XVIII The Apostle's Choice. (No. 2.)—PHIL. 3:8

XVIII The Apostle's Choice. (No. 2.)—PHIL. 3:8

The Forlorn Son—he was Lost and is Found

"For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry. Now his elder son was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants, and asked what these things meant. And he said unto him, Thy brother is come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound. And he was angry, and would not go in: therefore came his father out, and intreated him."—LUKE 15:24–28.

THEY have no less nor cause, beloved in our Lord, to be glad and to rejoice, whenever a wandering sinner comes home to Christ Jesus, who is so cheerful a receiver of them, who is so willing to receive them, and is so heartsome and kind to all His own who have any grace to claim kyndness to Him. And we see there is good ground for rejoicing and mirth, at the home-coming of a wandering sinner here. And wherefore we should rejoice also, when our Lord He rejoices, and makes such mirth. When He is so glad at the home-coming of a sinner, the sinner himself whom this most concerns should much more rejoice, and be glad. And our Lord He gives a very good reason for this gladness and rejoicing, "for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found."

Now the last part of the parable is, How the elder brother—eldest or in possession, and so repute[d] eldest—took with the Lord's kind dealing towards his younger brother. The text says, "And when he drew near the house, he heard music and dancing," and knew not what it meant, as the natural man knows not what it is to come to Christ, and how welcome a sinner is to Jesus. They know not how sweet the Lord's breath is unto those who have been long away from the Lord and get grace to come home to Him again. And the elder son calling for one of the servants, he speers, what meant that more than ordinary mirth that was among them? The servant answers, "Thy brother is come, and thy Father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound." And the son was angry, and would not go into the house. And the rest of the chapter is spent in a conference between the angry son and a kind and meek father. But we see the son that had an ill eye because his father's heart was good, and [was] the gentle and loving father; he was angry that his father had received the younger brother into his house again. There is nothing that makes a hypocrite's heart more sad than when God welcomes home a sinner to Himself. And the father again, as if he had done a fault, he speaks to his angry son in calm words, and gives a reason of his making mirth, and why he dealt so kindly with his younger son, and made so meikle of him; "Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make merry and be glad, for this thy brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found." That is a matter of joy in heaven to the Lord and to the blessed angels, and the Lord avows that He is content at the home-coming of a sinner, howbeit the eyes of the wicked world dow not endure it.

Now there be two excellent reasons given in the twenty-fourth verse, wherefore the Lord is glad and rejoices at the home-coming of the forlorn son. "This my son was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found." There is a change made upon him. "My son is translated from death to life; he was lost, but now he is found." That is a matter of rejoicing to be avowed before the world when a sinner that was dead becomes living; when a sinner that was running away from the Lord turns home again to Him and is found of Him. And this is a cause of rejoicing to the Father and the whole house that the Lord has gotten home a lost bairn and a forlorn son that was running away from him formerly.

See now what is said of his estate before he come home to his father. Before he was dead and lost in an uncow country; dead, and yet hungry, and would eat husks, and not long since he was coming home, and acknowledging to his father: "I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants;" and was ragged, and naked, and bare, and you know the woful gate that he was in. How then was he dead? for all these be actions of life. But, whatever a natural man does we may say he is dead, for all thir actions of life he does are not the actions of the life of God; for he has not that life, and so he is spiritually dead and knows not the case he is in while it is so. And that is the estate of all those who are not within the kingdom of the Son of God, albeit they eat, drink, sleep, walk, laugh, &c., and go about all the businesses of this life, and work the works of sin as living men, yet in the Lord's estimation they are nothing else but dead men.

The best works of the unregenerate who are not born again by the water and the Spirit, they are but only works of dead men. And therefore never go to question if the heathen and those that never heard of Christ can do works good in the sight of God, as the patrons of nature have been careful to defend things done by them as good. All the actions of natural men are dead actions before the Lord, and the best thing they can be called is only to call them well-farded sins. For actions are only good in God's estimation that can be called good from all the four causes. First, that are good in regard of the author of them; second, in regard of the matter; third, good in regard of the form or manner of doing them; and fourth, in regard of the end wherefore they are done. And if an action want any of these that it be not good in all these respects, then it is imperfect in the sight of God, and so ill. And therefore the Apostle says, Rom. 14:23, "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin." Now all the works of men, while they are in the state of nature, they are done without faith, and so they are sin. Look but to two things in the works of the natural man, and you will see all of them to be sin.

Works that come not from faith, if that the first motion of them comes not from the renewed man, these works are sin, as ye may see, Heb. 11:6: "Without faith it is impossible to please God." Let all the world distinguish as they will, it is a thing impossible that a man can do works to please God and procure life eternal unless he have faith, and the works be done in faith; which cannot be said of the natural man. Let all the world distinguish in this as they will, the Word of God warrants us to say this. Make the works of the natural man as fair and as beautiful as ye will in your eyes, and never so life-like, yet the Lord esteems them to be no other but dead and sinful works.

And then look to the end of all that the natural man does, and in that they are wrong also. Nay, but, says one who takes their defence, they intend not always an ill end in all they do, who are not in Christ, for they do not all to the honour of an idol or a wicked god, or for the honour of the creature. But the Spirit of God says, 1 Cor. 10:31, "Whether ye eat or ye drink or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." Where a work wants this intention, and the doer of the work aims not at this, albeit he should give his body to be burnt in the fire, and bestow all his goods on the poor, yet the Lord says this of him, that he is no other but a sounding brass, and a tinkling cymbal. It is a work of sin and is not done in obedience to God, but He is therein disobeyed.

And for that they refer not the end of all that they do to the honour of an idol-god; albeit it were so, as they allege, there are none who profess to give religious worship to anything but virtually he refers the last end of all he does thereto. But be it so, that he does not refer it to an idol; yet because he refers not the last end of all his actions to God, and makes not Him his last end, it is certain he must have another last end to which he refers all he does; for all reasonable creatures, even devils and wicked men, they do all that they do out of a conceit to attain happiness, and therefore their wicked end must either be the Creator or the creature. But if it be confessed, as the adversaries themselves do confess, that the last end is not the Creator, because they understand him not in the Mediator Christ Jesus, then the creature must be their last end, and that certainly is idolatry. To make the creature, either the first author of anything, or to make it the last end of anything, it is to put the creature in the rowme of God. For a man to do things for his credit, honour, his friend, &c., having no other end for what he does, is a work of a dead soul, and the Lord will not accept thereof as acceptable to Him.

One use of this is to see that the hearing of God's Word by the natural man, receiving the sacraments, reading, praying, &c., he will get no thanks for these, neither are they acceptable to God, so long as he is not in Christ. All these things that thou doest being out of Christ, will be but small bulk in the Lord's eyes in that day when thou shalt be judged of the Lord by thy works. And therefore careful should we be that we may be found in Christ, that our persons may be accepted in Him. And your persons being accepted in Christ, then the Lord will also accept of your works. But otherways all that the natural man does is wickedness; his prayer is sin and abomination before the Lord. When he is about prayer that is not in Christ, the smell of his sacrifice is unsavoury to the Lord. He cannot endure such prayers, and therefore great need have we to be assured that we are in Christ, that our works may not be dead but living works.

Observe while he says, "This my son was dead," there is the estate of the natural man before he come to Christ. Eph. 2:2, the apostle says: "And were by nature the children of wrath even as others." "But God for His rich mercy wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ." Has not the natural man a soul, and can he not perform the works of nature? A man in nature is not naturally dead, but he is spiritually dead.

There are three things that a man in nature, touching his spiritual life, has not. And first, the natural man has not life itself; second, he has not reason; and, third, He has not sense or the use of his senses. These are all joined with life where it is; yet he wants, them. And

First: I say he wants life itself, and all the natural motions thereof; and yet for all that he is hearing the Word and singing Psalms, and reading, &c. And yet these are not works of life in him. And he is praying. Now will a dead man do so? Yes; a man spiritually dead may do all these things so as he does them. All that the natural man does has nothing but an outside with it. The Lord sees the stinking bones of a dead corpse under all these. He sees seven abominations in such a man, and so He sees all abominations in him.

Second: The man in nature, he has no reason nor the reasonable presence of a living man. This may seem not to be very true-like. He is a governor of a city or a country side, and knows the laws very well, and he is a trim bookman. Can such a man be a dead man? Yes; all that such a man, who is in nature, does, is the work of a dead man; for there is never a word that he speaks, or a conclusion he makes, that is heaven-like, and therefore the work is dead. The very main end of all that he does is the world. It is that he may provide for him and his, that he may get honours, pleasure, court, &c., and the things of the world. All his words, thoughts, actions, run upon this pin, the things of this present world. All his logic and strongest arguments for anything he does even in reforming the matters of the house of God are taken from this: "It will hazard my life and my office in the world, if I join not in such things." This is plainly the reasoning of a dead man.

Third: Those who are only natural they want the sense of life. They know not what that is, to have a soul wounded with sin, because of this, and so are just like the drunken man that Solomon speaks of (Prov. 23:35)—when he is drunk with wine, every one goes by and beats him with rods, and he knows not that they do so till the wine be out of his head, and he wakes out of his dream; then the strokes he has gotten make him sore and crazed. Even so will it be with them who are in the state of nature, when they are wakened out of their dream. O! the blasphemous oaths will lie heavy on him then, and the harlotry of the harlot will be a sore burden to him; and he who has loved the creature more than God, who is the Creator, such a man will never feel his wounds till he be brought to the Physician Christ, and the Lord once translate him out of darkness into the kingdom of His dear Son, that he be brought from death to life. But then he feels all the sore strokes he has gotten all his time by sin. The first fall Adam got by sin dang him dead and all his posterity, and made him and his to want the life of God and His image wherewith they were endowed, from all mankind for ever in themselves.

Can this be, that one act of sin which works morally, can take away all the habitual justice and righteousness that are in man by nature? They who oppose the truth of God deny that man could lose by his transgression, but only by the decree of God that it should be so. But if sin be well looked to, it has two set of actions in it. The one is moral and the other is physical. Morally sin, even reatus, deserves that, because of it, the sinner should be deprived of life; and then physically, the blot of sin puts out the image of God. And if any man will speer how the first fall of Adam should put the life of God out of all mankind for all eternity? I answer, albeit we could give no natural reason, or any reason of logic or physic for this, yet this is sufficient for proof of it, that the Word of God says, the natural man cannot understand the things that are of God, for they are foolishness unto him, and Christ says (John 6:44), "No man can come unto Me unless the Father which hath sent Me draw him." These and many other places say unto us clearly that, albeit we know no other reason, yet this is enough to tell us that man, in the state of nature, he is a corrupt creature, and sees not God, and is not for Him, that he loves not God in that estate, nor can love Him; and this is the woful estate of every man so long as he remains in that case.

Now the use of this is: If so be that the natural man be so, how comes it to pass then that there be so many who will not be convinced that it is so with them? how comes it that it is so hard a task for a minister to convince a natural man that he has a hard heart, and that he is in a state of sin, and that all by nature are ignorant of God? This only is the cause, that all by nature are dead in sins and trespasses, and being dead cannot be brought to know they are so. No. Ye know all the art and logic in the world used to persuade or convince a dead man, that is in the grave, of the estate of his body, that it is dead and under corruption, will not convince him to know that it is so, because he neither hears nor sees what they do or say to him. Even so is it here with the man remaining still in the state of nature; he cannot be brought unto the faith of a hell to believe this, that "that day I came first into the world, I came in it an heir [of] hell." The natural man cannot be brought to believe this. The comparison holds well here between the natural man and the man that is buried in the grave; there are lilies and flowers growing out of the grave, but it smells filthily within. Little knows the man that is in nature what an ill smell he would cast if he were tane up and discovered. A man living in the state of nature, and so in the state of sin, he may be well busked, and have a good smell outwardly, be an honest married man in his own house, not deceiving or wronging his neighbours, not a shedder of blood, and yet he is only a man buried in a grave when all is done, and some flowers growing above the grave. But when God takes him out of his grave, and lets him see the case that he is in, then all his sins begin to stink. When he is wakened, then he counts all these things that formerly the world and he himself esteemed much of to be but dung, as we may see example in the Apostle Paul, Phil. 3:7: He counted that to be a Pharisee, to be come of the royal tribe, &c., to be but loss and dung for Christ. So we may see a man shall never get a right sight of the miserable estate he is in till first the Lord opens his grave that by nature he lies in. And, that being done, he shall then be forced to say: "Once I was dead, but now I am alive; once I was blind, but now I see; I was once lost, but now I am found. Once I was a stranger and an enemy to God, but now, Lord be thanked, who has taken in a poor forlorn dyvour to Christ, and has made me to know what is His will."

The other reason his father gives for his kind usage is, "He was lost, and is found." That is the property of a man in the state of sin. He is a lost man, that is, he is such a thing as may be lost, or wander from the right owner without his knowledge, and may be torn of wild beasts—a sinner in the state of nature. O! but there be many loose-handed devils to steal him away. In 1 John 5:18, the Apostle says, "He that is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not." The man that is in the state of nature is not held up as he that is born of God is. The Apostle says of himself, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day" (2 Tim. 1:12). So that while a man is once in the state of grace God becomes his keeper, but so long as a man is in the state of nature he is a tint creature, and he is ready to be turned away with any kind of religion; like unto those of whom the Apostle speaks (Heb. 13:9), who are carried about with divers and strange doctrines, and have not the heart established in grace, a comparison that is borrowed from ships, that every tide and every blast of wind that blows will blow and turn them as they come upon them, because she wants a rudder to keep her sure. So a man in the state of nature will receive any new gust in religion. Any wind or tide that comes from Satan and his instruments carries him away from his Lord. And the Apostle Peter (2 Pet. 3:17) has a word to this purpose borrowed from beasts: "See that ye be not led away with the error of the wicked and fall from your own steadfastness." It is an easy thing for Satan to drive a man away from religion, who follows only that religion which a king loves best, and who places his happiness in court. Certainly it is easy to drive such from any point of faith. And therefore the Word of God uses this comparison ordinarily to compare lost sinners to wandering sheep. David says, "I am gone astray like a lost sheep." And Matt. 10:5, 6, when Christ there is sending out His disciples to preach the gospel, and telling them what they shall first preach, He says: "Go not in the way of the Samaritans, but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." All these and many others say that a man in the state of nature is a man easily carried away with every wind of doctrine. Like the word Eliphas has to Job 15:12: "Wherefore doth thine heart carry thee away, and what do thine eyes wink at?" To be like one in an uncou country, or house.

