Man, by affecting wisdom out of the way of God, got a crack in his
head, which hath continued five thousand years and upwards, and ever
since our own wisdom and “knowledge hath perverted us” (Isa. xlvii. 10).
To be guided by this, is to be under the conduct of a blind leader,
and follow a traitor and enemy to God and ourselves. Man’s prudence
often proves hurtful to him: he often accomplisheth his ruin, while
he designs his establishment; and finds his fall, where he thought to
settle his fortune: such bad eyes hath human wisdom often in its own
affairs. Those that have been heightened with a conceit of their own
cunning, have at last proved the greatest fools. God delights to make
“foolish the wisdom of this world” (1 Cor. i. 20). Thus God writ folly
upon the crafty brains of Ahithophel, and simplicity upon the subtle
projects of Herod against our Saviour; and the devil, the prince of
carnal wisdom, was befooled into a furthering our redemption by his own
projects to hinder it. Carnal policy, against the prescripts of Divine
wisdom, never prospers: it is like an _ignis fatuus_, which leads men
out of the way of duty, and out of the way of security, and perverts
them into the mire and dangerous precipices. When Jeroboam would coin
a religion to serve his interest of state, he tore up the foundations
both of his kingdom and family. The way the Jews took to prevent a
fresh invasion of the Romans, by the crucifying Christ, brought the
judgment more swift upon them (John xi. 48). There is no man ruined
here, or damned hereafter, but by his own wisdom and will. (Prov. iii.
5, 7), “The fear of the Lord, and departure from evil, are inconsistent
with an {a601} overweening conceit of our own wisdom;” and leaning to
our own understanding, is inconsistent with a trusting in the Lord with
all our hearts. It is as much a deifying ourselves, to trust to our
own wit, as it is a deifying the creature to affect or confide in it,
superior to God or equally with him. The true way to wisdom is to be
sensible of our own folly (1 Cor. iii. 18), “If any man be wise, let
him become a fool.” He that distrusts his own guidance, will more
securely and successfully follow the counsel of another in whom he
confides. The more water, or any other liquor, is poured out of a
vessel, the more air enters. The more we distrust our own wisdom, the
more capable we are of the conduct of God’s. Had Jehoshaphat relied
upon his own policy, he might have found a defeat when he met with a
deliverance; but he disowned his own skill and strength in telling God,
“We know not what to do, but our eyes are upon thee” (2 Chron. xx. 12).
Let us, therefore, with Agur, disesteem our own understanding to esteem
Divine. Human prudence is like a spider’s web, easily blown away, and
swept down by the besom of some unexpected revolution. God, by his
infinite wisdom, can cross the wisdom of man, and make a man’s own
prudence hang in his own light. (Isa. xxix. 14), “The understanding
of their prudent men shall be hid.”
_Exhort. 4._ Seek to God for wisdom. The wisdom we have by nature,
is like the weeds the earth brings forth without tillage. Our wisdom
since the fall, is the wisdom of the serpent, without the innocency of
the dove: it flows from self‑love, runs into self‑interest. It is the
wisdom of the flesh, and a prudence to manage means for the contending
our lusts. Our best wisdom is imperfect, a mere nothing and vanity,
in comparison of the Divine, as our beings are in comparison of his
essence. We must go to God for a holy and innocent wisdom, and fill
our cisterns from a pure fountain. The wisdom that was the glory of
Solomon, was the donation of the Most High. (James i. 5), “If any
man want wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally,
and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” The faculty of
understanding is from God by nature; but a heavenly light to direct
the understanding is from God by grace. Children have an understanding,
but stand in need of wise masters to rectify it, and form judicious
notions in it. “There is a spirit in man, but the inspiration of the
Almighty gives him understanding” (Job xxxii. 8). We must beg of God,
wisdom. The gospel is the wisdom of God; the concerns of it great
and mysterious, not to be known without a “new understanding” (1 John
v. 20). A new understanding is not to be had but from the Creator of
the first. The Spirit of God is the “searcher of the deep things of
God;” the revealer of them to us, and the enlightener of our minds
to apprehend them; and, therefore, called a “Spirit of wisdom and
revelation” (Eph. i. 17). Christ is made wisdom to us, as well as
righteousness; not only by imputation, but effusion.[809] Seek to God,
therefore, for that wisdom which is like the sun, and not that worldly
wisdom which is like a shadow: for that wisdom whose effects are not so
outwardly glorious, but inwardly sweet, seek it from him, and seek it
in {a602} his word, that is, the transcript of Divine wisdom; “through
his precepts understanding is to be had” (Ps. cxix. 104). As the wisdom
of men appears in their laws, so doth the wisdom of God in his statutes.
