4. Our wills are slow and averse. It is not enough for a slow and dull servant to hear the commands of his master, but they must be often told him. We must be urged again and again, as Christ doth Peter. The heart is averse and deceitful ; we give a slight answer to the first demand, Will you do this lor God ? 2 Peter i. 12, 13, ' Where- fore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be stablislied in the present truth. Yea, I think it meet, as long as 1 am in this tabernacle, to stir you up, by putting you in remembrance.' Most men love to hear, as being greedy of novelty and speculation, expecting things that are rare
VeK. 16.] SEKMONS UPON JOHN XVII. 405
and less known. It is our duty to press things that are more known, to urge the will : 1 John ii. 21, ' I have not written to you, because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth ; ' not to acquaint them with new doctrine, but to urge them to steadfastness. All preaching is not to enlighten the understanding, but to gain the will, to stir you up again. Our affections are change- able ; heated water growetli cold again : we have need of the same truths to revive our frame. Our affections soon flag, as a bird cannot always keep upon the wing, and remembrance worketh not so much as present excitement. It were an excellent work to put you into the same frame again. Our corruptions and temptations daily arise ; we lose what we have wrought, we had need be quickened anew, put in mind again, that we may be kept in a good frame : 2 Peter iii. 1, 'This second epistle I now write unto you, in both which I stir up your pure mind by way of remembrance.' Secondly, It helpeth duties.
1. Meditation. The mind worketh freely upon such objects to wliich it is accustomed ; in things rare and seldom heard of there is more need of study than meditation, to search them out.
2. It helpeth application. We hear to do and practise, not only to know. We do not hear to store the head with notions, but that the life and heart might be bettered.
Use 1. Let it not be grievous to you to hear the same things pressed. Common truths are not too plain for our mouths, nor too stale for your ears. If you should hear the same sermon preached again, observe God's providence : ' A sparrow doth not fall to the earth without our heavenly Father.' Have I considered of this, meditated of it ? Doth not my heart need it again ? Sure there is somewhat in it that God directeth the minister to it again. Usually we come to hear sermons with an unmortified ear, and bewray an itch of novelty, as the Athenians, who loved to hear of new things. And this puts preachers upon ungrounded subtleties and quintessential extracts, and so the gravity and sobriety of religion is lost. Or else there is pride in it, as if they were above these common helps ; the most learned need a remem- brancer. Some will say. This I knew before ; they can teach me no more than I know already : 1 Cor. viii. 2, 3, ' If any man think that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know : but if any man love God, the same is known of him.' Dost thou practise what thou knowest ? This is a new hint from God to humble thee, to quicken thee. God seetli that I do not live up to my know- ledge, and therefore the same truth is returned. Pieachers should hear sermons, as prophets studied their own prophecies, as godly, as pro- phets; there is difference between the man and the pro])het. Or else for want of affection. In music, if a man hear an excellent lesson, he would hear it again; the second hearing is sweetest to a gracious heart. If it be grievous to any, it is to us that do more deeply consider it, and weigh it before it is brought. If it be not grievous to us, it is safe to you. It is a great wantonness and gluttony when men cannot endure to eat twice of one dish.
Use 2. It serveth to encourage you in your private exercises of rehearsing and meditation ; this is chewing the cud : Ps. Ixii. 11, 'God
406 SERMONS UPON JOHN XVII. [SeR. XXV.
hath spoken once, twice have I heard this, that power helongeth to God ; ' it was often revolved in the mind. The meat is taken into the month, and dij^estion is afterward. Repetition is the outward lielp, meditation the inward ; conscience preacheth over the sermon again to the heart.
Use 3. To ministers, not only to study new things, but to inculcate those that are of a common use : Jude 5, ' I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this.' We are not to content your curiosity, but to ])rovide for your benefit ; not to please the Athenian, but to profit the christian. We are not cooks, but physicians. People do not remember half we jireach, or they lose their affections. Christ often repeateth the same sentences, so do the apostles. You may repeat the same things, only with these cautions : —