Use. Take notice of God's favour in the addition of every new degree of grace, because the change is more remarkable. We may ascribe our first conversion to God, but we must also our after-growth. We are still under the love and care of Christ ; though we are passed from death, to life, yet not from earth to heaven. You are in continual need of Christ for direction, intercession, pardon, further sanctification, sup- port, comfort, and peace ; therefore take notice of every degree. If there be greater fervour, if more delightful exercise, if more ability and strength to overcome opposition, let God have the glory of all. He many times chastiseth our pride and unthankfulness with lapses or decays if we do not acknowledge him ; as Peter and David, what grievous lapses had they !
SEEMON II.
We are hound to thank God aliuays for you, hrethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all ioicards each other aboundeth — 2 Thes. i. 3.
In these words we have observed — (1.) An affectionate form of thanks- giving ; (2.) The matter of it.
For the first, it is a blessed thing when complaints are turned into thanksgivings, both for ourselves and others. For ourselves we should
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not be always craving and always complaining. Gratulation should find a place in our addresses to God, as well as acknowledgments of sin and supplications for grace : Col. iv. 2, ' Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving.' So for others, we should rather take notice of their excellences than of their blemishes. We give occasion to others to suspect us to have a rough imperious spirit, to be always finding fault, never acknowledging the grace they have received or the good they have done. This was far from Paul's temper, who was ever ready to acknowledge anything of Christ wherever he found it, especially where grace was discovered with eminency, as in these Thessalonians ; therefore he saith, ' We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet ; ' whence we observed four doctrines.
I am now to speak of the matter of this thanksgiving, ' Because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all towards each other aboundeth ; ' where observe these six things —
1. That it is a comfort that our inward man is in a good state, how- ever it be with us as to our outward condition before the world. These Thessalonians were poor and afflicted. We read in the first epistle; * They received the gospel in much affliction,' 1 Thes. i. 6 ; and in the verse next the text he speaketh of their ' patience and faith in all their persecutions and tribulations ; ' and the following words tend wholly to comfort them under their sore troubles. Yet their condition before God was thriving and prosperous, and matter of thanksgiving rather than lamentation. So 2 Cor. iv. 16, ' For this cause we faint not,' saith the apostle, ' but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.' We should count this world's goods well exchanged if the want or loss of them be recompensed to us by the increase of spiritual graces, and be glad if it go well with our souls, though our bodily interests be infringed. If God by an aching head will give us a better heart, by a sickly body an healthy soul, as he did to Gains, 3 John 2, by lessening us in the world, or reducing us to straits, make us ' rich in faith,' James ii. 5 ; by troubles and oppositions excite us to a more lively exercise of grace. We should not barely submit to such a dispensation, but give thanks. The children of God are always set forth to be of this temper : Ps. cxix. 71, 'It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes ; ' 2 Cor. xii. 9, 10, ' I will rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me ; therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecution, in distresses for Christ's sake ; for when I am weak, then am I strong ; ' if the afflictions and troubles of the world may do us good, and our knowledge and holiness be increased as our estates are diminished. So Heb. xii. 11, ' No chasten- ing for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous, nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.' All the honours and riches of the world are not worth the least degree or drachm of grace.
2. Their condition was not only good, but growing better every day. It is not enough barely to be good, but we must gi'ow from good to better, and be best at last. God's children wait on the Lord, and he is not wont to be sparing and straitened to those that attend upon him : Isa. xl. 31, ' They that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength.'
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