By this means we arrive to a heavenly sagacity. If these be rejected,
what wisdom can there be in us? a dream and conceit only (Jer. viii):
“They have rejected the word of the Lord, and what wisdom is in them?”
Who knows how to order any concerns as he ought, or any one faculty
of his soul? Therefore, desire God’s direction in outward concerns, in
personal, family, in private and public. He hath not only a wisdom for
our salvation, but for our outward direction. He doth not only guide
us in the one, and leave Satan to manage us in the other. Those that
go with Saul to a witch of Endor, go to hell for craft, and prefer the
wisdom of the hostile serpent before the holy counsel of a faithful
Creator. If you want health in your body, you advise with a physician;
if direction for your estate, you resort to a lawyer; if passage for a
voyage, you address to a pilot; why not much more yourselves, your all,
to a wise God? As Pliny said, concerning a wise man, “O, Sir, how many
Catos are there in that wise person!” how much more wisdom than men or
angels possess, is infinitely centered in the wise God!
_Exhort. 5._ Submit to the wisdom of God in all cases. What else was
inculcated in the first precept, forbidding man to eat of the fruit of
the “tree of knowledge of good and evil,” but that he should take heed
of the swelling of his mind against the wisdom of God? It is a wisdom
incomprehensible to flesh and blood; we should adore it in our minds,
and resign up ourselves to it in our practice. How unreasonable are
repinings against God, whereby a creature’s ignorance indicts and
judges a Creator’s prudence! Were God weak in wisdom, and only mighty
in power, we might suspect his conduct. Power without wisdom and
goodness is an unruly and ruinous thing in the world. But God being
infinite in one, as well as the other, we have no reason to be jealous
of him, and repine against his methods; why should we quarrel with
him that we are not as high, or as wealthy as others; that we have not
presently the mercy we want? If he be wise, we ought to stay his time,
and wait his leisure, because “he is a God of judgment” (Isa. xxx. 18).
Presume not to shorten the time which his discretion hath fixed; it
is a folly to think to do it. By impatience we cannot hasten relief;
we alienate him from us by debasing him to stand at our bar, disturb
ourselves, lose the comfort of our lives, and the sweetness of his
mercy. Submission to God we are in no case exempted from, because
there is no case wherein God doth not direct all the acts of his will
by counsel. Whatsoever is drawn by a straight rule must be right and
straight; the rule that is right in itself, is the measure of the
straightness of everything else; whatsoever is wrought in the world by
God, must be wise, good, righteous; because God is essentially wisdom,
goodness, and righteousness.
