[2.] Their life is hidden : Col. iii 3, ' Our life is hidden with Christ in God.' Hidden not only in point of security, as maintained by an invisible power ; but in point of obscurity ; there is a veil upon it. How so ? Partly, because the spiritual life is hidden under the veil of the natural life ; it is a life within a life ; the spiritual life is nothing else but the natural life sublimated, and overruled to higher and nobler ends: Gal. ii. 20, 'I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God.' They live in the flesh, but they do not live after the flesh. The children of God eat, and drink, and sleep, and marry, and give in mar- riage, as others do ; for when they are converted they do not divest themselves of the interests and concernments of flesh and blood ; but all these things are governed by grace, and carried on to eternal ends ; the grace now, or vital principle that rnleth this life is not seen, though the effects appear. Partly, Because of the veil of afflictions, outward meanness, and abasement, Heb. xi. 37, 38. The world was not worthy of them ; yet they wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, and the dens and caves of the earth. Who would think that so much worth should lie hid under a base outside? Would any judge that these lived in the highest favour of God, and constant communion with him, who had so little of his protection and common bounty ? That they should have so near a relation to God, and yet be so miserably poor and destitute? That those that want bread should be heh-s of a kingdom ? Jam. ii. 5. That they that feel the hand of God upon them so heavy and smart sometimes, should have so much of his heart? Partly under the veil of reproaches and calumnies: 1 Pet. iv. 6, ' They are judged according to men in the flesh, yet live to God in the spirit.' They ai'e presented in the world as a company of dissemblers and hypocrites, and yet in the meanwhile are the sincere servants and children of God : 2 Cor. vi. 8, ' As deceivers, and yet true ; ' the world counteth them deceivers, but God counteth them faithful. By the reproach of the world, as husbandmen by soil and dung, God maketh his heritage the more fruitful ; those that have a mind to hate will take up every prejudice against the people of God, and will not easily be dis- possessed of it. And partly, because there is another veil Vipon good christians, and that is the veil of infirmities, by which they often quench the vigour and obscure the glory of that life which they have, whilst they show forth too much of Adam and too little of Jesus. And so the spiritual life is carried on darkly, and in a riddle : Jam. iii. 2, ' In many things we offend all.' Certainly if our privileges be hidden, yet our graces should appear in their fruits and effects. Little of our happiness will be seen in this world, yet our holiness should be apparent and visible: 2 Thes. i. 11, 12, 'Wherefore also we pray always for you, that our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfil all the good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of laith with power ; that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God, and the Lord
152 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIII. [SeR. XXVII.
Jesus Christ,' If your condition be obscured and darkened bj' afflic- tions, it should not be obscured and darkened by sins ; a perpetual tenor of happiness we cannot expect in a changeable world ; yet by a constant course of holiness, we should plainly distinguish ourselves from those that will perish in the common apostasy and. defection of mankind. But alas ! God's children are not so cautious but that they border too near the world ; and though there should be such a broad diflFerence that the children of God may be manifestly distinguished from the children of the devil, 1 John iii. 10, yet too nuich of the influence of the evil s])irit remaineth with us, and is bewrayed by us upon all occasions. Yet there is a generation of men that row against the stream of flesh and blood : 1 Pet. iv. 4, ' Wherein they think it strange that you run not with them into the same excess of riot."
[3.] Hidden as to their privileges, and the glory of their estate. Many of God's children being mean, and low, and indigent, oppressed by the world, harassed with sundry calamities and afflictions, it doth not appear that we have such a great and glorious Father. Now we are stained with sin, blackened with sufferings, there is no visible appearance of our great dignity and prerogative. There must be a dis- tinction between earth and heaven ; our filiation in the world to come is another thing to what it is in this world ; for then their glory shall be manifest: Col. iii. 4, 'When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.' For the present, oiu' glory is spiritual and future : First, it is spiritual, and maketh no fair show in the flesh, as the image of God is an internal thing ; as ' the king's daughter is glorious within,' Ps. xlv. 13. . It lieth not in great revenues and pomp of living, but a plentiful participation of gifts and graces ; their comforts are spiritual, known by feeling rather than by report : Phil. iv. 7, ' The peace of God, which passeth all understand- ing,' Rev. ii. 17, ' To him that overcometli will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.' God's children are not utterly abandoned and left to the will of men ; the protection of God's providence is a mystery and riddle to the world, that must have all things under the view of sense : Ps. xxxi. 20, ' Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pride of man ; thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues ;' and Ps. xci. 1, ' He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty ; ' Job. xxix. 4, ' As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle.' God keepeth them, and maintaineth them, nobody knoweth how ; there is a secret and visible blessing goes along with them ; as others are blasted by an invisible curse. And secondly, it is future. The time of our perfection and blessedness is not yet come, and we cannot for the present judge of it, nor the world imagine what it shall be ; they do not consider the end of things, but look all to the present ; for the present they find the saints miserable ; and those that are dead, the world taketh them for lost: 1 Cor. xv. 1.9, 'If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.' They that are worse used by other men, have little advantage by Christ