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Post by Admin on Feb 2, 2024 12:31:30 GMT -5
Enoch's Character and Translation
Explained,
with a Description of Walking with God, as that in which
the Life of Religion Lies
And Enoch walked with God, and he was not; for God took him.
- GENESIS 5:24
IT is too evident, that the generation we live in is in a declining
condition; that professors are few, but real Christians fewer by far.
Religion with many is turned to be the object of their ridicule; and
among those that own it, to merely dry and sapless notions, for the
most part. Few now are added to the church, or brought over out of
the devil's camp. True godliness languishes, and serious
experimental religion wears out. Therefore I would press religion in
the life and power of it, on those that would save themselves from
this untoward generation.
Here shines the brightest star in the patriarchal age, which having
given light to the lower world for a time, was afterwards translated
into a higher sphere, and passed out of the world in as un usual a
manner as he lived in it. For as men live in the world, so ordinarily
they go out of it.
There is a long account here, where nothing is marked but names
and numbers, men's living and dying, till we come to Enoch, whose
singular piety is recorded. OBSERVE. The life of man is for the most
part a vain thing, of which, by the sleeping of some, and the
slumbering of others, nothing remains remarkable, but that they I
lived and died. But close walking with God serves another and better
purpose, than to cause one just fill up room in the world for a while.
From the short history of these antediluvian patriarchs, we may learn
one lesson, that will serve us all our days, viz. That we must die, how
long soever we live. It is reported of one, that by hearing this chapter
read in the church, he got such an impression of his own death, that
he turned religious, that he might die well. Drexel. de œtern.
But from the history of Enoch we may learn two lessons. 1. How to
live well in this world. 2. The happiness that abides those in another
world, who so live here; even eternal happiness of soul and body with
the Lord.
In the words there is remarked a real preaching that was given to the
old world by Enoch; a life-preaching; for his conversation preached
to them, what religion was, and what was their great duty, viz.
walking with God; a removal-preaching, (we cannot say his death
preached, for he did not die; but his passage out of this world
preached), that there is another and a better life with God in another
world, both for soul and body. And this is no doubt marked, to shew
us the mercy bestowed on that generation, that the godly in it might
be encouraged, and the wicked left without excuse, while such a
bright star shone so fair in that dark age. For it is observable, that his
walking with God is twice told, once, ver. 22, and here again in the
text, in conjunction with his happy removal, giving us a compendious
body of divinity, written for the use of that age especially, (not
excluding others), in this man's life and translation out of the world.
So that God left not himself without a witness in that degenerate age.
They not only heard, but saw in him, the power of godliness, and the
reward of it too.
OBSERVE, Men will not only have the best instructions and
warnings they get from the world, but those they get from the
examples of holy men, to answer for in the day of accounts. There are
silent preachers, who yet speak home, as Noah, who "being warned
of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to
the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world;" Heb.
11:7; and the men, of Nineveh, and the queen of the south, of whom
our Lord says, Matth. 12:41, 42, "The men of Nineveh shall rise in
judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it, because they
repented at the preaching of Jonas, and behold, a greater than Jonas
is here. The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this
generation, and shall condemn it; for she came from the uttermost
parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold, a
greater than Solomon is here." Examples of a holy life, if they do not
lead spectators to heaven, will drive them more deeply into destruction.
Though it is charitably thought, that all the patriarchs were good
men, yet surely the age wherein Enoch lived was a very degenerate
and profane age, Methuselah his son died the same year the deluge
came on. He lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years. Enoch walked
with God three hundred years. So from his translation there were six
hundred and sixty-nine to the deluge. Of that they got one hundred
and twenty years' warning of the deluge; so that to that time there
were but five hundred and forty-nine years. There were none of those
here mentioned but they lived more than seven hundred years. And
God's Spirit had been long striving with the generation before the
last hundred and twenty years. So that we may well reckon that many
of those who lived in Enoch's days, were of those God's Spirit had so
long striven with, and that were swept away by the deluge; and
consequently that it was a very degenerate and profane age he lived
in, wherein men had come the length to talk and act boldly against
the God that made them, as appears from Jude 14, 15, "Enoch also,
the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the
Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment
upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them, of all
their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all
their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against
him."
OBSERVE, Be the times never so bad, it is men's own fault they are
bad too. Eminent holiness, and intimate communion with God, may
be attained in the worst of limes. While that generation was running
to ruin, Enoch walked with God.
The reasons are,
1. Because however men grow worse and worse, heaven in still as
good and bountiful as ever; Isa. 59:1, 2, "Behold, the Lord's hand is
not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy that it
cannot hear, but your iniquities have separated between you and
your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not
hear." God's door still stands open, though the generation conspire
to trouble it very little for supply. Our Lord will never shut his door
upon his people, because they are few; but it shall stand open as long
as there is one that hath business in his house; Micah 2:7, "O thou
that art named the house of Jacob, is the Spirit of the Lord
straitened? are these his doings? do not my words do good to him
that walketh uprightly?"
2. Because those that mind for heaven, must row against the stream
always; and if they do not, they will be called down the stream in the
best of times; for, says our Lord, Matth. 11:12, "From the days of
John the Baptist, until now, the kingdom of heaven suffereth
violence, and the violent take it by force." If people will ply the
throne of grace, and resolutely set themselves against the epidemical
disease of their day, they may keep lively in the midst of a dead crew,
though with much difficulty, as our Lord observes; Rev. 3:4, "Thou
hast a few names even in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments."
3. The badness of the times affords matter to excite God's people the
more to their duty, and close walking with God. The profaneness and
formality of those they live among, and the dishonour done to God
thereby, should be like oil to the flame of their holy love and zeal, as
it was to David; Psalm 119:126, 127, "It is time for thee, Lord, to
work, for they have made void thy law. Therefore I love thy
commandments above gold, yea, above fine gold." The prospect of
what must needs be the issue of such apostasy of a generation may
also quicken them; even as one is the more concerned to see to his
own safety, that the rest of the family are pulling down the house
about their own ears; as was the case with Noah, who, among a very
wicked and abandoned people, had this character, "Noah was a just
man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God," Gen. 6:9.
4. Lastly. Because as the Lord shews himself most concerned for the
welfare of those who are most concerned for his honour; so the worse
the times are, they that cleave to him closely may expect to fare the
better, as Noah also did, when the Lord said to him, "Come thou, and
all thy house into the ark: for thee have I seen righteous before me in
this generation," Gen. 7:1. Moses never had a more glorious
manifestation of God, than at the time when the Israelites had fallen
into the idolatry of the golden calf, and God was about to destroy the
whole nation; as you will find by comparing Exod. 32:10, and chap. 33 and 34.
USE 1. Learn that those who keep not up communion with God, in
the life and power of religion, in evil times, are in God's account
joined and embarked with the generation of his wrath; and be who
they will, they will smart with the rest for it, though they pot not
forth their hands to the notorious abominations of the times they live
in. Hence is that threatening, Zeph. 1:12, "It shall come to pass at
that time, that I will search Jerusalem with candles, and punish the
men that are settled on their lees; that say in their heart, The Lord
will not do good, neither will he do evil." It is a heavy word that sets
formal hypocrites and profane wretches on one and the same
bottom; Psalm 125 ult., "As for such as turn aside unto their crooked
ways, the Lord shall lead them forth with the workers of iniquity."
2. Bad example with its influence will not excuse people before the
Lord. While it is no comfort to go to hell with company, there can be
no safety in following a multitude to do evil. What! will men think
that because the conspiracy against God and holiness is strong,
therefore they may join in it; that because serious godliness is going
over the brae, therefore they may give it a push? But we will be to
them that give an unhallowed touch to God's wain when it is at the
halting.
3. To be complaining of the evil of the times, sighing and going
backward in religion, is a fruitless unavailing complaint, neither
pleasing to God, nor profitable to one's self. For at no time does
religion consist in talking, but in walking with God. And that is but to
condemn ourselves out of our own months.
4. Lastly. Let us be exhorted to study the power and reality of religion
in these dregs of time. Let us draw the nearer to God, that we see so
many going far from him. And as we would not bring the wrath of
God on ourselves, let us neither join with a profane generation, nor
continue on our lees with a formal dead-hearted generation,
strangers to the power of godliness. Consider here,
1. Enoch's holy life in this world.
2. His happy removal into a better world.
FIRST, Let us consider Enoch's holy life in this world; "Enoch walked
with God." The Spirit of God puts a special remark on this. It is
Enoch's honour, that he did not walk as others did, after their lusts.
Yea, he walked more holily and closely with God, than other good
men of that age.
OBSERVE 1. God takes special notice of those who are best when
others are worst, Gen. 6:9. We see this in the instance of Noah in the
old world, and of Lot in Sodom; likewise of those mentioned Ezek.
9:4, concerning whom the Lord said, "Go through the midst of the
city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the
foreheads of the men that sigh, and that cry for all the abominations
that be done in the midst thereof;" and those taken notice of Mal.
