that piece of wickedness is no such evil thing; men need not be so
nice, and make such a pother24 about it, calling those that cry out so
hotly against it, men more nice than wise. Hence the prophets of old
used to be called madmen, and the world would reply against their
doctrine, Wherein have we been so wearisome to God, and what have we
spoken so much against Him? (Mal 1:6,7; 3:8,13).
(c) As the soul will do this, so to save sin, it will cover it with
names of virtue, either moral or civil; and of this God greatly
complains, yea, breaks into anger for this, saying, ‘Woe to them that
call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light
for darkness; and put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter’ (Isa
5:20)!
(d) If convictions and discovery of sin be so strong and so plain, that
the soul cannot deny but that it is sin, and that God is offended
therewith; then it will give flattering promises to God that it will
indeed put it away; but yet it will prefix a time that shall be long
first, if it also then at all performs it, saying, Yet a little sleep,
yet a little slumber, yet a little folding of sin in mine arms, till I
am older, till I am richer, till I have had more of the sweetness and
the delights of sin. Thus, ‘their soul delighteth in their
abominations’ (Isa 66:3).
(e) If God yet pursues, and will see whether this promise of putting
sin out of doors shall be fulfilled by the soul, why then, it will be
partial in God’s law; it will put away some, and keep some; put away
the grossest, and keep the finest; put away those that can best be
spared, and keep the most profitable for a help at a pinch (Mal 2:9).
(f) Yes, if all sin must be abandoned, or the soul shall have no rest,
why then, the soul and sin will part (with such a parting as it is),
even as Phaltiel parted with David’s wife, with an ill will and a
sorrowful mind; or as Orpha left her mother, with a kiss (2 Sam 3:16;
Ruth 1:14).
(g) And if at any time they can, or shall, meet with each other again,
and nobody never the wiser, O, what courting will be betwixt sin and
the soul? And this is called doing of things in the dark (Eze 8:12).
By all these, and many more things that might be instanced, it is
manifest that sin has a friendly entertainment by the soul, and that
therefore the soul is guilty of damnation; for what do all these things
argue, but that God, His Word, His ways, and graces, are out of favour
with the soul, and that sin and Satan are its only pleasant companions?
But,
[How sin, by the help of the soul, destroys it.]
Secondly, That I may yet show you what a great thing sin is with the
soul that is to be damned, I will show how sin, by the help of the
soul, is managed, from the motion of sin, even till it comes to the
very act; for sin cannot come to an act without the help of the soul.
The body doth little here, as I shall further show you anon.
There is then a motion of sin presented to the soul (and whether
presented by sin itself or the devil, we will not at this time
dispute); motions of sin, and motions to sin there are, and always the
end of the motions of sin are to prevail with the soul to help that
motion into an act. But, I say, there is a motion to sin moved to the
soul; or, as James calls it, a conception. Now behold how the soul
deals with this motion in order to the finishing of sin, that death
might follow (Rom 7:5).
1. This motion is taken notice of by the soul, but is not resisted nor
striven against, only the soul lifts up its eyes upon it, and sees that
there is present a motion to sin, a motion of sin presented to the
soul, that the soul might midwife it from the conception into the
world.
