-- Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Love to the Godly
calamity do they bring upon themselves! In this one summary instance, we may see, how much religion and obedience to God doth, tend to our own felicity and delight; and how easy a work it would be, if a wicked heart did not make it difficult; and how great a plague sin is unto the sinner; and how sore a punishment of itself! And by this you may see, what it is that all fallings out, divisions and contentions tend to; and all temptations to the abatement of our love; and who it is that is the greater loser by it, when love to our neighbour is lost; and that backbiters and censurers who speak ill of others, come to us as the greatest enemies and thieves, to rob us of our chiefest jewel, and greatest comfort in this world? and accordingly should they be entertained.
CHAPTER XXVIII
Special Cases and Directions for Love to Godly Persons as such Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Love to the Godly
WHOM we must take for godly, I have answered before, Chap. xxiv.
Tit. 1. Quest. v.
Quest. I. 'How can we love the godly, when no man can certainly know who is sincerely godly?'
Answ. Our love is not the love of God which is guided by infallibility, but the love of man, which is guided by the dark and fallible discerning of a man; the fruits of piety and charity we infallibly see in their lives. But the saving truth of that grace which is or ought to be the root, we must judge of according to the probability which those signs discover, and love men accordingly.
Quest. II. 'Must we love those as godly, who can give no sensible account of their conversion, for the time, or manner, or evidence of it?'
Answ. We must take none for godly, who shew no credible evidence of true conversion, that is, of true faith and repentance; but there is many an one truly godly, who through natural defect of understanding, or utterance, are not able in good sense to tell you what conversion is, nor to describe the manner in which it was wrought upon them, much less to define exactly the time or sermon when it was first wrought, which few of the best Christians are able to do; especially of them who had pious education, and were wrought on in their childhood. But if the covenant of grace be wisely opened to them according to their capacity, and they deliberately, and soberly, and voluntarily profess their present assent and consent thereto, they do thereby give you the credible evidence of a true conversion, till you have sufficient contrary evidence to disprove it.
For none but a converted man can truly repent and believe in God, the Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, according to the baptismal covenant.
Quest. III. 'But what if he be so ignorant that he cannot tell what faith, or repentance, or redemption, or sanctification, or the covenant of grace is?'
Answ. If you have sufficient evidence that indeed he doth not at all understand the essentials of the sacramental covenant, you may conclude that he is not truly godly; because he cannot consent to what he knoweth not: 'Ignorantis non est consensus:' and if you have no evidence of such knowledge, you have no evidence of his godliness, but must suspend your judgment. But yet many an one understandeth the essentials of the covenant, who cannot tell another what they are; therefore his mind (in case of great disability of utterance), must be fished out by questions, to which his yea or no, will discover what he understandeth and consenteth to: you would not refuse to do so by one of another language, or a dumb man, who understood you, but could answer you but by broken words or signs; and verily ill education may make a great many of the phrases of Scripture, and religious language as strange to some men, though spoken in their native tongue, as if it were Greek or Latin to them,
who yet may possibly understand the matter. A wise teacher by well composed questions may (without fraud or formality) discern what a man understandeth, though he say but yea or no, when an indiscreet, unskilful man, will make his own unskilfulness and uncharitableness, the occasion of contemptuous trampling upon some that are as honest as himself. If a man's desires and endeavours are to that which is good, and he be willing to be taught and use the means, it must be very gross ignorance indeed, and well proved, that must disprove his confession of faith. If he competently understand what it is to believe in God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, he understandeth all that, is absolutely necessary to salvation. And his yea or no may sometimes signify his understanding it.
Quest. IV. 'Must I take the visible members of the church, because such, for truly godly?'
