CHAPTER XXXI.—Means of proving and evidencing to our souls that God is our God
worldly things, how do we cherish hopes upon little grounds! if there shineth never so little hope of gain or preferment, we make after it: why then should we forsake our own mercy, which God offers to be our own, if we will embrace it, having such certain grounds for our hope to rest on?
It was the policy of the servants of Benhadad to watch if any word of comfort fell from the king of Israel, and when he named Benhadad his brother, they catched presently at that, and cheered themselves, 1
Kings 20:33. Faith hath a catching quality at whatsoever is near to lay hold on. Like the branches of the vine, it windeth about that which is next, and stays itself upon it, spreading further and further still. If nature taught Benhadad's servants to lay hold upon any word of comfort that fell from the mouth of a cruel king, shall not grace teach God's children to lie in wait for a token that he will shew for good to them? How should we stretch forth the arms of our faith to him, that 'stretcheth out his arms all the day long to a rebellious people!' Isa. 65:2. God will never shut his bosom against those, that in an humble obedience fly unto him. We cannot conceive too graciously of God. Can we have a fairer offer, than for God in Christ to make over himself unto us? which is more than if he should make over a thousand worlds. Therefore our chief care should be first by faith to make this good, and then to make it useful unto us, by living upon it as our chiefest portion, which we shall do: 1, By proving God to be our God in particular; 2, By improving of it in all the passages of our lives.
CHAPTER XXXI.—Means of proving and evidencing to our souls that God is our God 1. Now we prove it to our souls, that God is ours, when we take him at his offer, when we bring nothing but a sense of our own emptiness with us, and a good conceit of his faithfulness and ability to do us
good, when we answer God in the particular passages of salvation, which we cannot do, till he begins unto us. Therefore if we be God's, it is a certain sign that God is ours. If we choose him, we may conclude he hath chosen us first: 'if we love him, we may know that he hath loved us first,' 1 John 4:19. If we apprehend him, it is because he hath apprehended us first. Whatsoever affection we shew to God, it is a reflection of his first to us. If cold and dark bodies have light and heat in them, it is because the sun hath shined upon them first.
Mary answers not Rabboni till Christ said Mary to her, John 20:16. If we say to God, I am thine, it is because he hath first said unto us,
Thou art mine; after which, the voice of the faithful soul is, 'I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine,' Cant. 6:3.* We may know God's mind to us in heaven, by the return of our hearts upwards again to him; only as the reflected beams are weaker than the direct, so our affections, in their return to God, are far weaker than his love falling upon us. God will be to us whatsoever we make him by our faith to be. When by grace we answer his condition of trusting, then he becomes ours to use for our good.
2. We may know God to be our God when we pitch and plant all our happiness in him, when the desires of our souls are towards him, and we place all our contentment in him. As this word my is a term of appropriation springing from a special faith, so it is a word of love and peculiar affection, shewing that the soul doth repose and rest itself quietly and securely upon God. Thus David proves God to be his God, by early seeking of him, by thirsting, and longing after his presence, and that upon good reason, 'because God's lovingkindness was better to him than life,' Ps. 63:1, 2, 3, &c. This he knew would
'satisfy his soul as with marrow and fatness.' So St Paul proved Christ to be his Lord, by 'accounting all else as dung and dross in comparison of him,' Phil. 3:8.
Then we make God our God, and set a crown of majesty upon his head, when we set up a throne for him in our hearts, where self-love before had set up the creature above him; when the heart is so unloosed from the world, that it is ready to part with anything for
God's sake, giving him now the supremacy in our hearts, and bringing down every high thought, in captivity to him; making him our trust, our love, our joy, our delight, our fear, our all; and whatsoever we esteem or affect else, to esteem and affect it under him, in him, and for him; when we cleave to him above all, depending upon him as our chief good, and contenting ourselves in him, as all-sufficient to give our souls fit and full satisfaction; when we resign up ourselves to his gracious government, to do and suffer what he will, offering ourselves and all our spiritual services as sacrifices to him; when faith brings God into the soul as ours, we not only love him, but love him dearly, making it appear that we are at good terms with God, we are at a point for other things. How many are there that will adventure the loss of the love of God for a thing of nothing, and redeem the favour of men with the loss of God's!
Certain it is, whatsoever we esteem, or affect most, that, whatsoever it be in itself, yet we make it our god—Amor tuus, Deus tuus. The best of us all may take shame to ourselves herein in that we do not give God his due place in us, but set up some idol or other in our hearts above him.
When the soul can without hypocrisy say, My God, it engageth us to universal and unlimited obedience. We shall be ambitious of doing that which may be acceptable and well pleasing to him; and, therefore, this is prefixed as a ground before the commandments, enforcing obedience. 'I am the Lord thy God,' therefore 'thou shalt have no other gods before me,' Exod. 20:3, whomsoever else we obey, it must be in the Lord, because we see a beam of God's authority in them; and it is no prejudice to any inferior authority, to prefer God's authority before it, in case of difference one from the other. Nemini fit injuria cui praponitur Deus.
When we know we are a peculiar people, we cannot but be 'zealous of good works,' Tit. 2:14. 'If I be a Father, where is mine honour?' Mal.
1:6. Special relations are special enforcements to duty.
