On Keeping the Heart, a book by John Flavel. Number two. Section four. The fourth season requiring our utmost diligence to keep our hearts at the time of danger and public distraction. In such times the best hearts are too apt to be surprised by slavish fear. If Syria be confederate with Ephraim, how do the hearts of the house of David shake, even as the trees of the wood which are shaken with the wind? When there are ominous signs in the heavens, or the distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring, then the hearts of men fail for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth. Even Paul may sometimes complain of fightings within, when there are fears without. But, my brethren, these things ought not so to be. Saints should be of a more elevated spirit. So was David when his heart was kept in a good frame. The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life. Of whom shall I be afraid? Let none but the servants of Sam be the slaves of fear. Let them that have delight in an evil fear evil. Let not that which God has threatened as a judgment upon the wicked ever seize upon the hearts of the righteous. I will send faintness into their hearts in the land of their enemies, and the sound of a shaking leaf shall chase them. What poor-spirited men are those to fly at a shaking leaf? A leaf makes a pleasant, not a terrible noise. It makes, indeed, a kind of natural music. But to a guilty conscience even the whistling leaves are drums and trumpets. But God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love and of a sound mind. A sound mind that stands there in opposition to fear is an unwounded conscience not weakened by guilt, and this should make a man as bold as a lion. I know it cannot be said of a saint as God said of Leviathan that he is made without fear. There is a natural fear in every man, and it is as impossible to remove it wholly as to remove the body itself. Fear is perturbation of the mind arising from the apprehension of approaching danger. And as long as dangers can approach us, we shall find some perturbations within us. It is not my purpose to commend to you a stoical apathy, nor yet to dissuade you from such a degree of cautionary preventive fear, as may fit you for trouble, and be serviceable to your soul. There is a provident fear that opens our eyes to foresee danger and quickens us to a prudent and lawful use of means to prevent it. Such was Jacob's fear, and such is Prudence when expecting to meet his angry brother Esau. But it is the fear of diffidence from which I would persuade you to keep your heart. That tyrannical passion which invades the heart in times of danger, distracts, weakens, and unfits it for duty, drives men upon unlawful means, and brings a snare with it. Now let us inquire how a Christian may keep his heart from distracting and tormenting fears in times of great and threatening dangers. There are several excellent rules for keeping the heart from sinful fear when imminent danger threatens us. 2. Look upon all creatures as in the hand of God, who manages them in all their motions, limiting, restraining, and determining them at His pleasure. Get this great truth well settled by faith in your heart, and it will guard you against slavish fears. The first chapter of Ezekiel contains an admirable draft of providence. There you see the living creatures who move the wheels, that is, the great revolutions of things here below, coming unto Christ, who sits upon the throne, to receive new instructions from Him. In Revelation's sixth chapter you read of white, black, and red horses, which are but the instruments God employs in executing judgments in the world, as wars, pestilence, and death. When these horses are prancing and trampling up and down in the world, here is a consideration that may quiet our hearts. God has a reins in his hand. Wicked men are sometimes like mad horses. They would stamp the people of God under their feet, but that the bridle of providence is in their mouths. A lion at liberty is terrible to meet, but who is afraid of a lion in the keeper's hand? 2. Remember that this God, in whose hand are all creatures, is your Father, and is much more tender of you than you are or can be of yourself. He that touches you touches the apple of mine eye. 3. Let me ask the most timorous woman whether there be not a great difference between the sight of a drawn sword in the hand of a bloody ruffian, and of the same sword in the hand of her own tender husband. As great a difference there is between looking upon creatures by an eye of sense and looking on them as in the hand of your God, by an eye of faith, Isaiah 54 5, is here very appropriate. Thy maker is thine husband, the Lord of hosts is his name. He is Lord of all the hosts of creatures. Who would be afraid to pass through an army, though all the soldiers should turn their swords and guns toward him, if the commander of that army were his friend or father? A religious young man, being at sea with many other passengers in a great storm, and they being half dead with fear, he only was observed to be very cheerful, as if he were but little concerned in that danger, one of them demanding the reason of his cheerfulness. Oh, said he, it is because the pilot of the ship is my father. Consider, Christ first is the King and Supreme Lord over the providential kingdom, and then is your head, husband and friend, and you will quickly say, Return unto thy rest, O my soul. This truth will make you cease trembling and cause you to sing in the midst of danger. The Lord is King of all the earth. Sing, ye praise, with understanding. That is, let every one that has understanding of this heart-reviving and establishing doctrine of the dominion of our Father over all creatures. sing praise. 3. Urge upon your heart to express prohibitions of Christ in this case, and let your heart stand in awe of the violation of them. He has charged you not to fear, for we shall hear of wars and commotions, see that ye be not terrified, and nothing be terrified by your adversaries. 10 And within the compass of six verses, our Saviour commands us thrice not to fear men. Does the voice of a man make thee to tremble, and shall not the voice of God? If ye are such a timorous spirit, how is it that ye fear not to disobey the commands of Jesus Christ? I think the command of Christ should have as much power to calm as the voice of a poor worm to terrify your heart. I, even I, am he that comforts you. Who are you that you should be afraid of a man that shall die, and of the son of man that shall be made as a grass, and forget the Lord your Maker? We cannot fear creatures sinfully till we have forgotten God. Did we remember what He is and what He has said? We should not be of such a feeble spirit. Bring yourself, then, to this reflection in times of danger. If I let into my heart a slavish fear of man, I must let out the reverential awe and fear of God. And dare I cast off the fear of the Almighty for the frowns of a man? Shall I lift up proud dust above the great God? Shall I run upon a certain sin to shun a probable danger? Oh, keep your heart by this consideration. 4. Remember how much needless trouble your vain fears have brought upon you formerly. and has feared continually because of the oppressor, as if he were ready to devour. And where is the fury of the oppressor? He seemed ready to devour, yet you are not devoured. I have not brought upon you the thing that you fear. You have wasted your spirit, disordered your soul, and weakened your hands to no purpose. You might have all this while enjoyed your peace and possessed your soul in patience. And here I cannot but observe a very deep policy of Satan in managing a design against the soul by these vain fears. I call them vain with reference to the frustration of them by Providence. But certainly they are not in vain, as the end at which Satan aims in raising them. For in this he acts as soldiers do in the siege of a garrison. Who to wear out the besieged by constant watchings, and thereby unfit them to make resistance, when they storm it in earnest? Every night rouse them with false alarms, which though they come to nothing, yet remarkably answer the ultimate design of the enemy. O when will you beware of Satan's devices? 5. Consider solemnly, though the things you fear should really happen, yet there is more evil in your own fear than in the things feared, and that not only is the least evil of sin worse than the greatest evil of suffering, but is the sinful fear has really more trouble in it than there is in that condition of which you are so much afraid. Fear is both a multiplying and a tormenting passion. It represents troubles as much greater than they are, and so tortures the soul much more than the suffering itself. So it was with Israel at the Red Sea. They cried out and were afraid, till they stepped into the water. And then a passage was opened through those waters, which they thought would have drowned them. Thus it is with us. We, looking through the glass of carnal fear upon the waters of trouble, the swellings of Jordan, cry out, O they are unaffordable! Me must perish in them. But when we come into the midst of those floods, indeed, we find the promise made good. God will make a way to escape. Thus it was with the blessed martyr when he would have made a trial by putting his finger to the candle and found himself not able to endure that. He cried out, What? Cannot I bear the burning of a finger? How then shall I be able to bear the burning of my whole body tomorrow? But when that morrow came, he could go cheerfully into the flames with the scripture in his mouth. Fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name, thou art mine. When thou passest through the waters, I will be with you. When thou walkest through the fire, thou shall not be burnt. 