Part 6
6. We must carry in duties as under the eye of God, in a special manner; Psalm 89:7, "God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints; and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him." That looseness of heart, whereby it wanders here and there at duty, proceeds from the want of a due fear of God upon the soul; and is most contrary to walking with God; Jer. 12:2, "Thou art near in their mouth, and far from their reins." The fixing of the heart under the impressions of his awful presence, that so the soul may carry suitably before him, is to sanctify the Lord in our heart; Lev. 10:3.
7. We must be frequent in duties; 1 Thess. 5:17. They that walk with God are frequent in solemn duties; but in the interval of these they will be taken up with others of a less solemn nature, such as thinking, meditation on God, ejaculations, &c. And thus they will be readily kept in tune for the return of the more solemn duties. And indeed people then cease to walk with God, when they begin to be more
remiss and infrequent in solemn duties, and to be less careful of the frame of their hearts in the interval.
8. We must let new occurrences send us to our duty. This has been the practice of walkers with God, that whatever they have met with remarkable, it sent them to God? and "therefore," says the prophet, "I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me;" Micah 7:7. And where can a gracious heart have such a vent, as before the Lord, whatever it be full of, whether joy or grief?
9. Lastly. We must observe the fruit of our duties; Psalm 5:3, carefully notice what speed we come in our applications to the throne; and what effect God's speaking upon his throne has upon us. This is communion with God, to be sending word to, and receiving word from heaven; to be importing something thither in duties and the exercise of grace, and to be exporting something thence for the spiritual enriching of the soul.
THIRDLY, I shall consider walking with God in the properties thereof. Walking with God is religion; and it is,
1. Practical religion, religion in deed, not in word only; and there is no other sort of religion that will bring us to heaven; hence says our Lord; John 13:17, "If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." Talk as we will, if we do not walk with God, we are naught. Jacob dissembling with his father was the lively emblem of a hypocrite, the voice Jacob's, the hands Esau's. There is a great difference betwixt saying and doing in religion. The former is easy, the latter is difficult.
(1.) One may talk well of God and the things of God, and yet have nothing of the truth of religion. He may have a clear head in matters of religion, that has a dark heart; he may have a ready tongue to speak of them, whose feet are shackled with divers lusts, that he cannot walk in the way he speaks of; 1 Cor. 13:2. How many are ready
in the history of the Bible, that are strangers to the mystery of practical godliness? It is said of Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, that people were chained to her rather by the ear than by the eyes. So many, if ye hear them speak, they are something; but if ye look to their life, they are naught.
(2.) One may talk well for God, and yet have nothing of the truth of religion. But though they talk for him, they walk contrary to him. A man may preach for God, and teach others the way, that yet he never sets his foot on himself; Matth. 23:4. Being like a boatman that ferries others over the water, but still with his own back towards the shore. Both ministers and professors may contend zealously for the faith of doctrine, while they are utter strangers to the life of faith; like a physician prescribing remedies to others, while himself is dying of his disease, without applying of proper remedies.
(3.) One may talk well to God, that yet never walks with him. Many speak fair to the Lord, whose walk is ever foul, never cleansed; as in Israel's case; Deut. 5:27, 29. Fair professions, resolutions, promises, are often seen going up as dust. Look to their words, they are like Naphthali giving goodly words, but still as Rachel, though beautiful yet barren; Matth. 7:21, "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven."
But religion being a practical thing, let no man think he has begun to be religious, till he come to practice; Jam. 2:16, 17.—"faith, if it hath not works, is dead being alone."
2. It is inward and heart religion; 1 Pet. 3:4. They that have no religion but what is visible to the world, have no true religion; for God is the invisible God, and walking with him must be so too; Rom. 2:28, 29, "He is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of God." It may be very hard to make any difference betwixt the life of a hypocrite and a
sincere person; when the thread of hypocrisy is fine spun, it may pass the skill of the best discerner to discover it. And therefore one that walks with God, has a view beyond what he can see in others, or others can see in him. Ye must distinguish betwixt two things in religion.
(1.) The shell of it; and that is all you can see of my religion, or I of yours. This shell is religious bodily exercise, preaching, praying, works of piety, justice, mercy, and charity; 1 Tim 4:8. These things are not very frequent in the world; but at the great day many of them will be found like deaf nuts, which being cracked and their inside discovered, are cast into the fire.
(2.) The kernel of it; and that is what none can see but God and their own consciences that have it; and that is soul-exercise, heart-work; 1 Tim. 4:7; Acts 24:16. That only is godliness, and not the other. Preaching and praying, though it were with tears and the greatest seeming seriousness, is not godliness; it is the faith, fear, love, humiliation of heart, hatred of sin, resignation to the will of God, and conformity of the heart to his mind, which is in the preaching or prayer, that is religion in God's account. It is not the works of piety, &c., themselves, but the love to God for his own sake, and love to our neighbour for his, the holiness of the principle, manner, motives, ends that is in these works, that is religion. The bodily exercise is but the vehicle, in which these sacred drops are taken.
Let no man deceive himself. No kernel grows without a shell, and none can have the power of godliness without the form of it; but there is many a shell without a kernel, and much form where there is nothing of the power.
3. It is heavenly religion; Phil. 3:20. According to men's state and their nature, so will their actions be; for as is the tree, so will the fruit be. The heart of man, according as grace or corruption reigns in it, will tincture every thing that comes through it. Hence a natural man's very religion is carnal and earthly; Jam. 3:15. His best things
in religion smell of the earth. If a gale blow at any time on his soul, it rises low; if he sorrow for sin, it is the sorrow of the world; if he offer fire, it is strange fire. On the other hand, religion tinctures the very natural actions of one that walks with God; for this is a walking as one of another world.
Walking with God is indeed walking like one of the other world, namely, the upper world. The man conforms no more to the way of this world; Rom. 12:2, keeps no more its course; Eph. 2:2, but is coming through it as a pilgrim, and coming out of it; Cant. 4:8. And,
(1.) His root in this lower world is loosed, that he may be in due time transplanted into the upper world. The believer is no more one of the "world's own;" John 15:19. There is a certain sweetness to a man in his native soil; and so there is to natural men in the world, they are rooted in it by the greedy gripe their hearts take of it; Psalm 17:14. But when grace comes, that gripe is loosed, and fixes on heaven; and so that sweetness goes off, and the world turns the weary land to him; Isa. 32:2. They do not find that sweet in it which others find, and which they themselves sometimes found in it. Their hearts are on the way-gate.
