Chapter XVI. — Of trust in God • grounds of it ; especially his providence.
But to come nearer to the unfolding of this trust in God, which David useth here as a remedy against all distempers. Howsoever confidence and trust be an affection of nature, yet by the Spirit's sanctifying and carrying it to the right object, it becomes a grace of wonderful use. In the things of this life, usually he that hopes most is the most unwise man, he being most deceived that hopes most, because he trusts in that which is uncertain ;
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and therefore deceitful hope is counted but the dream of a waking man. But in rehgion it is far otherwise ; here hope is the main supporting grace of the soul, springing from faith in the promises of God.
Trust and hope are often taken in the same sense, though a distinction betwixt them hath sometimes its use. Faith looks to the word promising, hope to the thing promised in the word ; faith looks to the authority of the promisor, hope especially to the goodness of the promise ; faith looks upon things as present, hope as to come hereafter. God as the first truth, is that which faith relies on ; but God as the chief good is that which hope rests on. Trust or confidence is nothing else but the strength of hope. If the thing hoped for be deferred, then of necessity it enforces waiting, and waiting is nothing else but hope and trust lengthened.
Howsoever there may be use of these and such hke distinctions, yet usually they are taken promiscuously, especially in the Old Testament. The nature and use of faith is set out by terms of stajTug, resting, leaning, rolling om'selves upon God, &c., which come all to one, and therefore we forbear any further cmious distinction.
Now, seeing trusting in God is a remedy against all distempers, it is neces- sary that we should bring the object and the act, God and the soul, together; for efiecting of which it is good to know something concerning God and some- thing concerning trust. God only is the fit object of trust. He hath all the properties of that which should be trusted oji. A man can be in no condition wherein God is at a loss and cannot help him. If comforts be wanting, he can create comforts, not only out of nothing, but out of discomforts. He made the whale that swallowed up Jonah a means to bring him to the shore, Jonah i. 17. The sea was a wall to the Israehtes on both sides, Exod. xiv. 22. The devouring flames were a great refreshing to the three chil- dren in the fiery furnace, Dan. iii. That trouble which we think will swallow us up, may be a means to bring us to our haven ; ' so mighty is God in power, and so excellent in working,' Isa. xxviii. 29. God then, and God only, is a fit foundation for the soul to build itself upon, for the fij.'mer the foundation is, the stronger will the building be ; therefore those that will build high must dig deep. The higher the tree riseth, the deeper the root spreadeth and fasteneth itself below. So it is in faith : if the foundation thereof be not firm, the soul cannot build itself strongly upon it. Faith hath a double principle to build on, either a principle of being, or a principle of knowing. The principle of being is God himself, the principle of knowing is God's word, whereby God cometh forth ' out of that hidden light which none can attain unto,' 1 Tim. vi. 16, and discovereth his meaning towards us for our good.
This then must, 1, be supposed for a ground, that there is a God, and that God is, that is, hath a full and eternal being, and giveth a being, and an order of being, to all things else. Somethings have only a being, some things life and being, some things sense, &c., and some things have a more excellent being, including all the former, as the being of creatm-es endued with reason. If God had not a being, nothing else could be. In things subordinate one to another, take away the first, and you take away all the rest. Therefore this proposition, God is, is the first truth of all ; and if this were not, nothing else should be, as we see if the heavenly bodies do not move, there is no motion here below.
2. In the divine nature or being, there is a subsisting of three persons, every one so set out unto us, as fitted for us to trust in ; the Father as a Creator, the Son as a Redeemer, the Holy Ghost as a Comforter, and all
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this is in reference to us. God in the first person liatli decreed the great work of our salvation, and all things tending to the accomplishment of it. God in the second person hath exactly and fully answered that decree and plot, in the work of our redemption. God in the third person discovers and applies all unto us, and fits us for communion with the Father and the Son, from whom he proceeds.
3. God cannot be comfortably thought upon out of Christ our Mediator, in whom he was ' reconciling the world to himself,' 1 Cor. v. 19, as being a friend both to God and us, and therefore fit to bring God and the soul together, being a middle person in the Trinity. In Christ, God's nature becomes lovely to us, and ours to God ; othermse there is an utter enmity betwixt his pure and our impm'e nature. Christ hath made up the vast gulf between God and us. There is nothing more terrible to think on, than an absolute God out of Christ.