2. Well, notice being taken that a motion to sin is present, what
follows but that the fancy or imagination of the soul taketh it home to
it, and doth not only look upon it and behold it more narrowly, but
begins to trick and trim up the sin to the pleasing of itself and of
all the powers of the soul. That this is true, is evident, because God
findeth fault with the imagination as with that which lendeth to sin
the first hand, and that giveth to it the first lift towards its being
helped forward to act. ‘And God saw that the wickedness of man was
great in the earth’ (Gen 6:5,12,13). That is, many abominable actions
were done; for all flesh had corrupted God’s way upon the earth. But
how came this to be so? Why, every imagination of the thoughts, or of
the motions that were in the heart to sin, was evil, only evil, and
that continuously. The imagination of the thoughts was evil—that is,
such as tended not to deaden or stifle, but such as tended to animate
and forward the motions or thoughts of sin into action. Every
imagination of the thoughts—that which is here called a thought, by
Paul to the Romans, called a motion. Now the imagination should, and
would, had it been on God’s side, so have conceived of this motion of
and to sins, all to have presented it in all its features so ugly, so
ill favoured, and so unreasonable a thing to the soul, that the soul
should forthwith have let down the sluice, and pulled up the
drawbridge, put a stop, with greatest defiance, to the motion now under
consideration; but the imagination being defiled, it presently, at the
very first view or noise of the motion of sin, so acted as to forward
the bringing the said motion or thought into act. So, then, the thought
of sin, or motion thereto, is first of all entertained by the
imagination and fancy of the soul, and thence conveyed to the rest of
the powers of the soul to be condemned, if the imagination be good; but
to be helped forward to the act, if the imagination be evil. And thus
the evil imagination helpeth the motion of and to sin towards the act,
even by dressing of it up in that guise and habit that may best delude
the understanding, judgment, and conscience; and that is done after
this manner: suppose a motion of sin to commit fornication, to swear,
to steal, to act covetously, or the like, be propounded to the fancy
and imagination; the imagination, if evil, presently dresseth up this
motion in that garb that best suiteth with the nature of the sin. As,
if it be the lust of uncleanness, then is the motion to sin drest up in
all the imaginable pleasurableness of that sin; if to covetousness,
then is the sin drest up in the profits and honours that attend that
sin; and so of theft and the like; but if the motion be to swear,
hector, or the like, then is that motion drest up with valour and
manliness; and so you may count of the rest of sinful motions; and thus
being trimmed up like a Bartholomew baby, 25 it is presented to all the
rest of the powers of the soul, where with joint consent it is admired
and embraced, to the firing and inflaming all the powers of the soul.
And hence it is that men are said to inflame themselves with their
idols under every green tree. ‘And to be as fed horses, neighing after
their neighbour’s wife’ (Jer 5:8). For the imagination is such a
forcible power, that if it putteth forth itself to dress up and present
a thing to the soul, whether that thing be evil or good, the rest of
the faculties cannot withstand it. Therefore, when David prayed for the
children of Israel, he said, ‘I have seen with joy thy people, which
are present here, to offer willingly unto theel’ that is, for
preparations to build the temple. ‘O Lord God,’ saith he, ‘keep this
for ever in the imagination of the thoughts of the heart of Thy people,
and prepare their heart unto Thee’ (1 Chron 29:17, 18). He knew that as
the imagination was prepared, so would the soul be moved, whether by
evil or good; therefore as to this, he prays that their imagination
might be engaged always with apprehensions of the beauteousness of the
temple, that they might always, as now, offer willingly for its
building.
But, as I said, when the imagination hath thus set forth sin to the
rest of the faculties of the soul, they are presently entangled, and
fall into a flame of love thereto; this being done, it follows that a
purpose to pursue this motion, till it be brought unto act, is the next
thing that is resolved on. Thus Esau, after he had conceived of that
profit that would accrue to him by murdering of his brother, fell the
next way into a resolve to spill Jacob’s blood. And Rebecca sent for
Jacob, and said unto him, ‘Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching thee,
doth comfort himself, purposing to kill thee’ (Gen 27:42). See also
(Jer 49:30). Nor is this purpose to do an evil without its fruit, for
he comforted himself in his evil purpose: ‘Esau, as touching thee, doth
comfort himself, purposing to kill thee.’
The purpose, therefore, being concluded, in the next place the
invention is diligently set to work to find out what means, methods,
and ways, will be thought best to bring this purpose into practice, and
this motion to sin into action. Esau invented the death of his brother
when his father was to be carried to his grave (Gen 27:41). David
purposed to make Uriah father his bastard child by making of him drunk
(2 Sam 11:13). Amnon purposed to ravish Tamar, and the means that he
invented to do it were by feigning himself sick. Absalom purposed to
kill Amnon, and invented to do it at a feast (2 Sam13:32). Judas
purposed to sell Christ, and invented to betray him in the absence of
the people (Luke 22:3-6). The Jews purposed to kill Paul, and invented
to entreat the judge of a blandation26 to send for him, that they might
murder him as he went (Acts 23:12-15).
Thus you see how sin is, in the motion of it, handed through the
soul—first, it comes into the fancy or imagination, by which it is so
presented to the soul, as to inflame it with desire to bring it into
act; so from this desire the soul proceedeth to a purpose of enjoying,
and from a purpose of enjoying to inventing how, or by what means, it
had best to attempt the accomplishing of it.
