Christ Jesus; also their fears stand upon a mistake of the nature of
the covenant, in which they are wrapped up, which is ordered for them
in all things, and sure (2 Sam 23:5; Isa 55:3). Besides, God has
purposed to magnify the riches of his grace in their salvation;
therefore goodness and mercy shall, to that end, follow them all the
days of their life, that they may ‘dwell in the house of the Lord for
ever’ (Psa 23:6; Eph 1:3-7). They have also their intercessor and
advocate ready with God, to take up matters for them in such a way as
may maintain true peace betwixt their God and them; and as may
encourage them to be sober, and hope to the end, for the grace that is
to be brought unto them at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1 Peter
1:13; 1 John 2:1,2). Wherefore, though the godly have their fears, yea,
sometimes dreadful fears, and that of perishing for ever and ever; yet
the day is coming, when their fears and tears shall be done away, and
when their desires only shall be granted. ‘The fear of the wicked, it
shall come upon them; but the desire of the righteous shall be
granted.’
The words, then, are a prediction or prophecy, and that both concerning
the wicked and the righteous, with reference to time and things to
come, and shall certainly be fulfilled in their season. Hence it is
said concerning the wicked, that their triumphing is short, and that
the joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment (Job 20:5). O, their end
will be bitter as wormwood, and will cut like a two-edged sword! Of
this Solomon admonishes youth, when he saith. ‘Rejoice, O young man, in
thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and
walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes; but
know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment’
(Eccl 11:9).
This, therefore, showeth the desperate spirit that possesses the
children of men, who, though they hear and read all this, yet cannot be
reclaimed from courses that are wicked, and that lead to such a
condition (Prov 5:7-14). I say they will not be reclaimed from such
courses as lead to ways that go down to hell, where their soul must
mourn, even then when their flesh and their body are consumed. O! how
dear bought are their pleasures, and how will their laughter be turned
into tears and anguish unutterable! and that presently, for it is
coming! Their ‘judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their
damnation slumbereth not’ (2 Peter 2:3). But what good will their
covenant of death then do them? And will their agreement of hell yield
them comfort? Is not God as well mighty to punish as to save? (Isa
28:18). Or can these sinners believe God out of the world, or cause
that he should not pay them home for their sins, and recompense them
for all the evil they have loved, and continued in the commission of?
(Job 21:29-31). ‘Can thy heart endure, or can thy hands be strong in
the days that God shall deal with thee?’ (Eze 22:14). Thou art bold
now, I mean bold in a wicked way; thou sayest now thou wilt keep thy
sweet morsels of sin under thy tongue, thou wilt keep them still within
thy mouth. Poor wretch! Thy sins shall lie down in the dust with thee
(Job 20:11). Thou hast sucked the poison of asps, and the viper’s
tongue shall slay thee (Job 20:16). ‘Thou shalt not see the rivers, the
streaming floods, the brooks of butter and honey’ (Job 20:17). ‘All
darkness shall be hid in thy secret places, a fire not blown shall
consume thee.’ ‘This is the portion of a wicked man from God, and the
heritage appointed to him by God’ (Job 20:26-29).
And as they [the Scriptures] predict or prophesy what shall become of
the wicked; so also they plentifully foretell what shall happen to the
righteous, when he saith their desire shall be granted: of which more
anon. Only here I will drop this short hint, That the righteous have
great cause to rejoice; for what more pleasing, what more comfortable
to a man, than to be assured, and that from the Spirit of truth, that
what he desireth shall be granted? And this the righteous are assured
of here; for he saith it in words at length, ‘The desire of the
righteous shall be granted.’ This, then, should comfort them against
their fears, and the sense of their unworthiness; it should also make
them hold up their heads under all their temptations, and the affronts
that is usual for them to meet with in the world. The righteous! Who so
vilified as the righteous? He, by the wise men of the world, is counted
a very Abraham,[2] a fool; like to him who is the father of us all. But
as he left all for the desire that he had of a better country, and at
last obtained his desire; for after he had patiently endured, he
obtained the promise; so those that walk in the steps of that faith
which our father Abraham had, even those also in the end shall find
place in Abraham’s bosom; wherefore it is meet that we should cheer up
and be glad, because what we desire shall be granted unto us (Heb 6).
