them to shame before men; but few are sorry for the defects that sin
has made in nature, because they see not those defects themselves. A
man cannot be sorry for the sinful defects of nature, till he sees they
have rendered him contemptible to God; nor is it any thing but a sight
of God that can make him truly see what he is, and so be heartily sorry
for being so. Now ‘mine eye seeth thee,’ saith Job, now ‘I abhor
myself.’ ‘Woe is me, for I am undone,’ saith the prophet, ‘for mine
eyes have seen the King the Lord.’ And it was this that made Daniel say
his ‘comeliness was turned in him into corruption’; for he had now the
vision of the Holy One (Job 42:6; Isa 6:1-5; Dan 10:8). Visions of God
break the heart, because, by the sight the soul then has of his
perfections, it sees its own infinite and unspeakable disproportion,
because of the vileness of its nature.
Suppose a company of ugly, uncomely, deformed persons dwelt together in
one house; and suppose that they never yet saw any man or woman more
than themselves, or that were arrayed with the splendours and
perfections of nature; these would not be capable of comparing
themselves with any but themselves, and consequently would not be
affected and made sorry for their uncomely natural defections. But now
bring them out of their cells and holes of darkness, where they have
been shut up by themselves, and let them take a view of the splendour
and perfections of beauty that are in others, and then, if at all, they
will be sorry and dejected at the view of their own defects. This is
the case; men by sin are marred, spoiled, corrupted, depraved, but they
may dwell by themselves in the dark; they see neither God, nor angels,
nor saints, in their excellent nature and beauty: and therefore they
are apt to count their own uncomely parts their ornaments and their
glory. But now let such, as I said, see God, see saints, or the
ornaments of the Holy Ghost, and themselves as they are without them,
and then they cannot but must be affected with and sorry for their own
deformity. When the Lord Christ put forth but little of his excellency
before his servant Peter’s face, it raised up the depravity of Peter’s
nature before him to his great confusion and shame; and made him cry
out to him in the midst of all his fellows, ‘Depart from me, for I am a
sinful man, O Lord’ (Luke 5:4-8).
This therefore is the cause of a broken heart, even a sight of divine
excellencies, and a sense that I am a poor, depraved, spoiled defiled
wretch; and this sight having broken the heart, begets sorrow in the
broken-hearted.
2. The broken-hearted is a sorrowful man; for that he finds his
depravity of nature strong in him, to the putting forth itself to
oppose and overthrow what his changed mind doth prompt him to; ‘When I
would do good,’ saith Paul, ‘evil is present with me’ (Rom 7:21). Evil
is present to oppose, to resist, and make head against the desires of
my soul. The man that has his bones broken, may have yet a mind to be
industriously occupied in a lawful and honest calling; but he finds, by
experience, that an infirmity attends his present condition that
strongly resists his good endeavours; and at this he shakes his head,
makes complaints, and with sorrow of heart he sighs and says, I ‘cannot
do the thing that I would’ (Rom 7:15; Gal 5:17). I am weak, I am
feeble; I am not only depraved, but by that depravity deprived of
ability to put good motions,[6] good intentions and desires into
execution, to completeness; O says he, I am ready to halt, my sorrow is
continually before me!
You must know that the broken-hearted loves God, loves his soul, loves
good, and hates evil. Now, for such an one to find in himself an
opposition and continual contradiction to this holy passion, it must
needs cause sorrow, godly sorrow, as the apostle Paul calls it. For
such are made sorrow after a godly sort. To be sorry for that thy
nature is with sin depraved, and that through this depravity thou art
deprived of ability to do what the Word and thy holy mind doth prompt
thee to, is to be sorry after a godly sort. For this sorrow worketh
that in thee of which thou wilt never have cause to repent; no, not to
eternity (2 Cor 7:9-11).
3. The broken-hearted man is sorry for those breaches that, by reason
of the depravity of his nature, are made in his life and conversation.
And this was the case of the man in our text. The vileness of his
nature had broken out to the defiling of his life, and to the making of
him, at this time, base in conversation. This, this was it, that all
to[7] brake his heart. He saw in this he had dishonoured God, and that
cut him, ‘Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in
thy sight’ (Psa 51:4). He saw in this he had caused the enemies of God
to open their mouths and blaspheme; and this cut him to the heart. This
made him cry, I have sinned against thee, Lord. This made him say, ‘I
will declare mine iniquity, I will be sorry for my sin’ (Psa 38:18).
