3. I come now to the people's answer and reply, or entertainment of this exhortation : ' But ye said. Wherein shall we return ? ' (1.) It is not a serious question, but a cavil, not a desire of information, but a bold expostulation ; for it is mentioned here with a 'but;' 'but ye said ;' and it suiteth with the stout and stubborn genius of this people, who would not yield to anything that might infer their guilt. See it all along ; Mai. i. 2, ' I have loved you, saith the Lord ; but ye said, Wherein hast thou loved us ? ' They remember the old desolations, and were not satisfied with the present mercies. So ver, 6, ' Hear, 0
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priests, that despise my name ; and ye say, Wherein do we despise thy naibe ? ' They would not own any such thing. So ver. 7, ' Ye have offered polkited bread on mine altar ; and yet say, Wherein have we polluted thee?' They thought everything good enough for God, and yet would not own that they had any lessening thoughts of his majesty. So chap. ii. 14, God rejected their offerings, and they say, 'Wherefore ?' they saw no cause. So chap. iii. 8, ' Ye hath robbed me, saith the Lord ; ' as they detained the maintenance due for the support of his- worship ; ' and yet ye say. Wherein have we robbed thee ?' So ver. 13, ' Your words have been stout against me ; yet ye say. Wherein have we been stout against thee?' Thus did they outface all challenges. Therefore it is not a serious inquiry, like that, Acts ii. 37, ' Men and brethi-en, what shall we do ? ' and Acts xvi. 30. These speak as owning their sin, and desiring to be directed into a better course. But in the text they did not ask as desiring to be satisfied in the duty, but as quarrelling at the application of it to themselves ; wherein had they sinned, that they should need to return ? It is an exception to- the charge, that they had not departed from God. (2.) This question or reply was not in words. The scriptures are wont to attribute such sayings and speeches to wicked men as agree to their manners ; if their mouths do not say so, their practice and carriage saith so ; as P». xiv. 1, ' The fool hath said in his heart. There is no God.' There are explicit thoughts expressly conceived in our minds, and implicit thoughts which lurk in our hearts, and are known from the interpre- tation of our actions, when these are run up to their proper principle. Men live as if they were influenced by such a thought ; what could he do worse if he should actually say, There is no God ? So he show.s us what and wherein we offend ; not that they speak it in plain terms, but they clearly showed such was their meaning : What have we done amiss ? or wherein do we depart, that thou biddest us return ? that is, the exhortation was lost upon them, as if they needed no repent- ance nor reformation.
Doct. That a people who are apparently gone off from the ways of God, are not easily brought to a sight and sense of the necessity of returning to him.
The point is true— (1.) Of mankind in general; (2.) Of nations; (3.) Of particular persons.
First, The point is true of mankind in general, who, being fallen- from God, continue in their apostasy as long as they can with any tolerable shift and pretence of satisfaction. There is in all some false imaginary happiness, and some counterfeit righteousness, wherein they please themselves. The false happiness is as their God, and the superficial righteousness is as their Christ and mediator ; and so they are secure and senseless, till God open their eyes by a powerful con- viction. They neither seek after another happiness, nor trouble them- selves about the way whereby they may obtain it.
1. That men set up a false happiness in their carnal estate needeth not much proof ; for ever since man fell from God, he adhered to the creature : Jer. ii. 13, we left the fountain, and we betook ourselves to the cistern. And if we can make a shift to patch up a sorry happi- ness here in the world apart from God, we neither care for him, nor
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will come at him : Jer. ii. 31, ' Wherefore say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee ? ' They love to live of themselves. Our pleasure, profit, and honour, that is our God ; and while we enjoy these without control, we look no further ; and if we can sail with a full current in worldly felicity, we count ourselves well a-paid. Certainly we do not seek our happiness in an invisible God, nor can we wait to enjoy it in an invisible world. The flesh must be pleased ; and the more it is pleased, we think ourselves the more happy.
(2.) That there is something in us which is instead of Christ to us, to keep the conscience quiet when our afiections take up with present things. Our happiness is to satisfy our desires, our righteousness is to allay our fears. Now here we run to an external course of religi- ousness, as if it would make us perfect, as appertaining to the con- science. We seek to something external, which is diversified according to men's education. If pagans, to the epyov vo/xou, Kom. ii. 15. If we do some external works, and avoid some gross sins, wherein shall we return ? If Jews, to ritual observances of Moses, and there is our righteousness : Rom. x. 3, ' For they, being ignorant of God's right- eousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.'_ Out of ignorance and pride in their legal observances, they rejected the obedience of the gospel. If they be christians, they rest in baptism and the name of christians, or the outward profession of the gospel, without coming under the power of it. The apostles obviated this, 1 Peter iii. 21, and 2 Tim. iii. 5. Among christians, who are divided in opinions, interests, and affections, some rest in this form, some in that ; some that they are of a church which claimeth infallibility and damneth all others that are not of their own way ; and if they be herded there, they think they are safe. They are catholics, others are heretics ; and out of tlie church there is no salvation, but there they promise it themselves without scruple ; though God knoweth, and we may easily see that of all christians they are in the most hazardous condition ; and it is a very large charity that can allow them any pro- bability of salvation. Others have their external forms,_ wherein they place all their religion, though accompanied with little life and power of godliness. And others take up a stricter form, and delude their souls with the fallacy and self-conceit of disproving other men's errors, when their hearts are not a jot the better constituted towards God, or disposed to the heavenly life ; if they stand on the vantage ground, they are not the taller men. And so as long as men make any shift to live quietly in the carnal state, in vain do you press them to return to God. Thus it is with mankind in general.