Let us learn here to know how ill we are kept while we are in the state of nature, ready to be led away with court, honour, the love of the world, and to be stolen from the Lord. Has not the devil made sin to the natural man like new wine that is sweet in the down-going, that runs into his head who drinks it, and or he wit it steals away his wit from him, and his feet, and deprives him of the use of all his senses? So while a man remains in the state of sin, he drinks his new wine till he be stolen off his feet.

But when is the sinner well kept? Never till he come into Christ's house and kingdom, for there he gets a new Lord, and there are new laws there; he gets a new tutor then that will answer for him. This is a sufficient reason, albeit there were no moe to prove that fra once we come in Christ's tutory, that we are given over to Him, we cannot fall away again; for whoever they be that are given to Christ they are not their own, but they are bought with a price. We cannot keep ourselves well. We are always running away from our Lord. But when Christ our Lord comes and takes us home in His keeping, then are we sure; and never till then. For then we are our Lord's jewels, of whom our Lord says (Mal. 3:17): "And they shall be Mine in that day when I make up My jewels." There is no man who commits himself unto Christ, who ventures his life and all for Christ's cause and for religion, [but] He will answer for all that are given to Him. And when He renders up the kingdom to His Father, He will make such compt of them as that which we read, John 17:12, where He says: "Of all that Thou hast given Me have I lost none, but the child of perdition; that the Scripture might be fulfilled." There is no man lost by Christ but he who is a lost man in God's eternal decree.

Now when the older brother comes home to the house, he hears melody and joy and meikle mirth in his father's house, and he knows not what it means. And therefore he calls one of the servants, and asks what these things meant.

The text it will clear this point unto us, that the father of the house—the Lord and His angels—they are glad at the home-coming of a sinner, for there was rejoicing and dancing at the home-coming of His forlorn son, and it must be a good spring that gars him dance. Indeed He is very blith when a lost sinner comes home to Him, and He makes a psalm of joy upon it. And this was the matter of Christ's joy at this time, that a forlorn sinner is come home. This is a matter of no small comfort to such as have a mind home toward Christ, that their home-coming will gar the Lord rejoice. Is this modesty in Christ to dance? I am sure it is love gars Him to do it; and the apostle says love does nothing that is unseemly. The Word of God expresses to us in many pithy words the joy and rejoicing that the Lord our God has for the declaration both of mercy and justice upon mankind. As, first, for expression of God's affection when justice comes to seize upon the sinner who would have none of the Lord's counsel, nor hear none of His reproof, it is said, "The Lord laughs at his calamity, and mocks when his fear cometh" (Prov. 1:26). Laughter is not to the Lord an expression of affection as it is to man; but because this is one of the many ends that the Lord intends and aims at in the making of mankind, the declaration of the glory of His justice in so many as break their neck upon Christ, the Lord will "laugh at the calamity of such, and mock when their fears come." And then for the expression of the Lord's love and joy at the home-coming of a sinner, which is the declaration of the glory of the Lord's mercy in them who are appointed heirs of salvation, what expressions are these? Isa. 62:5: "As the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee." Zeph. 3:17: "The Lord thy God will rejoice over thee with joy, He will rest in His love, He will joy over thee with singing." And in Solomon's Song 8:6 there is an expression the Kirk has to this purpose, speaking to her beloved: "Set me as a seal upon thy hand, and as a signet upon thine arm." That which we wear between our breasts, because the breast is near the heart, and we love that well; and that which we make a chain and bracelet to our arm, we love it well. Now the Kirk prays that the Lord would make her so to Him, expressing this far unto us how excellent, how sweet, how lovely, all the Lord's elect and His lost ones, when they are found again, are to Him. And there is an expression not unlike unto this, Cant. 4:9: "Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes, with one chain of thy neck."

All this says this much unto us, that whatever can be in the father to contribute for the good of the bairns he has begotten, or what affection can be in the mother towards the fruit of her womb, all these are in the Lord towards His children, but in Him after an infinite manner, and are inimitable. They are in Him without any change or any imperfection at all; for the Lord needs no-wise to rejoice in this, for it adds nothing to Him, yet He expresses Himself this way to declare how greatly He rejoices in them who are saved when they come home to Him.

And also this serves to reprove that woful opinion of some who say that man's condemnation falls out against the will of God. No; certainly all that is in God is omnipotent, and so is His will omnipotent also. What He wills it comes to pass. The enemies of the grace of God bring in God weeping, full of sorrow and natural affection towards men, because He is condemned not according to His will. But if it were so, they would make God to be far from that infinite perfection the Word of God ascribes to Him; Eph. 1:5: He does whatsoever He will in heaven and in earth that we should be to the praise of His glory.

If the Lord make so meikle of honouring a sinner, that He accounts it to be the matter of His joy and rejoicing, O! that we and these who are yet in the black estate of nature, could be induced to believe, what joy it would be to our Lord, that we would repent, and believe in Him and His gospel! The natural man he knows not that the Lord rejoices at his home-coming, and will not believe the Lord's oath for it: "As I live, says the Lord, I delight not in the death of a sinner, but rather that he should repent, and be saved" (Ezek. 18:32). He rejoices at the home-coming of a sinner. Make God blith, and come home to Him and seek His face, repent of your ill-ways, and so make the Lord dance and sing that He has gotten home one who was running away from Him. Come home to the Lord and repent of sin that there may be a psalm over thy repentance in heaven. They are called a "destroyed" people (Hos. 13:9) to whom the Lord shows their sins, to make them mourn for them the more. O! that is the sweetest sight God can give to a sinner. When they been running to the devil and applauding themselves in their own ways, afterward to see them come greeting home to the Lord, touched in their conscience with rebukes and challenges for sins; O, that is a matter of God's mirth, and a delicate to Him. Learn to know this and have other thoughts of godliness than ever yet ye have had, to account them blessed who see their sins and by the discovery of them are driven to the Lord. And to this Lord who is the remedy of sin; to the Father of Christ and our Father; and the blessed Spirit who sanctifies and cleanses us from sin, we render all praise and glory for ever.—Amen.

The Forlorn Son

"And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: but as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf. And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make merry and he glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found."—LUKE 15:29–32.

LET the world, beloved in our Lord, esteem of the children of God as they will, the Lord has aye a good eye to them that repent and come home to Him. The Lord is kind to any without exception who will come and lay their sores upon Him and will give Him the weight of all that lies upon them. And the Lord seeks no more, in the matter of believing, of a humbled sinner, but that they lay the weight and burden of their salvation upon Him.

In thir words there is (1) the reason the Lord gives why the forlorn sinner is so handled. (2) We have to consider how this elder brother that knows not God takes with this. At the first he knows not what it meant when he heard more than ordinary joy and melody in his father's house, and he calls for one of the servants, and asks what it means. There is no natural man that knows the sweet kisses and expressions of love that the Lord shows to a home-coming sinner. (3) We have the servant's answer to the elder son. "Thy brother is come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound." (4) When the elder brother hears this, he is angry and refuses to go into the house. As the hypocrite he will not in any ways countenance the home-coming sinner. He will not welcome his brother when he is come home. Then his father comes and entreats the elder brother to come in. Then we have in the end, a conference between the loving father and the elder son, the father answering all the objections that the son could give against his kind and friendly dealing, and the son again accusing both his father for what he does and accusing his brother also.

First: He says, "I have served thee so many years and served thee after such a kind that I never at any time brake any of thy commandments, and yet thou never gavest me a kid to make merry with my friends." And herein accuses his father of unjust dealing, accounting him as it were the transgressor.

Second: He finds fault also with his father's son; he calls him not his brother but "thy son." "But as soon as this thy son was come which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf." He calls him a drunken waster, and one who had spent all his father's goods with harlots. The children of God they will never get that praise from hypocrites that the Lord Himself gives them. And then we have the father's mild and gentle oration to his son, yet entreating him and giving him fair words and giving a good reason wherefore this should be a time of mirth and rejoicing. "It was meet," says he, "that we should make merry and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found." Albeit he will not call him his brother, yet his father calls him his brother, and therefore, says he, this was a fit time to be glad and rejoice, namely, when a sinner comes home in penitence and mercy is shown to a penitent sinner. Now of thir particulars shortly.

And first: We have to speak of this that the forlorn son gets such a welcome of his brother and that his brother thinks so of the joy that is at his home-coming, that he knows not what it means. Therefore we have to learn that—

The course of God's goodness to a home-coming sinner and of that rejoicing that the Lord and the blessed angels who are His servants, and the matter of the Lord's giving mercy to such a one, it is a hid mystery to the natural man. He that knows no better than mere nature thinks God's kindness that He shows to sinners the work of the gospel and the news thereof, inviting sinners to come to Christ telling them that they will be welcome, he thinks that to be an uncow thing. That God should take a defiled sinner into His clean bosom, and give him mercy for all his sins, he knows not what that means; and therefore he offends at it. The natural man knows not the things that are of God, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. And he is carnally minded, he knows not the depth of the Lord's love; he knows not what that is for mercy and misery to meet together. He knows not, nor considers not, how kind and gracious the Lord is towards such, and what bowels of love and tender compassion the Lord has to a repenting home-coming sinner. No. There is no man that knows the greatness of the Lord's mercy, and how far His kindness is extended to home-coming sinners, but only he that will come and see, that will come and take a proof thereof himself. Sense is the best schoolmaster to teach us this lesson of God's goodness and His loving-kindness. By preaching, hearing, reading, contemplation of the cause and the theory of this, by all these we will only see this [goodness and loving-kindness] afar off. But once come and taste this goodness of the Lord, and come in within Christ's house, and hear heaven's music, and that will say more to you of these things than anything else can do, and more than ever ye would [have] believed.

A second reason for this is, This is a thing that is so contrary to nature that one who is a sinner, and withal a wicked sinner, that such should get mercy they cannot believe it. Scribes and Pharisees they wonder at this; and therefore Christ is challenged for this by them, for going to Zacchæus's house, who was a publican; and He is challenged and sore accused, and calumnies raised upon Him for this matter, in that He ate and drank and kept company with publicans and sinners, who were a people most hated among the Jews, that none would keep company with, but those that were like themselves, And Scribes and Pharisees and the Rabbis among the Jews break their neck upon Christ because of this, that He was so entire and so warm-hearted to poor vile sinners. And this is one point of the gospel, and indeed a main point of it, that Christ in the gospel invites sinners to come, and receives repenting sinners be they never so vile in their own eyes and the eyes of others. So that repentance is a work of the gospel and not a work of the law. It is a thing altogether supernatural and not proceeding at all from nature. And then—

Third: That the Lord should extend more than ordinary mercy to sinners, who have been furthest and deepest in guiltiness, the natural man cannot away with it. And that slays all these who are opposers of God's mercy, and so come not to Christ for mercy, because they think the offers of the gospel are not so meikle for them, seeing it is reached to them who transgress so highly in such a large manner. They cannot believe that, and foster themselves in that conceit, and take a wrong opinion of Christ. And thus they make hell to come upon themselves before the time, and the terrors of the second death before ever the Lord give out the sentence.

Now our use of this is to let us see what is the natural man's light, and what is his judgment of God's matters. That which is called free will in the understanding, believing God and Christ, the elder brother knows not what that means. This should be marked that the natural man who goes on into the ways of sin he has not right thoughts of God. All of them have false thoughts of God in their will and their affections. There is a hostility and enmity between their mind and the Lord, and His manner of dealing with poor sinners. He knows not what that means. What! has the natural man no light at all? Yes; he has some literal and natural light, but there are four faults in it shortly, and this is a clear difference between the light of the natural man and the believer's light.

First: There is no proportion between the light of the natural man and the things that are of God. Christ is little to the natural man, and so are mercy and repentance to a home-coming sinner little also. His heart is misted and blinded, he sees not what wide bowels of mercy and love Christ has to a home-coming sinner. But the believer sees Christ and mercy and repentance all in one colour. He sees that Christ has open arms for receiving a repenting sinner. He sees there is a chamber of love to receive a lost and tint sinner in Christ. He sees there is a door opened in Christ to receive those who come not into Him till the eleventh hour. Again—

Second: The light that the natural man has, it wants weight to draw the will and the affections and all the powers of the soul to love and embrace and follow after Christ. And therefore it may well be resembled to the light of the moon, especially in the winter season. The moon in winter has light, but it is not like the summer sun that has a melting and warming power with it. Whereas the light the believer has, it works upon his heart to warm and refresh him with the love of Jesus, that as he knows Christ so he follows on to know Him. And these two are joined in Hos. 6:3 by the spirit of God: "Then shall ye know Him if ye follow on to know Him." So that light and heat and refreshment follow the heat and sense of Christ's love that the natural man has. The natural man may see the gospel to be true, but he sees it not to be good, neither assents to the promises that are contained therein. Yet they are true promises but he assents not, or follows not in them as good, and so he goes no further on but to a bare light.

Thirdly and lastly: There is no liking, love, joy, desire, accompanying the light the natural man has, and because of this it is no wonder that those who have but little knowledge of Christ, it is no marvel albeit they misken the Lord's dealing with His children, and call that which is the excellence of Christ and of the gospel, madness and daffin. As certainly this will follow the not knowing Christ and His ordinances rightly, that so natural men may break their necks and stumble upon the works of God, as we may see in Psa. 83:11.

