shed upon us, ere we are led into all or into any truth; as the 14th, 15th, 16th chapters of John shew. We receive him as an unction first, ere he savingly . teacheth us any truth. 1 John ii. 20, ' Ye have an unction from the holy One ' (which is the Spirit, Acts x. 30), ' and ye know all things,' first and last. AU that ye know in spirituals, it is from him, yea, and by having him first. And as from having him first it is that we begin to know, so, that we continue to know and acknowledge spiritual things savingly, is from his abiding in us. He in his person is first said to abide, and so to go on to teach us. So ver. 27 of that chapter, ' But the anointing which ye have received of him abides in you : but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.' So then these idolatrous Corinthians, when they were converted to God, had first the Spirit communicated to them, casting out that evil spirit, and possessing his room in them, ere they could be taught the first letter in this school. Which agrees with what Christ says of the casting out Satan, in order to men's conversions (unto which Christ's scope extends) : Mat. xii. 27, 28, ' If I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out ? therefore they shaU be your judges. But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you ;' with which compare Luke xi. 20-22, &c. It is said by Matthew that it is the Spirit, by Luke, the finger of God, by whom Christ professeth to cast out devils, in men to be converted, as well as out of men possessed. This Spirit he compares there to a stronger than Satan, that comes upon him immediately as he is in his house or place,* binds him, and overcomes him ; and so himself enters in, as Matthew's and Mark's phrase is. For it is entry and possession the Holy Ghost aims at ; and it is the first thing he doth, after he hath pulled forth Satan, that was in possession, and bound him ; and then, being entered, he throws out his goods and weapons, mor tifies corruptions, and sanctifies the heart, and leads the soul into saving truths. And this is it which Paul insinuates, that he came upon these Corinthians, cast out the spirit that led them into error, entered himself, and led them into truth. And it was as necessary he should first come on them, ere they could spiritually assent to the first or least truth, as it is necessary he comes on us, and abides in us, to lead us into all truth else. And therefore it evidently follows, both, first, that the shedding forth, or entering in of the Holy Spirit is the first foundation to all wrought in us ,- and secondly, that therefore this his coming upon us and entering into us is immediately, without any preparation, when men are unregenerate., * Qu. ' palace ' ?— Ed. 62 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. When Christ indeed comes to dwell in our hearts by faith, as Eph. Ui. 17, there need be preparation in our hearts for that his coming, and there is a preparing the way of the Lord. For he is to be received by our faith as a Saviour and Redeemer, and therefore we cannot receive him as supposed to be such until we see ourselves sinners. But our receiving the Spirit is not objective', as we receive an object into our understandings or hearts, and so needs no preparation on our parts ; for he himself must first come to work aU apprehensions and affections in us, from first to last : Gal. iv. 6, ' He sends his Spirit into our hearts, crying, Abba^Father ;' and he cries as he comes along. There are two or three objections which I wUTanswer. Obj. 1. Can we imagine that the Spirit of God, who is so holy a Spirit, will come and enter into and possess himself of an unclean, filthy, and defiled heart, in the fulness and spring-tide of its filth and uncleanness ? Doth he not rather first make the heart holy, and then by that holiness dwell therein, seating himself in the new creature which he first creates ? Thus indeed some have evangelised, and thereupon distinguished between his coming upon us, as at first, and his dweUing in us. But I answer. Ans. 1. That if the Spirit could be denied in so doing, he would not do' it ; but this earth muds not the water that gets into it to become a spring, no more than the sunbeams are by shining into a dunghiU. Ans. 2. The substance of the soul (which he comes to) is his own, and he comes to make it clean, which he cannot do, unless he gets within it. It is weU for us he is so holy, for no other water but of this preciousness would have virtue and power to cleanse us. And this is no more absurdity than to say, that pure water is poured first into a vessel to take away the filth of it ; or that fire gets into and fills the pores of metals in the ore, whilst fuU of dross, to burn out, and consume, and separate it from them. Now these are the comparisons the Scripture useth : Ezek. xxxvi. 25, ' I will sprinkle clean water upon you.' And is not that pity, you wUl say, that not only water, but clean water, should be poured upon denied hearts, utterly defiled ? God prevents the objection, in teUing us that he thinks not much at this cost. The cleanest, sweetest water that heaven affords, he chooseth, viz., his own Holy Spirit. But the water is so clean, as it receives no tincture whilst it runs through you, and cleanseth you ; as it there foUows, ' And ye shall be clean; from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you ; and a new heart wiU I give you.' And this is interpreted to be the Spirit: ver. 27, ' I wiU put my Spirit within you;' not upon you only : that wiU not serve to cleanse ; he therefore puts him first into you. And what is this but what you read, 1 Cor. vi. 11, * Such were some of you, but ye are washed :' there is the genus, or in common the Spirit's work ; the particulars follow : ' But ye are sanctified, but ye are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.' The Spirit must do both, And it is no strange thing ye should receive the Spirit, and he come into you to do all these, ere ever you are sanctified or justified. That other comparison of fire, I need not insist on. You have it, Isa. iv. 4, ' When the Lord shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem by the Spirit of burning.' You know how the Holy Ghost in this respect is compared to fire up and down the New Testament. Now what is it to the fire to enter into what is drossy and defiled, to eat it out and consume it ? .Such fuel is proper for it to seize on, and shew its power upon. And what is it to this rushing wind to enter into the middle of a rotten house (the old Chap. IX.] in our salvation. 63 man) and blow it down, and rear up a new one in the room of it ? And what is it for this strong man to enter into Satan's house, whilst he is in it, and throw him out, and spoU and rifle all his goods, and throw them out after him ? He wiU not stand without doors to do it, as Christ also tells us. Obj. 2. A second objection is out of John xiv. 17, where Christ, speaking of the Spirit, says, ' Whom the world ' (or men unregenerate) ' cannot receive, because they see him not, neither know him : but ye know him ; for he dwelleth with you,' &c. Ans. The answer is clear. That promise of the Spirit there is meant of him as a comforter and assurer of salvation ; so ver. 16, ' I wUl pray the Father, and he will give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.' Now, as such, he can never come first on an unregenerate man, but he must be a Spirit of bondage first to him, and (as chap. xvi. ver. 8) ' convince the world of sin.' And therefore they in that condition are not capable of the Spirit as a sealer ; for they must have regeneration first, and faith first wrought: Eph. i. 13, ' After ye believed, ye were sealed with the Spirit of promise.' So as Christ's plain meaning is this : you that are already beUevers, and have already experimentally felt the workings of this Spirit in you, ' you know him' (says he), and to you, and to others that know him, by having been already wrought upon, I wUl send him as a Comforter, to fill your hearts with joy in believing, unspeakable and glorious. But unregenerate men are utterly incapable of this privilege, for they know him not in these first effects of regeneration and change of heart, and there fore as a comforter they see not nor know him. He must be a regenerator ere a comforter. Receive him they may to convert them, but not thus to assure them, until he hath wrought regeneration in them, as he hath done on you. I shaU now discourse about the indwelling or inbeing of the Spirit in us after he is thus come. Concerning which my assertion is this, That the indwelling of the Spirit also is of his person primarily and im mediately, and by his graces secondarily. And although it be with his graces, yet it is not primarUy by his graces ; but his person is given to dwell in us immediately and for ever, and his graces secondarily. Our persons (bodies and souls) are the temples of his person immediately ; his graces are the hangings, the furniture, that he may dweU like himself, ut habitet decore, that he may dweU handsomely. He is a holy Spirit, and ' hoUness becomes his house,' as the psalmist speaks ; and so, though he comes first into bare walls, yet he afterwards adorns them. You have a paraUel made in the Scriptures of this point of his indwelling with that former, of the gift of him : that as his person hath been shewed to be the great gift, and his graces the secondary gift, so his indwelling is primarily added to his person, and to his graces secondarily. Because sometimes in Scripture the Spirit is used to express his graces, the cause being put for the effect, therefore it hath been generally almost asserted that he dweUs no otherwise in us than by having wrought such and such graces. But my position is, that as the person of the Spirit is primarily given, so his person aoth primarily dweU in us, and his graces secondarily. And this I hope to make clear by parallel scriptures to those other. I. That text in 1 Cor. vi. 19 (which I said 1 should have recourse to again), shews it: ' Your bodies' (and therefore much more your souls) 'are the temples of the Holy Ghost, who is in you.' It was not sufficient for him to say they were as his temples, for him to be worshipped in, by and through the graces he puts in them, but he adds, ' Who is in you,, whom 64 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I, ye have of God.' Besides what afore was said, it appears further thus ;; for as he heightens their sin of fornication, in the former verse, that it is against the person of Christ, in respect of their relation to him as a husband, so in like manner in this verse, that it is against the person of the Holy Ghost, an indweller in them : ' Ye are the temples of the Holy Ghost, who is in you.' It is therefore made a, distinctive property of the Holy Ghost as in relation to the saints (even as procession is proper to him in relation to the Father), that he is the indweUer in us : 2 Tim. i. 14, ' That good. thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.' You may observe that in the place before cited, how still there came in this superadditional clause, ' By the Holy Ghost which is given in us ;' so in like manner that other clause, ' the Holy Ghost which dwells in us,' where the person of the Holy Ghost, as thus dweUing in us, is spoken of as abstracted and severed from his grace by two characters : First, That he exhorts Timothy to keep the truth in faith and love ; ver. 13, as also ver. 14, that whole frame both of grace and form of truth, which he calls ' that good thing committed to him by the Holy Ghost.' For evidently severing the Holy Ghost's person, as the conservator of faith, and love of the truth, and of all that is good within us, or committed to us. He dis- tinguisheth him (I say) from these graces as the things that are to be pre served by him. For else he should exhort to keep these graces by these graces themselves, if he meant that they were these graces by which .the Holy Ghost doth only dwell within us. Secondly, his exhortation to Timothy runs not thus, ' By the Holy Ghost who dwells in thee,' which yet had been more proper if he had intended the indweUing of those graces in him'; but he speaks generaUy ' by the Holy Ghost who dwells in thee and us,' all in common. H. It may be observed, that whereas both God and Christ, those other two persons, are also in Scripture said to be in us, and to dweU in us, yet this indwelling is more special, and immediationi suppositi, attributed tot- Holy Ghost ; which, as it serves to give him an honour pecuUar to him, so when set in such a comparison, even with them, must be meant and understood of his person, immediately, and not by his graces only. Yea, the other two persons are said to dweU in us, and the Godhead itself, be cause the Holy Ghost dwells in us, he being the person that makes entry, and takes possession first, in the name and for the use of the other two, and so bringeth them in. I shaU but name the place which looks this way: Eph. n. 22, 'Ye are an habitation unto God by the Spirit;' 1 Cor. ni.16, ' Know ye not that ye are the temple of God ? ' namely, the Father, or (if ye will) the Godhead itself. And it follows by a special addition, ' And that the Spirit of God dwells in you.' So giving the original foundation or ground how we came to be tempies of God, because the Spirit of God dwells there. Or, as afterwards, chap, vi., ' The Spirit which ye have of God.' Likewise, 1 John in. 24, ' He that keepeth his commandments dweUethin him, and he in him.' Take it either of God the Father or the Son, for he had spoken of either : ver. 23, ' And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us,' whom we feel dwelling and work ing in our hearts. And therefore our divines have generally affirmed it, that Christ is said to dwell in us, because first his Spirit dwells in us from Rom. vm. 9, 10, compared. Now to me it were strange to interpret such speeches that God and Christ dwell in us, because their Spirit dwells in us, and then by the Spirit mean only his grace, or the Spirit only by his grace ; for the Spirit of God being a third person, must needs be acknow* i Chap. IX.j in our salvation. 65 ledged an ihdweller as weU as the other two ; yea, and to come in between them and his own grace, seeing their dwelling in us is attributed to his. The truth is, that it is in this union of ours with God, as in that of Christ ; that look, as in the union of the man Jesus unto the Son of God, and in the indwelling of the Son of God in that human nature, the Son of God first and originally dwells there, and he dweUing therein, the Father is in the man, and the Spirit is in him, and he in the Father; so is it here in this subordi nate union of ours that the third person comes as the first inmate in us, and he taking possession, the other two come in and take up their abode also. Or, if you wUl, you may view it in the Spirit's comforting of us, which holds paraUel to this. Christ first promiseth to send the Spirit, as our com forter, into us : ' And when he is come ' (says he, John xiv. 15, 17), ' I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever ; even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him : but ye know him ; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.' ' And in that day' (ver. 20) ' ye shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.' 'If any man love me ' (ver. 23), ',my Father will love him, and we will come to him, and make our abode with him.' So the Spirit comes first. And thus it is even in their indwelling also; so as indeed it may be rightly urged to the point in hand, that if it be thus, that God and Christ dwell in us, be cause his Spirit dwells in us, that then much more it must be granted that his graces are said to be and to dwell in our hearts, because the Spirit first and primarily, who is the author of them, doth so ; as the beams do there fore dwell in this visible world, or the heavens, because the sun doth first and originally dwell there, whose emanations and flowings forth they are. I might bring an invincible argument from this, that he first comes ere he works grace, but I refer it to the next head. I observe that gifts and graces are called the manifestation of the Spirit, 1 Cor. xii. 7, that is, an outward demonstration or manifestation in men of that Spirit that dwells and abides within the heart, and is invisible. The seeing of the eye, the hearing of the ear, the acting of the fancy, and speech in the tongue, are the manifestation of the soul that dwells in the body, and dwells not there by these, but with these ; and in order, the soul itself is that iyihftyju,,* that actus primus of these, as actus secundi. And such is the Spirit to our souls, and his grace, he dwelUng first in us himself. And therefore, as animalis homo is a man that hath no more but a soul in him, that informs him, and acts him, without the Spirit of God, so oppositely he is a spiritual man (you have the opposition, 2 Cor. ii. 15) that hath received into his heart the Spirit of God (read all the verses afore), that he might know the things of God. The objection which hath diverted men from this assertion is, that the person of the Holy Ghost is everywhere : Ps. cxxxix. 7, ' Whither shall I go from thy Spirit ? or whither shall I fly from thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there,' &c. And in that respect, his person is as much in a worm as in the saints, and in all alike ; therefore, how can his person be said to dwell more in the saints than elsewhere, otherwise than by his effects and graces ? 1. According to the severity of this reason, the second person, the Son of God, should not be said to dweU otherwise in the human nature of Christ than by effects and graces, which, Col. u. 9, he is said to do: ' For in him * Qu. ' 'ivri\exeia ' ' — ^Er>- VOL. VI. K 66 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I. dwelleth aU the fulness of the Godhead bodUy,' in distinction from saints' and angels. For essentially, as he is God, he is also in the meanest crea ture; and yet the person of the Son, and the Godhead itself, dweUs person ally in that nature, and not the graces only. Now, what is it makes that indweUing to be more than by graces and effects, and so puts that vast difference ? All acknowledge that it is because he takes up that human nature into a nearer relation to his person, so as to be one person with it immediately ; and such an union graces alone work not, nor gives founda tion unto. And so he dwells in him upon that account. • Well then, 2dly, it is true that into so near and high a _ relation the saints are not taken up. They are not made one with the Spirit, nor doth the Spirit dwell in them upon that account. The Spirit dwelling in a saint is not said to be ' made flesh,' as the Word is, John i. 14 ; for then, what good or evil the samts do would personally be accounted the Holy Ghost's; our prayers his, subjectively ; yea, and our sins his ; as the blood and obe dience of that man Jesus was the blood and obedience of God, and the Son of God. Therefore our relation to the Holy Ghost's person is not so near by God's ordination. Yet, 3dly (as to the point in hand), We are capable and are made partakers, by the Uke ordination and free gift of God, of a relation, or propriety rather, to the very person of the Holy Ghost, which, though it be lower than that of the Son of God to human nature in Christ God-man, yet it is not founded upon graces, but is beyond them, and before them, even by God's free and absolute gift and donation of his person to us, in order to such graces, and the working of them in us. So as that this person should indeed dwell in us, in reference to graces as the final cause, but not the instrument at all, or means of his indwelling. It is unio personarum, an union of two persons immediately, us and him remaining two persons still, as that of marriage is of two persons immediately, in order to such and such ends. And it is not unio personalis, to become one person, as that of the two natures of Christ, the human and the divine, which is unio duarum naturarum, but not unio naturalis, of two natures, but not into one nature, but one person. And this difference was exempUfied in Christ him self, our head, in the man Christ Jesus, in whom the Spirit of God dwells, not personally, for then Christ would be one person with the Holy Ghost as well as with the Son of God ; nor doth the Father dweU personally in Christ, for then all three persons should have been said to be incarnate. And yet I suppose none will say that the person of the Spirit, nor of the Son, dweUs in the man Jesus only by means of his graces, put further, the person of the Spirit first rests on the man Christ, which person he hath a right unto, that he should dwell in him, because that man Christ Jesus is now united to the second person personally, and so to his graces second arily. So as if we ask whether in order of nature the person of the Spirit dweUs in him first, or the Spirit by its graces, we may without any hesita tion answer, the person of the Spirit primarily, and then his graces. Unto which seems to me to accord that in Isa. xi. 12, where it is first said, 'The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him ; ' namely, the person of the Holy Ghost, simply and absolutely considered ; then relatively, as in order ' endowing him with such and such particular graces, viz., ' The Spirit wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord.' Now for the manner of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost's person ; it is no error to affirm that it is the same in us and the man Christ Jesus. Sure Chap. X.] in our salvation. 