CHAPTER VI: The uses of the foregoing doctrine
banished, that is melancholy, and seeks solitariness, an heath, or a wilderness, as being ashamed to shew his head.
Thus you have seen all creatures reasonable, and of all sorts of them, affected with the thoughts of God's dispensation to his elect, all having an interest in it. That as at Christ's birth all the city of Jerusalem is said to have been moved at it; so are all sorts, both in heaven and in hell, at the new birth of one that hath been a lost sinner, which is that which putteth the notice upon it; whereas the regeneration of elect infants passeth silently: they are still-born, and no such noise made of it.
CHAPTER VI
The uses of the foregoing doctrine.—That they who are brought into a state of grace should always bear in their minds a remembrance of their former state of sin and misery.—That it will have an influence to promote and strengthen their faith.
You have seen God's ends and designs in his disposition toward the elect; and they are great and holy ends, and of as large an extent in their tendency, as in any other dispensation of God to us.
I come now to the uses to be made hereof on our part, which must be such as may answer those ends on God's part. And withal what uses may be made of such a time spent in sinning afore regeneration, may also fitly be turned upon the spirits of those that have had great fits of sinnings in any kind after regeneration. They will serve for both, but I will speak more directly as in relation to the first.
You have run out many years in great sins, or few years in many; look back, and now learn to make an improvement of that waste time in your lives. Men are apt to think that there is no use to be made thereof, especially of so long a time as that of unregeneracy was, in which we all lay. Now the apostle, he would never have exhorted the Ephesians (as you see he doth, Eph. 2:2), to remember what once they were, if there were not many most fruitful and profitable improvements of the consideration of that condition. It is called our
'vain conversation' (so Peter calls it, 1 Peter 1:18). And the apostle Paul saith, Rom. 6:21, 'What fruit had you in those things whereof ye are now ashamed?' But, my brethren, assure yourselves of this, that God would not have left many, yea, most of his children, to so long a time of sinning against him, in which they brought forth no fruit unto him, if that after they were turned unto him there were no ways whereby they should improve, and improve with interest and advantage, all the experiences they had of their sinfulness in that condition. God could have saved you cheaper than by letting you fall into sin at all; it was not for his profit, in a proper and direct way, that those whom he went to save should continue in sin, though but for one moment. He could have saved us, as he did the angels, a cheaper way. He loves his children so well that he would never have it said, that they had so and so dishonoured him, if he had not meant to have more honour (in an indirect way, in the event and issue, when all is summed up), by all that condition of sinning, in which formerly they had lain.
This general exhortation, which is as a foundation to the rest, is to bear all your days in remembrance your sins, and the condition of sin in which you sometimes were. In Eph. 2, the apostle had at large discoursed of the state and nature they had been in, and the close and conclusion he makes of all is, 'Wherefore remember that ye were sometimes Gentiles in the flesh,' &c. There are two things which in the New Testament we are called upon in an especial manner to remember; 1st, The death of our Lord and Saviour Christ, which the sacrament calleth upon us to remember, 'Do this in remembrance of me.' And the 2d is, 'Remember what once ye were,' what your estate
and condition was, and forget it not. There is a third, which is, That thou shouldst 'remember whence thou art fallen, and repent,' which is coincident with this second. Remember, it had need be urged, for we are apt to forget it; yet it is a duty lies upon us: Ezek. 16:22, He had discoursed there, in the former part of the chapter, what their condition was before God took them to be his people. 'Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite,' ver. 3; and so he goes on to mind them of their abominations, 'When thou wast' (saith he) 'in thy blood, I said unto thee, Live.' Now, after he had took them to be his people, when they had gone a-whoring from him, what is it be lays to their charge, especially at ver. 22, that in all their abominations and whoredoms they had not remembered? 'In all thine abominations and whoredoms thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, and wast polluted,' &c. And the not remembering of this, as it is made a great sin, so it is made a special reason why they had fallen from God so much, and so often, after they were his people; even because they remembered not. Every place thou comest in, where thou hast lived before, may put thee in mind of some sin or other, Jer. 3:2, 13. Every member of thy body hath sin written on it. The tongue is a 'world of evil,' thy feet have been swift to carry thee to vanity. The whole body is not able to contain the story of it. As of Christ's holy active life it was said, that all books in the world could not contain the history of them, so the same may be said of thy sins.
