From the Collected Works of Stephen Charnock Volume 5 A Discourse of the Mortification of Sin For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die, but if ye through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. Romans 8 verse 13 THE APOSTLE Heaven before spoken of justification by Christ, and showed the necessity of sanctification, whereby we indeed resemble the holiness of God, which he shows to be wrought by the Spirit of God, which is a band of communion between saints and Christ, who raises them both from sin, here and the grave hereafter. and that we are not debtors to the flesh and we should follow the suggestions of that, but to the spirit to observe his inspirations. He then in a text backs his exhortations with a threatening and a promise, a threatening to excite our industry and a promise to prevent our dejection. You must not imagine you shall be justified without being sanctified. For if you live after the flesh, you shall fall under that eternal death which is due to sin. But if you follow the motions of the spirit and endeavor to quench the first sparks of sin, the death of your body shall be an entrance into the happy life of your soul. Flesh Some by flesh understand the state under the law, others more properly corrupted nature. You shall die without hopes of a better life, but if you mortify the deeds of the body, the deeds of the body of sin, which is elsewhere called the body of death, the first motions to sin and passionate compliances with sin, which are the springs of corrupt actions, Corrupt nature is called a body here, morally, not physically. It consists of a number of vices, as a body of a number of members. You shall live. You shall live more spiritually and comfortably here and eternally hereafter. In these words of Romans 8 verse 13, we may observe one, a threatening. If you live after the flesh, you shall die. But number two, a promise. If you through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live. In the promise, there is one, the condition, and two, the reward. In the condition, there is first the act, mortify. Secondly is there is the object, the deeds of the body. the cause, the body, the effects, the deeds, the agents, you and the spirit, the principle, the spirit, the last principle, you, both conjoined in the work. You cannot do it without the spirit and the spirit will not do it without your concurrence with him and your industry and following his motions. From this act we may observe Sin is active in the soul of an unregenerate man. His heart is sin's territory. It is there as in its throne before the spirit comes. Mortification supposes spiritual life. Before and apart. Mortified. We call not a stone dead because it never had life. Justification supposes guilt. Sanctification filth. Mortification spiritual life. Preceding those acts. 2. Nothing but the death of sin must contend to renewed soul. This sentence is irreversible. Die it must. No indulgence is to be shown to it. No lighter punishment than death. Not the loss of a member, but the loss of its life. The axe must be laid to the root. and a knife must be held to the throat. The devils are restrained by the power of God from many sins, which cannot therefore be said to be mortified. As nothing but the death of Christ would satisfy the justice of God, so nothing but the death of sin would satisfy the justice of the soul. Number three, mortify. You must mortify. The time, the present. Once observed, his sin must have no pardon, so it must have no reprieve. No such mercy must be extended to it as to give it a moment's breathing. Dangerous enemies must be handled with a quick severity. If we do not presently kill sin, it may suddenly suck out the blood of our soul. Number four. It notes a continued act. It must be a quick and an uninterrupted severity. The knife must still stick in the throat of sin until it fall down perfectly dead. Sin must be kept down, though it will rage no more. It's a beast when the pains of death is more desperate. From the object observed, number one, mortification must be universal. Not one deed, but deeds, little and great, must fall under the edge. The brats must be dashed against the wall, though the main battle be routed, yet the wings of an army may get the victory. There are evil dispositions, depraved habits, corrupt affections. We should not spare a nest of vipers when we find them, because they are all equally injurious. 2. All actual sins are but the sproutings of original. The body signifies corrupt nature, and the deeds are the products of it. All the sparks issue from the furnace within. The body gives nourishment to the members, and the members bring supplies to the body. There are outward and inward deeds, acts of the mind, which, though not acts of the natural body, yet are acts of the body of sin. Galatians 5, verses 19 and 20. Hatred. Envies. Acts which the soul may perform separate from the body. Number three. The greatest object of our revenge is within us. Our enemies are those of our own house, inbred, domestic adversaries. Our anger is then a sanctified anger when set against our own sins. Our enemy has got possession of our souls, which makes the work more difficult. An enemy may be better kept out and cast out when he has got possession. Sin is within us and is always present with us, Romans 7 verse 21. It lies in ambush for us in the best of our duties. It starts out upon every occasion when we would do good. It would cut off all correspondences with heaven. It is our reason and our affections. It encamps in us, round about us, and easily besets us, Hebrews 12, 1. From the agents, you, the spirit, observe. One, man must be an agent in this work. We have brought this rubble into our souls and God would have us make as it were some recompense by endeavoring to cast it out. It's in the law. The father was to fling the first stone against a blasphemous son. We must not be neutral in this work, nor just look on. It will not be done without, though it cannot be done simply by us. It will not be done without our concurrence, though it cannot be done without a supernatural operation. 