Now the servant gives an answer to the elder brother, wherefore there should be mirth and rejoicing in his father's house. "Thy brother is come: and he hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound." The argument that the servant uses for that [which] the father did is: "Thy father hath received him a whole and living son who was once sick and dead, and therefore there is mirth and rejoicing." And the strength of the argument is tane fra the hazard wherein the forlorn son was once, and now, says he, he is escaped from that hazard and danger, and therefore it is most expedient and lawful, that there should be mirth and feasting and rejoicing in heaven. And so by this we may learn that this forlorn son he has once been in great hazard, he has once been over in the devil's camp, and so in great danger, but now he is returned safe and sound; and therefore the servant says to his brother: "He has received him safe and sound." The Lord would hereby teach us that we have been in a fearful and dangerous hazard while we remain in the state of nature. And indeed so it is. For being there we are under spiritual death, as it is Eph. 2:2: "Called us from death to life." And being in nature, we are also under the state of condemnation: "And were by nature the children of wrath as well as others."

And therefore all those who are come to Christ, they have cause to be blyth, and to rejoice and to praise Christ's rich and free grace, and to say with their hearts: "I thank God that whereas once I was a persecutor, and a blasphemer and an injurious person, one who hated Christ and the power of religion, &c.; but now I am not so, but, by free grace, I am become a new man." There is no man has such cause to sing a triumphant song of the Lord's praise as he who was once dead, and the Lord has given him mercy, and quickened him from that estate.

"And he was angry, and would not go in." This was the older brother. There seems to be natural reason for this, that he would not go in, he being a civil liver, and an honest man that way, one who had not at any time broken his father's command, as he himself says, that had not run away from his father, and tired of his company, and spent his goods with harlots and in debauchery, as his younger brother had done. This is a strange thing, thinks he, that he should make so meikle of him. Because it is so, I will not go into the house. Reason would say that the elder brother has cause to stick here, and to be offended at what his father does. But this is one of the supernatural points of the gospel, and a very great one; that those who seem to be furthest from mercy, who have done most for stopping mercy to be extended towards them, the Lord He ordinarily gives mercy to such. And yet, on the other part, honest civilians and well-covered Scribes, Pharisees, that have a trim-like outside, and seek for no more of religion, and seek not into Christ, the Lord hardens the heart of such, and gives them over to the spirit of error and delusion; and harlots and publicans, and very sinful persons, who are even seen to be great sinners, they get mercy and forgiveness, and are led into Christ to seek their life in Him.

We may learn here that it is God's way, and it is the way of the gospel, to ride upon the weakest, poorest, basest, and most contemptible things in the world, and to cause the glory of His mercy and goodness to shine upon them, and to cause the news of mercy to sound effectually to those who seem most lost in the world. Look wherever, at any time, God has shown mercy and the light and saving power of His truth, wherever the Lord has shown the greatest works of mercy, whether it be upon nations, or congregations, or families, or particular persons, it has always been shown most clearly and effectually to such as the world thought least of. When Jacob is blessing his children, there is not a word spoken of any blessing to the tribe of Levi (Gen. 49); but when he is dying the Lord by him gives them a curse because "they slew a man in their anger, and in their self-will they digged down a wall. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel. I will divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel." And yet the Lord has chosen them for His portion, even the tribe come of him who gat his father's curse, the Lord chooses him out of all the tribes of Israel to be His portion. And a bastard Jephthah—the Jews abhorred any of that kind—yet the Lord will have him to be a judge in Israel, and the instrument by whom He will work a great deliverance for that people. And among the twelve Patriarchs, the odd and the castaway son Joseph, who was hated and sold of his brethren; the servant of God, Moses, at the direction of the Lord's spirit, says of him, "The blessing of the Lord upon him who was cast forth of his brethren."

And likeways when Christ is coming into Jerusalem in His triumph, as it was prophesied, riding upon an ass and a colt the foal of an ass, He will not have Scribes and Pharisees to sing His triumph, but bairns and little ones, cry out "Hosanna, blessed is the king that cometh in the name of the Lord." And where, when Christ was born, were all the Bible-men and the book-learned men that should [have] known so well, and observed the time and the place of His birth? And yet shepherds get leave to be the first preachers of His birth to the world? No; all the great rabbis and exponers of the law they had beguiled themselves with their light, and knew not that Christ was born, and the shepherds proclaim His birth that so the Lord he may triumph upon the weakest things, and these fardest unlike heaven he will take them to heaven.

And this is, indeed, the sweetness of the mercy and love of our Lord, that even those who are furthest off from mercy in their own eyes, and in the eyes of the world, these shall get mercy rather than others who seem to be nearer within the reach thereof, that the Lord may make good that which is said by the apostle (1 Cor. 1:26–29): "For you see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and the weak things of the world to confound the strong; and base things in the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things that are not, to bring to nought things that are: that no flesh should glory in His presence." He will choose the kinless things of the world, and the nothings, to be his portion, that no flesh may glory before him, but that the glory of the salvation of all those who are saved may be to the Lord, and to the Lord allanerly.

O happy and blessed is the case and condition of a sinner who is despised of all, yea, even of themselves, and thereby can come home to Christ. When thou comest to Him the Lord will not speer at thee when thou comest, who was thy father, or thy mother, or what thy kindred is, neither will He speer what thou hast been doing all the time till thou come to Him, if so be thou come to Him with a bleeding heart for sin. And therefore let never man speer this question what they have been doing before who are come into Christ, for all thy harlotries and thy manifold sins and provocations be not bars away for those. And albeit Scribes and Pharisees hoot at you that thou should seek home to Christ, and be made welcome of Him; yet for all their ill will and their malice at Christ's dealings with His own poor ones, seeing He makes you welcome, make thou thyself welcome also.

What further says his elder brother to his father? "Neither did I at any time break Thy commandments." The word in the first language is, "I never went beyond thy commandment." Albeit this be the word of a proud Pharisee, yet it tells us what sort of obedience our God requires of us. That obedience he craves is not to go out of the straight line, not to decline to the right hand or to the left hand.

The doctrine is clear, and it is this: The law that God will have us to follow and to square ourselves unto as a line and rule, it is such a law as requires strict and precise obedience of us. The apostle says: "Walk circumspectly as in the day-time," that is, walk as those who count all their stops, and have light to see where they set their feet. God will either give such obedience as that, or He will account any obedience we give no obedience. And look to five things in the law of God, and that will tell us this is true.

First: The law of God it is a spiritual law, and it is not by hands, and feet, and tongue, and teeth, and obedience with the outward man that will satisfy God, but He must have the obedience of the heart and the inward man. And therefore the Lord lays charge upon our thoughts; Jer. 4:14; Isa. 55:7. In those places God will have the thoughts to be subject to Him: "O Jerusalem, wash thy heart from wickedness. How long shall vain thoughts lodge within thee?" "Let the wicked man forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, for He will have mercy; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon." And our Saviour Christ when He expones the the law (Matt. 5:22), ye will see exponing the sixth command, He not only forbids murder, but He says, "Whosoever miscalls his brother, and calls him 'Raca,' 'thou fool,' or is angry with him without a cause, he is a breaker of that command." And He not only condemns adultery for a sin and breach of the seventh command, but He says he that looks upon a woman and lusteth after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart; so that it will not be the outside of civility and of country holiness that will make a man accounted religious and holy in the sight of God, but the holiness of the heart.

Second: Look also to the universality of God's commandments, and that will tell us He requires such obedience, Psa. 119:6: "Then shall I not be ashamed, when I have respect to all Thy commandments." This says that shame follows upon that man who pretends to keep some of God's commands, and yet breaks other some wittingly. Not a drunkard and yet a harlot, shame will come upon such a man; not a cozener, and yet none may lippen to his word, shame shall come upon such a man. And that it is the commendation given to Zacharias and Elizabeth, that they walked in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. Again—

Third: If we will look to the universality of time, God requires such obedience of us, Psa. 106:3: "Blessed are they that keep judgment, and he that doeth righteousness at all times." There are anew who will keep the commandment of the Lord while the cross is lying upon them, or upon their house, or any of their bairns; but that place says: "Blessed is the man that doeth righteousness at all times." And then—

Fourth: In obedience to God's commands is to look to all the circumstances of our actions, to the end wherefore, to the manner how, and to the ground and principle from whence they flow. So the believer he must look to his intentions, what it is he sets before his eyes when he comes to hear the Word of God. If a man comes to the kirk to hear the Word for saving his honesty, because it will be a shame for him, he being a man of whom notice is taken, and in some place and reputation, if his place in the kirk shall be seen empty, or for any other by respect, then you obey not God after a right and acceptable manner. But if you can say, ye do what [ye do] in obedience to His commandments, for that end that ye may win a step nearer God, and may grow deep in His love, then that is right obedience. And then—

Lastly: In our obedience to God's commandments no man must make a pattern and rule of others in their obedience. What, albeit ye be as holy as that man, if ye be not holier than he, you and he may both go to hell together, as the Scribes and Pharisees ilk one of them did imitate others. But made that them to be holy? No. Christ says, "If your righteousness exceed not the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of God." It is a remarkable place that which we read 2 Kings 14:3, where King Amaziah is reproved of the Lord, that he did not as David had done before him. And may not a man be a good man, albeit he be not as holy as David was? Who can win to that high pitch? Yes; I confess he may be a good man, and not win so far on as he did. But this is to teach us that we make no man our copy in obeying the commandments of the Lord. But we must set that copy before us which Christ says of His Kirk, Cant. 4:7: "Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee." You must see and strive by all means to be quit of spots in the world.

Now the use of this, that we have been speaking [of] is, to reprove them who mock godliness, and scorn those who fear an oath, as the Scripture speaks, and make conscience of their words and thoughts as if that were in needless preciseness. But the way to heaven is a straight and narrow way, and alas! the world knows it not. They scorn a strict and precise walking with God in everything. And alas! this is even now the sin that rings in Scotland, that any who would walk so as to approve themselves to God in everything, these get a new name to be "Puritans" and "Separatists." And I believe there be not many parts where the gospel is that have gone so far on in this sin as we have done, notwithstanding our light be clearer than the light of others; and therefore our judgment must be the greater, for we lie under the woe that is pronounced by the Lord against those who call evil good and good evil.

Now only a word [more] of two things in this parable that we may close it. And—

First: That albeit the forlorn son when he comes home be highly honoured and kindly entreated by his father, yet the elder brother will not go into the house where he is, but is angry at both his father and his brother, challenging them both.

Second: What is it that ails him at his brother and his father? Nothing, but only because God is good to him, he cannot digest that. Where we may learn:

First: That whenever a sinner comes home to Christ they shall then get the hatred and envy of the rest of the world. What fault had this younger brother done to him to be angry for? No fault at all. But because he came home to Christ, therefore he is angry. And what is the ground of the hatred, that is between the followers of Christ and the rest of the world? They have no other cause wherefore to be angry at them, but because they are come home to Christ, and because it is so, they cannot get the world's heart. That must be true which Christ says and registers in His Testament: "Ye are not of the world, for if ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Ye shall get the world's malice, and all the quarrel that the world shall have against you shall be only because you are My disciples. The seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent cannot go together, but they must be at enmity." And how comes it to pass that there cannot be a kindly peace between Prelatists and Papists, and those who have bound themselves in a covenant with God? Even because we are not in one way. The Lord has said it, that their horns must be in our side. And, therefore, let no man who comes to Christ look always for the wind fair in his sails, and that he shall lie always upon a soft bed, fra thou hast tane you to Christ. No; thou shalt be used hardly of the men of the world, who are not in the same course with you, and shall be forced to say as the prophet Jeremiah says (15:10): "Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury; and yet every one doth curse me." And the reason of all their envy is because the Word of God is his delight. That shall be enough for a quarrel to the world. Seek God, and ye shall get the world on your top. Even thy father and mother and the wife that lies into thy bosom, if thou seek God, and they go not on into that way, also they shall be thy enemies. And, therefore, we must resolve to take the world's feid. If we would have God's favour, whoever comes to Christ must make them[selves] for the scourge of the world's tongue.

Wherewith is it that he finds fault? "As soon as this thy son came that hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf." The Pharisee has an ill eye towards the children of God, because God has a good heart to them. It is the natural man's ordinary to find fault with his neighbour's sins. It is ordinary for them to speak that, word which we read, Isa. 65:[5]: "Stand back by thyself, come not near me, I am holier than thou." A soul that is truly sanctified will be loathe to make a hole in his neighbour's conscience, that he may see what is there. No, he sees so many faults in himself that he sees not the faults of others well. He will say with the apostle, "I am the chief of sinners." The forlorn son speaks no ill of him, but he has much that he casts up to the forlorn son.

The last particular that we observe is: The Lord taking the forlorn son's part. "It was meet (says he) that we should make merry, and be glad," &c.—to teach us that God will for a while flatter a hypocrite, for you see the Lord reproves him not for his rough dealing. And woful is the case of that man under whose head God lays a cod to let him sleep in his security, and wakens him not to whom he says, as it is in Hos. 4:17: "Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone." Now,

Lastly: That the Lord takes the defence of His forlorn son. "It was meet that we should be glad and rejoice," teaches us this: Come home to Christ, who will, albeit all the world should speak ill of them, yet He will take their defence, and speak on their part. When that poor woman poured the ointment on Christ's feet, and the disciples began to murmur, and say, "It might [have] been sold for much money and given to the poor," Christ took her defence, and says, "Let her alone, she has wrought a good work on Me, for she did it for My burial; and wheresoever this gospel is preached throughout the world, this also that she has done shall be preached for a memorial of her." And Acts 9, when Ananias is bidden, "Go, preach to Saul," Ananias says: "This man has done much ill, and he has presently authority to bind all that call on Thy name, and carry them to Jerusalem;" but in ver. 15 Christ says, "Go thy way for he is a chosen vessel unto Me, to bear My name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel." And—

O, but that is a sweet thing, that albeit all the world should say against you, yet if thou wilt come to Christ, He will take thy part. Let them call you what they will, never so ill, He will call you His love, His dove, His undefiled, &c. And well is the soul that has Christ's commendation and high song of praise. It is better nor the commendation of all the world. What's the matter what men speak of you if God commend you. What is the matter albeit wicked men speak ill of you, if God speak good of you, for what He says all the world shall not get undone. Seek ye the Lord's commendation, and to be approven of Him, and it makes not then what men say against you. Lord teach us so to do for His name's sake. To this Lord, and our Lord, to His Father, and our Father, and to the Holy Spirit, be ascribed all glory, praise, and honour for ever and ever.—Amen.

The Worth and Excellence of the Gospel

"For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ."—2 COR. 10:4, 5.

