CHAPTER VII: The same continued
his knees would else grow feeble, that which is very powerful is the view and prospect of an unregenerate condition, and the sins thereof, like an army sent out to attach him, to course him, and to make him throw and plunge himself into the water-brook, as the hunted hart more furiously, when standing still and lifting up his ears, he winds, and hears the cries of all his sins that trace his blood. When a man shall see and consider, If I be not found in Christ, then not only all the sins I have committed since I knew God, but all the bold and bloody transgressions of my youth, the sins which I have vomited up, shall call me owner and author of them, and I am then still the miserable subject of them; the vast and thorough prospect of all this, ever and anon taken in, drives the soul with the more eager vehemence upon Christ. Or as a man hanging upon a high tree or pinnacle, having underneath him a gulf of all miseries, as suppose heaps of toads, and serpents, or ravenous beasts, that lie gaping in a deep pit, ready to prey upon him, and devour him, if he should let go his hold and fall down again amongst them (of which he is sensible, having lately scrambled forth of it, and got up upon that tree of life and preservation); the frightful view and prospect will cause him to make as sure hold as possibly he can, and to renew his hold again and again, and not to hold with one hand, but with both, entwining his arms and legs and his whole body about that tree, embracing it for preservation, as well as for the pleasant fruit that grows upon it; so it is here in this case too.
CHAPTER VII
The second use we should make of the review of that wretched, sinful state out of which God removes us by the work of his grace, is to have our hearts affected with the sense of God's extraordinary love manifested herein, and to excite and
heighten our love to God by the consideration of this his great love to us.
II. A second main improvement of the remembrance of thy former condition is to intend and heighten thy love to God. This is that second particular which Paul instanceth in 1 Tim. 1 as the redound and consequent of having been injurious in his former condition.
Grace was abundant in love (says he); that is, grace made this advantage thereof, to cause me to love God the more. And this is also the spirit of that saying, 'Mary loved much, because much was forgiven her,' Luke 7:47. Christ founds his reasoning upon two things.
1. God's usual dispensation, which is, that where lie leaves one to many sins, and long to continue in them, when he converts him, he works in him more love to himself; and on the contrary, where fewer sins have been, there is less love. For to assert the truth of this, Christ turns it both ways; for it follows, 'To whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.'
2. Christ founds his reason upon this, that where God shews more love, he works and draws forth more love to himself again. God chose us to be 'holy afore him in love.' It was the end of his choice, and the aim of his love. And as he makes it an agreement that he loved us first, so he will not bate the least grain, degree, or proportion of love, but he will have use for it; and those whom he loves most, he will cause their hearts to love him more in the end. Now God shews love in this life in no dispensation more—(I do not say only, or most by this, yet in none more)—for, as I shewed you, his end in it was to set forth grace, mercy, and love. And therefore, when he hath effectually wrought upon a soul that had lain in such an estate, he makes the heart sensible of more love from himself, and so draws love forth out of the heart again. Est magnes magni magnus amoris amor: 'Love is the loadstone of love,' and draws according to the measure of the virtue and spirit that is in it. When did Christ ask Peter, 'Lovest thou
me?' John 21:17, &c., but then, when he had denied him, when he first met with him after it. And it is observed, that as Peter had denied him thrice, so Christ asked him thrice, 'Peter, dost thou love me?' Christ expects a proportion of love from Peter to his own love shewn in pardoning of him. And as for this converting love of God, when fully considered, whom indeed would not such a love move?
