A HEAVENLY CONFERENCE. 481
to build comfort on, but * my God and your God' will yet maintain the relation of a Father to you, that have not dealt as you should do ; and maintaineth the relation of a God, notwithstanding your fall. So that we maintain not our assurance on any part in us, but on God's love. ' Whom he loveth, he loveth to the end,' John xiii. 1. Our God unchangeably loveth us, in whom there is not so much as a shadow of change. And therefore in the last of the Hebrews, it is called an ' everlasting covenant.' ' The God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant,' Heb. xiii. 20. By the blood of Christ there is an everlasting covenant. God will be our God to death, and in death, and for ever. For this rela- tion being on God's part, extendeth_ itself from forgiveness of sins to life everlasting. It is always. The blood of Christ is the blood of an ever- lasting covenant. * I will marry thee to me for ever,' Hosea ii. 19. It holdeth sure on God's part.
Let us labour to maintain this assurance of salvation from God's love.
Use 2. But for our comfort, ive must do our ]mrts too, thour/h it begin with God. It beginneth on God's part. He loveth us first, and embraceth us first ; and we must love again, and embrace again. We must desire of God grace to answer relation. Therefore I will prescribe some rules, how we may say, God is our God, with comfort. That we may have the com- fort of it, by making good our interest in him, to make it good that we are sons, as well as to call him Father ; that we are his people, as well as to call him our God ; his spouse, as well as call him our husband. And because this cometh from God, join this with all our endeavours : Lord, thou must begin ; I desire to shew myself as a spouse to thee ; but thou must discover thyself to me. I desire to love thee, but discover thy love first ; all I can do is but reflection. Thou must shine on me first. So desire God to reveal himself more and more in Christ Jesus ; and then we cannot but carry ourselves to him as we should do in our relation.
This day we must perform the relation on our sides. There be two words that go to this heavenly bargain. The covenant consisteth of two parts. Now, desire God, by his grace, to enable us to do our part, for he doth both. And desire him, according to his promise, to teach us to love him, and ' to write his law in our hearts,' Jer. xxxi. 33, to do what is good ; and circumcise our hearts, and give his Holy Spirit. We ask no more than he hath promised, and so go boldly to him. Lord, thou hast made a covenant with us ; we cannot keep it without thee. Thou hast not only promised grace and gifts, but the grace to perform the covenant on our parts must come from thee. And this God will do. Therefore in the use of means, attend upon him ; and looking to him, we shall have grace to do our parts, and then maintain this assurance, without which we cannot live as Christians should live.
That we may further maintain this relation, that God is our God, let us labour to get into Christ, for it is in him that God is our Father ; and to grow up in Christ, to grow more and more, to grow up in faith and in all grace.
A gracious Christian never wanteth arguments of assurance of salvation. It is the dead-hearted Christian, the careless Christian. Therefore labour, as to be in Christ, so to grow up in the knowledge of Christ.
And so to know God in Christ, labour to see the face of God in Christ ; for in him are all the beams of his love. As the beams of the sun in a glass are gathered, so the beams of all God's love meet in Christ. So
VOL. VI. H h
482 A HEAVENLY COKFERENCE.
lovely is God in Christ, •whatsoever we have in Christ it is from God in Christ. And whatsoever we have from God, it is through Christ ; there- fore grow in the knowledge of Christ, in faith in Christ. To this end are the sacraments, that we might grow up in him, and be fed into Christ. And then we may make right use of it, as the ordinance that God hath sanctified for this end. And as God doth take us out and set a stamp upon us, so labour to make choice of God more and more, and choice of God in Christ ; for there be the two objects of our faith and love. Choose God for our God, and esteem him above all, and renounce all other, and resign ourselves wholly to him ; for all is ours when God is ours. He setteth us apart from other men — taking us out — and appropriateth us to himself, chooscth us for his jewels. I beseech you, labour daily to choose God to be your God. If we say, we are God's, let us make choice of him at the same time, and appropriate him with our choice. He is mine in particular. There is renunciation of all others. I have served other gods heretofore ; the world, and the flesh, and the favour of man have been my god, but they shall be my god no more. If we choose him not, and ap- propriate him as ours, and renounce all other, and give ourselves to him, we cannot say he is ' our God.' This we should practise every day. In the solicitation of sin, or despair for sin, make use of this choice, and ap- propriation, and resignation. If we be tempted to any sin. Why, I am not mine own, I am God's. I have chosen him to be my God ; I have appro- priated myself to him ; I have renounced all other ; I have offered myself to him ; therefore what have I to do with sin, with this temptation ? I have taken the sacrament on it, that God is mine, and Christ is mine, with all his benefits. Therefore if there be any solicitation to sin, make this use of it ; and so we shall grow in assurance of our interest in God, when we can make use of it on all occasions.