6. Consult the many precious promises which are written for your support and comfort in all dangers. These are your refuges, to which you may fly and be safe when the arrows of danger fly by night, and destruction wasteth at noonday. These are particular promises suited to particular cases and exigencies. There are also general promises reaching all cases and conditions, such as these. All things shall work together for good, and so on. Though a sinner do evil an hundred times, and his days be prolonged, yet it shall be well with them that fear the Lord, and so on. Could you but believe the promises, your heart should be established. Could you but plead them with God, as Jacob did? Thou sayest, I will surely do thee good, and so on. They would relieve you in every distress. Quiet your trembling heart by recording and consulting your past experiences of the care and faithfulness of God in former distresses. These experiences are food for your faith in a wilderness. By this David kept his heart in time of danger, and Paul his. It was answered by a saint when one told him that his enemy's way laid him to take his life. If God take no care of me, how is it that I have escaped hitherto? You may plead with God old experiences for new ones, for it is in pleading with God for new deliverances as it is in pleading for new pardons. Mark how Moses pleads of that account with God. Pardon, I beseech, the iniquity of this people, as you have forgiven them from Egypt until now. He does not say, as men do, Lord, this is a first fault. You have not been troubled before to sign their pardon. Lord, because you have pardoned them so often, I beseech you, pardon them once again. So in new difficulties let the saints say, Lord, you have often heard, helped and saved in former years, therefore now help again. For with you there is plenteous redemption, and your arm is not shortened. 8 Be well satisfied that you are in the way of your duty, and that will beget holy courage in times of danger. Who will harm you if you be a follower of that which is good? or if any dare attempt to harm you, you may boldly commit yourself to God in well-doing. It was this consideration that raised Luther's spirit above all fear. In the cause of God said he, I ever am and ever shall be stout. Herein I assume this title. yield to none. A good cause will bear up a man's spirit. Hear the saying of a heathen to the shame of cowardly Christians. When the Emperor Vespasian had commanded Fleutius Priscius not to come to the Senate, or if he did come, to speak nothing but what he would have him, the Senator returned this noble answer, that he was a Senator, it was fit he should be at the Senate. And if, being there, he were required to give his advice, he would freely speak that which his conscience commanded him. The Emperor, threatening that then he should die, he answered, Did I ever tell you that I was immortal? Do what you will, and I will do what I ought. It is in your power to put me to death unjustly, and in my power to die with constancy. Righteousness is a brass plate. Let them tremble whom danger finds out of the way of duty. 9. Get your consciences sprinkled with the blood of Christ from all guilt, and that will set your heart above all fear. It is guilt upon the conscience that softens and makes cowards of our spirits. The righteous are bold as the lion. It was guilt in Cain's conscience that made him cry. Everyone that finds me will slay me. A guilty conscience is more terrified by imagined dangers than a pure conscience is by real ones. A guilty sinner carries a witness against himself in his own bosom. It was guilty Herod that cried out, John the Baptist is risen from the dead. Such a conscience is the devil's anvil, on which he fabricates all those swords and spears with which the guilty sinner pierces himself. Guilt is to danger what fire is to gunpowder. A man need not fear to walk among many barrels of powder if he have no fire about him. 10. Exercise holy trust in times of great distress. Make it your business to trust God with your life and comforts, and then your heart will be at rest about them. So did David. In what time, I am afraid, I will trust in thee. That is, Lord, if at any time a storm arise, I will shelter from it under the covert of your wings. Go to God by acts of faith and trust, and never doubt that he will secure you. You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you, says Isaiah. God is pleased when you come to him thus. Father, my life, my liberty, and my estate are exposed, and I cannot secure them. Oh, let me leave them in your hand. The poor leaves himself with you, and does his God fail him? No, you are the helper of the fatherless, that is, you are the helper of the destitute one, that has none to go to but God. This is a comforting passage. He shall not be afraid of evil tidings. His heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord. He does not say his ears shall be preserved from the report of evil things. He may hear as sad tidings as other men, but his heart shall be kept from the terror of those tidings. His heart is fixed. 11. Consult the honor of religion more and your personal safety less. Is it for the honor of religion, do you think, that Christians should be as timorous as hares to start at every sound? Will not this tempt the world to think, that whatever you talk, yet your principles are no better than other men's? What mischief may the discovery of your fears before them do? It was nobly said by Nehemiah, Should such a man as I flee, and who, being as I am, would flee? Were it not better you should die, than that the world should be prejudiced against Christ by your example? For alas, how apt is a world, who judge more by what they see in your practices, than by what they understand of your principles. To conclude from your timidity, that how much soever you commend faith and talk of assurance, yet you dare trust to those things no more than they, when it comes to the trial. O let not your fears lay such a stumbling block before the blind world. 12 He that would secure his heart from fear must first secure the eternal interest of his soul in the hands of Jesus Christ. When this is done, you may say, Now, world, do thy worst. You will not be very solicitous about a vile body when you are at once assured it shall be well to all eternity with your precious soul. Fear not them, says Christ, it can kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. The assured Christian may smile with contempt upon all his enemies and say, Is this the worst that you can do? What say you, Christian? Are you assured that your soul is safe, that within a few moments of your dissolution it shall be received by Christ into an everlasting habitation? If you be sure of that, never trouble yourself about the instrument and means of your death. Learn to quench all slavish creature fears in the reverential fear of God. This is a cure by diversion. It is an exercise of Christian wisdom to turn those passions of the soul which most predominate into spiritual channels, to turn natural anger into spiritual zeal, natural mirth into holy cheerfulness, and natural fear into a holy dread and awe of God. This method of cure Christ prescribes in the tenth of Matthew, similar to which is Isaiah 8, 12, and 13. Fear not their fear, but how shall we help it? Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself, and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. Natural fear may be outlaid for the present by natural reason, or the removal of the occasion, but then it is like a candle blown out by a puff of breath, which is easily blown in again. But if the fear of God extinguish it, then it is like a candle quenched in water, which cannot easily be rekindled. 14. Pour out to God in prayer those fears which the devil and your own unbelief pour in upon you in times of danger. Prayer is the best outlet to fear. Where is the Christian that cannot set his seal to this direction? I will give you the greatest example to encourage you to compliance, even the example of Jesus Christ. When the hour of his danger and death drew nigh, he went into the garden, separated from his disciples, and there wrestled mightily with God in prayer, even unto agony, in reference to which the apostle says, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong cries and tears, to him that was able to save from death, and was heard in that he feared. He was heard as to strength and support to carry him through it, though not as to deliverance or exemption from it. O that these things may abide with you, and be reduced to practice in these evil days, and that many trembling may be established by them. Section 5 The fifth season, requiring diligence in keeping the heart, is a time of outward lax. Although at such times we should complain to God, not of God, the throne of grace being erected for a time of need, yet when the waters of relief run low and lack begins to press, how prone are the best hearts to distrust the fountain. When the meal and the barrel and the oil and the cruise are almost spent, our faith and patience too are almost spent. It is now difficult to keep the proud and unbelieving heart and the holy quietude and sweet submission at the foot of God. It is an easy thing to talk of trusting God for daily bread, while we have a full barn or purse, but to say as the prophet, though the fig tree should not blossom, neither fruit be in the vine, and so on, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. Surely this is not easy. Would ye know, then, how a Christian may keep his heart from distrusting God, or repining against Him, when outward wants are either felt or feared? The case deserves to be seriously considered, especially now, since it seems to be the design of Providence to empty the people of God of their creature-fullness, and acquaint them with those difficulties to which before this they have been altogether strangers. to secure the heart from the dangers attending this condition. These considerations made through the blessing of the Spirit prove effectual. 