67 we are capable of it, and therefore shall have it, we being to be conformed to his image and likeness (as he to ours) in all that is possible, as he was to us, sin only excepted ; so we to him, the personal union and the privi-r lege of it excepted. Only, indeed, we differ herein from him in two things. 1. In the measure ; for he hath the Spirit given him ' without measure ' in his effects. 2. In the right to this indwelling of his person in us, and in him. He holds it as a royalty, and one of the greatest, from his per sonal union with the Son of God. We hold it in his right, and by virtue of the covenant of grace, and free donation ; for because we are sons adopted in him, ' he hath sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts,' Gal. iv. 6. But the modus, the manner of the indwelling, is one and tbe same. , These things long since satisfied me in this great point, and I submit them to judgment. CHAPTER X. The uses of the foregoing .doctrine-. Use 1. Let us view with admiration the riches of this gift of the person of the Holy Ghost. It is the word which the apostle useth here in the text, ' whom he shed upon us,' wXovo'icos, ' richly.' Let us value him accordingly, You value the things (every one of them) which God hath given us ; then value the Spirit much more, who is the author of the most, and discoverer of them all. Take .the most precious of graces, ' like precious faith ' (as Peter calls it), assurance of the love of God, which is the earnest of glory ; the gift of tho Spirit that works this faith, and the shedder abroad of this love, is infinitely greater. And therefore, in Rom. v. 5,_ after the enumera tion of faith, and all the fruits of it, peace with God, rejoicing in hope of glory, patience, experience, shedding abroad the love of God in our hearts, it is super-added, as more than all these, being the root, the spring of all, ' the Spirit which he hath given us.' Yea, and as in ver. 6, 7, 8, he sets out the greatness of the love of God, that gave Christ to die for us ; so, in those verses aforesaid, he would in like manner insinuate the greatness of that love that gave us this Holy Spirit to work all these graces in us, and reveal the love which God hath so commended. Insomuch as this hath been started as matter of debate, and most serious consideration, by some divines ; whether Filius datus (Isa. ix.), ' To us a Son is given,' or Spiritus datus, ' The Spirit given' (Rom. v.), be the richer favour ? Whether the incarnation, ' God manifest in the flesh,' or the diffusion, or ' pouring forth of the Spirit upon all flesh,' be the greater mercy ? From heaven they both came down, the Spirit as well as the Son, 1 Pet. i. 2, and from the bosom of the Father both. They are both of them pawns, and earnests, and witnesses alike, of one and the same love. It is also a dispute among interpreters, whether the gift of God, which, Kar e^o^v (as it is. caUed), is predicated so much, and held at so high a rate, John iv. 10, be Christ, or the Spirit, ' Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink ; thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.' It is ques tioned whether, as the sole sufficient satisfying object of our desires, is the gift of the Son or the gift of the Spirit 9 Whether Christ means himself, or the Holy Ghost, as given to us ? Many carry it to Christ, but the con text more clearly carries it to the Spirit.. For, l,.,the gift.of God (as there) 68 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK I, seems to be distinguished from, rather than explained by, that which fol< lows. ' Who it is that saith to thee,' and ' give me drink,' seem as two things, not one and the same. And, 2, that gift is clearly that Uving water which God and Christ give, and that is the Spirit, ver. 14 being compared with John vU. 38, 39. In the Old Testament you hear of it, as more than aU the mercies of giving the law, or bringing out of Egypt. ' Thou gavest them thy good Spirit to instruct them.' So Neh. ix. 20, 30, it is twice expressed, as also Isa. IxiU., when he professeth to mention ' the loving- kindness of the Lord, according to all he hath bestowed upon us,' ver. 7. Where you may see how he heaps up and multipUes words to set out the riches of God's mercies by. And this he reckons the greatest of their sins, that ' they rebelled and vexed his Holy Spirit,' as the greatest mercy of all, ' and therefore he fought against them,' ver. 10. And then himself remem bers what his kindness of old had been, and how doth he express the height's1 of it? ver. 11, ' Where is he that put his Holy Spirit within him ?' And when the temple was built again, and they- delivered out of Babylon, what is the greatest promise God could make, tiU Christ should come and give a greater measure of his Spirit ? You have it, Hag. ii. 5, ' According to the word -I covenanted with you, when I came out of Egypt, so my Spirit remains among you,' as the greatest pledge and pawn of my favour, ' fear you not.' But in the New Testament, there you hear of it again and again; as in the Old, ' Thou gavest them thy good Spirit ;' so in the New, ' He hath given his Holy Spirit,' is written almost in every epistle. It is almost all the talk, and fills their mouths throughout aU the book of the Acts; especiaUy the first fifteen chapters, it was aU their talk and speech. The first question they asked, when they met any that professed Christ, was (as Acts xix. 1, 2), ' Have ye received the Holy Ghost,' yea or no ? So tran scendent a privilege is it, that it is recorded as the emulation of the Jews against the Gentiles. The Jews had wont to make Messiah their glory (as Simeon hath it, Luke ii. 32, ' The glory of thy people Israel'). But when they had received the Holy Ghost (Acts u.) they would have run away with it alone, as the richest prize, tiU God confuted them, by pouring forth the same Spirit equaUy, and as much upon the GentUes, thereby giving both sorts his chUdren an equal portion in him, as being the whole of his estate now left to bestow, having given his Son afore: Acts xi. 17, < Forasmuch as God gave them' (says Peter) ' the Uke gift of the Holy Ghost, as he did unto us,' which argued the utmost of his favour to the one as weU as the other ; as that of the prophet also shews, Ezek. xxxix. 29, ' Neither will I hide my face any more from them, for I have poured forth my Spirit upon them, saith the Lord.' Nay then (say the Jews there), let them take all, as well as we. God hath withheld nothing from them, ' for then hath God granted the Gentiles repentance unto Ufe' ver. 18, and estated them in all promises, in all privileges of life, for he hath given them his Spirit, Who dares deny to baptize them ? Who dares to shut them out from any privileges ? ' For they have received the Holy Ghost as weU as we,' says Peter, Acts x. 41. And in that hot dispute in Acts xv., about the Gentiles' salvation, Peter silences aU with this (ver. 8, 9), ' God, who knows their hearts, hath given them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, as he did to us, and put no difference between them and us' (so ver. 11). They and we are heirs aUke of the same salvation; and God (saith Paul an apostle and a Jew, unto the GentUe Corinthians) hath established us with you and you with us, ' hath anointed us,' and ' sealed us,' and « given us the earnest of his Spirit in our hearts,' 2 Cor. i. 21, 22. That as the apostle argues, Chap. X.] in our salvation. 69 ' If he hath given us his Son, how shall he not with him give us all things ?' so the sum of these agitations is, that if God hath given us his Spirit, how shaU he not give us, I do not say, with him only, but in him, even in that one gift of him, give us aU things ? In this one gift of the Holy Ghost (as it is termed, Acts x. 47, and often elsewhere) — not gifts, as of many, but gift, as of one — is contained all the whole, both of grace and glory ; tanquam infonte, tanquam in semine ; as in the seed and fountain of both. Use 2. Is the gift of the Spirit that great and rich gift which God vouchsafes to the sons of men ? Then how miserable are they that have not this Spirit in them, nor have had any workings from him in order to their salvation, to this very day ! that live a life of sensual pleasures, in enjoying meat, drink, marriage, beauty, great houses, riches, fine clothes ; and then say (as in Revelations iii. 17), ' I am rich, and have need of nothing ; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked ; ' for why, thou wantest the Spirit. When Jude would express the misery of these sensual wretches, his words are, ver. 19, ' not having the Spirit.' And indeed (Rom. viU. 5, 6), ' they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh ; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnaUy minded is death ; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.' Use. 3. Let me instruct your hearts accordingly to direct your prayers hereafter with answerable intentions and vehemency, for the gift of the Spirit himself. You pray in the Spirit, and you bless in the Spirit ; let me exhort you to pray for the Spirit above aU, and to bless God for this Holy Spirit, as one of the greatest blessings of aU. When the apostle saw the Corinthians eager after spiritual gifts, his care and skill was to pitch their aims and desires upon what was most exceUent : 1 Cor. xii. 21, ' Covet the best gifts ; and yet I shew you a more excellent way.' Thou seekest after particular mercies, and some one particular grace thou at present findest thou needest, to be humbled for sin, to be emptied of thine own righteousness, to have the right way and art of believing particularly dis covered to thy heart, or to have power against such a lust, &c. And thou dost well, for thou art to branch thy prayers intoaU particular wants. But yet let me shew thee a more exceUent way. Pray for the Spirit himseli to be given thee ; and whilst thou seekest for the stream, forget not the foun tain. For when God gives thee him more and more to dwell in thee, and fill thee and mingle with thine heart, he brings with himself all these unto thee. Is thine heart hard ? li God pour this water on thee, it will soak into it, and soften it. Wouldst thou see thy sinfulness, the most spiritual wickedness of unbeUef, &c, in thee ? ' When he is come, he wUl convince of sin, because they believe not in me,' saith Christ. He that searcheth the deepest things of God, is much more able to search and discover the shaUows of thy heart. Wouldst thou have no confidence in the flesh, but be purely carried out of thyself to seek the righteousness of Christ alone, and be found therein ? Read Gal. v. 5, « We through the Spirit wait for the righteousness of faith.' Wouldst thou have joy and peace in believing, joy unspeakable and glorious, the love of God shed abroad in thine heart ? Pray for the Spirit : Rom. xv. 13, ' Now the God of hope fill you with aU joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.' Wouldst thou have thy lusts mortified ? ' We through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the flesh,' Rom. viii. 13. ' And ye through the Spirit have purified your hearts,' 1 Peter i. 22. Our Saviour Christ, both in his own practice and direction to us, hath 70 THE WORK OF THE HOLY" GHOST [BOOK L guided us to this, as the great request. 1. By his own example ; for what is made the greatest and most professed subject of the flower of the most raised prayers that our great high priest eternally puts up for us ? Yea, and upon what occasion did he first promise that he would pray for us ? It is even this : ' I wiU pray the Father to give you another Comforter, even the Holy Ghost,' John xiv. 16, 26. You may judge what things your own or others' judgments and apprehensions are raised up to as most excellent, by what your prayers and desires therein reach forward to, as the mark of your eye. Therefore in Christ's judgment, that knows best what is to be prayed for, this is the most exceUent. Yea, and you may take this further estimate of it, that he promiseth to spend his prayers now in heaven (and if ever his heart is wound up to the highest strains, it is there), yea, his prayers and intercessions there are spent most upon this subject. And though he may be supposed to pray for other things we stand in need of, yet I am sure this in particular is mentioned, and perhaps the first and chiefest. And as his own practice, so his direction pitcheth us upon this also; And he cites his father's judgment also of this to be the best request we can put up ; that if ever we were confined to ask but some one thing, he would advise us to ask this. In the 11th of Luke, Christ himself had been pray ing, and was upon that occasion desired to teach them to pray, ver. 1 ; and he gives them many particulars in that we call the Lord's Prayer, and then makes a parable to provoke them to importunity, ver. 5, 6, 7 ; and bids them ' Ask,' and ' seek,' and ' knock,' aU being several degrees of more urgency, vehemency, and importunity, so ver. 9 ; with promise that such shall in the end receive, ver. 10. But then what is the most eminent thing, the best, he would direct you to pray for ? Though he had given the par ticulars in the Lord's Prayer, he singleth out^this of the Spirit : ver. 13, ' If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children ; how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him ?' He wraps up this direction in a promise, and delivers it by way of promise for their greater encouragement, and he calls in his Father's judgment to prove that this is the best and greatest request : ' If you, that are evil, know how to give good, things to your children.' According to your judgment you use to give the best, and use to exercise your best judgment, ; therein ; then take your heavenly Father's judgment, which is most exceUent and desirable, even ' his Spirit.' And therefore, Mat. vii. 11 expresseth it thus : ' How much more shall your Father in heaven give good things,' even all good things (for such the Spirit summarily is), ' to them that ask him ?' This is the Father's judgment, you see, and it is Christ's, and you may be sure it is the Spirit's. You cannot honour him more than to pray most for him, that makes all your prayers ; and he takes it kindly to see himself most desired by you, that is the author of all your desires. You may observe also how Christ pitcheth our thirstings upon this great sea and ocean of goodness, able to supply us with whatever we desire. He had taught them (Mat. v.) to ' hunger and thirst after his righteousness,' and holiness therewith, with a promise of blessedness. But in the great day of the solemn feast, he makes this proclamation, John vii. 37-39, upon this last day of the feast he brings forth his best wine — ' Be filled with the Spirit, and not with wine' — he proclaims his best commodity at the end of this assembly. And you may observe he says but in general, ' He that thirsteth,' he names not what ; because, let it be what good soever the mind of man could be, supposed to stretch its desires to, that Spirit which he Chap. X.] in our salvation. 71 spake of, ver. 39, was a complete satisfaction to it, and so as they might thirst no more. And he directs them to two things ; 1, to believe on him self, and come to him who was to give the Spirit ; and then, 2dly, to come to his Spirit as given by him, whom we are also said to drink, 1 Cor. xii. 13. Our prayers are the most precious actings of our souls, and it is the greatest advantage that can be to us to have the aims of our prayers set to the best and highest marks. And upon all accounts you have seen this to be it, to pray for the, Spirit. And therefore learn hereafter, in your prayers, not to deal or traffic in particular or small wares only, but put in for the whole stock of the Spirit, as wise merchants use to do, and as Christ himself (as you have heard) in his intercession doth. And observe it in experience, when the Holy Ghost comes upon you, and fills your hearts as another Spirit, sensibly mingUng with yours, then if you go over all the promises. and find them yours, you can then apply this or that, or any one. And why ? Because you have the great promise, ' the Spirit of promise.' You may (let me say it with reverence) at such a time make use of the Spirit to anything whatsoever. You may fall upon your lusts by him, and. do more at such a time for the destroying of them than in many prayers after. You may ' by the Spirit ' then, at such a time, ' mortify the deeds of the flesh.' At such times improve your opportunity ; for, having the Spirit, you have all good things, and you may ask what you wUl and have it. And yet even then ask still for more of himself. Use 4. If the Holy Ghost be the great indweller in us, and graces but the manifestations of him, then let us shew forth the virtue of him, that dwells in us, and be holy, as he is holy : as Cor. iiii. 16, 17, ' Know ye not that ye are the temple of God ; and that the Spirit of God dwelleth jn you ? If any man defileth the temple of God, him shall God destroy ; for the temple of God is holy ; which temple ye are.' You see what a hei nous thing it is to defile the heart or soul, because his temple. But elsewhere the apostle holds forth a stronger motive, even that the Spirit dwells in us, as the soul doth in the body, and the life we lead is his, not ours ; as,,the life pf the body is not of the body, but of the soul in the body. This is the, purport of that Gal. v. 25, ' If we live in the Spirit, we walk in the Spirit.' The question first is (for opening of it), What is meant by that phrase, ' if ye Uve in the Spirit.' And how is it to be distinguished from ' walking in the Spirit'? If to live in the Spirit were meant to be active, lively, or striving in actions of spiritual life, to walk in the Spirit would be all one ; it would be but idem ex eodem.; for to live, in that sense, is to move and walk. But the genuine notion that interprets this is, that he intends a comparison : — 1. Between the soul's indwelUng in our bodies as a principle of life, and the Spirit's like indwelling as the fountain of spiritual life ; which that in the prophet also insinuates, Ezek. xxxvii. 