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words, that are next to the names of sin and satan; and at least carry in them much cause of suspicion.

And this hath led me up to the next use of the point.

CHAPTER XI.

Use 2. To Try our Self-denial: the Sincerity of the least

degree.

Of Exhortation.

BELOVED hearers, I have now before me as great a sin and danger to deter you from (even selfishness and its effects), and as great a duty to offer to your entertainment (even selfdenial) as any (save one) that I am acquainted with in the world. The raising up the soul to God is indeed the greatest work; but the mortifying of the flesh, and the denying of self is surely the next to it, being a real part of the change. You hear ministers tell you of the odiousness, and danger, and sad effects of sin; but of all the sins that ever you heard of, there is scarce any more odious and dangerous than this, yet I doubt there are many that never were much troubled at it, nor sensible of its malignity. My principal request therefore to you is, that as ever you would prove Christians indeed, and be saved from sin, and damnation that follows it, take heed of this deadly sin of selfishness, and be sure you be possessed with true self-denial; and if you have it, see that you use and live upon it.

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And for your help herein, I shall, 1. Tell you how your self-denial must be tried; and 2. How it must be exercised; and 3. I shall give you some further reasons to persuade you to it; and 4. Some directions for the procuring and strengthening it.

The trial of your self-denial may be performed by the help of the signs that have been given you before. In the ten particulars mentioned in the beginning, you may see what is selfishness, and what is self-denial. But for your further satisfaction, I shall only tell you in a few words, how the least measure of true self-denial may be known. And, in

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one word, that is thus: Wherever the interest of carnal self is stronger and more predominant habitually than the in

terest of God, of Christ, of everlasting life, there is no true self-denial or saving grace; but where God's interest is the strongest, there self-denial is sincere.' If you further ask me how this may be known, briefly thus:

1. What is it that you live for? what is that good which your mind is principally set to obtain? and what is that end which you principally design and endeavour to obtain, and which you set your heart on, and lay out your hopes upon Is it the pleasing and glorifying of God, and the everlasting fruition of him? Or is it the pleasing of your fleshly mind in the fruition of any inferior thing? Know this, and you may know whether self or God have the greatest interest in you. For that is your God which you love most, and please best, and would do most for.

2. Which do you set most by,, the means of your salvation and the glory of God, or the means of providing for self and flesh? Do you set more by Christ and holiness, which are the way to God; or by riches, honour, and pleasures, which gratify the flesh? Know this, and you may know whether you have true self-denial.

3. If you are truly self-denying, you are ordinarily ruled by God, and his word and Spirit, and not by carnal self. Which is the rule and master of your lives? Whose word and will is it ordinarily that prevails? When God draws, and self draws, which do you follow in the tenor of your life? Know this, and you may know whether you have true selfdenial.

4. If you have true self-denial, the drift of your lives is carried on in a successful opposition to carnal self, so that you not only refuse to be ruled by it, and love it as your God, but you fight against it, and tread it down as your enemy. So that you go armed against self in the course of your lives, and are striving against self in every duty; and as others think, it then goes best with them, when self is highest and pleased best; so you will know that it then goeth best with you, when self is lowest, and most effectually subdued.

5. If you have true self-denial, there is nothing in this world so dear to you, but on deliberation you would leave it for God He that hath any thing which he loveth so well. that he cannot spare it for God, is a selfish and unsanctified wretch. And therefore God hath still put men to it, in the

trial of their sincerity, to part with that which was dearest to the flesh. Abraham must be tried by parting with his only son. And Christ makes it his standing rule, "He that forsaketh not all that he hath, cannot be my disciple;" Luke xiv. 33. Yet it is true that flesh and blood may make much resistance in a gracious heart; and many a striving thought there may be, before with Abraham we can part with a son, or before we can part with wealth or life; but yet on deliberation, self-denial will prevail, and there is nothing so dear to a gracious soul, which he cannot spare at the will of God, and the hope of everlasting life. If with Peter we should flinch in a temptation, we should return with Peter in weeping bitterly, and give Christ those lives that in a temptation we denied him. For, habitually, God is dearest to the soul.

6. In a word, true self-denial is procured by the knowledge and love of God, advancing him in the soul to the debasing of self. The illuminated soul is so much taken with the glory and goodness of the Lord, that it carrieth him out of himself to God, and as it were estrangeth him from himself, that he may have communion with God; and this makes him vile in his own eyes, and abhor himself in dust and ashes; he is lost in himself, and seeking God, he finds himself again in God. It is not a stoical resolution, but the love of God and the hopes of glory that make him throw away the world, and look contemptuously on all below, so far as they are mere provision for the flesh.

