(4.) In fears of death. We must die by faith, as well as live by faith ; and then comfort ourselves with the promise and oath of God, called here two unchangeable things. We need all the props of faith that can be used. When all things are about to change, then think, God changeth not, though I am changing apace. As one comforted himself with that passage : Isa. liv. 10, ' For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed ; but my kindness shall not depart from thee.
314 SERMONS UPON HEBREWS VI. 18.
neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.' Sight is almost gone, and speech doth even fail, but God's loving-kindness will never be gone. You are changing, but you may look upon death itself as an act of faithfulness, and sent in mercy to break the shell, that you may have the kernel ; to dissolve the union between body and soul, that the soul may flit away to God.
SERMON III.
We may have siron{j consolation, d'c. — Heb. vi. 18.
DoCT. 2. That the fruit of tins certainty and assurance which we have by God's word and oath is strong consolation.
To make way for the discussion of this point, and to open the words which the apostle here usetli, I shall —
1. Inquire what is meant by strong consolation.
2. How this strong consolation ariseth from the certainty and assur- ance we have by God's word and oath.
3. How it is dispensed on God's part, and how far it is required on ours.
1. What is meant by strong consolation, la-^vpap TrapdfcXrjaLv. There are two terms, consolation, and st7'on[j consolation.
First, Consolation. There are three words by which the fruits and effects of certainty and assurance is expressed, which imply so many degrees of it. There is peace, comfort, and joy. Peace, in the scripture dialect, notes rest from accusations of conscience. Comfort notes a tem- perate and habitual confidence. Then joy notes an actual feeling, or an high tide of comfort, or a lively elevation of the saints.
1. Peace. That we have as a fruit of justification : Eom. v. 1, ' Being justified by faith, we have peace with God.' There are no actual doubts, though we cannot say we have absolute assurance. This is the lowest degree of assurance, and it is a fruit of the Holy Ghost ; as many of the children of God have encouragement to wait upon God, though they cannot for all the world say they have an absolute interest in Christ.
2. Then there is consolation and comfort, which notes an habitual persuasion of God's love ; there is an habitual confidence, a serenity and cheerfulness of mind. Though there be not high tides of comfort, there is support, though not ravishment. It is called ' everlasting con- solation,' 2 Thes. ii. 16, 17, ' Now our Lord Jesus Christ himseh, and God even our Father, who hath loved us, and given us everlasting con- solation, and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts, and establish you in every good word and work.' There is a settled comfort, and he prayeth for the continuance and increase of it. When the heart is lightened or eased in duties or troubles, it is bewrayed by a constant cheerfulness and alacrity in God's service, and support in troubles.
3. Then there is joy, or an high and sensible comfort : Rom. xv. 13,
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'Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost/ This abides not always ; it is a festival dispensation, wherewith God enter- tains the soul in the day of his royalty and magnificence, he useth it but now and then. We have this high joy, either after the pangs of the new birth, when deep sorrows were occasioned by the spirit of bon- dage. When David's bones were broken, then ' make me to hear joy and gladness,^ Ps. li. 8. Then we have the highest comfort : John xvi, 21, ' A woman when she is in travail, hath sorrow, because her hour is come ; but as soon as she is delivered of a child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.' Then our apprehensions of Christ are most fresh. Comfort, being a strange thing, is most welcome. Trouble makes way for more comfort ; for as our trouble is most vehement, so is our comfort enlarged. Or upon the solemn exercise of grace, when we are carried on in high assistance, in meditation, prayer, receiving the sapper, and the word is revived upon the conscience ; or else in times of suffering and self-denial, for God will always be even with a believer : 2 Cor. i. 5, ' For as the suf- ferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.' A man is no loser by Christ, but according to the ebb of out- ward comforts so is the tide and overflow of inward coniforts ; and when we have experience of Christ's sufferings, we also have experience of Christ's comforts, that at the same time God may have an experience of our faithfulness, and we of his. So that comfort is a middle degree of assurance between peace and joy ; a temperate confidence and support, though we do not feel ravishment and actual sweetness ; as a child doubteth not of his father's affection, though he doth not actually smile upon him.