2. You. All of you. It is the universal duty for the subject as well as the object. You carnal men, there is no precept given to you to sin. Therefore, it is not your duty to sin. The life of sin is your misery, and the mortification of sin is your happiness as well as your duty. 2. You renewed and justified persons. Regeneration does not privilege sin or exempt from the mortifying work of it. Election, and consequently the fruits of it, is to holiness and not from it. Ephesians 2 verse 4. Vocation and sanctification, in which mortification is the first step, are perspective mirrors to see to the top of election. Though you have mortified, yet you must still do it. And number three, you must do it through the Spirit. Mortification is not the work of nature. It is a spiritual work. Every man ought to be an agent in it, yet not by his own strength. We must engage in a duel, but it is the strength of the Spirit only that can render us victorious. We can sin of ourselves, but not overcome sin by ourselves. We know how to be slaves, but are unable of ourselves to be conquerors. As God made us first free, so He can only restore us to that freedom we have lost. And He does it by His Spirit, which is the Spirit of Liberty. 2. The difficulty of this work is by this declared. The difficulty is manifested by the necessity of the Spirit's efficacy. Not all the powers on earth, nor do the strengths of ordinances, can do it. Omnipotency must have the main share in the work. The implantation of grace in the heart is called creation. The perfection of grace is called a victory, both belonging to an almighty power. From the promise observed first, heaven is a place for conquerors only. Revelation 3 verse 21, To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me on my throne. He that will be sin's friend cannot be God's favorite. The way to eternal life is through conflicts, inward with sin, outward with the world. There must be a combat before a victory, and a victory before a triumph. 2. The more perfect our mortification, the clearer our assurance of glory. The more sin dies, the more the soul lives. The sounder our lives are, the more sensible we are that we live. The more the enemy flies, the more certainty of an approaching victory. 3. Mortification is a sure sign of saving grace. It is a sign of the Spirit's indwelling and powerful acting, a sign of an approach to heaven. DOCTRINE The doctrine to be hence insisted on is this. Mortification of sin is a universal duty, in the work of the spirit and the soul of a believer, without which there can be no well-grounded expectations of eternal life and happiness. I do not intend to fold discourse on the mortification of sin, but in pursuance of a former exhortation of resemblance to the holiness of God to which this work is necessary. We cannot resemble God until that which is a hindrance to this resemblance is taken away. and as our deformity is paired off, we come nearer to our original pattern. And therefore I shall only show, in short, what this mortification is and how we may judge of ourselves whether we are mortified to sin or not, and that without it there can be no hopes of heaven. First, what is mortification? It is a break in the league we naturally hold with sin. Since we are upon ill terms with God, we have kept a constant correspondence with this enemy. And the union between sin and the soul is as straight as that between the flesh and the bones, or the flesh and the blood, blood being in every part of the flesh, and sin in every part of the soul. In regard of this union, sin is called flesh because of its incorporation with the flesh. The union between sin and the soul is naturally as great as the union between Christ and a believer, and is expressed by a similitude of Mary's Romans 7, body and members, root and branches, as well as the other. It is political, too, as between a king and his subjects. Sin is therefore said to have dominion, to make laws. whence we read of the law of the members. In regard of this, mortification is expressed by the term of having no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, Ephesians 5.11, a breaking of the conjugal knot. The acquaintance and familiar correspondence with sin are broken off. The communion between sin and the soul is at an end. The common interest wherein they are linked together is divided. The form of the ancient divorce is all the welcome sin has. Isaiah 30, verse 22. You shall say unto it, get thee hence. Or with Ephraim, what more have I to do with idols? Hosea 14, 8. It looks now upon its former favorite as an enemy. Sin's yoke, that was slight, is now burdensome. Nothing is so much desired as shaking it off, and that is the object of our antipathy, which before had been the object of the choicest favor. In this regard it is called a denying of lust, Titus 2.12, a stop in the years against the importunities of it. and refusing all commerce and cohabitation with it. Secondly, it is a declaration of open hostility. Its leagues between princes are not broken, but a war will ensue. The waves of sin are rejected, the dominion of sin opposed, their throne of sin assaulted. The soul is in arms to chase out this usurper and free itself