[4.] Since sin cannot challenge any just title to us, it is unques- tionably our duty to yield up ourselves to the Lord. Let us see in what manner it is to be done.
250 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VF. [SeR. XI.
[1.] It must be done witli hearty and full consent of will. la the covenant of grace God demandeth his right to be given him by your consent ; it is indeed a due debt, but it is called a gift : ' My son, give me thy heart,' Prov. xxiii. 20 ; because you become his people not by constraint, but by consent : Ps. ex. 3, ' Thy people shall be vs^illing ia the day of thy power ;' and therefore it is resembled to marriage, than which nothing should be more free and voluntary : Cant. ii. 16, 'lam my beloved's, and my beloved is mine.' Thus freely and willingly should we resign ourselves to him.
[2.] It must be out of a deep sense of his love and mercy : Eom. xii. 1, ' I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice,' &c. ; and especially his great love in Christ : 2 Cor. v. 14, ' For the love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge,' &c. There must be thankfulness in the resolution to become the Lord's, for no bands will so strongly hold us to our duty as the bands of love ; when the soul is filled with admirations of his grace, and the ravishing sense of the wonders of his love in Christ, we do most kindly, heartily, and thoroughly surrender ourselves to God.
[3.] It must be with grief and shame, that his right hath been so long detained from him, and that we have wasted so much of our time and strength in the service of sin : 1 Peter iv. 1-3, ' Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind ; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin, that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries.' Therefore we should the more earnestly make restitution. Oh ! how sad a thing is it to grow old and grey- headed in the devil's service, and to spend the fresh and flower of our time so vainly and unprofitably ! Alas ! how hath our time, strength, and parts been wasted and nnprofitably employed ! Let us at length seek to do as much for God as ever we have done for sin.
[4.] This resolution must be full and entire, of all that you are and have. All your faculties : 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20, ' Ye are not your own, ye are bought with a price ; therefore glorify God with your bodies and souls, which are God's.' All that the soul can do and the body can do, it is all due to God, and all to be devoted to him. In every state : Kom. xiv. 7, 8, * For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself ; for whether we live, we live unto the Lord, or whether we die, we die unto the Lord ; whether "we live therefore or die, we are the Lord's.' Whatever you are and have, you must have that and be that to God ; living, dying, sickness, health, in prosperity, in adversity, in every action : Zech. xiv. 20, 21, ' In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses Holiness to the Lord, and the pots in the Lord's house shall be like the bowls before the altar, yea, every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holiness to the Lord of hosts.' There must be God's impress on all we do, our civil and sacred actions. All reserves are hypocritical. What one faculty you keep back from God. you do what you can to cut it off from his blessing. Would you be contented if God should take the soul to heaven and leave the body
VeR. 13.] SERMONS UPON ROMANS VI. 251
in hell, or the contrary ? What estate is not given to God is not sanctified ; what action is not ordered towards him as our last end is not rewarded, so that you give all, or none rightly.
[5.] The end why we give up ourselves to God is to be governed, disposed, and ordered by him, to be what he would have us to be, and to do what he will have us to do, to submit ourselves to his disposing will, and subject ourselves to his commanding will.
(1.) To submit ourselves to his disposing will, or the dominion of his providence. Let God carry you to heaven in what way soever he pleaseth ; if by many afflictions, or sharp pains, and infirmities of body, you dare not prescribe to God. You must say, as Christ, Heb. x. 5, 6, ' A body hast thou prepared for me ; lo, I come to do thy will.' God is wise* and knoweth that if we had a more healthy body, we might be in danger of neglecting the soul ; or if we had more of the world, we should neglect heaven. Therefore you must except nothing out of your resignation ; better the body be pained than the soul lost ; the thorn that sticlceth in the flesh may occasion rich experiences of grace. It may be God will have you to glorify him by martyrdom : Phil. i. 20, ' Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death;' that is, either by living in the body to preach the gospel longer, or signing the truth with his blood, if he died. So see David's resignation : 2 Sam. xv. 26, ' Let the Lord do unto me what seemeth good to him.' So we should humbly submit to the good-will of God : Dan. iii. 18, ' But if not, be it known unto thee, 0 king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image that thou hast set up.' They yielded their bodies to be burned, that they might not serve any gods but the Lord.