3:16, 17, "Then they that feared the Lord, spake often I one to
another, and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of
remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord,
and that thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith the
Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels, and I will spare
them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him."
1. To be thus argues an ingenuous spirit, a love to the Lord for
himself, and a love to his way for its likeness to himself; that the soul
is carried thus to it against the stream of the corruption of the age.
2. It argues not only grace, but the strength of grace. It must be
strong faith, love, &c. that so much bear out against the strong
temptation to apostasy, arising from the combination of a generation
against God and his way. To be holy when the helps to a holy life are
least in the world, argues the vigour of grace in the heart.
USE. Labour ye then to be best while others are worst, to confront
the impiety of the generation wherein ye live. Do they indulge
themselves in licentiousness? be ye the more strict and holy in your
walk. Do they take up with mere externals in religion? strive ye the
rather to get into the inner court, to taste and see, and here to have
communion with God.
OBSERVE. 2. It is the honor of a professor of religion, to outgo
others in the matter of close walking with God. God himself is
glorious in holiness. The more holy one is, the more like is he to God.
The liker he is to God, the more honorable is he.
USE 1. This lets us see what would be a blessed emulation among
professors, viz. that we were striving who should be most tender,
holy, and circumspect. O that that were brought in, in the room of all
our strifes and contests about practices and opinions, which eat out
the life of religion in our day! But alas! real holiness is little regarded,
and therefore little striven for.
2. It must be a godless-like mark in any person, to have the
serpentine grudge rise in their breasts against others, as they see
them eminent for holy and tender walking. These are the persons
most beloved and honoured of God; and it looks devilish-like to hate
them, and have one's heart rise against them, for that very reason for
which God loves them.
In the first part of the words we have,
1. The person characterized; and that is Enoch. There was another of
this name descended from Cain, who had a city called after his name;
Gen. 4:17. Immortality is desired of all; and because men cannot
stave off death, they follow after a shadow of immortality, that at
least their name may live when they are gone. Therefore that has
been an ancient custom, for men to call their lands after their own
names; Psalm 49:11. How much better was it with this Enoch, that
took that course to get on him the name of the city of God, which
Christ promises to write on all his people? Rev. 3:12. The city called
by the name of the other Enoch was destroyed by the deluge, and is
now unknown; but the city of God lasts still, and will last for ever.
OBSERVE. True piety is the best way to honour, even to true honour.
For "the righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance," when "the
memory of the wicked shall rot."
Enoch signifies dedicated, initiated, instructed. His life answered his
name, for he lived as one devoted to the Lord. OBSERVE. It is the
duty of those devoted to God by their godly parents, to devote
themselves to the Lord. And where grace comes in with good
education, it ordinarily makes men famous in their generation, and
signally serviceable to God.
He was the seventh from Adam, and a prophet, who foretold the last
judgment, even in that early age of the church; Jude 14, above cited.
He was like Noah, a preacher of righteousness in his day; and like
John Baptist, a burning and shining light, burning in his
conversation, shining in his doctrine.
OBSERVE. They that live near God, are most likely to be put upon
his secrets, and to know most of his mind; Psalm 25:14, "The secret
of the Lord is with them that fear him; and he will shew them his
covenant."
2. His character; he "walked with God." He lived like a man of
another world; a life of close communion with God. It imports, (1.)
That he was really religious; not only religious before men, but
before God. OBSERVE. Religion lies inwardly. We are that really
which we are before the Lord; Rom. 2 ult., "He is a Jew which is one
inwardly." (2.) He was eminently religious. OBSERVE. Men may
attain to eminency in religion, in very bad times, by setting the Lord
always before them. See here,
1st, What he was; a spiritual traveller through the world; he
"walked." Whereas it is said of others, they "lived;" it is said of
Enoch, "He walked with God." He looked on himself as a pilgrim and
stranger in this present world; Heb. 11:13, compare ver. 5, and did
not sit down in it to take up his abode on this side Jordan.
OBSERVE. They that would live a life of communion with God, must
live as pilgrims in this world, as travellers through it to a better
country.
1. Their hearts must be loosed from the world, bidding an eternal
farewell to it as a portion; 1 John 2:15. The heart gone from God
naturally sits down on the creature, to suck the sap of it, and to
pursue it as its chief good. Now, the first step to the sours thriving, is
to lift the heart from the creature, and once fairly to give up with the
vain world.
2. They must be fixed on the better country; Heb. 11:14. They must
look to the land that is afar off, resolutely aiming to be there, and
therefore habitually keeping it in their eye, as the mark they desire to
hit; Phil. 3:20. Thus we shall be heavenly in the frame and
disposition of our spirits.
3. They must keep death much in their view, the passage out of this
world into the other; Job 14:14, "If a man die, shall he live again? all
the days of my appointed time will I wait till my change come." See
what a familiarity he had contracted with it; chap. 17:14, "I have said
to corruption, Thou art my father; to the worm, Thou art my mother
and my sister." This is the way to wean our hearts from the world,
and to stir us up to converse much with another world.
4. Lastly. They must beware of dipping deep in things of this life, but
go through the world lightly, like travellers, who serve themselves
with a passing view of those parts they go through; 1 Cor. 7:29–31,
"But this I say, brethren, the time is short. It remaineth, that both
they that have wives, be as though they had none; and they that
weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they
rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and
they that use this world, as not abusing it; for the fashion of this
world passeth away."
The reason is, because the world is one of the great make-bates
betwixt God and a soul. And so far as it gets in betwixt God and us, it
causes an eclipse of the light of the Lord's countenance.
USE. As ever ye would live a life of communion with God, live as
pilgrims in this world. The manna never fell from heaven in the
wilderness, till the provision brought from Egypt was spent and
done. Deny yourselves to this world, if ye would have the taste of
things of a better world. When the vessels of your hearts are emptied
of the love of the world, the oil of grace will run.
2dly, The company he kept while he was in the way; "He walked with
God." He did not walk with the generation he lived in; did not go on
with the multitude, thinking it enough to do as they did; but he
"walked with God," being a follower of the Lord, keeping his eye on
him.
OBSERVE. True religion makes one give up with the way of the
world, and set God before them for all. It is the way of strangers from
God to follow the course of this world; Eph. 2:2. They that mind for
heaven, must be nonconformists to the world; Rom. 12:2. They must
be practical separatists from the world, in life and conversation;
Psalm 12:7, as it was with Joshua, who said, chap. 24:15, "As for me
and my house, we will serve the Lord."
USE 1. See here what a graceless-like thing it is for people to content
themselves to be like neighbour and others. Ah, Sirs, though all the
world should approve you, if God condemn you, what will it avail?
They that pin their faith or holiness on other people's sleeve, have
neither faith nor holiness, and will never see heaven.
2. See the necessity of a religion beyond the reach of the common
gang of the world; Zech. 3:8. Ye must not satisfy yourselves with the
religion that most part do; but press forward to leave them behind
you, because they do not walk with God.
3dly, His constancy in the way of the Lord; he "walked incessantly"
as the word signifies. He did not take his religion by fits and starts, as
many do, but he kept a constant course of it. Ver. 22 tells us, he
walked with God three hundred years, all the time he lived after he
begat Methuselah. Though perhaps he was a good man while he lived
single in his young days, yet his last days were his best days. His
greatest eminency for piety was in the days of his married life; while
his family was increasing, his soul was increasing too.
OBSERVE. A married state is a state of life very consistent with the
soul's flourishing in religion.
USE. How unreasonable, then, is that excuse, which goes mighty far
with the world; Luke 14:20, "I have married a wife, and therefore I
cannot come?" It was not so with Enoch; the comforts of it did not so
bewitch him, nor the cares of it so rack his spirit, but that he was one
of the holiest and heavenliest men that ever lived. What a pity is it,
that that state should be a state of declining in religion to so many,
and that as their family increases, their soul's case goes to wreck? So
that of their marriage-day it may be said, as John 6:66, "From that
time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him."
It is a holy state, and a helpful one, by God's appointment. It must
needs be a dreadful business, where the one proves a snare to the
other, for apostasy from the life of God.
Secondly, There is Enoch's happy removal into a better world.
1. Consider his leaving of this world; "He was not:" no more in this
world. Of all the rest it is said, they "died;" but of him only, "he was
not," for he died not, but got out of the world without dying. He was
taken off,
1st, Soon, being only three hundred and sixty-five years of age. That
was in the midst of his days; for there were none of the patriarchs
before the flood, but lived more than as long again.
OBSERVE. God ofttimes takes them soonest out of the world that are
dearest to him. Why then should we be fond of long life? He was a
man that was dear to God, and useful for God. And if he did not live
long, he lived fast, and did more in his few days, than others in
double the time. He had no loss, for the remainder of his days he got
in heaven.
2dly, Suddenly; so the phrase seems to import; Psalm 37:36, and so
the nature of the thing requires it to be; as in the case of Elijah; 2
Kings 2:11, and those who shall be changed; 1 Cor. 15:51, 52, cases
parallel to this. He evanished.
