3. As we ought not, on the one hand, to think God will supply our lusts, nor, on the other hand, distrust his care of necessaries, so we cannot be absolutely confident of particular success in temporal things ; for they are not absolutely promised, but with exception of the cross, and as God shall see them good for us. God reserved in the covenant a liberty both of showing his justice and his wisdom ; his justice, in scourging his sinning people : Ps. Ixxxix. 32, ' He will visit their iniquity with rods, and their transgression with scourges.' The world shall know God doth not allow sins in his own children. Sin is as odious to God in them as others, yea, more ; and therefore they feel the smart of it. The liberty of his wisdom: Ps. Ixxxiv. 11, 'The Lord God is a sun and a shield : the Lord will give grace and glory, and no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly ;' Ps. xxxiv. 9, 10, '0 fear the Lord, ye his saints, for there is no want to them that fear him : the young lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they that fear the Lord shall not want any good thing.' They may want many comforts, but no good thing. Good is not determined by our fancies, but God's wisdom. Well, then, we cannot expect a certain tenure of temporal happiness ; there is gi'cat danger in fixing a deceitful hope ; much of the subtlety of Satan is to be seen in it, w^ho maketh an advantage of our disappointments, and abuseth our rash confidence into a snare and temptation to atheism and the mis- belief of other truths.
4. The dependence we exercise about these things lieth in commit- ting ourselves to God's power, and referring ourselves to God's will. He is so able that he can secure us in his work, so good, that we should not trouble ourselves about his will, but refer it to him without hesi-
452 SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. [SeR. XL VIII.
tancy, which, if we could bring our hearts to it, it would ease us of many burdensome thoughts and troublesome cares : 1 Peter iv, 19, ' Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of Grod commit the keeping of their souls to him in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator ;' Prov. xv'i. 3, ' Commit thy ways unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established.' Put yourselves into God's hands, so trusting him with the issue of our affairs, though we know not how it will fall : 1 Chron. xix. 13, ' Let the Lord do what is good in his sight ;' 1 Tim. iv. 10, ' Therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the saviour of all men, especially of those that believe ;' and so are encouraged to go on cheer- fully with their duty. Trust in God is not idle expectation or a devout sloth, but such a dependence as giveth life to our service, that we may go on cheerfully, without disquiet in our work, and in ways wherein he hath appointed us to walk. The law gives protection to those that travel on the road, not in byways : ' He shall keep thee in all thy ways :' m viis, non in prcecipiiiis. Otherwise you seek to draw God into a fellowship of your guilt, and do ' make him serve with your iniquities,' Isa. xliii, 24 — he was doubly censured among the heathen that took a lamp from the altar to steal by — to make God's providence subservient to the devil's interest : 1 Peter iv. 19, ' Commit your souls to God in well-doing.' God never undertook to protect us in the devil's service.
Secondly, Keasons why it is our duty.
1. Trust, as it implieth recourse to God in our necessities, is neces- sarily required in the fundamental article of the covenant, in the choice of God for your God. Nature teacheth men in their distress to run to their gods : Jonah i. 5, ' The mariners cried every man to his god.' It immediately results from the owning of a God, that we should trust him with our safety ; much more when taught thus to do, and how to do so in the word.
2. Else there can be no converse with God. Truth is the ground of commerce between man and man ; so our dependence, which is built upon God's fidelit}'', is the ground of commerce between God and us. Man fell from God by distrust, by having a jealousy of him ; and still the evil heart of unbelief doth lead us off from God : Heb. iii. 12, ' Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.' But the more we believe him, the more we keep with him. God doth not give present pay- ment, nor govern the world by sense ; therefore faith is necessary : 2 Cor. V. 7, ' For we walk by faith, not by sight.' Sight is for heaven, faith for the present dispensation. We are now under sense, and that will mislead us. Keason is either refined by faith, or depressed by sense.