Part IV (continued, part 4)
(3.) That ye should perform duties so heartlessly, coldly, and indifferently; with so little faith, love, fervency, humility, zeal, and confidence. O look to the curse of the broken covenant, with the effects of it in earth and hell, that ye may be stirred up to the performance of duty after another manner. I mean not that ye should look upon it as what ye are actually liable to in case, of transgression; for this to a believer, who is never free from sin one moment, may well make his heart die in him like a stone; it will never kindly
quicken him; it may well drag or drive him to his duty, like a slave; it will never cause him perform it like a son; but look upon it as what ye are delivered from, and that will draw, melt, and kindly quicken the heart in love, Eph. 2:11–13; Luke 1:74, 75. Deliverance from wrath is the most powerful motive to obedience.
(4.) That ye should bear your troubles and trials so impatiently, as if your crosses were so many curses. Look to the condition of those under the curse in this world, and you will see your heaviest cross is lighter than their smallest ones, which have the weight of the enrse in them, that yours have not, however you cry out under their weight; yea your adversity is better than their prosperity; the frowns of providence you meet with, are preferable to the smiles of providence in their lot; there is no curse in the former, but in the latter there is. Look to the condition of those under the curse in hell; and that duly considered, ye will kiss the rod, and say, "It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not," Lam. 3:22. Look how Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, and you will see the poison taken out of the cup, and the pure water of affliction presented to you in your cup to pledge him in; and why not drink it, and drink it thankfully? Bear the cross for him, and take blows and buffetings for his sake, and from him for our own good, who has borne away the curse.
4. Have ye due thoughts of the evil of sin? Is your horror of it suitably raised? Rom. 12:9, "Abhor that which is evil," abhor it as hell, so the word may bear. If you duly consider the curse, it may fill you with shame and blushing on this head. There is much blindness in the minds of believers, much hardness in their hearts, and coldness in their affections with respect to spiritual things. The lively sense of the evil of sin is often very small. We dare not own believers to be yet liable to the curse, Christ having, with his precious blood applied to them by faith, freed them from it; but it is of great and necessary use to them as a looking-glass, wherein they may see the evil of sin, the due demerit of it, what their sins do in themselves deserve, what
Christ suffered for these sins of theirs, and what they should have suffered for them, if Christ had not suffered it in their stead. Trace the curse in its effects in this life, and after this life, as they have been represented to you; so will you see God's high indignation against sin, the infinite evil that is in the least transgression of the holy law. Behold it in this glass, and you shall conceive a horror of it; and be ashamed that you have entertained so slight thoughts of it.
5. Lastly, Are ye duly affected with the ease of those who, being strangers to Christ, are yet under the curse? Are ye at due pains for their recovery and deliverance? How natural is it for men, who with difficulty have escaped the greatest danger, to be affected with the case of others who are still in the same danger, in hazard of perishing? But though multitudes are under the curse still, and, it may be, some such as we have a peculiar interest in; yet where is the due care, compassion, and concern for them, that they may be delivered? They are not concerned for themselves, because they have not yet got a broad view of their hazard; but why are not such concerned for them, as have had their eyes opened in their own case. Sure the case of all men by nature is alike, and therefore the past danger of believers gives a clear view of the present danger of unbelievers, unless it be out of mind with them, which it should not be, that once they were "without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world," Eph. 2:12. The apostle's experience of the terror of the Lord stirred him up to prsuade others to flee from the curse, 2 Cor. 5:11; and it well becomes others, who are themselves as brands plucked out of the burning, to act with that concern in the case of others, pulling them out of the fire, Jude ver. 23, and to mourn for the case of those who continue insensible of their danger, as our blessed Redeemer did in the ease of Jerusalem, Luke 19:41, 42.
Secondly, Sinners, ye who are under the broken covenant of works still, not united to Christ by faith, and savingly interested in the
covenant of grace, but living yet in your natural unregenerate state, ye may hence be convinced,
1. That ye are under the curse; ye are they who are the people of the Lord's curse, under the sentence of the law, actually binding you over to destruction. Ye are they who by breaking of the original contract have fallen under the penalty, and are decerned in the court of heaven to pay it. Against you, as transgressors of the law, is the sentence passed according to the threatening, Gen. 2:17, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Against you, and every one of you in particular, is the curse denounced. So the condition of those under the curse, is your condition in particular; and what such are liable to, you are liable to; for your name is in the black roll of the people of the curse, of those appointed to death, and devoted to destruction, in virtue of the curse of the broken covenant of works.
