Wilt thou forsake all thy pleasures, merry company, and sensible comforts, to live a sad, retired, pensive life ? Wilt thou beggar and undo thyself, let go all thy comforts in hand, for an hope of that which thine eyes never saw, nor hast thou any certainty that it is any more than a fancy ! Wilt thou that hast lived in reputation and credit all thy life, now become the scorn and contempt of the world ? Thinkest thou thyself able to live such a strict, severe, mor- tified, and self-denying life, as the word of God requires ? And what if persecution should arise, (as thou mayest expect it will,) canst thou forsake father and mother, wife and children, yea, and give up thine own life too, to a cruel and bloody death ! be advised better, before thou resolve in so important a matter. What think- est thou of thy forefathers, that lived and died in that way thou art now living ? Art thou wiser than they ? Do not the generality of men walk in the same paths thou hast hitherto walked in ? If this way lead to hell, as thou fearest it may, think then how many millions of men must perish as well as thyself; and is such a sup- position consistent with the gracious and merciful nature of God ? Besides, think what sort of people those are, unto whom thou art about to join thyself in this new way ? Are there not to be found among them many things to discourage thee, and cool thy zeal ? They are generally of the lower and baser sort of men, poor and despicable : Seest thou not, though their profession be holy, how earthly, carnal, proud, factious, and hypocritical, many of them are found to be ! And doubtless, the rest are like them, though their hypocrisy be not yet discovered. •
O what stands and demurs, what hesitations and doubts, is the soul clogged with in its way to Christ ! But yet none of these can withhold' and detain the soul when the Father draws : Greater then is he that is in us, than he that is in the world. And thus you see the nature, manner, and efficacy of divine drawings, and how impossible it is for any soul to come to Christ without them.
The inferences and improvements of the point follow.
Inference 1. How deeply and thoroughly is tlie nature of man corrupted, and what an enemy is every man to his own happiness* that he must be drawn to it? John v. 40. "You will not come " unto me, that ye might have life.^
Life is desirable in every man's eyes, and eternal life is the most
80 THE METHOD OF GRACE. SERM. IV.
excellent : yet, in this, the world is rather agreed to die and perish for ever than come to Christ for life. Had Christ told us of fields and vineyards, sheep and oxen, gold and silver, honours and sensual pleasures, who would not have come to him for these ? But to tell of mortification, self-denial, strictness of life, and sufferings for his sake, and all this for an happiness to be enjoyed in the world to come, nature will never like such a proposition as this.
You see where it sticks, not in a simple inability to believe, but in an inability complicated with enmity ; they neither can come, nor will come to Christ. It is true, all that do come to Christ, come willingly ; but thanks be to the grace of God, that hath freed and persuaded the will, else they never had been willing to come. Who ever found his own heart first stir and move towards Christ ? How long may we wait and expect before we shall feel our hearts naturally burn with desires after, and love to Jesus Christ?
This aversion of the will and affections from God is one of the main roots of original sin. No argument can prevail to bring the soul to Christ, till this be mastered and overpowered by the Fa- ther's drawing. In our motions to sin we need restraining, but in all our motions to Christ we as much need drawing. He that comes to heaven may say, Lord, if I had had mine own way and will, I had never come here : if thou hadst not drawn me, I should never have come to thee. O the riches of the grace of God ! Oh unpa- ralleled mercy and goodness ! not only to prepare such a glory as this for an unworthy soul, but to put forth the exceeding great- ness of thy power, afterwards to draw an unwilling soul to the enjoyment of it.
Infer. 2. What enemies are they to God and the souls of men, that do all they can to discourage and hinder the conversion of men to Christ? God draws forward, and these do all that in them lies to draw backward, L e. to prejudice and discourage them from coming to Jesus Christ in the way of faith : this is a direct opposition to God, and a plain confederacy with the devil.
O how many have been thus discouraged in their way to Christ by their carnal relations, I cannot say friends ! Their greatest ene- mies have been the men of their own house. These have pleaded (as if the devil had hired and fee'd them) against the everlasting welfare of their own flesh. O cruel parents, brethren, and sisters, that jeer, frown, and threaten, where they should encourage, assist, and rejoice ! Such parents are the devil's children. Satan chuses such instruments as you are, above all others, for this work : he knows what influence and authority you have upon them, and over them ; and what fear, love, and dependence they have for
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you, and upon you ; so that none in all the world are like to manage the design of their damnation so effectually, as you are like to do.
Will you neither come to Christ yourselves, nor suffer your dear relations that would ? Had you rather find them in the ale-house than in the closet ? Did you instrumentally give them their being, and will you be the instruments of ruining for ever those beings they had from you ? Did you so earnestly desire children, so ten- derly nurse and provide for them ; take such delight in them ; and, after all this, do what in you lies to damn and destroy them ! If these lines shall fall into any such hands, O that God would Bet home the conviction and sense of this horrid evil upon their hearts.
And no less guilty of this sin are scandalous and loose professors, who serve to furnish the devil with the greatest arguments he hath to dissuade men from coming to Christ ; it is your looseness and hypocrisy by which he hopes to scare others from Christ. It is said, Cant. ii. 7. " I charge you by the roes and hinds of the field, " that ye stir not up, nor awake my beloved till he please."
Roes and hinds, like young converts and comers towards Christ, are shy and timorous creatures, that start at the least sound, or yelp of a dog, and fly away. Take heed what you do in this case, lest you go down to hell under the guilt of damning more souls than your own.
Infer. 3. Learn hence the true ground and reason of those strange, amazing, and supernatural effects, that you behold and so admire in the world, as often as you see sinners forsaking their pleasant, pro- fitable corruptions and companions, and embracing the ways of Christ, godliness, and mortification.