rich lustre of your habits; and the bigger your circumstances are, the
more lovely is your humble attention to the ministers of Christ, and
your readiness to hear our words is the more commendable: But will ye be
hearers only, and never practice? The time is coming, and the hour makes
haste upon you, when ye shall stand upon the borders of the grave, and
look into that world of spirits, where all the honours and distinctions
of this world are known no more. Ye shall be stripped of those vanities
which ye loved above God and heaven. Think how mean and despicable a
figure your souls will make amongst fallen angels, if the love of this
world, and neglect of God should bring you into that dreadful company.
What gay and swelling figures soever you have made on earth, you will
make but a poor and wretched one in that world, if ye are found
destitute of the riches of grace; and it will be a mournful inscription
written on your tomb, “_This rich man died,——and he lift up his eyes in
hell_;” Luke xvi. 23. _But, beloved, we hope better things of you,
though we thus speak, and things that accompany salvation_; Heb. vi. 9.
Thus I have finished the first general exhortation, to those who have
any valuable qualities attending them, but through the love of this
world are tempted to neglect heaven.
The second exhortation is addressed to those who are weaned, in some
good degree, from this world, and have treasures in heaven, but are
defective in those good qualities which might render them amiable upon
earth. I confess I have no direct commission from my text to address you
here: But I am unwilling and ashamed that a rich young man should go to
hell with some more lovely appearances upon him than you have, who are
in the way to heaven.
You have chosen God for your eternal portion, and your highest hope; you
have chosen his Son Jesus for your only Mediator, and your way to the
Father: you have chosen the worship and the ordinances of God as your
dearest delight; ye are the chosen objects of the love of God, and his
grace has inclined you to love him above all things. Methinks I would
not have any blot cast upon so many excellencies. Be ye advised
therefore to seek after that agreeable temper and conduct which may make
you beloved of men too; that the wisest and best of men may chuse you
for an honour to their acquaintance and company. This will render your
profession more honourable, and make religion itself look more lovely in
the sight of the world.
What a foul blemish it is to our christianity, when we shall hear it
said, “Here is a man who professes the gospel of grace, but he does not
practise the decencies that the light of nature would teach him! He
tells us, that he belongs to heaven; but he has so little of humanity in
his deportment, that he is hardly fit company for any upon earth.” Shall
it be said of any of you, “Here is a man that pretends to the love of
God, but he is morose in his disposition, rude in his behaviour, and
makes a very unlovely figure amongst men? Let him fill what station he
will in the church, he bears but a disagreeable character in the house,
and disgraces the family or the city where he dwells. What his secret
virtues or graces are, we know not, for they shine all inward; he keeps
all his goodness to himself, and never suffers his light to shine out
amongst his neighbours.”
Can I bear that it should be said concerning me, “He seems indeed to
have something of the love of God in him, but he is so rough in his
natural temper, and so uncorrected in his manners, that scarce any man
loves him? He may bend his knees to God in prayer, but he has not common
civility towards men. His morality and honesty appear not upon him with
honour: His virtue does not seem to sit well about him, and his religion
is dressed in a very unpleasing form.” Is this the way to give
reputation to the gospel? Is this to _adorn the doctrine of God our
Saviour in all things_; Tit. ii. 10. When we become christians, we _put
away bitterness, and wrath, and clamour, and evil-speaking, and
filthiness, and scurrilous jests_; Eph. iv. 31. and v. 4. We are
commanded to _speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers_; but to be
_gentle, and shew meekness to all_; Tit. iii. 2. _to prefer one another
in honour; to bless, and curse not; to rejoice with them that rejoice,
and to weep with them that weep; to condescend to men of low estate;
and, if possible, to live peaceably with all men_; Rom. xii. 14, 15,
16-18.
Are there any souls here of this unpleasing character and carriage! Did
you ever read these words in your bibles? Do ye think these are the
commands of Christ, or no? You profess to love him above all, but what
care have you taken to obey these precepts of his? or do you think the
sublime practices of faith and adoration will make those lower duties
needless? Have ye found the sweetness of being at peace with God, and
tasted of the pleasures of his love; and can ye disregard all the
practices and pleasures of love and peace among men?
