joy of heaven, and of the powers of the world to come, and yet could
not by any one, nay, by all of these, be made to break their league for
ever with their lusts and sins (Heb 6:4,5; Luke 8:13; John 5:33-35). O
Lord! what is man, that thou art mindful of him? Wherein is he to be
accounted of? He has sinned against thee; he loves his sins more than
thee. He is a lover of pleasures more than he is a lover of God!
But now, how shall this man be reclaimed from this sin? How shall he be
brought, wrought, and made, to be out of love with it? Doubtless it can
be by no other means, by what we can see in the Word, but by the
wounding, breaking, and disabling of the heart that loves it, and by
that means making it a plague and gall unto it. Sin may be made an
affliction, and as gall and wormwood to them that love it; but the
making of it so bitter a thing to such a man, will not be done but by
great and sore means. I remember we had in our town some time since, a
little girl that loved to eat the heads of foul tobacco-pipes, and
neither rod nor good words could reclaim her, and make her leave them.
So her father takes advice of a doctor, to wean her from them, and it
was this: Take, saith he, a great many of the foulest tobacco-pipe
heads you can get, and boil them in milk, and make a posset of that
milk, and make your daughter drink the posset-drink up. He did so, and
gave his girl it, and made her drink it up; the which became so irksome
and nauseous to her stomach, and made her so sick, that she could never
abide to meddle with tobacco-pipe heads any more, and so was cured of
that disease. Thou lovest thy sin, and neither rod nor good words will
as yet reclaim thee. Well, take heed; if thou wilt not be reclaimed,
God will make thee a posset of them, which shall be so bitter to thy
soul, so irksome to thy taste, so loathsome to thy mind, and so
afflicting to thy heart, that it shall break it with sickness and
grief, till it be loathsome to thee. I say, thus he will do if he loves
thee; if not, he will suffer thee to take thy course, and will let thee
go on with thy tobacco-pipe heads!
The children of Israel will have flesh, must have flesh; they weep,
cry, and murmur, because they have not flesh; the bread of heaven, that
is but light and sorry stuff in their esteem (Num 11:1-6). Moses goes
and tells God how the people despised his heavenly bread, and how they
longed, lusted, and desired to be fed with flesh. Well, says God, they
shall have flesh, they shall have their fill of flesh; I will feed them
with it; they shall have to the full; and that ‘ye shall not eat one
day, nor two days, nor five days, neither ten days, nor twenty days;
but even a whole month, until it come out at your nostrils, and it be
loathsome unto you; because ye have despised the Lord’ (Num 11:11-20).
He can tell how to make that loathsome to thee on which thou most dost
set thine evil heart. And he will do so, if he loves thee; else, as I
said, he will not make thee sick by smiting of thee nor punish thee for
or when thou committest whoredom, but will let thee alone till the
judgment-day, and call thee to a reckoning for all thy sins then. But
to pass this.
Eighth. Man, as he comes into the world, is not only a dead man, a
fool, proud, self-willed, fearless, a false believer, and a lover of
sin, but a wild man. He is of the wild olive tree, of that which is
wild by nature (Rom 11:17,24). So, in another place, man by nature is
compared to the ass, to a wild ass. ‘For vain or empty man would be
wise, though man be born like a wild ass’s colt’ (Job 11:12). Isaac was
a figure of Christ, and of all converted men (Gen 4:28). But Ishmael
was a figure of man by nature; and the Holy Ghost, as to that, saith
this of him, ‘And he will be a wild man’ (Gen 16:12). This man, I say,
was a figure of all carnal men, in their wildness or estrangedness from
God. Hence it is said of the prodigal, at his conversion, that he came
to himself then; implying that he was mad, wild, or out of his wits
before (Luke 15:17). I know there is a difference sometimes betwixt
one’s being wild and mad; yet sometimes wildness arriveth to that
degree as to give one rightly the denomination of being mad. And it is
always true in spirituals; namely, that he that is wild, as to God, is
mad, or besides himself, and so not capable, before he is tamed, of
minding his own eternal good as he should. There are these several
things that are tokens of one wild or mad; and they all meet in a
carnal man.
1. A wild or mad man gives no heed to good counsel; the frenzy of his
head shuts all out, and by its force leads him away from men that are
wise and sober. And thus it is with carnal men; good counsel is to them
as pearls are that are cast afore swine; it is trampled under foot of
them, and the man is despised that brings it (Matt 7:6). ‘The poor
man’s wisdom is despised, and his words are not heard’ (Eccl 9:16).