But in making the use, or application, I shall chiefly confine myself unto those ends which God had, as in relation to us, in this dispensation. I instanced in two eminent graces in Paul's example, 1
Tim. 1; I shall now present them particularly.
I. The consideration and remembrance thereof may help and further thy faith. It is true, the guilt of many and great sins is in a direct way an opposite and hinderer of faith: it strikes the hand off, and discourageth from laying hold on Christ; yet by God's dispensation,
that turns darkness into light, this may prove a provocative thereto, and an enlarger of it many ways.
1. Unfeigned faith of the operation of God is founded upon selfemptiness and poverty of spirit. If I would seek to move and stir my heart to kindly godly sorrow, I would take into consideration my sinning after conversion, as being committed against so much love, not only borne towards me, but either brought home to my heart, or on which my soul depends alone for its salvation; also against the blood of so gracious a Saviour, not shed only, but relied on, and to which I have daily recourse to have it sprinkled on my conscience; also against that Holy Spirit that dwells in me, and bears with me an unwearied patience. But if I would work my soul up to selfemptiness, I would, with the help of the Spirit, consider my natural condition, and that in two respects.
(1.) There I am sure to find a perfect emptiness of works of righteousness, for it afforded none; no, not in any imperfection. This
(when the sinfulness of such an estate is fully discovered) the heart needs not be taught, it is so apparent. These words, Tit. 3:5, 'Not by works of righteousness which we had done,' come in not here only, but elsewhere, upon this occasion, as taken for granted by all believers that had any insight into that estate, of which the apostle hath pronounced this conclusive sentence: 'So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God,' Rom. 8:8.
(2.) A man looking back thereon may see the vileness of his nature to the full, for it was then that the power of sin remained in its full strength (or to use Paul's phrase, Rom. 7:5), 'had force,' its full force in his members to bring forth fruit to death, which force is now in part broken and slain. A man then laid the reins upon his lust's neck.
A man then committed uncleanness with greediness, πλεονεξίᾳ, such as he could never have enough of. And it is the greediness, the unsatisfiedness, and eagerness of a man's lusts in sinning, humbles more than the outward action. A man may, by the course he then held, see what a dragon that serpent would have proved; but now
Christ hath trodden on his head, to keep him from ever growing again.
(3.) A man consulting that, may be convinced of his utter inability to help himself, and of his want of power to believe. Take any man, and he will easily be brought to acknowledge that he hath so much guilt of sin, as needs a mediator to God for him; and that it is necessary that he go to him, if he will have benefit by him. But yet still he flatters his heart with this, that he hath power to believe and lay hold on him; otherwise men would not dare to defer to believe and repent, if they took not this for granted, and were not encouraged by such an opinion. But when a man comes to see his natural condition, he sees himself without strength, plunged into misery, and unable for ever to help himself, and that there is not only need that God would graciously provide a mediator, a sacrifice for him (as Abraham said,
Gen. 22:8), but that God must as well give him faith to go unto Christ, as give Christ himself, and must find him hands to lay hold of him withal. And this also the apostle regards as a granted principle in believers' hearts, from a sight of their natural condition, Eph. 2. For having said they had been by nature dead in sins, he concludes, ver.
8, 'By grace ye are saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.' After conversion, a man finds himself quickened, through the Spirit and the new creature stirring in him; but he was afore utterly dead in sins and trespasses. There is nothing gives a more perfect experience of this inability than that estate. Let the soul remember but that, and he must needs remember he wanted all ability to any good.