O Sirs, admit the conviction, and go not about to bless yourselves in your own hearts, putting the thoughts of being under the curse far away from you. There is light enough here to convince your consciences in that point, if ye will not shut your eyes against clear light. All who are under the broken covenant of works are under the curse, but you are under that covenant; therefore you are under the curse. If you be not under that covenant, where is your discharge from it? The believer's discharge may be read; Rom. 8:1, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus." Chap. 7:4, "Ye are become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another." But where is yours? The unbeliever's discharge is nowhere to be found. It is past dispute that covenant is broken, and that being broken it curseth the breakers; it is undeniable that you are breakers of it, and therefore you must be under the curse.
It is your interest to admit this conviction. What will it avail you to bless yourselves in your own hearts, when God himself in his holy law denounces the curse against you? It is not by the sentence you pass on yourselves that you must stand or fall, but by the sentence
God passeth on you in his word. Nay, men's blessing themselves, against whom God denounceth the curse, does but the more expose them to the evils contained in the curse, coming on them speedily and furiously; Deut. 29:19, 20, "And it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of my heart, to add drunkenness to thirst; the Lord will not spare him, but then the anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the Lord shall blot out his name from under heaven." The admitting of this conviction is among the first steps to a delivery; and there would be good hopes of one's obtaining of the blessing of the gospel at length, if he were once soundly convinced of his being under the curse of the law. And therefore the curse is preached, not that sinners may perish under it, but that they, seeing themselves under it, may stir up themselves to make their escape. The law does its work to prepare sinners for Christ, convincing them of sin, that they are sinners; convincing them of their misery, that they are under the curse; and they that never yet saw themselves under the curse, give a shrewd sign that they were never yet brought from under it. But when once a sinner sees himself concluded under the curse of the law, then he is in a fair way to prize Christ and the blessing of the gospel, and to get himself carefully to inquire what course he should take to be saved. And the believing of the curse of the law with a particular application to one's self, must necessarily go before the so believing the promise of the gospel indeed.
Why should it seem strange in your eyes, who yet are not truly united to Christ by faith, that you should be under the curse of the broken covenant of works? that is the common case of all mankind by nature; and the deliverance from under it befals no man in a morning dream. And sure it is that most men have never been much in pain to get rid of it; and some there are who, striving to get clear of it in a legal way, have but wreathed that yoke faster about their own neeks. Do not you know that Christ himself, as the elect's surety, was made a curse? How could that be if they themselves had not been
under it, and likewise unable to bear it so as to exhaust it? Now, there is no saving interest in his purchase, till once the soul is brought to Christ by faith, and united to him; which you are not.
It is very consistent with the mercy of God, to lay unbelievers under the curse; for his mercy can never act in prejudice of his exact justice. The covenant being made with Adam for all mankind, the curse behoved to fall on the breakers according to the threatening, by virtue of the truth and justice of God. But mercy indeed has a way made for it towards the miserable under the curse, inasmuch as the prisoners are made prisoners of hope, by having deliverance from the curse proclaimed to them in the gospel; the which may be actually conveyed to them in the way of God's own appointment; namely the cursed sinner's believing on the name of Christ. But what need were there of either purchasing or proclaiming it to you, if you were not under it?
Think not that you cannot be under the curse, because God has done much for you, has given you many blessings, as health, strength, wit, wealth, and prosperity in the world; or because he has wrought many wonderful deliverances for you, has brought you from a low and mean estate to a high one, and mightily increased you in outward comforts and enjoyments. Remember it, and consider well, that all these are but left-hand blessings, which one may have poured in upon him in abundance, and yet be under the curse, and they be cursed to him; Mal. 2:2, "I will send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings; yea, I have cursed them already." Neither think, that because you are poor and mean in the world, have a hard and afflicted lot therein, that therefore you are certainly possessed of God's blessing and not under the curse. Nay, these things are in their own nature effects of the curse, and so they are in very deed to all who are not in Christ, but under the first covenant; and the curse may and doth pursue men in this world, as well as in the world to come; and one may be very miserable in this life and in the other too, by virtue of the curse. Neither deceive yourselves in this matter, with external privileges which you do enjoy in the fellowship of the
church. You may be set down at the table of gospel ordinances there, and yet be under the curse, Rom. 11:9, and by Virtue thereof, none of these things doing your souls good.