(1.) Submit to God, in his revelations. 1. Measure them not by reason:
the truths of the gospel must be received with a self‑emptiness and
annihilation of the creature. If our reason seems to lift up itself
against revelation, because it finds no testimony for it in its {a603}
own light, consider how crazy it is in natural and obvious things,
and therefore sure it is not strong enough to enter into the depths
of Divine wisdom: the wisdom of God in the gospel is too great an ocean
to be contained or laved out by a cockleshell. It were not infinite,
if it were not beyond our finite reach; our reason must as well stoop
to his wisdom, as our wills to his sovereignty. How great a vanity is
it for a glow‑worm to boast that it is as full of light as the sun in
the firmament! for reason to leave its proper sphere, is to fall into
confusion, and thicken its own darkness. We should settle ourselves
in the belief of the Scripture, and confirm ourselves by a meditation
on those many undeniable arguments for its Divine authority,――the
fulfilling of its predictions, the antiquity of the writing, the
holiness of the precepts, the heavenliness of the doctrine, the
glorious effects it hath produced, and doth yet produce, different
from human methods of success; and submit our reason to the voice of so
high a majesty. 2. Not to be too curiously inquisitive into what is not
revealed. There is something hid in whatsoever is revealed. We know the
Son of God was begotten from eternity, but how he was begotten, we are
ignorant. We know there is a union of the Divine nature with the human,
and that the fulness of the Godhead dwells in him bodily; but the
manner of its inhabitation we are in a great part ignorant of. We know
that God hath chosen some and refused others, and that he did it with
counsel; but the reason why he chose this man and not that, we know not;
we can refer it to nothing but God’s sovereign pleasure. It is revealed
that there will be a day wherein God shall judge the world; but the
particular time is not revealed. We know that God created the world in
time; but why he did not create the world millions of years before, we
are ignorant of, and our reasons would be bewildered in their too much
curiosity. If we ask why he did not create it before, we may as well
ask why he did create it then? And may not the same question be asked,
if the world had been created millions of years before it was? That he
created it in six days, and not in an instant, is revealed; but why he
did not do it in a moment, since we are sure he was able to do it, is
not revealed. Are the reasons of a wise man’s proceedings hid from us?
and shall we presume to dive into the reason of the proceedings of an
only wise God, which he hath judged not expedient to discover to us?
Some sparks of his wisdom he hath caused to issue out, to exercise and
delight our minds; others he keeps within the centre of his own breast;
we must not go about to unlock his cabinet. As we cannot reach to the
utmost lines of his power, so we cannot grasp the intimate reasons
of his wisdom. We must still remember, that which is finite can never
be able to comprehend the reasons, motives, and methods of that which
is infinite. It doth not become us to be resty, because God hath
not admitted us into the debates of eternity. We are as little to
be curious at what God hath hid, as to be careless of what God hath
manifested. Too great an inquisitiveness beyond our line, is as much a
provoking arrogance, as a blockish negligence of what is revealed, is
a slighting ingratitude.
(2.) Submit to God in his precepts and methods. Since they are {a604}
the results of infinite wisdom, disputes against them are not tolerable;
what orders are given out by infallible Wisdom are to be entertained
with respect and reverence, though the reason of them be not visible
to our purblind minds. Shall God have less respect from us than earthly
princes, whose laws we observe without being able to pierce into the
exact reason of them all? Since we know he hath not a will without an
understanding, our observance of him must be without repining; we must
not think to mend our Creator’s laws, and presume to judge and condemn
his righteous statutes. If the flesh rise up in opposition, we must
cross its motions, and silence its murmurings; his will should be an
acceptable will to us, because it is a wise will in itself. God hath no
need to impose upon us and deceive us; he hath just and righteous ways
to attain his glory and his creatures’s good. To deceive us, would be
to dishonor himself, and contradict his own nature. He cannot impose
false injurious precepts, or unavailable to his subjects’ happiness;
not false, because of his truth; not injurious, because of his
goodness; not vain, because of his wisdom. Submit, therefore, to him
in his precepts, and in his methods too. The honor of his wisdom, and
the interest of our happiness, call for it. Had Noah disputed with
God about building an ark, and listened to the scoffs of the senseless
world, he had perished under the same fate, and lost the honor of a
preacher and worker of righteousness. Had not the Israelites been their
own enemies, if they had been permitted to be their own guides, and
returned to the Egyptian bondage and furnaces, instead of a liberty
and earthly felicity in Canaan? Had our Saviour gratified the Jews by
descending from the cross, and freeing himself from the power of his
adversaries, he might have had that faith from them which they promised
him; but it had been a faith to no purpose, because without ground;
they might have believed him to be the Son of God, but he could not
have been the Saviour of the world. His death, the great ground and
object of faith, had been unaccomplished; they had believed a God
pardoning without a consent to his justice, and such a faith could not
have rescued them from falling into eternal misery. The precepts and
methods of Divine wisdom must be submitted to.