(4.) This, and this alone, teacheth a man one lesson (and it is one of the highest in faith's school) which but for the experiences hereof, a man would hardly, if ever, learn; and that is, that whenever a man puts forth an act of faith for justification, and comes to Christ for it, he should look upon himself as an ungodly person, and to be so in himself for ever. This is made the very genius, and the spirit of faith:
Rom. 4:5, 'But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness,' and no
other. Now after a man is once converted to God, although he is a sinful man in many respects, yet in that state he is not an ungodly, but really and truly a godly man. Doth the apostle then intend this speech of the first act of faith, which a man puts forth when he first believed only, that then indeed this acting faith was such as wherein looking upon himself as an ungodly person, in respect of all his former condition, he then came to Christ and God under such apprehensions of himself to be justified notwithstanding, looking on himself as a person utterly ungodly? Now, suppose the apostle had spoken it in respect of that first act of faith only, a man could not have had an experimental sense of his being, or having been ungodly, but by means of having lived in such an estate, wherein he had been both a sinner and also ungodly. But further, the apostle here speaks of the faith of a believer, which he continues to put forth from first to last; and his scope is to describe the whole of that faith all along, which in point of justification a believer lives by: which is evident, both [1.] By the instance he is alleging for his proof, which is the instance of Abraham. Abraham was not justified by works (ver. 2), therefore not we. 'For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness,' ver. 4, 5, as shewing and expounding what manner of act of faith that was which Abraham our father put forth. It was clearly this': he believed on him, or on God as justifying the ungodly, and so in believing looked upon himself under the consideration of an ungodly person. Now if indeed this act of faith in Abraham, which the apostle hath recourse to, had been that which at his first calling and conversion he put forth, then this speech of the apostle concerning this faith must have been limited to that first act of faith. But if it prove that that act of faith the apostle quotes of Abraham was that faith he put forth many years after he had first believed, then it must necessarily be understood that Abraham, after ho was converted, in believing for righteousness looked upon himself as ungodly. He had no eye to works no more than at the very first. Now it proves to be thus indeed; for it is in the 15th of Genesis that you find this first said of Abraham's faith,
whereas Abraham had been converted and a believer many years before; for Gen. 12:1–3, you read of Abraham's call out of his own country, when yet he believed: Heb. 11:8, 'By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place he after received, obeyed.' So then
Abraham, in believing, for ever looked on himself as ungodly.
[2.] The apostle's scope all along is, to assert the doctrine of justification by faith only, as well after conversion as in conversion, and how that in believing a man looks not at work or at himself as working, but eyes God under this consideration, as one that justifies a person, though ungodly; and upon those terms cometh to God for justification. And therefore justification (says he) is not by works, for they are a contradiction to the very formalis subjectum,* or that formalis ratio of a person to be justified, which true faith hath in its eye; for it both considers the person to be justified as not working, yea, as ungodly. And the formal consideration it hath of God, or under which it eyeth him, is, that he is a God justifying the ungodly.