14, ' I will put my Spirit into you, and ye shall live.' 2dly, That as walking or action of life spring from the soul's indweUing, so should an answerable walking from this of the Spirit's like indwelling. And so this expression, ,' if ye live in the Spirit,' is a persuasion drawn from a common professed principle. His inference runs thus: Consider whom you have in you. The Spirit. And how? Even as a constant principle of spiritual life. And to that end he doth dwell and abide in you, as your reasonable soul doth in your bodies. If you profess this, then live, and act, and walk, and shew forth graces worthy and suitable to so great and holy a Spirit, that hath vouchsafed and condescended thus to dweU in you, and become a fountain of such a Ufe in you and to you. 72 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOKl Every living thing acts according to that soul that is in it, according ,J the degree of vigour and activity, and kind of life communicated thereby.; If you then profess to Uve in the Spirit, walk in the Spirit ; as if you should say to a sottish man (Cui anima inservit tantum pro sale), If you be a man, have a reasonable soul in you, act and carry yourself as a man, and be not not Uke a beast that perisheth. The only inquest will be, Why, if he intend this simUitude of the soul's indwelling (as it is evident he doth), he should express it thus : ' If you live in the Spirit '? The answer is, It is true that we indeed, in common speech, rather use to say the soul lives in the body, than that the body Uves in the soul ; though in reality it be true that the body rather lives in the soul, than the soul in the body, the soul being a principle of life unto the body, and not e contra. The apostle thereupon, to express perfect and real dependence of life spiritual upon this great Spirit, chooseth rather to say, ' Live you in the Spirit,' thereby importing this Spirit to be the same to us in respect of all grace and spiritual life communicated to us by union with, and indwelling: in us, that the soul is to the body. And yet of Christ, Paul useth even that other phrase also (though only when he speaks of the activity of a Christian's life), that ' Christ lives in us,' Gal. n. 20. Use 5. Grieve not this Holy Spirit. That expression imports the highest motive. Superiors use to be offended, familiar friends grieved ; the Spirit, considered as a superior, therefore to resist him is termed rebeUion, : Isa. lxiv., ' They rebelled against his Holy Spirit.' But because he vouchsafes also to become a famUiar friend (as hath been declared), therefore he is also said to be grieved. And if you have love in you, that wiU move you more, when you think him you grieve is God, Isa. xxvU. 13. To grieve not man only, but God, is load enough ; more than to say you offend him. Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, is comparatively guarded with a trinity of articles, rb «i/iv/ia tov Qtov rb uytov. They shew his greatness and his goodness: his greatness, that he is the Spirit of God; his goodness (1.), the Holy Spirit in himself ; (2.) that he hath sealed you. We would not grieve a brother, Prov. xxui. 19, much less a father. You would not grieve a minister that watcheth over men's souls, as a substitute under the Holy Ghost (Heb. xUi.), much less himself. If thou hast done so, there is no way but to be grieved too, and as fire best takes out fire, so thy grief that of the Spirit's. I say no more but this to myself and you. There is a day a-coming in which you will need him and all his cordials ; therefore I speak to you in the words of Ecclesiasticus, which is the voice of that bodily self-love in us, and let it be of spiritual self-love also, ' Honour thy physician.' So treat this Holy Spirit, as thou wouldst one from whose prescription thou art in a continual course of physic, and none have skill but he. For when thou comest to die, his cordials must alone support, for none of any other's making wiU do thee any good. It is these, and these alone, must comfort, and carry thee to heaven. ***,The chapter ends abruptly, and is probably incomplete. In the folio edition there is at the bottom of the page the catchword ' And,' and the following page is left blank in all the copies that we have been able to consult. In other cases we have found pages blank in one copy, but not in another of the same edition, the omission being manifestly caused by the carelessness of the printers. In this case, however, it is probable that the manuscript left by the author was unanished.— Ed. Chap. I.] _ our salvation. 73 BOOK II. That there are two states or conditions through which God carries the elect : the state of nature, and the state of grace. — That the new birth is the pas sage between them, which evidenceth the necessity of the new birth, or regene ration. — The reasons why God hath so ordered it, that the generality of the elect, who live in riper years, should for some time remain in the state of nature before he renews them. — The uses qf the doctrine. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man ap peared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour ; that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs accord ing to the hope of eternal life. — Tit. HI. 4—7. CHAPTER I. Tlie words of the text explained ; from which, and other scriptures, it is proved that the elect are in a state of sin and wrath before they are brought into a state of grace. This text doth afford these heads to be treated on* : I. That there are two different states or conditions, which the elect of God, that are saved, pass through, between whieh regeneration is the pass. 1. The one is their first state in which they were born, a state of bon dage to sin, and obnoxious to instant damnation whilst they remain in it. This is clear in the words, and is premised to celebrate the mercy of it ; for having mentioned all men, in the very words afore, in exhorting to shew meekness to all men, it foUows, for we ourselves, whom God hath now shewn mercy unto, and severed and caUed out from the rest of man kind, were also sometimes disobedient, serving divers lusts and pleasures. These words, ' we also sometimes,' both import, that as the rest of men remained in this woeful state, so themselves, though now saved, were once in the same state of bondage to sin, serving divers lusts, and thereby ob noxious to damnation. 2. The other state is of grace and salvation ; therefore oppositely to that former state, he says, He hath saved us, justified us, and made us heirs of life. Us, who in the former estate had been heirs of hell, and children of wrath, as the opposition shews. .H. Hence it foUows that the new birth is the transitus, or passage between these two states, and the necessity thereof from thence may be demonstrated. 74 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK Hf IH. And, thirdly, that God, to magnify his grace, mercy, love, kindness (for all these are named) the more, leaveth many, or most of those he saveth, to remain and continue, for some time, in the first estate, before he doth regenerate them. For Paul, speaking of the commonalty and bulk of them in distinction from all other men, says, ' We ourselves were sometimes dis obedient,' and so remained and continued in that condition as well as other men. But at length, ' after the love of God appeared towards us' (says he), 'he saved us by regeneration,' and it aU tends to shew as well the necessity as the mercy of it. ' IV. Hence then it is evident, that the eminentest mercy that God doth, or which may be judged to be vouchsafed us in our whole lives, or to eter nity, is the laying the foundation in his first renewing, and regenerating us by his Spirit, as being the transitus, or the passage between both, by which we become translated from the one, and actually admitted into the other, of salvation : ' According to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of rege neration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abun dantly, through Jesus Christ our Saviour : that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.' V. Further, to set forth the mercy of it, there is presented here as great a solemnity at this business, as ever was or shall be found in any work done for us, namely, a joint concurrence, and yet distinct appearance, in a set and solemn conjunction of aU three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. A happy constellation or conjunction of. the planets faUing out at the instant of the birth of some great prince (especially if you supposed it one of those greatest conjunctions, whereof but six have been since the crea tion) how wonderful a prognostic would this be accounted by astrologers, '$ of great and glorious events .to follow and accompany him so born, and" thus honoured and marked.forth at his birth. But, lo ! a more glorious conjunction, of the three glorious persons in the heaven of heavens, of the three witnesses in heaven, as John terms them, solemnly meeting and appearing as witnesses at this great baptism, the only true baptism, the new birth of every believer ; caUed, therefore, ' the laver' or ' washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.' 1. The Father is implied in the 4th verse. After the love of our Saviour, he saved us by renewing us ; for God our Saviour, in the 4th verse, is clearly made a distinct per^ son from Jesus Christ, our Saviour, ver. 6 ; so then the Father is meant. 2. The Holy Ghost is mentioned, for it is called ' the renewing of the Holy Ghost,' was then shed on us abundantly. 8. Jesus Christ is named in those words, 'through Jesus Christ our Saviour.' All this displays the greatness of the mercy of our regeneration, which Peter had only in general words expressed (1. Pet. i. 3) ; but Paul, you see, doth it more particularly here, though Peter indeed doth also express the authors of this work ; for there is first God, as in opposition to all created causes : ' Blessed be God, who hath begotten us.' In God all three persons are included, having a distinct and proper hand in it, though of all the three persons the Holy Ghost more eminently and specially. His name is taken into its very deno mination. It is termed and denominated by the apostle, ' the renewing of the Holy Ghost,' as elsewhere the thing begotten : John iii., ' That which is born of the Spirit.' Lastly, in Christ, who is xar e%o%riv, our Saviour, of all transactions of his for our salvation, his resurrection hath the most eminent influence into our new birth, as the instrumental cause ; and for that I must have recourse unto Peter, and fetch it out of him, 'who halh begotten us again by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.' Chap. I.]' in our salvation. 75 06s. That there are two vastly differing estates of sin and damnation, of grace and salvation, which the new birth is the passage between, and the tran situs from the one to the other. This I must premise, as the apostle doth, in order to shew both the absolute necessity of regeneration, and greatness of the mercy of it. Not this scripture alone, but all the epistles, give eminent evidence to my assertion, and under several metaphors and expressions (wherein each delights in its variety) set forth maps and descriptions of these two estates, which argues this matter to have been, in the preachings of the apostles, a point of greatest moment. And this discrimination made is not to be understood as the setting out two sorts, or ranks, or destinies of men ; as if the one sort consisted only of persons that were reprobate, the other of elect, or as if none but reprobate should be understood to be in the estate of nature, and the elect to be such as were always in no other estate but the estate of grace. It is true indeed that all elect, sooner or later, are in the end translated into the estate of grace, or they could not be saved. And on the contrary, those whom God passeth by are left to con tinue and persist in the state of sin and damnation to their deaths, and they die in their sins, as Christ speaks. But these two differences in man kind are to be looked upon as two estates or conditions, whereof the one hath salvation, the other damnation, actually belonging to them at the present ; whilst any, either elect or they who are passed by, are respec tively the subjects of either. And therefore we find this different condition exemplified in one and the same persons themselves of the elect, take them in several times of their lives, in that estate we usually call of nature ; but afterwards, through being renewed, they are in the estate of grace. Only what the apostle speaks in another yet the like case, that by God's ordina tion holds in this, ' That is not first which is spiritual; (or the estate of grace), 1 Cor. xv. 46, ' but that is first which is natural ; and afterwards that which is spiritual.' His reason (ver. 49) holding also in this, that we are to bear the image of the earthly, the first Adam first, and then the image of the heavenly. This almost every epistle to all the saints they wrote to, doth more or less indigitate : thus Rom. vi. 17, 18, ' But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.' And 1 Cor. vi. 11, ' Such were some of you : but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.' And Gal. iv. 8, ' There was a time ' (then) ' when ye knew not God,' and a now : ' After that now ye have known God, or rather are known of God.' And Eph. ii. 1,2,-' And you hath he quickened, who were dead in sins and trespasses ; wherein in time past ye walked,' &c, and so he goes on to describe their natural condition. And Col. i. 21, ' And you, that were sometimes enemies in your minds by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled ;' and chap. ii. 13, ' And you, being dead in your Sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened, having forgiven you all trespasses.' Neither do they exemplify this in the same persons of the Gentile converts, but in the Jewish also ; who came in troops to John, to escape the wrath to come. And though himself was sanctified from the womb (Luke i. ver. 15) though conceived in the state of sin ; ' for that which is bom of the flesh is flesh ;' yet the multitude of the rest of the elect lived in disobedience until riper years, ver. 16, 17, ' And many of the children of Israel shaU he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias,' to turn them, namely through *76 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK H. his ministry. And accordingly our Peter, writing to the Jews, that had lived in the bosom of that church, speaks of them as of those_who_ before this their generation had a former estate, which he terms ' their vain con* versation,' ver. 18, and (ver 14) calls that estate ' the former lusts of their ignorance ;' so terming their former estate, from the want of saving know* ledge, when their lusts ruled, which now having escaped, they were made partakers of a divine nature : 1 Peter i. 4, having now ' purified their hearts, being born again of incorruptible seed,' ver. 22, 23. And more expressly he says of them (U. 10), that they he thus wrote to (who were by outward character the people of God) ' in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God ; which had not obtained mercy, but have now obtained mercy.' It was a state wherein actually, and before God as a judge, or according to the judgment the Word pronounced of them (by which God wUl judge all the world,) they were not a people ; though before God, as God, they were elected, and his chosen people. The other is a state of grace and mercy, ' but now ' (says he) ' have obtained mercy ;' and still regeneration or conversion is set out as the passover, as the equi noctial Une to be passed, that divides between both cUmates, the one of darkness and the shadow of death ; the other a contrary climate of Ught and glory : so the words just afore intimate, ' who hath caUed us out of darkness into his marvellous light.' And as Peter speaks thus of the Jews as well as GentUes, so Paul also having spoken (Eph. n. 1) to the Gentiles (compare ver. 11) : ' You were dead in sins ; wherein in time past ye walked ;' he turns his speech from them to himself and his countrymen the Jews, and says of all the generality of the Jews then converted, ' Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.' By those others he means the Gentiles, and he evidently speaks of what they had been in their con versation unto riper years. Divines usually term the one the state of nature, as the other the state of grace ; and they give them these terms warrantably frpm the Scriptures. 1. For the terming a man's condition after regeneration the state of grace, the apostle doth it expressly : Rom. v. 2, ' By faith ' (saith he) ' we have access into this grace wherein we stand ;' that is, into this station. It is a perpetual and standing condition of favour, when once we have admission or access into it, which by faith there, and by regeneration here in this text of Titus, we are said to have ; he speaks as we do, or rather we as he, calling it a state of grace. And so oppositely the other a state of nature, which you have as fully and as expressly mentioned, Eph. n. For when he would sum up what was that estate of both Jews and Gentiles fore-spoken of, he, as in a general conclusion, speaks thus, ' We were by nature chUdren of wrath, as weU as others.' His meaning is not only that both were aUke in such an estate when bom, as restraining that phrase ' by nature,' merely unto what they had been by birth, and so only tp their birth-sin (though that must be intended as the source or spring) ; but he speaks too of that race and whole time of their conversation, and course run, wherein they fulfilled the lusts they had by nature (as is evident) until quickened and saved. He termeth that whole stage they ran, and that scene of Ufe, a condition of nature, as acting all that while according to the principles and swing of nature, and having nought but nature in them, afore grace came and wrought in them. And therefore, as Erasmus hath weU observed, it is opposed to that which follows (ver. 5) « By grace ye are Chap. I.] in our salvation. 77' saved,' shewing in the former what naturally without grace, and until grace, their condition was, for sin and wrath. And this interpretation, that style of the apostle given to every man in that estate confirms, terming him, 1 Cor. ii. 14, ' a natural man,' in distinction from a spiritual, till made a spiritual man by regeneration : ' That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.' During all which time they remain (till new-born) ' children of wrath ; ' that is, whose portion is wrath, and they exposed to it, during such their condition. And similarly to this sense, that this phrase ' by nature ' should involve the whole time from the birth, as well as -the sinfulness of our birth itself, do other scriptures speak when they would describe and set forth that natural condition : Ps. Iviii. 