OBSERVE. A sudden removal out of the world may befal the best of
God's children. Why should the Lord's people then be afraid of
sudden death? It does but make sore work short work; and they that
are in Christ can never be taken habitually at least unprepared; and
they that always walk habitually with God, are always actually
prepared. Good old Eli died such a death.
2. Consider his transportation to heaven; "God took him;" took him
home, took him up soul and body at once to himself into heaven;
Heb. 11:5. God made a change on his corruptible body without death,
even such a change as will be made on the bodies of the saints that
shall be alive at Christ's second coming. So there was as great a
difference betwixt his removal and that of others, as betwixt his life
and theirs.
OBSERVE. When the saints leave the world, God takes them home to himself.
All the patriarchs mentioned in this chapter were alive at Enoch's
translation, except Adam, who died some time before, and Noah,
who was born some time after. Adam himself had heard the voice of
God, and Noah got an eminent confirmation of his faith in his
preservation in the ark. Enoch's translation might be confirming to
the rest, in the faith of a future happy state of the saints, both in soul
and body. And it was a sure pledge of the resurrection, that was then
far off, and not yet come.
OBSERVE. The weight of the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead,
which God so early confirmed. It is worthy to be remarked, how
Enoch's body was carried to heaven before the law, Elijah's under the
law, and Christ's under the gospel. So that each of the three great
periods of the world's age had in it a notable pledge of the
resurrection of the body.
USE. Let us then live and die in the faith of it; and while we live, live
as those that look for it.
Having thus given a large practical explication of the text, I proceed
to observe a point of doctrine from them, as the ground of some
further discourse.
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Post by Admin on Feb 2, 2024 13:20:32 GMT -5
DOCTRINE. The life of religion lies in walking with God; or, the
great thing we should aim at for practical godliness, is to walk with God.
Here I shall,
I. Explain this walking with God.
II. Confirm the doctrine, that the life of religion lies in walking with
God.
III. Lastly. Apply.
I. For explication of this walking with God, I shall consider it,
1. In the foundation thereof, with respect to our state.
2. In the matter of it, in respect of our frame and conversation.
3. In the properties thereof.
FIRST. I am to consider walking with God in the foundation thereof,
with respect to our state. And so it pre-supposes,
First, Spiritual life restored to the soul in regeneration. Men are
naturally dead to God and holiness; Eph. 2:1, "dead in trespasses and
sins." A dead man cannot walk, and a dead soul cannot walk with
God. Before Lazarus once in his grave could move again, he behoved
to be quickened and raised again. No wonder that many cannot walk
with God, seeing they are strangers to the life of God. They live as
they were born in a natural state. Consider,
1. The eye of the understanding is out, and man naturally is blind;
Eph. 5:8. Walking with God is a regular walk; how then can the blind
soul walk so? To walk at random is to walk contrary to God; Lev.
26:21. Heb. Never a soul will stumble on the way of God; for while in
the state of blindness, Satan and lusts lead the soul. Therefore we
must be cured by divine illumination; and for this cause the gospel is
preached; Acts 26:18, "to open men's eyes, and to turn them from
darkness to light."
2. The feet of the soul, the will and affections, are quite indisposed
for walking with God, and they must be cured. Hence is the promise,
Ezek. 36:26, 27, "A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I
put within you, and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh,
and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within
you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my
judgments, and do them."
(1.) They are distorted, disjointed, and cannot ply to the way of God;
Jer. 13:23, "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his
spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil."
They have got a set to backsliding from the Lord, and they cannot be
cured without a miracle of grace. That must give them a new set, or
we are undone for ever; Psalm 85 ult., "Righteousness shall go before
him; and shall set us in the way of his steps."
(2.) They are weak, and unable to bear us in his way, Rom. 5:6. We
lost our strength in the loins of our first parents, and never recover it
till we be in Christ, to partake of his Spirit. If the soul aim to rise, it
cannot; if to walk, the legs fail under us. Nay,
(3.) They are powerless, John 15:5, and 6:44. There is power in them
to carry us still further out of God's way, but they are absolutely
unable to move heavenward, till they be endowed with power from
on high. Therefore we are to be concerned for the new nature, the
principle of spiritual life.
Secondly, Faith in God through Jesus Christ. We must come to God
before we can walk with him, it is by faith we come to him, Heb. 11:6.
We are naturally at a distance from God; in the everlasting covenant
God offers to meet us in Christ. So by coming to Christ we meet with
God, that we may set off in our way with him. Whoso would walk
with God,
1. Must take God for their God in the covenant, Heb. 8:10,
renouncing all others for him, and accepting him as their God and
portion, to walk with him as their covenanted God. The world bears
great bulk in sinners' eyes naturally, but we must look over it and
above it, to the God that made it, that we may take up our souls'
everlasting rest in him. So did Enoch, while the rest were following
vanities; he closed his eyes on them, and came to God as his soul's
home.
2. They must embrace Christ in the offer of the gospel, seeing in him
only we can meet with God. God out of Christ is a consuming fire;
but vailed with the flesh of Christ, he is a refreshing son. We cannot
walk with an absolute God, more than dry fuel can lie before a
consuming fire.
Thirdly. A state of reconciliation with God; Amos 3:3, "Can two walk
together, except they be agreed?" Man naturally is in a state of
enmity with God. And while that lasts, he can never walk with God
dutifully to him, nor comfortably to himself. For in that state what
we do can never be acceptable to God, nor can we look for comfort to
ourselves by it; and hence Eliphaz advises, Job 22:21, "Acquaint now
thyself with him, and be at peace; thereby good shall come unto
thee." Therefore we must be in a justified state, having our sins
pardoned for the sake of Christ, and so in a state of peace through
the great Peace-maker. When God and a sinner in a state of enmity
meet, what can be expected but,
1. Angry looks? No wonder he turn his back on such; so that though
they come to Jerusalem, they see not the King's face; Hos. 5:6, "They
shall go—to seek the Lord; but they shall not find him, he hath
withdrawn himself from them."
2. Angry words? God can speak so as to make the conscience hear,
where there is no audible voice; Psalm 50:16, "But unto the wicked
God saith, What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou
shouldst take my covenant in thy month?" That is a question that
imports anger, upbraiding, accusing, and grief for the contempt put
upon him. And O what a sad matter is it to have him angry with us in
whose favour life lies; him to upbraid us, who does us all the good we
get; him our accuser, who is our only intercessor; and him to be
grieved with us, who only can make us glad?
3. Angry strokes? When enemies meet, no wonder there be blows a dealing.
Sometimes there are strokes on the body, 1 Cor. 10:1–6;
strokes on the soul, Mal. 1 ult. See how it was with the Israelites in
the wilderness; Psalm 106:15, "He gave them their request, but sent
leauness into their soul." Wherefore let us labour to have God for our
friend in Christ, that we may walk with him.
Fourthly, Conversion, or turning to God. We are naturally turned
away from God, and therefore are called to return to him, Hos. 14:1.
Our hearts are turned away from himself; our feet are turned away
from his way. We must turn back again ere we can walk with him.
1. Our hearts must be brought off the world to God; Cant. 4:8, "Come
with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon: look
from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the
lions' dens, from the mountains of the leopards." The first removing
of the heart was from God to the creature, from the fountain to the
muddy streams and broken cisterns, Jer. 2:13. There men naturally
seek their happiness, comfort, and satisfaction. But it must remove
again, leave the bulky vanity, the fair deceitful nothing, and return to
God. Our hearts must be lifted, our love, joy, delight, &c., off the
creature, and set on God.
2. Our hearts must be brought from our lusts to the Lord, from our
sins to our Saviour; we must say, "That which I see not, teach thou
me; if I have done iniquity, I will do no more," Job 34:32. That day
the soul returns to the Lord, the idols will be cast to the bats and to
the moles, Isa. 2:20. For if God get the throne in the heart, they will
get the cross. It was in this case God observed Ephraim, and was well
pleased with him; Jer. 31:18–20, "I have surely heard Ephraim
bemoaning himself thus, Thou hast chastised me, and I was
chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke; turn thou me, and
I shall be turned, for thou art the Lord my God. Surely after that I
was turned, I repented; and after that I was instructed, I smote upon
my thigh; I was ashamed, yea, even confounded, because I did bear
the reproach of my youth. Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a pleasant
child? for since I spake against him I do earnestly remember him
still, therefore my bowels are troubled for him; I will surely have
mercy upon him, saith the Lord."
3. We must be brought out of ourselves unto God; Matthew 16:24, "If
any man will come after me, let him deny himself." Man turning off
from God turned into himself, and made himself his chief end, acting
from himself and to himself. So we are naturally hemmed in within
the cursed circle of self, out of which we must be turned ere we can
walk with God. And,
(1.) Out of our self-wisdom, put in the room of Christ as a prophet
For thus saith God to all that would walk with him, "I will instruct
thee, and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go; I will guide thee
with mine eye," Psalm 32:8. Whoso would give up themselves to the
Lord, must, as it were, put out their own eyes, resolving never more
to guide themselves, that they may follow the Lord, as Abraham did,
Heb. 11:8, who, at God's call, went out, not knowing whither he went.