When a man is designed to do a matter, when his heart is set upon it,
and the broken-hearted doth design to glorify God, an obstruction to
that design, the spoiling of this work, makes him sorrowful. Hannah
coveted children, but could not have them, and this made her ‘a woman
of a sorrowful spirit’ (1 Sam 1:15). A broken-hearted man would be well
inwardly, and do that which is well outwardly; but he feels, he finds,
he sees he is prevented, prevented at least in part. This makes him
sorrowful; in this he groans, groans earnestly, being burdened with his
imperfections (2 Cor 5:1-3). You know one with broken bones has
imperfections many, and is more sensible of them, too, as was said
afore, than any other man; and this makes him sorrowful, yea, and makes
him conclude that he shall go softly all his days in the bitterness of
his soul (Isa 38:15).
Third. The man with a broken heart is a very humble man; or, true
humility is a sign of a broken heart. Hence, brokenness of heart,
contrition of spirit, and humbleness of mind, are put together. ‘To
revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the
contrite ones’ (Isa 57:15).
To follow our similitude. Suppose a man, while in bodily health, stout
and strong, and one that fears and cares for no man; yet let this man
have but a leg or an arm broken, and his courage is quelled; he is now
so far off from hectoring of it with a man, that he is afraid of every
little child that doth but offer to touch him. Now he will court the
most feeble that has ought to do with him, to use him and handle him
gently. Now he is become a child in courage, a child in fear, and
humbleth himself as a little child.
Why, thus it is with that man that is of a broken and contrite spirit.
Time was, indeed, he could hector, even hector it with God himself,
saying, ‘What is the Almighty, that we should serve him?’ or what
profit shall I have if I keep his commandments? (Job 21:15; Mal
3:13,14). Ay! But now his heart is broken; God has wrestled with him,
and given him a fall, to the breaking of his bones, his heart; and now
he crouches, now he cringes, now he begs of God that he will not only
do him good, but do it with tender hands. ‘Have mercy upon me, O God,’
said David; yea, ‘according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies,
blot out my transgressions’ (Psa 51:1).
He stands, as he sees, not only in need of mercy, but of the tenderest
mercies. God has several sorts of mercies, some more rough, some more
tender. God can save a man, and yet have him a dreadful way to heaven!
This the broken-hearted sees, and this the broken-hearted dreads, and
therefore pleads for the tenderest sort of mercies; and here we read of
his gentle dealing, and that he is very pitiful, and that he deals
tenderly with his. But the reason of such expressions no man knows but
he that is broken-hearted; he has his sores, his running sores, his
stinking sores; wherefore he is pained, and therefore covets to be
handled tenderly. Thus God has broken the pride of his spirit, and
humbled the loftiness of man. And his humility yet appears,
1. In his thankfulness for natural life. He reckoneth at night, when he
goes to bed, that like as a lion, so God will tear him to pieces before
the morning light (Isa 38:13). There is no judgment that has fallen
upon others, but he counts of right he should be swallowed up by it.
‘My flesh trembleth for fear of thee, and I am afraid of thy judgments’
(Psa 119:120). But perceiving a day added to his life, and that he in
the morning is still on this side hell, he cannot choose but take
notice of it, and acknowledge it as a special favour, saying, God be
thanked for holding my soul in life till now, and for keeping my life
back from the destroyer (Job 33:22; Psa 56:13, 86:13).
Man, before his heart is broken, counts time his own, and therefore he
spends it lavishly upon every idle thing. His soul is far from fear,
because the rod of God is not upon him; but when he sees himself under
the wounding hand of God, or when God, like a lion, is breaking all his
bones, then he humbleth himself before him, and falleth at his foot.
Now he has learned to count every moment a mercy, and every small
morsel a mercy.
2. Now also the least hopes of mercy for his soul, O how precious is
it! He that was wont to make orts[8] of the gospel, and that valued
promises but as stubble, and the words of God but as rotten wood; now,
with what an eye doth he look on the promise? Yea, he counted a
peradventure of mercy more rich, more worth, than the whole world. Now,
as we say, he is glad to leap at a crust; now, to be a dog in God’s
house is counted better by him than to ‘dwell in the tents of the
wicked’ (Matt 15:16,27; Luke 15:17-19).