3, ' They.are gone astray from the womb.' And it is the natural condition afore and without grace the psalmist there speaks of. For he not only says they were corrupt in or by the womb, but all along from the womb, thereby expressing their whole state. The like you have Gen. vi., ' from their youth.' Now when we say men's condition afore regeneration is aU that while a state of sin and wrath, as that of grace is the contrary, I desire all men to consider what that imports. Guilt of sin is one thing (the best are guUty), but a state of sin is a further thing. Corruption of nature to be in a man is one thing, the state of nature is another : to' be worthy of death is one thing, so every man in sinning is ; but to be in a state of death is another ; it is to be sentenced and adjudged to die, or as Christ speaks, condemned already : John iii. 18, ' He that believeth on him is not condemned : but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God ;' -which is all one to say, He that hath not such a faith as renews the heart (for of regeneration Christ hath discoursed, ver. 3-5 of the chapter) is in a state of condemna tion, so that he needs no other sentence. There wants nothing but execu^ tion ; for which how soon a writ wiU come out he knows not. As in the canon law for some transgressions a man stood excommunicated ipso facto upon the committing, as murder, &c, it depended not upon a new sentence. Here his state makes him instantly and immediately obnoxious to death. Every sin he sins not only deserves death, but it is ' unto death ;' not only the thing is worthy of it, but by reason of his state it redounds to the person, and binds him over to death, which is the true import of that phrase, ' A child of wrath by nature ;' as a man that stands sentenced and adjudged, condemned to die, is by a Jew termed a child of death : 2 Sam. xii. 5, ' This man is a child of "death.' For David as a king did at that time pronounce it of him, as we translate it, that he should ' certainly die.' And Christ, on the contrary, is termed a ' Son of love,' Col. i. 13 ; we translate it ' his dear Son,' but it is biog ay&arig, noting forth a perpetuated state of grace and favour borne to him, which Christ calleth ' abiding in his Father' lovq,' John xv. 2 ; that is, he remains in a perpetual state of grace and favour ; and in the Uke sense these are termed ' chUdren of wrath,' as abiding in it, 78 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II, CHAPTER II. That it is by the new birth that an elect soul is transplanted from a state of sin and wrath into a state of grace. — That it ought therefore to be our ear nest inquiry, whether we are regenerated, or no. — That though we are by nature the children of wrath, yet our case is not desperate, because this state I shall now evidence the assertion, that regeneration is the only altera tion of this estate of death, and so make way for application. A state is a permanent fixed condition, whether of good or evU, con tinued without cessation or interruption, until the legal terms of that con dition be altered. This might be in many instances exemplified. I will only take such as the apostle, discoursing of these two states (Rom. vi. 7) hath illustrated them to us by, which do withal directly concern the doc trine in hand. The Romans they had servants, which were slaves to them, and some by birth, over whom they had the power of life and death. The condition of such was a permanent condition, and so is that of apprentice servants among us, till the terms of that condition are altered. If they ran away, yet their condition altered not, they might take them wherever they found them. The terms of that alteration were either manumission or expiration by death. Now, Paul professeth, by this instance of this outward condition among men, to set out those other we are now upon : ver. 19, 'I speak after* the manner of men,' saith he ; that is, I use this allusion to express the difference of those two states you once were and * now are in ; ver. 17, 18, ' You were the servants of sin, but now, made free from sin, ye become the servants of righteousness.' Now, then, to see how upon regeneration the terms of this state and condition are altered, the apostle tells us that their hearts having been new moulded, cast into that mould of doctrine of the gospel (twov Sida^VS £'S ov KaigedMqri) into which they were delivered (sover.17), and they being ingrafted into Christ, and the likeness of his death and resurrection (ver. 3-5, &c, whereby they became dead to sin and were made men new risen again), therefore by the law of nations the terms of that condition were altered, ' and he that is dead,' saith the apostle, ' is freed ' from his master ; ver. 6, 7, ' Our old man being crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin ; ' and we being new raised from the dead by Christ's resurrection. Look then, as if you could suppose a Roman slave had been killed and dead, and then raised again to a new life, the law must have freed him from that former state, for he was now a man of another world ; so a man being freed from sin is also freed from a state of death, and he is said to pass from death to life, as it is expressed once by Christ : John v. 24, ' He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath ever lasting life, and shaU not come into condemnation ; but is passed from death to life.' And as it is expressed by John, 1 John in. 14, which is a second allusion to the state of a man adjudged to die in one kingdom, in which is absolute tyranny, and no pardon to be had, but certain death-,! wherein, whilst he remains, he is perpetuaUy in a state of death, which|i every moment may befaU him, and in the end certainly wiU. Now, what alters the terms of such a man's condition ? Do but suppose there is an other region, where grace and mercy only reigns, and which invites men Chap. _.] in our salvation. 79 to come over to it, with promises of life and pardon ; when he arrives there his state is changed. These are the two estates (Rom. v. 21), 'That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteous ness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.' Take a man that is a, servant to sin : sin is said to reign over him unto death, and whilst he re mains in it he is a son of death, a subject of death ; and that kingdom shews no mercy. But regeneration, and such a faith as regenerateth, is a bridge or ship to carry him over into another dominion of grace, ' where grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life,' and welcomes all that wUl come into its dominions, and takes them for ever into its protection. And if grace means to save a man, it prepares this ark for him, even ' the washing of regeneration,' whereof baptism is the seal: 1 Pet. iii. 20, 21, ' As in the days of Noah, when the ark was preparing, wherein few, thai is, eight souls, were saved by water. So the like figure unto it, viz., bap tism, doth now save us (not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God), by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.' It is not the outward but the inward baptism saves, and still by the resurrection of Jesus Christ : 1 Cor. vi. 11, 'Ye are washed, ye are sanc tified, ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of God.' Sanctified by the Spirit, and justified by the name of Christ, and being thus wafted over to the other side of the shore, the devil, sin, and hell, and death cannot reach you: 'You are not under the law,' the cove nant of creation, by virtue of which sin and death reigns in the first estate (for 'the strength of sin is the law'), 'but under grace;' that is, the dominion of grace, Rom. vi. 14, where Christ also reigns, chap. v. 21. The like you have Col. i. 12, 13, speaking of their conversion, and giving thanks to God for it : ' Giving thanks ' (says he) ' unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light : Who hath deUvered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son,' where we are safe for ever. And to the same purpose he speaks, Rom. vi. 9-11, 'Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more ; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once : but in that he liveth, he Uveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.' He would have them reckon and account themselves, asjfor the permanency of that new state, in that very same condition Christ is in, but then to take heed to walk accordingly : ver. 12, ' Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.' This is the natural, supreme law in the hearts of the subjects of that kingdom, and which re generation hath written therein. There is another similitude, whereby the apostle sets out these two states in their fore-mentioned fixed settledness, and this alteration from the one to the other (chap vU.), and it is that of marriage, which with us, you know, is a settled, fixed condition for life, till by death the terms of that condition be altered. Now, what says the apostle ? Rom. vii. 2, 3, ' The woman who hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth ; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress : but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law ; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.' By the covenant of the first creation (under which a man for ever stands tiU married to Christ), the heart of man was married to the law, and so 80 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK Hj subjected to the power of it, as to its natural husband ; as the wife by the law of creation is said to be to the husband (Gen. iii.), and among other; thmgs, to beget children according to his likeness on her. Man faUs from God, yet still the marriage holds, but through the disease of nature, and perverseness of the wife, children that are contrary to the holy law are brought forth by her, and no other, which, together with herself, are sub jected to the punishment of that law, ' Thou shalt die the death.' But now, says he, if either we die or the law die, then we may marry another, and so the terms of that condition and estate of subjection alters; and thus, says he, it is here, ver. 4, ' Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are be come dead to the law by the body of Christ ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruits unto God.' So then regeneration, which consists in the morti fication of lusts, and quickening us with Christ, and faith that marries us to him, makes the alteration ; and the resurrection of Christ foUows us stiU. Let me, ere I go off from this point, apply it a Uttle. We are aU here in the presence of God, and it is certain that we aU stand under one of these estates before God this day. We are all subjects belonging to one of these dominions, of death or life. And it is as certain that we aU once were in that condition of nature, and so of wrath, as sure as we are men. And it is also sure that nothing doth or can make the alteration out of the one into the other but true regeneration, which alone, by God's ordination, alters the condition of sin and death, as it is a permanent estate. For, to add this reason to the former, as the first birth alone was the foundation of that first estate, so this second birth alone is the entrance and access into this other estate of grace. And now then, whether regeneration be savingly wrought in us or no, is a question the best man may ask his own soul ; for God will not be mocked, or be put off with anything outward or inward that is below it. As Rom. iii. 23, ' For we aU have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.' And it is as certain, that if we die without obtaining of it, we are undone and lost for ever, and go to hell, as sure as we are now aUve. Use 1. Now then, first, for examination of our estates: consider that this being such a permanent condition, both that no change but into true hoUness makes the alteration ; and withal, corrupt nature will bear many elevations and refinements which are not the divine nature, it concerns us to make a very strict inquiry. It is certain God tries in several degrees how far corrupt nature will be refined, and yet faU short of the glory of God. You know what elevation Socrates was of among the heathens, and Paul among the Jews, by the addition of the Ught of the law, Phil. Ui., and how strict the young man in the gospel was in pharisaical observances ; and how far advanced above these, those are among Christians who are enlight ened and taste of the powers of the world to come, and yet fall short, Heb. vi. 4-6. Now, suppose any one man should be by God gradually re fined, and run through all such alterations as corrupt nature remaining still is capable of. Suppose a profane epicure were turned first a Stoic or a Socrates, then, with all his heroic virtues, turned a Jew, and embraced that religion ; yet Christ hath said it of the one and the other, ' Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees, ye cannot go to heaven ; ' yea, de facto, many devout heathens did turn to the Jewish pro fession (in which was salvation then, John iv. 22, as in the Christian faith now), and yet of them Christ pronounceth (Mat. xxui. 15) that they are twofold more the children of heU than before. If, in Uke manner, the most Chap. H.] in our salvation. 81 devout and righteous Turk should now turn Christian merely in outward profession, and embrace aU the articles of that profession, his condition would be but parallel to the former. Well, but then let this man be ele vated further, let him receive the word with joy, as the stony ground; yea, let him cast off all outward evils, as the thorny ground did the tops of aU its thorns that grew above ground, only the roots remaining not plucked up, let him escape ro\ giida/jLara, ' the gross defilements of the world,' 2 Peter ii. 20, ' through the knowledge of Christ ; ' let him ' escape the corruptions that are in the world through lust ; ' and in a word, let him further (as in Heb. vi. 4, 5) be ' enlightened, and taste of the heavenly gift, and be made partaker of the Holy Ghost, and taste the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come ; ' yet if he is not partaker of the divine nature (spoken of 2 Peter i. 4), whereby he mortifies the inward lusts themselves ; if he have not the divine image stamped on him, and made a nature in him, and child-like dispositions of love to God wrought, it is certam the terms of that condition he was born in are not altered. Like baser metals, corrupt nature will suffer many sublimations, and yet be base metal stiU; and until it comes to be turned into the true elixir, that changeth it into gold, the state of man is not changed. Men may run away from their master- sins (as servants from their masters) when their lusts are not crucified, their indentures not cancelled, and so long the terms of their estate is not altered, but sin fetcheth them again. Men in prison may be taken out of the dungeon and put into more open rooms, and there have their bolts knocked off, and from thence be brought to the grate to look out abroad, and see the happiness of them at liberty, and have communion with them, and so not to be far from the kingdom of God (as Christ said to the scribe, Mark xii. 34). Yea, in some prisons, as in the Tower, he may have liberty to walk abroad in. the walks and open air, and yet still be a prisoner. Yea, suppose he makes an escape, yet still the terms of his estate, as prisoner, is not altered, till he have that to shew for it which gives him a discharge by him that is the supreme judge or creditor ; and so it is here in this case. Again, take ice and melt it ; when it is water, heat it ; from thence boil it through fire or put hot irons into it ; yet still it is water, and retains its form in predominancy, and will return to its coldness again. So will corrupt nature, if the divine nature be not begotten in it. But if thou findest the least spark of that divine nature struck out of thy heart, it will in the end enkindle the whole man, and convert aU to its own nature, and Christ wiU never quench, but bring it forth to victory. Use 2. Then in the second place consider, that even from a man's birth this estate of sin and death is a fixed, settled, continued estate, without in terruption, untU the change specified be wrought. And go home and think how formidable a thing it is to be found therein, or continue in it but one night longer. For ' thou fool ' (says Christ, Luke xii. 20), ' this night may thy soul be required of thee.' And that it is such a permanent estate of sin and wrath, is that which, when a man's eyes are opened, strikes the terror into him ; and thus the apostles, in their writings, represent men's conditions to them. They speak not to them only of the guilt of such and such sins, but of a state of sin and death ; which language the primitive Christians were most sensible of, as that which stUl roused and awakened them to consider their estates ; for the danger thereof was of common ap prehension. See how the apostle expresses it, 1 Cor. xv. 17, ' If so, then ye are yet in your sins.' He speaks of it as of a fixed estate : you are in your sins ; and you are yet in them ; to this hour, as being a continued vol. vi. F 82 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II. estate, and that wherein the extremity of all evil lies. It is as if you should say of a man tied to a stake in the midst of ten thousand barrels of gun powder, He is in the fire (as Jude also speaks), and ready to be blown up every moment. And thus Christ also expresseth it, ' Ye shaU die in your sins,' John viii. 21. Thus also Peter speaks to Simon Magus, Acts vni. 21, 23, ' I perceive ' (says he) ' that thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter ;' no interest in this ' common salvation,' whereof we profess our selves partakers. ' I perceive that thou art in the bond of iniquity, and in the gall of bitterness ;' that is, thou remainest fixed in it, as in a permanent condition. And to the same purpose John speaks when he says, 1 John v. 19, ' The whole world lieth in wickedness,' as in its proper state and element. And (1 John iii. 14, and chap. ii. 9) his phrase expresseth a continuation or running on of it from the first : ' He that hates his brother is in darkness Until now.' And ver. 11, 'He that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that dart ness hath blinded his eyes.' That phrase, until now, is as if he had said, Let that man consider that he is not only in an estate of death and dark ness at the present, tha,t it is his present condition ; but that it hath been the condition he hath continued in, without interruption, aU along the whole space of his life hitherto. And how dreadful must that be ! If there were a narrow bridge of ice made over the vast ocean, and no island or spot of dry ground aU along, and a man from his birth had been set upon it, and had slid and furiously run upon it in the dark, and for twenty or thirty years made a continued journey on it even tUl now, and were now in the midst of it ; and at length light should rise and come upon him, to see how far he had advanced hitherto, and . how he was in the height of continual danger of falling into the sea, either by the bridge's breaking under him, or through his own stepping aside : imagine what dread would strike that man ! And yet this is the case of many that hear me this day. Now John uttered that speech to strike their hearts who had been professors of the principles of the Christian religion in those times ; of which religion the most frequent and famiUar principle was the infinite difference of these two estates of the sons of men. The sense and apprehension of which (he knew) they who were now apostatised, and hated those godly persons who continued to profess it, carried in their bosoms and consciences along with them ; insomuch as they had this abiding conviction, that if they were found to be in an unregenerate condition, they were, notwithstanding their pro fession, in the most desperate and deplorable estate, and darkness ' until inow.' And however they were apt presumptuously to bear themselves up with this, that they once were enlightened, and had a saving work upon them when first they entered into this profession, and therefore must have So stiU, he plainly tells them they had remained in this darkness ' until now ;' for they never had a true work of regeneration to make an alteration of their condition, and so the dismal account of that estate had ran on to this very day. And a great scripture this is with me, for its holding forth, that whoever is found in an unregenerate state at any time hath ever been in it ; and so consequently there is no intercision of grace, nor falling from it. Of such as faU away, the apostle professeth that they never had true grace ; but though enUghtened, yet faUing away, do shew that they have been, during all their time, unregeneratek To this also the 19th verse Records. ' They went out from us, but they were not of us ; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us : but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.' As it Chap. H.] in our salvation. 