(2.) The other world is the main thing he has in view; 2 Cor. 4:18. While the present world bears most bulk in the eyes of others, the world to come bears most bulk in the eyes of those that walk with God. That is their designed and desired rest, that sways them in the course of their life; their desires, hopes, and endeavours centre there. They overlook, and put on a holy regardlessness both of the good and ill of the present world, if by any means they may escape the ill of the world to come, and attain the good thereof. The purchase they design lies there.
(3.) He is making way to the other world, as a man on his journey; Cant. 8:5; not only by the course of nature, as all others, but in heart and affections, by which the soul moves; hence the apostle says, Phil. 1:23, "I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to
be with Christ; which is far better." It is true, when grace is not in exercise, a believer may be for building tabernacles here, he may be very unwilling to pass over Jordan; but then he is not walking with God, but standing still. Sometimes when believers are in the dark as to their state, or for some other reasons, they may be crying, as Psalm 39:13, "O spare me, that that I may recover strength, before I go hence, and be no more." Nevertheless there is never a groan they give under the body of death, never a desire they have of perfection of holiness, but there is wrapt up in it a desire to be with Christ, which is best of all.
(4.) He is conforming himself to the fashions of the other world; Psalm 45:10. It is his own country, being born from above; he is a pilgrim here, and therefore a man wondered at, as one of strange fashions. He sets himself to be like God in holiness, for that is the happiness of those that are above. As men serve an apprenticeship in a trade, that afterwards they may set up in it; so the life of a walker with God is an apprenticeship in holiness here, to set up in glory hereafter.
(5.) Lastly. He draws his great comfort from the unseen things of another world; Heb. 11:27. The apostle will have those in the Christian race to look off to Christ, "who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God;" Heb. 12:2. When this world smiles, his chief encouragement is not from it, but from the other world. When it frowns, thence is his support; Heb. 10:18. This has made the saints choose rather poverty and reproach, confinement, banishment, prisons, and death, than to act against the laws of heaven; and to undergo these joyfully, while the world wondered how they could bear up under them.
4. It is lively and active religion, being a walking with the living God, wherein there is not only grace, but grace in exercise; Cant. 1:12, That is a remarkable character given to Christians; 1 Pet. 2:5, "Ye also as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house." What? "Stones," and yet
"lively? Lively," and yet "stones?" Yes. The power of godliness is a compound of these two. It makes men lively in God's matters, yet as stones for solidity; solid, yet active, such as their spirits will stir within them in these matters. There are three sorts that cannot be walkers with God,
(1.) Dead people; they must be borne to their place, for they cannot go. Unregenerate graceless people cannot walk with God. What is the reason that so few walk with God. Why, truly the most part of gospelhearers are dead people; Eph. 2:2; and till they be raised out of the grave of a natural state, it is not to be expected of them. There was a great cry in Egypt while one was dead in every family; but alas! there are many so in many families.
(2.) Sleeping people; they are not fit for walking; and sleeping Christians cannot walk with God; Cant. 5:2. Sometimes the saints are going pleasantly on their way in the exercise of grace; their desires, love, faith, &c., are awake and stirring. But though unwatchfulness, security creeps on; and then they must lie down, they can go no further, till the Lord waken them; Matth. 25:5. And this is one reason why there are so many that have the root of the matter in them, who are not walking with God at this day.
(3.) Lame and wounded people, that have got broken bones by some grievous fall into sin; Psalm 51:8. They that have a thorn of guilt in their conscience, cannot walk till it be drawn out. For the conscience is defiled, the power of grace is weakened, the soul's communion with God marred; and they cannot recover their liveliness till they make new application of the blood of Christ, and renew their repentance.
5. It is regular religion, and uniform; for he that walks with God must needs walk by a constant rule, eyeing him not in some things only, but in all; Gal. 6:16; Psalm 16:8. He gives one rule of walking, extending to man's whole conversation; and so he that walks with him, walks regularly, aiming at a holy niceness, preciseness, and
exactness, in conformity to that rule in all things; Eph. 5:15, [Gr. Noticing carefully the prints of his feet with whom be walks.] Now this imports,
(1.) A design and fixed purpose in religion, namely, a purpose of conformity to God in it; Acts 11:23.—"and exhorted them all that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord." The words are emphatic, "that they would cleave unto the Lord," q. d. abide by his side; "with purpose of heart," laid down and determined beforehand. A man may do a good thing in religion, which yet will not be reckoned good indeed to him; because though he did it, he had no mind to please God in it. Religion's chance customers will never be esteemed walkers with God; Lev. 26 "walking contrary;" [Heb. By accident, at all adventures.]
(2.) A constancy in religion, in opposition to wavering; Heb. 10:23. Hereaway and thereaway in religion is not walking with God, who "is of one mind, and who can turn him?" Job 23:13. They that walk with men, or according to their own affections and inclinations, it is no wonder to see them at one time destroying what at another time they were building up; of one way in religion to-day, and another tomorrow; for these are changeable like the moon. But walking with God, people would go even forward, and keep their way they were on; neither going off on the right hand, because others go off at the left; nor going off at the left, because others go off at the right; Prov. 4:25–27.
(3.) An evenliness in religion, in opposition to a detestable unequalness; Matth. 23:23. To run with vigour in the lesser things of religion, and move like a snail in the greatest matters of it, is not walking with God. A wide conscience in substantial, and a narrow one in circumstantials, is a conscience of a profane and godless make and mould; hence is that intimation; Hos. 6:6, "I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God, more than burnt-offerings." A sincere conforming of ourselves to the duties required in the ten commands, summed up in love to God and our neighbour, is true
holiness. Instituted ordinances are the means of holiness, which will be laid aside in heaven, when perfection in holiness is obtained. Now to be hot in these last, and cold in the other, is as detestable as to be concerned to give meat to your neighbour, while in the meantime you stab him to the heart, to take away his life.
(4.) An universalness in religion; Psalm 119:6. He that makes no bones of balking some steps, walks not with God. They that confine their religion to their religious actions, and extend it not to their natural and civil actions, have no religion at all. What does it avail to pretend to a tenderness of conscience in one thing, and yet in other things to swallow a camel; to a tenderness in dealing with God, while no tenderness appears in their dealings with men? Psalm 119:128; Matth. 23:24. This is one of the causes of atheism and contempt of religion in the generation; Rom. 2:23, 24, "Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles, through you, as it is written."
