whelmed with fears from the greatness of their sins, may see and read what God hath done for these, and be relieved and comforted with these examples, ' by God intended to be as a memorial of what he had done for others in time past, and a sign what he can still do, yea, will, for the greatest sinners to the world's end, upon their repentance and faith. No sins, though as great and many as the waters of Jordan themselves, shall be able to stand before the mercy of God's gracious covenant, but shall all be cut off, and everlastingly pardoned to them. O ! wlio can read of a Manasseh, a Magdalen, a Saul, yea, an Adam, who undid himself and a whole world with him, in the roll of pardoned sinners, and yet turn av.^ay from the promise, out of fear there is not mercy enough in it to serve his turn? These are as land-marks, which shew what large boundaries mercy hath set to itself, and how far it hath gone, even to take into its pardon- ing arms the greatest sinners, that make not themselves incapable thereof by final impenitency. It were a healthful walk, poor, doubting Christian, for thy soul to go this circuit, and often to see where the utmost stone is laid and boundary set by God's pardoning mercy, farther than which he will not go; that thou mayest not turn, to the prejudice of the mercy of God, by thy own unbelief, nor suffer thyself to be abused by Satan's lies, who will make nothing to remove God's land-mark, if he may by it but increase thy trouble of spirit. But if after all this, thy sins seem to exceed the proportion of any one thou canst find pardoned in Scripture, which were strange; yet faith hath one way left beyond all these examples, for thy soul's siiccour, and that is, to fix thy eye on Christ, who, though he never had sin of his own, yet laid down his life to procure pardon for all the elect, and hath obtained it : they are all, and shall, as they come upon the stage, be pardoned. Now, saith faith, suppose thy sins were greater than any of the saints'; yet are they as great as all the sins of all the elect together? Thou darest not surely say or think so. And cannot Christ pro- cure thy pardon, who art but an individual, when he hath done it for so many mil- lions of his elect? Yea, were thy sins as great as all theirs are, the sum would be the same ; and God could forgive it, if it lay in one heap, as well as now it is in several. Christ is 'the Lamb, that taketh away the §in of the world;' John i. 29. See here all the sins of the elect world, and he carries it lightly away into the land of forgetfulness. Now, faith will tell thee, poor soul, that the whole virtue and merit of Christ's blood, by which the world was redeemed, is offered to tliee, and shall be communicated to thy soul in particular. Christ doth not retail and parcel out his blood, some to one and some to another, but he gives his whole self to the faith of every believer : all is yours, you are Christ's. O, what mayest thou not, poor soid, take up from the promise, upon the credit of so great a Redeemer !
CHAPTER XXI.
faith's TniUD ANSWER TO SATAn's ARGUMENT, URGING THE SOUL TO DE- SPAIR; WHERE FAITH OPPOSETH THE GREATNESS OF THIS ONE SIN OF DESPAIR TO THE GREATNESS OF THE REST.
Thirdly. Faith to quench this fiery dart, headed with the greatness of sin, and shot by Satan to drive the penitent soul to despair, teacheth him to oppose the greatness of this one sin of despair to the greatness of all his other sins. What, saith faith, would Satan persuade thee, because thou hast been so great and prodigious a sinner, therefore not to believe, or dare to think the promise hath any good news for thee ? Retort thou, O my soul, his argument upon himself, and tell him, that the very thing by which he would dissuade thee from believing, doth mvich more deter thee from despairing; and that is, the great- ness of this sin above all others. Grant it to be true what he chargeth thee with, that thou art such a monster in sin as he sets thee forth, (though thou hast no reason to think so upon his bare report,) dost thou think to mend the matter, or better thy condition by despairing ? Is this all the kindness he will shew thee, to make thee, of a great sinner, a desperate one like himself? This, indeed, is the only way he can think of to make thee worse than thou art ; and that this is true, faith is able to prove by these four considerations, which will easily evince more malignity to be in this one sin of despair than in any other, yea, than in all others together.
ABOVE ALL, TAKING THE SHIELD OF FAITH. 509