5. There may he added hereunto prevailing fears for a season of heing utterly rejected by God, of being found a reprobate at the last day. Jonah seems to conclude so, chap. ii. 4, " Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight;" — " I am lost for ever, God Avill own me no more." And Heman, Ps. Ixxxviii. 4, 5, " I am counted with them that go down into the pit: free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, whom thou rememberest no more : and they are cut off" from thy hand." This may reach the soul, until the sorrows of
Ver.1,2.] WHEREIN DEPTHS OF SIN CONSIST. 337
hell encompass it and lay hold upon it; until it Le deprived of com- fort, peace, rest; until it be a terror to itself, and be ready to choose strangling rather than life. This may befall a gracious soul on the account of sin. But yet because this fights directly against the life of faith, God doth not, unless it be in extraordinary cases, suffer any of his to lie long in this horrible pit, where there is no water, no refreshment. But this often falls out, that even the saints them- selves are left for a season to a fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation, as to the prevailing apprehension of their minds. And, —
6. God secretly sends his arroivs into the soid, that tuoiind and gall it, adding pain, trouble, and disquietness to its disconsola- tion: Ps. xxxviii. 2, " Thine arrovrs stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore." Ever and anon in his walking, God shot a sharp piercing arrow, fixing it on his soul, that galled, wounded, and per- plexed him, filling him with pain and gi'ievous vexation. These arrows are God's rebukes : Ps. xxxix. 11, " When thou with re- bukes dost correct man for iniquity." God speaks in his word, and by his Spirit in the conscience, things sharp and bitter to the soul, fastening them so as it cannot shake them out. These Job so mourn- fully complains of, chaj). vi. 4. The Lord speaks w^ords with that efficacy, that they pierce the heart quite through ; and what the issue then is David declares, Ps. xxxviii. 3, " There is no sound- ness," saith he, " in my flesh because of thine anger ; nor is there any rest in my bones because of my sin." The whole person is brought under the power of them, and all health and rest is taken away. And, —
7. Unspiritedness and disability unto duty, in doing or sufiering, attend such a condition : Ps. xl. 1 2, " Mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up." His spiritual ^^rength was worn away by sin, so that he was not able to address i-iimself unto any communion w^ith God. The soul now cannot pray with life and power, cannot hear -with joy and profit, cannot do good and communicate with cheerfulness and freedom, cannot medi- tate with delight and heavenly -mindedness, cannot act for God with zeal and liberty, cannot think of suffering with boldness and reso- lution ; but is sick, Aveak, feeble, and bowed down.
Now, I say, a gracious soul, after much communion with God, may, on the account of sin, by a sense of the guilt of it, be brought into a state and condition wherein some, more, or all of these, with other the like perplexities, may be its portion ; and these make up the depths whereof the psalmist here complains. What are the sins, or of what sorts, that ordinarily cast the souls of believers into these depths, shall be afterwards declared.
VOL. VI. 22
838 AN EXPOSITION UPON PSALM CXXX. [Vcr.1,2.
Secondly, I shall now show both tvhence it is that believers may fall into such a condition, as also whence it is that oftentimes they actually do so.
Whence it is thcat believers may be brought into depths on account of sin — ^Nature of the supplies of grace given in the covenant — How far they extend — Prin- ciples of the power of sin.
First, The nature of the covenant wherein all believers now walk with God, and wherein all their whole provision for obedience is inwrapped, leaves it possible for them to fall into these depths that have been mentioned. Under the first covenant there was no mercy or forgiveness provided for any sin. It was necessary, then, that it should exhibit a sufficiency of grace to preserve them from every sin, or it could have been of no use at all. This the righteousness of God required, and so it was. To have made a covenant wherein there was no provision at all of pardon, and not a sufficiency of grace to keep the covenanters from need of pardon, was not answerable to the goodness and righteousness of God, But he made man upright, who, of his own accord, sought out many inventions.
It is not so in the covenant of grace ; there is in it pardon pro- vided in the blood of Christ: it is not, therefore, of indispensable necessity that there should be administered in it grace effectually preserving from every sin. Yet it is on all accounts to be preferred before the other ; for, besides the relief by pardon, which the other knew nothing of, there is in it also much provision against sin, which was not in the other: —