83 is a true saying, If once in a state of grace, then ever so for the time to come ; so it is as true, that this man who is in the state of nature and wrath hath ever been in it for times past, even until now. So as such a man (and let every man consider it), though he may have many changes in the time of his pilgrimage, and may take up himself, and commit fewer and smaller sins in his middle age than in his youth ; or in his middle age than in his old age * (for it is not necessary that to continue in that estate he should every day wax worse and worse) ; yet if he be not truly regenerate, he is stUl in one and the same hold, and so all the sins that he hath, or doth commit, or shaU continue to commit every moment, they all shall centre in him, as being stUl in such an estate wherein an obligation stands in force against him for every sin he hath at any time put his hand unto. The power of corruption puts him on to sin, and then the guilt of sin binds him over to death. Every motion of sin from his cradle belongs to that estate. He is ' in the bond of iniquity,' go where he will, whether he sleeps or wakes ; and all his sins are as fresh to God as if they had been this moment committed. Time wears not out the guilt of any, but rather helps to make up the treasure of wrath greater (as in debts time adds an increase), and aU that time also the wrath of God abides upon him, and is ready to fall upon his head every moment ; and God is angry with him all that time. ' He is angry with the wicked every day,' as the psalmist speaks, Ps. vii. 11. And this brings eternity upon a man; and all put together wiU amaze the stoutest heart that ever was. And yet who almost considers these things ? Use 3. And this may also discover some usual deceits, even of the wisest men. They flatter themselves that aU are sinners, and they are only sinners as well as others. But they consider not a state of sin, which themselves and most of men are in. And if they hear the state of nature mentioned, they understand it only of that condition they were in when conceived or born, but they think that it is done away at baptism ; and never imagine that it stUl runs on, in omne volubilis mvum. They also set themselves to repent, and turn from this or that sin, but seek not a change of state, a general and universal change. And so they think they may deal with mercy well enough for any particular sin they live in, acknowledg ing themselves worthy of death for it, as all are for the least sin ; but con sider not that they remain adjudged to death, and abide in death for every sin, and that damnation sleeps not, but is coming upon them. The great inquest at the latter day will be, What state thou wert found in ? whether ' found ' (as Paul's phrase is, PhiUp. iii. 9) ' in Christ,' or found in thy sins ? Use 4. The only comfort to the sons of men that find themselves in that state is, that although it is a continuation of sin and wrath upon man whilst he is in it, yet it is alterable. It is not therefore said to be a state because it is unchangeable, as that of the devils is, ' who are kept in everlasting chains,' who ' abode not in the truth, but left their first estate ' (as Christ and Jude speak), and who are now in irrecoverable misery. No ; there is grace and mercy in this text, Tit. iu. 4-6. There is also a Holy Spirit spoken of, that may yet renew thee, and alter this estate of thine. But know assuredly, nothing else will alter it. There are two pleas upon which carnal men build the hopes of their sal vation, though they go on in the sinfulness of their own hearts, and die without this work wrought in them. * Qu. ' in his old age than in his middle age ' ? — Ed. 84 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II. 1. They plead God's infinite grace and mercy. Who (say they) shall limit his mercy ? He may pardon me however, if he pleaseth. 2. They say Christ hath died, and perfectly wrought salvation for them; and they cast themselves upon his death, to be saved by it. Well but here are two things (in 1 Peter i. 3), that do answer both these deceitful reasonings of carnal hearts. 1. God is merciful, it is true ; yea more, the text tells you he is ' abun dantly merciful ;' but withal it tells you, that when he shews mercy he begets a new nature (' who according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us'), so that if ever he means to shew thee mercy, he wiU shew it herein, and hereby, even in ' begetting thee anew,' that so he may shew thee mercy according to the wise counsel of his wiU. Thus also in Titus iii. 5, ' Ac cording to his mercy hath he saved us.' But how ? ' By the renewing of the Holy Ghost.' And in Jer. iii. 19, 20, God himself professeth how that else he cannot save them. Men think that for God to save them, is no more but only to put forth a prerogative act of pardon and shewing mercy ; as a king doth when he pardons a traitor ; but G6d always does . more, for when he pardons any one, he makes a friend and favourite of him, a son and heir, in whom he may delight ; therefore, together with par doning him, he also renews him. ' 2. And for Christ's death ; even that also will not save thee, without this new begetting ; and the text, 1 Peter i. 3, wiU warrant this too. For consider but this, that he rose again as well as died. Now as he died for the pardoning of your sins, so he rose again to regenerate and beget you again. Therefore says the text, 1 Peter i. 3, ' Who hath begotten us again by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.' If you wiU have the benefit of his death, you must find the power and virtue of his resurrection in sancti11 fying you, as Paul speaks, Phil. iii. 10. ' And you who are dead in sins and trespasses,' must be ' quickened with him,' unto a new life of grace, if ever you be saved. Both these you have in Eph. ii. 4-6, ' God, who is rich in mercy, hath quickened us together with Christ, even when we were dead in sins and trespasses, and hath raised us up together,' &c. And this new birth, or holiness, necessarUy accompanies pardon, even as Christ's resurrection followed his death ; and his death extends to save no more than his resurrection puts forth a power to beget. As, if Christ had not personally risen, we had been still in our sins, so if Christ be not risen in thee, thou art still in thy sins, and wilt die in them : Rom. vi. 12-14, ' Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lust "thereof : neither yield ye your members as instruments of unright eousness unto sin : but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shaU not have dominion over you : for ye are not under the law, but under grace.' And chap. vii. 4, ' Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruits unto God.' Which last place confirms that former reason given, that we being to be married to Christ, and he being to be risen from the dead, we must be made like him in a new resurrection. Chap. HI.] in our salvation. 85 CHAPTER III. That all God's elect do not indeed, before their regeneration, remain in that state of sin and wrath, as is evident in the case of infants* The great God, for holy and glorious ends, but more especially to give demonstration, or to make appear his love and kindness, his mercy and grace, hath ordered it so, that the generality of elect that live to riper years, should for some time remain in a condition of sin and wrath, and then he renews them, and turns them to himself. I have in the former chapters proved the matter of fact. My present business is to consider the design of God herein, and to what ends and purposes, and for what reasons he hath thus appointed such their condition. I must premise something by way of limitation, and explication, to pre vent exceptions against this truth. 1. My meaning is not, that God regenerates none but such as are grown up to riper years. I should be injurious to multitudes of his elect, if I so asserted. But as infants are capable of all the essentials of regeneration, so, de facto, it is evident that he regenerates multitudes of them whilst such. For in the Old Testament the promise being indefinitely uttered for time or age as well as person — ' I will be the God of thee and thy seed,' Gen. xvn. 7 ; ' And I will circumcise thy heart, and the hearts of thy seed,' Deut. xxx. 6 — and circumcision (which has the sign and seal of that circum cision of the heart mentioned in the promise, and so the seal of that pro mise itself, and of the performance), being by God's command applied to infants, whereof multitudes whilst such died, necessarily imports that there are some of that age, whom God had in his eye, whom he inwardly circum cised ; or else the promise and seal to them had been in vain. And if it had took place in none but those that lived until they grew up to riper years, then circumcision would have been deferred unto that age, as that wherein God's ordination had only been to regenerate mankind, namely, all when come to such or such an age, grown up, and not before. And circumcision is the seal of that righteousness, the same righteousness which beUevers grown up have imputed to them (as Rom. iv. 11, the apostle, in stancing in Abraham, says), ' He received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of faith ;' which words do not assert circumcision to have been a seal of faith or righteousness only unto them that actually do beUeve, but the purpose of them was to signify and exemplify what right eousness it was that circumcision was the seal of, which he exemplifies in Abraham, saying that it was the same that Abraham the father had im puted to him, and which believers lay hold on, which is called the right eousness of faith ; because revealed from faith to faith, and so apprehended and made known to us that are of riper years by faith: And so hereby he gives us to understand that elect infants circumcised, the seed of Abraham, dying, had and might have the very same righteousness which we and Abraham had by faith, and which circumcision did seal up to his faith, even as well as they have the actual application of that outward seal as much as Abraham had. And indeed the half of mankind dying whilst infants, it may be well supposed that as great a portion, at least for number, are found amongst the seed that die, as experience shewed was found among them that lived, and so were inwardly circumcised. And those promises, ' I will * This does not appear to be a correct summary. — Ed. 86 the work of the holy ghost [Book II. be the God of thee and thy seed ;' and ' I wiU circumcise the heart of thy seed;' being spoken (as they, are apparently) indefinitely of any age, one as weU as another, who shall dare to limit them to years of understanding only ? And if indefinitely for age, then it may as weU be supposed, that there is no time, or age, in the whole series of man's life, but there will be found instances of some of Abraham's seed that were therein regene rated, some in one, some in another ; even as there is not the least moment in the thread of man's life, but some or other have expired therein. And again, shall we limit it ,to infants of eight days old, to exclude all infants dying before eight days ? Surely no. The real intent was otherwise. As women were not excluded from the promise, though not circumcised per sonally ; to whom yet the promise held, as well as unto males ; and the female sex were representatively circumcised in the males ; so infants (take it still indefinitely of what age, yea, of what moment's standing you wiU, from their conception), were represented in the circumcision of those infants of eight days old. This deferring and staying of it then, and this representative circumcision at eight days old of some, was ordained typicahy to hold forth that representation of all the elect which that "U3, that strong male child Christ, the first-born of them, was to bear of all the seed, he standing in then- stead. And it is to no purpose to say, that circumcision sealed up to them only the promise of Canaan ; for beside that the promise to Abraham and his seed was one and the same, also infants that died (as half of mankind die when infants) enjoyed so little, some not at all, the benefit of that promise, ' that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God hath given thee,' as it were ridiculous to assert circumcision was applied to them to seal up that promise only. In the New Testament, we find that grace and aU the privUeges thereof are now more extendible, as to nations (' Go teach aU nations,' not the Jews only) so in like manner unto all sorts of persons, more than these to whom the grace and dispensations of grace in the Old Testament could be supposed to extend ; and therefore if to infants then, so now. And it is observable that the first in the catalogue of the New Testament (both according to Christ's account, Mat. xi. 11, and also that of Zacharias) was John, who, as the first-fruits to sanctify in a more special manner the lump of infants, was filled with the Holy Ghost in his mother's womb, Luke i. 15. Christ himself, who sanctified our nature, to the end that we might be sanctified (John xvii. 19, 'Heb. ii. 11), representatively sanctified every age of man he went through, as weU as those ages or years of man's life he fell short of. Now therefore he was sanctified in the womb, to sanctify some infants in the womb. He was holy when born, even because some infants when first born might be then sanctified. And the same Lord Jesus pro- nounceth of infants, that ' Of such is the kingdom of God.' Nor can it be supposed that he sanctifies only such infants that in his decrees he had appointed to die when infants ; for when Christ spake that last fore-cited speech, it was upon occasion of such infants being brought to him, who might be supposed to have lived up to riper years, and it being intended a direction to the apostles as ministers, with respect to infants coming or being brought to them, to be sure they were not first to judge who were to Uve and who were to die, and to regard the latter only, there fore Christ speaks indefinitely. And add to this, John Baptist, who Uved to riper years, was yet when an infant sanctified. And if we take a great lump of Christians that are grown up, some few Chap. HI.] in our salvation. 87 wiU be found sanctified from their infancy, insomuch as they dare not say but they had workings of grace on them ever since they can remember, and thai they had gracious dispositions (though proportioned to that age) mingled with the dawnings and springings of reason in them. This expe rience shews, and therefore you must not take this doctrine universally true, that of these that Uve to years of discretion, none are sanctified when infants. Yet in the text it is more generally and ordinarily true concerning those elect who live, that God (in whose hands are the times and seasons of regenerating men, as well as of all things else, Acts xvii.) hath appointed and ordered their month (as the prophet speaks) or times of bringing forth to be, when grown up' to years of discretion. And besides instances out of the apostles' epistles, many passages in the Old and New Testament evidence that thus it was even in those that lived in Zion, and were well educated in the church of God, and yet needed regeneration, and were rege nerated when of years of discretion, or grown up. In the Old Testament, David (Ps. li. 12) desires God ' restore to him the joy of his salvation, that he might teach sinners God's ways' (not hea thens only, but sinners among whom he lived), ' and that they might be converted unto him,' ver. 13. And though men scoff to hear of converts in the church, yet Isaiah teUs us of * converts in Sion,' Isa. i. 27. In the New Testament we have the example of Timothy, who though brought up by good parents, and taught the faith by his grandmother and mother (2 Tim. i. 5), and who, though he was one who knew the Scrip tures from a child, yet for all this his conversion was afterwards by Paul's ministry; who therefore calls Timothy his own son (1 Tim. i. 2), not only as nourished up by him in the words of truth (as 1 Tim. iv. 6), but as truly begotten (in respect of regeneration), as ever any other was of whose con version he was an instrument ; and therefore elsewhere also he still caUs him his son, 2 Tim. i. 2, 1 Cor. iv. 17, upon the same account that, he caUs Onesimus his son, PhUem. 10, ' My son Onesimus : ' and he gives the reason why he styles him so, ' whom I begat ' (says he) ' in my bonds.' And accordingly elsewhere, he distinguisheth between spiritual fathers and instructors in the same, 1 Cor. iv. 15, ' Though you have,' says he — that is, might be supposed to have — ' ten thousand instructors, yet not many fathers,' that is, that converted you ; none was an instrument thereof but I : ' For in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel.' And (Acts xviii. )he shews he was the converter of those saints at Corinth ; and as of them, so of Timothy, whom, in the very next words, he terms his son (which always speaketh relation to a father), and he having thus, in the words afore, distinguished between a father and an instructor, and having styled himself a father to them, for his having begotten them, that he should style Timothy his son, with the same breath, must necessarily be under stood in one and the same sense. And when he says, 1 Cor. iv. 17, ' for this cause I have sent unto you Timothy, who is my beloved son ;'|there was something of an argument in it to move them to receive Timothy, as sent them by him, being their natural brother, as it were, begotten by the same hand they had been. So then Timothy, though a towardly child, and well educated as any can be supposed to be, yet after he was come to years of discretion, it was that he was converted. And truly the additions of that word, ' begotten you through the gospel,' God having appointed as then, so now, the gospel, and that as preached, to be the ordinary standing means (though not with exclusion of other means) for begetting men to Christ, as 88 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK H. weU as building men up, argues God's secret ordination of those elect that live to riper years ; and yet because a great part of his elect die when young, he hath appointed baptism as a net for them (as he did circumci sion of old) and for the other that Uve, he hath reserved the word to catch them : Rom. x. 17, ' Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word.' That is the ordinance of God to that end, as it is also milk to nourish : 1 Pet. ii. 2, ' As new-born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.' It is seed to beget them, 1 Pet. i. 23, even the same word which is preached to them, ver. 25. And therefore one of the first encomiums David gives the word (Ps. xix. 7) is this, ' The law of God is perfect, converting the soul.' Aod God appointed the tribe of Levi in the church of the Jews to this end, Mai. ii. 6. Though they had circum cision then, as we have baptism now, yet Levi was appointed to convert, and that many, which is the same speech that is spoken of John Baptist's ministry, Luke i. 76, 77, &c, And now God hath ordained pastors and teachers, as for the building up, so for the jointing in of the saints, that is, for the conversion of them, Eph. iv. 16. CHAPTER IV. The reasons why God suffers his elect, grown into riper years, to continue for sometime in a state of sin. — The glory of God's mercy and free grace is the more illustrated by this dispensation. This explication and caution premised, I come now to give the reasons why it hath pleased God so to order it, that the generality of his elect, who live up to riper years, should for some time remain in a state of sin and wrath. You meet with a strange thanksgiving, Rom. vi. 17, ' God be thanked that ye were the servants of sin.' Had the apostle ended here, you would have deemed it blasphemy. But he thanks God, not simply for their having been the servants of sin ; yea, not merely for this, that now they were converted (which follows, ' that ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you,' that is, become men holy, both in heart and life), but he blesseth God complexly with respect to both, namely^for this change wrought in them, as it is set forth and Ulustrated by their having been the servants of sin formerly. No man likes or com mends the shadow in a picture, if you take that alone ; but it is the like- ness thereof unto the life itself which makes both the piece and the work man to be esteemed and praised. And yet the shadow sets off the picture, and gives a liveliness unto it. He in the next words shews how the image of God had been faintly stamped upon their hearts, as this similitude of being cast into a mould, there used, imports. And that is the main thing he blesseth God for ; yet withal he admires and extols God's workmanship and art in taking the advantage of so great and dark a shadow as an estate of sinning is (which themselves had first drawn) to be a foil to this bright image of his hoUness. God had let them alone a long while to draw the dark part (for sin was their work, and not God's work), who is only the Father of lights, and with him there is no shadow (as James speaks) and no darkness at all (as John hath it); and they had many years been appren tices at this work (' ye were the servants of sin '), and God all this while having had his work in his eye, he suffered them to go on unto a fuU mea- Chap. IV.] in our salvation. 