6. It is laborious and painful religion; for it is no easy life they have whose trade it is to walk on their feet; Heb. 6:10. And it is no easy religion to walk with God. Religion is not a business of saying, but doing; not of doing carelessly, but carefully, painfully, and diligently. If ye would be religious indeed, ye mast put to your hands to work, set down your feet to walk, run the Christian-race, ply all your strength to strive to enter in at the strait gate, wrestle with all your might against principalities and powers, &c. This will be evident, if ye consider these following things, (for an easy religion is the ruin of many).
(1.) Consider the scripture-notions of walking with God, in which the life of religion lies, and you will see they imply laboriousness. It is a working and labouring; John 6:27, "Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life;" [Gr. work.] Here he that works not, shall not eat. It is not only a working, but a "working out;" Phil. 2:12, a bringing the work to
perfection, otherwise what is wrought will be lost; 2 John 8. Some labour is easier than other; but religion is compared to that which is the hardest labour.
[1.] It is compared to the husbandman's work, which is no easy labour, ploughing, sowing, reaping; Hos. 10:12, "Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground." There is no ground so hard to labour, as the hard heart is to the spiritual husbandman. No ground does so quickly and incessantly bring forth thorns and briers as the corrupt nature. And whereas the husbandman for ordinary finds his work as he leaves it, the Christian rarely finds it so.
[2.] To the soldier's labour; 2 Tim. 4:7, "I have fought a good fight." He must watch while others sleep and take their ease, otherwise the enemy will be upon him. He must fight, he must not flee, but so fight as to overcome his spiritual enemies; Rev. 3:21. He must pursue; Heb. 12:14, namely, as one follows a flier, till he catch him. Heaven must be taken by storm; Matth. 11:12. The gate is strait, there is no entering with ease; men must press into it, else they cannot come thither; Luke 16:16.
[3.] To the wrestler's labour; Eph. 6:12, such as makes all the body to shake again, παλη. They must put forth their utmost strength, as those that are agonizing, wrestling with death; Luke 13:24. This the Christian finds in wrestling with strong lusts and violent temptations.
[4.] To the runner's labour in a race; Heb. 12:1. That requires patience and great eagerness; Phil. 3:13, 14; for they must so run as to obtain the prize; 1 Cor. 9:24.
(2.) Consider the way the Christian has to walk in towards Immanuel's laud, and ye will see that religion is a laborious business. For,
[1.] It is a difficult way; though plain in itself, yet to us it is difficult to know; Cant. 1:7, 8. How much precious time do the travellers spend in disputing which is the way, that might be better improved in going forward? Nay, many spend all their days in disputing about the way, till the sun go down on them, and night overtake them, ere they have begun to set off. Many mistake the way quite and clean; Eccl. 10:15, some going in the way of bare morality, some of drowsy wishes, and some of formality, &c. And many good Christians in the way are brought to that pass, that they know not where to set down the next step; but have hard work to know the road they should take.
[2.] It is a wilderness way, and therefore very solitary; Cant. 3:6. Canaan was a type of heaven, and to it the Israelites came through the waste howling wilderness, where they had many a weary step. An emblem of the way to heaven. There the Christian often suffers hunger and thirst, there he is bit with fiery serpents, there he is attacked by furious enemies, and there he has the Jordan of death to pass.
[3.] It is a rising, an upward way; Cant. 8:5. The way of sin is down the hill, easy, and therefore much frequented. But the way to glory lies up the hill; and hence so many are frightened from it at first sight; and many that seem to set fair off once, are quickly out of breath, and so retire. The temple, a type of heaven, was situate on a hill, Moriah; 1 Kings 10:5. Much hard travel had some of the Jews ere they got to Jerusalem, Psalm 84:6, 7; and when they came there, they had the hill of God to ascend into; Psalm 24:3.
(3.) Consider what he has to walk through, that walks with God in the way of the life of religion. He will meet with troops of opposition, but he must break through them all. They must walk through,
[1.] Opposition from the devil; 1 Pet. 5:8, 9. No sooner does a soul set on the way of God in earnest, but the armies of hell are set in battlearray against him. The sluggard says, "There is a lion in the way," &c., but the Christian resolutely walks forward. But it is hard work
when a poor Christian is engaged with a malicious and subtle devil, that has had five thousand years' experience of the black art of temptation.
[2.] Opposition from the world. The world agents the devil's cause for him, and never ceases to take the ill cause of the dragon against Michael by the end. But they that mind for heaven, must set their face against the storm, and weather all the blasts that come from that quarter. They will not want the counsel of the ungodly, but they must refuse it; Psalm 1:1; the mockeries of the wicked, but they must despise them; Psalm 119:51. Nay, sometimes it comes to persecution, and resisting even to blood; but they that walk with God, must go through even a sea of blood when called; Matth. 16:15. Daniel would not leave his prayers for thirty days, when praying was death by the law; Dan. 6:7, 10.
[3.] Opposition from their own hearts' lusts. A man's enemies are those of his own heart; Rom 7:24. Sometimes the false heart will be saying within the man, "Arise and let us. go back to Egypt;" sometimes with Peter, "Master, spare thyself;" sometimes with Judas, "What needs all this waste?" sometimes with Pharaoh, "I will not let you go." But the Christian must, over the belly of all these, walk forward; Matth. 11:12, "The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force."
(4.) Consider what he has to walk over. There are some things in the Christian's way to heaven, which it may be he cannot get through, but he must go over them.
[1.] Over the belly of discouragements, Heb. 10:35. Satan plies the engine of discouragement with all his force, and often mightily prevails by it, to make the Christian halt in his Christian course. And they may long sit still, if they mind to sit till they be removed. Nay, they must even break over them and go forward, though it be hard labour to get over them, saying with David, Psalm 42:5, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope
thou in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance."
[2.] Over the belly of stumbling-blocks laid in the way, Matth. 18:7. The world is ruined by offences. Some give the offence, and others take it; i. e. some fall in the way, and others cannot go by the stumbling-block, but break their necks over it. But he that walks with God, when he cannot get them removed out of the way, he goes over them; but will not go off his way for them, as people generally do; Job 17:9, "The righteous shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger."