Search now, and try your hearts by these evidences, whether you are possessed of this necessary grace of selfdenial. O make not light of the matter, sirs, and presume not of it, till you find good grounds! For I must tell you that self is the most treacherous enemy, and the most insinuating deceiver in the world. It will be within you when you are not aware of it, and will conquer you when you perceive not yourselves much troubled with it; and of all other vices is both the hardest to find out, and the hardest to cast out; the hardest to discover, and the hardest to cure. sure therefore in the first place that you have self-denial; and then be sure that you use it and live in the practice of it. And for this I must give you more particular advice.

Be

CHAPTER XII.

In what respect Self must be Denied.

II. AND here I beseech you take heed of self in all these following respects. 1. You must deny self as it is opposite to God, and a competitor with him, and the idol of the soul and of the world; and this is in all the ten respects which I mentioned in the beginning, and therefore shall not now rehearse. And this is the principal part of self-denial.

2. Self must be denied as it is but conceived as separated from God; and would be an end in a divided sense from God. For ourselves and all things else are created contingent, dependent beings, and must not be once thought of as if we were either our own beginning, or end, or in any capacity, but subservient unto God. Self becomes a satan, when it would cast off its due subordination to God, and would be any other than the workmanship of God, depending on him, and ruled by him, and living to him, loving him, desiring him, and seeking after him, and either mourning when we miss him, or rejoicing when we find communion with him.i.

3. Self must be denied as it stands up against the truth of the Gospel, and blindly and proudly quarrelleth with that word which faith relieth upon for justification and salvation. Carnal self is both the most incompetent judge of the word of God, and of spiritual affairs, and also the most forward, and arrogant, and audacious, for all it is so incompetent. And this is the damnable fountain of unbelief. That self is an incompetent judge of the word and ways of God, is evident: for, (1.) It is a natural enemy to them, and an enemy is no competent judge, "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be;" Rom. viii. 7. Deny therefore this enemy the power of judging the word of God. Ill-will never saith well. Enmity is credulous of all evil, and overlooks the good, and is accompanied with false surmises, and wresteth every word, and suspecteth or maketh an evil sense where there was none: there is not a worse expositor in the world. And therefore no wonder if such a nature of enmity can find matter of quarrel with the very Scripture itself, and with a

holy life, yea, with God himself; for it is him especially that the enmity is against.

(2.) Moreover self is a party, and therefore an incompetent judge. It is self that the Scripture principally speaks against. All over the Gospel there are the words of disgrace, and the arrows of death directed against the very heart of carnal self. God there proclaimeth and manageth an open war against it. And shall a party be the judge? Shall the traitorous delinquent be the judge? A child will hardly speak well of the rod, whatever he do by the corrector; but it is not to be expected that a thief should love the halter, or the gallows. God's word is the weapon that self must be slain by; and therefore self must be an incompetent judge of it.

(3.) Moreover self is quite blind in the matters of God. "The natural man discerneth them not, nor can do, because they are spiritually discerned;" 1 Cor. ii. 14. And the ignorant and blind are incompetent judges.

(4.) And the selfish man is no good student in the laws of God; even when he readeth the letter, he doth not mind or savour the spirit of them, "For they that are after the flesh, do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit;" Rom. viii. 5. A fair world it would be, if every collier should judge the privy council, and the judges of the land, or if every thief should sit upon his accuser and his judge, and every traitor should judge the prince. And a thousandfold more insufficient is self to judge the word of God. And yet as insufficient as it is, it is exceeding arrogant, and steps up into the judgmentseat, at every chapter that is read or heard: and if this blind and malicious judge be unsatisfied, forsooth the Scripture must be dark or contradictory, or what he pleases. This horrible, presumptuous arrogancy of self is it that hath opened so many mouths against the blessed doctrine of salvation, and made so many wretched apostates in the world, and cast so many others into doubtings of that word by which at last they must be judged, and which should have been the ground of their faith and hope.

4. Moreover, self must be denied as it stands up against the Lord Jesus Christ. When Christ is presented in his. wonderful condescension, in his incarnation, and mean, despised life, and in his ignominious death, proud self is offended

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