1. If God reduces you to necessities, He therein deals no otherwise with you than He has done with some of the holiest men that ever lived. Your condition is not singular. Though you have before this been a stranger to want, other saints have been familiarly acquainted with it. Hear what Paul says, not of himself only, but in the name of other saints reduced to like exigencies. Even to the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and are naked and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling place. To see such a man as Paul going up and down the world, naked and hungry and homeless, One that was so far above you in grace and holiness, one that did more service for God in a day than perhaps you have done in all your days, may well put an end to your repining. Have you forgotten how much even a David has suffered? How great were his difficulties! Give, I pray thee, says he to Nabal, whatsoever comes to your hand, to your servants, and to your son David. But why speak I of these? Behold, a greater than any of them, even the Son of God, who is the heir of all things, and by whom the worlds were made, sometimes would have been glad of anything, having nothing to eat. And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry, and seeing a fig tree afar off, leaving leaves, he came, if happily he might find anything thereon. Hereby, then, God has set no mark of hatred upon you, neither can you infer lack of love from lack of bread. When your repining heart puts to question, Was there ever sorrow like unto mine? Ask these worthies, and they will tell thee, That though they did not complain as thou dost, Yet their condition was as necessitous as thine is. 2. If God leave you not in this condition without a promise, you have no reason to repine or despond under it. This is a sad condition, indeed, to which no promise belongs. Calvin, in his comment on Isaiah 9.1, explains in what sense the darkness of the captivity was not so great as that of the lesser incursions made by Tiglath, the leaser. In the captivity, the city was destroyed, and the temple burnt with fire. There was no comparison in the affliction, yet the darkness was not so great, because, says he, there was a certain promise made in this case, but none in the other. It is better to be as low as hell with a promise than to be in paradise without one. Even the darkness of hell itself would be no darkness comparatively at all were there but a promise to enlighten it. Now God has left many sweet promises for the faith of his poor people to live upon in this condition, such as these, O fear the Lord, ye his saints, for there is no lack to them that fear him. The lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they that fear the Lord shall not lack any good thing. The eye of the Lord is upon the righteous, to keep them alive in famine. No good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. He was spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with him also freely give us all things? When the poor and the needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue fails for thirst, I, the Lord, will hear them. I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. Here you see the extreme wants, water being put for their necessities of life and their certain relief. I, the Lord, will hear them, in which it is supposed that they cry unto Him in their distress, and He hears their cry. Having therefore these promises, why should not your distrustful heart conclude like David's the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want." But these promises imply conditions. If they were absolute, they would afford more satisfaction. What are those tacit conditions of which you speak, but these, that he will either supply or sanctify your wants, that ye shall have so much as God sees fit for you? And does this trouble you? Would you have the mercy, whether sanctified or not, whether God sees it fit for you or not? The appetites of saints, after earthly things, should not be so ravenous as to seize greedily upon any enjoyment without regarding circumstances. But when wants press, and I see not whence supplies should come, My faith in the promise shakes, and I, like murmuring Israel, cry, He gave bread, can he give water also? O unbelieving heart, when did his promises fail? Whoever trusted them and was ashamed? May not God abrade you with thine unreasonable infidelity, as in Jeremiah 2.31? Have I been a wilderness to you? Or, as Christ said to His disciples, Since I was with you, lacked you anything? Yea, may you not upbraid yourself? May you not say with good old polycarp, These many years I have served Christ, And found Him a good Master? Indeed, He may deny what your wantonness desires, But not what your want calls for. He will not regard the cry of your lusts, Nor yet despise the cry of your faith. Though he will not indulge your want and appetite, yet he will not violate his own faithful promises. These promises are your best security for eternal life, and it is strange they should not satisfy you for daily bread. Remember the words of the Lord, and solace your heart with them amidst all your wants. It is said of Epicurus that in a dreadful perioxim of the colic he often refreshed himself by calling to mind his inventions in philosophy, and of Posidonius, a philosopher, that in an acute disorder he soullessed himself with discourses on moral virtue, and when distressed he would say, O pain, thou dost nothing. Though thou art a little troublesome, I will never confess thee to be evil. If upon such grounds as these they could support themselves under such wracking pains and even diluted their diseases by them, how much rather should the promises of God and the sweet experiences which have gone along step by step with them make you forget all your wants and comfort you in every difficulty. 3. If it be bad now, it might have been worse, as God denied you the comforts of this life. He might have denied you Christ, peace, and pardon also, and then your case had been woeful indeed. You know, God has done so to millions. How many such wretched objects may your eyes behold every day that have no comfort in hand, nor yet in hope, that are miserable here, and will be so to eternity, that have a bitter cup, and nothing to sweeten it? No, not so much as any hope that it will be better. But it is not so with you, though you be poor in this world, yet you are rich in faith and in error of the kingdom which God has promised. Learn to set spiritual riches over against temporal poverty. Balance all your present troubles with your spiritual privileges. Indeed, if God has denied your soul the robe of righteousness to clothe it, the hidden manna to feed it, the heavenly mansion to receive it, you might well be pensive. But the consideration that he has not may administer comfort under any outward distress. When Luther began to be pressed by lack, he said, Let us be contented with our hard fare. For do not we feast upon Christ, the bread of life? Blessed be God, said Paul, who is abounded to us in all spiritual blessings. 4. Though this affliction be great, God has far greater, with which he chastises the dearly beloved of his soul in this world. Should he remove this and inflict those, you would account your present state a very comfortable one, and bless God to be as you now are. Should God remove your present troubles, supply all your outward wants, give you the desire of your heart and creature comforts, but hide his face from you, Shoot his arrows into your soul, and cause the venom of them to drink up your spirit. Should he leave you but a few days to the buffetings of Satan? Should he hold your eyes but a few nights, waking with whores of conscience, tossing to and fro till the dawning of the day? Should he lead you through the chambers of death, show you the visions of darkness, and make his terror set themselves in array against you? Then tell me if you would not think it a great mercy to be back again in your former necessitous condition, with peace of conscience, and account bread and water, with God's favor, a happy state. O, then take heed of repining. Say not that God deals hardly with you, lest you provoke him to convince you by your own sins that he has worse rods than these for unsubmissive and froward children. 