VERSE 30.
Because for the work of CJtrist he ivas nigh to death.
This work of Christ especially aims at works of mercy to Paul while he was in prison, and for these he is said to be nigh to death. By his long and tedious journey he took a sickness, and thereby was nigh to death. And these are called ' the works of Christ ;' partly because all good works are from Christ — for he commands them, he allows them, he did them — and partly also because in the doing of them our aim is at Christ's honour. So then the excellency of good xcorks consists not in doing those rvhich are good in their own nature, but in well doing of them. All our particular actions must be done with having an eye on and a respect to Christ. What if therefore thou doest any good thing with an eye on ci'edit or a good name, nay, if of mere pity, without respect of Christ's command, example, and
52 OF TUE PROVIDENCE OF GOD.
obedience thereunto; all that thou docst in this manner cannot merit the name of a good vork, or a work of Christ. For Christ saith, that which you do to any of his little ones you do to him. And do you think that he will take it done to him, when he seeth in thy heart that thou regardest hy-respccts, and never intendest him in the thing thou doest ? No. You did it for commendation, to get popular applause, or for your own profit, or the like. Let it not bo with us in this manner. Let us do all things commanded in the second table, as in obedience of the first, to glorify God. Let us do good works thoroughly, though they cost us labour, cost, and danger ; also pray zealously, give cheerfully. ' Cursed is he that doth the work of the Lord negligently,' Jer. xlviii. 10. Give freely therefore to every one in whom Christ comes a-begging to thee. ' This is pure religion before God and undefiled, to visit the fatherless and widows,' James i. 27; but see that you keep yourselves ' unspotted of the world.' And these things done as they ought to be, will comfort us on our deathbed, and be an assurance to our consciences of our faith, and will strengthen us when all other works, done for any self-respect, shall be so far from comforting us, as they shall weaken and discomfort us, and bear witness to our guilty consciences of our hypocrisy. But to proceed. It may seem St Paul was ill advised of his work of Epaphroditus, that he called it a work of Christ, when it had like to have cost him his life. Yet ought it not to seem strange, for by this very pattern we learn not to avoid or fly from the doiufi of any irork of CJirist ; no, though bij doing of it ire incur danger of our lives. For the best good must take the chief and first place with us ; and by how much the soul is more excellent than the body, by so much is the good of the soul to be preferred before the good of the body. He that hates not father, mother, yea, his own life, in respect of God's glory, cannot be the disciple of Christ. God would have us exercise our judgments in these things beforehand, that we may go about all such things with a holy and zealous resolution. Hence we may gather grounds to answer divers doubts.
\i>t Quest. As, fi-rst, vchetlier in time of i^ersecution ire ought to lose our lives or deny the truth ?
Ans. To this I answer, out of the example of Epaphroditus, affirmatively, that we ought rather to lose our lives than deny the truth ; for God's truth is better than our lives. It was commendable in Priscilla and Aquila that they laid down their necks for Paul's life, Rom. xvi. 3, 4 ; much more is the truth of God's word to be esteemed above man's life. And they are counted wise that have that esteem ; as the martyrs, whose estate is accounted a blessed estate.
2d Quest. Furthermore, it will be asked, Whether a minister ought to leave his congregation in the time of pestilence, or not?
Ans. I answer, upon the same ground, he ought not ; for he is not, in regard of the work of God, to esteem his own life. But so as he is not bound to a particular visitation of every one whom it hath pleased God to visit with sickness, neither ought the sick party to require this at the hands of the pastor ; but rather to reserve him to the general good of all of them, and the rather to spare him. Thus did Beza. And in the law the leprous person was to go about and to cry ' Unclean, unclean,' to the end that others might not unawares be polluted by him. And therefore every one ought to be a good husband for himself, to lay up with himself grounds of comfort against such a time as it may please God to afflict him in any such manner. Another question may hence be answered.
Bd Quest. Whether a man may equivocate to save his oun life?