[3.] Over the belly of their credit and reputation sometimes. Many a time a Christian must make a stepping stone of his credit, to follow his duty; as David did, when he said unto Michal, "I will yet be more vile than thus, and I will be base in mine own sight," 2 Sam. 6:22. And it is a general rule in the practice of godliness, that they must be fools who will be wise. That is hard; but sometimes they must even make a stepping-stone of their reputation with carnal and untender professors, and lay their account with their obloquy and reproach for following their duty, as you may see Matth. 26:7–10.
[4.] Over the belly of their affections and inclinations. It was Levi's commendation, "Who said unto his father and unto his mother, I have not seen him, neither did he acknowledge his brethren, nor knew his own children," Deut. 33:9. They have little sense of practical religion, that do not see they must put the knife to the throat of their own inclinations and affections many times, to follow duty laid before them by the Lord. These are not the rule of our walk; but they that walk by their own inclinations and affections, walk not with God, but walk as they that are "sensual, not having the Spirit." And this is hard work, and so much the harder when they meet altogether, as sometimes they do in the case of the godly.
(5.) Lastly, Consider the little strength we have to walk with; 2 Cor. 3:5, "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of
ourselves." We got all of us a bruise in the loins of our first parents. Even such as walk with God are healed but in part, the broken bones are but beginning to knit. Well, if the iron be blunt, he must put to the more strength; the less one has, he mast make the better use of it. All these considerations shew that religion is a laborious and painful business.
Well, Sirs, a slothful easy religion is a dangerous business. Take heed to it; it will not be found walking with God. The sluggard is lost by his own sloth; he "will not plow by reason of the cold," says Solomon; "therefore shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing," Prov. 20:4. He is the unprofitable servant; see his doom, Matth. 25:26–30, "Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." He is unprofitable to himself, for he neglects his salvation-work; unprofitable to his Master, for he neglects his generation-work. Mark the sentence; he loved darkness to sleep in, he shall have his fill of it, "outer darkness." For carnal mirth, he shall "weep." He would not work because of the cold, in hell he shall "gnash his teeth."
7. It is self-denied religion; Matth. 16:24, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself." Thus our Lord Jesus walked when he was in the world; and "he that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked," 1 John 2:6. Self-denial is one of the first lessons that Christ puts in the hands of his scholars, and they have need of it in practice through the whole of their conversation. In the religion of walkers with God these two things are remarkable, laboriousness and self-denial, which sweetly meet together in it, as the wings of the cherubims over the ark.
(1.) Laboriousness, working as if they were to win heaven thereby, 1 Cor. 9:24, following holiness with all eagerness, as knowing that heaven is not given to loiterers, but labourers; and endeavouring to take the New Jerusalem as by storm. For walking with God, they look on themselves as under his eye, and therefore ply their salvation and
generation-work. And the love of Christ constrains them to be serviceable to him, and to ply themselves for conformity to his image.
(2.) Self-denial.
[1.] Overlooking their work and labour, as if God had not required it, putting no confidence in it before the Lord, nor valuing themselves upon it in his sight, Phil. 3:3; but laying the whole stress of their acceptance with God on the merits of Christ. This must needs be so; for,
(1.) He that walketh with God is acquainted with the holiness and spotless purity of himself, the exceeding breadth of his law, and the jealousy of his Holy Spirit; and therefore he cannot miss to see the imperfections of his best works in these bright glasses, and say as Psalm 19:12, "Who can understand his errors?" and 130:3, "If thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquities: O Lord, who shall stand?"
(2.) He honours the Son, living by faith in him, Gal. 2:20. And that is one's going out of himself for all to Jesus Christ, out of his own ill in point of practice and self-loathing, and out of his own good in point of confidence, Isa. 64:6.
[2.] Overlooking their own strength for working, as mere weakness, 2 Cor. 3:5. Self-denial makes one go out of himself for sanctification to the Spirit of Christ, as well as for justification to his blood, 1 Cor. 1:30; Isa. 45:24. For walking with God is a walking and leaning on him to be carried on the way, Cant. 8:5; a staying one's self upon him, as the traveller doth upon his staff. This must needs be so; for,
(1.) Whoso tries the way of walking with God, will quickly find he is not man enough for the opposition he will meet with in the way, not able to go but as he is led, nay nor stand but as he is held up, John 15:5. The least temptation or unmortified lust, how hard is it to one left to grapple with it in his own strength? Peter falls at the voice of a silly maid.
(2.) The scripture declares, that there is no safety in, nor good to be had from, one's working merely from his own inherent stock, Prov. 28:26, "He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool." Nay there is a curse denounced on him that does so, which will cause that he will never bring his work to perfection, Jer. 17:5, 6, "Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness." And therefore have we that watchword, Heb. 3:12, "Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God."
8. It is humble religion, Mic. 6:8. For howsoever any may set up before men, they must needs vail their faces when they see themselves in the presence of a holy God. Proud and conceited religion is of the wrong stamp, for it is quite unlike the Spirit of the holy Jesus; and of the saints, who, the more religious they were, were always the more humble. And the more proud and conceited professors be of their religion, be sure they are so far strangers to walking with God. Now, this humble religion will appear,
(1.) In low thoughts of ourselves, and honourable thoughts of others, in whom the image of God appears, Phil. 2:3. Paul counts himself the chief of sinners, though the chief of New Testament saints. A high conceit of ourselves, with an undervaluing of others, is a shrewd sign of little acquaintance with walking with God. For it is impossible but the man that walks with God, must see more evil in himself, than he can see in any other, that bears any thing of the holy image of God. But he that has the foul face, but looks not into the glass, may think it more beautiful than any that he sees.
(2.) In being denied to vain glory, Phil. 2:3. He that walks with God will not have occasion to hunt after the applause of men, unless he go off his way, and so far leave his Leader. It is a sad sign of little walking with God, to affect so much honour and respect from men, and for one to trumpet forth his own praise; a disposition smelling
rank of a naughty heart, Prov. 27:2, "Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth." John 12:43, "They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." It may nourish one to death, but not to life, like the chameleon, to live on air.
(3.) In refusing to stoop to nothing, whereby the honour of God, and the edification of the souls of others may be advanced; as exemplified in our Lord's humbling himself, Phil. 2:5–8. He that walks with God will be content to make a stepping-stone of his credit, ease, &c. for these ends, counting nothing too low for him whereby he may follow the Lord. But alas! there is a cursed respect for ourselves, that so prevails with many, that they count some duties of religion below them. And their pretended credit must spread, though it should darken the heavens, and wrap up the glory of God in a cloud.