89 sure (for the sins of elect men have a fulness before God converts them, as well as wicked men before God destroys them), and then God fell to work. And he that brings light out of darkness made that chaos and abyss of darkness which they had been so long a-creating, the groundwork whereby to set out his new world and workmanship of grace, more than if at first he had made aU perfect, and begun it by sanctifying them in the womb. And therefore, says the apostle, ' God be blessed that ye were the servants of sin,' which you are to take together with that which follows : ' But ye have obeyed from the heart,' &c. For sin, or an estate of sinning, cannot in itself alone be made the matter of God's praise, but yet it may serve the more to ' commend the grace of God unto us.' So says the apostle, Rom. iU. 5, ' If our unrighteousness commend the righteousness of God, what shall we say ? Is God unrighteous ? ' If God,*who is the judge of all the world (as ver. 6), wiU suffer the creature to go on in sin which it was justly born in, and for which he damneth milUons of souls, and is not unrighteous in taking such a vengeance (as follows, ver. 5), then if also he will suffer an elect son of his to go long on in sin, even unto a fulness, and then, instead of damning him, converts him, justifies him, and sanctifies him (' Such were some of you,' says the apostle, 1 Cor. vi. 11, ' but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified,' &c), he cannot be said to be unrighteous. In a word, this is such a phrase of speech as in the like case is usual in the Scripture'; so in Luke xv. 23, 24, says the fatherfof the prodigal, ' Let us eat, and be merry : for this my son was dead, and is alive again ; was lost, and is found,' &c. Merry they were, not simply for that he was dead and lost, but that, having been lost and dead, he was now found and alive ; the mercy of his finding and life being heightened by this, that once he was dead and lost, and therefore it enlarged their joy that he was now found and alive, and that (as that parable shews) more than if he had never played the prodigal. Now nothing is more the, object of thanks and praise to God than what proceeds from love and mercy. And so I come to that which at first I propounded to shew, the ends God hath in this dispensation of his ; to give an illustration and demon stration of, 1. His love or kindness. 2. His mercy. 3. His grace. All distinctly mentioned in the text. I shall first, in a word, distinguish these three. 1. Love is the foundation of mercy, whereby God peremptorily and un alterably pitched upon some men, and set himself to love them in all estates and conditions whatsoever. ' Who shaU separate us from the love of God in Christ ? ' Now I join kindness and love together in one, for they differ but thus, that kindness is when love strives to express itsetf in the most taking way, and to set a lustre upon what it doth. 2. Mercy is a continuing to love them when they are in misery, for mercy properly respects misery. 3. Grace imports the freeness of both these, his loving freely, and shew ing mercy freely, founded upon no respects in the creature moving him thereunto. Now that which I am to speak to is not simply that God hath put forth all these his attributes towards his children in their salvation in general, but particularly that he eminently doth it in this dispensation of his, when having left them to an estate of sinning, he yet at length quickens and saves them. 90 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II. Again, 2. By way of general premise to this discourse about all these three, whether God first pitch his love upon us simply considered as creatures, or creabiles in massd purd, in that pure mass, without the con* sideration of our being sinners, I will not dispute ; for in relation to this point it comes all to one. For if he first set not his love upon men con sidered as fallen into sin, but purely as creatures, yet his wise counsels pitched on this course, that we should be left to this condition only of having sin in us (as in the mixed estate of sin and grace after regeneration), but also to an estate of sin and death, to the end he might shew the more love ; that it might appear he took up so great a love, that though we were sinners it continued the same ; and not only so, but stirred up mercy to pity us therein'; and thus aU our sinfulness comes to magnify his love. And although God might have communicated himself to us without letting us have fallen into sin, though he might have communicated (I say) himself to us, as he wUl heaven, immediately and directly, when the world shall be at an end, when sin shaU be remembered no more, when God shaU be aU in aU, as he is to Christ, and he might have in this estate yet made us appre hensive of mercy in this respect, that when he might have left us to sin, and to such a condition of sinning, yet he in mercy would preserve us from it ; thus he shews love and mercy to the elect angels. But because the creatures are apt to receive the stronger impression by sense and real ex perience, and his end was to take our hearts in a rational and most taking way, suited to our apprehensions ; and then it is the understanding of man is taken and struck with admiration, when one contrary is set against or brought forth of another, which exceedingly serves to illustrate it; and also because God would suit his way of acting to the experience of man (by^which Christ himself learned obedience), and in common experience what a man really falls into, and is then deUvered out of, this affects more than what is altogether prevented ; therefore God ordained this course, rather so to com mend his love and mercy to us. 1. His love. The apostle John doth in this argument make a great matter of this one consideration, that we do not begin to love God, but he loved us first. ' Herein is the love of God,' says he, 1 John iv. 19, ' not that we loved God, but that he loved us,' and, as in ver. 19, ' loved us first.' And thus it may be greatened as to angels. But Paul goes farther, and, upon the consideration of this our unregenerate estate, winds this argument of God's love up to a higher pin, not only by the negative, that we loved not him first, but by aggravation positive, that we hated him, we were enemies to him ; so in Rom. v., ' God commended his love, when we were sinners, ' ver. 8, yea, ' when enemies,' ver. 10, ' Christ died for us.' And to set out his love herein, he makes four degrees of misery we were in, two negatives and two positives. (1.) He describes us to be ' without strength,' ver. 6, unable to help our selves ; yea, dead, and utterly dead ; for so of the body the same word is used; when it is dead, it is said to be ' sown in weakness,' 1 Cor. xv. The word is the same word that here he describes us to be. A good-natured man is moved to pity a poor weak child or beast without strength, but it must then have life in it ; but we were dead. This you have (Ezek. xvi. 5-7) set forth to the end to greaten God's love unto us. He compares that estate of ours afore to that of a dead child, stiU-bom, cast forth on a dunghill, all in gore blood, its men- struous blood, and none eye pitied thee. Then says God, ' I passed by1 thee, and said unto thee, Live.' I therefore say, a dead child, because Chap. IV.] in our salvation. 91 the mercy shewn was to bid it live, so putting life into it. Not only so, but ungodly. (2.) ' Ungodly,' ver. 5, and empty of that goodness he at first saw in us, so as what by the law of creation might more move him, was lost and for feited : as salt, when the savour, the goodness is lost, is fit for nothing but the dunghiU. Yet in that case now he is moved to pity. But, further, there are two positives added. (1.) We are said to be ' sinners,' ver, 8 ; that is, that had dishonoured God, and transgressed his law. But yet that might be pardoned if it were not out of malice and inbred enmity. Therefore (2.) he heightens it by this also, ' even when we were enemies.' A love, by aU these circumstances manifested to be such and so great that much water cannot qnench it (as Solomon speaks), is love to the height of admiration. And as hereby the greatness of his love, so the unchangeableness of his love, and peremptoriness thereof, is declared and made conspicuous. Is it not an unheard-of wonder, that so strong a stream of infinite love should run under ground for so many years, and that so many rebellions all that while should not dam it up, but that it should hold on its course uninterrupted, and work out all that had so long obstructed the current of it, and at last bubble up at a time designed, and save, and wash, and purify the wretched denied creature ? Doth the earth bring forth such a wonder ? Have mothers love enough to hold out thus ? Other things may manifest other properties of his love, as the giving of his Son shews the greatness of it, and yet even that, too, is set out by our natural estate. But nothing more argues the peremptoriness and unalterable resolution of God's love, than its holding out against all the provoking oppositions in us, against aU the sins committed before he had broke his mind, and declared his love unto us, or any open way engaged it : Jer. iii. from ver. 1 to the end of the chapter. It is usual with you (says God there), and according to the prin ciples you walk by, that though yourselves cast a wife off, and not she you, yet if she becomes another man's (as then she may), you wUl then never own her more. Ay, but (says God to his betrothed spouse, his church), ' Thou hast voluntarily played the harlot, and run after other lovers.' ' And' (ver. 5), ' thou hast done as evil as thou couldst,' hast sinned, as it were to the utmost, and yet I cannot part with thee, and ' yet return thou unto me,' says he. He stiU loves her and allures her unto him ; and why is it ? He gives the reason at the 14th verse, ' For I am married unto you,' &c. There was knit so fast a love-knot between God and them, a secret pre-contract on his part, though unknown to them, made by himself, even from all eternity, that no whoredoms, no continued sins whatever of hers, could untie. Well therefore might the apostle say, ' Who shall sepa rate us from the love of God' in Jesus Christ ? Yea, and challenge angels, devUs, afflictions, and all creatures else to do it, Rom. viii. 34-39. For surely if a continued course of sinning could not dissolve it, then nothing else can. II. The second thing which God eminently manifesteth hereby is mercy. And though God's mercy be absolutely in God, or in his nature,, and he had been merciful, although we nor any creature had ever been, or never had been miserable, yet the manifestation of that his mercy hath respect unto misery, whereof sin and death being the greatest, that can befall the creature, the freeing it therefore from an estate of both must needs be the fuUest manifestation of that his mercy and pity towards them. Thus, Rom, 92 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK IL xi. 32, the apostle says, ' God hath shut up' (or concluded) ' all under unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all,' both of Jews and GentUes, of whom, in the 30th and 31st verses, he had discoursed how, in their seve ral vicissitudes, first the Gentiles, then the Jews, had been shut up under unbelief, and locked up ; they both were under the surest lock and key that could be, unbeUef, and whereof God alone keeps the key ; who openeth, and no man shuts, who shutteth, and no man openeth. The key of the door of faith (as Acts xiU. it is called) is in God's hand alone, for it is the gift of God. And unbeUef is as a gravestone rolled over men, when already dead in sin, to keep them in that estate. Now unto those that have lain longest under it the greater mercy is shewn. God hath locked up the Jews under unbelief for sixteen hundred years, since Christ's death, as he had done the Gentiles for above two thousand years before Christ. And the design in this dispensation unto either was that he might have mercy upon both, who between them make up the aU of mankind, for these two divided the world. Now this which he doth unto these two bulks and bodies of mankind, the more in the end to iUustrate his mercy unto them, the like he doth to the particular persons of his elect. He shuts them up a long time under unbelief, that in the end he may have the more mercy on them. Whom likewise doth the apostle caU ' vessels of mercy,' Rom. ix. 23, but those who once were not his people ? As appears by verses 25 and 26, vessels of mercy they could not be, tiU they had first been fiUed up with sin and misery. And that some of them are greater, and of a larger size than others, this comes to pass by how much they have been fuUer filled with sin. Even as a bladder is more capable, and wiU hold more of a precious liquor, by how much at the first it hath been distended with wind; so these are enlarged to contain the more mercy, by how much they have, Uke a wild ass's colt, ' snuffed up the wind' (as the prophet speaks), and have walked on ' in the vanity of then- minds,' as Paul says, and ' in a vain conversation,' as Peter's words are. God's children, as well as reprobates, have a measure of iniquity, and a stint of sinning ; which, when they are once arrived to, and have filled then- measure, God begins to empty them, and to fill them up again with mercy. HI. The third attribute, the glory whereof God doth hereby advance, is his applying grace, which is the grace he here speaks of, and which super adds to his love and mercy a freeness, as being extended to us upon no motives or incentives in us, but ex proprio suo motu. So Rom. iii. 24, ' Being justified freely by his grace.' Now nothing can be supposed to illustrate the fulness thereof more than this kind of dispensation. For there can be supposed fewest motives for God to shew mercy to those who have done nothing but offended and provoked him in a continued course of sinning. After we are regenerate once, though we continue to offend him, yet then he is engaged to be reconciled to us. And therefore, Rom. v. 10, it is made a greater matter to reconcile us to himself at first when we were enemies, than to keep us friends being once reconciled. For to the upholding of our friendship many motives may faU in, from which at least God may take an occasion to back one kindness with another. But in this case there are none at all. Now both the riches of his justifying grace, and also of his sanctifying grace, are Ulustrated by this dispensation. And I mention both, and upon this very occasion you have both these distinctly mentioned, 1 Cor. vi. 11, where the apostle, having spoken of their condi tion before they were converted, he says, ' Such sinners were some of you; but now you are justified, now you are sanctified.' Chap. TV.] in our salvation. 93 1. God's justifying grace is hereby (1.) Cleared ; and (2.) Exalted ; and that more than any other way. (1.) Hereby is cleared to us that our justification is wholly of and by grace. Now, in the point of justification, the great competition is between grace and works. Grace looks upon works as its only enemy and compeer herein, which are therefore always set in a direct opposition throughout the epistles. This is in the text, and this dispensation it is the strongest con viction that could have been that works are no ingredients to the justifica tion of us. Take for proof of this the course the apostle holds in the Epistle to the Romans to clear this to them. After in the two first chapters he had proved that both Jew and GentUe were in the Uke natural corrupt estate, he says, chap. iii. 9, ' We have proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are aU under sin ; ' not sinners only, but under sin, that is, the dominion of it. And this natural condition, and the corruption of it, he describeth from the 10th verse to tho 19th ; and then at the 20th infers this as a corollary from it, ' Therefore by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be jus tified in his sight ; ' and, ver. 23, repeats his reason, « for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God ; ' and therefore he concludes (in ver. 28), ' that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.' This is so strong an eviction of this saving truth, that the papists themselves (to do Bellarmine and their doctrine itself this right) do acknowledge that works done afore regeneration, though never so outwardly righteous, are excluded from that first justification (as they by distinction call it) ; yea, he confess eth that justification then is therefore only in and through Christ's blood. But then after conversion, they say, there is a second justification, whereby a man is judged worthy of eternal glory, and such and such degrees of it ; and this they attribute to good works after conversion, dipped in Christ's blood. A man in and by regeneration being made inherently righteous, and set up anew, begins with a new stock, and so trades for eternal life. And that is their error. But yet, even to convince that works are excluded •from that their second justification as well as from the first, the considera tion of a man's unregenerate estate doth most aptly serve. The total cor ruption of that estate hath spoiled and disabled all the righteousness that shaU anew be bestowed for ever being fit to justify us. And this not simply because it hath defiled the person, and made him a traitor to God, and so nothing can ever, as from him (as in himself considered), be accepted. Nor is it the cause why works after conversion cannot justify us, because they are imperfect, and stained as a menstruous cloth (though that is a reason ex abundanti), but if we could suppose them as undefiled as after the resur rection they shall be, as perfect as in heaven they shall be, and if God should upon the first moment of conversion make any one so perfectly holy, yet they would not then serve to justify : ' If I know nothing by my self,' says Paul, ' yet I am not thereby justified.' And what is the true and utmost reason of this yet ? Because he had known so much by himself in his former unregenerate estate. This you shall find to have been the apostle's scope and way of reasoning (in the 8th to 11th verses of the second chapter to the Ephesians), why salvation is of grace, and not of ourselves, nor of works, neither afore nor after : ' For by grace are ye saved through faith ; and that not of yourselves : it is the gUt of God : not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.' That is, these very works are given by grace, of which this your former condition enough convinceth you ; for then you were nothing but 94 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BoPK H. sin, dead in sins and trespasses, not able to think a good thought, so as God was out of his grace to give you a new frame of heart on purpose created, or you had never come to have had the least good work. And if so, then you are not saved by these good works wrought by you, through this new workmanship in you, no more than by those afore ; for they all are the mere free gift of God, and of his grace ; and that righteousness that comes of grace, and holds of that tenure, can never come to justify. For the works that must justify must some way challenge that justification by debt or a due, not merited indeed (for so even Adam could not), yet by a natural due through that first covenant of nature, Rom. iv. 12. (2.) As the doctrine of justification is hereby cleared to be by grace, so his grace in justification is hereby advanced and extoUed, and that in two properties thereof. [1.] The freeness of grace. [2.] The exceeding riches thereof. You have the one, Rom. iii. 24 ; the other, Eph. ii. 7, 8, &c. [1.] The freeness of grace is hereby exalted ; for if you observe it, upon what occasion is the mention of the freeness of grace in justifying brought in in Rom. iii. 24, but only upon his having said before, ver. 22, 23, that they aU had sinned, and there was no difference ; that is, aU were alike in a state or condition of sinning. For those that are not justified are and remain in such an estate ; now, says the apostle, so do aU those whom he means to justify ; he justifies them freely by his grace. For then It is ap parent it is grace, out of its own mere motion, doth it, and so puts a differ ence, and that a vast one : ' Who caused thee to differ from another ?' says the apostle, 1 Cor. iv. 7. [2.] The exceeding riches of grace in justifying is hereby advanced; for when a man by sinning hath gone on to treasure up wrath, adding every moment to the heap for so long a time, it requires a vast sum of mercy treasured up by God to discharge and buy out (as it were) that other. And it is certain, when after so long and so lavish an expense of sinning, as falls out in a man's unregenerate condition, he comes first to God in the sight of aU his sins, though afore he Ughtly took it for granted God was merci ful, &c, yet now he stands aghast at it, and wonders where there should be riches of mercy enough to forgive so many millions of talents of sinning. And it is infinite mercy (God having such sums ready and lying by him) to forgive a man all after all, upon one single act of faith. It is infinite mercy in God to suffer such a poor and mean ticket to take up upon pure trust so much riches, whenas yet God hath no experience neither of our good behaviour. I wiU not now dispute whether then, at the first justifi cation, God pardons all a man's sins to come as weU as past. For whether the one or the other be asserted, yet this must be reckoned the great act and time of justifying, and of expending the riches' of grace upon us, even when he first saved us by faith, as Eph. ii. 7-9. And if then aU sins to come as well as past are pardoned, yet not tUl then ; and then after so long a forbearance, God at once doth it. WeU might the apostle triumph upon such an experiment, and say, ' Who shaU lay anything to _e charge of God's elect ? It is God that justifies.' ShaU sin, that a man was bom in, that lay as an old debt from the womb ? The apostle cuts that off with an easy answer, ' Not as the offence, so is the grace ; ' it abounds much more, Rom. v. 15, 16. Though sins, continued in with full consent, every one of which had made the corruption of nature of a deep dye, have abounded.; nay, throw on heaps of actual transgressions as high as heaven, as Daniel Chap. V.] in our salvation. 