CHAPTER LXII – Q.12: May God be finally loved as our felicity and portion for our own sake?
love and complacency in us, we must rest and delight our souls in for ever. And thus we must comply with the will of God.
CHAPTER LXII
May God be finally Loved as our Felicity and Portion?
Quest. 12. 'You tell us that we must seek ourselves but as means to God: how then may we make our salvation our end; or desire the fruition of God, when fruition is for ourselves, of somewhat that may make us happy? Doth he not desire God as a means for himself as the end; that desireth him as his portion, treasure, refuge, and felicity?'
Answ. There are such abundance of abstruse philosophical controversies 'de anima et fine,' that stand here in the way, that I must only decide this briefly and imperfectly for vulgar capacities.
Schoolmen and other philosophers are not so much as agreed what a final cause is. But this much briefly may give some degree of satisfaction to the moderate. 1. No fleshly profits, pleasures, or honours must be made our end. This we are agreed on. 2. The ultimate end of all the saints, is an end that is suitable to the nature of love; and that is, perfectly to love God, and please him, and serve him, and to be perfectly beloved of him, and behold his glory. So that it is not an end of self-love, or love of concupiscence, or for our commodity only; but it is the end of the love of friendship: now all love of friendship doth take in both the party loving, and the party beloved into the end; for the end is a perfect union of both, according to their capacities. And it being 'intentio amantis,' the end of love, both God and ourselves must be comprehended in it, as the parties to be united; and so it is both for him, and for ourselves.
3. But yet though both parties as united be comprised in the end, it is not equally, but with great inequality. For, 1. God being infinite goodness itself, must 'appreciativè' in estimation and affection, be preferred exceedingly before ourselves; so that in desiring this blessed union, we must more desire it to please and praise him, and give him his due, for which he created, redeemed, and glorifieth us, than to be ourselves happy in him. 2. And God being not a mere friend, but our absolute Lord of infinite power and glory, it must be more in our intention to bring to him eternally, than to receive from him; (though both must be comprised:) For receiving is for ourselves, further than we intend it for returns; but returning is for God; not to add to his blessedness; but to please his will, and give him his own; for he made all things for himself. And so that in union with him we may give him his own in fullest love and praise, and service, and thus please him, must be the highest part of our intention, about our own felicity in enjoying him.
So that you may see, that self-denial teacheth no man to ask, 'Whether he could be content to be damned for Christ?' For this is contrary to our propounded end, in the whole. For a damned man hath no union of love with God, and giveth him not his own in love or praises.
Object. 'What say you then by the wishes of Moses and Paul?"
Answ. 1. The saying of Moses is very plain, Exod. 32:32. He doth not desire that his soul might be made a ransom for Israel, but that if God would not pardon them, but destroy them and cast them off, he would blot out Moses' name from his book, that is, from among the number of the living; so that his saying is no other than such as Elias
or Jonas was, "What good will my life do me, if I live to see thy people cast off, and all thy wonders for them buried? Therefore either let them live in thy sight or kill me with them." This is the plain meaning of Moses' request.
And for Paul's, the difficulty is somewhat greater: 1. Some think that Paul meaneth (Rom. 9:3.) that he once wished himself to be no Christian in the days of his ignorance, and all through his zeal for the Jewish nation. But this is improbable. 2. Some think that he meaneth only, I could wish to be given up to death for them, as the accursed under the law.
3. Some think that he meaneth only, I could wish myself yet unconverted to Christ, so they were converted.
4. Some think the meaning is, 'I could wish myself cast out of the church, and given up to Satan for any bodily suffering.'
5. Some say it is only to have his salvation deferred.
6. And some, that it is damnation for a time.
But 7. The plain meaning seemeth to be this; 'so great is my love to my countrymen, the Jews, that if it were offered to my choice whether they, or I without them, should enjoy Christ, I would yield to be cast out of his sight for ever, rather than they should,' where mark; 1. That it is not a wish that it were so, for he knew that this was no means to promote their salvation; but it is a discovery of his affection that would wish or choose this if it were a means to that end. 2. And it is not the sin of not loving Christ that he would choose, but only the misery of being deprived of his blessed presence. 3. And
the reasons of this, his choice, are these two conjunct: 1. Because the souls of so many thousands is, in impartial reason, more to be valued than the soul of one; 2. And principally because by the conversion and salvation of a whole nation, God may be more honoured and served than by one.
And note farther, 1. That this is not set as a mark for every Christian to try the truth of his love by. 2. But yet no doubt but it is a duty and degree of grace that every one should aim at. For 1. We see among heathens that nature itself teacheth them that a man should lay down his life for his country, because a country is better than a man.
And proportionably, reason tells us that the salvation of a country being a greater good than of any one, it should be more preferred; and self-love goeth against plain reason when it contradicteth this.
What man's reason doth not tell him that it were better he should die than the world should be destroyed, or the sun turned into darkness; yea, or that one church or country perish? And so of salvation.
2. And it is agreeable to the nature of love to desire that most, that most pleaseth him whom we love: and therefore to desire rather that God may have multitudes than one, and be served and praised by them. So much about the matter of self-denial.
III. I have finished the two first things which I promised to you under the use of exhortation, viz. the trial of your self-denial, and the particulars in which it consisteth, and must be exercised; and there I have shewed you, 1. In what respect self must be denied. 2. What that selfishness is that must be denied, as to the inward disposition; and,
3. What is that objective self-interest that must be denied, which consisteth in so many particulars that I cannot undertake to