(2.) Out of our self-righteousness, put in the room of Christ as a
priest. We must come up to duties, and then come over them,
renouncing all confidence in them, laying no weight on them in the
point of oommending us to the favour of God. For what stress is laid
on them that way, derogates from the honour of him on whom the
Father has laid help, and is inconsistent with the character of the
true circumcision, Phil. 3:3. Otherwise we cannot walk with God in
duties.
(3.) Out of our self-will and self-ability, put in the room of Christ as a
king. Man is naturally wilful, and will have his own liking, and do
what seems good in his own eyes. But in the day that one comes to
walk with God, he gives up with his own will, saying, "Thy will be
done on earth, as it is in heaven." He gives it to be led as a captive
after Christ's chariot wheels, so that he may draw it and drive over it,
as seems good in his eyes, 2 Cor. 10:5.
Man also naturally goes into himself for strength wherewith to do
commanded duty, being ignorant of Christ as the head of influences
for sanctification. But in the day one comes to walk with God, he
renounces his own stock as insufficient, and gives up himself to live
by Christ, in the way of being daily supplied, John 6:57. For then he
sees the truth of that saying, "He that trusteth in his own heart is a
fool; but whoso walketh wisely, he shall be delivered," Prov. 28:26.
SECONDLY, I shall consider walking with God in the matter of it, in
respect of our frame and conversation. And indeed this duty goes as
broad as the whole law. I must take it up in some particulars. If we
would have the life of religion in our walk, we must not walk at random.
First, We must walk with God in the way of habitual eyeing of him in
all things. It is the neck-break of many, that God is not in all their
thoughts, and the ruin of religion among professors, that they forget
God, though he is not far from any of us. The heart is like a common
inn, so thronged with strangers, that the master is not noticed, but
thrust out to make room for others. It was otherwise with David;
Psalm 16:1, "I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at
my right hand, I shall not be moved."
1. We must eye him as our witness in all things. Let us say
everywhere as Hagar, Gen. 16:13, "Thou God seest me," Let us fix on
our hearts awful apprehensions of his omniscience and
omnipresence, as Psalm 139:7, "Whither shall I go from thy spirit, or
whither shall I flee from thy presence?" There is a root of Atheism in
our hearts that says, "The Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord
seeth not," Ezek. 9:9. And O how ready are the best to forget, though
they are ever under the chalk of his eye, that he is a witness to every
thought, word, and action! Thus walking with God implies,
(1.) The believing of his all-seeing eye, embracing it with a firm faith,
that he is intimately acquainted with all our ways, Heb. 4:13. His eye
is on us where no other eye can see us, yea, where our own eyes
cannot reach, that is, into our hearts. And where the true faith of this
is, it will not want an impression of proportionable depth with the
strength of the faith wherewith it is apprehended.
(2.) An habitual minding of this all-seeing eye that is on us, Psalm
16:8. Walkers with God are frequently sisting themselves in the
presence of this God; and especially when the temptation comes,
they look to him that sees them, and say, "Shall I do this great
wickedness, and sin against God?"
(3.) A suitable respect to this all-seeing eye, influencing our hearts,
lips, and lives, to beware of sin, and to be diligent and upright in
duty. The eyes of a child will restrain people sometimes; how much
more should the eye of God that is never off us?
2. Eye him as our Judge, to whom at length we must give an account,
Rom. 14:10. Let us remember and often have in our mind, that word
which at length will reach our ears, "Rise ye dead, and come to
judgment." We might walk as we list, if we were never to be called to
account. But there is not a thought, word, or action, but what must
be judged, Rom. 2:16; Eccl. 12 ult. We can never say there is more
than a step betwixt us and the judgment-seat, and therefore there is
good reason we should walk as prisoners going to the bar.
(1.) Let us walk as under the eye of an infinitely holy Judge, who
cannot look on sin but with abhorrence, Hab. 1:13. He can never be
brought by any means to approve of sin, how little soever we think of
it. The least spot is offensive to the eyes of his jealousy, and he
cannot away with it.
(2.) Let us walk as under the eye of an accurate Judge, from whom
no crime can be hid, whose eyes no pretences nor fair colours can
deceive. Let us remember when we come there, our crimes cannot be
hid for want of evidence; for the omniscient Judge himself is witness
to all, and that omniscience will pierce through all the vails
wherewith we now cloke our sins.
(3.) Let us walk as under the eye of an impartial Judge. He is one that
cannot be biassed either by feud or favour. He is no respecter of
persons, but rewards every one according to his work. The belief of
this would make us impartial in our own cause; and if we were
walking with God, we would sist our own cause without partiality.
3. Eye him as our Redeemer and Saviour; Isa. 45:22, "Look unto me,
and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is
none else." To eye God as our witness and judge, without eyeing him
as a God in Christ, atoned by his blood, would fright us away from
him, so as we could never walk with him more. But that a guilty
creature may walk with God, let him,
(1.) Eye the mercy of God in a Mediator; Isa. 55:7, "Let the wicked
forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him
return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him, and to our
God, for he will abundantly pardon." That is a large covering under
which may be hid all the guilt of our walk. It reaches deep and
extends very far, Psalm 86:13, "Great is thy mercy toward me: and
thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell." In our most
accurate walking, and when we have done our utmost, there will be
need of grace and mercy. And we must believingly apply to it, that
when we have fallen, we may rise up again and walk.
(2.) Eye the righteousness of a Redeemer. Had the most close walker
with God nothing to look to but the righteousness of his own works,
he would never have ground of joy all the way through the
wilderness. But the naughtiness of his own righteousness makes him
look often to the imputed righteousness, and there he joys; Isa.
45:24, 25, "Surely, shall one say, In the Lord have I righteousness
and strength.—In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and
shall glory."
(3.) Eye the conscience-purging blood, Heb. 12:22, 24. If thou hast
come up into Christ's chariot of the covenant, the covering of it is a
covert of purple, that is ever over thy head. When conscience is
wounded with guilt, it is like a thorn got into the foot of the traveller,
who can walk no more till it be drawn out, Heb. 9:14.
4. Eye him as the fountain of strength, Isa. 45:24, forecited. This is
the way that David resolved to walk with God, Psalm 71:16, "I will go
in the strength of the Lord God." The way we have to go is difficult,
we have little strength, and there is much opposition; we need to
keep our eye on him in whom the believer's strength lies, Psalm 84:5.
None walk with God but those that draw strength from him, for the
whole of their walk. And that lies in two things.
(1.) Believing the promise of strength and furniture, for whatever
piece of the way we are called to go through, Psalm 116:9, 10, "I will
walk before the Lord in the land of the living. I believed, therefore
have I spoken." The spiritual traveller has many a difficult step in his
way to Immanuel's land, but in the covenant there is strength
promised to carry him through them all. He must keep his eye on the
promise, and firmly believe it, for that is the way to suck the breasts
of these consolations.
(2.) Using the means on the credit of the promise. God's institutions
have promises annexed to them, and they become effectual, being
thus believingly used; Heb. 4:2, compare John 17:17. To pretend to
believe without the use of means, is presumption; to use the means
without believing the promise, is lifeless formality. Is there a lust to
mortify, or a temptation to resist? let us use the means, and believe
the promise of sanctification with close application to ourselves.
5. Eye him as our Master, Lord, head, and husband; Psalm 45:11, "He
is thy Lord, and worship thou him." See how the spouse comes out of
the wilderness walking with God, even leaning on him as her Head
and Husband; Cant. 8:5. We must walk with him, as obedient
servants with a master, dutiful subjects with a king, &c. Whomsoever
others serve, let it be our resolution to serve the Lord; Josh. 24:15.
And this imports, that we must be ready,
(1.) To receive his orders, and the least indications of his mind to
comply with them, signified to us by his word or providence. How
closely did the psalmist thus walk with God? Psalm 123:2, "Behold,
as the eyes of servants look unto the hands of their masters, and as
the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress; so our eyes wait
upon the Lord our God, until that he have mercy upon us." And this
is the duty of all pretending to be espoused to Christ. So that it must
needs be great untenderness, that "God speaks once, yea, twice, yet
men regard it not."
(2.) To do his bidding; "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" said
Paul; Acts 9:6. Our Lord lets us see, that it is not talking of, but thus
walking with God, that is religion indeed; Luke 6:46, "Why call ye me
Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?" And it is not the
hearers, but the doers of the word that shall be justified. There is no
walking with God, if we walk not in the road of obedience to his
commands. If we take our own way, we walk not with him, but Satan.