95 speaks, and these reaching also as low as heU, let Manasses come with his fifty years' continued rebellion, and Paul with his, although these abound, yet grace much more. Yea (verse 20 of that chapter), the apostle is bold to make the utmost supposition, that where sin hath abounded, grace hath abounded much more ; and in the next verse compares it to a mighty mon arch that rejoices in the conquest of so many enemies : ' grace reigns through righteousness.' And the glory thereof lies (as of other potentates, as Solomon says) in the multitude of these its subjects. 2. This conduceth to shew forth the power of sanctifying grace, or that renewing grace. In the text, Eph. i. 19, the apostle Paul attributes to this the greatest power that ever God did or will put forth in any work, unless in that of raising Christ from that low estate the human nature was in unto the highest estate of glory. And how comes it that so great a power ap pears ? He teUs us, Eph. ii. 1, where he goes to prosecute it, ' You who were dead in sins and trespasses hath he quickened ' ; dead in the sin of nature, dead by transgressions actual, whereof each gives a fresh stab ; not only twice dead (as Jude speaks), but a thousand times dead. And though in nature there is but one measure of death, one man that is dead of one stab is as dead as he that hath ten thousand ; yet if you were to raise a man to life, it would require a greater power to raise a man to life that hath a thousand stabs in vital parts ; for every stab must be cured, or he will be dead stiU. Or rather, to exemplify it thus : to raise a man rotten in the grave is a matter of greater power than to raise a man newly dead. Mary thought that Christ might have kept Lazarus from dying whilst any spark of Ufe had been in him (so twice it is said, John xi. 21, 32, ' If thou hadst been here, my brother had not died ' ). But now (says Martha, ver. 39), ' he is not only dead, but stinketh.' He hath been dead four days, ver. 39 ; and indeed Christ had stayed away on purpose to shew forth the glory of God; ver. 5, 6, compared with the 40th. In like manner thus Christ defers and suffers his own chUdren to be in a state of death. He defers his own not only four days, but many years, and before he raiseth them up, lets them stink in their sins. The virtue of Christ's death and resurrection is a sovereign remedy for any sore, and God is a skUful physician, that in tends to shew the virtue of it, and often drives so long, till, as the prophet says, the wound is otherwise incurable, and then applies and cures them. CHAPTER V. Other reasons why God suffers his elect, who are adult, to continue for some time in a state of sin. — That this dispensation turns to their benefit aiid advantage in the event. — That it serves for the conviction and, judgment of wicked men, and greater confusion of Satan. Unto those ends of God's suffering his elect to remain for some time in a state of sin, which are the principal and more immediate, I may add others which are but additional, yet ingredients, into this his wise and gracious dispensation. And as the ends before mentioned related to himself, so these other regard all sorts of inteUigible* natures, both men and angels, and aU sorts of either, good or bad. > L They regard good men. 1. The persons themselves whom he after such a state convertetb. He * That is, ' intelligent,' or, ' capable of understanding.' — Ed. 96 the work of the holy ghost [Book Hi disposeth of a state of sinning afore conversion for their good, as all things else to work together for good ; namely, for the increase of their most pre cious graces afterwards. This Paul, in telling that story of his conversion which so much delighted him, holds forth : 1 Tim. i. 14, 'The grace of our Lord Jesus was exceeding abundant, with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.' The sum of which is this : (1.) He had shewn how much the contrary sins had abounded. ' I was a blasphemer ' (says he), ' a persecutor ; ' I did it in unbelief. (2.) How infinitely God's grace in pardoning him had much more super- abounded, vwigiirXiomse. 1 (3.) He had shewn how thereupon, when converted, the contrary graces and gifts abounded in him, instancing in faith and love. As on God's part, and in God's heart, pardoning and accepting grace abounded, so on his part also, and in his heart, faith and love abounded also. 'The grace of the' Lord was abundant with faith and love ; ' that is, with those effects of it, in some proportionable correspondency to the grace shewn him ; and in these returns to God again his heart was answerably affected to the comparative measure of his former sinfulness and God's grace. These were the rever berations, the reboundings and reflections, rising out of both. And it is observable that he carries his discourse so as to shew how, when he was converted, the graces particularly contrary to those very sins he had most exceeded in afore were wrought in him, and so that therein the abundance of God's grace was to be observed. The sins which he instanced in are three. [1.] Unbelief; 'I did it' (says he) 'in unbeUef,' ver. 12. Oppo sitely, the grace of faith was afterwards abundant. [2.] ' I was a perse cutor ' (says he), ' and injurious ; ' but now grace was abundant in the love to God and all his saints, and his love rose higher than ever any one's but Christ's ; he could have wished himself accursed for them, Rom. ix. 1. [3.] ' I was ' (says he) ' a blasphemer,' the foulest throat that ever opened itself against God and his tabernacle, and the saints that were on earth. He had been a wicked Saul, breathing out threatenings and slaughters against the disciples, Acts ix. 1 ; but now Christ counted him faithful, and put him into the ministry, and he proved the best preacher that Christ ever had. ' He now preaches the faith he once destroyed,' was the bruit and character went forth of him, Gal. i. 24. And how he laboured more than all the other apostles, himself also reports. 2. It proves an advantage also to other saints, and that many ways. (1.) It gives an occasion of glorifying God, in the conversion of some notorious sinner, throughout all the churches. So those that never had seen Paul's face — Gal. ii. 22, 23, ' I was unknown by face to the churches in Judea ' — and who had heard only, that he which persecuted them in times past now preached the faith, glorified God. (2.) It gives them occasion also of shewing forth the disposition of grace, which of all other is most noble and natural to the new creature, and that is a zeal for, desires to, prayers, and endeavours after the conversion of others, which, as in nature, so in grace, is the most natural work. Which that they may have opportunity to exercise, God affords them through this dispensation, matter in their several relations, and this not only to minis ters, but to all sorts of private Christians. God, in his providence, marries a wife (that after proves a believer) to* a husband that continues an unbe liever long after ; ' And what knowest thou,' 1 Cor. vii. 16, ' 0 wife, whether thou shalt save thy husband ? ' So then, as God ordained it thus, to shew forth his own love and mercy the more, so withal he designed it, Chap. V.] in our salvation. 97 that we might give demonstration of our love and pity to the souls of men, as he hath in his divine providence left the most of mankind in- poverty or necessitous, to give occasion of that grace of charity which he so delights in, as being the likeness of himself. To save souls was the tempting argu ment to Christ himself (Isa. xlix. throughout, and Isa. liii.). Now Christ having paid the price, and so having perfected for ever them that were to be sanctified, he went to heaven on purpose to leave the actual conversion of souls unto us his brethren. He would not do it himself instrumentaUy, because he would not take that work out of our hands that believe. He knew they had the same graces and desires for saving souls himself had, and he would leave them matter for the specifying of it. He withal knew how great a joy it would be to a father to win his child, a wife to convert her husband, which often falls out, as the apostle insinuates, 1 Cor. vii. 16, ' What knowest thou ? ' He knew that he could not use a higher and greater motive to endure much (as they did) from heathen husbands. The like he says, 1 Peter iii. 1. So that, as the apostle says, he fulfilled the after- sufferings of Christ, that is, what he left for us after his example to bear ; so I may say he hath left us this as the after-work, which was pro perly his, and should have been his, even to save men's souls from death (James v. 20), but that he would have us have the honour of it. Neither doth he employ his angels (who are ministering spirits in all other the greatest affairs in this world) in this work, but reserves it wholly for us men. He gave the law by them, but not the gospel. He knew there was no greater joy, next to joy in God himself, can befall a Christian, than to convert a sinner. That which satisfied Christ himself, and for which he thought himself well a-payed for all his sufferings, was, that he saw the travail of his soul. Isa. Uii. 10, ' He shall see his seed, and the work of the Lord shall prosper in his hands. He shall see the travail of his soul, and be satisfied.' And he knew that to see the Uke in converting souls, would, in our proportion, of all things else most rejoice us. 3 John, verse 4, ' I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.' First, to see those he might caU his children : 'My children,' saith he (as Isaiah speaks in Christ's person, ' Lo, here am I, and the chUdren thou hast given me'), and then to hear they walk in truth. H. This dispensation regards bad men, and such as God means to cast away. God hath a design upon them also in this dispensation of his. God in this world as well, makes way and prepares evidence against the day of judgment, as for the salvation of his own. This, as one great work to he done at the day of judgment, Enoch held forth to the then ungodly world: Jude 14, 15, ' And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon aU, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.' As to execute judgment, so to convince ; and I observe it is said, ' all ungodly among them,' that is, that have Uved among the saints in this world ; and of what in a more especial manner are they to be convicted ? Even of their hard speeches spoken against him, that is, against Christ, as appearing in the saints. Thus Paul was convicted by that speech from heaven, ' Why persecutest thou me ? ' Now there is nothing of aU passages of God's dispensations that falls out in this world, that hath more of con? viction in it, than to see those that lived once according to the course of this world, and in the same lusts with themselves, to turn unto God, and vol. vi. . <* 98 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK H. becpme new men. Neither yet doth anything usually more provoke them to hard speeches, even against that conviction, than such strange accidents when they do fall out. Nothing hath more of conviction in it, and is therefore used as a most effectual means of gaining men, even when the word will not, nor the doctrine of it. ' If any obey not the word, they may without the word be won by their conversation,' 1 Peter iii. 1. It sets home the word, as an example of judgment doth a threaten ing against such and such a sin. Hence Isaiah says (Isa. xxix. 23, 24) ' When Israel' (speaking of the nation) ' shall see his chUdren, the work of mine hands' (answerably to Eph. ii. 10, 'You are his workmanship, created,' &c), ' in the midst of him ; they that erred in spirit shall come to under standing, and they that murmured ' (that were opposers of religion) ' shall learn doctrine.' Such an example sets home many sermons. They see the word verified ; whilst men shall see and hear, as Christ speaks, on wru%t>l ivayytKiZpvrai, that the poor are evangelised, are gospelised, turned into a living gospel, the word of God taking hold of them, and they becoming an ingrafted word, as James speaks. What the word says and speaks of con version, is made true and good, and exempUfied in them in their conversion. Christ speaks it not of the bare preaching of it to the poor, for so it was to aU as well as the poor ; but thereby expresseth the effect of it upon them, reckoning it among the miracles that accompanied the preaching of it; ' The bhnd see,' &c. And therefore Christ there brings it in as a visible object : ' Tell John the Baptist' (says he) ' what you have seen and heard;' namely, these miracles accompanying the preaching of the gospel, and poor souls converted by it, the greatest of all the rest. And these Christ allegeth as a full conviction that he was that Messiah to come into the world. For that was the message, ver. 19, 20,* John sent them about, to the end they might ocularly be convinced of it. So then, my brethren let me say this to you, This hath the reality and power of conviction in it, that miracles were ordained for. Now though aU other miracles are ceased, yet God continues this standing miracle. Men are apt to think with them selves, If I had lived in those times, when all those miracles were wrought, I should surely have believed. 0 adulterous generation, do ye seek a sign ? No other sign shall be given you, but that afore your very faces, your companions in evil, your children, or wives, that once Uved in sin as you do, in that estate you continue in, are converted afore your eyes, and turn from their evil ways, professing damnation to have been in that estate which they lived in before. And if you will not believe by this, if one were raised from the dead you would not believe, for a greater resurrection is here. And therefore such a real conviction shall be brought against thee at latter day (if thou also turn not) with greater evidence than the multitudes of sermons thou hast heard. And though the word of God must judge us, yet this wUl much more. And yet when men do thus turn to God, and see converts live among them, they are enraged to speak evil of them, which serves to make up the fuU measure of that sinfulness and vengeance Jude speaks of. The apostle Peter (1 Peter iv. 1) gives a definition of a primi tive convert; (1.) He is one, says he, that 'hath suffered in the flesh.' He and his lusts have been on the cross with Christ, and it hath had this effect, that he ceaseth from the common practice of known sins ' He hath ceased from sin' — and hath utterly left them for the salvation of his soul, and this for ever : ' That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh, to the lusts pf men, but tp the will of God.' To the lusts of men, * Of Luke vii.— Ed. Chap. V.] in our salvation. 99 that is the same lusts the most of men live in. This is his bent, this is his profession, and this is the work begun upon him. There was a time indeed, ' a time past in our lives ' (says Peter in the next verse, ver. 3) ' in which we wrought the will of the Gentiles ' (for whilst men live in the same lusts with others they please them, they are as they would have them), ' when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquet- ings, and abominable idolatries.' Well, but now they had turned to God, what do the Gentiles among them think and speak of it ? ' They think it strange,' that is, it is a wonder to them, for it is as a kind of miracle, they cannot tell what in reason or nature to ascribe it to. And they yet ' speak evU of them,' and though they are convinced by nothing more, yet they are provoked to speak evil of them upon no occasion more, for it brings their consciences upon them, it publicly declares that the courses and state they still remain in are evil and wicked, and the way to destruction ; and this makes them put the cause of this alteration upon ten thousand other pretences or grounds, as hypocrisy, &c. Well, but says Peter, all this makes but work for the day of judgment, and prepares evidences of convic tion for to help Christ to clear his sentence of condemnation of them ; for so it follows, ' Who shall give an account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead.' So then, this is one of those ends which God hath in his dispensation. And surely for a wicked man to see another that walked in the same way with him begin to turn head on a sudden, run contrary ways so cross to flesh and blood, and which tends to reproach, and perhaps rum in this world : this must needs amaze and awaken his companion. III. This dispensation hath its influence also upon angels, both good and bad, and produceth as great effects, conjunct with God's glory, as any other dispensation of God's providence whatever. 1. In the good angels it proves the occasion of as great a joy as any we read of, that fills the hearts of those great spirits. They are the most curious spectators of God's works of wonder ; and themselves are employed by Christ in the greatest transactions that belong to this world, in wars and making peace, &c, and in what belongs to the preservation of God's elect ; and this is an inferior work for them. But they are said in a more special manner to joy and rejoice in what themselves have no hand at all, not the least, viz., to see and behold sinners and lost sheep converted unto God. Christ says expressly, ' There is joy in heaven at the conversion of one sinner ;' and as it would seem, this joy befalls them in a great part of a reward and recompence for their other so cheerful undergoing those other employ ments and services in this world, which are below them ; which yet, as it were by the by, God entertains them with, as the Roman emperor did the people with their spectacula, sights and shows to please and to delight them. Sure I am, we read of this to be matter of joy to them, who have God so much to rejoice in, and not those other employments of theirs ; because this of aU other is so meet to, and more conjunct with the glory of God, which they have made their happiness. Thus also the glorious sufferings of apostles and martyrs are made a spectacle for angels to feast their eyes withal, 1 Cor. iv. 9. So the preaching the gospel, the sending down the Spirit, the sufferings of Christ, the glory that followed, are rehearsed as things the angels do pry into, 1 Peter i. 11, 12 ; and also that which was the end of Christ's death, and of sending down the Holy Ghost, and of preaching the gospel, namely the conversion of souls. 