Now if this be the nature, the tendency of faith as justifying, then, says the apostle, it is impossible to be justified at all by works; but if we are justified, it must be by faith. For by this faith excludes works in the very formalis ratio of the subject to be justified, who is one that worketh not, and in the formalis ratio of the object it eyes, the person justifying, God justifying the ungodly. And therefore we may be said to be justified by faith all along, after conversion as well as before we are; 'for the just live by faith,' and the righteousness of God is still revealed from faith to faith, as he had shewn in the beginning of his discourse: chap. 1 ver. 17, 'For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, The just shall live by faith.' Then it must be after conversion as well as before that the faith of a believer doth in some true and real perspective or other look upon himself as ungodly, and as having no works at all; and for every apprehension of faith the believer must look on himself as ungodly. Faith and truth are the nearest of kin of all things else; therefore that which God would have me believe must have the greatest and clearest truth in it. Therefore this must remain
a certain and irrefragable truth, that after conversion a man may be said to be an ungodly person. And how can this be? Why, it is no way solvable but by this, that a man having once been an ungodly person, and in such an estate he is to look upon himself, as in himself, for ever as such, when he comes to be justified. In the 2 Cor. 12:5, you have Paul distinguishing concerning himself: 'I knew a man in Christ: of him I will glory, yet of myself I will not glory;' yet this man was himself, that same one individual Paul. So then Paul in Christ is differing in his own eye from Paul in himself. Thus here a believer is taught this strange distinction, to acknowledge himself as in Christ to be a new creature, a person godly, but yet to turn the other end of the prospective, and view himself as in himself to be an ungodly person, utterly ungodly. And if he will at any time present himself afore
God's throne for justification, he must plead sub formâ impii, as our law says in another case, sub formâ pauperis. He must appear in his unregenerate rags, or rather nakedness, as a person abominable, cast out, and weltering in all his blood; for God as justifying regards nothing at all that difference, which yet himself hath made; of godly and ungodly,—godly since regeneration, and ungodly afore,—but looks upon the man as environed with the guilt of both estates, and so having been once godly;* as one that is in that court to be adjudged, reckoned so still. It is not a man's new godliness takes away the guilt of his ungodliness, but it is only God's imputing a righteousness to him that is none of his own. Now look how God, as justifying, looks upon things; so will God have faith, as justifying, to view things also. And therefore when faith comes afore a justifying
God, it must lay aside the thoughts of its own works; though it have never so many to plead in its own court, yet it must fall down and acknowledge (as they at the altar did), 'A Syrian ready to perish was my father;' and an ungodly person I was once, and am still, as in the guilt thereof ready to perish, and as in thy sight (O Lord) I present myself afore thee as such; and I cast myself upon thee to justify me, not as now godly and converted, but as ungodly, for so I was once, and am ever so to be reckoned, in myself considered. And this is clearly the faith we first brought to God when we first believed; this is the faith we live by, and this is the faith we are to die in. And so as
justification in God is one uniform act, actus individuus, as divines speak, so hereby it comes to pass that faith (take it as it justifies) is also an act of one kind, uniform, constant, and like itself, both at first, at last, and all along; it is 'A believing on God, that justifies the ungodly,'
Now faith would not have a ground for such an apprehension, unless a man had been sometimes in such a condition wherein he was utterly ungodly; and experience of that estate, by having passed some time of a man's life therein, helpeth faith to think, yea, formeth in the heart the thought of this condition. Take John Baptist, sanctified in the womb, who grew up to actual faith after, yet he apprehended, though not by experience, yet from the word, as David also did, that in his conception he was utterly ungodly, nothing but flesh. But if a man hath found himself to live in such an estate some years, and hath been convinced of it, then experience helps faith, and teacheth it this so hard lesson, than which there is none harder in the school of Christ. And this Abraham was taught by occasion, that himself had lived in such a condition afore his call, having been brought up in idolatry in his father's house: 'for they served other gods,' saith the Holy Ghost, Josh. 24:2, speaking conjunctively of Terah, Nahor, and Abraham. And therefore in God's call of him the words run thus:
Gen. 12:1, 'Get thee from thy father's house;' that is, leave their sins and ways, as Ps. 45, in God's speaking to the church, that phrase is in like manner included. Now hence it was that Abraham ever after, when he came to believe, first looked upon himself as in the guilt of this estate. I was an idolater, might Abraham say, and would have been so still; therefore I believe on thee, O Lord, who justifiest not Abraham as religious, but Abraham the idolater. I reckon not myself by what through thy grace I am, but what but for thy grace I should have been. Paul speaks of himself,' I wag a blasphemer once,' and I reckon myself so still; and all the sermons I have made, it was not I, but the grace of God in me. Take the I, and put nothing but blasphemy, persecution, and all concupiscence to it, for this I consisteth of nothing else. And the sense of this caused Paul to say, 'I know nothing by myself, yet I am not hereby justified,' 1 Cor. 4:4;
that is, suppose I did know nothing by myself since conversion, yet I know so much by myself before as it would never justify me. But as to that point, the faith I live by is to believe on him that justifies the ungodly. So then the experience of such a former estate of sin helps that part of faith which consists of self-emptiness.