THE most part of the world, beloved in our Lord, there are but few of them who put that price upon the gospel of Christ that is meet to be put upon it, and so did some of thir false apostles. They called the gospel foolishness, daffing. They thought it to be but baseness itself. But men's thoughts are not the measure whereby this gospel is to be measured, for the Word of God and the gospel of Christ, is not of the less worth in itself that men put a small price upon it. But our Lord He knows best what is the worth and excellence of this gospel of Christ. He who kens the vanity and daffing of the vain thoughts of the heart of man, He kens that albeit all the world should count light of His gospel, esteeming it but foolishness and daffing, and a weak thing; yet He knows that the weapons of that warfare are not carnal and fleshly, but mighty through the power of God to the pulling down of strongholds. I say nothing now of what I spake before, but only I say this:

Be no party in the world. Make the gospel and Christ your party, and take not the gospel for your enemy; for resist the gospel who will, and, whoever they be that stand out against it, it shall aye at last overmaster them, and ding them down, and tread them under foot, whether they will or no. How many have there been who have been setting their shoulders and their wits together to thrust this gospel out of the world. They thought it to be a cumbersome guest, and would fain [have] been quit of it, and so pressed to blow out Christ's candle. But they have been like drunken men, who in their drunken humour would run up to the top of a hill to blow out the light of the sun; but instead of blowing out the light thereof, they have only kythed their own foolishness. Even so do men in the world, climb up, upon the top of their worldly pomp and ambition, to blow out this candle of the gospel. But the more they blow at it to get it out, they only kythe their witlessness the more. It has evermore proved itself to be master, and more, against all who oppose it.

A second use that we are to make of this, that the weapons of the gospel are mighty, is: Wherever this gospel cometh, whether it be to a congregation, to a nation, or to a particular person, it will evermore be master. We may not think to make a servant thereof, because it is mighty through the power of God. It is the arm of the Lord, as it is in Isa. 53:1; the prophet says there, "Who hath believed our report, or to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?" And so never think to bruike the gospel and make a servant of it; for ye can no more make the gospel a servant to serve you than ye are able to break the Lord's arm. And, indeed, he is a strong party who will make the Lord's arm either to bow or to break. And, therefore, wherever the message of the gospel comes, let it have its own proper place; make it master. Let it prove to be the power of God to lay down those high and strong turrets of pride, of self-love, of worldly-mindedness, &c., under the foot of Christ, that so He may be known thereby to be mighty. The gospel will not be a servant and drudge to any. It will not be a post-horse to run our errands for us. It will not be a servant to the greatest upon earth. If it be mighty, through the power of God it will keep its own place, who will, who will not.

Moreover, if the gospel be not the arm and power of God to bring us home to Christ and to salvation, it shall then be the blackest news that ever we heard in our time. It is not for nought that our Lord, who is mercy itself, pronounced such a woe against Chorazin and Bethsaida, even a more heavy woe than against Tyre and Sidon. Woe! to you for evermore to whom Christ and the gospel come, and yet mend ye not. And He also pronounces a woe and a curse against these who bring not out the fruits of the gospel where it comes. And, therefore, it were best for you to bring out the fruits of the gospel timeously; for ye will not be quit of the gospel so easily and so lightly as ye trow to be quit of it. It will either mend you or end you. If it do no more, it will leave a summons at your door declaring that mercy and salvation were offered to you, and ye would not accept of it.

If ministers cannot be means to save people's souls, they will yet leave a summons at the door of your souls, and will take the sun, the moon, stars, the stones, and timber of the kirk, in witness that we did our duty, and told our Master's message to you, but ye would not obey. And, therefore, for Christ's sake, seeing the gospel is come to you, take heed that ye despise it not, as ye will be answerable to Him who is the Master thereof. In Revelation 14:9, 10 there is a woe and an everlasting curse pronounced against these who receive not the gospel when it is sent to them. And, 2 Thess. 1:9, 10, the apostle says the Lord will come in flaming fire and take vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the gospel of Christ. There is no less doom pronounced against those who are disobedient to the gospel of Christ nor the vengeance and the heavy curse of God. His word and gospel have not another word to say to the despiser of the gospel nor the vengeance of Christ to light upon them. That is a heavy burden to light upon any. And therefore I beseech you, in God's name and in Christ's name, let the gospel have the one work, which is the proper work thereof. Let it be master, and think not to make a servant of it. Bow unto the gospel, least if ye bow not willingly unto it, it break you all in pieces.

Our weapons of our warfare, they have might and power from heaven and from God to ding down strongholds. Then it is so. It is but a daft question and a foolish conceit of those who are enemies of the Lord's grace to say, that for all that might and power that is in the gospel, that yet, notwithstanding, the free-will of these to whom it is sent with that power, may say or no to it, Take it, or reject the offer thereof, as your free-will pleases. This is nothing else but a conceit of those who never kent the power of the gospel. And we may know the gospel to be mighty through the power of God if we will look either to Him who is the author of this gospel, or if we will look to the matter that is contained in the gospel, or if we will look into the manner of the working thereof.

For the author of this gospel, it is no other but God Himself. Indeed, if this gospel were the word of a man only, albeit it were spoken unto the soul of a man, then I think man's free-will might say or no to it, as it pleased. But the gospel is not the word of man to man, but it is a love-letter that is written to us by our Lord Himself, and is dited by His Spirit. And why may it not command our will to yield unto it, seeing the Lord Himself is the author thereof? It is a great indignity offered to our Lord to say, Let Him speak as He will, albeit it were never so pithily; and let Him work with His word as He pleases, that yet, notwithstanding, to say or no, to accept or not accept as He pleases, that albeit our Lord shoot His arrows at man, yet He may either resist or jouk, and let the fire go by him. He that framed the arrow He has put might and power in it, He has put steel in the point thereof, that it may pierce where it lights. And, when He intends to bring in a soul to Himself, He shoots not as it were at the rivers and so to shoot at it begess, but He shoots as it were at a mark; and He aims and sets right on before He shoots, and so cannot but light into the mark, and His arrow it will pierce where it lights.

Again, if we will look unto the matter that is contained in the gospel, we will see that it is mighty through the power of God, for all the world cannot frame and make up such logic as is contained in the gospel. All the wits in the world cannot pen such a glorious description of the New Jerusalem as is contained in the two last chapters of the Revelation. Nor can all the wits of men and angels make such a description of the Son as there is made of Him (Heb. 1) All the world cannot come out with such a description of the power of the gospel as that which is here. And, therefore, albeit hell and all the powers had said that the gospel shall not prevail, yet seeing He said that it shall prevail, they shall not be able to resist it, but it shall prove to be mighty through the power of God, who is the author thereof.

Third: if we will look unto the manner of the working of the gospel, we will also see it to be mighty to ding down all our strongholds. If God were not omnipotent, there might be some show for this, to say that man's free-will might say aye or no to the gospel of Christ. But He who knows all the several parts and the turnings of the heart of man, shall not He know how to win in into it? How can He make any creature by His power but He maun also know by His power how to move it as He thinks meet? He who when He backs His word with power can win into [the] heart where there are seven devils and speak to it, can He not win into any man's heart how backward soever it be? I am sure there was never a man who had more hurtful thoughts of the Son of man, Jesus Christ, than the Apostle Paul had, for he dought not endure to hear of His name, nor to hear of any who professed His name, but persecuted them all most cruelly. And yet our Lord, He did no more but speak a word or two to him; and with these same few words He spake to him, He cast him off his high horse whereupon he rode so triumphantly, and lays him laigh down upon his back and under His feet. And whereas he was going of purpose to persecute the members of Jesus Christ, he says to Him, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" To hear our Lord casting down, at an instant, such a strong and cruel opposer of the gospel of Christ, and presently to make him say, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" that is a cast of the power of our Lord's right arm. And so they are but fools to say that nature, or free-will, or man's heart is able to decline from the straik of God's Word when He resolves to work upon them by it.

Now Lord be thanked that it is so, that we are not able to resist it but that it is mighty and powerful to overcome us. There is a trim place for proving of this point, Cant. 2, where the spouse, which is the Kirk, is telling the manner of her well-beloved's working. He worketh by love. Now love, it cannot be ravished or hindered any way, albeit the lover may be ravished, or tane away, or kept away from the thing beloved; yet love cannot be so, for if it can be ravished or hindered, then it is not true love. In ver. 4, "He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love." And when the banner of love is holden up by Christ over the Kirk, is she able to resist then, and to hold Him out, as she pleases? No; for the next verse says when this banner of love was holden over her she fell a sound [Authorized Version, "sick of love"], and therefore she says in the next verse, "Stay me with flagons, and comfort me with apples: for I am sick of love." This is our Lord's gate of working upon the hearts of those whom He is minded to turn to Himself, He casts a lump of love over them, and when He does that, He can gar the rebel fall a sound of love. When a soul is running fra God and fra the consolations of His Spirit; when Jesus once sets His love upon you, and speaks to thy soul, it shall not be in thy power to resist, or to win out of His hand again. Let men make a principle of free-will, or determine whereupon it is that the word sets first. But when the Lord speaks to any, and backs His word with power, it makes them to set their heart upon Jesus; and the soul that Christ loves, He looks upon it in love, and, when the Lord does so, the soul is far fra indifferent then, whether it receive Christ and His word or not; but there is a necessity laid upon them that they must yield. And the Lord also, He is far fra that, that He counts whether these to whom He speaks give obedience to Him or not. He speaks not so. But whoever they be to whom He speaks, if they submit not willingly He treads them under foot, and makes them pliable, and so makes good that word spoken, Deut. 30:6: "And the Lord thy God will circumcise thy heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live." Take with your rebellion to God all of you, not [only] with that natural power of resisting the grace of God, but take with that wickedness and sweirness that is in the soul, and that opposition that nature makes to Christ till He subdue it by His power. And Ezek. 36:26, where a new heart is promised by the Lord, and He promises to take away the old and stony heart.

But say they there, "That new heart that is promised to us there, it is promised upon condition that we resist it not." But look to the text, and ye will see that it mentions no such thing as "I will give unto you a new heart if you oppose it not;" but the text says absolutely, "A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in My statutes to do them." There our Lord He meets with the wits of men and opposes Himself to all objections that they can make of this kind, while He promises to take away the stoniness of the old heart, and then to give a new heart also, and to cause those whom He takes in hand to walk in His statutes. This in effect is our Christ's gospel. Even the power and the mighty arm of God to bring in the rebel soul to Christ and to make it Christ's own captive, and to make all of us say, "I find there is more life and power in His word than ever I could have believed there was to bring me into grace whether I will or not."

And, in effect, who are those who oppose this power of the grace of God? and it has been very well observed by learned men, that there was never any who opposed themselves unto it, but those who kent nothing of the grace of God themselves. And thus the grace of God it revenges itself upon them. Because they resist and oppose the power of it they shall never get profit or benefit thereby. And, indeed, few—few whoever kent what the power of the grace of God meant—durst take upon them to be an Arminian, or to speak against the power of the grace of God; but if any know rightly the power of the grace of God, it were the way to make souls fall in love with it, and to make them loath to say anything against it.

Now if this word and weapons of our warfare be mighty through the power of God, pulling down strongholds, &c., we have sweet uses arising unto us from this. And—

First: O, if we could get your hearts summoned to obey this, that ye would come in to Christ, and give over your hearts to Him to be wrought upon by His word. Alas! and any of you have a bairn that is unlettered, ye will send it to the school that it may learn there. Others, through feeling of disease on their bodies, will have recourse to the physicians. If a man have a weak and troubled estate he will have recourse to the lawyer, and will concredit his cause to him. And yet thou hast a rebellious soul, and yet thou wilt not give over that to Christ to take and order therewith, and to work upon all the powers thereof, and to change them by His word. If we could once win on this far, to let God's word work upon our hearts by our Lord's power, we would then find that we get a sweet niffer, we would get a new heart for an old heart, we would get new spirits for old spirits. O! but that is a sweet and a happy change. And there is no way for us to become new men and women, but only this, by renouncing ourselves over to the power of God's word to be wrought upon by it, and, if we be not new men and new women, it had been better for us that we had never lived. Woe! is to that soul for evermore that has no more of Christ than nature gives unto it! We may get some learning by being at schools, wisdom may be acquired by pains, riches, &c., and the world may esteem of a man for these things; but yet, for all that, he is nothing else but Christ's painted tomb. For all these, he is all rotten and filthy within; for as beautiful-like as he looks without, yet within he is nothing else but the workhouse of the devil. Say of such a man what ye will, make him never so trim a man for natural parts, wanting a spiritual work, yet he is no other in Christ's account, but a trim limb of the devil. Will the world call him an honest man, then he is an honestheir of Satan. If ye will call him a civil man, yet he is no other but a civil heir for hell, whatever the world thinks of him or himself. Yet this is the account that God has of a man so long as he has not given himself over to be wrought upon by the word of God.

Second use. An there be any here who are complaining of a rebellious heart, of a stony and hard heart, I say to such; "Look if ye cannot get faith to believe in this gospel of Christ, to lay hold upon thir weapons that are mighty, through the power of God, to the pulling down of strongholds, and get faith to believe in it. Thou wilt not find the heart to be so backward. A soul which has such a hard, a rebellious, and a stony heart, it burdens them very sore. But here [is] a ground of comfort to such, if thou can get faith to believe it, that albeit thy heart were never so rebellious, hard, and stiff, yet there are weapons in Christ's armoury that are able to ding it down, to humble and soften it. Thou wilt say, "I cannot get my haughty heart humbled, nor can I get it win off the love of the world, and I find many lusts prevailing there wherewith I am greatly borne down." But here is our comfort, if we have faith to believe. This word of the gospel, it is mighty through the power of God to bring all these in subjection. If ye can get but this far as to be chased into Christ, by reason of the sight of your sins, it is sweet and comfortable.