Wherefore, young sinners and old sinners, yet in your natural unconverted state, be convinced that ye are under the curse which has been described. Lay the matter to heart; what the law saith to them that are under it, it says to you; take it home then to yourselves, and believe you are under the curse.
2. Be convinced that ye are in a very miserable condition, being under the curse; Eph. 2:3, "By nature the children of wrath." Whatever your outward lot in the world is, your condition is dreadful in this respect. If you had Samson's strength, Absalom's beauty, Solomon's wit and wealth, and Methuselah's long life-time to enjoy them in, your case is miserable beyond expression, being under the curse of the broken covenant of works. The case of a devoted person, loaded with the curses of a city or country, and so put to death, was lamentable; but whosoever thou art who art under this covenant, and so under the curse, thou hast the curse of the Lord of heaven and earth upon thee, binding thee over to eternal destruction, and so art in a thousand times worse case. Your loss is unspeakable, and the whole world cannot compensate it; namely, the loss of God's favour. This burthen is insupportable; for there is that weight in this curse which will sink thee for ever, though now, perhaps, thou feelest it not. The curse binds thee to the payment of a debt to revenging justice, which thou wilt never be able to discharge. You have heard your miserable condition under the curse at large.
To sum it up in a few words; your condition is miserable here, and will be more miserable hereafter, if you die as you now live. In this world, the cloud of wrath hangs over your head, and the small rain of God's indignation is continually falling upon you; in the world to come, the full shower will fall, the floods of wrath will break out and overwhelm you. Your life hangs in doubt every day; and as you live in the most dangerous circumstances, exposed without any covert to
the arrows of wrath; so you are not ready to die. On this side death you are in the midst of your armed enemies, and on the other side death you fall into the hands of the living God. O lay to heart year misery ere it be too late.
Refuse not to admit the conviction of the great misery of your condition, because you do not feel yourself so miserable. Remember, that it is not your feeling, but God's word of truth, which can determine you happy or miserable. The judgment of God is always according to truth; and if you will carry your case to the word, you will see it a most deplorable case; view it in the glass of the holy broken law which you are under, and you must needs be affected with the horror of it; "For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse." You read, you hear the law, with its terrible sentence against the breakers, its fearful curses and denunciations of wrath; but do you apply them to yourselves? Nay, you entertain them as if they did not concern you, nor were directed to you; and if at any time they are like to take hold of you, and grip your consciences, you flee from them, and labour to divert your minds from such thoughts. But remember, "what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law;" and consequently it saith them to you, as if your name were expressed in what it saith. And if the law speaks to you indeed, it will have its effect on you, however you may persuade yourself it means not concerning you.
What though you do not feel your misery? Many think themselves in good case, who in very deed are in a most miserable and wretched condition, as it fared with Laodicea, Rev. 3:17. They entertain themselves with dreams of happiness, while ruin abides them; think themselves safe, while they are in the utmost hazard. Nay, there are many who are so far gone under the curse, that they are past feeling, Eph. 4:19. Neither the sinfulness nor misery of their souls gives them any distress, anxiety, or perplexity of mind. And that is a case miserable to a degree, inasmuch as it is so far a hopeless case.
But why are ye not sensible of your miserable case? Though ye feel not the weight of it upon you for the present, yea though ye have all ease and prosperity in the world, being neither under trouble of body nor mind, nor any disaster in your affairs; yet ye ought to remember, that the curse works by silent strokes, as well as by tormenting plagues, as ye have heard; yea, and that the most terrible workings of the curse are awaiting the people of the curse, on the other side death. Surely then ye have reason to believe, and be convinced, that your state is most miserable, though for the present you feel not the weight of it; for the curse, working like a moth, insensibly, makes a ruinous condition, in which the breaking will at length come suddenly at an instant; and they must needs be in a state of unspeakable misery, whom eternal destruction from the presence of the Lord is abiding, ready to seize them at the time appointed.
Wherefore believe the doctrine of the law, concerning the curse, and the misery of sinners under it; believe it with application to yourselves. Believe it upon the testimony of God, who is truth itself; believe it, because God has said it, though perhaps you do not feel it; so shall you come to be duly affected with it, and by that means be stirred up to a concern to be saved from it, which would be a promising step towards a recovery.