THE NATURE OF THE WORDS.
But I shall here leave off this short way of paraphrasing upon the
text, and shall come more distinctly to inquire into the nature of the
words; but my subject-matter shall be the last part of the verse, ‘The
desire of the righteous shall be granted.’ From which words there are
these things to be inquired into.
FIRST. What, or who is the righteous man? SECOND. What are the desires
of a righteous man? THIRD. What is meant or to be understood by the
granting of the desires of the righteous? ‘The desire of the righteous
shall be granted.’
[WHO IS THE RIGHTEOUS MAN?]
FIRST. For the first of these, namely, ‘WHAT OR WHO IS THE RIGHTEOUS
MAN?
My way of prosecuting this head shall be to show you, first, that I
intend a righteous man not in every sense, but in that which is the
best; otherwise I shall miscarry as to the intendment of the Holy
Ghost; for it may not be supposed that these words reach to them that
are righteous in a general, but in a special sense; such, I mean, that
are so in the judgment of God. For, as I hinted, there are several
sorts of righteous men that yet have nothing to do with this blessed
promise, or that shall never, as such, have their desires granted.
FIRST. There is one that is righteous in his own eyes, and is yet far
enough off from the blessing of the text: ‘There is a generation that
are pure’ or righteous ‘in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from
their filthiness’ (Prov 29:12). These are they that you also read of in
the evangelist Luke, that are said to trust ‘in themselves that they
were righteous, and despised others’ (Luke 18:9). These are set so low,
by this their foolish confidence, in the eyes of Jesus Christ, that he
even preferred a praying publican before them (Luke 18:13,14).
Wherefore these cannot be the men, I mean those righteous men, to whom
this promise is made.
SECOND. There are those that by others are counted righteous; I mean
they are so accounted by their neighbours. Thus Korah and his company
are called the people of the Lord, and all the congregation by them
also called holy, every one of them (Num 16:3,41). But as he who
commends himself is not approved, so it is no great matter if all the
world shall count us righteous, if God esteemeth us not for such: ‘For
not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends’
(2 Cor 10:18).
THIRD. There are those that indeed are righteous when compared with
others: ‘I came not to call the righteous’; ‘for scarcely for a
righteous man will one die,’ and the like, are texts thus to be
understood. For such as these are, as to life moral, better than
others. But these, if they are none otherwise righteous than by acts
and works of righteousness of their own, are not the persons contained
in the text that are to have their desires granted.
FOURTH. The righteous man therefore in the text is, and ought to be,
thus described: 1. He is one whom God makes righteous, by reckoning him
so. 2. He is one that God makes righteous, by possessing of him with a
principle of righteousness. 3. He is one that is practically righteous.
First. He is one that God makes righteous. Now, if God makes him
righteous, his righteousness is not his own, I mean this sort of
righteousness: ‘Their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord’ (Isa
54:17). God then makes a man righteous by putting righteousness upon
him—by putting the righteousness of God upon him (Phil 3:6-9). Hence we
are said to be made the righteousness of God in Christ: ‘For God hath
made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him’ (2 Cor 5:21). Thus God, therefore,
reckoneth one righteous, even by imputing that unto us which is able to
make us so: ‘Christ of God is made unto us—righteousness’ (1 Cor 1:30).
Wherefore he saith again, ‘In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be
justified and shall glory’ (Isa 45:25).
The righteousness then by which a man is made righteous, with
righteousness to justification of life before God, for that is it we
are speaking of now, is the righteousness of another than he who is
justified thereby. Hence it is said again by the soul thus justified
and made righteous, ‘The Lord hath clothed me with the garments of
salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness’ (Isa
61:10). As he also saith in another place, ‘I spread my skirts over
thee, and covered thy nakedness’ (Eze 16:8). This we call a being made
righteous by reckoning, by the reckoning of God; for none is of power
to reckon one righteous but God, because none can make one so to be but
him. He that can make me rich, though I am in myself the poorest of
men, may reckon me rich, if together with his so reckoning, he indeed
doth make me rich. This is the case, God makes a man righteous by
bestowing of righteousness upon him—by counting the righteousness of
his Son for his. He gives him righteousness, a righteousness already
performed and completed by the obedience of his Son (Rom 5:19).