But, further, when the soul has thus far, by its wickedness, pursued
the motion of sin to bring it into action, then to the last thing; to
wit, to endeavours, to take the opportunity, which, by the invention,
is judged most convenient; so to endeavours it goes, till it has
finished sin, and finished, in finishing of that, its own fearful
damnation. ‘Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin; and
sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death’ (James 1:15).
And who knows, but God and the soul, how many lets, hindrances,
convictions, fears, frights, misgivings, and thoughts of the judgment
of God, all this while are passing and repassing, turning and
returning, over the face of the soul? how many times the soul is made
to start, look back, and tremble, while it is pursuing the pleasure,
profit, applause, or preferment that sin, when finished, promiseth to
yield unto the soul? for God is such a lover of the soul, that He
seldom lets it go on in sin, but He cries to it, by His Word and
providences, ‘Oh! do not this abominable thing that I hate!’ (Jer 44:
4); especially at first, until it shall have hardened itself, and so
provoked Him to give it up in sin-revenging judgment to its own ways
and doings, which is the terriblest judgment under heaven; and this
brings me to the third thing, the which I now will speak to.
3. As the soul receives, detains, entertains, and wilily worketh to
bring sin from the motion into act, so it abhorreth to be controlled
and taken off of this work—‘My soul loathed them,’ says God, ‘and their
soul also abhorred Me’ (Zech 6:8). My soul loathed them, because they
were so bad; and their souls abhorred Me, because I am so good. Sin,
then, is the cause of the loss of the soul; because it hath set the
soul, or, rather, because the soul of love to sin hath set itself
against God. ‘Woe unto their soul, for they have rewarded evil unto
themselves’(Isa 3:9).
[Through sin the soul sets itself against God.]
Third, That you may the better perceive that the soul, through sin, has
set itself against God, I will propose, and speak briefly to, these two
things:—
I. The law. II. The gospel.
I. For the law. God has given it for a rule of life, either as written
in their natures, or as inserted in the Holy Scriptures; I say, for a
rule of life to all the children of men. But what have men done, or how
have they carried it to this law of their Creator; let us see, and that
from the mouth of God himself.
1. ‘They have not hearkened unto My words’ (Jer 6:19).
2. ‘They have forsaken My law’ (Jer 9:13).
3. They ‘have forsaken Me, and have not kept My law’ (Jer 16:11).
4. They have not ‘walked in My law, nor in My statutes’ (Jer 44: 4).
5. ‘Her priests have violated My law’ (Eze 22:26).
6. And, saith God, ‘I have written to him the great things of My law,
but they were counted as a strange thing.’ (Hos 8:12).
Now, whence should all this disobedience arise? Not from the
unreasonableness of the commandment, but from the opposition that is
lodged in us against God, and the enmity that it entertains against
goodness. Hence the apostle speaks of the emnity, and says, that men
are enemies in their minds, their souls, as is manifest by wicked works
(Col 1:21). This, if men went no further, must needs be highly
provoking to a just and holy God: yea, so highly offensive is it, that,
to show the heat of His anger, He saith, ‘Indignation and wrath,
tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil,’ and
this evil with a witness, ‘of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile,’
that doth evil (Rom 2:8,9). That breaketh the law; for that evil He is
crying out against now. But,
II. To speak of the gospel, and of the carriage of sinful souls towards
God under that dispensation.
The gospel is a revelation of a sovereign remedy, provided by God,
through Christ, for the health and salvation of those that have made
themselves objects of wrath by the breach of the law of works; this is
manifest by all the Scripture. But how doth the soul carry it towards
God, when He offereth to deal with it under and by this dispensation of
grace? Why, just as it carried it under the law of works: they oppose,
they contradict, they blaspheme, and forbid that this gospel be
mentioned (Acts 13:45; 27:6). What higher affront or contempt can be
offered to God, and what greater disdain can be shown against the
gospel? (2 Tim 2:25; 1 Thess 2:14-16). Yet all this the poor soul, to
its own wrong, offereth against the way of its own salvation; as it is
said in the Word of truth, ‘He that sinneth against me wrongeth his own
soul: all they that hate Me love death’ (Prov 8:36).