3. Be convinced, that your case is desperately sinful while you are under that covenant. While sin remains, the root of misery remains, which will spring up; the fountain abides, which will cast forth waters of bitterness; and it must and will remain in its strength while ye are under that Covenant; because, being under that covenant, ye are under the curse. Hence says the apostle, 1 Cor. 15:56, "The strength of sin is the law." While the law, as the covenant of works, then, hath power over a man, sin will have its strength in him, which he can by no means break. While ye are under that covenant, and so under the curse,
(1.) The guilt of your sin lies on you, the guilt of eternal wrath; and it cannot be removed. The curse stakes you down under that guilt, it
binds it upon you as with bands of iron and brass, that it is not possible you should ever get up your head, while the curse is on it; and the curse will be upon it as long as ye are under that covenant, Gal. 3:10. The covenant in the threatening of it said, If man sin, he shall die; and so sinning he contracted the guilt of death, he came under debt to vindictive justice. The curse of the covenant says, The sinner must die, he must pay his debt to the utmost farthing, he cannot be freed from it without full payment. This you cannot do. The justice and truth of God confirm the curse of the law on the sinner, that it cannot be balked without an imputation of dishonour on them. And since it is not posssible for you to make full satisfaction, and so to exhaust the curse, no, not through the ages of eternity; it is evident, that the curse does inviolably bind the guilt of your sin on you, so that while the former remains on you, the latter is immoveable.
Now consider that ye were born sinners under this covenant, and so born under the curse of it; and that the law is most extensive, both as to parts and degrees of obedience, and so condemns everything you do, because you do nothing in the perfection which it requires. Hence your sins are innumerable, your several pieces of guilt are past reckoning, and you are every day adding to the account; but in the meantime the account never suffers any diminution. The state of a sinner under the curse is an unfathomable gulf, into which the waters are continually running, but not the least drop goes out from it again. New guilt is still added, but nothing of the old or new guilt is removed; the curse lets in more, but it lets none out; all is sealed up under the curse, from your sin in the womb, till your sin of this minute.
Ye will say, God forbid! Surely he is a merciful God. I have been troubled about my sins, and I have repented of them, and begged forgiveness, and I hope he has pardoned me; and I hope to do the same for the time to come, and he will pardon me still. ANSWER. Not to speak here of what repentance can be found in one lying under the curse of the first covenant, ye should take notice, that you
being still under the covenant of works, God deals with you in the way of that covenant, and that covenant admits of no pardon to them who are under it, Acts 13:39. For a pardon under that covenant would render the threatening and curse of it vain, and of no effect; and so fasten a blot and stain on the truth and justice of God, and would indeed quite overturn that covenant, and leave it as little regarded by God himself, as it has been by the sinner. Indeed, if you can bear the curse, so as, by your suffering what it binds on you, to exhaust it, and fully satisfy justice; then your crime is expiated, and even in the way of that covenant God and you are friends again; but that is as impossible for you, as to lift the whole fabric of heaven and earth out of its place. The truth is, nothing can procure you the pardon of one sin, but what can remove the curse; while you are under that covenant, you have no saving interest in the blood of Christ, so the curse is not taken off you thereby; and certain it is, that your repentance and begging forgiveness can never remove the curse from off you, for they can never be a full satisfaction to offended justice. And therefore, notwithstanding your pretended repenting and begging pardon, your guilt still remains; there is no pardon in the case; though your guilt is forgotten by you, it is remembered of God still, and is written before him as with a pen of iron, and the point of a diamond.
(2.) Sin has a reigning power over you; and it neither is nor can be broken, you continuing under that covenant, Rom. 6:14, where the apostle plainly teaches, that they who are under the law are under the dominion of sin. Man, innocent and holy, entered into that covenant; but once turning a sinner under it, he could never turn a saint again under it. It furnished strength to man being clean to keep himself clean, but provided no laver for him once defiled, to wash himself clean again, I know that the men of that covenant do not make, all of them, an alike black appearance in their lives and conversations; some of them bear the devil's mark on their foreheads; others have it in the hollow of their hand, which, they can keep from the view of the world. Bat the whole of them are an unsanctified company, and under the reigning power of sin, which is
in them entire and unbroken, Rom. 3:10–12. So that I say your ease is desperately sinful as to the reigning power of sin, while under that covenant; ye neither are nor can be holy under it. And think not this strange. For,
[1.] Since you are sinners under that covenant, you must needs be dead men; for so runs the threatening; Gen. 2:17, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die." Your natural life is yet preserved, therefore your spiritual life then must be gone, Eph. 2:1. So all the men of that covenant are dead and buried in trespasses and sins. Death preys on their souls, and bears full sway there. Hence it is called "the law of sin and death," Rom, 8:3, sin and death reigning over all that are under its dominion. And therefore Christ, the head of the second covenant, was made a quickening spirit, death reigning under the first.