(3.) Submit to God in all crosses and revolutions. Infinite Wisdom
cannot err in any of his paths, or step the least hair’s breadth from
the way of righteousness: there is the understanding of God in every
motion; an eye in every wheel, the wheel that goes over us and crusheth
us. We are led by fancy more than reason: we know no more what we ask,
or what is fit for us, than the mother of Zebedee’s children did, when
she petitioned Christ for her sons’ advancement, when he came into his
temporal kingdom (Matt. xx. 22): the things we desire might pleasure
our fancy or appetite, but impair our health: one man complains for
want of children, but knows not whether they may prove comforts or
crosses: another for want of health, but knows not whether the health
of his body may not prove the disease of his soul. We might lose in
heavenly things, if we possess in earthly things what we long for. God,
in regard of his infinite wisdom, is fitter to carve out a condition
than we ourselves; our shallow reason and self‑love, would wish for
those things that {a605} are injurious to God, to ourselves, to the
world; but God always chooses what is best for his glory, and what
is best for his creatures, either in regard to themselves, or as they
stand in relation to him, or to others, as parts of the world. We are
in danger from our self‑love, in no danger in complying with God’s
wisdom: when Rachel would die, if she had no children, she had children,
but death with one of them (Gen. xxx. 1). Good men may conclude,
that whatsoever is done by God in them, or with them, is best and
fittest for them; because by the covenant which makes over God to them,
as their God, the conduct of his wisdom is assured to them as well
as any other attribute: and, therefore, as God in every transaction
appears as their God, so he appears as their wise Director, and by
this wisdom he extracts good out of evil, makes the affliction which
destroys our outward comforts consume our inward defilements; and the
waves which threatened to swallow up the vessel, to cast it upon the
shore: and when he hath occasion to manifest his anger against his
people, his wisdom directs his wrath. In judgment he hath “a work to
do upon Zion;” and when that work is done, he punishes the fruit of the
“stout heart of the king of Assyria” (Isa. x. 12); as in the answers of
prayer he doth give oftentimes “above what we ask or think” (Eph. iii.
20), so in outward concerns he doth above what we can expect, or by
our short‑sightedness, conclude will be done. Let us, therefore, in all
things, frame our minds to the Divine Wisdom, and say with the Psalmist
(Ps. xlvii. 4): “The Lord shall choose our inheritance and condition
for us.”
_Exhort. 6._ Censure not God in any of his ways. Can we understand the
full scope of Divine wisdom in creation, which is perfected before our
eyes? Can we, by a rational knowledge, walk over the whole surface of
the earth, and wade through the sea? Can we understand the nature of
the heavens? Are all, or most, or the thousandth part of the particles
of Divine skill, known by us, yea, or any of them thoroughly known? How
can we, then, understand his deeper methods in things that are but of
yesterday, that we have not had a time to view? We should not be too
quick, or too rash, in our judgments of him: the best that we attain to,
is but feeble conjectures at the designs of God. As there is something
hid in whatsoever is revealed in his word, so there is something
inaccessible to us in his works, as well as in his nature and Majesty.
In our Saviour’s act in washing his disciples’ feet, he checked Peter’s
contradiction (John xiii. 7): “What I do, thou knowest not now, but
thou shalt know hereafter.” God were not infinitely wise if the reason
of all his acts were obvious to our shallowness. He is no profound
statesman, whose inward intention can be sounded by vulgar heads at
the first act he starts in his designed method. The wise God is, in
this, like wise men, that have not breasts like glasses of crystal, to
discover all that they intend. There are “secrets of wisdom above our
reach” (Job xi. 6); nay, when we see all his acts, we cannot see all
the draughts of his skill in them. An unskilful hearer of a musical
lesson may receive the melody with his ear, and understand not the
rarities of the composition as it was wrought by the musician’s mind.