from its tyranny, and sin is up in arms to reduce its subject to its ancient obedience. And here behold that irreconcilable and tedious war, without a possibility of renewing the ancient friendship, and which ends not but with a total conquest of sin. This hostility begins in a bridling corrupt affections. laying a yoke upon anything that would take part with the enemy. It cuts off all the supplies of sin, stops all the avenues to it, which the apostle expresses by making provision for the flesh, Romans 13, verse 14. It is a turning the stream which fed sin into another way. His anger is the degree of murder, and he that hates his brother is a manslayer. So he that hates sin and proclaims a war against it is killed it, affect to, though not act to. He has attained one degree of mortification when his anger against it is irreconcilable. like the anger of those that quarrel about a crown, which cannot be ended but by the death of one of the pretenders. Number three. A strong and powerful resistance by using all the spiritual weapons against sin which a Christian armory will afford. The list of which magazine we have in Ephesians 6 verse 13 and 14 and so on. Adhering of the word, setting a sin in the front, that the arrows of God may pierce it to the heart. An intuited sword may cut the sinews of it asunder, improving our baptism, which is a burial with Christ, to which end the apostle mentions it in Romans 6, verses 2 and 3, sending up strong cries for the assistance of heaven. as Paul did when he had the thorn in the flesh, 2 Corinthians 12, 7, redoubling its messages to heaven for a quick supply. The apostle expresses his reluctance against sin by two emphatical words in 1 Corinthians 9, verse 27, I keep under my body and bring it into subjection. I Keep it under. The word signifies to take hold of or to grip an adversary, as wrestlers do when they would give their antagonists to fall and lay him flat with the earth, or to beat and pound, as wrestlers anciently did with their plummets of lead. Whence the word is derived from this in the text, and it signifies putrefied wounds. And the other word signifies to lead captive, to subject a body, to serve God, not lusts, to lead it as a slave, not to endure it as a master, of bringing the affections into order that they may not contradict and disobey the motions of the Spirit in sanctified reason. Number four. A killing of sin expressed in the text by mortifying or putting to death. In Colossians 3 verse 5, mortify, but the word signifies to reduce to a carcass, that though like a carcass that may retain the shape, liniments, and members that it had while it was living, yet It has no longer any life, strength, and motion like it did before. And it is called a crucifying, Galatians 5.24, which comprehends all the acts which preceded the crucifying of Christ, which was done with the greatest spite as much as could be. The same measures, the same proportions, the same earnestness of spirit are observed. A total deafness to the Christ and complaints of sin is that of the Jews to the groans of the Lord of Life, a crucifying it, notwithstanding all it would give in exchange. It is called in Scripture by the name of revenge, which ends not without the destruction of the hated person, and sometimes not with it. Every day there is to be a driving, a new nail into the body of death. a break in some limb or other of it until it expires. Section 2. The second thing is how we may judge of our mortification. First, negatively. All cessation from some particular sin is not a mortification of it. A non-commission of sin, of a particular sin, is not an evidence of the mortification of the root of it. Indeed, a man cannot commit all kinds of sin at a time, nor in many years. The commands of sin are contrary. And many masters commanding contrary things cannot be served at one and the same time. Pride commands to lavish and covetousness, to hoard. All sins have their times of reigning in a wicked man, as all graces have their particular seasons of acting according to the opportunities God gives. Has Yael abhorred the thoughts of that cruelty the prophet foretold that he should act? What? Am I a dog? II Kings 8, 12-13. Yet that sin lay bid by him as Joash, by Jehoiada, hoping for the time to play his part, an act has the Alice a slave to it. The cessation of a member from motion at present is no argument either of the death of the body, or the mortification of that member. A cessation from one sin may be but an exchange for another. It may be a divorce from sin odious to the world, and an embrace in another sin that has more specious pretenses. as a man may forsake one harlot and fall in league with another. Some sins do not so much affright to conscience, and those may be entertained when a frowning conscience scares a man from some more abominable sin, lusts, or of several sorts. Titus 3.3 A man may cast off the service of one master and list himself in the service of another. He changes his lord without changing his servility. A man cannot be said to be clean because he has risen out of one thing to drench himself in another. 2. This cessation may be from some outward gross acts only, not from a want of will to sin, if a large log did not lie in the way. There may be speculative pride, ambition, covetousness, uncleanness when they are not externally acted. And this is more dangerous, as infectious diseases are when they are hindered by cold from a kindly eruption and strike inward to the heart and so prove mortal. The pollutions of the world may be escaped when the pollutions of the heart remain. A man may be a fine, garnished and swept house, and yet an habitation for seven devils worse than reigned there before. The apostle's command for cleaning reaches to the filthiness of the spirit as well as that of the flesh. 