3. Now he that was wont to look scornfully upon the people of God, yea,
that used to scorn to show them a gentle cast of his countenance; now
he admires and bows before them, and is ready to lick the dust of their
feet, and would count it his greatest, the highest honour, to be as one
of the least of them. ‘Make me as one of thy hired servants,’ says he
(Luke 15:19).
4. Now he is, in his own eyes, the greatest fool in nature; for that he
sees he has been so mistaken in his ways, and has not yet but little,
if any true knowledge of God. Every one now, says he, have more
knowledge of God than I; every one serves him better than I (Psa
73:21,22; Prov 30:2,3).
5. Now may he be but one, though the least in the kingdom of heaven!
Now may he be but one, though the least in the church on earth! Now may
he be but loved, though the least beloved of saints! How high an
account doth he set thereon!
6. Now, when he talketh with God or men, how doth he debase himself
before them! If with God, how does he accuse himself, and load himself
with the acknowledgments of his own villanies, which he committed in
the days wherein he was the enemy of God! ‘Lord,’ said Paul, that
contrite one, ‘I imprisoned and beat in every synagogue them that
believed on thee. And when the blood of thy martyr Stephen was shed, I
also was standing by, and consenting unto his death, and kept the
raiment of them that slew him’ (Acts 22:19,20). Yea, I punished thy
saints ‘oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and
being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange
cities’ (Acts 26:9-11).
Also, when he comes to speak to saints, how doth he make himself vile
before them! ‘I am,’ saith he, ‘the least of the apostles; that am not
meet to be called an apostle’; I am ‘less than the least of all
saints’; I was a blasphemer; I was a persecutor, and injurious, &c. (1
Cor 15:9; Eph 3:8; 1 Tim 1:13). What humility, what self-abasing
thoughts, doth a broken heart produce! When David danced before the ark
of God, also how did he discover his nakedness to the disliking of his
wife; and when she taunted him for his doings, says he, ‘It was before
the Lord,’ &c., ‘and I will yet be more vile than thus, and will be
base in mine own sight’ (2 Sam 6:20-22). O, the man that is, or that
has been kindly broken in his spirit, and that is of a contrite heart,
is a lowly, humble man.
Fourth. The broken-hearted man is a man that sees himself in spirituals
to be poor. Therefore, as humble and contrite, so poor and contrite are
put together in the Word. ‘But to this man will I look, even to him
that is poor, and of a contrite spirit’ (Isa 66:1,2). And here we still
pursue our metaphor. A wounded man, a man with broken bones, concludes
his condition to be but poor, very poor. Ask him how he does, and he
answers, ‘Truly, neighbours, in a very poor condition!’ Also you have
the spiritual poverty of such as have, or have had their hearts broken,
and that have been of contrite spirits, much made mention of in the
Word. And they go by two names to distinguish them from others. They
are called THY poor, that is, God’s poor; they are also called ‘the
poor in spirit’ (Psa 72:2, 74:19; Matt 5:3). Now, the man that is poor
in his own eyes, for of him we now discourse, and the broken-hearted is
such an one, is sensible of his wants. He knows he cannot help himself,
and therefore is forced to be content to live by the charity of others.
Thus it is in nature, thus it is in grace.
1. The broken-hearted now knows his wants, and he knew it not till now.
As he that has a broken bone, knew no want of a bone-setter till he
knew his bone was broken. His broken bone makes him know it; his pain
and anguish makes him know it; and thus it is in spirituals. Now he
sees to be poor indeed is to want the sense of the favour of God; for
his great pain is a sense of wrath, as hath been shown before. And the
voice of joy would heal his broken bones (Psa 51:8). Two things he
thinks would make him rich. (1) A right and title to Jesus Christ, and
all his benefits. (2) And saving faith therein. They that are
spiritually rich are rich in him, and in the faith of him (2 Cor 8:9;
James 2:5).
