The fourth way is by anthoritij and discorery. St Paul was rapt up in[to] the third heaven ; he saith, they were such things that he saw, that could not be spoken of, strange things, 2 Cor. xii. 4. And Christ tells us of a kingdom. Christ knew what they were. And the word tells us what they are. Our faith looks to the authority of the word, if we had not the first fruits, nor any other discovery. God that hath prepared them, he saith so in his word, and we must rest in his authority. And there are some that have been in heaven. Christ our blessed Saviour, that hath taken into a perpetual union the manhood with the second person, which he hath knit unto it, he knows what is there ; and by this means we come to have some kind of knowledge of the things to come.
Fifthly, Again, Inj a kind of reasoniny likewise from the lesser to the greater, we may come to know not only the things, but the greatness of them. As, is there not comfort now in a little glimpse, when God shines upon a Christian's soul, when he is as it were in heaven ? Is there such content- ment in holy company here, what shall there be in heaven ? Is there such contentment in the delights of this world, that are the delights of our pilgri- mage ? (They are no better ; our houses are houses of pilgrimage ; our contentments are contentments of passengers.) If the way, the gallery that leads to heaven, be so spread with comforts, what be those that are reserved in another world ! A man may know by raising his soul from the lesser to the greater. And if the things that God hath provided in common for his enemies as well as his friends (as all the comforts of this world, all the delicacies and all the objects of the senses, they are comforts that are com- mon to the enemies of God, as well as his friends) : if these things be so
168 A GLANCE OF HEAVEN.
excellent, that men venture their souls for them, and lose all to be drowned in these thin^rs, Oh what peculiar things are they that God hath reserved for his own children, for those that love him, when those that are common with his enemies are so glorious and excellent ! These kind of ways we may come to know them by the help of the Spirit.
Those unmixed joys, those pure joys, that are full of themselves, and have no tincture in heaven, are understood by those joys we feel on earth ; the joy of the Holy Ghost, which is after conflict with temptations, or after afflictions, or after hearing and meditating on good things. The heavenly joys that flow into the soul, they give us a taste of that full joy that we shall have at the right hand of God for evermore. That comfort that we shall have in heaven, in the presence of God, and of Christ, and his holy angels, is understood in some little way by the comfortable presence of God to the soul of a Christian, when he finds the Spirit of God raising him, and cheering him up, and witnessing his presence ; as ofttimes, to the comfort of God's people, the Holy Ghost witnesseth a presence, that now the soul can say, God is present with me, he smiles on me, and slrength- eneth me, and leads me along. This comfortable way God's children have to understand the things of heaven, by the first fruits they have here. For God is so far in love with his children here on earth, and so tender over them, that he purposes not to reserve all for another world, but gives them some taste beforehand, to make them better in love with the things there, and better to bear the troubles of this world. But alas ! what is it to that that they shall know ? as it is 1 John iii. 2, ' Now we are the sons of God, but it appears not what we shall be,' That shall be so great in comparison of that we are, that it is said not to appear at all. It appears in the first fruits in a little beginnings ; but alas ! what is that to that glory that shall be ! ' Our life is hid with Christ in God,' Col. iii. 3. Jt'^is hid. There is no man knows it in regard of the full manifestation ; because here it is covered with so many infirmities, and afflictions, and so many scorns of the world are cast upon the beauty of a Christian life ; it is hid in our head Christ. It is not altogether hid, for there is a life that comes from the root, from the head Christ to the members, that quickens them ; but in regard of the glory that shall be, it is a hidden life.
Eeasons. Let us consider the reasons why God will have it thus, to make it clear, before I go further. We must be modest in reasons when we speak of God's counsels and courses. I will only name them to open our understandings a little.
1st Beason. (First.) It is enough that God tcill have it so. A modest Christian will be satisfied with that, that God will have a difierence be- tween heaven and earth. God's dispensation may satisfy them.