We are not required indeed to sell truth for peace, nor strict godliness
for the forms of civility. There is no need that we should conform
ourselves to any of the sinful practices of this world, in order to
fulfil the law of love. But wheresoever the customs of the place where
we dwell are consistent with the strict and holy rules of Christ, we
should practise them so far, as to render ourselves agreeable to those
with whom we converse, that we may shine in the world as the honours of
Christ, and that unbelievers may be won by our conversation, to come and
hear our gospel, to learn the same faith, and embrace the same hope: Not
only the things that are true, and honest, and just, and pure, but the
things that are lovely in the sight of men, and things that are of good
report, must be the subjects of our meditation, our learning, and
practice; Phil. iv. 8. St. Paul, that great apostle, did not think these
things unworthy of his care; he enjoins them upon the primitive
christians from his own example, and promises them the presence of the
God of peace. These are the things which I have taught you, saith he,
these ye have heard and seen in me; conform your manners to these rules,
and the God of peace shall be with you; ver. 9.
Believe me, friends, the natural habit of christianity is all decency
and loveliness: We put the religion of our Saviour into a disguise, and
make it look unlike itself, if our temper be sour and fretful, if our
carriage be coarse and rude, and our speech savour of roughness and
wrath. A Jew might make a better apology, for a harsh and severe
deportment, than a christian could do; he might put on a morose air with
better countenance, and plead the dispensation he was under, the bondage
of the law, and the terrors of mount Sinai. But we under the gospel, are
free-born; Gal. iv. 26-31. and our carriage should be ingenuous in all
respects. John the baptist, in his garment of hair, may be indulged in a
roughness of speech; he was but a forerunner of the gospel, and can
hardly be called a christian: but the followers of the Lamb should have
a mild aspect, a pleasing manner, that every one who beholds us may love
us too; that the Son of God, if he were here upon earth, might look upon
us and love us in both his natures, with a divine and human love.
Thirdly, The last address I would make to those who are furnished with
every good quality, and every divine grace, who are beloved by God and
men. Such a one was our Lord Jesus Christ in the days of his flesh: He,
from his very childhood, grew in wisdom, and in stature, and in favour
with God and man; Luke ii. 52. He had further discoveries of divine love
made to him daily: and as his acquaintance increased in his younger
years, so did his friends too, till his divine commission made it
necessary for him to oppose the corruptions of his country, and reform a
wicked age, and thus expose himself to the anger of a nation that would
not be reformed. There was something lovely in his human nature, beyond
the common appearance of mankind; for his body was a temple, in which
the godhead dwelt in a peculiar and transcendent manner, and his soul
was intimately united to divinity. I cannot but think, that, in a
literal sense, he was _fairer than the children of men_, and that there
was _grace in his lips_, and a natural sweetness in his language: Psal.
xlv. 2. If the Jews beheld _no comeliness in him, if his visage was
marred more than the sons of men_, it was because he _was a man of_
uncommon _sorrows, and acquainted with grief_; which might cast
something of heaviness or gloom upon his countenance, or wear out the
features of youth too soon. But surely our Lord, in the whole
composition of his nature, in the mildness of his deportment, and in all
the graces of conversation, was _the chiefest of ten thousands, and
altogether lovely_. How amiable are those who are made like him?
Such was John the beloved disciple; you may read the temper of his soul
in his epistles: What a spirit of love breathes in every line? What
compassion and tenderness to the babes in Christ? What condescending
affection to the young men, and hearty good-will to the fathers, who
were then his equals in age? With what obliging language does he treat
the beloved Gaius, in his third letter; and with how much civility, and
hearty kindness, does he address the elect lady and her children, in the
second? In his younger years, indeed, he seems to have something more of
fire and vehemence, for which he was surnamed _A son of thunder_; Mark
iii. 17. But our Lord saw so much good temper in him, mixed with that
sprightliness and zeal, that he expressed much pleasure in his company,
and favoured him with peculiar honours and endearments above the rest.