(3.) To be careful to please him in all things; 1 Cor. 7:34, to give
content to the heart of Christ in whatever we do; Col. 1:10, not only
to do the thing he commands, but to do it to his mind, so as he may
take pleasure in us, and delight to do us good. For thus the duty of
Christ's spouse in walking with God is summed up; Psalm 45:10,
"Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget
also thine own people, and thy father's house."
6. Lastly. Eye him as our chief end. As he that walks with God sets off
in his way in him and by him, so he walks to him as the great end of
his walk; Psalm 16:8, "I have set the Lord always before me." Rom. 11
ult., "For of him, and through him, and to him are all things; to
whom be glory for ever. Amen." This implies two things,
(1.) Aiming at his glory in all things; 1 Cor. 10:31. We must make that
the great scope of all our actions, and of our whole life. He that walks
with God displaces self, which is the dead sea into which all our
actions naturally run, and sets up the honour of God instead thereof;
reckoning his life no more useful in the world than it tends to the
honour of God. For we are as trees in a vineyard, of no use, but as
they bring forth fruit to their master's use; Luke 13:7.
(2.) Seeking to enjoy him as our chief happiness; Psalm 73:25. Man
can never be self-sufficient, (no not angels); that is the peculiar
prerogative of God, whose perfections are infinite. So he must needs
seek his happiness without himself. While he is without God in a
natural state, he seeks it in the creatures; when he comes to God, he
takes God for it. And walking with God, he habitually seeks it in the
enjoyment of him, and feeds at that table he sits down to in
conversion. And so if ye would walk with God,
(1.) Ye must seek to enjoy him in all things, in the measure he is to be
enjoyed here; Psalm 27:4; seek to enjoy him in ordinances; Psalm
63:1, 2, public, private, and secret. Ye must not stay in the shell, nor
in the outer court; but seek to believe, taste, and feel; Psalm 34:8. Ye
must seek him in providences; Psalm 94:4, merciful and favourable,
smiling and frowning. He will be the sap and foyson of mercies to the
walker with God; Gen. 33:10, and they will see his name in cross
dispensations; Micah 6:9.
(2.) Ye must seek to enjoy him in heaven hereafter. If ye walk
through the world with God, ye will walk as pilgrims bound for
another and better country, keeping that in your view as your only
rest; Heb. 11:13, 16. He that walks with God, walks as one living that
he may die well, making it the business of this life that he may learn
to die, and to get beyond it to a better life.
Secondly, We must walk with God in the way of the heart's going
along with him in all things, as the shadow goes with the body.
Hence it is called "walking after the Lord;" Hos. 11:10, "following the
Lord;" Numb. 14:24. Walking with God is no bodily motion, but a
spiritual motion, a moving of the heart and affections; and so it must
import necessarily the heart's going along with him. I will take it up
in these three things. If ye would walk with God, your hearts must go
along with him,
1. In the way of believing in all things. Thus Enoch walked with God;
Heb. 11:5. God is a Spirit, and our souls are spirits. The way of
communion betwixt God and us is in the way of believing, for we
cannot know him to our salvation, but as he has revealed himself to
us in his word. So God manifesting himself by his word, we cannot
walk with him, but as our hearts go along with these manifestations
of himself, in the way of believing; hence is that account the apostle
gives us of his walk; Gal. 2:20, "The life which I now live in the flesh,
I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself
for me." So walking with God imports,
(1.) Believing his commands. Faith discerns the stamp of divine
authority on the commands, and so gives them a suitable weight on
one's own spirit. It esteems and judges them all right and reasonable;
Psalm 119:128. So they are believed to be not only from God, but
suited to the divine perfections, and to man's real welfare. Which
cannot miss to influence the person to obedience.
(2.) Believing his promises, the promises of the gospel; Heb. 11:13.
He that walks with God, does not only believe the great leading
promises of the covenant, of God himself's being their God, and of
eternal salvation, but the lesser promises depending on these. And
while others take other things for their heritage, they take the
promises for theirs; Psalm 119:111. So the great thing that sways
them in their course of life, is the prospect of unseen things; (2 Cor.
4:18,) to be had in another world, and likewise the prospect of what
is promised even in this life.
So the promises are apt to influence obedience; and when they do,
that is walking with God; when one ventures on, and follows the way
of duty on the credit of the promise; e.g. giving out of their substance
at God's call, upon the faith of the promise; Prov. 3:9, 10, &c.
(3.) Believing his threatenings; Heb. 11:7. We find holy men have
thus walked with God, being influenced to a tender holy walk by the
faith of God's threatenings in his word; Job 32 ult. David was not of a
servile legal spirit, when he says, Psalm 119:120, "My flesh trembleth
for fear of thee, and I am afraid of thy judgments." Hence they that
walk with God, will not venture on an ill thing, more than they would
take fire into their bosom, because the terror of God makes them
afraid of sin.
2. In the way of compliance with his holy will. If we do not thus in all
things, we walk contrary to him. When man fell off from God, his
own will became his law, and was set in opposition to the will of God.
When he returns to God, his will is inclined by grace to God's will;
and walking with God it goes along therewith, complying with it in
all things. So walking with God imports,
(1.) Complying with the will of his command in all things; Acts 9:6.
The heart of the believer is reconciled to, and approves of the law as
holy, just, and good; and while he walks with God, he labours
sincerely to suit his walk thereunto in all things, being grieved at any
reluctancy that is in the heart against any piece of obedience, crying
with David, Psalm 119:5, "O that my ways were directed to keep thy
statutes!"
(2.) Complying with the will of his providence, the heart being
reconciled to that lot which God is pleased to carve out; Psalm 47:4.
O what walking contrary to God is there in this respect, while the
proud unhumbled heart will not, cannot accommodate itself to
divine dispensations! but murmurs, frets, and repines, and rebels
against the Lord, as the sovereign Governor of the world.
3. In the way of habitual moving of the heart towards him. Grace has
an attractive virtue in the heart drawing it towards God. And when it
is in exercise, it will make the heart to be moving towards him,
whereas otherwise it settles on other things besides him. So in
walking with God there is,
(1.) Frequent thinking and meditating on him, Mal. 3:16. That is a
black character of the wicked; Psalm 10:4, "God is not in all his
thoughts." And the saint is in a backgoing condition that begins to
forget him; Jer. 2:32. Yea, fleeting thoughts are not sufficient; if we
walk with God, he will be the subject of our meditation, both
occasional and stated; Psalm 63:6. If we walk with a man, he is ever
in our view, and so we cannot miss to think on him.
(2.) Habitual moving of the heart towards him, in love, desire, trust,
&c. He is the chief good and the best of beings, which should ever
command our love, Deut. 6:5. That is the holy fire that is kept
glowing and flaming in the heart of one that walks with God, loving
him for himself, and for his goodness to us. Desires after him are the
breathings of a soul touched with the love of God, tending to perfect
enjoyment. And the continual wants and weakness that such a one
finds himself compassed with, turn him very naturally to trust and
dependence on him.
(3.) Frequent use of ejaculatory prayer, 1 Thes. 5:17. This is that kind
of prayer to which we have access at all times, the darting up of a
desire to the Lord, whatever be the lawful business we are about, or
whatever be our case. And hardly can people be thought to walk with
God, that are not frequently sending these swift, though silent,
messengers to heaven. We find Jacob, in the midst of his testament,
using such a devout ejaculation; Gen. 49:18, "I have waited for thy
salvation, O Lord." See Moses's practice, Exod. 14:15, and
Nehemiah's, before he answered a king, Neh. 2:4.
Thirdly, We must walk with God in ordinances, Luke 1:6, submitting
to, and seeking communion with God in all ordinances as we have
access. The ordinances are the banqueting-house of Christ wherein
he feasts his people, Cant. 2:4, the galleries wherein the king is held
by those that walk with him there, Cant. 7:5. Particularly the
communion with God is to be sought and kept up,
1. In secret prayer, Matth. 6:6. We must walk with God in a due and
ordinary observance of that kind of prayer. It is a duty wherein the
people of God have had as much communion with God as in any
other; witness Jacob's experience, Gen. 32:24, and Daniel's, chap.
9:22. The Lord promises his people a particular familiarity with him
in that duty; Cant. 7:11, "Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the
field; let us lodge in the villages." And however some may be blythe
to get it shifted, yet the truly-exercised would find it hard, nay, they
could not at all live without it. And how people can walk with God,
taking it only now and then, and not making conscience of ordinary
observing of it, I see not. And indeed people will readily know by
their disposition in secret prayer, whether they be in a thriving case
or not.
2. In family prayer, Acts 10:2, 3. Never one that gives Christ heart room,
but they will be willing to give him house-room too. And there
are none that walk with God themselves, but they would fain all their
family walked with God too, Josh. 24:15. And there are none who
have gone about it seriously, but must say, that family worship is an
ordinance in which God is to be found. Prayer-less families are in a
dangerous condition; they are as if the owners should uncover the
roofs of them, that wrath may be showered down on them; Jer. 10
ult., "Pour out thy fury upon the heathen that know thee not, and
upon the families that call not on thy name." And I think if people
were walking with God in family-duties, they would not lay by the
morning-exercise, as many of you do. And what is it that hinders it?