5. If it be bad now, it will be better shortly. Keep your heart with this consideration. The meal in the barrel is almost bent. Well, be it so, why should that trouble me? If I am almost beyond the need and use of these things, the traveler has spent almost all his money. Well, says he, though my money be almost spent, my journey is almost finished too. I am near home, and shall soon be fully supplied. If there be no candles in the house, it is a comfort to think that it is almost day, and then there will be no need of them. I am afraid, Christian, you misreckon when you think your provision is almost spent, and you have a great way to travel, many years to live and nothing to live upon, and maybe not half so many as you suppose. In this be confident, if your provision be spent, either fresh supplies are coming, though you do not see from where, or you are nearer your journey's end than you reckon yourself to be. Desponding soul, does it become a man travelling upon the road to that heavenly city, and almost arrive there, within a few days' journey of his father's house, where all his wants shall be supplied, to be so anxious about a little meat, or drink, or clothes, which he fears he shall want by the way? It was nobly said by the forty martyrs, when turned out naked in a frosty night, to be starved to death. The winter indeed is sharp and cold, but heaven is warm and comfortable. Here we shiver for cold, but Abraham's bosom will make amends for all. But says to this bonding soul, I may die for want, whoever did so. When were the righteous forsaken? If indeed it be so, your journey is ended, and you shall be fully supplied. But I am not sure of that. Were I sure of heaven, it would be another manner. Are you not sure of that? Then you have other matters to trouble yourself about of these. Methink these should be the least of all your cares. I do not find that souls perplexed about the want of Christ, pardon of sin, and so on, are usually very solicitous about these things. He that seriously puts such questions as these, what shall I do to be saved, how shall I know my sin is pardoned, does not trouble himself with what shall I eat, what shall I drink, or wherewithal shall I be clothed. Does it become the children of such a father to distrust his all-sufficiency, or repine at any of his dispensations? Do you will to question his care and love upon every new exigency? Say, have you not formerly been ashamed of this? Has not your father's seasonable provision for you in former difficulties put you to the blush, and made you resolve never more to question his love and care? And yet will you again renew your unworthy suspicions of him? Disingenuous child, reason thus with yourself. If I perish for want of what is good and needful for me, it must be either because my Father knows not my wants, or has not wherewith to supply them, or regards not what becomes of me. Which of these shall I charge upon him? Not the first, for my Father knows what I have need of. Not the second, for the earth is a Lord's. and the fatness thereof, his name is God all-sufficient. Not the last, for as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pities them that fear him. The Lord is exceeding pitiful and of tender mercy. He hears the young ravens when they cry, and will he not hear me? Consider, says Christ, the fowls of the air, not the fowls at the door that are fed every day by hand, but the fowls of the air that have none to provide for them. Does he feed and clothe his enemies, and will he forget his children? He heard even the cry of Ishmael in distress. O my unbelieving heart, do you yet doubt? 7. Your poverty is not your sin, but your affliction. If you have not by sinful means brought it upon yourself, and if it be naught but an affliction, it may the more easily be borne. It is hard indeed to bear an affliction coming upon us as the fruit and punishment of sin. When men are under trouble upon that account, they say, O if it were but a single affliction coming from the hand of God by way of trial, I could bear it. But I have brought it upon myself by sin. It comes as the punishment of sin. The marks of God's displeasure are upon it. It is the guilt within that troubles and galls more than the lack without. But it is not so here, therefore you have no reason to be cast down under it. But though there be no sting of guilt, yet this condition wants not other stings, as for instance the discredit of religion, I cannot comply with my engagements in the world, and thereby religion is likely to suffer. It is well you have a heart to discharge every duty. Yet if God disable you by providence, it is no discredit to your profession that you do not that which you cannot do, so long as it is your desire and endeavor to do what you can and ought to do. And in this case God's will is that lenity and forbearance be exercised towards you. But it grieves me to behold the necessities of others, whom I was wont to relieve and refresh, but now cannot. If you cannot, it ceases to be your duty, and God accepts a drawing out of your soul to the hungry in compassion and desire to help them, though you cannot draw forth a full purse to relieve and supply them. But I find such a condition full of temptations, a great hindrance in the way to heaven. Every condition in the world has its hindrances and attending temptations, and were you in a prosperous condition, you might there meet with more temptations and fewer advantages than you now have. For though I confess poverty as well as prosperity has its temptations, Yet I am confident prosperity is not those advantages that poverty has. Here you have an opportunity to discover the sincerity of your love to God, when you can live upon Him, find enough in Him, and constantly follow Him even when all external inducements and motives fail. Thus I have shown you how to keep your heart from the temptations and dangers attending a low condition in the world. when want oppresses and the heart begins to sink, then improve and bless God for these helps to keep it. Section 6 The sixth season, requiring this diligence that came in the heart, is the season of duty. Our hearts must be closely watched and kept when we draw near to God in public, private, or secret duties, for the vanity of the heart seldom discovers itself more than at such times. How often does a poor soul cry out, O Lord, how gladly would I serve you, but vain thoughts will not let me. I come to open my heart to you, to delight my soul in communion with you, but my corruptions oppose me. Lord, call off these vain thoughts, and suffer them not to estrange the soul that is a spouse to you. The question then is this, how may the heart be kept from distractions by vain thoughts in times of duty? There is a twofold distraction or wandering of the heart in duty. First, voluntary and habitual. They set not their hearts aright, and their spirit was not steadfast with God. This is the case of formalists, and it proceeds from the want of a holy inclination of the heart to God. Their hearts are under the power of their lusts, and therefore it is no wonder that they go after their lusts. even when they are about holy things. Secondly, involuntary and lamented distractions. I find in a law that when I would do good, evil is present with me, O wretched man that I am, and so on. This proceeds not from want of a holy inclination or aim, but from the weakness of grace and the want of vigilance in opposing indwelling sin. But it is not my business to show you how these distractions come into the heart, but rather how to get them out and prevent their future admission. First, sequester yourself from all earthly employments and set apart some time for solemn time to meet God in duty. You cannot come directly from the world into God's presence without finding a saver of the world in your duties. It is with the heart, a few minutes since plunged in the world, now in the presence of God, as it is with the sea after a storm, which still continues working, muddy and disquiet, though the wind be laid and the storm be over. Your heart must have some time to settle. Few musicians can take an instrument and play upon it without some time and labor to tune it. Few Christians can say with David, My heart is fixed, O God, it is fixed. When you go to God in any duty, take your heart aside and say, O my soul, I am now engaged in the greatest work that a creature was ever employed about. I am going into the awful presence of God upon business of everlasting moment. O my soul, leave trifling now, be composed, be watchful, be serious. This is no common work. It is soul work. It is work for eternity. It is work which will bring forth fruit to life or death and the world to come. Pause a while and consider your sins, your wants, your troubles. Keep your thoughts a while on these before you address yourself to duty. David first mused and then spoke with his tongue. 2. Having composed your heart by previous meditation, immediately set a guard upon your senses. How often are Christians in danger of losing the eyes of their mind by those of their body. Against this David prayed, Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity, and quicken thou me in thy way. This may serve to expound the Arabian proverb, Shut the windows that the house may be light. It were well if you could say in the commencement, as the holy man once said when he came from the performance of duty, Be shut, O my eyes, be shut, for it is impossible that you should ever discern such beauty and glory in any creature as I have now seen in God. You must avoid all occasions of distraction from without, and imbibe that intenseness of spirit in the work of God which locks up the eye and ear against vanity. 3. Beg of God a mortified fancy. A working fancy, says one, how much soever it be extolled among men, is a great snare to the soul, except it work in fellowship with right reason in the sanctified heart. The fancy is the power of the soul, placed between the senses and the understanding. It is that which first stirs itself in the soul, and by its motions the other powers of the soul are brought into exercise. It is that in which thoughts are first formed, and as that is, so are they. If imaginations be not first cast down, it is impossible that every thought of the heart should be brought into obedience to Christ. The fancy is naturally the wildest and most untamable power of the soul. Some Christians have much to do with it, and the more spiritual the heart is, the more does a wild and vain fancy disturb and perplex it. It is a sad thing that one's imagination should call off the soul from attending on God when it is engaged in communion with Him. Pray earnestly and perseveringly that your fancy may be chastened and sanctified, and when this is accomplished, your thoughts will be regular and fixed. 