Chapter III
The excellence of faith, in ihat it is most active, and hath the greatest influence in the u-hole course of our salvation from first to last.
2. This grace will be found of all other unto honour and glory at the appearing of Christ, if we respect man s salvation. This I shall make forth to you by running over some particulars. I will not stand to shew you the excellency of faith in this respect, that if there be any condition of the covefrom first to last, and never ceaseth till it hath brought it to salvation. In this little poor brittle vessel God hath ventured the blood of Christ, ventured in it the souls of his redeemed, the dwelling of his Holy Spirit, and all the works of the Spirit ; they are all in this brittle vessel through the power of the Holy Ghost acting the soul by it, to set the soul safe on shore in the other world ; and it ceaseth not, I say, till it hath carried the soul to Christ, and put it immediately into his hands. It begins all, and it endeth all, manageth all till the soul comes to heaven. I say in this life, my brethren, there are two principles of life to mankind, as there is of life and nourish ment to the sons of men : the one is in the womb by the navel-string, by which it takes in all its nourishment then. But no sooner is it out of the womb, and cometh into the world, but it hath another principle to take in nourishment by, and then the other is cut off, and is of no use. So it is here ; there are two principles we are to live by for evermore ; there is faith, which is a seeing of Christ absent, and there is vision, which is seeing of
CjlAP. III.l OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. 471 him present in heaven. We are here in this world as children in the womb, in comparison of the other ; and the glory of the other differs from that we have here, as much as the glory of the king upon his throne, from what he was in the womb. Now all the while we are here, it is this principle of faith that we live by, which is as the navel-string to convey nourishment to us ; but when faith hath performed all its offices, and we are grown up unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, which is for heaven, then the soul is carried into the other eternal world, and then indeed faith eeaseth, and the soul lives by vision. Faith is both nurse, and midwife, and all, to the soul, both for the beginning and carrying on, and doing all, till you come to the other world. I shall run over some particulars to manifest this to you.
(1.) It is faith that prepares the soul for Christ. A man s conscience may be first set awork in the sight of sin, set upon by all, and they may humble him, and bring him down very low ; but that which strikes the great stroke in preparing you for Christ is the taking you off for ever from all abilities, and from whatsoever is in yourselves, and out of that emptiness to go to Jesus Christ. Now it is faith only that doth this ; that only is the emptying grace which is the filling grace of Christ. Though the Spirit begins upon a man s conscience first, yet it is faith that perfects that work of making you nothing, and then it comes and raiseth you up to all things in Christ. Now as it is a rule, both in the law of nature and of common wealths, that it is the same power must make void a law that makes a law, the same power that creates must annihilate and bring to nothing, so it is the same faith that brings the soul to nothing, and empties it of itself, and of all things else, and that brings it unto Jesus Christ, and fills it with the fulness that is in him. It is all but faith digging downward, and working upward. In John xvi. 8, it is said, The Spirit shall convince the world of sin, and of righteousness. The thing I quote it for is this, the word there that is translated convince, is the same that is used in the definition of faith in Heb. xi. 2. You know faith there is called the evidence of things not seen ; the word is gXs/p/oi, conviction, the same that Christ useth here when he saith, The Spirit shall convince the world of sin ; that is, he shall work faith in them to see their lost condition ulti mately. The same spirit of faith and conviction that convinceth me of righteousness, convinceth me of my lost condition ; and therefore he adds, if"you mark it, Because ye believe not on me ; for that is the ultimate conviction that prepares a man for Christ. To take a man off of his own bottom, to make him see that he hath no ability to believe in Christ of himself, this faith doth; and having done thus, convinces a man of his lost condition ultimately. What is the reason the first promise is made to poverty of spirit by Christ, in Mat. v. 3 ? Certainly in poverty of spirit there he includes faith, and Christ would not have pronounced a blessed ness but upon forgiveness of sins, and that is upon believing ; yet it is eminently denominated poverty, because it is a work of faith, as making the soul poor. It is faith only that makes a man fling away his pwn right eousness, and to count it dross and dung, as you have it in Phil, iii., and to lay hold upon the righteousness of the Lord Jesus. It is faith that ultimately strikes that great stroke in preparation so much spoken of ; and truly other preparation will not drive a man to Christ.