Not that this righteousness, by being bestowed upon us, is severed from
Jesus Christ; for it is still his and in him. How then, may some say,
doth it become ours? I answer, by our being put into him. For of God
are we in Christ Jesus, who is made unto us, of him, ‘righteousness.’
And again, we are made ‘the righteousness of God in him.’ So then, the
righteousness of Christ covereth his, as a man’s garments cover the
members of his body, for we are ‘the body of Christ, and members in
particular’ (1 Cor 12:27). The righteousness therefore is Christ’s;
resideth still in him, and covereth us, as the child is lapped up in
its father’s skirt, or as the chicken is covered with the feathers of
the hen. I make use of all these similitudes thereby to inform you of
my meaning; for by all these things are set forth the way of our being
made righteous to justification of life (Matt 23:37; Eze 16:8; Psa
36:7).
Now thus a man is made righteous, without any regard to what he has, or
to what is of him; for as to him, it is utterly another’s. Just as if I
should, with the skirts of my garments, take up and clothe some poor
and naked infant that I find cast out into the open field. Now if I
cover the person, I cover scabs and sores, and ulcers, and all
blemishes. Hence God, by putting this righteousness upon us, is said to
hide and cover our sins. ‘Blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute sin’ (Rom 4:7,8). For since this righteousness is
Christ’s, and counted or reckoned ours by the grace of God, it is
therefore bestowed upon us, not because we are, but to make us
righteous before the face of God. Hence, as I said, it is said to make
us righteous, even as gay clothes do make a naked body fine. ‘He hath
made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him.’
This is of absolute necessity to be known, and to be believed. For
without this no man can be counted righteous before God; and if we
stand not righteous before God, it will benefit us nothing as to life
eternal, though we should be counted righteous by all the men on earth.
Besides, if God counts me righteous, I am safe, though in and of myself
I am nothing but a sinner, and ungodly. The reason is, because God has
a right to bestow righteousness upon me, for he has righteousness to
spare; he has also a right to forgive, because sin is the transgression
of the law. Yea, he has therefore sent his Son into the world to
accomplish righteousness for sinners, and God of his mercy bestows it
upon those that shall receive it by faith. Now, if God shall count me
righteous, who will be so hardy as to conclude I yet shall perish? ‘It
is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that
died, yea, rather that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of
God, who also maketh intercession for us. Who shall separate us from
the love of Christ?’ (Rom 8:33-35).
Thus therefore is a man made righteous, even of God by Christ, or
through his righteousness. Now if, as was said, a man is thus made
righteous, then in this sense he is good before God, before he has done
anything of that which the law calls good before men; for God maketh
not men righteous with this righteousness, because they have been, or
have done good, but before they are capable of doing good at all. Hence
we are said to be justified while ungodly, even as an infant is clothed
with the skirt of another, while naked, as touching itself (Rom 4:4,5).
Works therefore do not precede, but follow after this righteousness;
and even thus it is in nature, the tree must be good before it bear
good fruit, and so also must a man. It is as impossible to make a man
bring forth good fruit to God, before he is of God made good, as it is
for a thorn or bramble bush to bring forth figs or grapes (Matt
7:15,16).
But again, a man must be righteous before he can be good; righteous by
imputation, before his person, his intellectuals, can be qualified with
good, as to the principle of good. For neither faith, the Spirit, nor
any grace, is given unto the sinner before God has made him righteous
with this righteousness of Christ. Wherefore it is said, that after he
had spread his skirt over us, he washed us with water, that is, with
the washing of sanctification (Eze 16:8,9). And to conclude otherwise,
is as much as to say that an unjustified man has faith, the Spirit, and
the graces thereof; which to say is to overthrow the gospel. For what
need of Christ’s righteousness if a man may have faith and the Spirit
of Christ without it, since the Spirit is said to be the earnest of our
inheritance, and that by which we are sealed unto the day of redemption
(Eph 1, 4). But the truth is, the Spirit which makes our person good, I
mean that which sanctifies our natures, is the fruit of the
righteousness which is by Jesus Christ. For as Christ died and rose
again before he sent the Holy Ghost from heaven to his, so the benefit
of his death and resurrection is by God bestowed upon us, in order to
the Spirit’s possessing of our souls.