What though you perform religious duties under this covenant? They are all but dead works, but the carcases of duties, without life and spirit. They have the matter of duty, but they are not done in a right manner; they are not from a right principle, nor are they directed to the right end; they are all selfish, slavish, and mercenary, and can never be acceptable to God.
[2.] Being under the curse, there is a separation betwixt God and your soul, and so the course of sanctifying influences is blocked up, Isa. 57:2. While the curse thus stands as a partition-wall of God's own making, in the course of justice, betwixt God and you, how can there be any saying communion with him? and without that how can ye be made holy? Our Lord Jesus Christ, by his death and sufferings, purchased the Spirit of sanctification for those that are his; plainly importing, that there was no access for the Spirit of sanctification to the unholy creature by the first covenant.
You may possibly find an enlargement of heart in duty under that covenant; but mistake it not for communion with God, there is no communion with him but by Jesus Christ the head of the second
covenant, Eph. 2:18. And for an evidence hereof, you shall observe, that whereas communion with God has a sanctifying and humbling efficacy where it is; these enlargements have no such effect, but on the contrary fill the heart with pride and self-esteem, and so render the soul more unholy, 1 John 1:6
(3.) That covenant is no channel of sanctification to the unholy creature. To a sinner it is "the ministration of death," 2 Cor. 3:7, and of "condemnation," ver. 9, a "killing letter," exacting obedience to be performed on the strength given at first, but now quite spent; but promising no new strength for duty, but laying on the curse for nonperformance. It is the gospel, or covenant of grace, that is the "ministration of the Spirit," ver. 8. And for this the apostle appeals to the experience of those who have received the Spirit, Gal. 3:2, "Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?"
It is true, that under that covenant you may have been influenced to reformation of life, and prompted to the performing of duty; but all this amounts to no more in that case, but a change of life, and reaches never to a change of one's nature. Fear of punishment and hope of reward, are here the springs of all; not the love of God; and so the result of it is a form of godliness, without the power of it.
[4.] That covenant, instead of having a sanctifying influence on sinners, has an irritating power on their corruptions. The more close it comes upon their consciences, the more their lusts are provoked, as was before explained, Rom. 7:7. I may herein appeal to sinners' experience. Have ye not sometimes found sleeping corruptions awakened by the law's forbidding of them? and weak lusts gather strength by the very sight of the hedge which the law has set betwixt you and them? And have not your hearts, on some particular occasions, finding how their inclinations were crossed by its commands, awed and frightened by its threatenings and curses, even risen against it secretly, and against the God that made it?—Thus under that covenant your case is desperately sinful.
4. Be convinced, that while ye remain under that covenant, ye remain under the curse; and there is no deliverance from the curse without deliverance from the covenant. "For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse." It is vain to think one can be under that covenant, being a sinner, and not be under the curse; for the curse will be found to take place in the dominion of the law, wherever sin is found. So as long as ye live under the broken covenant of works, so long ye live under the curse; and if ye die under that covenant, ye die under the curse. When innocent Adam entered into that covenant, it did not curse, nor could it curse him or his, while as yet there was no command of it broken; but when once sin entered, the curse immediately took place, and seized on him and all his posterity; and under it they lie, as long as they remain under that covenant, and are not delivered from that original contract.
This is a weighty consideration, and may pierce the hearts of all who have not got their discharge as to that covenant, who have not got that hand-writing that is so much against them, blotted out with respect to them. Whatever ye do, whatever ye suffer, whatever change be in your conversation, or in the temper and disposition of your spirits, while ye remain under that covenant, the yoke of the curse remains still wreathed about your necks. And, to fasten this conviction the more on you, consider,
(1.) Ye being under that covenant were born under the curse, "by nature the children of wrath," Eph. 2:3. Adam's sin laid all men under it; and as soon as we are Adam's children we are cursed children, bound over to death by the sentence of the broken law or covenant, Rom. 5:18. Now, there are only two ways how that curse may be supposed to be removed and taken off you, viz., either by your own bearing it for yourselves so as to bear it off, or by another's bearing it for you imputed to you; for that it should be taken off you in a way of mere mercy, without any bearing it to the satisfaction of justice, is inconsistent with God's justice, truth, and covenant, as you heard before. But the former way, it cannot be that ye are or shall be delivered from it; for whatever ye have suffered in your souls, bodies,
or any other way, or whatever ye may suffer is still but the sufferings of a finite being, which can never compensate the wrong done to the honour of an infinite God by your sin; and therefore the sufferings of the damned have no end. The breach made by the creature's sin in the honour of an infinite God, is a gulf which swallows up all sufferings of the creature, but can never be thereby filled up. As to the latter, it cannot take place, but in the way ot the second covenant, which is inconsistent with your continuing under this covenant. The imputation of Christ's satisfaction, and the delivery from the curse thereby are consequents of the soul's union with Christ, Rom. 8:1, which is by one's entering into the covenant of grace, whereby they part with the covenant of works which they naturally cleave to, Rom. 7:4. Therefore it necessarily follows, that while ye remain under the covenant of works, ye remain under the curse, the curse laid on for Adam's sin.