2. A wild or mad man, let him alone, and he will greatly busy himself
all his life to accomplish that which, when it is completed, amounts to
nothing. The work, the toil, the travel of such a one comes to nothing,
save to declare that he was out of his wits that did it. David,
imitating of such a one, scrabbled upon the gate of the king, as fools
do with chalk; and like to this is all the work of all carnal men in
the world (1 Sam 21:12,13). Hence, such a one is said to labour for the
wind, or for what will amount to no more than if he filled his belly
with the east wind (Eccl 5:16; Job 15:2).
3. A wild or mad man, if you set him to do anything, and he does it, he
will yet do it, not by or according to your bidding, but after the
folly of his own wild fancy; even as Jehu executed the commandment of
the Lord; he did it in his own madness, taking no heed to the
commandment of the Lord (2 Kings 9:20, 10:31). And thus do carnal men
do, when they meddle with any of God’s matters, as hearing, praying,
reading, professing; they do all according to their own wild fancy;
they take no heed to do these after the commandment of the Lord.
4. Wild or mad men, if they deck or array themselves with ought, as
many times they do, why, the spirit of their wildness or frenzy appears
even in the mode and way in which they do it. Either the things
themselves which they make use of for that purpose are very toys and
trifles; or if they seem to be better, they are put on after an antic
manner, rather to the rendering of them ridiculous, than to bespeak
them sober, judicious, or wise; and so do natural men array themselves
with what they would be accepted in with God. Would one in his wits
think to make himself fine or acceptable to men by arraying himself in
menstruous cloths, or by painting his face with dross and dung? And yet
this is the finery of carnal men, when they approach for acceptance
into the presence of God (Isa 64:6; Phil 3:7,8).
O the wildness, the frenzy, the madness, that possesses the heart and
mind of carnal men! they walk according to the course of this world,
according to or after that spirit which is in truth the spirit of the
devil, which worketh in the children of disobedience (Eph 2:1-3). But
do they believe that thus it is with them? No, they are, in their own
account, as other madmen are, the only ones in the world. Hence they
are so taken and tickled with their own frantic notions, and deride all
else that dwell in the world. But which is the way to make one that is
wild, or a madman, sober? To let him alone will not do it; to give him
good words only will not do it; no, he must be tamed; means must be
used to tame him. ‘He brought down their hearts with labour,’ or by
continual molestation; as you have it (Psa 107:10-12). He speaketh
there of madmen that are kept up in darkness, and bound in afflictions
and irons, because they rebelled against the words of God, and
contemned the counsel of the Most High.
This, therefore, is the way to deal with such, and none but God can so
deal with them. They must be taken, they must be separated from men;
they must be laid in chains, in darkness, afflictions, and irons; they
must be blooded, half-starved, whipped, purged, and be dealt with as
mad people are dealt with. And thus they must be dealt with till they
come to themselves, and cry out in their distresses. And then they cry
to the Lord in their troubles, and he saveth them out of their
distresses; then he brings them out of darkness, and the shadow of
death, and breaks their bands in sunder (Psa 107:13-15). Thus, I say,
God tames the wild, and brings mad prodigals to themselves, and so to
him for mercy.
Ninth. Man, as he comes into the world, is not only a dead man, a fool,
proud, self-willed, fearless, a false believer, a lover of sin, and a
wild man; but a man that disrelishes the things of the kingdom of God.
I told you before, that unconverted man is such as did not taste
things; but now I add, that he disrelishes things; he calls bitter
things sweet, and sweet bitter; he judges quite amiss. These are they
that God threateneth with a woe. ‘Woe unto them that call evil good,
and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter’ (Isa 5:20).
This latter part of this text shows us evidently that the things of God
are disrelished by some. They call his sweet things bitter, and the
devil’s bitter things sweet; and all this is for want of a broken
heart. A broken heart relishes otherwise than a whole or unbroken one
doth. A man that has no pain, or bodily distress, cannot find or feel
virtue or good in the most sovereign plaister, were it applied to arm
or leg; no, he rather says, Away with these stinking daubing things. O!
but lay the same plaisters where there is need, and the patient will
relish, and taste, and savour the goodness of them; yea, will prize and
commend them to others.
Thus it is in spirituals. The world, they know not what the anguish or
pain of a broken heart means; they say, ‘Who will show us any good,’
that is, better than we find in our sports, pleasures, estates, and
preferments. ‘There be many,’ says the Psalmist, speak after this sort.