(2.) And then when the soul is thus ultimately emptied by faith, and is lost, it is faith that first spies out Christ, as that ail-sufficient satisfaction received by God the Father. When the soul is in a storm and is even cast away in his own apprehension, when it hath thrown overboard all his
472 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS [PART III. BOOK I. own goods, all his own righteousness, all his own hopes, all his own abili ties, or whatever it be, and if God should leave the soul in that condition, the wrath of God, like mighty waves, would break in upon it, and swallow it up. "What doth faith now ? It climbs up to the top of the mast. Oh there is Christ, I have spied out the Lord Jesus, and it makes out to him instantly, gets aboard of him presently. Therefore now the entrance into the state of grace is attributed unto faith, in Rom. v. 1, * We have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand.
(3.) Then again, though there is a radical union that we have with Jesus
Christ, without all preparation, for he takes us before we take him, yet notwithstanding, all the communion we have with Jesus Christ is transacted by faith. The union, on our part, is mainly and primarily by faith : it is that which, on our part, ties the marriage knot ; it is not love, but consent, that makes man and wife. It is the heart s coming off to be Christ s, and going unto Christ to be his, and to be righteousness for him, and to be a head and a Saviour to him ; this is it which makes a union, and this is done by faith. There are but two things that do marry us unto Christ, as Hos. ii. 19 clearly holds forth : * I will betroth thee unto me in faithfulness and in loving-kindness ; that is now on God s part. But what is on our part ? It follows : and thou shalt know the Lord. There are but these two things make the match. Here is the faithfulness and loving-kindness of God on his part ; and then here is on our part, You shall know the Lord. I opened that before out of Jer. ix. I need not stand to repeat it, for in the Old Testament you shall find that faith is expressed, as there, by our knowing of God, who exerciseth loving-kindness in the earth. Now though that love doth unite too, for the soul is united to what it loves by love, yet it is faith that brings Jesus Christ into the heart, and reveals him to the soul in all his excellencies and his glory. We apprehend his love first, or his excellencies first, how lovely he is, even before love unites the soul to him. So that faith is first, and though that love may unite us to him, as for the excellencies in his person, yet take him as he is a mystical head, and as a husband, and a husband given, so it is faith that goes out to him as such, and goes out to him with an instinct after mystical union with him.
(4.) And then, all fellowship and communion with him, to be sure, is by faith. Unto all communion and fellowship with another, there are two things required. The first is, to make that person real and present ; and the second is, to have a familiar bold access. Now it is faith only that doth both these things to us, and therefore it is faith that lays the founda tion for all the fellowship and communion that we have with the Father and with the Son, the which the apostle John so much commendeth. First, it is faith only that makes God and Christ present, that so we may have fellowship with them, for we only have fellowship with those that are some way or other present to our spirits. It is not love that makes another pre sent ; it may set the fancy on work to make pictures of the party absent, but it is divine faith alone that hath the art to make God and Jesus Christ present. It sees God that is invisible, &c., causeth God to dwell in the heart, and bringeth Christ down from heaven, and causeth him to dwell in the heart. There is no more of God to my soul than that which by faith it takes in of him ; therefore wicked men are said to be without God and without Christ in the world, for so far is God and Christ got into a man s soul, as he by faith sees him, and takes in the knowledge of him, and takes him in so really, as love could not make that reality ; it may set the fancy on work, as I said, to make pictures in the fancy and to talk of him, but
CHAP. III.] OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. 473 the party is not there present, so as faith makes God and Christ to be to the soul. And then again, it is faith that makes us familiar with God : all our access with boldness it is by the faith of him, as Eph. iii. 12 hath it ; beholding him with open face, we come to him with open face, with confidence and boldness. The communion we have by faith with Christ, is often compared unto eating and drinking, as in John vi. 46. It is so for the reality of it : My flesh is meat indeed, saith he. Now a man hath many members in his body, but he hath communion with his meat no way but by his mouth and stomach, and indeed he can have it no way else : the hand takes it, the eye sees it, and the like, but unless the mouth and stomach receive it, the man starves still. Faith alone is that which takes
Jesus Christ to fetch nourishment from him, makes a man find the sweet ness that is in him, and draws virtue from him, makes my soul in this respect one with him, and he with me.
(5.) And then all the joy we have in Jesus Christ, it is through believ: Rom. xv. 13, that you may be filled with all joy and peace through ing believing. In John iv. 14, unto him that believeth there is promised a fountain of living water, springing up in his own heart, which faith is indeed the fountain of, for you see it is to him that believeth. He that believeth hath the witness in himself, hath the fountain of all joy in himself ; so the next words to the text, In whom believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeak able and full of glory.