Answ. Yes, except when you have particular sufficient proof of their hypocrisy. Certainly no man doth sincerely enter into the baptismal covenant, but he that is sincerely a penitent believer (if at age). For that covenant giveth actual pardon and adoption to those that sincerely enter into it: the very consenting to it (which is repentance and faith) being the very condition of the present reception of these benefits. And therefore it is that the ancient writers still affirmed that all the baptized were regenerated, justified, and adopted: whether an adult person be truly fit for baptism, or not, the pastor that baptizeth is to judge; and he must see the credible signs of true faith and repentance before he baptize him; which are no other than his understanding, voluntary, sober profession of consent to the baptismal covenant; but when he is baptized and professeth to stand to that covenant once made, he is to be judged a godly person by all the church-members, who have not sufficient proof of the contrary; because if he be sincere in what he did and still professeth, he is certainly godly; and whether he be sincere or not, he himself is the best and regular judge or discerner, so far as to put in his claim to baptism, which the pastor is obliged not to deny him, without
disproving him; and the pastor is to judge as to his actual admittance; and therefore the people have nothing necessarily to do, but know whether he be baptized and stand to his baptism; for which they are to take him as sincere; unless by his notorious discovery of the contrary they can disprove him. These are not only the true terms of church-communion, but of love to the godly; and though this goeth hardly down with some good men, who observe how few of the baptized seem to be seriously religious, and therefore they think that a visible church-member as such, is not at all to be counted sincere, that is, to be believed in his profession, and that we owe him not the special love which is due to the godly, but only a common love due only to professors without respect to their sincerity; yet this opinion will not hold true; nor is a profession required without respect to the truth or falsehood of it; the credibility of it being the very reason that it is requisite. Nor is it any other faith or consent to the covenant below that which is sincere and saving, which must be professed by all that will be taken for church-members. And though those that are of the contrary opinion are afraid lest this will occasion too much strictness in the pastors in judging whose profession is credible, and consequently will countenance separation in the people, yet God hath provided a sufficient remedy against that fear, by making every man the opener of his own heart, and tying us by the law of nature and of Scripture, to take every man's profession for credible, which is sober, understanding and voluntary, unless they can disprove it, or prove him a liar, and perfidious, and incredible. And whereas it is a latitude of charity which bringeth them to the contrary opinion, for fear lest the incredible professors of Christianity, should be all excluded from the visible church, yet indeed it is but the image of charity, to bring catechumens into the church, (as to set the boys of the lowest form among them that are in their Greek,) and to deny all special Christian love to all visible members of the church as such; and to think that we are not bound to take any of them (as such) to be sincere or in the favour of God, or justified, for fear of excluding those that are not. But of this I have largely written in a Treatise on this subject.
Quest. V. 'Must we take all visible church-members alike to be godly, and love them equally?'
Answ. No: there are as many various degrees of credit due to their profession, as there are various degrees of credibility in it: some manifest their sincerity by such full and excellent evidences in a holy life, that we are next to certain that they are sincere: and some make a profession so ignorantly, so coldly, and blot it by so many false opinions and vices, that our fear of them may be greater than our hope; of whom we can only say, that we are not altogether hopeless of their sincerity, and therefore must use them as godly men, because we cannot prove the contrary; but yet admonish them of their danger, as having much cause to fear the worst: and there may be many notorious wicked men in some churches, through the pastors' fault, for want of discipline; and these for order sake we must assemble with, but not dissemble with them and our own consciences, so as to take them for godly men, when the contrary is notorious; nor yet to admit them to our familiarity. The pastor hath the keys of the church, but we have the keys of our own houses and hearts.
Quest. VI. 'Must we love all equally that seem truly godly, the strong and the weak?'
Answ. No: be that loveth men for their holiness, will love them according to the degrees of their holiness, as far as he can discern it.
Quest. VII. 'Must we love him more who hath much grace (or holiness) and is little useful for want of gifts, or him that hath less grace and eminent useful gifts?'
Answ. They must both be loved according to the diversity of their goodness. He that hath most grace is best, and therefore most to be loved in himself; but as a means to the conversion of souls and the honour of God in the good of others, the man that hath the most eminent gifts, must be most loved. The first is more loved in and for
his own goodness the second is more lovely 'propter aliud' as a means to that which is more loved than either of them.
Quest. VIII. 'Must we love him as a godly man, who liveth in any great or mortal sin?'
Answ. Every man must be loved as he is: if by a mortal sin, be meant a sin inconsistent with the love of God, and a state of grace, then the question is no question; it being a contradiction which is in question
But if by a great and mortal sin, be meant only this or that act of sinning, and the question be. Whether that act be mortal, that is, inconsistent with true grace or not? Then the particular act, with the circumstances must be considered, before that question can be answered. Murder is one of the most heinous sins; and one man may be guilty of it, out of deliberate, habitual malice; and another through a sudden passion; and another through mere inadvertency, carelessness and negligence. Stealing may be done by one man presumptuously, and by another merely to save the life of himself or his children: these will not equally prove a man in a state of death, and without true grace. And which is a mortal sin inconsistent with the life of grace, and which not, is before spoken to, and belongeth not to this place. Only I shall say, that the sin (be it great or small as to the outward act or matter) which certainly excludeth the habitual devotedness of the soul to God, by resignation, obedience and love, is mortal or a mark of spiritual death; and so is all sin, which consisteth not with habitual repentance, and a predominant hatred of sin as sin, and of a disobedient, unholy heart and life; and therefore all sin, which is not repented of, as soon as it is known, and the sinner hath time and opportunity of deliberation; because in such a case, the habit of repentance will produce the act.
Quest. IX. 'Must an excommunicated person be loved as godly or not?'