Under the Old Testament there was more of Divine power, {a606} and
less of his wisdom apparent in his acts: as his laws, so his acts, were
more fitted to their sense. Under the New Testament there is more of
wisdom, and less of power; as his laws, so his acts, are more fitted
to a spiritual mind; wisdom is less discernible than power. Our wisdom,
therefore, in this case, as it doth other things, consists in silence
and expectation of the end and event of a work. We owe that honor to
God that we do to men wiser than ourselves, to imagine he hath reason
to do what he doth, though our shallowness cannot comprehend it. We
must suffer God to be wiser than ourselves, and acknowledge that there
is something sovereign in his ways not to be measured by the feeble
reed of our weak understandings. And, therefore, we should acquiesce
in his proceedings; take heed we be not found slanderers of God, but
be adorers instead of censurers; and lift up our heads in admiration of
him and his ways, instead of citing him to answer it at our bar. Many
things in the first appearance may seem to be rash and unjust, which,
in the issue, appear comely and regular. If it had been plainly spoke
before that the Son of God should die, that a most holy person should
be crucified, it would have seemed cruel to expose a son to misery;
unjust to inflict punishment upon one that was no criminal; to join
together exact goodness and physical evil; that the sovereign should
die for the malefactor, and the observer of the law for the violators
of it. But when the whole design is unravelled, what an admirable
connexion is there of justice and mercy, love and wisdom, which before
would have appeared absurd to the muddied reason of man! We see the
gardener pulling up some delightful flowers by the roots, digging up
the earth, overwhelming it with dung; an ignorant person would imagine
him wild, out of his wits, and charge him with spoiling his garden: but
when the spring is arrived, the spectator will acknowledge his skill
in his former operations. The truth is, the whole design and methods
of God are not to be judged by us in this world; the full declaration
of the whole contexture is reserved for the other world, to make up a
part of good men’s happiness in the amazing views of Divine wisdom, as
well as the other perfections of his nature. We can no more perfectly
understand his wisdom than we can his mercy and justice, till we see
the last lines of all drawn, and the full expressions of them; we
should therefore be sober and modest in the consideration of God’s
ways; “his judgments are unsearchable, and his ways past finding out.”
The riches of his wisdom are past our counting, his depths not to
be fathomed, yet they are depths of righteousness and equity; though
the full manifestation of that equity, the grounds and methods of his
proceedings are unknown to us. As we are too short fully to know God,
so we are too ignorant fully to comprehend the acts of God: since he
is a God of judgment, we should wait till we see the issue of his works
(Isa. xxx. 18). And in the meantime, with the apostle in the text, give
him the glory of all, in the same expressions, “To the only wise God be
glory, through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.”
{b1} THE EXISTENCE AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD
STEPHEN CHARNOCK
TWO VOLUMES IN ONE
Volume 2
{b2}
{b3} CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
DISCOURSE X.
ON THE POWER OF GOD.
JOB xxvi. 14.――Lo! these are parts of his ways: but how little
a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who
can understand? b5
DISCOURSE XI.
ON THE HOLINESS OF GOD.
EXODUS xv. 11.――Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods?
Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises,
doing wonders? b108
DISCOURSE XII.
ON THE GOODNESS OF GOD.
MARK x. 18.――And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good?
There is none good but one, that is, God. b209
DISCOURSE XIII.
ON GOD’S DOMINION.
PSALM ciii. 19.――The Lord hath prepared his throne in the heavens:
and his kingdom ruleth over all. b356
DISCOURSE XIV.
ON GOD’S PATIENCE.
NAHUM i. 3.――The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and
will not at all acquit the wicked: the Lord hath his way in the
whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his
feet. b472
INDEX. b525
OF TEXTS. b541
{b4}
{b5} DISCOURSE X.
ON THE POWER OF GOD.
JOB xxvi. 14.――Lo! these are parts of his ways: but how little a
portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can
understand?