(4.) In a kindly accommodating of our spirits to humbling providences, Job 1:21. Sometimes the Lord leads his people very low, through afflictions, crosses, poverty, and wants. The humble will follow him whithersoever he goes. But the proud, nothing will satisfy them, but rising, and they will blacken the heavens with their murmurings and complaints when they are falling. But if our lot be not brought up to our spirits, let our spirits be brought down to our lot. We are on our journey out of this world, and we may come as soon, and more safely, to an happy end of it, the low way, as the high way.
(5.) Lastly, In an absolute resignation to the will of God, saying in everything, "Not my will, but thine be done," Luke 22:42. Walking with God is a following of him as the shadow does the body. It causes men put a blank in the Lord's hand, that he may fill up in it what he pleases. But so far as we come short of the great duty of absolute resignation to the will of God, we come short of walking with God.
9. It is constant religion. Walking is not a rising up and sitting down again, but a continued action, like that of a traveller going on till he
come to his journey's end. Enoch walked on through the world, till he was not. It is constant in two respects.
(1.) Without interruption. It is not a religion taken by fits and starts but going on evenly; Psalm 16:8, "I have set the Lord always before me." Some people's religion is like an ague, wherein they have their hot fits and their cold fits. They go to and fro; they will be one day for God, and another for the devil. Whatever good mood they be found in at any time, they do not abide at it, Hos. 6:4. And so they can never bring it to any good account; for they are always beginning, ever learning, but never come to the knowledge of the truth. These people's religion consists in two things.
[1.] Flashes, and that is all they have for heaven; flashes of affections like those mentioned, Psalm 78:34, "When he slew them, then they sought him: and they returned and inquired early after God." The spirit of holiness does not rest on them, but some light touches of his common influences they get, which do not abide. Hence with convictions sometimes, and with melted but unsanctified affections, their hearts will be as when in the time of great rain every pool is full, but quickly dry again, because it has no spring. Whereas it is otherwise with those that walk with God; John 4:14, "The water that I shall give him, shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life."
[2.] Overleaps into the holy ground; and that is all that heaven has from them; Job 27:9, 10, "Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him? will he delight himself in the Almighty? will he always call upon God? They do not usually feed on God's pastures, but at the table of the world and their lusts. God saw this was the temper of the Israelites, which made him say concerning them, "O that there were such an heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children for ever," Deut. 5:29. They will be to-day crying Hosannah, to-morrow, Crucify him. Religion is not their element, and so they cannot abide with it, Job 24:13.
(2.) Without defection and apostacy. We read of some, John 6:66, that "went back, and walked no more with him." They cast off religion, and laid it by for good and all. These people's walking with God (if we may call it so), will be no more remembered but to their condemnation, Ezek. 3:20. They will never see heaven; Luke 9 ult., "No man having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God." Lot's wife was an emblem of such; she looked back to Sodom, and God turned her to a pillar of salt, for a terror to apostates. For scuh he abhors, Heb. 10:38. But they that walk with God will not be,
[1.] Bribed away from him, by the allurements of the world and flesh, which is one engine of Satan whereby he makes many apostates, as Judas, Demas, &c. How many are there who have sometimes, by their addictedness to the way of God, promised great things, and so have gone on for a time flourishing? But afterwards Satan has led them aside by temptations, and always farther and farther off the way, till he has got them to cast off religion altogether.
(2.) Boasted away from him, by the severities they may meet with in following the Lord; Cant. 8:7, "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it." Sometimes Satan plays the fox, by cunning wiles to draw sinners to apostacy; and sometimes the lion, to drive them to it by hardships, mockeries, hard usage, and persecutions. But religion, where it is of the right stamp, will last, whatever methods may be used to put it out.
10. Lastly, It is progressive religion; religion that is going forward; Prov. 4:18, "The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." There is a mark the soul aims at when it sets off in the Lord's way; and that is perfection in holiness, and walking with God is a pressing forward to it, Phil. 3:13, 14. Such a one is adding a cubit to his spiritual stature. When the seed of grace is sown in the heart in regeneration, the man must walk with God, that so the seed may grow and shoot forth. And so in walking with God the new creature grows,
(1.) Inward, growing into Christ, Eph. 4:15; uniting more closely with him, and cleaving more firmly to him as the head of influences, which is the spring of all other growth.
(2.) Outward, in good works, in life and conversation. Not only like Naphtali do they give goodly words, but like Joseph they are as fruitful boughs.
(3.) Upward; for their conversation is in heaven, Phil. 3:20; in heavenly-mindedness and contempt of the world.
(4.) Lastly, Downward, in humility and self-loathing. Thus he that walks with God makes progress in sanctification.
There is also in it a progress in experimental knowledge of religion, 2 Pet. 3 ult. The traveller the farther he goes on, he knows the country the better; and he that walks with God gets Christian experience. Not only is his head more filled with raw unfelt notions, but his soul is stored with saving acquaintance with truth. The further be goes on, he becomes the more expert a traveller to the heavenly Canaan. He observes what has worsted, and what bettered his soul's case; and so will labour to eschew the one, and follow the other. And when he comes to a dark step, he can bear out the better, that it is not the first he has gone through.
Thus far of the nature of walking with God.
II. I shall next confirm this doctrine, That the life of religion lies in walking with God. In order to this consider,
1. That religion is not a matter of speculation, but of practice. Whatever light it brings into the mind, it is for moving the heart and affections. And therefore it is called the doctrine according to godliness. And the greatest mysteries of our religion are mysteries of godliness; 1 Tim. 3:16. I think the devil may be a greater speculative divine than the best of us can pretend to be. And the apostle supposes one may understand all mysteries, and all knowledge, and
yet be nothing; 1 Cor. 13:2. So little worth is the knowledge of religion without the practice, the word without the power.
2. All other practice of religion, without walking with God, is but bodily exercise, little worth, 1 Tim. 4:8. The Jews wrote on their synagogue-doors, "Prayer without intention is as a body without the spirit." And where walking with God is wanting, there is the carcase of religion, but the soul of it is away. It can never be pleasing to God, because it is not agreeable to his nature, John 4:24.
