4. Faith reasoneth and argueth in a most powerful and prevailing way, with such arguments that a believer cannot say nay to them. It reasoneth partly fi-om what is past, and so all its arguments are dipped in love, or a sense of God's kindness to us in Christ, and then they must needs be forcible : Titus ii. 11, 12, ' For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men, teaching us, that deny- ing ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world ; ' and Gal. v, 6, ' Faith worketh by love ;' and Eom. xii. 1, * I beseech you, by the mercies of God/ &c. Faith sets love to plead for God, and love beareth all before it : 2 Cor. V. 14?, ' The love of Christ constraineth us ; ' so in the text, ' Who loved me, and gave himself for me.' There is nothing like the pleadings of faith ; he left heaven for our sakes, and took a body, and endured a cursed death, and is gone to heaven to plead our cause with God ; he hath pardoned so many sins, and what wilt thou then not do for him ? Faith will take no repulse. And then faith reasoneth forward, partly fi"om hope, and partly from fear. From the eternal recompenses ; no hopes equal to the rewards it proposeth, no fears comparable to the terrors it representeth , no pleasure like the joys of heaven, no terrors like the torments of hell ; and so looking into the world to come, it breaketh the violence of every contrary inclination : 2 Cor. iv. 17, ' For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory,' and so quickens the soul to follow hard after God, and overcometh the world, the great hindrance of keeping the commandments : 1 John v. 4, ' This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.'
IV. What shall we do, that faith may have such an influence upon us?
1. Consider how just it is for God to command, and how reasonable it is we should obey the supreme being ; his will is the reason of all things, and who should give laws to the world but the universal sovereign, who made all things out of nothing ? Whatsoever you are, or have, you received it from the Lord ; and therefore whatever a reasonable creatm-e can do, you owe it to him. You are in continual dependence upon him, ' for in him you live and move, and have your
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being/ Acts xvii. 28 ; and he hath bought you and redeemed you, and called you to life by Christ, 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20, ' You are not your own, for ye are bought with a price ; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's/ You owe your time and strength, your life and love, all that you are and can do, you owe it all to God.
2. He enjoineth nothing but what is good for us: Deut, vi. 24. 'And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God for our good ; ' and Deut. v. 29, '0 that there were such an heart in them that they would fear me, and keep my command- ments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children for ever.' God hath tempered his sovereignity to the reasonable crea- ture, and doth not rule us with a rod of iron, but with a sceptre of love.
3. That God loveth all that are good, and hateth all that are evil, without any respect of persons : Acts x. 35, ' But in every nation, he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of him ; ' and Ps. V. 5, ' Thou hatest all the workers of iniquity ; ' the greater of either kind the more, the lesser the less.
4. This must be laid up in the heart with a lively faith, and this belief must prevail with us so far as to submit ourselves to God's will, to like what he liketh and to hate what he hateth ; to love that best which his word telleth us he loveth best, to hate that most which his word telleth us he hateth most, though otherwise ])leasant to our nat- ural inclination, But alas ! we mistake opinion for faith, or a cold and dead assent for true believing. A hypocrite is not transformed by his faith ; he talketh much of it, but he showeth little of the spirit of it ; especially the fruit of obedience, which is most natural and proper to it, and without which all other pretences are to little purpose ; as the three children in the furnace, the fire had no power over them, nor was one hair of their head singed, nor their coats changed ; no more power hath the word upon their hearts. A true believer is changed thereby : 2 Cor. iii. 18, ' But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord ; ' Phil. iii. 10, ' That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufi'erings, being made conformable to his death.'