Chapter I
The words of the text explained ; from which, and other scriptures, it is
proved that the elect are in a state of sin and wrath before they are brought
into a state of grace.
THIS text doth afford these heads to be treated on :
I. That there are two different states or conditions, which the elect of
God, that tire saved, pass through, between which regeneration is the pass.
1. The one is their first state in which they were born, a state of bon
dage to sin, and obnoxious to instant damnation whilst they remain in it.
This is clear in the words, and is premised to celebrate the mercy of it ;
for having mentioned all men, in the very words afore, in exhorting to
shew meekness to all men, it follows, for we ourselves, whom God hath now shewn mercy unto, and severed and called out from the rest of man
kind, were also sometimes disobedient, serving divers lusts and pleasures. These words, we also sometimes, both import, that as the rest of men
remained in this woeful state, so themselves, though now saved, were once
in the same state of bondage to sin, serving divers lusts, and thereby ob
noxious to damnation.
2. The other state is of grace and salvation ; therefore oppositely to that
former state, he says, He hath saved us, justified us, and made us heirs of
life. Us, who in the former estate had been heirs of hell, and children of
wrath, as the opposition shews.
II. Hence it follows that the new birth is the transitus, or passage between these two states, and the necessity thereof from thence may be
demonstrated.
74 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II.
III. And, thirdly, that God, to magnify his grace, mercy, love, kindness
(for all these are named) the more, leaveth many, or most of those he saveth, to remain and continue, for some time, in the first estate, before he doth
regenerate them. For Paul, speaking of the commonalty and bulk of them in distinction from all other men, says,
* We ourselves were sometimes dis
obedient, and so remained and continued in that condition as well as other men. But at length,
* after the love of God appeared towards us (says
he), he saved us by regeneration, and it all tends to shew as well the
necessity as the mercy of it.
IV. Hence then it is evident, that the eminentest mercy that God doth, or which may be judged to be vouchsafed us in our whole lives, or to eter
nity, is the laying the foundation in his first renewing, and regenerating us by his Spirit, as being the transitus, or the passage between both, by which we become translated from the one, and actually admitted into the other, of salvation :
* According to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of rege neration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abun
dantly, through Jesus Christ our Saviour : that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Y. Further, to set forth the mercy of it, there is presented here as great a solemnity at this business, as ever was or shall be found in any work done for us, namely, a joint concurrence, and yet distinct appearance, in a
set and solemn conjunction of all three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. A happy constellation or conjunction of the planets falling out at the instant of the birth of some great prince (especially if you supposed it one of those greatest conjunctions, whereof but six have been since the crea
tion) how wonderful a prognostic would this be accounted by astrologers, of great and glorious events to follow and accompany him so born, and thus honoured and marked forth at his birth. But, lo ! a more glorious conjunction, of the three glorious persons in the heaven of heavens, of the three witnesses in heaven, as John terms them, solemnly meeting and
appearing as witnesses at this great baptism, the only true baptism, the new birth of every believer ; called, therefore, the laver or
* washing of
regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost. 1. The Father is implied in the 4th verse. After the love of our Saviour, he saved us by renewing us ; for God our Saviour, in the 4th verse, is clearly made a distinct per son from Jesus Christ, our Saviour, ver. 6 ; so then the Father is meant.