The first of these giveth us a right to the kingdom of heaven; and the
second yields the soul the comfort of it; and the broken-hearted man
wants the sense and knowledge of his interest in these. That he knows
he wants them is plain; but that he knows he has them is what, as yet,
he wants the attainment of. Hence he says—‘The poor and needy seek
water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst’ (Isa
41:17). There is none in their view; none in their view for them. Hence
David, when he had his broken heart, felt he wanted washing, he wanted
purging, he wanted to be made white. He knew that spiritual riches lay
there but he did not so well perceive that God had washed and purged
him. Yea, he rather was afraid that all was going, that he was in
danger of being cast out of God’s presence, and that the Spirit of
grace would be utterly taken from him (Psa 51). That is the first
thing. The broken-hearted is poor, because he knows his wants.
2. The broken-hearted is poor, because he knows he cannot help himself
to what he knows he wants. The man that has a broken arm, as he knows
it, so he knows of himself he cannot set it. This therefore is a second
thing that declares a man is poor, otherwise he is not so. For suppose
a man wants never so much, yet if he can but help himself, if he can
furnish himself, if he can supply his own wants out of what he has, he
cannot be a poor man. Yea, the more he wants, the greater are his
riches, if he can supply his own wants out of his own purse.
He then is the poor man, that knows his spiritual want, and also knows
he cannot supply or help himself. But this the broken-hearted knows,
therefore he in his own eyes is the only poor man. True, he may have
something of his own, but that will not supply his want, and therefore
he is a poor man still. I have sacrifices, says David, but thou dost
not desire them, therefore my poverty remains (Psa 51:16). Lead is not
gold, lead is not current money with the merchants. There is none has
spiritual gold to sell but Christ (Rev 3:18). What can a man do to
procure Christ, or procure faith, or love? Yea, had he never so much of
his own carnal excellencies, no, not one penny of it will go for pay in
that market where grace is to be hand. ‘If a man would give all the
substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned’ (Can
8:7).
This the broken-hearted man perceives, and therefore he sees himself to
be spiritually poor. True he has a broken heart, and that is of great
esteem with God; but that is not of nature’s goodness, that is a gift,
a work of God; and that is the sacrifices of God. Besides, a man cannot
remain content and at rest with that; for that, in the nature of it,
does but show him he is poor, and that his wants are such as himself
cannot supply. Besides, there is but little ease in a broken heart.
3. The broken-hearted man is poor, and sees it; because he finds he is
now disabled to live any way else but by begging. This David betook
himself to, though he was a king; for he knew, as to his soul’s health,
he could live no way else. ‘This poor man cried,’ saith he, ‘and the
Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles’ (Psa 34:6). And
this leads me to the fifth sign.
Fifth. Another sign of a broken heart is a crying, a crying out. Pain,
you know, will make one cry. Go to them that have upon them the anguish
of broken bones, and see if they do not cry; anguish makes them cry.
This, this is that which quickly follows, if once thy heart be broken,
and thy spirit indeed made contrite.
1. I say, anguish will make thee cry. ‘Trouble and anguish,’ saith
David, ‘have taken hold on me’ (Psa 119:143). Anguish, you know, doth
naturally provoke to crying; now, as a broken bone has anguish, a
broken heart has anguish. Hence the pains of one that has a broken
heart are compared to the pangs of a woman in travail (John 16:20-22).
Anguish will make one cry alone, cry to one’s self; and this is called
a bemoaning of one’s self. ‘I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning
himself,’ saith God (Jer 31:18). That is, being at present under the
breaking, chastising hand of God. ‘Thou hast chastised me,’ saith he,
‘and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke.’ This is
his meaning also who said, ‘I mourn in my complaint, and make a noise.’
And why? Why, ‘My heart is sore pained within me’ (Psa 4:2-4).
This is a self-bemoaning, a bemoaning themselves in secret and retired
places. You know it is common with them who are distressed with
anguish, though all alone, to cry out to themselves of their present
pains, saying, O my leg! O my arm! O my bowels! Or, as the son of the
Shunammite, ‘My head! my head!’ (2 Kings 4:19). O the groans, the
sighs, the cries, that the broken-hearted have, when by themselves, or
alone! O, say they, my sins! my sins! my soul! my soul! How am I loaden
with guilt! How am I surrounded with fear! O this hard, this desperate,
this unbelieving heart! O how sin defileth my will, my mind, my
conscience! ‘I am afflicted and ready to die’ (Psa 88:15).[9]
Could some of you carnal people but get behind the chamber-door, to
hear Ephraim when he is at the work of self-bemoaning, it would make
you stand amazed to hear him bewail that sin in himself in which you
take delight; and to hear him bemoan his misspending of time, while you
spend all in pursuing your filthy lusts; and to hear him offended with
his heart, because it will not better comply with God’s holy will,
while you are afraid of his Word and ways, and never think yourselves
better than when farthest off from God. The unruliness of the passions
and lusts of the broken-hearted make them often get into a corner, and
thus bemoan themselves.