4. If you would keep your heart from vain excursions when engaged in duties, realize to yourself, by faith, the awful presence of God. If the presence of a great man would compose you to seriousness, how much more should the presence of a holy God? Do you think that you would dare to be gay in light if you realize the presence and inspection of the Divine Being? Remember where you are when engaged in religious duty, and act as if you believed in the omniscience of God. All things are naked and open to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. Realize His infinite holiness, His purity, His spirituality. Strive to obtain such apprehensions of the greatness of God as shall suitably affect your heart, and remember His jealousy over His worship. This is that the Lord spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me, and before all the people I will be glorified. A man that is praying says Bernard should behave himself as if he were entering into the court of heaven where he sees the Lord upon his throne, surrounded with ten thousand of his angels and saints ministering to him. When you come from an exercise in which your heart has been wandering and listless, what can you say? Suppose all the vanities and impertinences which have passed through your mind during a devotional exercise were written down and interlined with your petitions. Could you have the faith to present them to God? Should your tongue utter all the thoughts of your heart when attending the worship of God? Would not men abhor you? Yet your thoughts are perfectly known to God. O think upon this scripture! God is greatly to be feared in the assemblies of his saints, and to be had in reverence of all them that are round about him. Why did the Lord descend in thunderings and lightnings and dark clouds upon Sinai? Why did the mountains smoke under him, the people quake and tremble round about him? Moses himself not accepted. But to teach the people this great truth, Let us have grace whereby we may serve him acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire. Such apprehensions of the character and presence of God will quickly reduce a heart inclined to vanity, to a more serious frame. 5. Maintain a prayerful frame of heart in the intervals of duty, where reasons can be assigned why our hearts are so dull, so careless, so wandering, when we hear or pray But there have been long intermissions in our communion with God. If that divine unction, that spiritual fervor, and those holy impressions which we obtained from God while engaged in the performance of one duty were preserved to enliven and engage us in the performance of another, they would be of incalculable service to keep our hearts serious and devout. For this purpose, frequent ejaculations between stated and solemn duties are of most excellent use. They not only preserve the mind in a composed and pious frame, but they connect one stated duty, as it were, with another, and keep the attention of the soul alive to all its interests and obligations. If you would have the distraction of your thoughts prevented, endeavor to raise your affections to God, and to engage them warmly in your duty. When the soul is intent upon any work, it gathers in its strength and bends all its thoughts to that work. And when it is deeply affected, it will pursue its object with intenseness. The affections will gain an ascendancy over the thoughts and guide them. But deadness causes distraction, and distraction increases deadness. Could you but regard your duties as a medium in which you might walk in communion with God, in which your soul might be filled with those ravishing and matchless delights which His presence affords? You might have no inclination to neglect them, but if you would prevent the recurrence of distracting thoughts, if you would find your happiness in the performance of duty, you must not only be careful that you engage in what is your duty, but labor with patient and persevering exertion. to interest your feelings in it? Why is your heart so inconstant, especially in secret duties? Why are you ready to be gone almost as soon as you are come into the presence of God, but because your affections are not engaged? 7. When you are disturbed by vain thoughts, humble yourself before God and call in assistance from heaven. When the messenger of Satan buffeted Paul by wicked suggestions, as it is supposed, he mourned before God on account of it. Never slight wandering thoughts and duty as small matters. Follow every such thought with a deep regret. Turn to God with such words as these, Lord, I come here to commune with you. And here a busy adversary and a vain heart conspiring together have opposed me. O my God, what a heart have I, that it shall never wait upon you without distraction. When shall I enjoy an hour of free communion with you? Grant me your assistance at this. Discover your glory to me, and my heart will quickly be recovered. I come here to enjoy you, and shall I go away without you? Behold my distress, and help me! Could you but sufficiently bewail your distractions, and repair to God for deliverance from them, you would gain relief. 8. Look upon the success and the comfort of your duties as depending very much upon the keeping of your hearts close with God in them. There are two things, the success of duty and the inward comfort arising from the performance of it, are unspeakably dear to the Christian, but both of these will be lost if the heart be in a listless state. Surely God hears not vanity, nor does the Almighty regard it. The promise is made to a heart engaged. Then shall you seek me and find me, when you shall search for me with all your hearts. When you find your heart under the power of deadness and distraction, say to yourself, O what do I lose by a careless heart now? My praying seasons are the most valuable portions of my life. Could I but raise my heart to God, I might now obtain such mercies as would be manner of praise to all eternity. 9. Regard your carefulness or carelessness in this manner as a great evidence of your sincerity or hypocrisy. Nothing will alarm an upright heart more than this. What, shall I give way to a customary wandering of the heart from God? Shall the spot of the hypocrite appear upon my soul? Hypocrites, indeed, can drudge on in the round of duty, never regarding the frame of their hearts. But shall I do so? Never! Never let me be satisfied with emptied duties. Never let me leave off from duty, until my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. 10. It will be of special use to keep your heart with God in duty, to consider what influences all your duties will have upon your eternity. Your religious seasons are your seed times, and in another world you must reap the fruits of what you sow in your duties here. If you sow to the flesh, you will reap corruption. If you sow to the spirit, you will reap life everlasting. Answer seriously these questions. Are you willing to reap the fruit of vanity in the world to come? What dare you say when your thoughts are roving to the ends of the earth in duty? When you scarce mind what you say or hear? Now, Lord, I am sowing to the Spirit. Now I am providing and laying up for eternity. Now I am seeking for glory, honor, and immortality. Now I am striving to enter in at the straight gate. Now I am taking the kingdom of heaven by holy violence. Such reflections are well calculated to dissipate vain thoughts. Section 7 The seventh season, which requires more than common diligence to keep the heart, is when we receive injuries and abuses from men, such as the depravity and corruption of man that one is become as a wolf or a tiger to another. And as men are naturally cruel and oppressive one to another, so the wicked conspire to abuse and wrong the people of God. The wicked devoureth a man that is more righteous than he. Now when we are thus abused and wronged, it is hard to keep the heart from revengeful motions, to make it meekly and quietly commit the cause to him that judges righteously, to prevent the exercise of any sinful affection. The spirit that is in us lusteth to revenge, but it must not be so. We have choice helps in the gospel to keep our hearts from sinful motions against our enemies and to sweeten our embittered spirits. Do you ask how a Christian may keep his heart from revengeful motions under the greatest injuries and abuses from men? I reply, when you find your heart begin to be inflamed by revengeful feelings, immediately reflect on the following things. 1. Urge upon your heart the severe prohibitions of revenge contained in the law of God. However gratifying to your corrupt propensities revenge may be, remember that it is forbidden. Hear the word of God. Say not, I will recompense evil. Say not, I will do so to him as he has done to me. Recompense no man evil for evil. Avenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath. For it is written, Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. On the contrary, if your enemy hungers, feed him, if he thirsts, give him drink. It was an argument urged by the Christians to prove their religion to be supernatural and pure, that it forbids revenge, which it is so agreeable to nature, and it is to be wished that such an argument might not be laid aside. Awe your heart, then, with the authority of God and the Scriptures, and when carnal reason says, My enemy deserves to be hated, let conscience reply, but does God deserve to be disobeyed? Thus and thus hath he done, and so hath he wronged me. But what has God done that I should wrong him? If my enemy dares boldly to break the peace, shall I be so wicked as to break the precept? If he fears not to wrong me, shall I not fear to wrong God? Thus let the fear of God restrain and calm your feelings. 