O, but I like these souls well who are ever mourning for sin, who are complaining of a hard, rebellious, uncircumcised, stony heart. But here is a ground of comfort for such, that God's word is mighty through His power to bear down sin. If we could once win to this, to think that sin is a burden, it were good for us, it would drive us in to Christ. Thou art nearer to heaven when thou art bemoaning the estate of thy hard heart, and art putting it in Christ's hand to be healed, than when thou thinkest all well with you. Thou art meet then to receive of Christ's pity, for He is a Lord ready to forgive all such as come to Him in humility, He is a physician who will take sick folks in hand to heal them who have no money to give for their cure. He is indeed the poor man's physician. He seeks no more of us, but only to tell Him that we are sick. He has a hammer to beat down the hard heart. He has a sword to cut it in pieces. He can make whole the broken heart and afflicted spirit for sin; He can give a new heart and new spirit. Cast not down your heart, because ye find the hardness thereof; cast not away your confidence for all that, but believe in God's word, which is mighty through the power of God to bring it under these.

The Lord be thanked that there is this meikle power in the gospel of Christ, as to make a soul that is sick for sin whole again, as to make a hard heart a soft heart; that there is virtue into it, as to pour down that Spirit upon us, promised to the house of David (Zech. 12:10), the spirit of prayer and supplications, and the spirit of repentance and mourning for sin. And if we could attain to this, it were a sweet preparation for a solemn fast and humiliation when the Lord is glooming upon the land for the sins thereof, and the Lord is calling to solemn fasting and humiliation for the sins of the land; it were meet that every one of us should take to heart our own sins and the sins of the land wherein we live, and be humbled before God for them, that so the Lord might comfort us.

Now, where are the fruits and effects of thir weapons of our warfare? To pull down strongholds, to cast down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God in bringing in subjection everything to the obedience of Christ. These be even all things that be either within or without a man that set themselves in any way against the gospel. It brings all of them in subjection. Especially it casts down all these fortifications that be inwardly in the soul against Christ and the gospel, even all these things that natural men lippen to.

Now, whose is the house before this work be wrought? Matt. 12:44, answers this question. Satan says, "I will return into my house whence I came out." So the goodman of that old house is no other but the devil; and Christ our Saviour says in another place, "How can a man enter into a strong man's house, unless he first bind the strong man and cast him out?" He means there that Satan is master of every man's house until Christ come into the soul and bind him and cast him out, and take possession there Himself. That may gar all our feathers fall, albeit so oft we will say that we love Christ. For speer at all men and women, they will say that they love Christ, and they are angry that any should think otherways, yet by nature all of us are keeping a castle against Christ, and were keeping it for the devil's service. And of necessity before ever Christ come to dwell into the soul, all these high towers they must fall to the ground, and Christ must bring in a new work with Him, and make us new creatures. And this is one of the works of the gospel, even to lay all the heights that are in man's soul down even with the ground, to make sin and the devil and all these lusts that are keeping up the castle of the heart from him, fall flat to the ground together. And He soops all that muddy house to the door, that so He may make a pleasant house of ashler work for Himself. It seeks to cast down all the old rotten barns that formerly have been built there by sin and the devil, and to exalt us, that so the king of glory may come in as it is, Psa. 24:7: "Exalt yourselves, ye gates; be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors: that so the King of glory may come in."

All this serves greatly to ding down our proud natures, to let the natural and the civil man see in what estate he is in God's sight, albeit he have a good report before the world, that yet notwithstanding he is not a man great in God's sight unless the gospel has gotten work in him to ding the high towers that are in him. If thou hast never had a sick soul for sin it is a token that Christ and His word have never had any work in you; it is a token, if it be so, that as yet we are God's rebels; and woe is to them for evermore who are in that case, and will remain in it stubbornly. He has wisdom to call in rebels, and power to make them submit themselves to Him. But He has also a rod of iron to bruise them all to pieces, who proudly stand out against Him. Well's them who can give over the old house to Christ in time, who resolve that nature and their sins and their own old hearts will never take them to heaven. Aye, albeit they have some knowledge of God, and be acquainted with divinity that way liberally; yet [they] know that all these are no other but the keeping up of a castle against Christ, and building up forts against Him, and are made to acknowledge that we are ever in a woful estate until the gospel come in with the power thereof, and ding down all these strongholds that are in us; and to account so of ourselves that we know nothing till we know that Christ has thus wrought in us. Mark the speech of a learned man who doubtless had a very great measure of learning, yet he says of himself: "I know nothing, neither do I desire to know anything but the Cross of Christ and Him crucified; whereby I am crucified to the world, and the world is crucified to me.' All the natural and civil honesty in the world will not do the turn to bring us to heaven, till we once see that by nature we are in a damnable case, and, in God's mercy that if He please He may cast us away from Him for ever to hell. If we be not made Christ's captives we shall be captives and bondmen in hell for ever. Except we become a fallen down building that Christ may build us up, we shall questionless be miserable for ever.

Now of this point a word or two of some things. First, concerning some ordinary faults that are in some, making them to hold by these towers. Next, we will show unto you some marks of these where these strongholds are casten down. Third, we will show unto you the way that the Lord keeps in casting down these strongholds.

Now for the ordinary faults that are in men in holding up these towers. They are:

First: And there is no man who is born without this: Thir walls of sin and strongholds they are not altogether casten down so long as we are living here. If it had not been so, one who was a chosen vessel of mercy, the Apostle Paul, had never used that speech spoken, Rom. 7:18: "I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." This was spoken by him after his regeneration. And woes them! who acknowledge not that there is some of the old work of nature to the fore in them so long as they are here. Why? How can this be true? Because there is nothing that altogether expels original corruption that is in all of us but only glory. I know indeed that true grace sneds away the branches off that tree, and wins in upon the stock also. And grace casts down the walls and the roof of this house. But for the root of this tree, and the ground stones of that house, there is nothing gets that hoked up and takes order with it but only glory. Aye, the children of God, when the house has been casten down by the grace of regeneration, they have been ready many times to build toofalls for themselves again; as we read of Noah, Lot, David, who fell in heinous sins after they were freely regenerate[d] of God, and the falling into these heinous sins, it was the building of toofalls and little houses of sin and corruption again.

But there be others again, against whom the Lord is shooting the arrows of His gospel, and yet there is not a hole made into their walls by them, nor a branch sned off their tree for all that can be done to them. We may read of the like of these, Acts 7:51, where the Apostle Stephen is preaching to some Jews, and in the end he says unto them: "Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart." He shoots strongly at them, but there is not a hole made into their wall for all his shots, but they fortify it so strongly that it shoots back again at himself, who preached to them, and they presently stone him to death for what he did. And so did they to Christ Himself. He shot at them by the preaching of His word and working of miracles among them, to batter down their old walls; but they shot out again at Him and crucified Him. This is a pitiful mark where the gospel is preached to people, and it convinces them of sin, and all that that produces in them is, it raises hatred in their heart against the preachers of the gospel. But there is not one hole made in their old work for all that they can do, but it stands upright unshaken.

But there be a third sort of people whose old walls and strong towers, preachers, by their preaching, make to totter and shake, but incontinently when they find their walls begin to shake, they set to to put props to them to hold them up; such as we read of Cain and of Ahab, they did this—they returned to their former pleasures and their old sins again, albeit their consciences were challenged for the wrongs they had done. And, indeed, these persons are in a very miserable case, who get their sins discovered and laid open to them by the preaching of the word, and yet go home presently and away to the tavern, or, when they go out here, fall to their swearing, and so heap up their sins continually and obdures their conscience. These are in a very fearful case if they were sensible of it.

But the best sort of the hearers of God's Word is these who fald themselves willingly to Christ our Lord, when He speaks to them by His Word and preachers, who are content that the Lord ding down their towers of pride, of worldly-mindedness, of filthiness, that He bring to the ground their high castles of self-love, lay under His feet their love to the world, ding down their conceit and love they have to superstition and idolatry. And in the Word of God, ye will find six several marks of such hearers as these, and we shall point at them. For the—

First mark, look Acts 2:37, where the Apostle Peter preaching to a number of souls who were converted to Christ, it is said, they were pricked at the heart by his preaching. The words he spake to them were such as if a serpent had stinged them, they were so sharp they pierced the heart. When the Word of God begins to batter at the hearts of such, and to discover unto them the great towers of atheism that are in them, the high walls of profanity, the deep waters of bloodshed, the strong desires of filthiness, when they see such a slavery to all sorts of sin, and are borne down under the sense thereof, then the heart of the child of God it is stinged, it is pricked, it is rent, and pierced, as it were by it.

The second mark of such is set down to us Jer. 31:18: "I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus; Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised." When once the soul is complaining of sin and is borne down under the sense thereof, and is sending up complaints both to God and to His servants against it, it is a token that these high towers are beginning to fall down, but as long as thou art continuing in thy guiltiness of sin, and are not complaining against it, that is not the gate to heaven. Albeit thou hope for heaven, yet it is not well with thee, it is a token that there are high towers into thy soul, that the work of the old Adam is yet standing fast.

A third mark of these who fald willingly to Christ, and stoop to His Word, is this: They begin presently when their sins are discovered to them, to make syllogisms of their own, even as the unjust steward, who was shot out of his service, for faults committed by him. When he was out he begins to think with himself: "What shall I do now? I cannot beg for shame. None will pity me for work. I cannot work. And I have not of my own to keep me." And so he resolves he will back to his master again. Let him cast him in prison if he will, for then he kens he maun find him. Happy is the soul when it comes to such an estate as that; it sees it has nothing of its own to live upon, and so resolves it will go back to Christ. Let Him cast it in prison, if He will, it is in a better estate nor it was then. Sich-like [was] the forlorn son when he had spent all that he had, and had no more. He resolves that he could not die for hunger in a far country, and, at the first, he thought he could not for shame go home to his father, yet when he saw that no other could be, he resolves that he will do it, go home, and offer his service to his father, for he thought it better to be a living servant nor a dead son.

A fourth mark of these who stoop willingly to the gospel is: It raises into them an earnest desire after a Saviour. I will not say but in some this desire of a Saviour is not so throughly spiritual as it should be; yet there is some desire in him after Christ, and he sees that far, that he may not want Him, and he desires that Christ would come in into his soul and ding down all his haughty lusts and imaginations, and wishes that he were in body and soul made captive to Jesus.

A fifth mark of these who are obedient to the gospel of Christ is: He looks, evermore looks, to the promises with a long look of love. He never hears such a promise as that Christ Jesus came into the world to save penitent sinners, but he thinks with himself, "O! if I were one of these whom He is come to save. And O! if I could have my heart steeped into these gracious promises."

A sixth mark of these who yield unto the gospel is: There is no man who prizes Christ so highly as such a man does. O! he would give heaven, if he had it, to have Christ. There is nothing he would think too dear to be sure of Christ. You know that woman who is spoken off by the Evangelist Luke, who washt Christ's feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. If her hair had been heaven and her tears, she would have thought them over ill to wash and to dicht Christ's feet; she had such a high estimation of Him. When once the soul comes to this pass; "O! miserable man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death," and knows how far thou art oblist to Christ for delivering you from it, it will make you to put a high price upon Christ, and make you to say, "O! that I could give anything for Him that I might get Him. If heaven and earth were mine I would give them for Him." There will be no pinching then, when the soul is once truly humbled by the word of God. There will be no pinching then what we give for Christ. It would not be then, "Wilt thou give thy sinful lusts for Christ? wilt thou quit thy pride for Him? wilt thou quit the world and the things thereof for Christ?" We will stand upon nothing then, but we will quit all willingly that we may gain Christ. And these are very lively and clear marks of a downcasten and humbled soul by the word of God.

Now for the way and order that the Lord keeps in casting down thir strongholds. The text tells us that nature and the old man it is first cast down, it is all shot to the ground; and so the law it has work first to cast down before the gospel get anything ado to raise up. And this is to let all of us see what estate we are in by nature, even in the state of damnation. I know this casting down of the old work it is rather a preparation for working than any proper work.

But what is the first work that the gospel works upon the soul? There is a question about this among some. Some say that repentance it is the first work; others say that believing it is the first work. But I think there can be no true repentance without some measure of faith preceding. But verily I think there is a work into the soul that goes before either faith or repentance. Our Saviour Christ has a word John 6:45, 46: "They shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh unto Me." So there is a sort of hearkening to the word of the Father, that is in some before it be in others; and while He speaketh of a resurrection in the former verse, it is likely to be meant that that is the first work. Then this is the first work that is wrought into the soul—howbeit the habit of all the rest be wrought then also—even a spiritual hearing and apprehending of Christ by the soul; and then in the next place follows believing. And Christ our Lord He puts a difference between this hearing and faith, for the soul it can never come to Christ to believe in Him until it have once some apprehension of the first work wrought into the soul, until it learn to make a difference between Christ and other men by a spiritual hearing of God's word, till they learn to know His tongue by the tongue of all others. Where before they had but a light conceit of His word, now they esteem greatly of Him and of His word; and having attained to that, then follow believing in Christ and resting upon Him. And then follows the third work, a godly sorrow for sin, which indeed is formally the work of repentance, for whatever sorrow they had formerly, it was nothing else but a legal downcasting for sin, but no true repentance and godly sorrow till then.

Use. Then there must be a humiliation and downcasting in all who rightly know what Christ is. I would send all of you to this mark to see and try if ye have ever had this humiliation and downcasting, and consequently to try if ye have Christ. Alas! I trow, examine the most part, and speer at them how they gat Christ, and how He came to them, or when were their high castles dung down. I trow they maun be forced to answer that they have either gotten Him in their cradle, while they were young, and kent not of it, or they have gotten Him sometime while they were sleeping; but for grief and sorrow for sin, for one tear for offending God, they never kent nothing of that kind. I would be loath now by saying this to bind sorrow for sin unto tears, for I know there is a true sorrow that is without tears, and I know there is a real sorrow that is beyond tears. But this far, I say, that there maun be a true humiliation for sin one way or other before Christ come into the soul. But alas! I trow all Jobs [Job 6:4] be dead to have such sorrow, and find such grief for sin as he had. To have the arrows of the Almighty drinking up their spirits as he had, I trow the most part kens not what that means, as to have such a deep sort of offending at themselves for offending of such a good Lord, even, to be angry at the heart at themselves, for offending Him; and when this is, it will drink up the spirits.

