Chapter 12: True and False Conversions the favor of God? He may just as well desire the conversion of souls, and labor to promote it, from motives purely selfish.
To glorify God; the true saint because he loves to see God glorified, and the deceived person because he know that is the way to be saved. The true convert has his heart set on the glory of God, as his great end, and he desires to glorify God as an end, for its own sake.
The other desires it as a means to his great end, the benefit of himself.
To repent. The true convert abhors sin on account of its hateful nature, because it dishonors God, and therefore he desires to repent of it. The other desires to repent, because he knows that unless he does repent he will be damned.
To believe in Jesus Christ. The true saint desires it to glorify God, and because he loves the truth for its own sake. The other desires to believe, that he may have a stronger hope of going to heaven.
To obey God. The true saint that he may increase in holiness; the false professor because he desires the rewards of obedience.
7. They may agree not only in their desires, but in their resolutions. They may both resolve to give up sin, and to obey God, and to lay themselves out in promoting religion, and building up the kingdom of Christ; and they may both resolve it with great strength of purpose, but with different motives.
8. They may also agree in their designs. They may both really design to glorify God, and to convert men, and to extend the kingdom of Christ, and to have the world converted; the true saint from love to God and holiness, and the other for the sake of securing his own happiness.
One chooses it as an end, the other as a means to promote a selfish end.
They may both design to be truly holy; the true saint because he loves holiness, and the deceived person because he knows that he can be happy in no other way.
9. They may agree not only in their desires, and resolutions and designs, but also in their affection towards many objects.
They may both love the Bible; the true saint because it is God's truth, and he delights in it, and feasts his soul on it; the other because he thinks it is in his own favor, and is the charter of his own hopes.
They may both love God; the one because he sees God's character to be supremely excellent and lovely in itself and he loves it for its own sake; the other because he thinks God is his particular friend, that is going to make him happy for ever, and he connects the idea of God with his own interest.
They may both love Christ. The true convert loves his character; the deceived person thinks he will save him from hell, and give him eternal life and why should he not love him?