(2.) Suppose that curse were removed, and no curse were lying on you now for the first breach of the covenant; yet ye cannot refuse but that however watchfully you have behaved yourselves, endeavouring to keep the law you have been guilty of some sins in your own persons; you have, sometimes at least, thought evil, spoken evil, and done evil; some duties ye have omitted, some crimes against God and his law ye have committed. Now these lay you under the curse, since you are under the covenant which curseth the sinner; for it is written "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." It is not enough to do some things of the law; if all be not done, one is by this covenant staked down under the curse.
(3.) When you have done the best that possibly you can do to keep the commandments, ye still fall under the curse, while ye are under this covenant, because whatever good ye do, ye do it not; for perfection in every point of duty is required under it, Luke 10:27, and not only so, (for that is required under the covenant of grace too, Matth. 5 ult.,) but it is required under pain of the curse; for it is written, "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things," &c.
So that if you should omit no duty, external or internal, consistent with one's continuing under that covenant, and should perform them with all the vigour, zeal, and carefulness ye are capable of; yet even for these the covenant would thunder out its curse against you, for that you fail in them in any the least measure or degree.
(4.) Forasmuch as the law requires all perfection in all things, and at all times; and that at no time, in any action, you attain to that perfection, but are still sinning in all your thoughts, words, and actions; therefore the law is still raining down its curse on you, and binding you over with new ties to death, for your new sins, cursing for every thing done amiss. Wherefore since you do nothing but what, one way or other, is done amiss in the eye of the law, it is impossible you should ever get your head lifted up from under the curse while you continue in that covenant.
(5.) Lastly, But put the case, though indeed it is impossible that you under this covenant could arrive at perfection, so that you should sin no more, either by omission or commission, either in the matter or in the manner of what you do; but that your obedience should be from this moment perfect in parts and degrees, and that you should obey in as great perfection as the angels do in heaven; I say that, notwithstanding, you remaining under this covenant should still remain under the curse. For it is evident that you are guilty of many sins already, and what is done by you can never be undone; and for that cause you have fallen under the curse already, and your perfect obedience for the present time and the time to come, being a debt you owe for the time wherein it is performed, can never expiate the former guilt or be reputed satisfying for the debt before contracted. Yea, suppose you had never sinned in your own persons, but had perfectly obeyed since you were capable of keeping or breaking God's law; yet being under that covenant you should still be under the curse, as being born under it, on the account of Adam's first sin, which it is plain, on the former grounds, could not be expiated by that your supposed perfect obedience.
Thus it is evident, that while ye remain under this covenant ye remain under the curse.
Say not, that, at this rate, all must be under the curse, since in many things we offend all; for the state of sinners under the two covenants is vastly different. By the first covenant, they that are under it are liable to the curse in case of sinning; but by the second covenant, they that are under it are not liable thereto in any case, but freed from it, Gal. 3:13. Because Christ's bearing it for them is imputed to them. Sin under the former reigns unto death, but under the latter "grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life," Rom. 5 ult. In justification the obedience and satisfaction of Christ, made for all the sins of all his people, past, present, and to come, are imputed unto believers, and so they are discharged at once of their whole debt to revenging justice, and they can never more fall under the curse, nor be liable to it for their sins, more than a man can be liable in payment of a debt already paid and discharged. To pretend that believers may be liable to the curse, and yet not fall under the curse upon their sinning is vain; for if by the law, or threatening, they be liable to the curse in case of transgression; the curse must needs seize them, when they do actually transgress, in virtue of the truth of God in the threatening; for hath he said it, and shall it not come to pass? Neither is it profitable, in the case of the curse, to distinguish betwixt gross sins, and other sins; for the cursing law makes no such distinction in that point, but where it curseth for one sin, it curses for all, of what kind soever; Gal. 3:10, "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things," &c.