But what says the distressed man? Why, ‘Lord, lift thou up the light of
thy countenance upon us’; and then adds, ‘Thou hast put gladness in my
heart’; namely, by the light of thy countenance, for that is the
plaister for a broken heart. ‘Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more
than in the time that their corn and their wine increaseth’ (Psa
4:1-7). O! a broken heart can savour pardon, can savour the
consolations of the Holy Ghost. Yea, as a hungry or thirsty man prizes
bread and water in the want thereof, so do the broken in heart prize
and set a high esteem on the things of the Lord Jesus. His flesh, his
blood, his promise, and the light of his countenance, are the only
sweet things both to scent and taste, to those that are of a wounded
spirit. The full soul loatheth the honey-comb; the whole despise the
gospel, they savour not the things that are of God.
If twenty men were to hear a pardon read, and but one of those twenty
were condemned to die, and the pardon was for none but such; which of
these men, think you, would taste the sweetness of that pardon, they
who are not, or he that was condemned? The condemned man, doubtless.
This is the case in hand. The broken in heart is a condemned man; yea,
it is a sense of condemnation, with other things, that has indeed
broken his heart; nor is there anything but sense of forgiveness that
can bind it up, or heal it. But could that heal it, could he not taste,
truly taste, or rightly relish this forgiveness? no; forgiveness would
be to him as it is to him that has not sense of want of it.
But, I say, what is the reason some so prize what others so despise,
since they both stand in need of the same grace and mercy of God in
Christ? Why, the one sees, and the other sees nothing, of this woeful
miserable state. And thus have I showed you the necessity of a broken
heart. 1. Man is dead, and must be quickened. 2. Man is a fool, and
must be made wise. 3. Man is proud, and must be humbled. 4. Man is
self-willed, and must be broken. 5. Man is fearless, and must be made
to consider. 6. Man is a false believer, and must be rectified. 7. Man
is a lover of sin, and must be weaned from it. 8. Man is wild, and must
be tamed. 9. Man disrelishes the things of God, and can take no savour
in them, until his heart is broken.
[V. THE REASONS WHY A BROKEN HEART IS ESTEEMED BY GOD SUCH AN EXCELLENT
THING.]
And thus have I done with this, and shall come next to the reasons of
the point, namely, to show you, why or how it comes to pass, that a
broken heart, a heart truly contrite, is to God such an excellent
thing. That to him it is so, we have proved by six demonstrations; what
it is, we have showed by the six signs thereof; that it must be, is
manifest by those nine reasons but now urged; and why it is with God or
in his esteem an excellent thing, that is shown by that which follows.
First. A broken heart is the handiwork of God; an heart of his own
preparing, for his own service; it is a sacrifice of his own providing,
of his providing for himself; as Abraham said in another case, ‘God
will provide himself a lamb’ (Gen 22:8).
Hence it is said, ‘The preparations of the heart in man, &c., is from
the Lord.’ And again, ‘God maketh my heart soft, and the Almighty
troubleth me’ (Job 23:16). The heart, as it is by nature hard, stupid,
and impenetrable, so it remains, and so will remain, until God, as was
said, bruiseth it with his hammer, and melts it with his fire. The
stony nature of it is therefore said to be taken away of God. ‘I will
take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you,’
saith he, ‘an heart of flesh’ (Eze 36:26). I will take away the stony
heart, or the stoniness, or the hardness of your heart, and I will give
you a heart of flesh; that is, I will make your heart sensible, soft,
wieldable, governable, and penitent. Sometimes he bids men rend their
hearts, not because they can, but to convince them rather, that though
it must be so, they cannot do it; so he bids them make themselves a new
heart, and a new spirit, for the same purpose also; for if God doth not
rend it, it remains unrent; if God makes it not new, it abides an old
one still.
This is that that is meant by his bending of men for himself, and of
his working in them that which is pleasing in his sight (Zech 9:13).
The heart, soul, or spirit, as in itself, as it came from God’s
fingers, a precious thing, a thing in God’s account worth more than all
the world. This heart, soul, or spirit, sin has hardened, the devil has
bewitched, the world has deceived. This heart, thus beguiled, God
coveteth and desireth: ‘My son,’ saith he, ‘give me thine heart, and
let thine eyes observe my ways’ (Prov 23:26).
