(3.) Faith overcomes the world by telling the soul that all things are its own. Says faith, This God is thy God, this Christ is thy Christ, this righteousness is thy righteousness, this promise is thy promise, this crown is thy crown, this glory is thy glory, these treasures are thy treasures, these pleasures are thy pleasures. * All things are yours,' saith the apostle, ' things present are yours, and things to come are yours,' 1 Cor. iii. 22. Thus the faith of the martyrs acted, and so made them victorious over a tempting and a persecuting world, Heb. xi. 35.
(4.) Faith overcomes the world by valuing the things of this world as they are. Most men overvalue them, they put too great a price
Rom. VIII. 32-34.] heaven on earth. 459
upon them, they make the world a god, and then they cry, ' Great is Diana of the Ephesians.' Oh but faith now turns the inside of all creatures outward, faith presents all worldly things as impotent, as mixed, as mutable, as momentary to the soul, and so makes the soul victorious. Faith makes a man to sde the prickles that be in every rose, the thorns that be in every crown, the scabs that be under every gown, the poison that is in the golden cup, the snare that is in the delicate dish, the spot that is in the shining pearl, and so makes a Christian count and call all these things, as indeed they are, ' vanity of vanities,' and so the believing soul slights the world, and tramples upon it as dung and dross. And lastly, •
(5.) Faith overcomes the world, by presenting Jesus Christ to the soul as a most excellent, glorious, and comprehensive good, as such a good that comprehends all good.^ Christ is that one good that compre- hends all good, that one thing that comprehends all things. All the beauties, all the rarities, all the excellencies, all the riches, all the glories of all created creatures, are comprehended in Christ. As the . worth and value of many pieces of silver is connected in one piece of gold, or in one precious jewel, so all the whole volume of perfections which is spread through heaven and earth is epitomised in Christ ; and the sight and sense of this makes the soul to triumph over the world. Faith presents more excellencies and better excellencies in Christ than can be lost for Christ, and so it makes the soul a conqueror.
I have been long upon these things, because they are of much weight and worth : I shall be the briefer in what follows. But before I leave this pomt, I shall give you these hints :
In the first place, I shall give you some hints concerning strong faith.
In the second place, I shall give you some hints concerning weak faith.
My design in both is, to keep precious souls from mistaking and fainting. Concerning strong faith, I shall give you these short hints :
(1.) The first hint. Strong faith will make a soul resolute in resist- ing, and happy in conquering the strongest temptations, Heb. xi. 3, &c., Dan. vi. 10, &c.
(2.) The second hint. It will make a man own God, and cleave to God, and hang upon God, in the face of the greatest difficulties and dangers, Rom. iv, 18, &c., Ps. xliv. 16-18. So Job will trust in God though he slay him. Job xiii. 15, 16.
(3.) The third hint. It will enable men to prefer Christ's cross be- fore the world's crown, to prefer tortures before deliverance, Heb. xi. 3, &c.
(4.) The fourth hint. Strong faith will make a soul divinely fear- less, and divinely careless ; it will make a man live as the child lives in the family, without fear or care, Ps. xxiii. 4. Dan. iii. 16, 'We are not careful to answer thee, O king ; our God whom we serve is able to deliver us, and he will deliver us,' &c. Micah vii. 7-9.
(5.) The fifth hint. Strong faith will make a man cleave to the promise when providence runs cross to the promise, Num. x. 29,
1 Omnia vita infidelium peceatum est, et nihil bonum tine aummo bono. — Augustine. There is no good without Christ, the chiefest good.
460 HEAVEN ON EAKTH. [ROM. VIII. 32-34;.
2 Chron. xx. 9-11. Ps. Ix. 6, 7, 'God hath spoken in his holiness,' saith David ; * I will rejoice : I will divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth. Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine,' &c.^ Though David was in his banishment, yet his faith accounts all his as if he had all in possession, and that because God had spoken in his holiness. His faith hangs upon the promise, though present providences did run cross to the promise, &c.
(6.) The sixth hint. Strong faith will make men comply with those commands that do most cross them in their most desirable comforts, Heb. xi. 8, 9, and x. 31< ; Gen. xxii.
Now, O precious souls ! you are not to argue against your own souls, that surely you have no faith, because that your faith doth not lead you forth to such and such noble things. Thou mayest have true faith, though thou hast not so great faith as others of the Lord's worthies have had.^
The philosophers say that there are eight degrees of heat : we dis- cern three. Now, if a man should define heat only by the highest de- gree, then all other degrees will be cast out from being heat. So if a man should define faith only by the highest degrees and operations of it, then that will be denied from being faith that indeed is faith, as I shall presently shew.
In the second place, I shall give you some hints concerning weak faith.
(1.) The first hint A weak faith doth as much justify and as much unite a man to Christ as a strong faith. It gives a man as much pro- priety and interest in Christ as the strongest faith in the world. The babe hath as much interest in the father as he that is of grown years. A weak faith gives a man as good a title to Christ, and all the precious things of eternity, as the strongest faith in the world. A weak hand may receive a pearl as well as the strong hand of a giant.' Faith is a receiving of Christ, John i. 12.
(2.) The second hint. The promises of eternal happiness and bless- edness are not made over to the strength of faith, but to the truth of faith ; not to the degrees of faith, but to the reality of faith. He that believes shall be saved, though he hath not such a strength of faith as to stop the mouth of lions, as to work miracles, as to remove mountains, as to subdue kingdoms, as to quench the violence of fire, as to resist strong temptations, as to rejoice under great persecutions, Heb. xi. 33-35. No man that is saved is saved upon the account of the strength of his faith, but upon the account of the truth of his faith. In the great day Christ will not bring balances to weigh men's graces, but a touch-stone to try their graces ; he will not look so much at the strength as at the truth of their graces.
(3.) The third hint. The weakest faith shall grow stronger and stronger. A weak believer shall go on from faith to faith. Christ is the finisher as well as the author af our faith^ Rom. i. 17, Heb. xii. 2. Christ will nurse up this blessed babe, and will not suffer it to be
> So Joshua and Caleb, Num. xiv. 22-24.