3. The great difference betwixt the sincere Christian and the hypocrite lies here, Phil. 3:3, "We are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." What makes the sincere Christian differ from the hypocrite in his walk? Is it that he performs external duties? No, you cannot pitch upon one of these, but a hypocrite may perform the same? Is it that he knows and can speak of religion better? No, a hypocrite may excel a good Christian in these gifts. Is it that he has sometimes a flood of affections? No; Pharaoh, Esau, and the stonyground hearers wanted not these. But the hypocrite never comes up to walking with God, which the sincere does, though not always.
4. Without this there is no sanctification, because without it there is no communion with God, and so no sanctifying influences. A man may pray many a prayer, hear many a sermon, and be many a year a professor of religion, and yet never be a whit the more holy unless he walk with God. All without that in this point, is but the washing of a blackmoor, labour in vain. For spiritless lifeless walking will never heal our unholy nature. Hence when the heart is away from God, the man is as "the heath in the wilderness, and shall not see when good cometh," Jer. 17:5, 6.
5. This is that part of religion that will remain in heaven for ever, 1 Cor. 13:8. Thus the happiness of heaven is held out under the notion of walking with God, Rev. 3:4. All divine institutions tend to this. For this was the course the first Adam was set on, but broke off from; this
course the second Adam held; and to be brought back to this will be man's greatest happiness. So that without controversy the soul of religion lies here.
6. Lastly, Our spiritual life lies in communion with God. In ourselves we are dead spiritually, being slain in Adam. Now our life is in Christ, Col. 3:4, and we cannot partake of that life, but by communion with him, Gal. 2:20, "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God." It is that communion with Christ that makes men truly lively, and their religion, religion indeed, in so far as it makes men walk with God.
I shall now make some improvement of this subject, in uses of information, reproof, and exhortation.
USE I. Of information. This lets us see,
1. That the religion of those is little worth, that are utter strangers to walking with God. It is but the carcase of religion without the soul. The apostle speaks of "vain religion;" Jam. 1:26, "If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain." This is such. It is vain with respect to God's approbation, for be will never approve of it; Rom. 2:28, 29; and vain with respect to their own salvation, it will never bring them to heaven, nor abide the trial; Matth. 7:22.
2. True religion lies not in a form, but has a power with it causing a holy walk; 2 Tim. 3:5. True religion is not a vain inefficacious thing, but has a commanding power with it. It is in the heart like the centurion, when it says to the man, "Go," he "must go;" and when it says, "Come, he cometh." It has a restraining power, it binds up the man from sin. Job was tempted to blaspheme, but the power of godliness restrained him. It sets the man in God's way, it keeps him on it, and causes him to go forward in it.
3. That no man has more true religion than what influences his walk. God will never measure people's religion by fair words or a shining
profession, but by the course of their life and actions, in faith, love, and other moral duties. God has written his law in the Bible, has transcribed it again into the renewed heart, and they write it over again in their holy conversation.
4. There is little of the life of religion in the world, there is so little walking with God in it. There are few that have the form of godliness in comparison of those that want it; and yet but few of those who have the form, that have the power too. How few are there that eye God in all things, whose hearts go along with him as the shadow with the body, that walk with him in ordinances, in providences, in their stations and relations, and in their actions, natural, civil, and religious! O how rare is practical, inward, heavenly, &c. religion!
USE II. Of reproof. Hence we may reach a reproof to several sorts of persons, that do not walk with God.
1. Those that have never yet risen up from their sin. Walking with God is a motion of the soul from sin to sanctification; Isa. 1:16, 17. It is like the going up a stair, where the first step raiseth a man from the ground, and so he goes up by degrees till he come there where he would be. Heaven is the upper room, faith and holiness are the stairs, and the state of sin is the ground. But alas! many have not come the length of the first step yet; they are still in their sins, under the guilt of them, and under the power of them. They have not with Lazarus come out of the grave, with Matthew left the receipt of custom, nor with the palsied man risen out of their bed; and far less with Enoch do they walk with God.
(1.) Consider, we cannot say of you, "Ye are not far from the kingdom of God;" for truly ye are even as far from it as Adam led you and left you. The way to the pleasant land is long, and your day is far spent; but to this day ye have not entered on the way, nor stirred a foot from your old sins. Are ye not afraid, that your be gone day ere ye are able to undertake the journey?
(2.) If ye lie still, ye will never see heaven. As soon shall heaven and hell meet, as you shall get to heaven in that state and case. If ye sit still ye die; and therefore rise and walk, and flee from the wrath to come.
2. Those whose life is a mere wandering; Eccl. 10:15, "The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the city." Many spend their days thus wandering; among the creatures their souls wander, and from one they go to another; they take a miserable round in the vanities of this world; but never go beyond them to God. They wander up and down in the way of sin; sometimes they fall into one miserable course, sometimes into another, but never into the course of holiness. They walk in a round, whereof the centre is hell, and the circumference sin and vanity. All their life they go from one sin and one vanity to another, and at death, when they leave the world, they are in the same place they were in when they came in to it; i.e. As they were born in sin they die in it, and tumble down to hell, their miserable life being not a walking with God, but a wallowing in one puddle of sin all along.
(1.) Your thus wandering is a clear evidence that your natural blindness is not removed; Rev. 3:17. Your plague is in your head, and so your heart cannot be right. Ye have never yet discovered the excellency of Christ the Captain of our salvation, nor the glory of the land that is afar off, and ye know not the way leading to it. Therefore your case is sad.
(2.) Remember the generation that wandered in the wilderness, died there, and never saw the land of Canaan; 1 Cor. 10:5. This will be your doom, if ye continue. Ye are walking in a mist among fearful precipices and fiery serpents; how can ye miss to fall?
3. Backsliders, that have turned their backs on God's way, John 6:66. These, instead of walking with God, fall away from him, back to their old sins. They gave up their names to him, listed themselves under his banner, but now they have turned runaways. They came under
bonds to God and his way; but they have broken his bonds, and cast away his cords from them. They once appeared on God's side, but they have got over into the devil's camp.
(1.) Your sin is greater than if ye had never set off in the Lord's way. Ye know that relapses into a disease are most dangerous, and most hopeless; and so "it had been better for you not to have known the way of righteousness, than after you have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto you," 2 Pet. 2:21. For then men sin over the belly of more light than before, they cast a particular infamy upon the way of God, as if they would make the world to believe from their experience that Christ's yoke is intolerable.