But, further, the soul despiseth not the gospel in that revelation of
it only, but the great and chief bringer thereof, with the manner,
also, of His bringing of it. The Bringer, the great Bringer of the
gospel, is the good Lord Jesus Christ himself; He ‘came and preached
peace to them that the law proclaimed war against; became and preached
peace to them that were afar off, and to them that were nigh’ (Eph
2:17). And it is worth your observation to take notice how He came, and
that was, and still is, as He is set forth in the word of the gospel;
to wit, first, as making peace Himself to God for us in and by the
blood of His cross; and then, as bearing (as set out by the gospel) the
very characters of His sufferings before our faces in every tender of
the gospel of His grace unto us. And to touch a little upon the dress
in which, by the gospel, Christ presenteth unto us while He offereth
unto sinful souls His peace, by the tenders thereof.
1. He is set forth as born for us, to save our souls (Isa 9:6; Luke
2:9-12).
2. He is set forth before us as bearing of our sins for us, and
suffering God’s wrath for us (1 Cor 15:3; Gal 3:13).
3. He is set forth before us as fulfilling the law for us, and as
bringing of everlasting righteousness to us for our covering (Rom 5:4;
Dan 9:24).
Again, as to the manner of His working out the salvation of sinners for
them, that they might have peace and joy, and heaven and glory, for
ever.
(1.) He is set forth as sweating of blood while He was in His agony,
wrestling with the thoughts of death, which He was to suffer for our
sins, that He might save the soul (Luke 22:44).
(2.) He is set forth as crying, weeping, and mourning under the lashes
of justice that He put Himself under, and was willing to bear for our
sins (Heb 5:7).
(3.) He is set forth as betrayed, apprehended, condemned, spit on,
scourged, buffeted, mocked, crowned with thorns, crucified, pierced
with nails and a spear, to save the soul from being betrayed by the
devil and sin; to save it from being apprehended by justice, and
condemned by the law; to save it from being spit on, in a way of
contempt, by holiness; to save it from being scourged with guilt of
sins, as with scorpions; to save it from being continually buffeted by
its own conscience; to save it from being mocked at by God; to save it
from being crowned with ignominy and shame for ever; to save it from
dying the second death; to save it from wounds and grief for ever.
Dost thou understand me, sinful soul? He wrestled with justice, that
thou mightest have rest; He wept and mourned, that thou mightest laugh
and rejoice; He was betrayed, that thou mightest go free; was
apprehended, that thou mightest escape; He was condemned, that thou
mightest be justified; and was killed, that thou mightest live; He wore
a crown of thorns, that thou mightest wear a crown of glory; and was
nailed to the cross, with His arms wide open, to show with what
freeness all His merits shall be bestowed on the coming soul; and how
heartily He will receive it into His bosom?
Further, all this He did of mere good will, and offereth the benefit
thereof unto thee freely; yea, He cometh unto thee, in the word of the
gospel, with the blood running down from His head upon His face, with
His tears abiding upon His cheeks, with the holes as fresh in His hands
and His feet, and as with the blood still bubbling out of His side, to
pray thee to accept of the benefit, and to be reconciled to God thereby
(2 Cor 5). But what saith the sinful soul to this? I do not ask what he
saith with his lips, for he will assuredly flatter God with his mouth;
but what doth his actions and carriages declare as to his acceptance of
this incomparable benefit? For ‘a wicked man speaketh with his feet,
and teacheth with his fingers’ (Prov 6:12,13). With his feet—that is,
by the way he goeth: and with his fingers—that is, by his acts and
doings. So, then, what saith he by his goings, by his sets and doings,
unto this incomparable benefit, thus brought unto him from the Father,
by His only Son, Jesus Christ? What saith he? Why, he saith that he
doth not at all regard this Christ, nor value the grace thus tendered
unto him in the gospel.
1. He saith, that he regardeth not this Christ, that he seeth nothing
in Him why he should admit Him to be entertained in his affections.