This man cannot do this thing: for that his heart has the mastery of
him, and will not but carry him after all manner of vanity. What now
must be done? Why, God must take the heart by storm, by power, and
bring it to a compliance with the Word; but the heart of itself will
not; it is deluded, carried away to another than God. Wherefore God now
betakes him to his sword, and bring down the heart with labour, opens
it, and drives out the strong man armed that did keep it; wounds it;
and makes it smart for its rebellion, that it may cry; so he rectifies
it for himself. ‘He maketh sore, and bindeth up; he woundeth, and his
hands make whole’ (Job 5:18). Thus having wrought it for himself, it
becomes his habitation, his dwelling-place: ‘That Christ may dwell in
your hearts by faith’ (Eph 3:17).
But I would not swerve from the thing in hand. I have told you a broken
heart is the handiwork of God, a sacrifice of his own preparing; a
material fitted for himself.
1. By breaking of the heart he openeth it, and makes it a receptacle
for the graces of his Spirit; that is the cabinet, when unlocked, where
God lays up the jewels of the gospel; there he puts his fear; ‘I will
put my fear in their hearts’; there he writes his law; ‘I will write my
law in their heart’; there he puts his Spirit: ‘I will put my Spirit
within you’ (Jer 31:31-33, 32:39-41; Eze 36:26,27). The heart, I say,
God chooses for his cabinet: there he hides his treasure; there is the
seat of justice, mercy, and of every grace of God; I mean, when it is
broken, made contrite; and so regulated by the holy Word.
2. The heart, when broken, is like sweet gums and spices when beaten;
for as such cast their fragrant scent into the nostrils of men, so the
heart when broken casts its sweet smells in the nostrils of God. The
incense, which was a type of prayer of old, was to be beaten or
bruised, and so to be burned in the censer. The heart must be beaten or
bruised, and then the sweet scent will come out: even groans, and
cries, and sighs, for the mercy of God; which cries, &c. to him, are a
very excellent thing, and pleasing in his nostrils.
Second. A broken heart is in the sight of God an excellent thing;
because a broken heart is submissive; it falleth before God, and giveth
to him his glory. All this is true from a multitude of scriptures,
which I need not here mention. Hence such a heart is called an honest
heart, a good heart, a perfect heart, a heart fearing God, and such as
is sound in God’s statutes.
Now, this cannot but be an excellent thing, if we consider, that by
such a heart, unfeigned obedience is yielded unto him that calleth for
it. ‘Ye have obeyed from the heart,’ says Paul to them at Rome, ‘that
form of doctrine which was delivered you’ (Rom 6:17). Alas! the heart,
before it is broken and made contrite, is quite of another temper: ‘It
is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.’ The great
stir before the heart is broken, is about who shall be Lord, God or the
sinner. True, the right of dominion is the Lord’s; but the sinner will
not suffer it, but will be all himself; saying ‘Who is Lord over us?’
and again, say they to God, ‘We are lords, we will come no more unto
thee’ (Psa 12:4; Jer 2:31).
This also is evident by their practice; God may say what he will, but
they will do what they list. Keep my sabbath, says God; I will not,
says the sinner. Leave your whoring, says God; I will not, says the
sinner. Do not tell lies, nor swear, nor curse, nor blaspheme my holy
name, says God; O but I will, says the sinner. Turn to me, says God; I
will not, says the sinner. The right of dominion is mine, says God;
but, like that young rebel (1 Kings 1:5), I will be king, says the
sinner. Now, this is intolerable, this is unsufferable, and yet every
sinner by practice says thus; for they have not submitted themselves
unto the righteousness of God.
Here can be no concord, no communion, no agreement, no fellowship.
Here, here is enmity on the one side, and flaming justice on the other
(2 Cor 6:14-16; Zech 11:8). And what delight, what content, what
pleasure, can God take in such men. None at all; no, though they should
be mingled with the best of the saints of God; yea, though the best of
saints should supplicate for them. Thus, says Jeremiah, ‘Then said the
Lord unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me,’ that is, to
pray for them, ‘yet my mind could not be toward this people; cast them
out of my sight, and let them go forth’ (Jer 15:1).
Here is nought but open war, acts of hostility, and shameful rebellion,
on the sinner’s side; and what delight can God take in that? Wherefore,
if God will bend and buckle the spirit of such an one, he must shoot an
arrow at him, a bearded arrow, such as may not be plucked out of the
wound: an arrow that will stick fast, and cause that the sinner falls
down as dead at God’s foot (Psa 33:1,2). Then will the sinner deliver
up his arms, and surrender up himself as one conquered, into the hand
of, and beg for the Lord’s pardon, and not till then; I mean not
sincerely.
