From these and the like considerations, it may be made manifest that the greatest part of the devotion that is in the world doth not spring from the spiritual renovation of the minds of men; without which it is not accepted with God, That which remains to give in instance, farther evidence unto the discovery we are in the pursuit
430 OF SPIRITUAL MINDEDNESS. [PART II.
of, is, what are the grounds and reasons whereon those whose minds and affections are spiritually renewed do delight in the institutions of divine worship, and attend unto their observance with great heed and diligence. And because this is an inquiry of great importance,
and is of great use to be stated in other cases as well as that before us, I shall treat of it by itself in the ensuing chapter, that the reader may the more distinctly comprehend it, both in the nature of the doctrine concerning it and in the place it holds in our present dis- course.
CHAPTER XV.
Delight of believers in: the holy institutions of divine: worship—The grounds and reasons thereof—The evidence of being spiritually minded thereby, etc.
THAT all trwe believers, whose minds are spiritually renewed, have a singular delight im all the institutions and ordinances of divine worship is fully evident, both in the examples of the saints in the Scripture and their own experience, which they will never forego; for this hath been the greatest cause of theiv suffering persecution, and martyrdom itself, in all ages. Ifthe primitive Christians under the power of the pagan emperors, or the witnesses for Christ under the antichristian apostasy, would or could have omitted the observ- ance of them (according to the advice and practice of the Gnostics), they might have escaped the rage of their adversaries. But they loved not their lives in comparison unto that delight which they had in the observance of the commands of Christ as unto. the duties of evangelical worship. David gives us frequently an instance hereof in himself: Ps. xlii. 1-4, “As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my meat day and night, while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God? When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me: for I had gone with the multitude, I went with them to the house of God, with the voice of joy and praise, with a multitude that kept holyday.” Ps. lxiii. 1-5, “O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is; to see thy power and thy glory, so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary, Because thy loving-kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise thee. Thus will I bless thee while I live: J will lift up my hands in thy name My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips.” Ps, Ixxxiv, 1— 4, “How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lorp of hosts! My soul
CHAP, XV.] DELIGHT IN THE DUTIES OF DIVINE WORSHIP, 431
longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lorp: my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God. Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lorp of hosts, my King, and my God. Blessed are they that dwell in thy house: they will be still praising thee. Selah.”
But “a greater than David is here.” Our Lord Jesus Christ him- self did, upon all occasions, declare his delight in and zeal for all the ordinances of divine worship which were then in force by virtue of divine institution and command; for although he severely reproved and rejected whatever men had added thereunto, under the pretence of a supererogating strictness of outward order, laying it all under that dreadful sentence, “ Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be plucked up,” and so cast into the fire, yet as unto what was of divine appointment, his delight therein was singular, and exemplary unto all his disciples. With respect here- unto was it said of him, that “the zeal of God’s house had eaten him up,” by reason of the affliction which he had in his spirit to see the worship of it neglected, polluted, and despised. This caused him to cleanse the temple, the seat of divine worship, from the polluters and pollutions of it, not long before his sufferings, in the face and unto the high provocation of all his adversaries. So with earnest desire he longed for the celebration of his last passover: Luke xxii 15, “ With desire bave I desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer.” And it is a sufficient evidence of the frame of spirit and practice of his disciples afterward, in reference to the duties of evan- gelical worship by his appointment, that the apostle gives it as an assured token of an unsound condition, and that which tendeth to final, cursed apostasy, when any fall into a neglect of them, Heb. x. 25-27.