And indeed if you search into the reason of it, you will be sa- tisfied, that the choicest of means can do nothing upon the heart, until Christ by his Spirit open it, because ordinances work not as natural causes do : for then the effect would always follow unless miraculously hindered ; and it would be equally wonderful, that all that hear should not be converted, as that the three children should be in the fiery furnace so long, and yet not be burned : no, it works not as a natural, but as a moral cause, whose efficacy depends on the gracious and arbitrary concurrence of the Spirit. " The wind " bloweth where it listeth," John iii. 8. The ordinances are like the pool of Bethesda, John v. 4. At a certain time an angel came down and troubled the waters, and then they had a healing virtue in them. So the Spirit comes down at certain times in the word, and opens the heart ; and then it becomes the power of God to sal- vation. So that when you see souls daily sitting under excellent and choice means, and remain dead still, you may say as Martha did to Christ of her brother Lazarus, Lord, if thou hadst been here they had not remained dead. If thou hadst been in this sermon, it had not been so ineffectual to them.
3. It implies the utter impotency of man to open his own heart, and thereby make the word effectual to his own conversion and salvation. He that at first said, " let there be light," and it was so, must shine into our hearts, or they will never be savingly en- lightened. * £ Cor. iv. 4, 6. A double misery lies upon a great part of mankind, viz. Impotency and Pride. They have not only lost the liberty and freedom of their wills, but with it have so far lost their understanding and humility as not to own it. But, alas !
* It must therefore be acknowledged, that such is our insufficiency of ourselves in all respects that the heavenly dpctrine cannot be unprofitable to us, or have its due effect, except so far as the Spirit both forms our minds to understand it, and our hearts ta submit to it. Calvin on this place.
136 THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE. SERM. X.
Man is become a most impotent creature by the fall ; so far from being able to open his own heart, that he cannot know the things of the Spirit, 1 Cor. ii. 14. cannot believe, John vi. 44. cannot obev, Rom. viii. 7. cannot speak one good word, Matt. xii. 34. cannot think one good thought, 2 Cor. iii. 5. cannot do one good act, John xv. 5. O what a helpless, shiftless thing is a poor sin- ner ! Suitably to this state of impotence, conversion is in scripture called regeneration, John iii. 3. a resurrection from the dead, Eph. ii. 5. a creation, Eph. ii. 10. a victory, £ Cor. x. 5. Which doth not only imply man to be purely passive in his conversion to God, but a renitency, and opposition made to that power which goes forth from God to recover him.
Lastly, Christ's opening the understanding imports his divine power, whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself. Who but God knows the heart ? * Who but God can unlock and open it at pleasure ? No mere creature, no not the angels themselves, who for their large understandings are called intelligencies, can command or open the heart. We may stand and knock at men's hearts, till our own ake ; but no opening till Christ come. He can fit a key to all the cross wards of the will, and with sweet effi- cacy open it, and that without any force or violence to it. These things are carried in this part of his office, consisting in opening the heart : which was the first thing propounded for explication.
Secondly, In the next place, let us see by what acts Jesus Christ performs this work of his, and what way and method he takes to open the hearts of sinners.
And there are two principal ways, by which Christ opens the understandings and hearts of men, viz. by his Word and Spirit.
1. By his word ; to this end was Paul commissioned and sent to preach the gospel, Acts xxvi. 18. " To open their eyes, and turn " them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to u God.'" The Lord can, if he pleases, accomplish this imme- diately ; but though he can do it, he will not do it ordinarily witta out means, because he will honour his own institutions. Therefore you may observe, that when Lydia's heart was to be opened, " there appeared unto Paul a man of Macedonia, who prayed him, " saying, come over into Macedonia, and help us," Acts xix. 9. God will keep up his ordinances among men : and though he hath not tied himself, yet he hath tied us, to them. Cornelius must send for Peter : God can make the earth produce corn, as it did at first, without cultivation and labour ; but he that shall now ex- pect it in the neglect of means, may perish for want of bread.
* He alone, whose throne is in heaven, has access into, and can instruct the heart.
SERM. X. THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE. 137
2. But the ordinances in themselves cannot do it, as I noted before ; and therefore Jesus Christ hath sent forth the Spirit, who is his Proreoc, his vicegerent, to carry on this work upon the hearts of his elect. And when the Spirit comes down upon the souls in the administration of the ordinances, he effectually opens the heart to receive the Lord Jesus, by the hearing of faith. He breaks in upon the understanding and conscience by powerful convictions and compunctions ? so much that word, John xvi. 8. imports, " He " shall convince the world of sin ;" convince by clear demonstra- tion *, such as inforces assent, so that the soul cannot but yield it to be so ; and yet the door of the heart is not opened, till he has also put forth his power upon the Avill, and, by a sweet and secret efficacy, overcome all its reluctions, and the soul be made willing in the day of his power. When this is done, the heart is opened : saving light now shines in it ; and this light set up, the Spirit in the soul is,
1. A new light in which all things appear far otherwise than they did before. The names Christ and sin, the words heaven and hell have another sound in that man's ears, than formerly they had. When he comes to read the same scriptures, which possibly he had read a hundred times before, he wonders he should be so blind as he was, to overlook such great, weighty, and concerning tilings as he now beholds in them ; and saith, Where Avere mine eyes, that I could never see these things before ?
2. It is a very affecting light ; a light that hath heat and power- ful influences with it, which makes deep impressions on the heart. Hence they whose eyes the great Prophet opens, are said to be " brought out of darkness into his marvellous light," 1 Pet. ii. 9. The soul is greatly affected with what it sees. The beams of light are contracted and twisted together in the mind; and being re? fleeted on the heart and affections, soon cause them to smoke and burn. " Did not our hearts burn within us, whilst he talked with " us, and opened to us the scriptures ?"