This is the disciple who was taken into the holy mount with James and
Peter, and saw our Lord glorified before the time; this is the disciple
who leaned on his bosom at the holy supper, and was indulged the utmost
freedom of conversation with his Lord; John xiii. 23, 24, 25. This is
the man who obtained this glorious title, _The disciple whom Jesus
loved_; that is, with a distinguishing and particular love. As God, and
as a Saviour, he loved them all like saints; but as man, he loved St.
John like a friend; John xxi. 20. and when hanging upon the cross and
just expiring, he committed his mother to his care; a most precious and
convincing pledge of special friendship.
O how happy are the persons who most nearly resemble this apostle, who
are thus privileged, thus divinely blessed! How infinitely are ye
indebted to God your Benefactor, and your Father, who has endowed you
with so many valuable accomplishments on earth, and assures you of the
happiness of heaven? It is he who has made you fair, or wise; it is he
who has given you ingenuity, or riches, or, perhaps, has favoured you
with all these; and yet has weaned your hearts from the love of this
world, and led you to the pursuit of eternal life: It is he that has
cast you in so refined a mould, and given you so sweet a disposition,
that has inclined you to sobriety and every virtue, has raised you to
honour and esteem, has made you possessors of all that is desirable in
this life, and appointed you a nobler inheritance in that which is to
come. What thankfulness does every power of your natures owe to your
God? that heaven looks down upon you, and loves you, and the world
around you fix their eyes upon you, and love you: That God has formed
you in so bright a resemblance of his own Son, his first-beloved, and
has ordained you joint-heirs of heaven with him; Rom. viii. 17.
Watch hourly against the temptations of pride; remember the fallen
angels, and their once exalted station; and have a care lest ye also _be
puffed up, and fall into the condemnation of the devil_. Walk before God
with exactest care, and in deepest humility. Let that divine veil be
spread over all your honours, that as you are the fairest images of
Christ, ye may be dressed like him too; for he who is the highest Son of
God, is also the holiest of the sons of men; he who is personally united
to the godhead, and is one with his Creator, is the humblest of every
creature.
HYMN FOR SERMON VIII.
_A Hopeful Youth falling Short of Heaven._
Thus far ’tis well: You read, you pray,
You hear God’s holy word,
You hearken what your parents say,
And learn to serve the Lord.
Your friends are pleas’d to see your ways,
Your practice they approve:
Jesus himself would give you praise,
And look with eyes of love.
But if you quit the paths of truth,
To follow foolish fires,
And give a loose to giddy youth,
With all its wild desires.
If you will let your Saviour go,
To hold your riches fast;
Or hunt for empty joys below,
You’ll lose your heaven at last.
The rich young man whom Jesus lov’d
Should warn you to forbear!
His love of earthly treasures prov’d
A fatal golden snare.
See, gracious God, dear Saviour, see
How youth is prone to fall:
Teach them to part with all for thee,
And love thee more than all.
Footnote 22:
This discourse was delivered at Tunbridge-wells.
SERMON IX.
_The Hidden Life of a Christian._
COL. iii. 3.—For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
THE FIRST PART.
Death and life are two words of a solemn and important sound. They carry
so much of force and moment in them, as must awaken mankind to
attention; and therefore the Spirit of God often uses them as metaphors,
to express things unseen and spiritual, and to describe the state both
of saints and sinners: So that all who are alive on the face of the
earth, in the language of scripture, are said to be dead too, but in
different senses. Those who are in a state of nature, and under the
power of sin, unpardoned and unsanctified, are dead in trespasses and
sins; yet they live the life of brutes in the lusts of the flesh, or the
life of devils in the lusts of the mind; Eph. ii. 1, 2. Those who are
recovered from the fall, and brought into a state of grace by the gospel
of Christ, are said to be dead also; that is, they are dead to sin; Rom.
vi. 11. and they are crucified, and so dead to the world; Gal. vi. 14.
The delights of sin are hateful to them, so that they allure them not to
forsake their God; and the lawful enjoyments of life are so far
tasteless to the saints, in comparison of the things of heaven, that
they have much less influence, than once they had, to tempt them away
from God, and from the practice of holiness.
It is in this sense the christian Colossians are said to be dead in my
text. But they have another, a new life, and that of a different kind;
such as is mentioned in this verse, and which is hid with Christ in God;
and it is this hidden life shall be the chief subject of my discourse.