Answ. You must distinguish, 1. Of excommunication. 2. Of the person that is to judge. 1. There is an excommunication which
censureth not the state of the sinner, but only suspendeth him from church-communion as at the present actually unfit for it: and there is an excommunication which habituately or statedly excludeth the sinner from his church-relation, as an habituate, impenitent, obstinate person. 2. Some persons have no opportunity to try the cause themselves, being strangers, or not called to it; but must take it upon the pastor's judgment: and some have no opportunity to know the person and the cause, whether he be justly excommunicated or not. Now 1. Those that know by notoriety or proof that the person is justly excommunicated with the second sort of excommunication, must not, nor cannot love him as a godly man. 2. Those that know by notoriety or proof that the person is unjustly excommunicated, are not therefore to deny him the estimation and love which is due to a godly man: though for order sake they may sometimes be obliged to avoid external church-communion with him. 3. Those that know nothing of the cause themselves, must judge as the pastor judgeth who is the legal judge; yet so, as to take it to be but a human, fallible, and no final judgment.
Quest. X. 'Can an unsanctified hypocrite unfeignedly love a godly man?'
Answ. There is no doubt but he may materially love him, on some other consideration; as because he is a kinsman, friend, benefactor, or is witty, learned, fair, &c.
Quest. XI. 'But can he love a godly man because he is godly?'
Answ. He may love a godly man (at least) as he may love God: an unholy person cannot love God in all his perfections respectively to himself, as a God who is most holy and just in his government, forbidding all sin, and condemning the ungodly; for the love of his sins is inconsistent with this love. But he may love him as he is most great, and wise, and good in the general, and as he is the Maker and Benefactor of the world and of the sinner; yea, and in general as his
Governor: and so he may verily think that he loveth God as God,
because he loveth him for his essentialities; but indeed he doth not (speaking strictly), because he leaveth out some one or more of these essentialities; even as he that loveth man as rational, but not as a voluntary free agent, loveth not man as man: and as a heretic is no Christian, because he denieth some one essential part of Christianity, even so as to the love of godly men, an ungodly man may believe that they are better than others, and therefore love them; but not as godliness is the consent to that holiness and justice of God, which would restrain him from his beloved sins, and condemn him for them. So far as they are simply godly to themselves, without respect to him and his sins, he may love them.
Quest. XII. 'May he love a godly man as he would make him godly, and convert him?'
Answ. He may love him as a better man than others, and in general he may wish himself as good, and may love him because he wisheth him well; but as he cannot be (or rather is not) willing himself to leave his sins and live in holiness, so another is not grateful to him, who urgently persuadeth him to this.
Quest. XIII. 'Doth any ungodly person love the godly comparatively more than others?'
Answ. So far as he doth love them as godly, so far he may love them more than those that are not such: many a bad father loveth a religious child better than the rest; because they think that wisdom and godliness are good; and they are glad to see their children do well, as long as they do not grate upon them with troublesome censures: for another man's godliness costeth a bad man little or nothing; he may behold it without the parting with his sins.
Quest. XIV. 'Doth every sincere Christian love all the godly with a special love? even those that oppose their opinions, or that they think do greatly wrong them?'
Answ. 1. Every true Christian loveth a godly man as such, and therefore loveth all such, if he take them to be such. 2. No godly man doth habitually and impenitently live in such malice or enmity, as will not suffer him to see the godliness of a dissenter or adversary, when it hath sufficient evidence. 3. But ill education and company, and want of opportunity, may keep a true Christian from discerning the godliness of another, and so from loving him as a godly man. 4.
And error, and faction, and passion may in a temptation so far prevail as at present to pervert his judgment, and make him misjudge godly men to be ungodly, though when he hath opportunity to deliberate and come to himself, he will repent of it.
Quest. XV. 'What is that love to the godly which proveth a man's sincerity, and which no hypocrite or unregenerate person doth attain to?'
Answ. It hath in it these essential parts: 1. He loveth God best, and his servants for his sake. 2. He loveth godliness, and the person as godly, and therefore would fain be such himself; or loveth it for himself as well as in others. 3. He loveth not one only, but all the essential parts of godliness (our absolute resignation to God our
Owner, our absolute obedience to God our Ruler, and our highest gratitude and love to God our Benefactor and our End). 4. He loveth godliness and godly men, above his carnal worldly interest, his honour, wealth or pleasure; and therefore will part with these in works of charity, when he can understand that God requireth it.
These four set together make up that love which will prove your sincerity, and which no hypocrite doth perform. Hypocrites either love the godly only as their benefactors with a self-love; or they love them as godly to themselves, but would not be like them, and love not godliness itself to make them godly; or they love them for some parts of godliness, and not for all; or they love them but in subjection to their worldly love; with such a dry and barren love as James rejecteth, James 2; as will not be at any great cost upon them, to feed, or clothe, or visit, or relieve them.