2 Corinthians 7 verse 1. We save the soul. so we may save sin. The bias of the soul may run strongly to that sin and affection and pleasure from the outward acts of which it abstains. It is most dangerous for the house when the fire burns inward. A man may be sooner cured of an outward scald than an inward heat, which when it comes to a hectic fever is incurable. Number three, it may be a secession from a sin merely because of the alteration of the Constitution. Every age has particular sins which it inclines men to. Some sins are more proper to young men, which the Apostle called, therefore, youthful lusts. 2 Timothy 2 verse 22, Lust reigns in young men, but its empire decays in an old withered body. Some plants which grow in hot countries will die in colder climates. Ambition decays in age when strength is wasted, but sprouts up in a young man who has hopes to live many years and make a flourish in the world. A present sickness may make an epicure nauseate the dainties which he would before rake even in the sea to procure. There's a cessation from acts of sin not of a sense of sin, but a change of the temper of his body. Number four. A cessation from acts of sin may be forced by some forethoughts of death, some pang of conscience, apprehensions of going to hell, presence in some scripture threatening, or some sharp and smarting affliction, some signal judgment of God inflicted upon one or other of the companions in sin, which are all of themselves but a kind of force. day being the scourges in which God sometimes lashes a man from the present act of sin. As a present pain in one part of a body may take away a man's stomach, to have no delight in his food, but when the pain is removed his appetite returns to him. So while a man is upon the rack, and God accusing him. He takes no pleasure. He takes no sweetness and sin. But after these horrors are taken off, he feeds as hardly as before, and he sometimes has a greater stomach. His men, after a fit of sickness, eat more plentifully to recover the strength which before they lost by the distemper. Number five. A cessation from acts of sin may be for lack of an occasion, for lack of time, place, and materials. A man's will is not against sin, but he lacks an opportunity for it. This is not from mortifying grace within, but from a providential operation of God in withholding the materials necessary for the commission of sin. Who will say the sins of drunkenness, gluttony, and oppression, committed by men on earth, are mortified in them when they are in hell. They lack materials, not a nature nor an affection to commit it. Where they again upon the earth, grace lies idle many times for lack of objects to exercise itself about. So does lust in the heart, like a snake starved with cold until it is heated by a temptation. A man's condition in the world is not a sign of this mortification. There may be grasping and ambitious thoughts in a cottage. Prodigality may be in a poor man's wishes, though not within his power. Yea, and sometimes there is more prodigality in a poor man's unnecessary expense of a penny than in another man throwing away a pound. Restraints from sin are not the mortification of it. Men may be curbed when they are not changed. And there is no man in the world but God restrains him from more sins, which he has a nature to commit, than what he does actually commit. He often hedges up the way with thorns when he does not alter the heart by grace, and does by his providence hinder the execution of the sinful motions. when he does not root out the wickedness that lies secretly in the nature. It was an act of God's providence to restrain Abimelech. Genesis 20 verse 6. I withheld you from sinning against me. These restraints are mercies God would have us bless him for, but they are no evidences of mortifying grace. Mortification is always from an inward principle in the heart. Restraints are from an outward principle. A restraint is merely a pulling back as a man hindered from doing a mischief by a stronger power. But mortification is from a strength given, a new metal put into the soul, both the courage and strength to resist it. There is strength in the inward man, Ephesians 3 verse 16. In a renewed man there is something beside bare considerations to withhold him, something of an antipathy which heightens and improves those considerations in which the soul is glad of them, because the edge and dent of them is against sin. Whereas a man barely restrained would fain stop the entrance of such thoughts, or when they are entered would turn them out of doors again. There are things merely put into him that have no welcome. Neither do they change the will, but put a little stop to it, to alter the method of proceedings. Mortifying grace finds something in the nature, as there is in the nature of a fountain, to work out the mud when dirt is cast in to infect it. True mortification proceeds from an anger with, and a hatred of, sin, whereas restraints are from a fear of the consequences of sin, as a man may love the wine which is yet too hot for his lips. But mortification proceeds from an anger, a desire of revenge, And sin is called an abomination to a good man, as well as to God, which signifies an intense and well-heated anger. It is not only a passionateness, which upon some disappointment and sin, or a tasting the bitterness of it, may be vented against it, which is short-lived and quickly allayed, as the sea after a storm. But it is a rooted revenge, which is the sweetest passion, and