So this misery is peculiar to those under the covenant of works.
5. Be convinced, that there is no salvation for you under that covenant. You must either quit it, and escape out of its dominion, or perish under it. To be saved, and yet be under the curse is inconsistent. But while ye are under that covenant, ye are under the curse; and therefore while ye are under it, ye cannot be saved, but
must needs perish. Therefore, I say, if ye abide in that broken ship, ye are ruined, ye will be swallowed up, ye will never see the shore of Immanuel's land. O be convinced of this, that you may despair of ever entering into heaven by that door; that your hopes and expectations by it may die, being plucked up by the roots; and you may look out for another door of hope. Consider,
(1.) That it was the door opened to innocent Adam indeed, but by one wrong step missing it, he could never make his entry by it any more, but was fain to betake himself to another door, even Jesus Christ in the free promise, Gen. 3:15. How then can ye expect to enter by it? he found that being once a sinner, he was able no longer to live under the dominion of the law, and therefore did betake himself to the dominion of free grace; his garment of fig-leaves which he made for himself, he parted with as insufficient, and took on the coat of skins (of sacrifices) which the Lord God made unto him. Ye must go and do likewise, or ye perish.
(2.) Sinners being shut up for destruction under this covenant, the door was bolted with the bar of the curse, so that there is no escaping from death by it for them, Gal. 3:10. When Samson was shut up for death in Gaza, he took the doors of the gate of the city, bar and all, upon his shoulders, and so got out of the city to the mountains, Judg. 15. But this bar of the curse is too heavy for the shoulders of angels, they are not able to bear it, far less are ye able. So there is no access to the hill of God that way for you. That gate is like unto what we read of; Ezek. 44:2, 3, "No man shall enter in by it: it is for the prince," the Lord Jesus Christ, the true Samson, who, when all his elect were shut up for death in the prison of the law covenant, barred with the bar of the curse, put himself in their room; and in his might lifted up the gate, bar and all, and carried them away, and so made a way for them to escape.
Take heed you deceive not yourselves in this matter, with the promises of life you apprehend to be made to your keeping of the commandments of God. It is true, there is a promise of life to
obedience in the covenant of works; but then it is only to perfect obedience. The curse is denounced against the least failure, Luke 10:27, 28, Gal. 3:10. Now, it is evident you can have no hope by this promise, since you cannot perform the obedience to which it is made. And there is no promise of life in that covenant on any lower condition. Sincere obedience will not entitle you to that promise, though ye could perform it, as ye really cannot; the will cannot be accepted here for the deed; for the law denounces the curse on every one under it for the least imperfection; and so staves them off from any benefit by its promise. The promise of life and salvation is in the covenant of grace freely made for the sake of Christ, to be received by faith in him; and even in it godliness hath the promise of life annexed to it, but is made not to the work, but to the worker being in Christ; and not for his work's sake, but for Christ's sake. But you being under the covenant of works, have no saying interest in the promises of the covenant of grace, and so have no part nor lot in the life and salvation there promised. And besides, all your obedience is servile and mercenary, unacceptable to God; so far from having the promise of life, that on the contrary such workers are expressly excluded from it; Gal. 4:30, "Cast out the bond-woman and her son: for the son of the bond-woman shall not be heir with the son of the free-woman."
Thus ye see there is no salvation for you under the broken covenant of works.
6. Be convinced, that there is an absolute necessity of being set free from the covenant of works, of being brought into the covenant of grace, and savingly interested in the Lord Jesus, the second Adam. If you be not set free from the first covenant, ye are ruined. For as many as are under the bond of it are under the curse. To put the question to yourselves, Whether you had best quit that covenant, or not? is in effect, Whether you had best remain under the curse, or endeavour to escape? This is a point that in reason can admit no more dispute, than whether a drowning man should be willing to be
preserved from perishing? or whether a man should cast burning coals out of his bosom?
If you be not brought into the covenant of grace, interested in Jesus Christ by faith, you can never be freed from the covenant of works. No man shall ever get up that bond, but on his instructing full payment both of the principal sum and of the penalty; that is, both of perfect obedience to the law, and satisfaction to justice for the breach made by sin. This you shall never be able to instruct, do or suffer what you will, unless you embrace and unite with Christ by faith in the second covenant, by means of which his obedience and satisfaction shall be counted up on your score.