Second. And this leads me to the second thing, namely, That God makes a
man righteous by possessing[3] of him with a principle of
righteousness, even with the spirit of righteousness (Rom 4:4,5). For
though, as to justification before God from the curse of the law, we
are made righteous while we are ungodly, and yet sinners; yet being
made free from sin thus, we forthwith become, through a change which
the Holy Ghost works in our minds, the servants of God (Rom 5:7-9).
Hence it is said, ‘There is therefore now no condemnation to them which
are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the
Spirit’ (Rom 8:1). For though, as the apostle also insinuates here,
that being in Christ Jesus is antecedent to our walking after the
Spirit; yet a man can make no demonstration of his being in Christ
Jesus, but by his walking in the Spirit; because the Spirit is an
inseparable companion of imputed righteousness, and immediately follows
it, to dwell with whosoever it is bestowed upon. Now it dwelling in us,
principles[4] us in all the powers of our souls, with that which is
righteousness in the habit and nature of it. Hence the fruits of the
Spirit are called ‘the fruits of goodness and righteousness,’ as the
fruits of a tree are called the fruit of that tree (Eph 5:9).
And again, ‘He that doth righteousness is righteous,’ not only in our
first sense, but even in this also. For who can do righteousness
without he be principled so to do? who can act reason that hath not
reason? So none can bring forth righteousness that hath not in him the
root of righteousness, which is the Spirit of God, which comes to us by
virtue of our being made sons of God (1 John 2:19, 3:7; Gal 4:5-7).
Hence the fruits of the Spirit are called ‘the fruits of righteousness,
which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God’ (Phil
1:11). This then is the thing we say, to wit, that he that is made
righteous unto justification of life before God, is also habituated
with a principle of righteousness, as that which follows that
righteousness by which he stood just before. I say, as that which
follows it; for it comes by Jesus Christ, and by our being justified
before God, and made righteous through him.
This second then also comes to us before we do any act spiritually
good. For how can a man act righteousness but from a principle of
righteousness? And seeing this principle is not of or by nature, but of
and by grace, through Christ, it follows that as no man is just before
God that is not covered with the righteousness of Christ, so no man can
do righteousness but by the power of the Spirit of God which must dwell
in him. Hence we are said through the Spirit to mortify the deeds of
the body, which works are preparatory to fruitful actions. The
husbandman, says Paul, that laboureth, must first be partaker of the
fruit; so he that worketh righteousness, must first be blessed with a
principle of righteousness (2 Tim 2:1-6). Men must have eyes before
they see, tongues before they speak, and legs before they go; even so
must a man be made habitually good and righteous before he can work
righteousness. This then is the second thing. God makes a man righteous
by possessing him with a principle of righteousness; which principle is
not of nature, but of grace; not of man, but of God.
Third. The man in the text is practically righteous, or one that
declareth himself by works that are good; a virtuous, a righteous man,
even as the tree declares by the apple or plum it beareth what manner
of tree it is: ‘Ye shall know them by their fruits’ (Matt 7:16). Fruits
show outwardly what the heart is principled with: show me then thy
faith, which abideth in the heart, by thy works in a well spent life.
Mark how the apostle words it, We being, saith he, ‘made free from sin,
and become servants to God, have our fruit unto holiness, and the end
everlasting life’ (Rom 6:23).