accomplished by many projects and contrivances. A man tastes the sweetness of giving blow after blow to sin. It is before he took a pleasure in, and had friendship with it. Mortification is a voluntary rational work of the soul. Restraints are not so. The devil has nothing of his nature altered, but has as strong an inclination to sin as ever, though the act he intends is often hindered by God. As in the case of Job, his malice was as great as before to do him a mischief. But God puts a bar upon Satan and refuses him a license. Job 1 verse 10. Now, if that grace which hinders be more than what a devil has, then no more argues a man mortified than the devil's forbearance of sin argues that he is mortified to it and recovered his angelical state. Number two, we may judge a mortification positively. When upon a temptation that did usually excite a beloved lust, the lust does not stir. It is a sign of a mortified state, as it is a sign of the clearness of a fountain when after the stirring of the water the mud appears. Peter's sin seems to be self-confidence, but it was a sign of a greater mortification of it that when Christ pressed him to declare his love in that demand. John 21, verse 15. Loveth thou me more than these? He would not vaunt his love to Christ to be greater than the rest of his brethren's. His answer goes no further than, Yea, Lord, you know that I love you, without any more than these. As it is with a man that is sick, let the most savoury meat be for him which before he had a value for, if he cannot taste it. and his appetite be not provoked by the sight of it. It is an argument of the strength of his distemper, and where it is lasting, of his approaching death. So when a man has the temptation of sin decked and garnished with all the allurements the devil can dress it up with, and he has no stomach to close with it, it is a sign of a mortified frame. It is a sign of the power of sin when upon the fair offer it makes, and the allure it baits, it lays. The affections to it are presently stirred. It is an evidence of a connaturality and a mighty agreement between that sin and the heart. when upon every spark it takes fire. It is a sign a man was filled with all unrighteousness and had not only a few loose corns about him, so on the contrary when upon the least motion of temptation there was one to have the gates open for it, the affections rise against it and upon the least alarm all run to the walls to defend them. and forbid the entrance. It is an evidence of the weakness of that lust that kept before a correspondence with such temptations. And the greater evidence it is when the temptation is high and yet vigorously resisted, is when the spring tide is high and blown in with the wind. It is an argument of the strength and firmness of the riverbank to keep it out from entering upon the ground. Whereas when a man is carried away by every temptation, It is a sign that there is no mortifying grace at all but a great friendliness between sin and the heart. Now we'll question the deadness of that tree at the root which does not bud upon the return of the spring's sun. Nor need we question the weakness of that corruption which does not stir upon the presenting a suitable temptation. 2. When we meet with few interruptions in spiritual duties of worship, the multitude of such diversions and an easiness to comply with them is a sign of an unmortified brain. as it is a sign of much weakness in a person and the strength of his distemper when he is not able to hold fast anything, or when the least blow or jog makes him let go of his hold. In duty we are to lay fast hold on God, Hebrews 6 verse 18, and join ourselves to the Lord, Isaiah 56 verse 3. It is a weak union when every puff of wind is able to separate us, when the starting of sin in us easily turns us from our course. It argues either a credulity to believe its enticements, or our affection to love its allurements, and also the forth and strength of sin, as a frequent starting of an enemy from woods and fastnesses to obstruct our passage. It is a sign of some strength remaining, and of more than some few scattered troops, rather than some well-bodied army. The more there is of a man's self, flesh, unspiritualness in any service, the more there is of an un-mortified temper. The sprouting up of such fruits argues much, juice and sap at the root, especially when the eruptions of sin are more numerous and vigorous than the resistances of them, but when the heart can run its race in a service with some freedom, and the interruptions from the flesh are few and languish hidden. It is a sign that it is met with a weakening wound. They are rather gasps of corruption than any strong attempts. 3. When we bring forth the fruits of the contrary graces, it is a sign that sin is mortified. It is to this end that sin is killed by the Spirit. that fruit may be brought forth to God, the more sweet and full fruit a tree bears, the more evidence there is of the weakness of those suckers which are about to root, to hinder his generous productions. Believers are called vines, and olive plants, planted in a fair soil, and God the husbandman, who waters and dresses, prunes and cuts off the luxuriant branches, that he may have fruit, and fruit fit for him. John 15 verses 1 and 2. The more fruit is brought forth, the greater sign that the soul is purged, and whatsoever is an enemy to that fruit is cut off and weakened. The more nature rises to the exercise of acts proper to it, the more strength of the disease that oppresses it is wasted. Every exercise of grace is both the discovery of the weakness of sin and a fresh blow given to it for the wounding of it.