2. Set before your eyes the most imminent patterns of meekness and forgiveness, that you may feel the force of their example. This is a way to cut off the common pleas of flesh and blood for revenge. As thus, no man would bear such an affront. Yes, others have, born as bad and worse ones. But I shall be reckoned a coward, a fool, if I pass by this, no matter so long as you follow the examples of the wisest and holiest of men. Never did anyone suffer more or greater abuses from men than Jesus did, nor did anyone ever endure insult and reproach and every kind of abuse in a more peaceful and forgiving manner. When he was reviled, he reviled not again. When he suffered, he threatened not. When his murderers crucified him, he prayed, Father, forgive them. And herein he has set us an example, that we should follow his steps. Thus his apostles imitated him. Being reviled, say they, we bless. Being persecuted, we suffer it. Being defamed, we entreat. I have often heard it reported of the holy Mr. Dodd that when a man enraged at his close convincing doctrine assaulted him, smote him on the face, and dashed out two of his teeth, that meek servant of Christ spit out the teeth and blood into his hand and said, See here, you have knocked out two of my teeth, and that without any just provocation. But on condition that I might do your soul good, I would give you leave to knock out all the rest. Here was exemplified the excellency of the Christian spirit. Strive then for the spirit which constitutes the true excellence of Christians. Do what others cannot do. Keep the spirit in exercise and you will preserve peace in your own soul and gain the victory over your enemies. Consider the character of the person who has wronged you. He is either a good or a wicked man. If he is a good man, there is light and tenderness in his conscience, which sooner or later will bring him to a sense of the evil of what he has done. If he is a good man, Christ has forgiven him greater injuries than he has done to you. And why should you not forgive him? Will Christ not abrade him for any of his wrongs, but frankly forgive them all? And will you take him by the throat for some petty abuse which he has offered you? But if a wicked man has injured or insulted you, truly you have more reason to exercise pity than revenge towards him. He is in a deluded and miserable state, a slave to sin and an enemy to righteousness. If he should ever repent, he will be ready to make you reparation. If he continues impenitent, there is a day coming when he will be punished to the extent of his deserts. You need not study revenge. God will execute vengeance upon him. 4. Remember that by revenge you can only gratify a sinful passion, which by forgiveness you might conquer. Suppose that by revenge you might destroy one enemy, yet by exercising the Christian's temper you might conquer three enemies, your own lust, Satan's temptation, and your enemy's heart. If by revenge you should overcome your enemy, the victory would be unhappy and inglorious, for in gaining it you would be overcome by your own corruption. But by exercising a meek and forgiving temper, you will always come off with honor and success. It must be a very disingenuous nature, indeed, upon which meekness and forgiveness will not operate. That must be a flinty heart which this fire will not melt. Thus David gained such a victory over Saul, his persecutor, that Saul lifted up his voice and wept, and he said to David, Thou art more righteous than I. 5. Seriously propose this question to your own heart. Have I got any good by means of the wrongs and injuries which I have received? If they have done you no good, turn your revenge upon yourself. You have reason to be filled with shame and sorrow, that you should have a heart which can deduce no good from such troubles, that your temper should be so unlike that of Christ. The patience and meekness of other Christians have turned all the injuries offered to them to a good account. Their souls have been animated to praise God when they have been loaded with reproaches from the world. I thank my God, said Jerome, that I am worthy to be hated of the world. But if you have derived any benefit from the reproaches and wrongs which you have received, if they have put you upon examining your own heart, if they have made you more careful how you conduct, if they have convinced you of the value of a sanctified temper, will you not forgive them? Will you not forgive one who has been instrumental of so much good to you? What, though he meant it for evil? If through the divine blessing your happiness has been promoted by what he has done, why should you even have a hard thought of him? Consider by whom all your troubles are ordered. This will be of great use to keep your heart from revenge. This will quickly calm and sweeten your temper. When Shammai railed at David and cursed him, the spirit of that good man was not at all poisoned by revenge. For when Abishai offered him, if he pleased, a head of Shammai, the king said, Let him curse, because the Lord has said to him, Curse David. Who shall then say, Wherefore have you done so? It may be that God uses him as his rod to chastise me, because by my sin I gave the enemies of God occasion to blaspheme. And shall I be angry with the instrument? How irrational were that! Thus Job was quieted. He did not rel and meditate revenge upon the Chaldeans and Sabeans, but regarded God as the orderer of his troubles, and said, The Lord has taken away, blessed be his name. 7. Consider how you are daily and hourly wronging God, and you will not be so easily inflamed with revenge against those who have wronged you. You are constantly affronting God, yet He does not take vengeance on you, but bears with you and forgives. And will you rise up and avenge yourself upon others? Reflect on this cutting rebuke, O thou wicked and slothful servant! I forgave you all that debt, because you desired me. Should you not also have compassion on your fellow-servant, even as I had pity on you? None should be so filled with forbearance and mercy to such as wronged them, as those who have experienced the riches of mercy themselves. The mercy of God to us should melt our hearts into mercy towards others. It is impossible that we should be cruel to others, except we forget how kind and compassionate God has been to us. And if kindness cannot prevail in us, methinks fear should. If you forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. 8. Let the consideration that the day of the Lord draws nigh restrain you from anticipating it by acts of revenge. Why are you so hasty? Is not the Lord at hand to avenge all His abused servants? Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth, and so on. Be ye also patient, for the coming of the Lord draws nigh. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned. Behold, the judge stands at the door. Vengeance belongs to God, and will you wrong yourself so much as to assume his work? The next season in which special exertion is necessary to keep the heart is when we meet with great trials. In such cases the heart is apt to be suddenly transported with pride, impatience, or other sinful passions. Many good people are guilty of hasty and very sinful conduct in such instances. and all have need to use diligently the following means to keep their hearts submissive and patient under great trials. 1. Get humble and abasing thoughts of yourself. To humble is ever the patient man. Pride is the source of your regular and sinful passions. A lofty will be an unyielding and peevish spirit. When we overrate ourselves, we think that we are treated unworthily, that our trials are too severe, thus we cavil and repine. Christian, you should have such thoughts of yourselves as would have put a stop to these murmurings. You should have lower and more humiliating views of yourself than any other one can have of you. Get humility and you will have peace, whatever be your trial. 2. Cultivate a habit of communion with God. This will prepare you for whatever may take place. This will so sweeten your temper and calm your mind as to secure you against surprises. This will produce that inward peace which will make you superior to your trials. Habitual communion with God will afford you enjoyment, which you can never be willing to interrupt by sinful feeling. When a Christian is calm and submissive under his afflictions, probably he derives support and comfort in this way. But he who is discomposed, impatient, or fretful shows that all is not right within. He cannot be supposed to practice communion with God. 3. Let your mind be deeply impressed with an apprehension of the evil nature and erects of an unsubmissive and restless temper. He grieves the Spirit of God and induces his departure. His gracious presence and influence are enjoyed only where peace and quiet submission prevail. The indulgence of such a temper gives the adversary an advantage. Satan is an angry and discontented spirit. He finds no rest but in restless hearts. He bestirs himself when the spirits are in a commotion. Sometimes he fills the heart with ungrateful and rebellious thoughts. Sometimes he inflames the tongue with indecent language. Again, such a temper brings guilt upon the conscience, unfits the soul for any duty, and dishonors a Christian name. O keep your heart, and let the power and excellence of your religion be chiefly manifested when you are brought into the greatest straits. 