Use 2. Let us provide for long sufferings. All colours will not liold as long as the cloth lasts. We need a great deal of grace, because we know not how long our great troubles may last. Sometimes sufferings are like to be long. First, When the cross maketh little improvement, carrieth little conviction with it. While the stubborness of the child continueth, the blows are continued. God will withdraw till they acknowledge their offence, Hosea v. 15. When we eye instruments, and pour our rage upon them ; or instruments are minded, and we hope to be delivered some other way, when we repent not. Secondly, When provocations are long : Deut. xxviii. 58, 59, ' If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law, that is written in this book, tliat thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, The Lord thy God ; then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance ; and sore sicknesses, and of long continuance.'
SERMON CXXXVL
Deal witJi thy servanl according to tliy mercy, and teach me thy statutes.— Yer. 124.
In this verse we have two requests — the one general, the other par- ticular; wherein he would have the Lord exercise his mercy to him. Show thy mercy to me in teaching me thy law. The one respects the privilege part of religion, the other the duty part; the one concerns time past, or the pardon of sin already committed, ' Deal with thy servant according to thy mercy ;' the other prevention of sin for the time to come, that I may perform my duty for the future, ' Teacli me thy statutes.' Mercy is the ground of his request ; teaching God's law the matter of it. He would have this gilt bestowed on him freely.
First branch, ' Deal with thy servant,' &c. Where we have —
1. His relation to God, thy servant.
2. The terms upon which he would have God deal with him : Not according to my works, but accordwg to thy mercy.
First, His relation is mentioned either — (1.) As a part of his plea, as if he had said. Lord, thou art merciful to all, for ' thy tender mercy is over all thy works,' Ps. cxlv. 9 ; much more to thy servants : now I am thy servant. God's servants have a special claim and interest in God ; besides his general bounty, they expect his special mercy and
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274 SERMONS UPON PSALM cxix. [Ser. CXXXVI.
iavour : Ps. cxvi. 1(5, '0 Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am thy servant, and the sou of thiuo handmaid,' Clear that, that you are some of God's servants once, and then you may the better expect your master's bounty. Or, (2.) To show his need of mercy though God's servant. ISuch an emphasis it seemeth to have : Ps. cxliii. 2, ' Enter not into judgment with thy servant;' non elicit cum hostibus tuis. He doth not say, Enter not into judgment with thine enemy, but witli thy servant. So hei-e David, that was God's servant, a man of singular holiness, desireth that God would deal witli him in mercy. From lirst to last, the saints have no other plea. Tlicodoret, on the text, observeth, o ToaavTrj'? dp£Tp]<i ipydrrj'; eXeou? Tv-)(elv, &C. — so great a, worker of righteousness beggeth to receive mei'cy, and looketh for all his salvation by mercy. And again, ovic diraiTel [xicrOov dWd (fnXav- dpooTTiav alrec — he doth not challenge a reward, but asketh favour and kindness.
Doct. That God's best servants have no other and no better plea than that God would deal with them in mercy,
1. Because there is and can be no merit on the creature's part towards God, according to the rule of justice. Adam in innocency could impetrare, not mereri ; it was his grace to covenant witli the creature, when innocency and purity did adorn our nature ; how much more since the fall, and the distance between God and us hath been so widened by sin ! What merits must be indehitum and utile. It must be indehitum : when our righteousness was perfect, yet still due by virtue of our relation to God as creatures ; and paying of debts deserveth no reward. The lawyers tell us, Nemo conseqiiitur prcc- mium, quod facit ex officio dchitum. We are bound, and do but our duty ; but God is not bound to us. All that the creature hath and is, and can do, it oweth to God, and hath received it from him ; and God is in such a degree of excellency above us that he cannot be obliged. Where there is so great a disparity of nature and being, there is no common right to make him obnoxious, to make it justice to any action of ours to reward us. Aristotle denied children could requite their parents, and merit from- them, and that the obligation of merit is only between equals ; certainly not between God and men. There was nothing which bound him necessarily to reward his creature but his free covenant. Again, that which merits must be tdile, profitable to him from whom we challenge reward. If we be never so righteous, the benefit is ours, not God's. He is not beholden to us, useth us not out of indigence, but indulgence ; not as if he needed anything, but we need his blessing : Lukexix. 10, ' When we have done all, we are unprofitable servants ; ' and Ps. xvi. 2, ' Our goodness extendetli not to thee,' God givcth all, recciveth nothing from us. The beam oweth all to the sun, the sun nothing to the beam.