Think how, during thy unregenerate condition, God lay in ambushment for thee, to environ thee about, and then overcame thy heart with loving-kindness. Think how during all that time thou hadst not one good thought of God (Ps. 10, 'God was not in all thy thoughts'), that yet God's heart and thoughts continually have been upon thee, thinking nothing but thoughts of peace to thee, and not of evil, Jer. 29:11. Thou wert written upon his heart and the palm of his hands all that time thou didst nothing else but write and score up sins against him. You may observe (for it is worth it), how out of this disposition of heart in God, the Holy Ghost cannot forbear bringing in the mention of Saul in the history of his life and actions, again and again before his conversion, as one he had his eye upon whilst he was a persecutor: Acts 7:58, 'The witnesses,' knowing his zeal, 'laid their clothes down at a young man's feet called Saul,' who was consulting
Stephen's death, Acts 22:20; his hand was in the murder of the first martyr. I saw thee then, said God to him when he converted him; and if he tells us of it, he told himself much more. And again, you have it again repeated in ver. 3 of that chapter, 'As for Saul' (he stood in God's eye more, and God all that while took more notice of what he did than of all other men), 'he made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and haling men and women, committed them to prison.' And as he said of Sennacherib, 2 Kings 19:27, 'I have known thy abode, thy going out, and coming in, and thy rage against me;' so he shews he did take notice of Saul all that while, but with a differing intention. As he relieved himself against Sennacherib's rage and tumult, that he would put a hook in his nose, and a bridle in his lips
('And I will turn thee back by the way which thou camest,' ver. 29), so God did all that while please himself with the thoughts of his purposes towards this Saul; that the time would shortly come, that he should have him come in as fast, and with as much holy violence,
to seek mercy from God, as ever he had gone forth against him; that he should see him in the pulpit preaching the doctrine he now destroyed; that he should have a hook, a cord of love to strike into his heart and draw him back again; and that he had appointed the instant moment when he would throw it at him, just when he was going to Damascus. And God, out of his love, pleased himself as much with the thought of this aforehand, nay more, than he did at the thought of his turning back Sennacherib, whom, you may perceive, that God makes sport at. And as God is said to laugh at the wicked, seeing his day a-coming, Ps. 37:13, God pleaseth himself with this thought concerning an elect soul: Well, let him play on the line, the day of his conversion is at hand, and then I shall have him.
Well, this time draws near, and to shew how much God's thoughts were on it, as ours use to be on some great occurrence, for which a set time is appointed, God is speaking of it a third time: Acts 9:1,
'And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings,' &c. You see the Holy Ghost puts in a yet, as if God began now to think the time long, or was then thinking with himself, his time is but short which I have allotted him to continue in sin, it is almost out, he yet breathes out threatenings, but his threatenings now shall breathe out their last.
Now, the same heart and affection God had all that while towards thee whilst in thy natural condition, and when thou wert committing such and such a sin, God saw thee ere thou didst him (as Christ told
Nathanael, 'I saw thee under the fig-tree') loving thee all that while with the same love with which he loves thee now, though then concealed, as Joseph was to his brethren. And as he had appointed a fulness of time for the coming of his Son into the world, so he had appointed 'a set time' to have mercy on thee, as the psalmist speaks,
Ps. 102:13. And Oh, how did God long all that while until that time should come; as Jer. 13:27, 'When shall it once be? 'And when that day was come, you may see how his heart rejoiced in the parable of the prodigal: Luke 15:20, 'When he was yet a great way oil, his father saw him.' It expresseth his longing, how he looked out aforehand; his love sending forth his eyes, as messengers, to feed him with that news he so delighted in. And after thou begannest but to utter thy heart to him, he could not hold long, but fell upon thy neck and
kissed thee; so ver. 20. He broke up that treasure of mercy he had from everlasting laid by for thee under lock and key of his everlasting purposes, and which he had reserved and kept for thee as thy portion. Though millions in all ages had passed afore him, and might have been heirs of it, yet he reserved the rich robe for thee, and fetched it out for thee, Luke 15:22. And when thou begannest to melt towards him for having offended him, and to bemoan thyself (as, Jer.
31:18, the phrase is) more out of love to thyself, and sense of thine own misery, than love to him, yet he fell a-weeping too as fast as thou, and his bowels were stirred for thee; what, says he, 'Is
Ephraim, my pleasant child,' come home to me? And is Ephraim, the wickedest of all the tribes, become pleasant to me? God speaks it wonderingly, as indeed admiring at his own affections, how enlarged they were, how his love was gushed forth, and therefore well mayest thou. What heart is there that proves the subject of these glorious, yet true occurrences, that will not, is not moved at the remembrance or the rehearsal of them? They so took Paul's heart, that the love manifested therein would never out of his mind: 'I was' (says he) 'a blasphemer, but I obtained mercy.' If we had been in Paul's heart to have discerned the mixtures of the strange affections which met when he put these two together, I and mercy, who ever would have thought that these two should meet, that were as distant as hell and heaven? Who would not (thought Paul) have made a but of exception at me? Who would not have entered a caveat against my ever having mercy, of all men else, if there had been no more in the world?
Ananias puts in a demur, Acts 9:13, when Christ did but speak of him; 'Lord, I have heard by many, how much evil he hath done to the saints at Jerusalem.' And it is said, ver. 21, that 'all that heard him were amazed.' But yet this Saul obtained mercy, and so hast thou. Oh let this grace of our Lord be abundant with love in thy heart towards him again, as it was in Paul's. Paul could never think of these passages, but a sea of love broke into his heart and overflowed it.