I pray you try whether or no this work be in you, for many will be beguiled at the last day, thinking that they have gotten these things, and when it is tried it will be found to be nothing else but a plain imagination. And God, at the first, sees all such to be but false and counterfeit work; their repentance, their believing, and all that they have; and so that they are not in Christ. And therefore we should never rest until we get sure wit whether we be in Christ or not, if we be passed beyond nature as yet, if we be stepped from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of the Son of God. Lord, waken all of us to put ourselves to a trial in this point, and to see that we be not such who profess to be in Christ, and yet in the meantime remaining in nature. Now to this Lord, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, be all praise and glory for ever. Amen.

The Apostle's Choice

No. I

"But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord."—PHIL. 3:7, 8.

THERE is no man, Beloved, that has a reasonable soul, but his soul it has a choice, and something that he counts his good and happiness that fain he would be at; and as many as have reason with them, there is some good thing that fain they would have. And the apostle that speaks these words that now are read, he teaches us his choice.

This text it is the apostle's choice of all things that were in the bosom of the created world, of all things that heaven has, of all things that earth can afford. He tells what is the thing among them all he would fainest be at. Comparing himself with the false apostles who lived then, and being disputing against their ceremonies and service-book, and all such idle toys as these, he turns his back upon them; and after he has bidden the Philippians beware of these snares, for they were not apostles of Christ's sending, he tells them in the next rowme what it was that he loved best of all other things, when he had compared his choice and their choice together; for that which the false apostles would have been at was circumcision as under the law, albeit the blind people they saw not this—which was something like unto Christ, and an old ordinance of God—Christ before this time had adumbrate these shadows. When the apostle compares the two ways together, and considers that he himself was once upon that course, he counts of himself as one that was a king yesterday, but is become a beggar for all these things the day; he counts himself like a drunken man who thinks, in the time of his drunkenness, that he is very rich, but when he comes to himself and is fresh, he counts all that he conceited of then not to be worth a drink of cold water. When he looks unto Jesus and saw His loveliness, the apostle would say no less to them, comparing himself to them, and his choice with the false apostles whom he is forbidding them to follow, than that they should not open the ear in the least thing to mix the law of Moses and Christ's ordinances together. And to induce them to this, he comes in with his own experience of Christ, what he thought of Him beyond all other things, and says this much in effect, that all the false apostles they tell you of ceremonies and of righteousness by Moses' law. And he tells of himself: "If I would be proud of these things, then I might boast with the best of them of as great privileges as they have, whether religious, natural, or civil. But," says he, "when once I gat a sight of lovely Jesus, I abhorred them all, and could not abide them in comparison of the excellence of Christ Jesus my Lord." He says, "I am one who has as meikle to boast of as any of them has. I was circumcised the eighth day as well as they, and so gat the outward seal of the covenant. I am a Jew as well as any of them, and more, I am come of the royal tribe of Benjamin, of whom came the first king that ever was in Israel; for the outward observation of the law I was a Pharisee, and for my zeal I was one who persecuted the gospel and Christ as sore as any did, and for the righteousness which is of the law I was blameless, a civil, honest man. I carried myself so as no man could spit on my cloak." But that is a sweet turn that follows after the reckoning up of these things. He says, "When once I began to know Christ, fra once I gat a sight of that lovely Saviour Christ, then all these things whereof I thought so highly before, and that they were my gain, I thought but basely of them, and counted them but loss. Fra that time they had no rowme in my count book, but I cast all of them away, having once fallen in love with Christ."

So will every soul do who has had another lover nor Christ, and then gets Christ for his lord and love. This is the original work of a soul that has been meikle tane up with civil privileges in the world, or any outward thing, that has thought meikle of court, honour, riches, pleasure, &c. And then he comes to know what Christ is by experience. Such a one shall be forced to say, "I never knew what happiness and blessedness was till now. All those things wherein I placed happiness before were no other but empty appearances thereof until once I met with the Son of God." That is a real mark of a soul that has indeed met with Christ; it can put all other things down laigh, and the Son of God up high in his own rowme. And it must be so with them who have gotten a sight of Christ, and knows what He is. Bairns they cannot compare youth with old age, because they have never yet known what old age is. But those who are come to old age, they can compare the one with the other, and having tried both, and known what youth is—not other but daffing, and hunting after nutshells, in respect of old age. There are none of those who are in glory but they know well enough what it was to be in the estate of sin, and what lying happiness it is that is promised to sinners here. They know well enough what is the ill of night drinking, and what ill is in that to deny a covenant and to quit Christ; they know what it is to sell an exceeding weight of great glory for this present world. Even so the children of God, who are fallen in love with the Son of God, they can speak more of the vanity of all things that are hereaway, and of the excellence of Jesus, than all the world beside can do.

Now for the particulars contained in the words. The apostle tells us here what it was that was the wail of his wit, and ye know well enough what he did, and what he made his choice, for he was no fool; and he says that all the fair satins, and pasments, and gold-lace, that he had before he came to Christ, when he came to Christ he counted them all to be beggar's rags, and that is in the seventh verse, "But what things were gain to me, these I counted loss for Christ;" and then in the eighth verse he confirms this yet more, for it might [have] been objected: "What, Paul, count ye nothing of circumcision, esteem ye so little of that to be a Jew, to be of the royal tribe of Benjamin, for your profession to be a Pharisee, to have such zeal, to be blameless touching the outward righteousness of the law?" "No," says he, "I rue nothing of what I have said, 'Yea, doubtless I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung that I may win Christ.' " And then in the next verse follows his wish what it is that he desires. And first what it is that he would not have. He says that he would not for the world "be found in his own righteousness, which is by the law." In that righteousness whereof the false apostles teach, in that righteousness that nature has, for as glorious like as it seemed to them. And then he tells what it is that he would have. "That he might have the righteousness which is by the faith of Christ," even to be found in that righteousness which is of God by faith. "That is," says he, "the main thing that I would be in hands with."

First: Look for the dependence of thir words. How is it that the apostle compares himself with thir false teachers, who follow the now dead ceremonies of Moses' law? He says, "Let them who know no better follow these dead ceremonies and services, but for me, I have changed all these things now. I have quit them all, and tane me only to Christ."

Then we may see that there is a far difference between a minister who is fairly called of Christ under the New Testament, and those false teachers who have their face towards Rome, or any other false religion that leads away from Christ. All these who are false teachers, and lead away from Christ, they would evermore be at nignayes and dead ceremonies in the service and worship they profess. But the apostle would say here, and all true pastors with him, "Let the Pharisees and those who know no better, go on with their dead ceremonies and their service-book, but for me, God send me Christ and His righteousness, and if I get Christ and His righteousness to be mine, then adieu to them and all their ceremonies, and to their righteousness by the law, and all these things."

This is a note of the false kirk and of the false apostles; they would evermore be at ceremonies. The religion they would be at is a religion that stands all in fair shows, a religion for Kirk and market. But the religion which is the way to heaven, and the true Kirk, and [which] Christ's ministers would be at, is a religion that is spirit and life, a religion that specially is inward more nor outward. [In] Isaiah 1:13 there is a number there who were for the new moons, holidays, multitudes of sacrifices, meikle fat of lambs and rams. But the Lord and His prophet they are for this (Isa. 1:16): "Wash you, make you clean; put away the ill of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do well." And Micah 6:6, there are some there for offering thousands of rams and ten thousands of rivers of oil, for giving their firstborn for their transgression; but the Lord tells what it is that He seeks, "To do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God." And Matt. 15, there is the like dispute between the scribes and Pharisees and Christ. The scribes and Pharisees they were all for religious ceremonies, as they called them, such as eating of meat with unwashen hands, vessels, &c. But Christ and His disciples they were more for keeping the commandments of God than for observing the traditions of men.

Use: Learn to make a difference rightly of the two parts of the controversy that is between the prelates and the land. What is the quarrel that the prelates and their adherents have at Scotland this day? It is not because we will not follow the Bible and God's ordinances in His worship; but their quarrel at us is, because we will not follow a service-book and ceremonies, and because we will not have a creature of their upsetting, a prelate, to be head of the Church. And this is our comfort that the controversy stands thus, that they are not coming against us for not following the Bible and the revealed will of God in His Word, for we are willing that matters shall be judged thereby both in Assemblies and Parliaments. And, blessed be God! that the matter stands so, that it is not religion that they are pursuing us for, but something that is like religion, and we stand for the defence of the true religion. And this also serves to put a difference between an honest person and those who come with an honest and prepared heart to the communion, and those who have no other motive to induce them to it but for the fashion. Those who come to the communion because they would be illspoken of if they did otherways. O! but that be a naughty end, and such will not come speed. There is a far difference between these and such as come here, and care for nothing else, if so be that they can meet with Christ Himself, and care not what all the men in the world say of them. O! that this were our end and errand this day. And I lay this upon your conscience to try yourself hereby whether your end in coming here this day be to get Christ or not.

The apostle goes on and says, "What things were gain to me those I counted loss for Christ." Then this tells us that the apostle he had what was gain to him, as well as the false apostles had. He had whereof to boast as well as they. "Are they apostles? so am I. Are they circumcised? so am I." The apostle says by this, "I can ride up with the best of them and something more, if they come to a boasting for things of that kind." Compare the life of the believer and the life of the natural man together, and let the natural man lay counts and figures of his state here and multiply them until doomsday. We that are believers, we have all that the natural man has, and something more. And there be four things wherein believers are beyond all the natural men in the world.

First: The wicked have this world, and they have it as the men of this world. They bruick it as "the men of this earth," as it is Psa. 10:18. And the world it is their patrimony and hire. The believers have the world also, but in another manner than they have, for we have it only as our inns, to stay in while we are here, and not as our patrimony and hire. There is none of us who lies out of the world more than they do, but the world is only our moveables, while it is their patrimony, and their portion that is ordained for them. That is the difference betwixt the heir and him who is only a servant, for the son has always the estate prepared for him, but the servant he gets no more than his penny fee, and when all is done he is put to the door. Whatever the natural men in the world have we have it also, but we have it after a surer way than they have it. And this should teach us to use this present world as though we used it not, seeing it is not our heritage but only our moveables.

Second: For natural and worldly men, the sun it shines upon them by day and the moon by night, the rain it falls upon the just and unjust; but we have the Sun of Righteousness to shine upon us, which they have not, and that is better nor all other things that are in the world. They have the sun and the moon and these other profits and pleasures in the world to laugh upon them; but we have Him who made all things and can undo them when He will, to laugh upon us, and that is much better.

Third: Natural men they have the toom, empty, and frothy creature; but we have the blessing with these things. They have bread for their use; but we have the staff of bread, which is better. And—

Lastly: and I make an objection of it—they have ofttimes a fairer wind in their sails nor we have here; but yet they have not law-burrows of it that it shall be always so. They have more of court and pleasure, profit and ease, more than we have while we are here—and it is true that we have the cross more than they ofttimes; but they are not sure that it shall continue so. But albeit they have these things, and we want them, yet we have that which is spoken of Rom. 8:37: "We are more than conquerors through Him that loved us." They have court and kings upon their side, and we have them not; yet this is enough against them all, that we have Him upon our side who to this hour never tint a battle, whatever party He had against Him. They have Spain and antichrist and the powers of the world with them, yet God be thanked that we have Him for us who guides all these at His pleasure. We have Him on our side who gets that stately style ascribed to Him, Rev. 1:5: "The Prince of the kings of the earth," so that all others, were they never so great, all of them are under Him. And so we may see they have no reason to tire who have sided themselves in a covenant with the Son of God, for before all be said that is to be said, and before the field be done, we shall be forced to say that we have gotten the highest of the brae above our enemies, and that the shadow of the Sun of Righteousness has looked upon us.

"These things that were gain to me I counted them loss for Christ." Here is a strange change, that these things that before were gain are now become loss to the apostle; and yet it is a change incident to all those who are in Paul's case; and the reason of it is, because whoever they be who are not in Christ they see not things as they are indeed, but he looks upon them so as they seem to his sophistic reason; but when any comes to Christ and gets His light they will be forced to say, "The thing that before I thought as my very heart or the apple of my eye, whereof I thought quit me of the one as soon quit me of the other, yet when once I came to Christ and gat a sight of Him, I counted nothing at all of these."

The doctrine is clear. A man who once comes truly to Christ changes his mind, his estimative faculty is altogether changed. Moses, he lived forty years at Pharaoh's court in Egypt, and there is no question but at that time he thought meikle of it to be such a great courtier in such a great king's court. But when once he gat faith to behold Christ and the recompense of reward, he had another thought and estimation of things than before. He esteemed Christ's worst things better than the things that were in Egypt; and so do all those who are indeed converted unto Christ. You count meikle of gold now, but if once you knew what Christ is, you would count it nothing in comparison of Him. If you had once your cheek laid to His sweet cheek, and had one blink of that glorious and beautiful face of His, ye shall then change all your opinions and thoughts that now you have, and you shall cry shame upon all the painted idols in the world, in comparison with fair Jesus, when once you have gotten a sight of the Son of God; and indeed it must be so. This says that natural men they have false counters wherewith they lay their accompts—the natural man has no good arithmetic. See you not what is counted of Christ by the world. Acts 4:11: "This the stone which was set at nought by you builders." Men use to write ciphers for nothing, and so they put Christ for a cipher and counted Him nothing. But counted they so of themselves even in slaying of the Lord of glory? No. They counted themselves wise, for they say, "If we receive this man, the Romans will come upon us and take our nation from us." And the woman of Samaria when He came first to the well, and tells what He could do, she says, "Art Thou greater than our father Jacob who digged the well?" And where laid she Christ in the meantime? She thought Him not so much worth as a drink of cold water. This is the estimation the world has of Christ. And the Papists they have this estimation of Christ; they think themselves and the fathers are worth something, but for Christ and His truth they think it not worth a drink of water to them.

Now where fra comes this, that men in the world count so little of Christ?

Answer: Because there is something broken in them that makes five seem to be seven; there is something wrong in them that makes gold seem to be God. That blind mind that thou hast naturally will never let you see Christ to be Christ. But once come to Christ Himself, and then ye will be put from such thoughts. He will give unto you another sight, that old sight will be put out of the office.

