JaS. IV. 4.] UPOK THE ErjSTLE OF JAMES. 313
Is enmify with God. — When you begin to please the world you Avage war against heaven, and bid open defiance to the Lord of hosts; the love of God and care of obedience is abated just so much as the world prevaileth in you. There is a like expression Rom. viii. 7, ' The carnal mind is enmity against God ; ' averse and adverse. So doth the world not only withdraw the heart from God, but oppose him. A man can hardly serve two masters, though of the same judgment ; but God and the world are opposite masters, they com- mand contrary things : 1 John ii. 15, ' If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him ; ' Mat. vi. 24, ' Ye cannot serve God and mammon.' They that match covetousness with profession seek to reconcile two of the most unsuitable things in the world.
Whosoever therefore. — General truths must be enforced by applica- tive inferences, and so they fall directly upon the soul : Job v. 27, ' So it is, hear it, and know it for thy good.'
Will he the friend of the luorld. — BovXrjdf] noteth the aim and serious purpose. All do not find the world to favour them ; do what they can, ' the world is crucified to them ; ' but they are not as Paul was, ' crucified to the world,' Gal. vi. 14. Therefore the scripture taketli notice not of what is in the event, but the aim. Besides, the serious purpose and choice discovereth the state of the soul ; he is also absolutely a worldly man that tvill be a friend of the world. So 1 Tim. vi. 9, ot jSovXofxevoi irXovrelv, ' they that will be rich.' In heavenly matters the deliberate choice and full purpose discovereth grace : Acts xi. 23, ' That with purpose of heart they would cleave to the Lord.' Therefore Christians should look to their purpose and aim. What is it ? What do you give your minds to ? When a man setteth himself to grow rich, to lay up treasures upon earth, he is a worldly man ; as when he giveth his heart and mind and whole man to do what God requireth, whatever cometh of it, he is a true servant of the Lord. To this purpose are those speeches of Solomon : Prov. xxiii. 4, ' Labour not to be rich ; ' that is, do not give up thy heart and en- deavours to find out and follow all ways to increase thy wealth and estate : so Prov. xxviii. 20, ' He that maketh haste to be rich,' &c., hath set up that for his purpose. Now this purpose of the soul may be known, partly by a resolute carrying on the end Avithout weighing the means and consequences ; partly by the diligence and earnestness of the spirit. When the end is fixed, we are patient of all labour, but impatient of check and disappointment.
7s the enemy of God. — Actively and passively ; it maketh a man hate God, and to be hated by God. Duty will either make us weary of the world, or the world will make us weary of duty. The children of God have experience of the one, and hypocrites of the other.
The points, besides those observed in the exposition, are these : —
Ohs. 1. That worldliness in Christians is spiritual adultery. It dis- solveth the spiritual marriage between God and the soul ; of all sins it is most unsuitable to the marriage-covenant, the covenant of grace, wherein God propoundeth himself to be ' all-sufficient,' Gen. xvii. 1, We have enough in God, but we desire to make up our hap- piness in the creatures; this is plain whoring : Ps. Ixxiii. 27, ' Thou hast destroved all them that go a whoring from thee ; ' that is, those
344 AN EXPOSITION, WITH NOTES, [JaS. IV. 4.
which sought that in the world which is only to be found in God. There are degrees in this whoredom. You know there may be adul- tery in aftection when the body is not defiled ; unclean glances are a degree of lust. The children of God may have some outrunning and straggling thoughts : when the devil is at their elbows, the world may be greatened in their esteem and imagination : ' Happy is the people that is in such a case,' Ps. cxliv. 15 ; but they presently correct themselves, and return to the bosom of God ; yea, rather, ' happy is the people whose God is the Lord.' In others there is a higher degree ; they settle those affections upon the world which are only due and proper to God, as their care, delight, desire, fear, hope, which should be kept chaste and loyal to Jesus Christ; yet there is still some profession. As a woman that is not contented with one husband, and yet still retaineth the colour and pretence of the first marriage : this is in hypocrites, who divide their hearts between God and the world. There are others who plainly leave the Creator for the creature, and prefer the world before God, the i)rofits and pleasures of it before communion with him in holy duties. To let the world share with God is an evil, but to prefer the world before God is an impiety. As a whorish wife preferreth every one before her own husband, so do the profane, who live as professed prostitutes: their love is wholly with- drawn from God as a husband, and their obedience from him as a lord : they ' love pleasures more than God,' 2 Tim. iii. 4. Well, then, check worldly inclinations ; when your hearts are too passion- ately drawn forth to present comforts and contentments, or when your thoughts are raised into too great admiration of them, or when worldly ease and })leasure hindereth and withdraweth you from duty, or are apt to prefer carn.al satisfaction before comn] union with G(xl, remember at such time this is adultery. You are not your own, but given up to God: 1 Cor. vi. 15, ' Know ye not that your bodies are members of Christ ? And shall I take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an liarlotH God forbid.' This love is Christ's; these admiring thoughts, these pains, time, care, earnestness, they are all Christ's ; and shall I give that wiiich is Christ's to the world ? God hath fenced us against outward atlultery by fear and shame : some countries punish it with whi))ping, others with death. There is base- ness and danger also in spiritual adultery. There is baseness; affec- tions are impure, s(j far as they are let out upon other things rather than God : shall I be an adulterer or an adulteress to (i^od ? Ifow will this expose me to the scorn of men and angels ? At the last day they will come pointing, as in Ps. Iii. 7, ' This is the man that made not God his strength, but trusted in the abundance of his riches ! ' This is a Gadarene, that loved his swine more than Christ, that preferred a game at cards before communion with God, a cup, a drunken meeting, before the house of God, &c. Spiritual harlots will not be able to look good men and angels in the face. Theie is danger in it too ; God is a jealous God. Whoring under the law was [)unislied with death: 'Every one that goeth a-whoring from thee wilt thou destroy.' There is nothing provoketh the Lord so much as this, that base things should be prefened l)efore him.