And now God has overcome, and his right hand and his holy arm has
gotten him the victory. Now he rides in triumph with his captive at his
chariot wheel; now he glories; now the bells in heaven do ring; now the
angels shout for joy, yea, are bid to do so, ‘Rejoice with me, for I
have found my sheep which was lost’ (Luke 15:1-10). Now also the
sinner, as a token of being overcome, lies grovelling at his foot,
saying, ‘Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the king’s enemies,
whereby the people fall under thee’ (Psa 45:3-5).
Now the sinner submits, now he follows his conqueror in chains, now he
seeks peace, and would give all the world, were it his own, to be in
the favour of God, and to have hopes by Christ of being saved. Now this
must be pleasing, this cannot but be a thing acceptable in God’s sight:
‘A broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.’ For it
is the desire of his own heart, the work of his own hands.
Third. Another reason why a broken heart is to God such an excellent
thing is this, a broken heart prizes Christ, and has a high esteem for
him. The whole have no need of a physician, but the sick; this sick man
is the broken-hearted in the text; for God makes men sick by smiting of
them, by breaking of their hearts. Hence sickness and wounds are put
together; for that the one is a true effect of the other (Mark 2:17;
Micah 6:13; Hosea 5:13). Can any think that God should be pleased, when
men despise his Son, saying, He hath no form nor comeliness, and when
we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him? And yet
so say they of him whose hearts God has not mollified; yea, the elect
themselves confess, that before their hearts were broken, they set
light by him also. He is, say they, ‘despised and rejected of men,—and
we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed
him not’ (Isa 53:2,3).
He is indeed the great deliverer; but what is a deliverer to them that
never saw themselves in bondage, as was said before? Hence it is said
of him that delivered the city, ‘No man remembered that same poor man’
(Eccl 9:15). He has sorely suffered, and been bruised for the
transgression of man, that they might not receive the smart, and hell,
which by their sins they have procured to themselves. But what is that
to them that never saw ought but beauty, and that never tasted anything
but sweetness in sin? It is he that holdeth by his intercession the
hands of God, and that causes him to forbear to cut off the drunkard,
the liar, and unclean person, even when they are in the very act and
work of their abomination; but their hard heart, their stupefied heart,
has no sense of such kindness as this, and therefore they take no
notice of it. How many times has God said to this dresser of his
vineyard, ‘Cut down the barren fig-tree,’ while he yet, by his
intercession, has prevailed for a reprieve for another year! But no
notice is taken of this, no thanks is from them returned to him for
such kindness of Christ. Wherefore such ungrateful, unthankful,
inconsiderate wretches as these must needs be a continual eye-sore, as
I may say, and great provocation to God; and yet thus men will do
before their hearts are broken (Luke 13:6-9).
Christ, as I said, is called a physician; yea, he is the only
soul-physician. He heals, how desperate soever the disease be; yea, and
heals who he undertakes for ever. ‘I give unto them eternal life,’ and
doth all of free cost, of mere mercy and compassion (John 10:28). But
what is all this to one that neither sees his sickness, that sees
nothing of a wound? What is the best physician alive, or all the
physicians in the world, put all together, to him that knows no
sickness, that is sensible of no disease? Physicians, as was said, may
go a-begging for all the healthful. Physicians are of no esteem, save
only to the sick, or upon a supposition of being so now, or at any
other time.
Why, this is the cause Christ is so little set by in the world. God has
not made them sick by smiting of them; his sword has not given them the
wound, his dart has not been struck through their liver; they have not
been broken with his hammer, nor melted with his fire. So they have no
regard to his physician; so they slight all the provision which God has
made for the salvation of the soul. But now, let such a soul be
wounded; let such a man’s heart be broken; let such a man be made sick
through the sting of guilt, and be made to wallow himself in ashes
under the burden of his transgressions; and then, who but Christ, as
has been showed afore, then the physician; then, wash me, Lord, then
supple my wounds, then pour thy wine and oil into my sore; then Lord
Jesus cause me to hear the voice of joy and gladness, that the bones
which thou hast broken may rejoice. Nothing now so welcome as healing;
and so nothing, no man, so desirable now as Christ. His name to such is
the best of names; his love to such is the best of love; himself being
now not only in himself, but also to such a soul, the chiefest of ten
thousand (Can 5:10).