And there is another reason for this. The apostle says of himself (1 Cor. 13:11): "While I was a child I spake as a child," &c. A man, while he is in nature, is no other but a plain bairn; but when once he comes to Christ he becomes an old man, and so his thoughts change. You know what a man of thritty years will think of the nignayes and the clay houses that he was wont to build when he was a bairn. The timber of them would be of loch-reeds, and the theiking of it of leaves of trees, and all these things that they thought meikle of when they were bairns when they hear of them will laugh at themselves, and count nothing of them. Even so is it with a man that is come to Christ, when he is laying his counts he lays down the world and all that is in it for a cipher, and lays down counters for Christ.

A third reason is: A man who is come to Christ he is a man risen from the dead; and what thoughts think you will you have of all things that are here when you see all that is here set on fire together? What will you think of honours, riches, pleasures, &c., when you see the Son of God set down upon a white throne to judge the world, and with your eyes you see all these things consumed and wasted? Will not a man say then that he has been nothing but a fool that set set his heart upon these things that perish so suddenly?

Use First: This serves to let these see who are truly and indeed converted to Christ the first thing that ever they get. See and try if you would know this. If ever you have changed your minds as yet; for that is certain that these whose minds and estimatures are nothing changed, they are never come to Christ yet. Ephraim is brought in saying, "What have I to do any more with idols?" Fra once Israel returns to the Lord, they will have no more to do with idols, nor anything that may provoke Him. If you love the world, your night drinking, your idols of profit, pleasure, ease as well as well as ever ye did, and be raxing your arms after these things, until your sinews be like for to break to compass them about, say what you will, and profess what you will, you have gotten no new thing as yet, ye are not come in grips with Christ, for you lay down Christ and heaven and glory for a cipher, and your court, favour, profit, pleasure, &c., for all things. O! but there be many false arithmeticians in the world, who in laying their compts lay down the world for thousands, but when they come to lay Christ, they lay Him down for a cipher or for a penny. But stay till you begin to count over again, and then you shall be forced to say that you laid a fool's count, that thought so meikle of a clayey world that evanishes, and thought so little of Him that made the world and all things therein and endures for ever.

Use Second: We see that men they must either change their thoughts, or it will be very ill with them in the end. They must change. Their thoughts as well as their practices must be changed. We must be cast into a new mould, otherways we are lost and tint souls. If thou be in Christ thou lookest to pleasant things in the world, as a stranger does to fair meadows, orchards, palaces, coaches, courts, and pleasant countries until he is far afield. He looks to all these things with a sigh, if he love home well, and says: "He had rather be at home in his own country nor have them all." Such is the estimation that those who are in Christ have of the things of the world. He can let out a hearty laughter at all things that are in it; and count nothing of them all, to be at home, in glory with Christ, and with His Father.

"I count all things loss for Christ." Was that a loss to be circumcised, to be of the people of Israel, to be descended of the royal tribe of Benjamin, and to be blameless for the outward things of the law? The apostle tells us by this, that whatever comes betwixt a man and Christ to keep him from a right estimation of Christ, albeit all the brave pasments and gold fuilzie in the world were upon it, it is no other but plain nothing, and we should count so of it. If anything come between me and Christ, whatever it be, away with it. The apostle would say, "The time was when I counted as meikle of these things as they did, but when once I met with Christ, and saw things with daylight"—for the sinner and the man who are in nature see all things with moonlight—then he says of all these things, "I counted them all loss that I might gain Christ" (Matt. 16:26). There is a man pre-supponed there to have gained the whole world; and who is there in the world that has gained, if that man has not gained that has gained the whole world? But it is said of such a man, albeit he should gain—as who yet ever gained it all—yet if in gaining thereof he lose his own soul, he is a loser when all is done (Rom. 10:3). It is said that the Jews which followed after the law of righteousness they attained not unto it, and so they lost by following thereof, for they tint the righteousness of Christ. Whoever follows after something which seems to be theirs, and that they would be at, and then tines Christ by following thereof, such men are losers, get they that which they follow, or get they it not. The works that Papists do to merit by them, they are their loss instead of profit, for they come between them and Christ. Whatever it be, court, honour, or pleasure, or anything else that thou followest, if it come between thee and Christ, thou art a loser in seeking of it. Aye, if it were in seeking that which is spoken of Prov. 1:13, "All precious substance," or seeking that which is spoken of Prov. 7:18, "To fill thyself with love," yet if it come between you and Christ it is loss. And there is good reason it should be so. What is it which makes a man lose in the world? Is it that which is taken out of his rent for a year? Albeit, something be tane away that way, that is not meikle; but if anything be tane away from a man's stock that is it which makes loss. So whatever takes away any of Christ from us, who is our stock, that is loss indeed, and may be justly called loss. And God knows there be many who lose this way. There be many who for winning of court, honour, favour of kings, profit, pleasure, they care not to sell their covenant, and Christ, and His Kirk. And, alas! what winning is there when all is done. God knows there is just nothing. They use to say of merchants, they are rich. But another who knows better will say, Stay till all his counts be fitted, and all his creditors paid, and then you will know whether he be rich or poor. It is even just so here. To get a higher style in the world, to quit thy covenant with God, what winning is there when sinners shall once become sin-sick, and their compts begin to be laid, and they must pay again, all the pleasures that they have gotten that way, and he must vomit it all up again? As it is Job 20:15, and they will see they are losers. You think you are well set up now, if you get riches and honours and pleasures; but stay till the Lord come, and say, "Pay me for all the court, honour, pleasure, &c., that ever you gat;" and there will be a great poverty soon then. Stay till Christ come to crave a count of men and women, how they have spent their talents, and they shall be seen to be very poor. I speak only of one place (Rev. 6:15) for clearing of this point—Kings and great men, rich men, chief captains, and mighty men, they are cited there before the Son of God. And what are their great places and their great wages that they gat worth to them then? They cry out, "Mountains and rocks fall on us, and hide us from the face of the Lamb that sits on the throne, and from His wrath, for the day of His wrath is come, and who shall be able to lose [stand?]." So that there is no loss like unto this loss, for me to lose my country, wife, bairns, &c. So did David these things, and the children of God may lose them. But to lose the precious soul, woe to thee for evermore who does this, for thy loss is never kent till then. Of all the losses in the world that is the most fearful to lose Christ, and so to lose thy own soul.

What is the other part of the apostle's choice, or that which he would be in hands with? "For the superexcellent knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord."

Why says he not for Christ Himself rather than for the superexcellent knowledge of Christ? Christ is one thing, and the superexcellent knowledge of Christ another, and yet in substance both of them are one. There is a great question anent this. What it is that is the greatest happiness of the glorified in heaven, and what it is that is the main happiness of those who are journeyers towards this kingdom? But the happiness both of the one and the other stands in this superexcellent knowledge of Christ. There were very grave and learned men who lived at the time when Paul lived, for it is probable that there went letters between Paul and Seneca, who was a very learned man, and that they conversed one with another. But what counts the apostle to be his superlative knowledge? Even this, to trust and believe in a Saviour slain and despised by the world. There was no wisdom in his accompt like the knowledge of this. And look to this superexcellent knowledge of Christ in three things, and you shall find it to be so.

First: All the wisdom natural men can speak with will never make the thing they speak of go into the heart. All that the moralists in the world can speak of heaven or of hell, all that they can speak of the deformity of vice, and of the beauty and comeliness of virtue, can never make it go into the hearts of men and women. But Christ, when He speaks in the gospel of these things, He can speak into the heart, and speaks daily to the hearts of many, and whoever gets a sight of Christ Himself in the gospel, O! so fair, so excellent as the knowledge of Him will be to them. All the knowledge of all the sovereigns in the world will be nothing to them.

Second: The gospel is superexcellent in the knowledge thereof. Is there no further knowledge of Christ to be had there as Mary's son, a carpenter's son? Yes, He is to be seen there as a plant of renown, as Ezekiel calls Him; as the branch of righteousness as Zachariah calls Him; and as Isaiah says, He is to be seen there as wonderful in His works. There He is miraculous. In His death He is to be seen as life, so that He is a wonder to all to think upon.

Third: Look into Christ's offer in the gospel, and that is also wonderful, and His knowledge is superexcellent in that: To offer a kingdom to all His followers. How long shall it endure? For an hundred thousand years? Aye. It endures for evermore. It lasts for all eternity. Let Christ make an offer of that when it is racked on God's wheel, it would give meikle at such a time to have an interpreter to repeat its own case to it, meikle more if Christ should make this offer to it. Ye shall find also that in this offer there is peace to a troubled conscience, ease to a troubled mind. To offer a kingdom, thus how great a matter is it? Who is there can offer an eternal kingdom but only He? A soul may dream of a kingdom, but none can speak it into the conscience but He who can say, "Come and see." Come therefore to this sacrament with disposed hearts, and set to your nose to the sweet smell of the Son of God, bend your ears to hearken to the offers, and ye shall see and hear superexcellent knowledge there.

The Apostle's Choice

No. II

"The knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ."—PHILIPPIANS 3:8.

HOW like, beloved in our Lord, that the apostle is meeting with a doubt here, in the eighth verse of this chapter, which might seem to rise from that which he has said in the seventh verse thereof. And does the apostle count all his former gain to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus? even all these fair and great privileges that are in so great request among men, and the men who were of his profession they thought no little thing of thir privileges, to be of the seed of Israel, an Hebrew of the Hebrews, come of the royal and kingly tribe, to be for profession a Pharisee, for zeal a persecutor of the Church, touching the righteousness that is of the law blameless. It might have been said to Paul, "Paul, think ye nothing of all these?" The apostle answers to these, ver. 8, and says, "I will eat nothing in of that which I have said, but confirms it." "Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. Yea, also, I count them to be but dung. I count them not worthy the least of my love to take any of it from Him."

The first thing we learn here is, Labour once to win in a way of commendation of Christ, and then His praise shall grow among your hands. Speak once good of Christ into your heart, and ye will not win soon off that text again. The more that you think of Christ, the more will that matter grow among your hands. The more you enter upon thinking of Christ's fulness, the more will you love it. Paul, the longer he speaks of Christ, the higher he grows in estimation of Him, for he said before, "I count all things loss for Christ," but now, "I count them dung for Him, that I may gain Him." Learn to be content to lose all things that ye may get Christ, and if you do so, indeed, you may be sure you shall get Him. You will see this to be true also Cant. 5. When there is a question moved to the Church, the spouse of Christ, "What is her beloved," say they, "more than another beloved?" Compare verse sixth with the sixteenth, and ye will see the answer to be clearly this way. In verse sixth, she answers: "My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand, His head is as the most fine gold, His locks are bushy and black like a raven, His eyes are as the eyes of doves, His cheeks are as a bed of spices," &c. And then, having described Him in all His parts in the sixteenth verse, she says of Him: "He is altogether lovely," and, "therefore wonder not," would she say, "that I make so meikle din for my beloved, for there is nothing in Him, but that which is most desired." And Psa. 73:24: "Thou wilt guide me with Thy counsel, and afterwards receive me to glory." But he goes higher in the next verse: "Whom have I in heaven but Thee, and I desire none in earth beside Thee;" and so still ascends. Isa. 40:7, the prophet, speaking of the Lord's greatness and majesty, says, "All nations before Him are as nothing, and they are counted unto Him to be less than nothing and vanity." So that whoever they be who take themselves to speak of God, or of Christ, in their excellency and glory, if they think rightly of it, they will be dipped over head and ears in it. No created paper and ink are able to describe the Lord as He is. Aye, His word tells not all to us what He is. It is not possible for us to get a copy of Him. Set a thousand worlds of poets to make songs of Christ they could not say the thousandth part of the thing that is true of Him.

Use First: This serves to teach all the ministers of Christ this common place of preaching. Above all things learn this, to put our Lord Jesus high up above all, that so He may be a world's wonder to men and angels: for to speak rawly and caldriffly of Christ, and not to grow continually in the praises of His excellence, is one of the faults of the friends of the Bridegroom.

Use Second: If there be so meikle to be spoken of Him, while we are here, O then, when we come to our Father's house, and shall see Him as He is, face to face, what large thoughts shall there be of Him then, when the thoughts that are of Him in the kingdom of grace are so great! What shall these thoughts be of Him that shall be in the kingdom of glory? What marvel is it that that song of His praises lasts for ever and ever, that they never weary who sing this song, for He will byde all the songs of praise of the glorified. [Why] but we to whom Christ has given pawns this day that He was slain for our sins, what should we do to Him again, but lift Him up high in our praises and put Christ high in His rowme, and everything under Him in their rowme?

Third use: If it be so that our Lord is so high that He can never be enough praised, why is there so meikle din this day in Scotland for adhering to a covenant and for quitting of a covenant? No, the din is not for a covenant or a ceremony, or such a thing is not the main thing that is in controversy in Scotland this day. But whether Christ should be only King and Priest unto His own Kirk to give out laws, or if men should rule there as they please. And this should put all Scotland and all the world to it to hazard for such a glorious Lord as Christ is.

Before the apostle go from this he has a word that is worthy to be observed before we leave it, "Christ Jesus my Lord." When the apostle is speaking of Christ, he must have a kiss of Him to himself by the way, he must of necessity speak something to let his hearers know what he thought of Christ. To teach us this far that whenever we speak of Christ, whenever we preach of Him, or whenever we hear of Him, to strive evermore to apply Him, and to take Him home to ourselves. There be three good reasons of this, why both the apostle and all others with him, they should labour to apply Christ unto themselves when He comes near unto them any way.

First: Because to speak or hear of His name and not to smell of Him thereafter, it is a very great miss when Christ speaks to us and comes to offer Himself to you in the sacrament. When Christ goes away, and has not met with you and thou hast not gotten a kiss of Him, woe! to that person whoever they be, woe! to that soul to whom Christ offers Himself, and they notwithstanding get no good of Him. Christ comes to thy elbows, thy eyes, and thy ears, and all the parts of thy body, and soul; and yet, between you and God, if thou can say, thou has met with Him to day, and woe to them that cannot say it. And this apostle he has reason to speak of Christ, for he knows His worth and excellency (Col. 1), he is speaking a word of Christ there, and having spoken a word for Him, he digresses a little from his text, that he may speak more of Christ (v. 15), "Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature; for by Him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in the earth, visible and invisible," &c. It is even with all of them that has a right estimation of Christ as with them that go unto their coffer and see gold lying there and stay a while tirling it over, they have such pleasure in it. So is it with all those who get a glance of Christ in the Word or the sacraments.

