2 CORINTHIANS CHAP. I, VER. 12. 295
high price set on the guidance of God's Spirit, and on grace, as indeed it is worthy of it, and then we shall have it.
4. Again, if we would lead our lives according to spiritual and heavenly wisdom, according to grace, and gracious wisdom ; let us learn, as it is, Job xxii. 21, to be more andinnrr acquainted icith God by prayer; for grace comes not from within us. Grace is in Christ as in the root, as in the spring, as in the sun ; we have it but as the beam, as the stream. Therefore let us leai'n to be acquainted with God, and with Christ by prayer and meditation, and search into his word by reading, and by hearing him speak to us, and let us often speak to him.
Let us acquaint ourselves with him by prayer, and by hearing his word, and then we shall have his grace to guide us. For grace is a fruit of his peculiar love. He gives grace to his own peculiar people. How do you think, shall he have a peculiar delight in us, if we labour not to be more and more acquainted with him ? by often speaking to him, by often hearing of him, by coming into his presence, and attending as much as we can upon his holy ordinances, by conversing as much as we can in the holy things of God, Those that will be warm, they come under the beams of the sun ; those that would have the Spirit work efleetually, they must come where the Spirit is eflectual, where the Spirit works. Now the Spirit is effectual in the word preached. The Spirit fell upon Cornelius and the rest when they were hearing of St Peter, Acts x. 44. And the Spirit is where there is conversing in good compan}-. ' Where two or three are met together, I will be in the midst of them,' saith Christ, Mat. xviii. 20. ' If we walk with the wise, we shall be wiser,' Prov. ix. 9.
It must be the heavenly wisdom of a Christian, if he would lead his life by grace, to attend upon all the means of grace. Because the Spirit of God is effectual by his own means, he works by his owm means ; therefore use the means that the Spirit hath sanctified for the working of grace. I do wonder at a company of vain sottish creatures, that carry themselves according to their vain conceits, according to the whirling of their own bi'ain, in toys* and baubles that come into their heads ! They care not for the hearing of God's blessed truth. Either they abstain altogether, or else they hear it carelessly, as if it were a thing that concerned them not. Oh, but those that will lead their lives by grace, they come to it by the Spirit, and the Spirit is only effectual in hol}^ ordinances. It must be our wisdom therefore, to bring ourselves under some means or other, that the Spirit may be effectual.
The wisest and the best men in the world are no longer gracious than they are wise this way. If they neglect good company, good acquaintance, if they neglect the hearing of the word, if they neglect prayer, they will grow dead, and dull, and carnal-minded ; they will be possessed with base thoughts. How do men differ one from another ? Not so much by any habitual grace that is in them, as by avoiding all that might prejudice them in a Christian course, and by using all means whereby the Spirit of God may be effectual.
5. Again, the way to be under the grace of God's Spirit is often to medi- tate of the grace of God, the free love of God in Jesus Christ: for so it comes tirst. The first grace of all is God's free love in the forgiving of our sins, and accepting us to life everlasting ; and then he doth alter and change our natures more and more, he transforms us more and more. When we find therefore any defect of grace ^in our hearts, when we find coldness, and
* That is, trifles.— G.
296 COMMENTARY ON
dcadncRS, and dulness, go to llie first fire, to the first Sun, to the fi'ec grace of God in Christ, pardoning all our sins, and accepting us to life everlasting, and promising us grace to lead our lives iu the mean time. If you have fallen into any sin by the temptation of Satan, or your own weakness, beg not first grace to alter your course, to sanctify your life ; but renew every day your interest in the first grace, iu the forgiveness of sins, and your acceptation to everlasting life. For till God have pardoned your sins, and have witnessed to your souls that you stand reconciled, he will not give the best fruit of reconciliation, which is grace.
Therefore every day examine your lives, if j'ou have ofleuded God, in what terms you stand with God, and if you stand in ill terms, that there is any sin against conscience, the best way is not presently to amend that ; for that will not be, except the heart be warmed with God's love and favour in the pai'don of your sins tirst, and in the acceptation of you in Cln'ist, not- withstanding your sins ; as he justifieth us every day, not only in the first act of conversion, but dail}'. He acquits our consciences daily from our sins. And therefore in the Lord's prayer Christ teacheth us every day to say, 'Forgive us our sins,' Mat. yi. 12. And then, after forgiveness of sins, to beg the particular graces for our lives that we want. I would this were better thought on.