4. Consider how desirable it is for a Christian to overcome his evil propensities. how much more present happiness it affords, how much better it is in every respect to mortify and subdue unholy feelings than to give way to them. When upon your deathbed you come calmly to review your life, how comfortable will it be to reflect on the conquests which you have made over the depraved feelings of your heart. It was a memorable saying of Valentinian the Emperor when he was about to die, amongst all my conquests there is but one that now comforts me. Being asked what that was, he answered, I have overcome my worst enemy, my own sinful heart. 5. Shame yourself by contemplating the character of those who have been most imminent for meekness and submission. Above all, compare your temper with the Spirit of Christ. Learn of me, saith he, for I am meek and lowly. It is said of Calvin and Ursin, though both of choleric natures, that they so imbibed and cultivated a meekness of Christ as not to utter an unbecoming word under the greatest provocations. And even many of the heathens have manifested great moderation and forbearance under their severest afflictions. Is it not a shame and a reproach that you should be outdone by them? 6. Avoid everything which is calculated to irritate your feelings. It is true spiritual valor to keep as far as you can out of sin's way. If you can but avoid the excitements to impetuous and rebellious feelings or check them in their first beginnings, you will have but little to fear. The first workings of common sense are comparatively weak. They gain their strength by degrees, but in times of trial the motions of sin are strongest at first. The unsubdued temper breaks out suddenly and violently, but if you resolutely withstand it at first, it will yield and give you the victory. Section 9 The ninth season in which the greatest diligence and skill are necessary to keep the heart is the hour of temptation when Satan besets the Christian's heart and takes the unwary by surprise. To keep the heart at such times is not less a mercy than a duty. Few Christians are so skillful in detecting the fallacies and repelling the arguments by which the adversary incites them to sin as to come off safe and whole in these encounters. Many eminent saints have smarted severely for their lack of watchfulness and diligence at such times. How, then, may a Christian keep his heart from yielding to temptation? There are several principal ways in which the adversary insinuates temptation and urges compliance. 1. Satan suggests that here is pleasure to be enjoyed, that temptation is presented with a smiling aspect and an enticing voice. What are you so dull and phlegmatic as not to feel the powerful charms of pleasure? Who can withhold himself from such delights? Reader, you may be rescued from the danger of such temptations by repelling the proposal of pleasure. It is urged that the commission of sin will afford you pleasure. Suppose this were true, will the accusing and condemning rebukes of conscience in the flames of hell be pleasant to? Is there pleasure in the scourges of conscience? If so, why did Peter weep so bitterly? Why did David cry out of broken bones? You hear what is said of the pleasure of sin, and have you not read what David said of the effects of it? Thine arrows stick fast into me, and your hand presses me sore. There is no soundness in my flesh because of your anger, neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin, and so on. If you yield to temptation, you must feel such inward distress on account of it, or the miseries of hell. But why should the pretended pleasures of sin allure you, when you know that unspeakable, more real pleasure will arise from the mortification than can arise from the commission of sin? Will you prefer the gratification of some unhallowed passion with the deadly poison which it will leave behind? to that sacred pleasure which arises from hearing and obeying God, complying with the dictates of conscience and maintaining inward peace. Can sin afford any such delight as he feels who, by resisting temptation, has manifested the sincerity of his heart and obtained evidence that he fears God, loves holiness, and hates sin? 2. The secrecy with which you may commit sin is made use of to induce compliance with temptation. The tempter insinuates that this indulgence will never disgrace you among men, for no one will know it. But recollect yourself. Does not God behold you? Is not the Divine Presence everywhere? What if you might hide your sin from the eyes of the world? You cannot hide it from God. No darkness nor shadow of death can screen you from His inspection. Besides, have you no reverence for yourself? Can you do that by yourself which you dare not have others observe? Is not your conscience as a thousand witnesses? Even a heathen can say, when you are tempted to commit sin, fear yourself without any other witness. The prospect of worldly advantage often enforces temptation. It is suggested, why should you be so nice and scrupulous? Give yourself a little liberty, and you may better your condition. Now is your time. This is a dangerous temptation and must be promptly resisted. Yielding to such a temptation will do your soul more injury than any temporal acquisition can possibly do you good. And what would it profit you if you should gain the whole world and lose your own soul? What can be compared with the value of your spiritual interests? Or what can it all compensate for the smallest injury of them? 4. Perhaps the smallness of the sin is urged as a reason why you may commit it. Thus it is but a little one, a small matter, a trifle, who will stand upon such niceties. But is the majesty of heaven little too? If you commit this sin, you will offend a great God. Is there any little hell to torment little sinners in? No, the least sinners in hell are full of misery. There is great wrath treasured up for those whom the world regards as little sinners. But the less the sin, the less the inducement to commit it. Will you provoke God for a trifle? Will you destroy your peace, wound your conscience, and grieve the Spirit all for nothing? What madness is this? An argument to enforce temptation is sometimes drawn from the mercy of God in the hope of pardon. God is merciful. He will pass by this as an infirmity. He will not be severe to mark it. But stay, where do you find a promise of mercy to presumptuous sinners? Involuntary reprisals and lamented infirmities may be pardoned, but the soul that doth ought presumptuously, the same reproaches the Lord, and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. If God is a being of so much mercy, how can you affront him? How can you make so glorious an attribute as the divine mercy in occasion of sin? Will you wrong him because he is good? Rather let his goodness lead you to repentance and keep you from transgression. Sometimes Satan encourages to the commission of sin from the examples of holy men. Thus and thus they sinned and were restored. Therefore you may commit this sin and yet be a saint and be saved. Such suggestions must be instantly repelled. If good men have committed sin similar to that with which you are beset, did any good man ever sin upon such ground and from such encouragement as is here presented? Did God cause their examples to be recorded for your imitation or for your warning? Are they not set up as beacons that you may avoid the rocks upon which they split? Are you willing to feel what they felt for sin? Dare you follow them in sin and plunge yourself into such distress and danger as they incurred? Reader, in these ways learn to keep your heart in the hour of temptation. Section 10 The time of doubting and of spiritual darkness constitutes another season when it is very difficult to keep the heart. When the light and comfort of the Divine Presence is withdrawn, when the believer, from the prevalence of indwelling sin in one form or other, is ready to renounce his hopes, to infer desperate conclusions with respect to himself To regard his former comforts as vain delusions, and his professions as hypocrisy, is such a time much diligence as necessary to keep the heart from despondency. The Christian's distress arises from his apprehension of his spiritual state, and in general he argues against his possessing true religion, either from his having relapsed into the same sins from which he had formerly been recovered with shame or sorrow, or from the sensible declining of his affections from God, or from the strength of his affections toward creature enjoyments, or from his enlargement in public, while he is often confined and barren in private duties, or from some horrible suggestions of Satan, with which his soul is greatly perplexed. or, lastly, from God's silence and seeming denial of His long-depending prayers. Now, in order to the establishment and support of the heart under these circumstances, it is necessary that you be acquainted with some general truths which have a tendency to calm the trembling and doubting soul, and that you be rightly instructed with regard to the above-mentioned causes of disquiet. Let me direct your attention to the following general truths. 1. Every appearance of hypocrisy does not prove the person who manifests to be a hypocrite. You should carefully distinguish between the appearance and the predominance of hypocrisy. There are remains of deceitfulness in the best hearts. This is exemplified in David and Peter, but the prevailing frame of their hearts being upright, they were not denominated hypocrites for their conduct. 