2. As this dispensation of God layeth a foundation for that private part of faith, self-emptiness, so it is sanctified by God as a help and promoter of faith in its positive acts.
(1.) Faith, as ye know, lies in a confidence (as the apostle expresseth it) in an adventuring to cast my soul on Christ for salvation. Now if a man hath adventured upon some uncouth doubtful way, and found success and issue therein, he is emboldened to attempt the like with more resolution, especially in some special desperate case; he made such or such an attempt, and it succeeded. Now, when thou at first conversion sawest thyself (I speak especially to such) as to the time past of thy life to have continued in a lost and undone condition, and foundest thyself hopeless and helpless in respect of any power or qualification in thyself that might stand thee in any stead, tell me, was it not a bold adventure to begin first to believe? It is certain the first act of faith that any man doth put forth (and every man had a beginning) was the boldest adventure in the world; that thus thou, a soul guilty of nothing but ungodliness, and so much ungodliness for time past, shouldst stretch forth thy impure hand (perhaps trembling when thou didst it) to touch him that is the Holy One of God; to dare so much as to think with thyself, he may yet love me, pardon me, and be my husband, was the boldest adventure which thou couldst make.
And yet God drew, and persuaded thy heart to come to him with such a purpose and aim of spirit, which venturous act of thine he seconded with easing, quieting, and pacifying thy heart; stilling and commanding the waves, that were coming in upon thy soul, to be quiet for the present; yea, perhaps owning thy soul with leaving some impressions and intimations of his love and grace inclining towards thee. Now then, here is the improvement of this experience. I would have thee (the greatest venture being already borne) be bold to
reiterate the same act of faith continually, which thou mayest now do with more steadiness and freedom of spirit than when thou didst first believe. It is a phrase peculiar in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chap. 3:14, 'To hold fast the beginning of our confidence stedfast to the end;' as if he had said, your first onset and attempt, your beginning to venture upon Christ, was an act of daring; do but hold fast and renew the same, which you have greater encouragement to do, if by no other, even by this, that you know what it is to begin.
Consider, thy faith at first act of believing had no experience of its own to hearten it, as Adam and Eve had not when the promised seed was first preached; but now faith hath had some experience, if never so small, at one time or other; then believe again and again, and hold fast thy confidence unto the end.
(2.) Yea, the consideration of this may help thee in the worst and highest temptation that can befall thee, for usually the devil's worst, or the worst he is permitted to speak of thee to thyself, is to terrify thee with this, that thou art still an ungodly creature in thy natural condition; and he well knows how terrible the fear of that is to a poor believing soul. Well, but yet such a desperate plunge is not usual with thee; if thou wouldst speak truth, thou art seldom brought so low, thus to conclude, or to sit down so persuaded of thyself, though full of doubts and suspicions. Yet usually when thou hast cast up all, thou darest not say God hath wrought nothing yet saving on thy heart.
Well, but suppose Satan hath overthrown thee in all suits and pleas, and thou art reduced to this, I am yet after all this an ungodly person; do thou but yet strengthen thy weak knees, and if thou canst not walk, creep to Jesus Christ and say, What I was bold to do at first, I will do still; if I be driven back to that point from whence I launched forth into the vast ocean of free grace at first, having neither sail nor compass, I will to sea again; and as I ventured then, I will do so still. And though I have missed hitherto, yet there was a time when ungodly Abraham, ungodly Paul, &c., began first to believe, and to believe on God, as one that justifies persons ungodly.
