For use hereof, it should teach us to labour to attain to this estate of being spiritually convinced of the goodness of God, that we may by experience say, ' It is good for me to draw near to God,' for God will not esteem of us accord- ing to our knowledge, but as our afiections are, and therefore the wicked man he calls a worldling, because the world filleth him, let his knowledge be never so gl-eat. And the church in the Kevelation is called heaven, because their afi'ections and minds are that way, xxi. 1 ; and again, the more we are convinced of God's goodness, the better we are; for God's goodness, tasted and felt by the soul, doth ennoble it, as a pearl set in a gold ring maketh it the more rich and precious. But to come to the estate that is so commended to us, it is described to us by drawing near unto God, so as we may take this for a received ground, that
Doct. [Eighth,] Mans happiness is in communion with God. Before the fall
of man, there was a familiar conversation with God ; but by the sin of our
first parents we lost this great happiness, and now we are strangers, and
as contrary to God as light is contrary to darkness, and hell to heaven ;
* A frequent sentiment in his Letters. — G.
72 THE saint's happiness,
he holy, we impure ; he full of knowledge, we stark fools ; and instead of delighting in him, we now tremble at his presence, and are afraid of such creatures as approach nigh to him, trembling at the presence of angels, nay, afraid of a holy man, ' What have I to do with thee, thou man of God? art thou come to call my sins to remembrance?' 1 Kings xvii, 18, And therefore we tly the company of good men, because their carriage a,nd course of life do upbraid us ; and hence it is that at the least apprehension of God's displeasure, wicked men do quake. The heathen emperor trembled at a thunder clap.* But God, in his infinite mercy andjgoodness, left us not, but entertaining a purpose to choose some to draw near unto him ; and to this end he hath found out a way for man and him to meet, but no way for the angels ; and the foundation of this union is in Christ, in whom he reconciled the world to himself; for he being God, became man, so to draw man back again unto God ; and thus, like Jacob's ladder, one end of it is in heaven, the other on earth. The angels ascending and descending shew a sweet intercourse between God and man, now reconciled together, so as Christ is now ' a living way ' for ever, being ' the way, the truth, and the life.' He is a way far more near and sure than we had in Adam ; for in him God was in man, but now man subsisteth in God, so as our nature is now strengthened by him, who also hath enriched it and advanced it : and what he hath wrought in his own human nature, he by little and little will work in all his mystical members ; so being once far off, we are now made near, and this he did principally by his death, for reconciliation is made by his blood. Col. i. 20 ; and thus, by the admirable mystery of his deep wis- dom, he hath found a means to make the seeming opposite attributes of justice and mercy to kiss each other, so as we are saved, and yet his infinite justice hath full content. For how could his hatred of sin appear more gloriously than in punishing it upon his own only beloved Son ? And therefore worthily he is called ' our peace ; ' for he is that great peace- maker otfering himself up, and us in him, ' as a sweet-smelling sacrifice, acceptable to God,' Philip, iv. 8, being then thus brought near to God, to keep and maintain this nearness, so as nothing may separate us again. He hath put into us his own Spirit, so as we are one spirit with Christ ; and by that Spirit he worketh in us and by us by that Spirit, We hear, read, pray, and as by the soul in us our bodies do live, breathe, and move, and the hke, so he maketh his Spirit to move in us to a holy conversation and a heavenly hfe, being thus made ' partakers of the divine nature,' 2 Peter i, 4 ; and this sanctifies us to a holy communion with God ; and there- fore the apostle prays, 2 Cor. xiii. 14, ' The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with them ; ' that is, for a fuller manifestation of the love of God in sending Christ, the grace of Christ in coming to us, and the conrtnunion of the Holy Spirit, because by it we are made to Hve a holy life, and to com- municate with God ; and thus the three persons in Trinity conspire together m reducing man back again to be more near to God.