2. As they thus cry out in a bemoaning manner of and to themselves, so
they have their outcries of and against themselves to others; as she
said in another case, ‘Behold and see, if there be any sorrow like unto
my sorrow’ (Lam 1:12). O the bitter cries and complaints that the
broken-hearted have, and make to one another! Still every one imagining
that his own wounds are deepest, and his own sores fullest of anguish,
and hardest to be cured. Say they, if our iniquities be upon us, and we
pine away in them, how can we then live? (Eze 33:10).
Once being at an honest woman’s house, I, after some pause, asked her
how she did? She said, Very badly. I asked her if she was sick? she
answered, No. What then, said I, are any of your children ill? She told
me, No. What, said I, is your husband amiss, or do you go back in the
world? No, no, said she, but I am afraid I shall not be saved. And
broke out with heavy heart, saying, ‘Ah, Goodman Bunyan! Christ and a
pitcher; if I had Christ, though I went and begged my bread with a
pitcher, it would be better with me than I think it is now!’ This woman
had her heart broken, this woman wanted Christ, this woman was
concerned for her soul. There are but few women, rich women, that count
Christ and a pitcher better than the world, their pride, and pleasures.
This woman’s cries are worthy to be recorded; it was a cry that carried
in it, not only a sense of the want, but also of the worth of Christ.
This cry, ‘Christ and a pitcher,’ made a melodious noise in the ears of
the very angels![10]
But, I say, few women cry out thus; few women are so in love with their
own eternal salvation, as to be willing to part with all their lusts
and vanities for Jesus Christ and a pitcher. Good Jacob also was thus:
‘If the Lord,’ said he, ‘will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put
on, then he shall be my God.’ Yea, he vowed it should be so. ‘And Jacob
vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this
way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on; so
that I come again to my father’s house in peace: then shall the Lord be
my God’ (Gen 28:20).
3. As they bemoan themselves, and make their complaints to one and
another, so they cry to God. ‘O God,’ said Heman, ‘I have cried day and
night before thee.’ But when? Why, when his soul was full of trouble,
and his life drew near to the grave (Psa 88:1-3). Or, as it says in
another place, out of the deep, ‘out of the belly of hell cried I’ (Psa
130:1; Jonah 2:2). By such words expressing what painful condition they
were in when they cried.
See how God himself words it. ‘My pleasant portion,’ says he, is become
‘a desolate wilderness, _and being_ desolate, it mourneth unto me’ (Jer
12:11). And this also is natural to those whose hearts are broken.
Whether goes the child, when it catcheth harm, but to its father, to
its mother? Where doth it lay its head, but in their laps? Into whose
bosom doth it pour out its complaint, more especially, but into the
bosom of the father, of a mother, because there are bowels, there is
pity, there is relief and succour? And thus it is with them whose
bones, whose hearts are broken. It is natural to them; they must cry;
they cannot but cry to him. ‘Lord, heal me,’ said David, ‘for my bones
are vexed; Lord, heal me, for my soul is also sore vexed’ (Psa 6:1-3).
He that cannot cry feels no pain, sees no want, fears no danger, or
else is dead.
Sixth. Another sign of a broken heart, and of a contrite spirit is, it
trembleth at God’s Word. ‘To him that is poor, and of a contrite
spirit, and trembleth at my Word’ (Isa 66:2).
The Word of God is an awful Word to a broken-hearted man. Solomon says,
‘The word of a king is as the roaring of a lion’; and if so, what is
the Word of God? for by the wrath and fear is meant the authoritative
word of a king. We have a proverb, ‘The burnt child dreads the fire,
the whipped child fears the rod’; even so the broken-hearted fears the
Word of God. Hence you have a remark set upon them that tremble at
God’s Word, to wit, they are they that keep among the godly; they are
they that keep within compass; they are they that are aptest to mourn,
and to stand in the gap, when God is angry; and to turn away his wrath
from a people.