Well, to come to the trials. But let me first add this to the former : whomsoever God is a God to, it is known sjjecially by spiritual and eternal favours. A man cannot know certainly that God is his God by outward and common things that castaways may have ; for a castaway may have Ish- mael's blessing and Esau's portion, blessings of the left hand, common graces. To know undoubteclly, therefore, that God is our God, must be by peculiar matters ; for those whose God God is are a peculiar people, a holy nation, severed from others. First of all, then, know what the Spirit of God saith to thy soul ; for they that are God's have his Spirit, to reveal to their spirits the secret and hidden love of God. But if the voice of the Spirit be silent in regard of testimony, go to the work of the Spirit ; but go to the pecuhar work of the Spirit. For though the Spirit may be silent in regard of his testimony, yet there are some works or other of the Spirit in a man, whereby he may know that God is his God ; as the Spirit of God works in some sort a proportion in him unto God, and none can know better what God is to him than by searching of his own heart, what he is back again to God ; for as God saith to him by his Spirit, Thou art mine, so they say to God, Thou art mine. Let us then come to the trial by our carrying ourselves to God. Can we say with David, ' Whom have I in heaven but thee ?' or ' What is there in earth in comparison of thee ?' Ps. Ixxiii. 25. When the conscience can tell us that we make God our trea- sure and our portion above all earthly things, then w^e make him our God. A Christian singleth out God above all things in the world for his happi- ness. Lord, thou art mine ! Whatsoever wealth is mine, or riches mine, or friends mine — I stand not upon that, but thou art mine. A rich man runneth to his wealth, and makes flesh his arm. He runneth to friends, to bear him out in ill causes ; but a true Christian that hath God for his God, he may know it by this, he singleth out God for his portion, runs to him in all extremities. Lord, thou art mine. This is a sign that God hath said to his soul first, * I am thy salvation,' Ps. xxxv. 3. How can the soul appropriate God to himself? How can he say, as Thomas did, ' My Lord and my God,' John xx. 28, except the Lord have spoken peace to the soul before, and have said, ' I am thy salvation' ? It is a sign we have made God our God, when we prize him and value him above all the world ; and when, with St Paul, Phil. iii. 8, we count all things * dung and dross, in comparison of Jesus Christ our Lord.* What we will do most for, that is our god. If we will do most for God, he is our God. K we do most for pleasures, they are our god. If we do
10 THE FAITHFUL COVENANTER.
most for riches, break our rests and crack our consciences for them, that is our god. In a word, whatsoever we value highest, that is oui- god.
K.vaniine uliat affections xve hare to God : for it is aftection that makes a Christian. Single out some few that we are most oflending in. As, first, for fear, it may shame us all. Indeed, a Christian upon his best resolution is better. But the ordinary carriage of men is, they fear men more than God ; they fear everything more than him that they should fear above all. For instance, is the retired carriage of men to God such as their carriage is to the eye of the world ? "Will not they do that in secret ofitimes that they will not do openly ? In secret they will commit this or that sin, and think. Who seeth '? There are secret abominations in the closet of their hearts. They will not fear to do that in the eye of God, that they fear to do in the eye of a child of six years old, that is of any discrijtion. Is this to make God our God, when we fear the eye of a silly mortal creature more than the eye of God, that is ten thousand times brighter than the sun, that is our judge? Is God our God the whiles? Undoubtedly, when God is made our God, there is an awe of the eye of heaven upon a man in all places. Therefore this is the condition of the covenant, ' Walk before me,' or ' Walk as in my sight,' 1 Sam. ii. 30. How do we walk before God as in his sight, when there is such a great deal of difference in our carriage secretly, and before the eyes of men ? when we labour more to approve our carriage to men, than we make conscience of our spirits to God ? This may shame us. Even the best of us who are in covenant with God, and have made God our God, we have cause to be abased for this : and surely one of the best ways to make God's children abased and humbled, is to compare the different proportion of their carriage ; how they carry them- selves to men whom they respect, and to outward things in the world, and how they carry themselves to God. If God be our God, there will be an universal fear and care to please God in all times and in all places, because he is everywhere ; darkness and light are all one to him.