What but the weary world? Ye cannot get time for it, because of your
business. But are ye not afraid of God's curse on that business that
shuts out his worship? And if it should thrive, ye take the way to get
leanness to your souls. It looks not like walking with God to stand off
from family worship, till they have no other thing ado, and it is a
graceless-like thing to offer only that time to God that costs you nothing.
3. In reading of the word, John 5:39. We find the truly-godly have
been great lovers of the Bible. O how does David commend it,
especially in the 119th psalm, though it was but a small part of it that
was written in his time. One that would walk with God, should even
walk through the Bible, reading it, and acquainting themselves with
the mind of God in it. And ye will see, that whenever persons come to
be in earnest exercised about their case, they will very naturally go to
their Bibles in quite another manner than they used to do.
4. In extraordinary prayer, setting time apart for it, either in secret,
or in families; of which I have spoken before.*
5. In hearing the word. Whenever the Lord puts an occasion of
hearing the word in your hand, he says in effect, Come walk with me
in the galleries; and "with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of
salvation," Isa. 12:3. And every believing soul will reply with David,
Psalm 65:4, "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to
approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be
satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple."
The Sabbath-day is a day of blessing, the preaching of the gospel is
the great means for the salvation of sinners, 1 Cor. 1:21. Is it not then
a slighting of communion with God, for people to idle away so many
Sabbaths at home, in making so little conscience of attending on
public ordinances? Read through the whole Bible, and ye will not
find a gracious person but was much addicted to the place where his
honour dwells, to public ordinances. And I assure you, the godly in
some places would wonder if they could have any good in them at all,
that can contentedly sit at home, when they are neither sick nor sore,
nor have any providential necessity put upon them. It is very
observable, Numb. 9:10–13, "that if any man of Israel, or of their
posterity should be unclean by reason of a dead body, or be in a
journey afar off, yet he should keep the passover unto the Lord:—but
the man that was clean, and was not in a journey, and forebore to
keep the passover; even the same soul should be cut off from his
people, because he brought not the offering of the Lord in his
appointed season." Whence observe, that as those who against their
wills are forced to be absent from God's ordinances, may expect the
favours of his grace under their affliction; so those who of choice
absent themselves, may expect the tokens of his wrath for their sin.
6. Lastly. In the sacrament of the Lord's supper. That is an ordinance
especially appointed for communion with God; 1 Cor. 10:16. And it
has been so in the experience of many souls. Wherefore it must be
strange how those can walk with God, that never set their foot on
that holy ground, though they have one opportunity after another.
And if ye would walk with God in these duties, (1.) Ye must make
conscience of preparation, even prepare for secret prayer, &c. (2.)
Seek and press forward for communion with God in these
ordinances, and take not up with the external work. (3.) Do not take
them by starts, but keep an ordinary, as ye have occasion, otherwise
ye cannot be said to walk with God in them.
FOURTHLY. We must walk with God in providences. These are his
ways wherein he walks towards us, and we must walk with him in
them; Hos. 14 ult., "Who is wise, and he shall understand these
things? prudent, and he shall know them? for the ways of the Lord
are right, and the just shall walk in them." Sometimes he goes with
us in the way of smiling, sometimes of cross providences; but
whether he take the high road of lifting up, or the low one of
downcasting, we are to follow, and walk with him. This lies in these
seven things,
1. We must notice his hand in all that we meet with from any hand
whatsoever. God guides the world by wisdom, and without him
second causes cannot move; Ezek. 1:20. Whether thou meet with a
mercy or a cross, say in thine heart, This is the finger of God; Gen.
33:10. The not noticing of this is a spice of atheism, that God is
highly displeased with; Psalm 28:5, "Because they regard not the
works of the Lord, nor the operation of his hands, he shall destroy
them, and not build them up." See how the Pagan Chaldeans do with
smiling providences; Hab. 1:16, "They sacrifice unto their net, and
burn incense unto their drag; because by them their portion is fat,
and their meat plenteous." And see what the Philistines say of their
afflictions, "It is a chance." But he that walketh with God, takes all
out of the Lord's hand.
2. We must accommodate ourselves to the aspect of providence,
whether it be shining or louring; Eccl. 7:14. For without this we shew
a contempt of providence, which the Lord takes heinously, as you
may see by looking to Isa. 22:12–14. We must rejoice in his mercies,
and walk soberly and concernedly under the strokes of his hand.
3. We must labor to find out the design of providence. Providence
has a voice, and it is a voice of speech which may be understood;
Ezek. 1:24. The works of providence are a book which the walker
with God labors to read the mind of God in. Merciful dispensations
are preachers of repentance, and happy are they that hear their
voice; Rom. 2:4. Cross dispensations have a language to the same
purpose; Micah 6:9, "The Lord's voice crieth unto the city, and the
man of wisdom shall see thy name; hear ye the rod, and who hath
appointed it."
To help you to know the particular design of providence in cross
dispensations that ye meet with.
(1.) Pray in faith for it, believing that God will discover it to you in the
use of means, in his own time; Job 10:2, "Shew me wherefore thou
contends with me." Compare Matth. 21:22, "All things whatsoever
ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." But take good heed
that your souls be truly and honestly laid open to divine instruction,
that you be disposed to know it at any rate, though it should touch
you in a most sensible part; Psalm 25:9, "The meek will he guide in
judgment; and the meek will he teach his way."
(2.) Search for it, as the Israelites did for the accursed thing; Psalm
77:6. Think upon it, in order to find it out. Take a view of your way,
what it was before and at the time when ye met with the cross; even
as when men have lost any thing, they go back till they come to the
place where they are sure they had it.
(3.) Take help of the word in this matter. Consider scripture threatening's,
or examples, that may be apposite to your case. All that
you or I meet with is but a fulfilling of the scripture; Hos. 7:12. And
as providence gives light to the word, so the word gives light to
providence. And thus Moses opened up the meaning of a dark
providence to Aaron from the word; Lev. 10:3, "This is it that the
Lord spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me,
and before all the people I will be glorified. And Aaron held his peace."
(4.) Listen to the whispers of conscience under the rod. The sin that
under the rod conscience casts most in thy teeth, is very likely to be
the sin that God is aiming at, as in the case of Joseph's brethren;
Gen. 42:21, who "said one to another, We are verily guilty concerning
our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he besought
us; and we would not hear; therefore is this distress come upon us."
Even as the man that has a sore finger, whatever touches his hand,
the finger smarts; an evidence that there his sore lies.
(5.) Consider what sin it is that thou hast had most reproofs for from
the word, most checks for by some lesser steps of providence, most
challenges for from conscience, and yet thou hast not reformed. That
is likely to be it. For God's rods follow his rebukes, as Absalom did
with Joab: Jer. 22:21, 22, "I spoke unto thee in thy prosperity, but
thou said, I will not hear; this hath been thy manner from thy
youth, that thou obeys not my voice. The wind shall eat up all thy
pastures, and thy lovers shall go into captivity, surely then shalt thou
be ashamed and confounded for all thy wickedness."
6. Lastly. Consider the nature of the stroke or cross, for very readily
there is a discernable affinity betwixt sin and the stroke. Sometimes
God punishes men in the same kind with their sin, as in the case of
Adonibezek; Judg. 1:7. Sometimes in the occasion of their sins, as
Eli's indulgence to his children was punished by the death of them.
Sometimes their punishment is in what is most contrary to their sin,
as David's sin in numbering of the people. Sometimes God measures
to us in temporals, as we do to him in spirituals; Hos. 4:12, 13; 1 Cor.
11:30, and several other ways.
One that walks with God will have so much ado with these things,
that they should very carefully observe them, for daily practice of
taking up God's mind in what they meet with.
4. We must endeavor to comply with the designs of providence; Job
36:10, 11. Providences in favorable dispensations are God's cords of
love and bands of a man, whereby he draws sinners to himself. In
afflicting dispensations they are God's furnace for melting of souls,
that they may take on suitable impressions. And O but it is sad when
the effect of all is that; Hos. 11:2, "As they called them, so they went
from them." Jer. 6:29, 30, "The bellows are burnt, the lead is
consumed of the fire, the founder melts in vain; for the wicked are
not plucked away. Reprobate silver shall men call them, because the
Lord hath rejected them." That is a grievous complaint; Jer. 5:3,
"Thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; thou hast
consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction; they
have made their faces harder than a rock, they have refused to
return." But he that walketh with God makes it his business to
comply with the dispensations of providence in the design of them,
to serve the Lord more cheerfully that God is kind to him, and to
bring forth the peaceable fruits of righteousness under afflictions.
5. We must notice the harmony of providences with the word; Psalm
48:8, "As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of
hosts." This is the way to get communion with God in providences.