2. We ought to regard what can be said in our favor as well as what may be said against us. It is the sin of upright persons sometimes to exercise an unreasonable severity against themselves. They do not impartially consider the state of their souls. To make their state appear better than it really is, indeed, is the damning sin of self-flattering hypocrites, and to make their state appear worse than it really is is the sin and folly of some good persons. But why should you be such an enemy to your own peace? Why read over the evidences of God's love to your soul as a man does a book which he intends to confute? Why do you study evasions and turn off those comforts which are due to you? 3. Everything which may be an occasion of grief to the people of God is not a sufficient ground for their questioning the reality of their religion. Many things may trouble which ought not to stumble you. If upon every occasion you should call in question all that had ever been wrought upon you, your life would be made up of doubtings and fears, and you could never attain that settled inward peace and live that life of praise and thankfulness which the gospel requires. 4. The soul is not at all times in a suitable state to pass a right judgment upon itself. It is peculiarly unqualified for this in the hour of desertion or temptation. Such seasons must be improved rather for watching and resisting than for judging and determining. 5. Whatever be the ground of one's distress, it should drive him to, not from, God. Suppose you have sinned thus and so, or that you have been thus long and sadly deserted, yet you have no right to infer that you ought to be discouraged as if there was no help for you in God. When you have well digested these truths, if your doubts and distress remain, consider what is now to be offered. 1. Are you ready to conclude that you have no part in the favor of God because you were visited with some extraordinary affliction? If so, do you then rightly conclude that great trials are tokens of God's hatred? Does the Scriptures teach this? And dare you infer the same with respect to all who have been as much or more afflicted than yourself? If the argument is good in your case, it is good in application to theirs, and more conclusive with respect to them, in proportion as their trials were greater than yours. Woe then to David, Job, Paul, and all who have been afflicted as they were! But had you passed along in quietness and prosperity, had God withheld these chastisements with which He ordinarily visits His people, would you not have had far more reason for doubts and distress than you now have? 2. Do you rashly infer that the Lord has no love to you because He has withdrawn the light of His countenance? Do you imagine your state to be hopeless because it is dark and uncomfortable? Be not hasty in forming this conclusion. If any of the dispensations of God to His people will bear a favorable as well as a harsh construction, why should they not be construed in the best sense? And may not God have a design of love rather than of hatred in the dispensation under which you mourn? May he not depart for a season without departing forever? You are not the first that have mistaken the design of God in withdrawing himself. Zion said, The Lord has forsaken me, my Lord hath forgotten me. But was it so? What saith the answer of God? Can a woman forget her sucking child? And so on. But do you sink down under the apprehension that the evidences of a total and final desertion are discoverable in your experience? Have you then lost your conscientious tenderness with regard to sin? And are you inclined to forsake God? If so, you have reason indeed to be alarmed. But if your conscience is tenderly alive, if you are resolved to cleave to the Lord, if the language of your heart is, I cannot forsake God, I cannot live without His presence, Though he flay me, yet will I trust in him. Then you have reason to hope that he will visit you again. It is by these exercises that he still maintains his interest in you. Once more, are sins and feelings suitable to judge of the dispensations of God by? Can their testimony be safely relied on? Is it safe to argue thus? If God had any love for my soul, I should feel it now as well as in former times, but I cannot feel it. Therefore, it is gone. May you not as well conclude when the Son is invisible to you that He is ceased to exist? Read Isaiah 1 verse 10. Now if there is nothing in the divine dealings with you which is a reasonable ground of your despondency and distress, let us inquire what there is in your own conduct for which you should be so cast down. 1. Have you committed sins from which you were formerly recovered with shame and sorrow? And do you thence conclude that you sin allowedly and habitually, and that your oppositions to sin were hypocritical? But do not too hastily give up all for lost. Is not your repentance and care renewed as often as you commit sin? Is it not the sin itself which troubles you? And is it not true that the oftener you sin, the more you are distressed? Is it not so, a customary sinning of which Bernard excellently discourses thus? When a man accustomed to restrain sins grievously, it seems insupportable to him. Yet he seems to descend alive into hell. In process of time it seems not insupportable, but heavy, and between insupportable and heavy there is no small descent. Next, such sinning becomes light, his conscience smites, but faintly, and he regards not her rebukes. Then he is not only insensible to his guilt, but that which was bitter and displeasing has become to some degree sweet and pleasant. Now it is made a custom, and not only pleases, but pleases habitually. At length, custom becomes nature. He cannot be dissuaded from it, but defends and pleads for it. This is allowed in customary sinning. This is the way of the wicked. But is not your way the contrary of this? 2. Do you apprehend a decline of your affections from God and from spiritual subjects? This may be your case, and yet there may be hope. But possibly you are mistaken with regard to this. There are many things to be learned in Christian experience. It has relation to a great variety of subjects. You may now be learning what it is very necessary for you to know as a Christian. Now what if you were not sensible of so lively affections as such ravishing views as you had at first? May not your piety be growing more solid and consistent and better adapted to practical purposes? Does it follow from your not always being in the same frame of mind, or from the fact that the same objects do not at all times excite the same feelings that you have no true religion? Perhaps you deceive yourself by looking forward to what you would be rather than contemplating what you are compared with what you once were. 3. If the strength of your love to creature enjoyment is a ground of desperate conclusions respecting yourself, perhaps you argue thus, I feel that I love the creature more than God. If so, I have not true love to God. I sometimes feel stronger affections toward earthly comforts than I do toward heavenly objects. Therefore, my soul is not upright within me. If indeed you love the creature for itself, if you make it your end, in religion but a means, and you conclude rightly, for this is incompatible with supreme love to God. But may not a man love God more ardently and unchangeably than he does anything or all things else? And yet when God is not the direct object of his thoughts, may he not be sensible of more violent affection for the creature than he has at that time for God? His rooted malice indicates a stronger hatred than sudden, though more violent, passion. So we must judge of our love not by violent motion of it now and then, but by the depth of its root and the constancy of its exercise. Perhaps your difficulty results from bringing your love to some foreign and improper test. Many persons have feared that when brought to some imminent trial they should renounce Christ and cleave to the creature. But when the trial came, Christ was everything, and the world is nothing in their esteem. Such were the fears of some martyrs whose victory was complete. But you may expect divine assistance only at the time of and in proportion to your necessity. If you would try your love, see whether you are willing to forsake Christ now. 4. As a lack of that enlargement in private which you find in public exercises is an occasion of doubts and fears, consider then whether there are not some circumstances attending public duties which are peculiarly calculated to excite your feelings and elevate your mind, and which cannot affect you in private. If so, your exercises in secret, if performed faithfully and in suitable manner, may be profitable, though they have not at all the characteristics of those in public. If you imagine that you have spiritual enlargement and enjoyment in public exercises while you neglect private duties, doubtless you deceive yourself. Indeed, if you live in the neglect of secret duties or are careless about them, you have great reason to fear. But if you regularly and faithfully perform them, it does not follow that they are vain and worthless, or that they are not of great value because they are not attended with so much enlargement as you sometimes find in public. And what if the Spirit is pleased more highly to favor you with this gracious influence in one place and at one time than another? Should this be a reason for murmuring in unbelief or for thankfulness? The vile or blasphemous suggestions of Satan sometimes occasion great perplexity and distress. They seem to lay open an abyss of corruption in the heart, and to say there can be no grace here. But there may be grace in the heart where such thoughts are injected, though not in the heart which consents to and cherishes them. Do you then abhor and oppose them? Do you utterly refuse to give up yourself to their influences that strive to keep holy and reverent thoughts of God and of all religious objects? If so, such suggestions are involuntary and no evidence against your piety.