These latter words of the text afford two plain and easy propositions or
doctrines.
I. That the life of a christian is a hidden life.—II. That it is hid
with Christ in God. Let us meditate on them in order.
Doctrine I. A christian’s life is a hidden life.—Here we shall, _First_,
Consider what is this life, which is said to be hidden. And, _Secondly_,
In what respects it is so.
_First_, What is this life of a christian which is said to be hidden?
Not the animal life, whereby he eats, drinks, sleeps, moves and walks;
this is visible enough to all about him. Not the civil life, as he
stands in relation to other men in the world, whether as a son, as a
father, a master, or a servant, a trader, a labourer, or an officer in
the state: For all these are public, and seen of men.
But the hidden life is that whereby he is a christian indeed; his
spiritual life, wherein he is devoted to God, and lives to the purposes
of heaven and eternity. And this is the same life, which, in other parts
of scripture, is called eternal; for the life of grace survives the
grave, and is prolonged into glory. The same life of piety and inward
pleasure, which begins on earth, is fulfilled in heaven; and it may be
called the spiritual, or the eternal life, according to different
respects; for it is the same continued life acting in different stations
or places, and running through time and eternity; 1 John v. 11, 12.
Eternal life is in the Son, and he that hath the Son, hath this life; it
is begun in him, he is already possessed of it in some degree.
As the life of the child is the same with that of the full-grown man; as
the same vital principles and powers run through the several successive
stages of infancy, youth and manhood; so the divine life of a saint,
begun on earth, runs through this world, through death, and the separate
state of souls; it appears in full-grown perfection, in the final
heaven, when the whole saint shall stand complete in glory. Thus the
spiritual life of a christian is eternal life begun; and eternal life is
the spiritual life made perfect.
If we would describe this life in short, it may be represented thus: It
is a life of faith, holiness and peace; a life of faith, or dependance
upon God for all that we want; a life of holiness, rendering back again
to God, in a way of honour and service, whatsoever we receive from him
in a way of mercy; and a life of peace in the comfortable sense of the
favour of God, and our acceptance with him through Jesus Christ. All
these begin on earth, and in this sense faith itself, as well as peace
and holiness, shall abide in heaven: we shall for ever be dependants,
for ever happy and for ever holy.
In a state of nature the man lived such a sinful and carnal life, that
was more properly called death; but when he becomes a believer, a true
christian, he is new created; 2 Cor. v. 17. hew-born; John iii. 3,
raised from the dead, and quickened to a new life; Eph. ii. 1, 5. which
is called being risen with Christ, in the verses before my text; Col.
iii. 1. And this very spiritual life, as the effect of our symbolical
resurrection with Christ, is the subject of several verses of the 6th
chapter to the Romans, whence I cannot but infer the same to be designed
here, _viz._ that the christian who is dead to sin, is risen with
Christ, and alive to God; as Rom. vi. 11. All the life that he lived
before, with all the shew and bravery of it, with all the bustle and
business, the entertainments and delights of it, was but a mere dream, a
fancy, the picture of life, a shadow and emptiness, and but little above
the brutes that perish. Now he lives a real, a substantial, a divine
life, a-kin to God and angels, and quite of a different nature from what
the men of this world live.
There is this difference indeed which the scripture makes between the
spiritual life and the eternal. The first chiefly respects the
operations of the soul, for the life of the body is not immortal here:
the second includes soul and body too, for both shall possess
immortality hereafter. The first is attended with many difficulties and
sorrows; the second is all ease and pleasure. The first is represented
as the labour and service: the last, as the great, though unmerited,
reward; Gal. vi. 8. He that soweth to the Spirit, and fulfils the duties
of the spiritual life, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. The
one is the life of holiness and inward peace, though mingled with many
defects, and surrounded with a thousand disadvantages and trials: the
other, is the same life of holiness and peace, having surmounted every
difficulty, shining and exulting in full joy and glory.
_Secondly_, We come to consider, in what respect this life may be called
a hidden life.
And here I shall distinguish that part of it, which is more usually
called the spiritual life, and is exercised in this world, from that
which is more frequently called life eternal, and belongs rather to the
world to come: and then I shall make distinct inferences from the
consideration of each.