(2.) Your condemnation will be the greater. It is a fearful word, Heb. 10:38, "If any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him." Prov. 14:14, "The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways." As the sorest fall is from the highest place, so the deepest plunge into the lake of fire is from the threshold of heaven. And when the backslider is taken in the snare of destruction, it will be a peculiar worm in his conscience for ever, that once in a day he had well nigh escaped.
4. Resisters of the Holy Ghost, whom God is using all means with to draw them to his way, but they will not come on it, Jer. 2:25, "I have loved strangers, and after them will I go." Not only are they called by the word, but by providence. God meets some in their evil ways, like the angel with the drawn sword in his hand meeting Balaam, and yet they will not leave it. God hedges up their sinful ways with thorns, yet they break through the thorn hedge. Their consciences tell them they are wrong, and give them many a secret blow to drive them into the way: but they follow their corruptions over the belly of their consciences.
(1.) This is dreadful and dangerous work, as being a fighting against God and against yourselves, Acts 7:51. But though the potsherds of the earth strive among themselves, it is miserable folly to strive with
their Maker. The voice of the word, providence, and conscience is the voice of God; take heed how ye entertain the same.
(2.) The issue must needs be terrible, if it be continued in, Job 9:4. For when God judgeth, he will overcome. What can be expected of it, but that God be provoked to cease striving with you, and to lay the reins on your neck, Gen. 6:3; Psalm 81:11, and afterwards call you to an account as wilful rejecters of salvation?
5. Enemies to the way of God, who not only do not walk in it themselves, but hinder others to walk in it, as the scribes and Pharisees, Matth. 23:13. There are agents for the devil in the world, who have a malignant hatred against the power of godliness, and set themselves to quench the Spirit in others, by mocking, tempting them to sin, &c. Consider,
(1.) That is the devil's trade, and therefore a sad indication of one that is a child of the devil. Let such hear what the Spirit of the Lord says to them, Acts 13:10, "O full of all subtilty, and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?" God is especially an enemy unto those that are enemies to his ways, and so set themselves to advance the devil's kingdom.
(2.) The blood of souls will be a heavy load; and such as turn others from the way of God, their blood will be upon their head. And those that set themselves that way, they need not doubt but that in such a corrupt world they will always be successful with some, Luke 16:27, 28.
6. Loose and licentious professors, who walk so scandalously that the world may see they do not walk with God, Jer. 7:8–10, "Behold, ye trust in lying words, that cannot profit. Will ye steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not; and come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are
delivered to do all these abominations?" There are many that profess religion, that it were telling religion they did not pretend to it. For hearken to their words, take a view of their life, there is no tenderness to be seen there. The voice is Jacob's, but their rough hands declare them to be profane Esau's. There is nothing that looks like holiness about them, but the profession of the truth; but their tongues and their lives are profane. Whoso sees them, may see their light hearts and offensive lives have nothing of the ballast of the power of godliness. Consider,
(1.) A loose and licentious life, under whatever profession it appear, argues a godless and graceless heart, Phil. 3:18, 19. It is an easy thing for people to make a profession, which costs them not the life of a lust; to addict themselves to this or that opinion, while they do not addict themselves to the study of a holy life; to pin a new creed to an old life. But were grace in the heart, and they made partakers of the new nature, it would make them study holiness in all manner of conversation.
(2.) What will the end of that way be, think ye? See Psalm 125 ult., "As for such as turn aside unto their crooked ways, the Lord shall lead them forth with the workers of inquity." And if there be a hotter place in hell than another, the hypocrite that has a profession of religion, but a licentious life, shall get it, Matth. 24 ult. And their profession will serve but to make them so much the more marks for the arrows of God's vengeance.
7. Close hypocrites, whose outward conversation is blameless, but in the meantime they are strangers to the life of religion, and walking with God, "having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof," 2 Tim. 3:5. They go about duties, but they are strangers to communion with God; they walk blamelessly, but walk not with God; they abound in bodily exercise, but are estranged to spiritual worship; they exercise gifts, but they have nothing of the exercise of grace. Their souls are estranged from the life of God, and are dead
within them; and they are like some dead beasts, there is nothing of them profitable but the skin, i. e. the outward form.
(1.) Consider that religion may serve to blind your own eyes, and the eyes of the world, but not the eyes of God. The close hypocrite will be like Ahab in disguise, but the arrow hit him for all that; for there is no deceiving the eyes of the Almighty.
(2.) It will have a miserable issue. God loves to discover hypocrites, Rev. 3:16, "Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." Sometimes he withdraws his restraint that he has on them, and turns out their inside in this life before the world, as Judas, Ananias, and Sapphira. But he will not fail to do it at the great day, when every one shall be judged according to his works.
8. Lastly, Gracious persons, whose grace is not in exercise, who though they be spiritually alive in respect of their state, yet are not lively, but dead in their frame, Cant. 5:2. They are not walking with God as sometimes they have been, but are fallen asleep, and are going after the way of their own hearts. O Sirs, ye are off the way, and I will tell you how ye may know it. A gracious person may know that he is not walking with God,
(1.) By the decay of his love to his Guide. This was God's controversy with the church of Ephesus; Rev. 2:4, "I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love." And may not the Lord say to many of his people this day, as Jer. 2:2, "I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown?" While the soul walks with God, it keeps its eye upon Christ, and seeing him cannot but love him. But the soul loses sight of Christ; then out of sight, out of mind; and what the eye sees not, the heart rues not. A sad sign that ye are off the way.
(2.) By decay of love to the fellow-travellers; Matth. 24:12, "Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." There has been a day wherein the people of God have dearly loved one another, delighted to pray, converse, &c., together; and the wrong done to any one of them was, by reason of their sympathy, as done to them all. But alas! where is that now? Christian love is much decayed. What is the reason? Why, travellers as long as they are going out the road together, have a particular kindness one for another; but when they begin to stay by the way and scatter, one going to his business, and another to his, love wears off. Even so the Lord's people taking different ways, and scattering from one another, their love to each other cools.
(3.) By the decay of zeal for the honour of their Leader. If one would affront a captain on the head of his troop, all the soldiers' hearts would stir within them. But when he is left alone, there is none concerned to resent the injuries done to him. I never like that zeal, that, overlooking the substantial of religion, burns out on the lesser things. But this I will say, that were there more walking with God among us, there would be more zeal for the great things of religion; and if so, then more for the lesser things too. Were we more concerned for the kingdom of Christ within us, we would be more zealous for the kingdom of Christ without us.