Here then is the one thing needful; unless you take this course, ye shall never see life or salvation, but perish for ever.
7. Lastly, Be convinced, that your help must come wholly from the Lord Jesus Christ, and that you can contribute nothing by your own working for your own relief; Hos. 13:9, "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thy help." For being under that covenant, ye are under the curse; and what can one do for himself, acceptable to God, who is under these bonds of death? It is true, sinners will not, come to Christ, till they be deeply sensible of their sin and misery; but to require such and such qualifications in sinners before they may come to Christ, is to lay a snare before them, keeping them back from Christ, and teaching them to lay some weight upon their qualifications while they are yet under the curse.
In a special manner to tell sinners that they must truly repent of their sins before they may believe in Christ, or before they may apprehend the remission of sin in the promise, is in effect to say, that they must be holy, and repent in a manner acceptable to God, while they are yet lying under his curse; for the curse is not removed but in justification. The truth is, there is a legal repentance, agreeing to the state of one under the curse, arising from a legal faith, the faith of the curse, that goes before saving faith and remission of sin; and
however necessary it is to stir up the soul to prize Christ, it cannot be acceptable to God, since the man is still under his curse. But no doing no working, no repenting of ours can please God, till once we are from under the curse, through faith in him who justifies the ungodly. And therefore, to effectuate the sinner's passing from the one covenant and its curse, into the other, and the blessing thereof, no doing, no working of ours is required, but only to receive Christ, pardon of sin, deliverance from the curse by faith, they being all offered and exhibited, in the free promise of the gospel, to the sinner under the curse. And so, the curse being removed, the partition-wall betwixt God and the sinner is taken down, and the influences of the Spirit unto sanctification, evangelical repentance, and new obedience, flow into the soul.
USE II. Of Exhortation
First, Let unbelievers, who are still under this covenant, receive these convictions, and be warned, excited, and exhorted timely to sue to be delivered from under the covenant of works, and for that end to be instated in the covenant of grace, by faith in Jesus Christ. What need is there of further motives than the text gives, in telling us, that all under this covenant are under the curse? which has been explained at large to you. Ah! is it safe to go home and sleep another night under the curse? Is it safe to venture more time under it, when you know not which moment of your time may be the last? As ye have any regard to your own souls, lay this matter to heart, and delay no longer; but haste, escape for your life. Consider, I pray you,
1. The curse is a weight which you will never be able to bear. The weight of God's revenging wrath is in it, and it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God; on whomsoever this stone falls, it will grind him to powder.
2. It is a growing weight; as your sins grow, the curse grows; Rom. 2:5, "After thy hardness and impenitent heart, thou treasurest up
unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath." The evils thou art bound over to are the greater, and the bonds are the stronger.
3. It is a weight that may be now removed from off you; 2 Cor. 6:2, "Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation." Those whom this weight has sunk down into the pit already, it can never be removed from off them; but ye are yet within the reach of mercy, the Mediator is ready to take the yoke off your jaws.
4. If the weight of the curse be not removed from off you, it will be the heavier that deliverance from it was in your power; Matth. 11:21, "It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you." The men of that covenant will all feel the weight of the curse, but it will have a double weight to despisers of the gospel.
5. Lastly, It will be an eternal weight, Matth. 25:41, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire." There is an eternal weight of glory for the saints in the promise; and an eternal weight of wrath for sinners in the curse, which they shall for ever lie under, and never get clear of.
Let these motives then excite and induce you to flee from the curse of the broken covenant of works, unto the covenant of grace, where life is only to be found.
Secondly, Believers in Christ, delivered from this covenant, (1.) Be thankful for your deliverance, as a deliverance from the curse. Let the warmest gratitude glow in your breasts for so great a deliverance; and let your soul, and all that is within you, be stirred up to bless your glorious Deliverer for this unspeakable blessing. (2.) Walk holily and fruitfully in good works, since the bands of death are removed, and your souls are healed. Be holy in all manner of life and conversation; adorning the doctrine of God your Saviour in all things. Let the whole tenor of your lives testify that you are not under the curse, but that you inherit the blessing of eternal life, by living to
the praise and honour of Christ, who hath delivered you from the wrath to come. (3.) Turn not back to the broken covenant of works again, in legal principles, nor in legal practices. The more the temper and frame of your spirit lies that way, the more unholy will ye be; and the more your duties savour of it, the less savoury will they be unto your God. It is only by being dead to the law, that ye will live unto God.
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A View of the Covenant of Works, Copyright © 2019
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