And a sweet feast they often afford to those that are thus exercised to
discern them; hence, says David; Psalm 92:4, "Thou, Lord, hast
made me glad through thy work. I will triumph in the works of thy
hands?" and said Jacob to his brother Esau; Gen. 33:10, "Therefore
have I seen thy face, as though I had seen the face of God, and thou
was pleased with me." The word is the scheme and draught of the
government of the world; and the lines of providence are all drawn
accordingly. So that whatsoever thou meetest with, it is an
accomplishment of scripture-promises, threatening's and doctrines.
And a child of God in applying them thus to the rule, may have sweet
communion with God.
6. We must follow the conduct of providence in subserviency to the
word, keeping our eye on the promise; Psalm 32:8, "I will instruct
thee, and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go; I will guide thee
with mine eye." To separate providence from the word, and then
make it a rule, is dangerous; Jonah 1:3. But to follow the conduct of it
with an eye to the word, is a notable part of the Christian's walking
with God. Providence is the hand of the Lord whereby be opens the
way in the wilderness to his people, that they may follow him. And go
where they will, as long as they can thus keep their eye on their
guide, they may judge themselves in the safest way.
7. Lastly. We must live in the exercise of the graces suitable to the
dispensations of providence wherewith we are trysted; Eccl. 7:14.
Some dispensations are sweet and comfortable; let us by them be
stirred up to love the Lord the more; Psalm 116:1. Let any comfort
that we find in the creature be used to enlarge our hearts in
thankfulness to, desire of, and cheerfulness in serving the Lord.
Some are heavy, and require patience; some dark and doubtful, and
require faith. Some take away our created supports, and dry up our
cisterns, and put out our candle; and such require trust in the Lord,
and to rejoice in him; Hab. 3:17, 18. Thus he that walks with God,
follows him whithersoever he goes.
FIFTHLY, We must walk with God in the stations and relations
wherein he hath placed us. These are the sphere that God hath given
us to move in, in the world. And whoso walks not with God in them,
will never please him. There are two pieces of work which a Christian
has to do.
1. One for himself, and that is his salvation-work; Phil. 2:12. That is,
to secure his eternal welfare in the enjoyment of God, so to make
sure his gracious state, to maintain a gracious frame and disposition,
by getting incident controversies betwixt God and his soul done
away, grace actuated, strengthened, and nourished, till he come to
the stature of a perfect man in Christ. This lies in his personal walk.
2. One for God, and that is his generation-work; Acts 13:36. This lies
in his relative walk. Whence we may conclude, that so far as a man or
woman is defective in their relative duties, so far they are useless for
God, and take up room in the world for no purpose. And so far as
they do ill instead of good in their relations, they walk contrary to
God. We see how the Lord in the works of nature has joined together
the creatures, the sun to shine by day, and the moon by night, the
beasts to serve man, and the earth with the products thereof to serve
both. The beauty of the world lies in every one's keeping their place,
and being serviceable in the place wherein God has set them. And so
relations are the joints of society; and they that would walk with God,
must walk with him in them.
(1.) We must labor faithfully to discharge the duties of our stations
and relations, as under the eye of God, who is our common Overseer,
Witness, and Judge; Psalm 101:2. God has shaped out our work to
us, whether in the church, commonwealth, or family, wherein some
are as eyes, some as hands, and some as feet. Though the work of
others may be higher and more honorable than ours, our greatest
honor will be to approve ourselves to God in our own part. God
observes how every one does his duty, the husband, the wife, the
master, the servant. And they that walk with God, will behave
themselves in these things as under the eye of God, as well as when
they are at prayers; &c. Col. 3:22.
(2.) We must do the duties of our relations under a sense of the
command of God. It is not enough that the husband love his wife, or
the wife submit herself to her husband, &c., if conscience of duty
towards God do not sway them thereto; Eph. 5:21. We must make
God our great party in all these things, otherwise we do not walk with
God in them. There is no relation one stands in, but God has set
them their duty; and so the performance of these duties is as much
the trial of our obedience, as the most religions actions we are
capable of.
(3.) We must do the duties of our relations with an eye to the real
good of our relatives. "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself," is
the sum of the second table. No man is born for himself but to be
serviceable to God and his fellow-creatures; Rom. 15:2. And the more
useful we are to others, the more we serve God, and the more we are
like him; for he does good unto all, even unto the unholy and
unthankful.
(4.) Lastly. We must do the duties of our relations with an eye to the
honour of God; 1 Cor. 10:31. O the dishonour that is done to God by
the little conscience that is made of relative duties, by crying relative
sins. Should the fabric of the world run into confusion, sun, moon,
stars, day and night, go out of their courses, where were the honour
of God arising from the beauty of an orderly management of the
world? But ah! how often are the foundations in churches, states, and
families out of course, and there nothing but disorder and confusion,
contention and opposition, every one going out of their course; and
so the honour of God, and their own good and comfort lying buried
in the ruinous heap? This is walking contrary to God.
This walking with God is particularly noticed concerning Enoch;
Gen. 5:22, "And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah
three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters." He walked with
God in his family, as a father and a husband, in the married state. So
if thou be a walker with God, it will appear in the relations wherein
thou standest; for grace makes a good husband, a good wife, a good
master, a good servant, &c. And the duties of relations will readily try
both the reality and strength of grace.
SIXTHLY, We must walk with God in all our actions, whether
natural, civil, or religious; 1 Cor. 10:31, "Whether therefore ye eat or
drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." Religion is to
our conversation like salt to meat, necessary to season our whole life,
whatever it is that we are about.
First, We must walk with God in our natural actions, such as eating,
drinking, sleeping, &c. These are common to us with the beasts; but
we must not be like the beasts in the use of them, but walk with God
therein. Now, if we would walk with God in these things,
1. We must do them under a sense of the command of God. Eating
and drinking, &c., are duties of the sixth command; and therefore we
ought to do them because God has said, "Thou shalt not kill."
Wherever there is a divine ordinance respecting any natural action,
we ought therein to have respect to that ordinance; 1 Tim. 4:4, 5,
"For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be
received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the word of God
and prayer." Our bodies are the Lord's, and he binds us by all lawful
means to preserve them; and then do men walk with God in these
things, while they patch up the mud-wall house under the sense of
the command of the owner.
2. We must depend on the Lord for benefit by them; 1 Tim. 4:5.
Without the blessing on the means, the end cannot be obtained.
Without God our meat cannot nourish us, nor our clothes warm us;
so that the emptiness of the creature points us to God at every turn,
agreeable to what our Lord says; Matth. 4:4, "Man shall not live by
bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of
God." It is no less than spiritual idolatry to overlook the Lord, and
look for the benefit from the creature itself; Jer. 17:5; Hos. 4:10. If he
would say the word, we might eat and not be filled, sleep and not be
refreshed. So that even in these we are called to walk by faith with
God, looking for the benefit of God's ordinance and appointment
about these things.
3. We must use them for God and his service; as the traveller takes
his staff in his hand, not to be a burden or a carriage to him, but to
help him on his journey. While the soul is in the body, it has a mighty
dependence thereon; and so it is as the horse that must be cared for,
to the end we may accomplish the journey; 2 Kings 3:15. So walking
with God in these things, would make us use them so, as may most fit
us for the work of our Christian calling, haring that as our great
scope before our eye.
4. We must keep a holy Christian moderation in these things; Phil.
4:5. We must be like Gideon's lappers, even when waters of a full cup
are set before us. People may easily fall into a sinful eagerness in
these things; Gen. 25:30, and sink their hearts into these things,
wherein they should only lightly go along with wariness; Luke 21:31,
regulating ourselves in the use of them, by what is best to fit us for
our salvation and generation-work, which is the true rule of
moderation. For the heart must not sit down on them as its end and
rest; but pass through them as a means and way; 1 Cor. 7:29–31.
5. We must ascend by the creature unto the Creator, from creaturesweetness to that infinite fulness that is in God; Zech. 9 ult., "How
great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty! corn shall make
the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids." Seeing all
perfection in the creature is originally from God, it must be in him,
and that infinitely. If there be any thing desirable in the streams, it
must be more so in the fountain. If the light of the sun be so pleasant
to the eyes, be who is light itself must be infinitely more so. Whatever
pleasure or delight we find in meat, drink, &c. it points us to God,
from whom that sweetness is derived, as drops from the ocean.
6. We must look on them as covenant mercies, and the fulfilment of
promises; Deut. 26:3, &c. God has secured our necessary comforts by
promise; Isa. 33:16. "Bread shall be given him, his waters shall be
sure." Psalm 127:2, and 84:11. So when we receive them, we should
look on them as such; and then however coarse the meat be, being
served up in the dish, not of common providence, but of the
covenant, it will have an uncommon sweetness, and we will have
communion with God in that which others find no more in than
beasts do.