(4.) By the decay of tenderness, and care to please the Lord; Col. 1:10. While David was walking with God, he was tender of the least sin, his heart smote him when he had cut off the lap of Saul's garment. But at another time he lay long under horrible guilt in the matter of Uriah, his heart being hardened. Sometimes Christians could have had no rest without the enjoyment of God in duties; but alas! at other times they are formal in performance of their duty as a task. And an evil deed will not be so heavy to them, as a rash word or vain thought would sometimes have been.
(5.) By the decay of diligence in duties, instead whereof slothfulness creeps in; Eccl. 10:18. He that walks with God will be diligent to note
every step of his way; so it is an ill sign when the heart turns careless. He will be much conversant with God in the duties of religion, often found on the road to the throne, because he has much business with heaven; but when he walks not with God, he remits of his diligence, and comes far short of his former pains in his soul-matters.
(6.) By a decay of heavenly-mindedness, instead of which there creeps in carnality and earthly-mindedness. Walking with God is a heavenly life; Phil. 3:20. And while a child of God holds at it, it tinctures all his thoughts, words, and actions with a savour of heaven; Cant. 3:6. But when that fails, all these savour of death.
(7.) Lastly. By a decay of liveliness and earnestness in duties. Sometimes a child of God is like Jacob wrestling for the blessing; he is very peremptory, and will not take a naysay; Gen. 32:26. Sometimes again as Ephraim, like a "silly dove, without heart," Hos. 7:11; having neither heart nor hand to ply the throne of grace; a sad sign of not walking with God.
Now, to such I would say two things,
[1.] Horrid ingratitude is stamped on your ceasing to walk with God; Jer. 2:31. The pleasantest and most profitable days a Christian ever has, are those wherein he walks with God; and when he gives over that, his real well days are done; Hos. 2:7. Then his bones flourish as an herb, but otherwise they wither like the grass. Therefore may we say, "Do ye thus requite the Lord, O foolish people and unwise?" Deut. 32:6.
[2.] It is easy to go off the way, but not so to get on it again; it is easy to halt and sit down, but not to rise up again and walk. Ye had need to awake in time, lest the Lord give you a fearful wakening, either by some heavy stroke, or, which is worse, by letting you fall into some grievous guilt, as he did David.
USE ult. Of exhortation. Study the life of religion, in walking with God. Walk not after your lusts, nor in the way of the world, either its
way of profaneness, or its way of formality; but go through the world walking with God. I offer the following motives,
MOT. 1. Ye are going fast through the world, and ere long will be at your journey's end. Time runs with a rapid course; and whether ye sleep or wake, ye will soon find yourselves pass the border of time; Job 9:25, 26. The watch going wrong may run as fast as when she goes right; and the man that walks after his own lusts, makes as great speed to the end of his journey, as he that walks with God. And since we must walk through the world, and cannot abide here, why will we not choose the best company in our way, and walk with God?
2. Walking with God is the only way to get safe to our journey's end; Heb. 2:10. It was only Caleb and Joshua that got to Canaan, for they followed the Lord fully. All the world is on a journey; but there are two ways, and two companies. There is the way of holiness, and all the saints walk there, with the Lord on their head; and the end of this way is salvation. And there is the way of sin, a broad way, wherein are many roads, bare civility, morality, profaneness, and formality; all the unregenerate walk there, and the god of this world on their head, and the end is destruction. Choose ye with whom ye will walk.
3. Religion is not a matter of speculation and talking, but a matter of practice and walking with God; Psalm 116:9, "I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living." Your eternal state lies at stake, which ye will never bring to a comfortable issue without this. Till ye enter on this way, ye are to begin to be religious, how long soever your standing in a profession has been. After children are born, it is long ere they begin to walk; but as soon as one is born again, and becomes a child of God, he immediately falls a walking with God.
4. There is a pleasure, a refined, undreggy pleasure, in walking with God; Prov. 3:17, "Wisdom's ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." This pleasure arises from the testimony of conscience, which is a feast to the soul; 2 Cor. 1:12, enough to make a sick man whole; from the intrinsic pleasantness in the way of
holiness, which has a surpassing beauty in the eyes of those that are capable to discern; Psalm 119:97 and 165; and from the soul's communion with God which it finds in that way; Psalm 4:6, 7.
OBJECT. But what can it do to us for a through-bearing in the world? ANSW. Very much, "having promise of the life that now is," as well as "of that which is to come;" 1 Tim. 4:8. Those that walk with God have a promise of provision in this word; Psalm 37:3; Matth. 6:30. It is no maybe, but as sure as the covenant can make it; Isa. 33:16, "Bread shall be given him, his water shall be sure." It is true, God's bond is not always paid as it were in money: but if not, it is always paid in money-worth, If they get not the thing itself, they get as good; 2 Cor. 6:10,—"as having nothing, and yet possessing all things."
6. Walking with God is the best security in evil days. There are sinning and ensnaring times; who can be so safe in them as they that walk with God? even as in a dark day, those that keep closest with their guide, are likeliest to get safest through; Prov. 11:3, "The integrity of the upright shall guide them." There are suffering times, days of common calamity; and then those that walk with God are likeliest to be brought through, as Noah; Gen. 6:9.
7. Lastly. This is the way all have taken, that have walked through the world to Immanuel's land. God's children only are heirs; and they that are his children must follow him; Eph. 5:1. There is no walking with God in heaven, but for those that walk here with him in holiness. And therefore remember," If ye live after the flesh ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live;" Rom. 8:13.
I shall now shut up all with some directions, and advices for walking with God.
1. Labour to be sure ye are Christians indeed, and once fairly set on the way, by closing with Christ. Renounce the world and your lusts;
and look on yourselves as men bound for another world, under the conduct of the Captain of the Lord's hosts; Cant. 4:8.
2. Lay it down for a certain conclusion, that religion is quite another thing than mere external performances. It is a conforming of the soul to the image of Christ, and of the life and conversation to the holy law, by a participation of the virtue of his blood and Spirit. And therefore there must be constant endeavours to abide close by Jesus Christ, in the exercise of faith, love, and universal tenderness, not only in life, but in heart; Prov. 4:23.