And thus, as it brings us into communion with Christ, so it brings the Spirit also down into the heart. I acknowledge that the Holy Ghost comes down without all preparation upon a man s heart, for how else is a man prepared but by the Holy Ghost, when he comes to convert a man ? Yet there is a coming of the Holy Ghost down upon a man s soul upon believ ing. The great promise of the Holy Ghost, which the New Testament so much speaks of, to seal a man up to salvation, to give a man fellowship with the Father and with the Son, which was the great coming down of the Holy Ghost you read of in the primitive times in respect of grace, he came upon men in respect of gifts, but that is nothing to salvation, but that great promise of sending down the Holy Ghost to seal up a man s salvation, and to give him communion with God the Father, and with Jesus Christ, and to fill him with the fulness of God, the coming of the Holy Ghost to this purpose we receive by faith. The text is express for it, Gal. iii. 14, That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. And that is the reason, I take it, that in John xiv. 17, Christ speaking of that coming of the Holy Ghost upon the apostles, he tells them that they had him already, they had him so far as to enable them to believe : He dwelleth with you, saith he ; but there was a farther having of him as a Comforter. Now he tells them there, that the world cannot receive that Spirit, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him. I take it the meaning may be this, that the world cannot receive the Holy Ghost to come thus as a comforter, as a sealer, which is the thing promised there to the disciples, till such time as a man knows and sees, that is, believes. For otherwise, if this were true, that no man could receive the Holy Ghost till he knoweth him and seeth him, I would ask, How comes a man unconverted (as all once are) to know him and see him, and to see Christ ? By faith, that must be acknow ledged. And who works this faith ? The Holy Ghost certainly. There fore there is a receiving of the Holy Ghost, as a comforter and as a sealer, upon believing.
And then I might likewise shew you, that all our standing in grace is by faith. Rom. v. 2, By whom we have access by faith into the grace wherein
474 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS iTART III. BoOK I. we stand ; and stand by faith, for as we have access into the grace by faith, so we stand by it too. And in the words a little before the text, we are said to be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. Mark it, faith is joined there in commission with the power of God. Doth the power of God keep 3
Tou ? Faith keepeth you too. And as I said before, God is not shy of attributing that to faith which is proper only to himself, because faith attributes all to the power of God, and gives that the honour. But I say, we are kept through faith ; for, my brethren, if the way of our being kept were by other graces, we were in a miserable case, we should be at a loss ever and anon ; but faith is never nonplussed. Adam did not live by faith, and what then ? He had no access into the grace in which he stood, no, in which he fell rather ; but by faith we have access into the grace wherein we stand. Faith it stands, and stands out all storms, as I may express it to you. Whenas waves are ready to overwhelm the soul, what doth faith ? It leads a man to the Rock that is higher than he, as the psalmist hath it, Ps. Ixi. 2. All a man s other graces are but like: if he stand upon them, he is soon swallowed up. It is faith quicksands that carries the soul to Christ, who is the rock, and upon whom, when the soul hath set its footing, it standeth sure. If the soul be in any disquietness, what recovers it ? It is faith.
Why art thou cast down, my soul ? and why art thou disquieted within me ? Trust thou in God, Ps. xlii. 5. There is the remedy. Be you in any great tentation, if you can but got to believe, and to see God and Christ, so as that by faith he become but present to your spirits, and that you can see that in him that draws your hearts to rest upon him, your tentation is gone presently; it is impos sible that any man can be miserable if he believe. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee. It is a famous place that in Isa. xxvi. 3. And how is the mind stayed on God ? By faith. If a man be fallen, what reduceth him again ? It is faith. If you let go your faith when you fall into sin, you will fall down to the bottom ; as when a man is going up a ladder, if his foot slip, and he let go his hands, what can hinder him from falling to the ground ? When Christ foresaw that Peter would sin against him, what said he ? I have prayed that thy faith fail not. If thy faith fail not, that will recover all again. If any man sin, saith the apostle, we have an advocate with the Father. Let him go to Jesus Christ, and begin to recover himself by faith, and then let him mourn for sin, &c. Renew thy faith, and thou renewest all. It is faith that bears the brunt of all tentations. When all other graces are under hatches, and dare not look out, faith will be above board, and steer the ship still. Above all, take the shield of faith, saith the apostle. A shield, you know, stands a man in stead when his sword is gone, and when his hel met is cracked ; and when all his other armour is gone, he may lie safely under his shield, for that used to cover the whole man. It is faith that can deal with the wrath and anger of God, and with all the fiery darts of Satan, and makes a man, when he hath done all, to stand ; so the expres sion is in Eph. vi. Other graces in such a case, poor things, they will all stand trembling, and cry out, Who shall deliver us ? But faith says, I thank my God, through Jesus Christ, he is he that will deliver me. And it quencheth all the fiery darts of Satan too. We may in this case speak of faith, as the Scripture speaks of God in Isa. lix. 16, * He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor ; therefore his arm brought salvation. Indeed faith is the arm of the Lord, and that brings salvation to us, when all other graces are at a loss. It is faith which can bear out conflicts with God himself. This was it that bore Christ
ClIAP. III.] OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. 475
My God, my God, when God had forsaken him. And when God seems to be a man s enemy, and to upon the cross, and enabled him to say, fight against him, he secretly upholds faith within him to stand it out : Though he kill me, saith Job, yet will I trust in him, Job xiii. 15. And when God, who is greater than our heart, and is able to condemn us, and when conscience, that hath so much guilt laid up in it, is against us, then can faith have access with boldness unto the throne of grace ; or at leastwise the soul thereby is enabled to trust in God.
