[4.] I shall add one proposition more, that this debt and obligation cannot be dissolved ; for as long as we depend upon God in being and operation, so long we are bound to God. Man hi\i\\ principmm etfintm, a principle upon which he dependeth, and an end to which he is appointed ; a superior to whom he is subject, and to whom he must give an account.
(1.) This power and right cannot be alienated by us, or vacated and made void by our sin ; we indeed sold ourselves for nought, but that
VeR. 12] SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIII. 31
was to our own loss, uot to God's : Isa. lii. 3. He hath a full right to command us to keep the law, whether we be faulty or innocent. A di'unken servant is a servant, though disabled to do his master's work ; no man's right can be vacated without his consent ; for the default of another doth not make void our right, especially if inferiors ; as the rebellion of the subject doth not exempt him from the power of his prince.
(I.) God doth not make it away by bestowing his gifts on the creature ; for he hath given us only dispensationem, the employment of these things ; not dominium, the sovereign power over them ; man hath nothing that is his own, but as he hath it from God, so for God ; as to life, man is not dominus vitce, but custos ; this is true not only of life, but of time, wealth, strength, parts, yea, of all that we have and are. There is a higher lord, to whom by the law of our creation we owe the debt of duty, love, and obedience ; and to whom we are account- able for the mercies of his daily providence ; and who hath an absolute and uncontrollable right in all that we have and are ; all our owning is but a stewardship : Luke xvi. 2. We have a right to prevent the encroachment of our fellow creatures, but not a right to exclude our accountableness and obligation to God ; we have a right by way of charge and trust, as a steward in things committed to him, or a factor in the estate consigned to his hands, or a workman in his tools and instruments, which the master giveth him to do his work withal; but not an absolute independent right ; they are not ours to use as we think meet. When God disposed his gifts, he did not dispossess himself ; as the husbandman doth not intend to throw away his seed, when he scattereth it in the furrows of the earth, but soweth it to receive it again with increase.
(3.) This right in us is so inherent in God, and proper to him, that God himself cannot communicate it to another ; for he hath told us that he will not give his glory to another; to make the creature independent, is to make it no creature. God is God still, and the creature is the creature still, obnoxious to the law of its creator, or else to his punishment for the breach of it. It implieth a contradiction that he should cut off the creature from dependence upon himself, and therefore from subjection to himself; while God is God, and we are creatures, there will be a debt due from us to him, because we depend upon him for our being and preservation ; our petty interests may be alienated, as a lord may make his vassal absolutely free, or a ))rince his subject ; as Saul proclaimed, that whosoever encountered Goliah, he would make his house free in Israel, 1 Sam. xvii. 25 ; that is, free from taxes, imposts, services in war, but not free from being a subject ; but no creature can be exempted from duty to God, or made free from his debt ; for dependence upon God, and our subjection to him, are so twisted together, tliat the one cannot be without the other ; we wholly depend upon him for being and all things else, and therefore we must be wholly subject to him. Well then, consider man in the order of creation, and he is a debtor to God, not to his own flesh ; bound to refer his service, strength, time, care, life, and love to him from whom he received them ; these are sound reasonings not to be reproved.
32 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIIL [SeR. XV.
2. By the condition of their spiritual being, so they are much more debtors to God : and therein consider, —
[1.] The foundation on whicli this new estate is built, and that is our redemption by Christ. This doth infer the debt mentioned in the text, whether we respect the state from whence we were redeemed, the price paid for us, or the end why we were redeemed. The state from whence we were redeemed, was a state of woful captivity ; from God's debtors we became Satan's slaves. Now if a captive were ransomed by another man's money, his life, service, and strength did belong to the buyer, ' for he is his money : ' E.Kod. xsi. 21. Christ hath bought us from a worse slavery, tlierefore all that we have belongeth to him ; we are debtors. So for the price that was paid for our ransom ; as from the worst slavery, so with the greatest price : 1 Pet. i. 18, ' We are not redeemed with corruptible things, such as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ' Now this maketh us debtors, and destroyeth all right and property in ourselves : 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.' Take in the end, and the argument is the more conclusive ; he hath redeemed us ' to God : ' Kev. v. 8 ; Rom. xiv. 4, ' For to this end Christ both died, and rose again, and revived ; that he might be Lord both of dead and living.' Well then, we are not to live as we list, but to live unto God ; not debtors to the flesh, to live after the flesh, but debtors to the Spirit, to be led by the Spirit of God ; ex ordinejusticice, justice requireth this, we are the Lord's.