2. The Holy Ghost is mentioned, for it is called the renewing of the Holy Ghost, was then shed on us abundantly. 3. Jesus Christ is named in those words, through Jesus Christ our Saviour. All this displays the
greatness of the mercy of our regeneration, which Peter had only in general words expressed (1 Pet. i. 3) ; but Paul, you see, doth it more particularly here, though Peter indeed doth also express the authors of this work ; for there is first God, as in opposition to all created causes : Blessed be God, who hath begotten us. In God all three persons are included, having a distinct and proper hand in it, though of all the thr3e persons the Holy Ghost more eminently and specially. His name is taken into its very deno mination. It is termed and denominated by the apostle, the renewing of the Holy Ghost, as elsewhere the thing begotten
: John iii., That which
is born of the Spirit. Lastly, in Christ, who is xar s&yjv, our Saviour, of all transactions of his for our salvation, his resurrection hath the most eminent influence into our new birth, as the instrumental cause ; and for that I must have recourse unto Peter, and fetch it out of him, who hath
begotten us again by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
CHAP. 1.1 IN OUR SALVATION. 75
Obs. That there are two vastly differing estates of sin and damnation, of
grace and salvation, which the new birth is the passage between, and the tran-
situs from the one to the other. This I must premise, as the apostle doth, in
order to shew both the absolute necessity of regeneration, and greatness of
the mercy of it. Not this scripture alone, but all the epistles, give eminent
evidence to my assertion, and under several metaphors and expressions
(wherein each delights in its variety) set forth maps and descriptions of
these two estates, which argues this matter to have been, in the preachings of the apostles, a point of greatest moment. And this discrimination made
is not to be understood as the setting out two sorts, or ranks, or destinies
of men ; as if the one sort consisted only of persons that were reprobate, the other of elect, or as if none but reprobate should be understood to be
in the estate of nature, and the elect to be such as were always in no other
estate but the estate of grace. It is true indeed that all elect, sooner or
later, are in the end translated into the estate of grace, or they could not be
saved. And on the contrary, those whom God passeth by are left to con
tinue and persist in the state of sin and damnation to their deaths, and
they die in their sins, as Christ speaks. But these two differences in man
kind are to be looked upon as two estates or conditions, whereof the one
hath salvation, the other damnation, actually belonging to them at the
present ; whilst any, either elect or they who are passed by, are respec
tively the subjects of either. And therefore we find this different condition
exemplified in one and the same persons themselves of the elect, take them
in several times of their lives, in that estate we usually call of nature ; but
afterwards, through being renewed, they are in the estate of grace. Only what the apostle speaks in another yet the like case, that by God s ordina
tion holds in this, That is not first which is spiritual (or the estate of
* but that is first which is natural ; and afterwards
grace), 1 Cor. xv. 46,
that which is spiritual. His reason (ver. 49) holding also in this, that we
are to bear the image of the earthly, the first Adam first, and then the
image of the heavenly. This almost every epistle to all the saints they wrote to, doth more or less indigitate
: thus Rom. vi. 17, 18, But God
be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the
heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made
free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. And 1 Cor. vi.
: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but
11, Such were some of you
ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our
God. And Gal. iv. 8, There was a time (then) when ye knew not God, and a now :
* After that now ye have known God, or rather are known of
God. And Eph. ii. 1,2, And you hath he quickened, who were dead in
sins and trespasses ; wherein in time past ye walked, c., and so he goes on to describe their natural condition. And Col. i. 21, And you, that
were sometimes enemies in your minds by wicked works, yet now hath he
reconciled ; and chap. ii. 13, And you, being dead in your sins and the
nncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened, having forgiven you all
trespasses. Neither do they exemplify this in the same persons of the
Gentile converts, but in the Jewish also ; who came in troops to John, to
escape the wrath to come. And though himself was sanctified from the womb (Luke i. ver. 15) though conceived in the state of sin; for that
which is born of the flesh is flesh ; yet the multitude of the rest of the
elect lived in disobedience until riper years, ver. 16, 17, And many of the
children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go
before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn them, namely through
76 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II.
his ministry. And accordingly our Peter, writing to the Jews, that had lived in the bosom of that church, speaks of them as of those who before this their generation had a former estate, which he terms their vain con
versation, ver. 18, and (ver 14) calls that estate the former lusts of their
ignorance ; so terming their former estate, from the want of saving know
ledge, when their lusts ruled, which now having escaped, they were made
partakers of a divine nature : 1 Peter i. 4, having now purified their
hearts, being born again of incorruptible seed, ver. 22, 23. And more
expressly he says of them (ii. 10), that they he thus wrote to (who were by outward character the people of God) in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God ; which had not obtained mercy, but have now obtained mercy. It was a state wherein actually, and before God as a judge, or according to the judgment the Word pronounced of them (by which God will judge all the world,) they were not a people ; though before God, as God, they were elected, and his chosen people. The other is a state of grace and mercy,
* but now (says he)
* have obtained mercy ; and still regeneration or conversion is set out as the passover, as the equi noctial line to be passed, that divides between both climates, the one of darkness and the shadow of death ; the other a contrary climate of light and glory
: so the words just afore intimate, who hath called us out of darkness into his marvellous light. And as Peter speaks thus of the Jews as well as Gentiles, so Paul also having spoken (Eph. ii. 1) to the Gentiles
(compare ver. 11): You were dead in sins; wherein in time past ye walked ; he turns his speech from them to himself and his countrymen the Jews, and says of all the generality of the Jews then converted, Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our
flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind ; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. By those others he means the Gentiles, and he evidently speaks of what they had been in their con versation unto riper years.
