imme-,

(4.) The life of faith is an HONOURABLE LIFE. is the honour of the favourite that he can go i diately to his prince, when strangers must trace the climax of court accesses. Yea, without all peradven ture, it is an honourable life to live as God himself liveth; and this is the glory of God, that he liveth in ནབས་ himself and of himself; and truly in their proportion, such honour have all his saints; they live in God and upon God here by faith; and they shall live in God and upon God hereafter by sight, in the beatifical vision. The saints have an aula a self-sufficiency, (as it were) within themselves. Prov. xiv. 14.

This is the excellency of the life of faith, and this the people of God experience by their sufferings, whereby God calls them out of the world, and taking them into himself, he doth reveal to them by degrees the mystery and privilege of living upon God, and upon God alone.

P

13. By afflictions and distresses GOD TAKES US OFF FROM SELF-CONFIDENCE, and teacheth us to TRUST HIM MORE, AND OURSELVES LESS.

This is the same with the former, save only that we speak now of trust in God, in opposition to confidence in ourselves, and not in others; a distemper that prevails much in our natures: ever since we rendered ourselves able to do nothing, nothing but sin,

r

<f ! {L

we think ourselves able to do any thing; we fancy to

E 2

+

ourselves a kind of omnipotence, when all our strength is to sit still: Naturally we are prone to entertain and nourish high presumptions of our own strength, and

of our own wisdom. 19 ɔ "barw of yang ito v

い

(1.) Of our own strength in our prosperity wo think ourselves able to carry any cross; we fancy ourselves strong enough to bear away even Samson's gates upon our shoulders, and prepared to encounter any. affliction in the world; but when the hour of 4 temptation comes, we find we are but like other men, and are ready to sink, with Peter, if but one wave riseth higher than another. Usually sufferings before they come are like a mountain at a great distance, which seems so small that we think we could almost stride over it; but upon nearer approaches, when we come to the foot of it, it appears as if it would fall upon us, and crush us in pieces. Peter is so big with love to Christ, that he will die with him rather than forsake him; yea, though all the rest should betake themselves to their heels, he will stand by him to the last drop of blood; and yet behold, when it comes to the trial, a weak silly damsel is able with a single question to fright him out of his confidence, and he doth not only forsake, but forswear his Lordon PENDLETON, in the book of martyrs, will fry out a fat body in flames of martyrdom, rather than betray his -religion; but when the hour comes that Christ and religion had most need of him, he had not one drop

And (2.) As we are prone to presume of our own strength, so we are very apt to idolize our own wisdom; to lean to our own understanding, and think by our policy to winde ourselves out of any labyrinth of trouble and perplexity: but we find it otherwise when we come into the snare, we then are forced to cry out with the church, He hath hedged me about that I cannot get out, he hath made my chain heavy : like a malefactor that hath broke out of prison, he thinks to run away, but he hath an heavy chain upon his heel, that spoils his haste; and being fenced in round about, he goeth to this corner, hoping to find some gap, but there he finds the hedge made up with thorns; and to another corner, and there also the briars stop him: but that is not all; read on in the church's complaint, and you shall find greater obstructions: He hath enclosed my ways with hewn stones. Suppose a man would venture the scratching of his flesh, to break through an hedge to save his life, yet that would not do, God had taken away the hedge, and built a wall instead of it; a wall so high that they could not clamber over, a wall so thick that they could not dig through. The meaning is, man in affliction thinks to make his way through by his own art and cunning, but upon the attempt he finds difficulties arising still higher and higher, so that when all is done, escape is impossible, without an immediate rescue by the arm of omnipotence. This was Paul's case-When we came to Asia, we were pressed out of

measure beyond strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life:* A great strait, in all probability it was that uproar at Ephesus, wherein Paul was like to have been pulled in pieces, for it was a trouble that befel him in Asia, (Acts xxiii. 10;) a strait wherein the apostle was at his wits end; we despaired even of life, i. e. we were bereft of all counsel how to expedite ourselves out of the danger. As David complains, Psalm xiii. 2, How long shall I take counsel in my soul? When he was persecuted by Saul, and beset with innumerable dangers, he took counsel; he thought of this means and the other means; cast about this way and that way how to escape, but in vain; all his counsels left him as full of sorrow and despair as they found him; How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart? He had his sorrow for his pains. Thus it was with the apostle, all his counsel left him in the hand of despair, We despaired even of life: his case was no other than the prisoner at the bar, at the time the sentence of death is passed upon him; he looks upon himself (and so do standers by) as a dead man; he is legally dead, dead to all intents and purposes of the law; there wants nothing but execution: so it was with Paul, We had the sentence of death in ourselves; the sentence was past in his own breast, and now saith Paul, I am but

* Ωστε εξαπορηθηναι ημας. Dicetur απορείθαι qui non novit quomodo sese ex aliqua difficultate expediat. BEZA:

a dead man. This was his strait, and it seemeth God had a design in it, and what was that? Himself will tell you we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead. See here the design is expressed negatively and affirmatively. Negatively, that we might not trust in ourselves: God saw even in that great apostle himself, a disposition to self-confidence, a proneness to be exalted above measure, through the abundance of revelations; and therefore as to prick the bladder of pride, God gave him a thorn in the flesh; so to work out this self-trust, God reduceth him to a -state of despair as to outward and visible probabilities.

Affirmatively, But in God which raiseth the dead": By this desperate exigence God would teach Paul ever after where strength and counsel were to be had in the like extremities; no where but in God and him abundantly: the God of resurrections can never be nonplust; he that can raise the dead, can conquer the greatest difficulty; he that can put life into dead men, can put life into dead hopes, and raise up our expectations, out of the very grave of despair; that God can put life into dead bones, is a consideration able to put life into a dead faith.

To this purpose it is very observable, that even those to whom God hath indulged the largest propor tions of faith and courage, he hath suffered not only to languish under fears, but even to despair under insupportable difficulties, before they could recover