4. The Spirit of God, which knows the deep things of God and the depths of our hearts, doth reveal this mutual interest betwixt God and those that are his, it being a principal work of the Spirit to seal this unto the soul, by discovering such a clear and particular light in the use of means, as swayeth the soul to yield up itself wholly to God.
When we truly trust, we may say with St Paul, 'I know whom I have trusted,' 2 Tim. 1:12; he knew both that he trusted, and whom he trusted. The Spirit of God, that reveals God to be ours, and stirs up faith in him, both reveals this trust to our souls, and the interest we have in God thereby. 'The Lord is my portion, saith my soul,' Lam.
3:24; but God said so to it first. If instinct of nature teaches dams to know their young ones, and their young ones them, in the midst of those that are alike, shall not the Spirit of God much more teach the soul to know its own father? As none knows what is in man, but the spirit of man, so none knows what love God bears to those that are his, but the Spirit of God in his. All the light in the world cannot discover the sun unto us, only it discovers itself by its own beams. So all the angels and saints in heaven cannot discover to our souls the love that is in the breast of God towards us, but only the Spirit of God, which 'sheds it into our hearts,' Rom. 5:5. The Spirit only teaches this language, My God. It is infused only into sanctified hearts; and, therefore, ofttimes mean men enjoy it, when great, wise, and learned persons are strangers to it, Mat. 11:25.
5. The Spirit when it witnesseth this to us is called 'the Spirit of adoption,' Rom. 8:15, and hath always accompanying of it a spirit of supplication, whereby with a familiar, yet reverend* boldness, we lay open our hearts to God as a dear father. All others are strangers to this heavenly intercourse. In straits they run to their friends and carnal shifts, whereas an heir of heaven runs to his Father, and tells him of all.
6. Those that are God's, are known to be his by special love-tokens that he bestows upon them, as,
(1.) The special graces of his Spirit. Princes' children are known by their costly jewels, and rich ornaments. It is not common gifts, and glorious parts that set a character upon us to be God's, but grace to use those gifts, in humility and love, to the glory of the giver.
(2.) There is in them a suitableness and connaturalness of heart to all that is spiritual, to whatsover hath God's stamp upon it, as his truth and his children, and that because they are his. By this likeness of disposition, we are fashioned to a communion with him. Can two walk together and not be agreed? It is a certain evidence that we are
God's in Christ, if the Spirit of God hath wrought in us any impression like unto Christ, who is the image of his Father. Both
Christ looking upon us, and our looking upon Christ by faith, as ours, hath a transforming and conforming power.
(3.) Spiritual comforts in distress, such as the world can neither give, nor take away, shew that God looks upon the souls of his with another eye, than he beholdeth others. He sends a secret messenger that reports his peculiar love to their hearts. He knows their souls, and feeds them with his 'hidden manna,' Rev. 2:17. The inward peace they feel is not in freedom from trouble, but in freeness with God in the midst of trouble.
(4.) Seasonable and sanctified corrections, whereby we are kept from being led away by the error of the wicked, shew God's fatherly care over us as his. Who will trouble himself in correcting another man's child? yet we oftener complain of the smart we feel, than think of the tender heart and hand that smites us, until our spirits be subdued; and then we reap the quiet fruit of righteousness. Where crosses work together for the best, we may know that we love God, Rom.
8:28, and are loved of him. Thriving in a sinful course is a black mark of one that is not God's.
7. Then we make it appear that God is our God, when we side with him, and are for him and his cause in ill times. When God seems to cry out unto us, 'Who is on my side, who?' 2 Kings 9:32; then if we
can say as those in Isaiah, whereof one says, 'I am the Lord's, and another calls himself by the name of Jacob, and another subscribes with his hand unto the Lord,' Isa. 44:6, it is a blessed sign. Thus the patriarchs and prophets, apostles and martyrs, were not ashamed of God, and God was not ashamed to own them. Provided that this boldness from God proceed not only from a conviction of the judgment, but from spiritual experience of the goodness of the cause, whereby we can justify in heart what we justify in words. Otherwise men may contend for that with others, which they have no interest in themselves. The life must witness for God as well as the tongue. It is oft easier for corrupt nature to part with life rather than with lust.
This siding with God, is with a separation from whatsoever is contrary. God useth this as an argument to come out of Babylon, because we are his people: 'Come out of her, my people,' Rev. 18:4.
Religion is nothing else but a gathering and a binding of the soul close to God. That fire which gathers together the gold, separates the dross. Nature draws out that which is wholesome in meats, and severs the contrary. The good that is to be had by God, is by cleaving to him, and him only. God loves an ingenuous and full protestation, if called to it. It shews the coldness of the times when there is not heat enough of zeal to separate from a contrary faith. God is a jealous
God, and so we shall find him at last. When the day of severing comes, then they that have stood for him, shall not only be his, but his treasure, and his jewels, Mal. 3:17.
There is none of us all but may some time or other fall into such a great extremity, that when we look about us, we shall find none to help us: at which time we shall throughly know, what it is to have comfort from heaven, and a God to go unto. If there be anything in the world worth labouring for, it is the getting sound evidence to our souls that God is ours. What madness is it to spend all our labour to possess ourselves of the cistern, when the fountain is offered to us? O beloved, the whole world cannot weigh against this one comfort, that God is ours. All things laid in the other balance, would be too light. A moth may corrupt, a thief may take away that we have here, but who