2. This dispensation of God hath a design upon bad angels. I observe 100 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK H. it, that next to man's salvation, Satan's confusion is that which God on Christ's behalf purposes with most vehemency and edge of spirit, to con trive how at once to save men, and together confound Satan in the most exquisite and artificial way. You may read and observe it, how God gave forth that first and great promise of Christ, the promised seed, and of man's salvation by him, not first and directly to Adam and Eve themselves (whose salvation yet it concerned), but in his speech unto, and in his cursing of the devil : Gen. iii. 5, ' I will put enmity between thee and the woman, her seed and thy seed. It shall break thy head,' &c. It was spoken in their hearing indeed, but immediately directed to the devil, and the point of it levelled point blank at his breast. He gave it, I say, with a vengeance, uttered with the highest indignation, it answerably being matter of pleasure and delight to him to disappoint that enemy. Now of all contrivements which God in his wisdom, sharpened with revenge, hath sought out, even next to the sending his Son in the world (Non macies* invenit tormentum), God hath not invented a more exquisite rack and torment to that evil spirit, than that an elect chUd of God's, havfng continued many years in a state and course of sin, and in the devil's full possession, should be pulled forth of his clutches, and converted unto God after so long a time. And that he was in his possession, is the thing that vexeth the devil. Had a man been regenerated in the womb, it had been far less vexation to him. It is the usual description of conversion in the New Testament, that it is the turning of a man from the power of Satan unto God, Acts xxvi. 18, a deUvering us from the power of darkness (which is Satan's), and translating us into the kingdom of his Son, Col. i. 13. It is certam that, afore conversion, the devil rules and reigns as fully in one that is elect, as any other man, and finds no difference, Eph. ii. 2. Now consider what a confusion it must needs be to the devil, that when for ten or twenty years he hath possessed a man in peace (as in the parable Christ tells us, Luke xi. 21), and like a strong man hath fortified his house round, insomuch as he is in peace and security,' that he is his own, and that he shaU have him to heU with him (he is called his proper goods and chattels, in that Luke xi. 21), that when he hath fortified his understanding, the tower of the soul, 2 Cor. x. 4, 5, with strongholds and high imaginations, when he hath cast up mounts and bulwarks, and environed and moated the iU ground again and again with corrupt affections, that there is no access to move it; insomuch as he glories in the possession of a man (as Nebuchadnezzar did in his palace : and to shew the devil's like boast and vain account herein, Christ useth the very /word in that Luke xi. 21, hg rr\v uvX^v iocvrov, he termeth the man's soul his court, his palace), that when the devil is walking up and down, and in the midst of glorying, Is not this the man I have possessed so long ? ' Is not this the Babel which I have built for the glory of my majesty ?' In an instant a word comes from heaven, ' Thy kingdom is departed from thee,' and the Holy Ghost seizeth upon all, and none of Satan's fortifications can keep the wind of the Spirit out, which blows where he listeth, as Christ says John iii. ; and the Holy Ghost binds this strong man (as Christ speaks), in an hour, throws down, and in a great measure flights all the works which this spirit had been a-rearing all that man's lifetime hitherto. Oh, how must this needs still that enemy and avenger, when he hath had a man so long as it were in a string, 2 Tim. ii. 26, taking him captive at his will. He knew how and where to lay traps and gins for him, and take him as the fowler doth the silly birds. To have this poor forlorn man pulled out * Qu. ' majus' t — Ed. Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 101 of his jaws, when he had in his thoughts drank him up (as Peter speaks), and in peace possessed him : what an infinite confusion must this be to him ? Insomuch as Christ concludes of him, that being thus cast out he walks in dry places, like one banished, that is melancholy, and seeks solitariness, an heath, or a wilderness, as being ashamed to shew his head. Thus you have seen all creatures reasonable, and of all sorts of them, affected with the thoughts of God's dispensation to his elect, all having an interest in it. That as at Christ's birth all the city of Jerusalem is said to have been moved at it ; so are all sorts, both in heaven and in hell, at the new birth of one that hath been a lost sinner, which is that which putteth the notice upon it ; whereas the regeneration of elect infants passeth silently : they are stiU-bom, and no such noise made of it. CHAPTER VI. Tlie uses of the foregoing doctrine. — That they who are brought into a state of grace should always bear in their minds a remembrance of their former state of sin and misery. — That it will have an influence to ^promote and strengthen their faith. You have seen God's ends and designs in his disposition toward the elect ; and they are great and holy ends, and of as large an extent in then- tendency, as in any other dispensation of God to us. I come now to the uses to be made hereof on our part, which must be such as may answer those ends on God's part. And withal what uses may be made of such a time spent in sinning afore regeneration, may also fitly be turned upon the spirits of those that have had great fits of sinnings in any kind after regeneration. They wUl serve for both, but I wiU speak more directly as in relation to the first. You have run out many years in great sins, or few years in many ; look back, and now learn to make an improvement of that waste time in your lives. Men are apt to think that there is no use to be made thereof, espe cially of so long a time as that of unregeneracy was, in which we all lay. Now the apostle, he would never have exhorted the Ephesians (as you see he doth, Eph. ii. 2), to remember what once they were, if there were not many most fruitful and profitable improvements of the consideration of that condition. It is called our ' vain conversation' (so Peter calls it, 1 Peter i. 18). And the apostle Paul saith, Rom. vi. 21, ' What fruit had you in those things whereof ye are now ashamed ?' But, my brethren, assure yourselves of this, that God would not have left many, yea, most of his children, to so long a time of sinning against him, in which, they brought forth no fruit unto him, if that after they were turned unto him there were no ways whereby they should improve, and improve with interest and advantage, aU the experiences they had of their sinfulness in that condition. God could have saved you cheaper than by letting you fall into sin at all ; it was not for his profit, in a proper and direct way, that those whom he went to save should continue in sin, though but for one moment. He could have saved us, as he did the angels, a cheaper way. He loves his children so well that he would never have it said, that they had so and so dishonoured him, if he had not meant to have more honour (in an indirect way, in the event and issue, when all is summed up), by all that condition of sinning, in which formerly they had lain. This general exhortation, which is as a foundation to the rest, is to bear 102 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II, all your days in remembrance your sins, and the condition of sin in which you sometimes were. In Eph. ii., the apostle had at large discoursed of the state and nature they had been in, and the close and conclusion-he makes of all is, ' Wherefore remember that ye were sometimes GentUes in the flesh,' &c. There are two things which in the New Testament we are called upon in an especial manner to remember; 1st, The death of our Lord and Saviour Christ, which the sacrament caUeth upon us to remem ber, ' Do this in remembrance of me.' And the 2d is, ' Remember what once ye were,' what your estate and condition was, and forget it not. There is a third, which is, That thou shouldst ' remember whence thou art fallen, and repent,' which is coincident with this second. Remember, it had need be urged, for we are apt to forget it ; yet it is a duty lies upon us : Ezek. xvi. 22, He had discoursed there, in the former part of the chapter, what their condition was before God took them to be his people. ' Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan ; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite,' ver. 3 ; and so he goes on to mind them of their abominations, ' When thou wast' (saith he) ' in thy blood, I said unto thee, Live.' Now, after he had took them to be his people, when they had gone a-whoring from him, what is it he lays to their charge, especiaUy at ver. 22, that in all their abominations and whoredoms they had not remem bered ? ' In all thine abominations and whoredoms thou hast not remem bered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, and wast polluted,' &c. And the not remembering of this, as it is made a great sin, so it is made a special reason why they had fallen from God so much, and so often, after they were his people ; even because they remembered not. Every place thou comest in, where thou hast Uved before, may put thee in mind of some sin or other, Jer. iii. 2, 13. Every member of thy body hath sin written on it. The tongue is a ' world of evil,' thy feet have been swift to carry thee to vanity. The whole body is not able to contain the story of it. As of Christ's holy active life it was said, that all books in the world could not contain the history of them, so the same may be said of thy sins. But in making the use, or application, I shall chiefly confine myself unto those ends which God had, as in relation to us, in this dispensation. ; I instanced in two eminent graces in Paul's example, 1 Tim. i. ; I shaU now present them particularly. I. The consideration and remembrance thereof may help and further thy faith. It is true, the guilt of many and great sins- is in a direct way an opposite and hinderer of faith : it strikes the hand off, and discouragem from laying hold on Christ ; yet by God's dispensation, that tons dark ness into light, this may prove a provocative thereto, and an enlarger of it many ways. 1. Unfeigned faith of the operation of God is founded upon self-empti ness and poverty of spirit. If I would seek to move and stir my heart to kindly godly sorrow, I would take into consideration my sinning after con version, as being committed against so much love, not only borne towards me, but either brought home to my heart, or on which my soul depends alone for its salvation ; also against the blood of so gracious a Saviour, not shed only, but relied on, and to which I have daily recourse to have it sprinkled on my conscience ; also against that Holy Spirit that dweUs in me, and bears with me an unwearied patience. But if I would work my soul up to self-emptiness, I would, with the help of the Spirit, consider my natural condition, and that in two respects. Chap. VI.] in our salvation. 103 (1.) There I am sure to find a perfect emptiness of works of righteous ness, for it afforded none ; no, not in any imperfection. This (when the sinfulness of such an estate is fully discovered) the heart needs not be taught, it is so apparent. These words, Tit. iii. 5, ' Not by works of righteousness which we had done,' come in not here only, but elsewhere, upon this occasion, as taken for granted by all believers that had any insight into that estate, of which the apostle hath pronounced this con clusive sentence : ' So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God,' Rom. viii. 8. (2.) A man looking back thereon may see the vileness of his nature to the ftill, for it was then that the power of sin remained in its full strength (or to use Paul's phrase, Rom. vii. 5), ' had force,' its fuU force in his members to bring forth fruit to death, which force is now in part broken and slain. A man then laid the reins upon his lust's neck. A man then committed uncleanness with greediness, whereas, one that doth not do things out of goPd wUl, thinks everything enough that he thinks wiU but save him. His heart is less than his actions, and though by reason of convictions of what he ought to do, he cannot think it too much, knowing it to be his duty, yet when he doth it, and afterward, his heart thinks it much, and grudgeth it. Fiftly;, Lastly, In case of trial, when in temptation poor souls think all they have done is in vain, this goodwill will appear, in that JUey repent not of what they have done ; 2 Cor. vii. 9, 10, it is therefore called ' repentance never to be repented of.' There can no case befaU them, wherein they do repent, or are sorry for what they have done ; but stUl wish it had been much better for God's sake. If he hath had any glory by it, and if they should be damned, and not rewarded, they are contented to give him so much in. Whereas the other, as suitors when they are out of hope, send for all their tokens again, though they pretended much love ; so they did in the prophet : ' It is in vain,' say they, ' to serve God ; and wherefore have we fasted, and thou seest it not ?' CHAPTER V. The application or uses of the foregoing doctrine. I shall now shut up this discourse with what'is the apostle's chief scope in the text, 2 Cor. v. 18-20, viz., an use of exhortation, to 'beseechmen to be reconciled to God ;' because reconcUiation imports an having been formerly enemies ; and in that case, it is (as I shewed), necessary for men to apprehend themselves in a state of enmity with God, ere they will ever seek unto God for peace and reconciliation, or Usten to the true terms of it. 1. I shall therefore, in the first place, earnestly beseech all men to con sider whether yet such a work of reconciliation be wrought in them, yea or no ? And this is a question the best and greatest man living may, with out offence, be entreated to ask his own heart ; and it concerns every man that will have reconciliation with God to do it. To this end I beseech you to consider that we were once enemies, that is, in a state of enmity, and it is not Christ's having died that altereth that state. You see that the text supposeth God's having been in Christ reconciling the world, when yet the world remaineth unreconciled to God ; for upon that supposition he foundeth this exhortation. It is true, Christ died for us, when we were enemies, and therein his love was shewn ; Rom. v. 8, ' God commendeth his love to us, that while we were yet sinners' (and enemies, as it follows), ' Christ died for us.' Yet withal it is as true that we remain notwithstanding in that state, until a work of reconciliation to God is wrought in us, through Christ's death : Col. i. 22, ' And you that were sometime enemies, yet now Chap. V.] in our salvation. 141 hath he reconciled.' Nothing is more sure than that we were all once such ; and it were weU if we had good reasons to be as sure that now we are not. And the apostle everywhere stands upon the important now of every man's condition, as putting every man upon the examining his pre sent condition. 2. And, secondly, consider, that this enmity is seated in your minds and natures. You are ' enemies in your minds,' Rom. v. 8. Whence there fore it must be acknowledged that there must needs be some great alteration wrought in your minds, if God and you be friends. And thence consider that therefore it is not education, or outward privileges, or deportment in the church, that either doth alter, or argues your condition altered. As take a wolf, a cub, that is newly fallen from the dam, which is, as we know, in its nature an enemy to a lamb, though you put it into a lamb's skin, and bring it up with the sheep in the same fold, and feed it with the same food, yet still it will remain a wolf, and an enemy to a lamb : — such is our woful case, being born in our natures enemies to God, though immediately when we fell from the womb, we had a Christian's ear-mark given us, were trained up in a Christian profession, and have been ever since fed with the same word, &c, yet we are enemies stiU, if there be no more alteration in us. It was the case of Simon Magus, Acts viii. 23, ' I perceive thou art still in the gall of bitterness.' And ver. 21, ' Thou hast neither lot nor part in this matter,' though he had been baptized, &c. And though an innocent and harmless carriage in the world be added to this, yet this wiU not argue your estates to be altered, for a wolf may be so tamed, that it shall not do much hurt ; for every beast hath and may be tamed, as James saith, James iii. 7, ' Every kind of beasts and of birds, and of serpents, and things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind.' And if mankind can tame beasts, their inward natural disposition remaining, but restrained, God can do the Uke, and much more, to the hearts and spirits of men, without changing of them. Thou mayest be a tame wolf, be chained up from ranging and devouring, and yet still remain an enemy. For re member that this enmity is seated in thy mind and nature. That your hearts are not filled with so much gall, as to carry you on to evil works, doth not argue you friends and reconcUed, if withal they be not seasoned with so much good wiU to God, as to make you ' zealous of good works,' Titus U. 14. Mere neuters (if you could be such) are no friends. God accounts them enemies ; Mat. xxi. 30. ' He that is not with me is against me,' says Christ, our supreme judge. 3. Neither, thirdly, is it a forward profession of what is outwardly good, added to your inward carriage, which will argue you to be friends ; for flatterers may abound in outward kindnesses, as weU as friends, Isa. lviii. 2. You see a company there to mention kindnesses to God, whom God regards not. For it is with God herein as with great men, who have many flat terers, but few friends, as Solomon expresseth it, Prov. xix. 6, ' Many entreat the favour of the prince,' &c, because of gifts, ' and wiU be friends' (that is, seem to be), ' to him that giveth gifts.' And thus also God, having great gifts in his hand to give away, heaven, &c, and the keys of death and hell at his girdle ; he hath many who do seek and earnestly entreat his favour, out of such respects and ends ; and apprehensions strongly set on upon their hearts, who yet do but flatter him. Therefore trust to none of these, but love to have such a work of true reconciliation wrought in you as hath been spoken of. Which, if there be, the before mentioned disposi tions of pure good wiU wiU be sooner or later bubbling up in ypur hearts. 142 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BooVjDZ In brief, therefore, take the help and benefit of aU those particulars to examine your estates by, and try whether such a work hath been wrought in you. (1.) Consider, whether thou, having first apprehended thy enmity against God, thou wert therewithal brought to know God anew, and his Son ; and knowing him, didst fall in love with him (and all that ever yet have known him, have loved him) not with such a love only as we bear to some hero that doth great and noble things ; or to our dead founders, whom we speak well of, and commend their doings, although we never knew them but by tradition (and such at best is the common love to God and Christ which men bear to them) ; but so to know and love him, as to be enamoured with him, as one in love useth to be with the person he sets his affections on. Doth thy heart burn after him, when thou seest a glimpse of him but passing by thee ? Or, to use the phrase in Job, ' Art acquainted with him?' Job xxii. 21. Hath he imparted any secrets to thee, as to his friends he doth ? John xv. 15. Hath he shewed and manifested himself to thee' John xiv. 20, if not in assurance of his love to thee, yet in the goodness that is in himself ? Though thou hast seen him but as through the lattice (as the church did, Cant, v.), yet canst thou never be at quiet till thou seest him again ? Hath thy heart been divorced from all other lovers upon acquaintance with him ? Hast thou chosen him, and dost thou seek him for ever ? And for what hast thou chosen him, and why dost thou seek him ? Good will looks especially at the person, not the fortunes (as you caU them) ; ' I seek not yours, but you,' is the language of a friend. Alex ander had two friends : the one he called <£/Ao/3a