72 SERMONS UPON TITUS IL 11-14. [SeR. III.
Col. i. 13, ' Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.' Christ and Satan cannot reign in the same heart, nor God and the world. Joseph was taken out of prison, and then preferred to Pharaoh. This is the method : Luke i. 73, ' That he would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our lives.' Deliverance hath the precedence ; first the thorns must be rooted out, and then the corn is sowed.
2. It must not be otherwise. God will have nothing to do with us till we have renounced sin. A plausible life is but a counterfeit varnish, like gilding over a rotten post, or a moral integrity, till sin be renounced. The prodigal left his husks, and then returned to his father. This is the method at our first conversion. Indeed afterwards there is some difference ; when once grace is once planted in the heart, it hath the advantage of corruption, and worketh first. Thus it is said of Job, chap. i. 1, ' That man was perfect and upright, one that feared God and eschewed evil' First fearing God, then eschewing evil. Grace having taken possession, and being seated in the heart, it works first. Like a man possessed and seated in his house, he seeketli to expel his enemy. So at first way is made for the operation of grace, and then all the work afterwards is the destruction of sin.
Ohs. 4. It is not enough to renounce one sin, but we must renounce all ; for when the apostle speaks of denying ungodliness, he intends all ungodliness. Compare this with 1 Peter ii. 1, 'Wherefore, laying aside all malice, and all guile and hypocrisies;" and James i. 21, ' Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness.' All sins must be renounced, little sins and great sins. Great sins, as adultery, drunkenness, and the like, are manifest, Gal. v. 19 ; that is, nature doth abhor them, they stink and smell rank in nature's nostrils, even to a natural conscience. Then for little sins : Mat. v. 19, ' Who- soever shall break one of these least commandments, and teach men so to do, shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven.' It is spoken of ministers principally ; whoever shall give license by the gospel to the least sin, either break it himself, or teach men so to do, shall have no place, no room among gospel ministers. No sin can be little that is committed against the great God. Sins are not to be measured by the smallness of the occasion, or by the suddenness of the act, but by the offence done to God, to an infinite majesty. The less the sin, the greater many times it is. It argues much malice to break with God upon every slight occasion ; there is more unkindness in it, and the more contempt of God ; and it argues the greater depravation of nature. As a little weight will make a stone move downward, because of its natural inclination, so it is a sign we have an inclination that way when a small matter can draw us from God. Again, secret* sins must be eschewed as well as public : Isa. Iv. 7, ' Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts ; ' the thought as well as the way is to be forsaken. By ivay is meant his outward course of life ; by his thouglits is meant the hidden workings of his spirit. Nothing more transient and sudden than the thought ; therefore, as we must not do evil before men, so we must not thmk evil before God. God
VeR. 12.] SERMONS UPON TITUS IL 11-14. 73
seeth the thought, as well as man the actions, and infinitely more. The thoughts are visible to him, and these fall under a law as well as our actions. Again, sins of temper, to which we are more incident, as well as other sins to which we have less inclination, they must be mortified : Ps. xviii. 23, ' I was also upright before him, and I kept myself from mine iniquity.' That sin which we call ours should be most watched against, and most hated above all others. As a man should be afraid of the meat of which he hath once surfeited, so the sin that hath once prevailed over us we should be more cautious against. It is nothing for a sordid spirit to be less proud, or a proud man to be less covetous, or a covetous man to be less sensual, or a sensual man to be less pas- sionate ; still a christian is tried by the revenge he takes upon his own sin, his master-lust. Again, not only sins which lie at a distance from our interest, but sins that bring us most profit and advantage. In these things God tries us ; it is the offering up of our Isaac, our darling. In a corrupt world some things bring credit and profit ; but as for the right hand, the right eye, we must phick out the one and cut off the other : Mat. v. 29, 30, ' If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee ; for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee ; for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.' Cannot we do so much for God and for grace's sake.