Mark his order: first we are made free from sin; now that is by being
justified freely by the grace of God through the redemption which is in
Jesus Christ, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith
in his blood. Now this is God’s act, without any regard at all to any
good that the sinner has or can accomplish; ‘not by works of
righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy’ thus he
saveth us (Titus 3:5; Rom 3:24; 2 Tim 1:9). Now, being made free from
sin, what follows? We become the servants of God, that is, by that turn
which the Holy Ghost makes upon our heart when it reconciles it to the
Word of God’s grace. For that, as was said afore, is the effect of the
indwelling and operation of the Holy Ghost. Now having our hearts thus
changed by God and his Word, the fruits of righteousness put forth
themselves by us. For as when we were in the flesh, the motions of sin,
which is in our members, did bring forth fruit unto death, so now, if
we are in the Spirit, and we are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit,
if so be the Spirit of Christ dwells in us, by the motions and workings
of that we have our fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life
(Rom 8:6,9).
But now by these fruits we are neither made righteous nor good; for the
apple maketh not the tree good, it only declares it so to be. Here
therefore all those are mistaken that think to be righteous by doing of
righteous actions, or good by doing good. A man must first be
righteous, or he cannot do righteousness; to wit, that which is
evangelically such. Now if a man is, and must be righteous, before he
acts righteousness, then all his works are born too late to make him
just before God; for his works, if they be right, flow from the heart
of a righteous man, of a man that had, before he had any good work, a
twofold righteousness bestowed on him; one to make him righteous in the
sight of God, the other to principle him to be righteous before the
world. ‘That he might be called a tree of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord, that he might be glorified’ (Isa 63:3).
The want of understanding of this, is that which keeps so many in a
mist of darkness about the way of salvation. For they, poor hearts!
when they hear of the need that they have of a righteousness to commend
them to God, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, that is, of
that which God imputeth to a man, and that by which he counteth him
righteous, have it not in their thoughts to accept of that unto
justification of life. But presently betake themselves to the law of
works, and fall to work there for the performing of a righteousness,
that they may be accepted of God for the same; and so submit not
themselves to the righteousness of God, by which, and by which only,
the soul stands just before God (Rom 10:1-3). Wherefore, I say, it is
necessary that this be distinctly laid down. That a man must be
righteous first, even before he doth righteousness; the argument is
plain from the order of nature: ‘For a corrupt tree cannot bring forth
good fruit’: wherefore make the tree good, and so his fruit good; or
the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt (Luke 6:43).
Reason also says the same, for how can Blacks beget white children,
when both father and mother are black? How can a man without grace, and
the spirit of grace, do good; nature is defiled even to the mind and
conscience; how then can good fruit come from such a stock? (Titus
1:15). Besides, God accepteth not any work of a person which is not
first accepted of him; ‘The Lord hath respect unto Abel and to his
offering’ (Gen 4:4). To Abel first, that is, before that Abel offered.
But how could God have respect to Abel, if Abel was not pleasing in his
sight? and how could Abel be yet pleasing in his sight, for the sake of
his own righteousness, when it is plain that Abel had not yet done good
works? he was therefore first made acceptable in the sight of God, by
and for the sake of that righteousness which God of his grace had put
upon him to justification of life; through and by which also the Holy
Ghost in the graces of it dwelt in Abel’s soul. Now Abel being
justified, and also possessed with this holy principle, he offers his
sacrifice to God. Hence it is said, that he offered ‘by faith,’ by the
faith which he had precedent to his offering; for if through faith he
offered, he had that faith before he offered; that is plain. Now his
faith looked not for acceptance for the sake of what he offered, but
for the sake of that righteousness which it did apprehend God had
already put upon him, and by which he was made righteous; wherefore his
offering was the offering of a righteous man, of a man made righteous
first; and so the text saith, ‘By faith Abel offered unto God a more
excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was
righteous’ (Heb 11:4); that is antecedent to his offering; for he had
faith in Christ to come, by which he was made righteous; he also had
the spirit of faith, by which he was possessed with a righteous
principle; and so being in this manner made righteous, righteous before
God, and also principled to work, he comes and offereth his more
acceptable sacrifice to God. For this, all will grant, namely, that the
works of a righteous man are more excellent than are even the best
works of the wicked. Hence Cain’s works came behind; for God had not
made him righteous, had no respect unto his person, had not given him
the Spirit and faith, whereby alone men are made capable to offer
acceptably: ‘But unto Cain and to his offering, the Lord had not
respect’ (Gen 4:5).