Therefore the prophet, speaking in the person of sinners, says, ‘He
(Christ) hath no form nor comeliness, and when we shall see Him, there
is no beauty that we should desire Himl’ and then adds, to show what he
meaneth by his thus speaking, saying, ‘he is despised and rejected of
men’ (Isa 53:2,3). All this is spoken with reference to His person, and
it was eminently fulfilled upon Him in the days of His flesh, when He
was hated, maligned, and persecuted to death by sinners; and is still
fulfilled in the souls of sinners, in that they cannot abide to think
of Him with thoughts that have a tendency in them to separate them and
their lusts asunder, and to the making of them to embrace Him for their
darling, and the taking up of their cross to follow Him. All this
sinners speak out with loud voices, in that they stop their ears and
shut their eyes as to Him, but open them wide and hearken diligently to
anything that pleaseth the flesh, and that is a nursery to sin. But,
2. As they despise, and reject, and do not regard His person, so they
do not value the grace that He tendereth unto them by the gospel; this
is plain by that indifferency of spirit that always attends them when,
at any time, they hear thereof, or when it is presented unto them.
I may safely say, that the most of men who are concerned in a trade,
will be more vigilant in dealing with a twelvepenny customer than they
will be with Christ when He comes to make unto them, by the gospel, a
tender of the incomparable grace of God. Hence they are called fools,
because a price is put into their hands to get wisdom, and they have no
heart unto it (Prov 18:16). And hence, again, it is that that bitter
complaint is made, ‘But My people would not hearken to my voice; and
Israel would none of Me’ (Psa 81:11). Now, these things being found, as
practised by the souls of sinners, must needs, after a wonderful
manner, provoke; wherefore, no marvel that the heavens are bid to be
astonished at this, and that damnation shall seize upon the soul for
this (Jer 2).
And indeed, the soul that doth thus by practice, though with his
mouth—as who doth not? he shall show much love, he doth,
interpretatively, say these things:—
(1.) That he loveth sin better than grace, and darkness better than
light, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath showed, ‘And this is the
condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness
more than light (as is manifest), because their deeds were evil’ (John
3:19).
(2.) They do, also, by their thus rejecting of Christ and grace, say,
that for what the law can do to them, they value it not; they regard
not its thundering threatenings, nor will they shrink when they come to
endure the execution thereof; wherefore God, to deter them from such
bold and desperate ways, that do, interpretatively, fully declare that
they make such desperate conclusions, insinuates that the burden of the
curse thereof is intolerable, saying, ‘Can thine heart endure, or can
thine hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with thee? I, the
Lord, have spoken it, and will do it’ (Eze 22:14).
(3.) Yea, by their thus doing, they do as good as say that they will
run the hazard of a sentence of death at the day of judgment, and that
they will, in the meantime, join issue, and stand a trial at that day
with the great and terrible God. What else means their not hearkening
to Him, their despising of His Son, and the rejecting of His grace; yea
I say again, what else means their slighting of the curse of the law,
and their choosing to abide in their sins till the day of death and
judgment? And thus I have showed you the causes of the loss of the
soul; and, assuredly, these things are no fables.
Objection. But some may object, and say, But you denounce all against
the soul; the soul, as if the body were in no fault at all; or, as if
there were no punishment assigned for the body.
Answer 1. The soul must be the part punished, because the soul is that
which sins. ‘Every sin that a man doeth is without the body,’
fornication or adultery excepted (1 Cor 6:18). ‘Is without the body;
that is, as to the wilily inventing, contriving, and finding out ways
to bring the motions of sin into action. For, alas! What can the body
do as to these? It is in a manner wholly passive; yea, altogether as to
the lusting and purposing to do the wickedness, excepting the sin
before excepted; ay, and not excepting that, as to the rise of that
sin; for even that, with all the rest, ariseth and proceedeth out of
the heart—the soul; ‘For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed
evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness,
wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride,
foolishness: all these evil things come from within, and defile the
man’ (Mark 7:21-23). That is, the outward man. But a difference must
always be put betwixt defiling and being defiled, that which defileth
being the worst; not but that the body shall have its share of
judgment, for body and soul must be destroyed in hell (Luke 12:4,5;
Matt 10:28). The body as the instrument, the soul as the actor; but oh!
the soul, the soul, the soul is the sinner; and, therefore, the soul,
as the principal, must be punished.