7. Lastly. We must be thankful for all our mercies, unto God as the
giver; 1 Thess. 5:18. We must pay to him verbal acknowledgements;
Hos. 14:2; Deut. 8:10, and real acknowledgements, serving him in
the strength of our mercies, and that cheerfully, as he deals
graciously with us in these things. What we have from him must be
used for him; Rom. 11 ult.; and the more liberally he deals with us,
the more cheerfully ought we to serve him; Deut. 28:47, 48.
Secondly. We must walk with God in our civil actions, such as are
competent to men in society, as trading, buying, selling, working,
and in a word, managing our worldly business: that as we may not
act like beasts in the former, so we may not act as men that know not
God in the latter. Now, if we would walk with God in managing of our
temporal affairs,
1. We must act in these matters as under a sense of a command or
appointment of God in them. God has given each his calling, station,
and work; and we are to act therein suitably in obedience to him; 1
Cor. 7:24, doing our proper business as to the Lord, who is our great
Master; Eph. 6:7. Thus a man should go about his worldly business,
whether for his own or another's advantage because God has said,
"Thou shalt not steal;" looking on it as a piece of his duty to God.
2. We must depend on him by faith, for direction in our business;
Prov. 3:6. We must pray for it, and trust God for it. Temporal affairs
are not excepted; Phil. 4:6, "In every thing by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known
unto God." Whence is a dexterity and skill to manage a temporal
business, to do a piece of work to purpose without or within doors?
Is it not from the Lord? Jam. 1:17, "Every good gift, and every perfect
gift is from above." Isa. 28:26, "For his God doth instruct him to
discretion, and doth teach him." Common influences of the Spirit are
as necessary to the exercise of a gift, as saving influences are to the
exercise of grace. Remember the error the princes of Israel fell into;
Josh. 9:14, "The men took of their victuals, and asked not counsel at
the mouth of the Lord;" and Lot's unhappy choice, wherein he did
not own God; Gen. 13:11, 12.
3. We must depend on the Lord by faith, for the success of our lawful
endeavours; Psalm 127:1. Whatever men undertake with an eye to
God in it, they may depend on him for the success of it; Psalm 1:3. An
unsanctified confidence of success God often blasts, that he may let
all men see in every thing, that "by strength no man shall prevail;" 1
Sam. 2:9, and that "the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the
strong;" Eccl. 9:11. And while people torment themselves with
anxiety as to events, he brings their fears ofttimes on them, and lets
them see, that by taking thought no man can add a cubit to his
stature.
4. We must cut and carve in them as may be most for the honour of
God and our soul's welfare. This is the great mark that we would
always keep in view, and according to which we must steer our
course. Our eternal interest is our greatest, and all other interests
must vail to it. The honour of God is the sheaf to which all others
must bow; and the balance is to be cast on that side always on which
these are; Matth. 26:26, "For what is a man profited, if he shall gain
the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in
exchange for his soul?" Where is the gain where the foot is lost to
save the shoe? The world, with whom gain is godliness, and a penny
more or less determines them in their affairs, would have thought
Moses a foolish man for missing a good bargain; Heb. 11:24. But he
acted even as wisely, as a man who cares not for gaining that pound,
in gaining which he must lose a talent. Therefore consider in your
worldly affairs, what will be best for your souls.
5. We must deal with men as under the eye of God, a holy jealous
God, whether we be masters, servants, neighbours, &c. Eph. 5:15. Be
strict and precise observers of common justice, according to the
golden rule, "Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do
ye even so unto them." Whatever occasions you have to do an unjust
thing, let the eye of God be a sufficient restraint; Job 31:21–23. Let
men pretend to what strictness they will otherwise, while they are
not strict in their morals this way, they do more ill to religion, than
perhaps they will ever be capable to do good.
6. We must observe Christian moderation in these things; 1 Cor.
7:29, 30. Do not give yourselves wholly to them, to relish nothing but
what savours of them, as those of Solomon did; Luke 17:28. Let them
not steal away your heart, and justle out religion, like those
mentioned, Luke 14:16, &c., but remember still you have greater
business in hand than that; and therefore dip no farther into them,
than you may do with safety to your soul's case.
7. Lastly. We must be suitably affected with the providence of God in
these things; ascribing the success of our affairs to the Lord, and
giving him thanks for blessing the work of our hands; acknowledging
disappointments and crosses in them to come from the same hand;
taking them kindly as trials wherewith the Lord sees meet to exercise
us, and labouring to know and comply with the design of them.
Thirdly, We must walk with God in our religious actions, and so
distinguish ourselves from hypocrites, who do the things, pray, hear,
&c., but do not walk with God in them. Now, if we would walk with
God in religious duties,
1. We must do our duty out of respect to the command of God; Psalm
119:4. We must say in this case, as Simon did in another; Luke 5:5,
"At thy word I will let down the net." When people are led to duties
from a custom, or some such low principles or motives, they do not
walk with God in them. He that walks with God in them, discerns the
stamp of divine authority on every duty, and that awes his heart into
a compliance therewith.
2. We must seek the honour of God in all we do; John 8:50. And
indeed if we be let into a view of his glory in duties, the advancing of
it will be our great aim. If thou be in duty with others, let God
himself be your scope, and take heed of parting the glory betwixt him
and thyself. If thou be alone, seek to give him the glory of all his
perfections, by acknowledging of, and carrying as under the
impression of, the same.
3. We must go about our duty in his own strength; Zech. 10 ult.;
Psalm 71:16, renouncing all confidence in ourselves; 2 Cor. 3:5. No
gifts are to be trusted to in this, for they may soon be blasted, and no
bare gift can make one act graciously. Nay, habitual grace is not to be
trusted to for that end; for the fire not blown cannot give us light.
Actual grace needs still to be preserved and fed, else it will fail.
Therefore we must lean on the Lord himself for it; Isa. 45:24. And we
must stretch out the withered hand in duty, in hopes of influences
from him, and set to sea in confidence of the blowings of the Spirit.
4. We must be spiritual in our duties; John 4:24; Phil. 3:3. One that
walks with God will not take up with bodily exercise, or lip-labour;
but endeavour after inward worship, which is the work of the heart.
This lies in loving, fearing, trusting, desiring, humbling of the heart
before him; believing his word, &c. And so he will reckon no more to
be done in worship of God, than what is done with the heart.
5. We must seek to enjoy God in duties, and not be satisfied without
it; Psalm 27:4. When thou comest to the galleries, let thine aim be to
see the King in his glory. And let not the empty chair of state satisfy
thy soul; for nothing is sufficient for the soul, but the enjoyment of
God himself; Psalm 73:25. And if this be thine aim, thou wilt pursue
it, and thurst forward till thou come even to his seat.
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.
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Post by Admin on Feb 2, 2024 13:57:11 GMT -5
(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 gospel hearers 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
labor, 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 labor; 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 labor 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 battle array 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 honors 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 highway.
(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 stony ground 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.
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Post by Admin on Feb 2, 2024 13:59:31 GMT -5
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.
3. Being set on the way, labour to hold by it. Ye must learn not to be
shamed out of God's way, by the reproaches of the world. Care not
for the name of singularity, and be not ashamed to be fools in the
world's eyes; 1 Cor. 3:18, 19, not to be bribed nor boasted out of
God's way, by any advantage or loss in the world; Heb. 11:24.
4. Closely ply the work of mortification; Gal. 5:24. What is your need
of Christ, if it be not to save you from your sins? Matth. 1:21. Beware
of making Christ the minister of sin, by going the round betwixt
sinning and confessing, without suitable endeavours for
mortification. Mortification is no easy business; but most necessary.
5. Beware of indulging yourselves in those things that are accounted
but small sins, and abstain from all appearances of evil. No man will
walk with God, to whom any sin is so small that he will make no
bones of it. And those that stand not to go frankly into the borders of
sin, will very readily step over.
6. When ye fall lie not still, but get up again by a new application of
the Redeemer's blood, and renewing your repentance. For no man
can walk so but he will stumble; but then the suitable remedies are to
be improved for recovery.
7. Be frequent in self-observation and examination. Take notice how
often the pulse of your affections beats. Retire into yourselves, and
observe the way of your hearts and lives; Hag. 1:7. And examine
yourselves often as to your state and case; 2 Cor. 13:5. Ask yourselves
whether ye be going forward, or backward, what profit ye make of duties?
8. Be diligent observers of providence; Psalm 107 ult., towards yourselves and others.
9. Be tender of waiting on the Lord, to know sin and duty in particular cases.
10. Be diligent in all religious duties, missing none of them, and
being frequent in them all. For these are the trysting places for
communion with God, which they that walk with him must diligently attend.
11. Prepare for duties before ye set about them; not only public
duties, but private and secret ones. For the rushing on these without
consideration, is the high way to make them vain and fruitless.
12. Labour to be spiritual in all things; in religious duties seeking to
exercise grace, and enjoy communion with God; and even in other
things, to act as under his eye, and by influence of his command.
13. Lastly. Live by faith; 2 Cor. 5:7. For it is by faith that the soul is
set and kept in this walk.
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