I should shew you here likewise, that faith is the mother of all graces ; and when I say so, my meaning is not, as some have said, that all habits of sanctification, and of all graces, they are wrought upon us after faith, and after the act of believing. No ; he that believeth, he is born of God, John v. 3 ;* and faith itself is a part of the new creature, which God works in us. But though it be not the mother of all the habits of grace in us, which are all wrought in the whole lump at first ; and though God draws faith out first, yet it is that grace that sets all other graces a-work, that sets all wheels a-going. When God hath drawn out faith to lay hold upon Christ, then it works by love, it is faith that then goes out for strength in Christ, that manageth all motives to move to obedience, and to live to him that died for me. It is faith that fetclieth all acceptation for every work we do ; without faith it is impossible to please God. As faith justifies the person, so it justifieth, and (as Luther was wont to say) it fulfils the whole law in Christ. Why ? Because I have recourse to Christ, which hath a righteousness beyond mine, and it throws away its own righteousness
the end of the law to him who believeth, Horn, x., that is, the perfection of the law. therefore it is called
I might shew you also, that it overcomes the world, it overcomes all the good of the world, and all the evil of the world ; and likewise how it sweeteneth all crosses. It overcomes all the good things of the world. So Heb. xi. 18, Moses, by faith, seeing him that was invisible, forsook
Egypt, and refused to be called the son of Pharaoh s daughter. It brings in objects so strong, so vigorous, so transcendency glorious into the soul, that it mastereth reason, and sense, and lusts, and all. It overcomes the evil of the world : Heb. xi. 33, Through faith they subdued kingdoms, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, &c. ; 2 Tim. i. 12, Therefore I also suffer these things: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded he is able to keep that I have committed to him.
And when you come to die (let me but add that), it must be by faith ; faith, as it begins all, so it ends all. It is that which must stand you in stead when that king of terrors environs you. It is not your own graces that will help VGU ; but if thy soul hath been familiar with God by faith (for there is a familiarity grows upon God by exercising acts of faith towards God), faith will resign up the soul immediately into the hands of God and Christ with boldness. Lord, saith he, into thy hands I commend my spirit. That very speech was the voice of faith, and it was the greatest trust that ever was* These all died in faith, saith he in Heb. xi., and therefore salvation is called the end of our faith, in this Epistle, chap. i. ver. 9.
I shall in a word make a use of it, and so conclude. And the use is but plainly this, to pitch your hearts upon seeking that at the hands of God and of Jesus Christ, and upon exercising that especially which will most be found unto the glory of God in you, and most to honour and glory unto
This is a mis-quotation. In 1 John iv. 7, we read, Every one that loveth is born of God. ED.
476 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS [PART III. BOOK I. you also, at the appearing of Jesus Christ, and that is this grace of faith. There is no grace glorifies God so much as this ; a few thoughts of believ ing glorify him much more than a great deal of obedience. This will be found at the latter day. If you find that this grace hath not sprung up in you, or abounded in you, seek unto God that this grace of all graces else may abound ; and to that end I have set out the excellency of faith to you. It is the great work of God ; so Christ said when they asked him, what * This, saith he, they should do that they might work the works of God ? is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent. Our Saviour Christ, when the apostles said unto him, Lord, increase our faith, Luke xvii. 5, he did presently on purpose fall on the commending it yet more to them, and setting out the excellency of faith, and told them what great things it could and would do, to the end he might make them inflamed yet more after believing, and that their hearts might be set yet more upon endeavouring after it. You say well, saith he, to say, Lord, increase our faith ; for of all graces else it is good to seek the increase of that, because it is such a grace as can do all things, that can set on work all that is in God, and set a-work likewise all other graces.