Now let us consider wherein the spiritual life is said to be hidden.
I. The acts and exercises of it are secret and unknown to the public
world. The saint is much engaged in the important and hidden concerns of
his divine life; and his converse is with God and Christ, who dwell in
the world of invisibles.
Who knows the secret transactions between God and the soul of a
christian, when he first entered into covenant with God, through Christ
the Mediator, and began this happy life? Who can tell the inward
workings of his spirit towards Jesus Christ his Lord in the first
efforts of his faith, and embraces of our Saviour? Who was acquainted
with the secret sorrows of his soul, when he was first set a mourning
for his past sins, and humbled himself in bitterness before God; Or who
can express the surprizing delight, and secret satisfaction he felt at
heart, when God communicated to him the first lively hope of forgiveness
and divine salvation? O the unknown joys of such an hour which some
christians have experienced, when a divine beam of light shone into
their souls, and revealed Jesus Christ within them, as St. Paul speaks:
when they saw his all-sufficiency of righteousness and grace, to answer
their infinite necessities; and when they durst believe in him as their
Saviour!
And as the beginnings of this life are hidden from the world, so the
exercises and progress of it are a secret too. While the world is
following after idols and vanity, the christian, in his retired chamber,
breathes after his God and his Redeemer, and gives a loose to his
warmest affections, in the pursuit of his Almighty Friend, and his best
beloved. While the men of this world are vexing their spirits, and
fretting under present disappointments, he dwells in a lonesome corner,
mourning for his sins and follies. And at another time, while the
children of vanity grow proud in public, and boast of their large
possessions, and inheritances, he rejoices in secret, in the hope of
glory, and takes divine delight in the fore-thought of his better
inheritance among the saints: his conversation is in heaven; _Phil._
iii. 20.
I might run through all the exercises of the sanctified affections, and
the various parts of the divine worship, and of the conduct of a saint
among the children of men. With what humble fear does he entertain the
mention of the name of God? With what deep self-abasement, and inward
adoration? At the presence of sin how is his anger stirred? and his holy
watchfulness when temptations appear? how does he labour and wrestle,
fight and strive, lest he be overcome by the secret enemies of his soul?
And as his bitterness of heart is unknown to the world, so _a stranger
intermeddles not with his joy_; Prov. xiv. 10. He feeds on the same
provision which his Lord Jesus did on earth, for it his meat and his
drink to do the will of his Father which is in heaven; This is a feast
to the christian, which the world knows not of; John iv. 32, 34.
II. The springs and principles of this life are hidden and unknown to
the world; and therefore the world esteems many of the actions of a true
christian very strange and unaccountable things, as we shall shew
afterward, because they see not the springs of them.
The word of God, or the gospel, with all the hidden treasures of it, is
the chief instrument, or means, whereby this divine life is wrought and
supported in the soul. The true christian beholds the purity of God in
the precepts; he reads grace, heaven, and glory, in the promises; he
sees the words of the bible in a divine light, and feeds sweetly on the
hidden blessings of scripture, deriving life, and nourishment, and joy
from it; whereas the carnal world go not far beyond the letters and
syllables. The gospel, which is all light and glory to a saint, is
hidden to them that are lost; 2 Cor. iv. 3. This same gospel is written
in the heart of a christian, and is the principle of his life there.
This is immortal and incorruptible, the seed of the word abiding in the
heart; the image of the eternal God, drawn out in such characters as our
nature can bear: For the written word is a transcript of God’s holiness;
and when it is inwrought into all the powers of a believing soul, it
becomes a vital principle within him for ever. A believer is, as it
were, cast in the very mould of the gospel; so the word signifies; Rom.
vi. 17. This is the word hidden in the heart, that secures the saint
from sin; Ps. cxix. 11.
The motives and springs that awaken a christian to keep up, and maintain
this spiritual life, are things hidden from the eyes of the world;
things eternal and invisible, 2 Cor. iv. 18. _While we look not at the
things that are seen, that are temporal; but at the things that are
unseen, and eternal_; we then count the joys or sorrows of this world,
things of little importance; then we live like christians, and the life
of our Lord Jesus is manifested, or copied out, in our lives; as ver.
10, 11.