Second: Those who have gotten a sight of Him, they ought to stand still and look more upon Him, for He is well worth looking on. And we who are ministers, if we carry Christ to others, and be gathering in the Lord's bride to Him, should not we ourselves be the better and get our drink silver at the least? Woe! to them that preach Christ to others, whatever they be, and cannot say, "My Lord Jesus Christ."

A Third reason for this is, because wherever Christ is rightly and kindly spoken of, He evermore leaves tokens that He has been there, He leaves some drops of myrrh behind Him, and that makes them speak more to His commendation.

Use: All these who have heard of Christ this day, and have been partaker of Him in the sacrament, let them take something of Christ home with them—sick folk, take home physic with you; blind folk, take home eyes with you; lame folk, take home feet and hands with you; ignorants, take home knowledge with you, for Christ is all in all, and this is indeed to eat and to drink worthily.

Another word. Let us mark of this that the apostle says, "Christ Jesus my Lord." This is a homely word that He speaks, even as if there had been no moe in heaven or in earth who had right to Him. It might have been said to Paul, Is Christ yours more than He is the world's? Yes; but He is common to all believers. Christ is like a ship that is divided among so many owners. The ship belongs to every one of them. Even so David, and Thomas, and His apostles, and all believers have their own property in Christ. And yet, albeit He be a common Saviour to all believers, yet every believer in particular may make Christ his treasure and his portion, and this should hearten us to go in application of Christ to ourselves as ours, and never to rest till we come to that. There is no common thing in the world like unto Christ, for He is free to all believers, even all that are in Him. The saints they have a free heritage that no man has anything to say against it. Where was he that could ever say: "The sun, the moon, the earth were his property"? These things are common to all, and every one is like to scart out other's eyes for them; but having once gotten Christ by faith in thy soul, thou may say of Him, "My Lord and my God;" and O! but thou art rich for evermore who can say this far indeed, and art sure of it.

The apostle he goes on and says: "I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ." The word in the original is, "I have made shipwreck of all things." He says, "I am content to cast away all the gold pasments, all the satins, all the velvets that I had being a Pharisee, and let them tine for Christ. I am content to quit them all, and to let them all go to nothing, to that end that I may make Christ my gain." And the apostle he speaks not here of himself only as an apostle, but he speaks of himself as a believer, and speaks after that manner. Tine what he will, he shall aye keep Christ to the fore. And indeed He is well worthy of His rowme, and woe! is [to] them, and they shall say it one day, Woe! is [to] them for evermore, who cast Christ overboard that they may keep Christ and honour and the world. And there are four sorts of persons who wrong Christ this way.

First: There are some who have even heavy a loadening in already, and so cast Christ overboard, because Christ and that loadening which they have already, cannot agree, and before they quit their other loadening they will quit Christ—1 Tim. 6:9: "They who will be rich fall into divers temptations and snares, and into many hurtful and foolish lusts, which draw men into destruction and perdition." It is not said that they are rich, but they who will be rich. They resolve that they will take in a burden of the world and will sail to heaven with [it]. Nay two ills light upon such.

First: The world and Christ they will never agree together. Your gain, your ease, your credit, your riches, &c., they may well agree with Christ as long as the weather is fair and both go one gate. But stay till the wind change, and it come to that whether you will quit your credit, your gain, your pleasures, &c., or Christ and religion, and it will be seen then, that such take them to the world, and to things thereof, and are content that Christ and religion and a covenant and conscience be all casten overboard. Let them sink or swim rather ere they quit their temporal peace, or ease, or gain. And O! but that be a miserable change.

Again: Where the love of the world and the things thereof carry over high a sail, and are proud of them, He denies to give them grace, for He resists the proud. They content themselves with the outside of religion, and labour not for the power thereof. Alas! Is this holiness enough? to come to the communion, to sit reverently in the kirk, and have no more but that? I grant it is not ill indeed. But if thou hast no more of religion but that, it will be a sail to blow full of wind and blow you into the midst of the sea and drown you. For the Lord He shall seek an account of you for all the occasions of the Word and Sacraments and other exercises of that kind that ye have been at albeit the most part see not this, and shall ask of them, how they have profited by every one of these occasions? and He shall try and search them whether they came in sincerity to seek the Lord in all these exercises, or if their errand was to seek any other thing.

There is a thrid sort of persons that are sailing, but they are sailing close under the water; and these are they who know that they do wrong, and yet notwithstanding, they will go on in that same ill course; and, indeed, if there be a fearful case of impenitence in the world, this is most fearful, to add drunkenness to thrist, and to walk on into the imaginations of their own heart, saying, they shall have peace in so doing. The Lord will not spare such, but the anger of the Lord and His jealousy shall smoke against them. And—

Lastly: There be some that this cancer and ill are into the spirit; they pre-suppone that they have faith, and yet it is but a rotten faith. Look to the faith of many, and it will be found to be thus with them. O woe! to you for evermore, who are beguiled in a matter of such consequence as this. Every man trows that his profession and his grace are good enough, that there is neither crack nor flaw into it, and yet many are deceived. Never man suspected his own gold but it is good enough, and yet many have but brass instead of it. It were meikle better for us in time to try whether we be in the faith or not, than thus to be deceived in a matter of so great importance, for woe! to them for evermore who beguile themselves in such a matter as this, that when they go at that last day to open up their profession, to find out their faith and their grace, and that they find nothing there, but only a show, and a fair glori-flenkun—think you not but this will be a miserable mistake to many? Aye! that it will; and so learn to beware of it.

"All things." What should Paul cast this away and make shipwreck of it, to be of Israel, to be come of the tribe of Benjamin, to be as touching the law a Pharisee, blameless before all men? Answer: Yes; the world and all that is in it is to be casten away, in three cases.

First: The world is to be casten away in so far as it is an idol, and when it will be in Christ's place. In that case cast overboard with it.

Second: If the world will have the yolk of your love, and the heart of it, then the world is not worth the keeping. When the apostle looked upon all other things into the world that he loved, and laid them into the balance, and laid Christ His alone in the other balance, he found Him to be weightier than all, that He far overvalues them all, and sees that he has been no other but a befooled man in setting his heart upon them so long, and so is content to quit them all for gaining Christ.

Third: We must quit the world and the things thereof. If there come a competition between Christ and them, that we must either quit the one or the other, as sometimes there will come terms of competition this way,in foro contradictorio as they say—the matter will be soon decided by one who looks to heaven and to glory that is to be had by adhering to the Son of God, and then looks to the hundreds of all other things. They will say, "To hell with all other things that would hinder me from bruicking the Son of God." "Court, go thy way, and take thy leave, and all the pleasures thereof," Daniel says, "and welcome death, and to be all torn with wild beasts rather ere I quit to speak with God in prayer." "I here write a free resignation of the world and all things therein, rather ere I want a communion that way with heaven. This seems to be a fair spoken word, to quit all things in the world for a communion with Christ. And yet there be four things in Christ that will say that, without exception, all other things should be quit for Him.

First: Look what Christ Himself is—He is all love. He is all essential love, for if the creatures have any good thing in them to draw the heart after them, they have it only from Christ.

Second: See what the Scripture says of the loss of heaven and the loss of other things. Matt. 10:39: "He that findeth his life shall lose it;" Matt. 13:46: "This is the pearl hid, which when a man had found, he went and sold all that he had and bought it." What will buy heaven? If all the angels in heaven were sold, what would they do to the buying of heaven? Ay! albeit there were as many of them as there have fallen drops of rain since the world began, and a thousand times more, they were not all able to buy it. So that there is no loss comparable to the loss of heaven. What reck of the loss of gear, wife, children, country, &c., if thou keep heaven and keep Christ. Thou may then look over thy shoulder and laugh at them, and look to Him who can carry you through the sea dry shod, and will bear you through all difficulties, and at last set you in glory.

The third consideration to make us quit the world for Christ, is in consideration how the Scripture sets Christ above all things both as God and man. First as God (Isa. 40:18) He is set alone: "To whom will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare with Him?" And then as man, He is always alone also both as king, priest, and prophet—Psa. 72: Kings they are put beneath Christ, for they must all fall down before Him. All kings think it an honour to hold Christ's stirrup and acknowledge that to be true which is written of Him—Rev. 19:16: "King of kings and Lord of lords." There was never another gat that style but Himself; and Heb. 10:12: All priests are put under Him and prophets also, for Moses is put down and Christ is put up. And the angels, who are far above any creature, they are all of them put down and Christ is put up. And then, in His power, He passes all other kings. Who is there that has such a cloak to put about him as glory? and who has such chariots at their command as He has? who can say that word which He says, Isa. 50: "I, at My rebuke, dry up the sea; I make the rivers a wilderness: their fish stinketh; … I clothe the heavens with darkness, and I make sackcloth their covering?" Will ye tell me where dwells that king that can draw a web of darkness from the east to the west, so that at midday nothing shall be seen if he please? Where is that king that can dry up the Red Sea at his pleasure? Kings are only kings on land, but they cannot command the sea. They have not the chair which is spoken of Psa. 29: "The Lord has His chair in the seas." That is the Lord's royal chair that belongs to Him only. The Lord He is God of the sea and of the land also, and is another manner of monarch in battle nor poor silly bits of clay are.

And then the last consideration is that there is no benefit of God good unless we get Christ with it.

Let our use of all this be to stir up all these who spend their love, their confidence, their fear, upon the earth and the things thereof, to come here and to ware all upon this one thing; poor bits of needy creatures that fall in love with the world and the things thereof, that are so toom and empty, come here and fall in love with Christ who can furnish you all things whereof you stand in need. O! fools, that they are, who are toomingtheir purse, and yet, for all that, get no bread to stay their hunger. They are reproved for it, Isa. 55: "Wherefore do ye spend your money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which will not satisfy." O! that we could learn to set all our desires upon our lovely Jesus, and learn to find and see all that we desire in Him; as, indeed, all that we can think of is completely in Him. If this were known and believed, certainly we would not so much set our hearts and our affections upon other lovers as now we do.

"And do count them all but dung that I may win Christ." The word that is before is not in the first language here, for the superexcellent knowledge of Christ, as some translate it, but it is for Christ Himself. It tells us this far, that there was no created thing beside Jesus that He was seeking, telling us this also, what it is that is the formal object whereunto the soul looks, and what it would be at. It is not the remission of their sins, or peace of conscience, sanctification, justification, or any of these things that are purchased to us by Christ, but it is Christ Himself they would be at. Look, then, if that be the proper thing whereunto your soul looks, to be in hands with Christ, John 1:2: "To as many as received Him, He gave them power to become the sons of God;" 1 John 5:12: "He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son hath not life." That is the main thing the child of God desires to be in hands with, even with Christ Himself; to be seeking to have a full portion of joy in the Holy Ghost. But seek Christ before that. Conviction of sin may be sought for, but Christ Himself is more. The losing of a hard heart may be sought from Christ, and yet Christ Himself is more, and therefore He should rather be sought. And look unto thir two things, ye will see good reason for it.

First: See what the Lord's covenant says, "I will be thy God and God of thy seed." Abraham he gets that of God in place of all other things. Christ is the only treasure and the only storehouse that the weary traveller can look unto so long as they are on their journey.

Again, all these other things, beside Christ or without Him, they are nothing else but creatures. To seek forgiveness of sin, joy in the Holy Ghost, losing of a hard heart, &c., it is to seek the creature without the Creator. The learned call all these things objectum quo, but Christ is objectum quod. Christ is the only bolster whereon the wearied soul can rest itself. How little think ye would a soul sensible of Christ's presence, or His absence, be affected with anything that they could get, if so be they get not Christ Himself at a communion? It is good, indeed, to get the remission of sins, or strength to walk in His ways; but it is best of all to get Christ Himself. You know whoever marries a bridegroom they put a difference between himself and the rings, jewels, and other propines that are sent by him to her. Now all these things are so, being contradistinguished from Christ Himself. They are the gifts wherewith He pro-pined His bride, and so should love Himself above all these things.

Look unto two or three examples of this preferring Christ to all things else, Cant. 3. See how many the spouse of Christ had there to comfort her, and would not be comforted by any of them, but only by Himself. She was in her bed, and it would be thought her warm bed would comfort her, but it did not. Nor were there any in the streets that could comfort her, neither watchman nor virgins, but she says, "Saw ye Him whom my soul loves," so that she declares that Christ Himself is more to be desired than any other is. And Mary Magdalene (John 20) had odd company with her, five chief apostles. If she had been a Papist, she would have thought it better company to be at the holy grave. Beside these, she had the company of the angels and Christ Himself, but she took Him for the gardener. But all these could not comfort her. The angels and Christ ask her, "Woman, why weepest thou? What ails thee? Hadst thou not good company here, having the disciples, the angels, and the gardener?" But she says, "They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him, that I may take Him away." "A fig for them all!" would she say, "fra I want Christ."

Use: If God would give unto you all created pleasures and big you a Paradise of all created things, yet never be content until ye get Christ Himself. A soul that is sensible of Christ will be like one out of their own element without Christ. O! if thou kent what Christ were would thou count thy cothouse, or some of thy world's goods, or a pint or quart of blood over meikle to quit for Christ? Whoever does so knows not Christ rightly. O! to be in love with Christ and to love Himself for Himself. That would put some moderation upon our sorrow when we go away from the communion, not having so meikle faith, so meikle love, so meikle repentance, so meikle joy, &c., as we would wish having gotten some sense of Christ Himself coming into the soul. O! sound may they sleep the night who have gotten this. Lord, send it to them who want it, and confirm it to them who have gotten any measure of it. And to this, Lord Jesus, to His Father, and to our Father, and the Holy Spirit, be glory and praise for ever and ever.—Amen.

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Eighteen Quaint Sermons by Samuel Rutherford, Copyright © 2019

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