It is not disproportions of greater or lesser ungodliness that makes
any difference. If thou wert more ungodly than thou wast at first (which yet thou art not), it matters not with God.
(3.) In the temptation about fears of perseverance or falling away, the consideration hereof may help thee. Thou hast corruptions break forth within thee, and thou fearest they one day will undo thee, and are apt to think, Will God bear with me to the end? Well, but remember how disobedient thou once wert, committing sin with greediness, which now thou canst not do, a seed of God remaining in thee, which God upholds in thy heart, as a spark in the sea, that thou canst not sin as thou wert wont. It is certain thou art not worse in that respect than thou wert in that estate of ungodliness once; then reason thus with thyself, If God then loved me so, and loves his people so whilst in that condition, as he in the end pulled me forth of that estate, will not this his love more easily be induced to preserve and keep me in this estate I yet stand in? Yes surely, Rom. 5:10, 'For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son; much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.'
Do thou now then but make the comparison between the one estate and the other. Thou never earnest at him then, nor didst anything for him, and yet he received thee, but now thou camest every day to him, and he reduceth, and brings thee back again. And consider further, that God, during all the time of thy unregeneracy, had all that while thou wert running on in sin, a time in his eye, in which he would bring thee home unto himself, and relieved himself (as it were) with this, Well, let him now take his swing, I shall have him shortly on his knees for all this, and he shall come home by 'weeping cross,' and seek unto me for grace and holiness, with the same eagerness he now pursues his pleasures. So now consider, though thy spirit by fits runs out into bold evils against him, and corruptions break forth in thee, that yet God doth, and can much more easily relieve himself about thee now, than he did before. He says with himself, Well, there is a time a-coming shortly, in which I shall take him up to myself, and sanctify him fully, and present him without spot and wrinkle afore myself, Eph. 5:27; it is but bearing with these trifling miscarriages and breakings forth a little space, I did forbear him much more afore
when he did nothing but sin, and never sought to me in earnest or seriously, nor had I one jot of service from him all that while; but now, though he thus sins, yet I get now and then a lively broken prayer of him, I see his heart is with me notwithstanding, and he is never quiet till he comes to me again, and but half his heart and consent is in the sinning, and my free grace is honoured in him in pardoning of him; and though I honour not myself so much in keeping him altogether free, yet he never comes to be as bad as afore conversion in respect of the frame of his heart in sinning. Surely then, says God, as I bore with him then, and said his day of conversion is a-coming; so I will bear with him now, as a father doth with his son that serves him, for I see a day of his being made perfectly holy is a-drawing near, and it is but my waiting till that change shall come. Do thou relieve thyself with these thoughts too, and help thy faith with this also, that he that gave at first so great and fatal a blow to thy corruptions, and so sensibly deaded all thy desires to the world and the pleasures of sin, that thou foundest them as dead drink to thy stomach which had lost its spirit, and wrought so great a change in thee then, the same God will at the day of thy death
(which is the next great day when thy change shall come) give all thy sins a final blow, and an eternal death's wound. Thou hast found the one in part, and trust him thou shalt find the other. 'Wait' (as Job says) 'till this great change shall come,' whereof that other was a beginning and a pledge, and of the two the greater.
(4.) Lastly, the remembrance and consideration of such an estate may serve, and is sanctified by God, to quicken a believer, and to take the faster hold of Jesus Christ. And although the strength with which we believe is wholly and entirely from the Spirit, and put into the soul by him who is said to 'strengthen us in the inner man,' Eph.
3:16, yet he useth apt, and suitable, and fit motives by and with which he conveys it, and conveys it answerably to the fitness, strength, and force that is in such motives to work upon an intelligent nature. Now, among all the considerations that are like to thrust and push on a man's soul to take hold on Christ with violence, and that may quicken him in his way to the city of refuge, even when