Divines usually term the one the state of nature, as the other the state of grace ; and they give them these terms warrantably from the Scriptures. 1. For the terming a man s condition after regeneration the state of
grace, the apostle doth it expressly : Rom. v. 2, By faith (saith he) we have access into this grace wherein we stand ; that is, into this station.
It is a perpetual and standing condition of favour, when once we have admission or access into it, which by faith there, and by regeneration here in this text of Titus, we are said to have ; he speaks as we do, or rather we as he, calling it a state of grace. And so oppositely the other a state of
nature, which you have as fully and as expressly mentioned, Eph. ii. For when he would sum up what was that estate of both Jews and Gentiles
fore-spoken of, he, as in a general conclusion, speaks thus, We were by nature children of wrath, as well as others. His meaning is not only that both were alike in such an estate when born, as restraining that phrase by nature, merely unto what they had been by birth, and so only to their
birthsin (though that must be intended as the source or spring) ; but he
speaks too of that race and whole time of their conversation, and course
run, wherein they fulfilled the lusts they had by nature (as is evident) until
quickened and saved. He termeth that whole stage they ran, and that scene of life, a condition of nature, as acting all that while according to the principles and swing of nature, and having nought but nature in them, afore grace came and wrought in them. And therefore, as Erasmus hath well observed, it is opposed to that which follows (ver. 5) By grace ye are
CHAP. I.] IN OUR SALVATION. 77
saved, shewing in the former what naturally without grace, and until grace, their condition was, for sin and wrath. And this interpretation, that style of the apostle given to every man in that estate confirms, terming him, 1 Cor. ii. 14,
* a natural man, in distinction from a spiritual, till made a
* That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. During all which time they remain (till new-born) children of wrath ; that is, whose portion is wrath, and they exposed to it, during such their
spiritual man by regeneration
condition. And similarly to this sense, that this phrase by nature should
involve the whole time from the birth, as well as the sinfulness of our
birth itself, do other scriptures speak when they would describe and set
* They are gone astray from the womb. And it is the natural condition afore and without grace the
forth that natural condition : Ps. Iviii. 3,
psalmist there speaks of. For he not only says they were corrupt in or by the womb, but all along from the womb, thereby expressing their whole
state. The like you have Gen. vi., from their youth. Now when we say men s condition afore regeneration is all that while a
state of sin and wrath, as that of grace is the contrary, I desire all men to
consider what that imports. Guilt of sin is one thing (the best are guilty), but a state of sin is a further thing. Corruption of nature to be in a man
is one thing, the state of nature is another : to be worthy of death is one
thing, so every man in sinning is ; but to be in a state of death is another ;
it is to be sentenced and adjudged to die, or as Christ speaks, condemned
* He that believeth on him is not condemned : but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed
: John iii. 18,
already
in the name of the only begotten Son of God ; which is all one to say, He that hath not such a faith as renews the heart (for of regeneration Christ hath discoursed, ver. 3-5 of the chapter) is in a state of condemna
tion, so that he needs no other sentence. There wants nothing but execu
tion ; for which how soon a writ will come out he knows not. As in the canon law for some transgressions a man stood excommunicated ipso facto upon the committing, as murder, &c., it depended not upon a new sentence. Here his state makes him instantly and immediately obnoxious to death.
Every sin he sins not only deserves death, but it is unto death ; not
only the thing is worthy of it, but by reason of his state it redounds to the
person, and binds him over to death, which is the true import of that phrase, A child of wrath by nature ; as a man that stands sentenced and adjudged, condemned to die, is by a Jew termed a child of death : 2 Sam. xii. 5,
* This man is a child of death. For David as a king did at that time
* certainly die. And
pronounce it of him, as we translate it, that he should
Christ, on the contrary, is termed a Son of love, Col. i. 13 ; we translate
* his dear Son, but it is viog ayd^g, noting forth a perpetuated! state f
grace and favour borne to him, which Christ calleth abiding in his Father
love, John xv. 2 ; that is, he remains in a perpetual state of grace and favour ; and in the like sense these are termed
* children of wrath, as
abiding in it.
78 THE WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST [BOOK II.