1. In these will this aversation and loathing often- times discover itself in the affections. A secret striving will be in them about close and cordial dealing with God. Unless the hand of God in his Spirit be high and strong upon his soul, even when convictions, sense of duty, dear and real esteem of God, and communion with him, have car- ried the soul into its closet, yet if there be not the vigour and power of a spiritual life constantly at work, there will be a secret loathness in them unto duty ; yea, sometimes there will be a violent inclination to the contrary, so that the soul had rather do any thing, embrace any diversion, though it wound itself thereby, than vigorously apply itself unto that which in the inward man it breathes after. It is weary before it begins, and says, when will the work be over ? Here God and the soul are immediately concerned, and it is a great conquest to do what we would, though we come exceedingly short of what we should do.
2. It discovers itself in the mind also : when we address ourselves to God in Christ, we are, as Job speaks, ' to fill our mouths with arguments ;' Job xxiii. 4. that we may be able to plead with him, as he calls upon us to do, Isa. xliii. 26. ' Put me in remembrance, let us plead together.' Whence tiie church is called upon to take unto itself words or argu- ments in going to God, Hos. xiv. 2. The sum is, that the mind should be furnished with the considerations that are prevailing with God, and be in readiness to plead them, and to manage them in the most spiritual manner to the best ad- vantage. Now is there no difficulty to get the mind into such a frame, as to lay out itself to the utmost in this work?
38
THE NATURE AND POWER
to be clear, steady, and constant in its duty ? to draw out, and make use of its stores and furniture of promises and ex- periences ? It starts, wanders, flags, all from this secret aver- sation unto communion with God, which proceeds from the law of indw'elling sin. Some complain that they can make no work of meditation, they cannot bend their minds unto it. I confess there may be a great cause of this, in their want of a right understanding of the duty itself, and of the ways of managing the soul in it, which therefore I shall a little speak to afterward. But yet this secret enmity hath its hand in the loss they are at also, and that both in their minds and in their affections. Others are forced to live in family and public duties, they find such little benefit and success in private. And here hath been the beginning of the apostacy of many professors, and the source of many Ibolish sensual opinions. Finding this aversation in their minds and affections from closeness and constancy in pri- vate spiritual duties, not knowing how to conquer and pre- vail against these difficulties, through him who enables us, they have at first been subdued to a neglect of them, first partial, then total, until having lost all conscience of them, they have had a door opened unto all sin and licentiousness, and so to a full and utter apostacy. I am persuaded there are very few that apostatize from a profession of any continuance, such as our days abound withal, but their door of entrance into the folly of backsliding, was either some great and no- torious sin that blooded their consciences, tainted their af- fections, and intercepted all delight of having any thing more to do with God; or else it was a course of neglect in private duties, arising from a weariness of contending against that powerful aversation which they found in themselves unto them. And this also, through the craft of Satan, hath been improved into many foolish and sensual opinions, of living unto God without, and above, any duties of commu- nion. And we find, that after men have for awhile choked and blinded their consciences with this pretence, cursed wickedness or sensuality hath been the end of their folly. And the reason of all this is, that the giving way to the law of sin in the least, is the giving strength unto it : to let it alone is to let it grovv, not to conquer it is to be conquered bv it.
OF INDWELLING SIN. 39
As it is in respect of private, so it is also in respect of public duties, that have any thing extraordinary in them. What strivings, strugglings, and pleadings are there in the heart about them, especially against the spirituality of them ? Yea, in and under them, will not the mind and aft'ections sometimes be entangled with things uncouth, new, and strange unto them, such as at the time of the least serious business, a man would not deign to take into his thoughts ? But if the least loose, liberty, or advantage be given unto in- dwelling sin, if it be not perpetually watched over, it will work to a strange and unexpected issue. In brief, let the soul unclothe any duty whatever, private or public, anything that is called good, let a man divest it of all outward respects which secretly insinuate themselves into the mind and give it some complacency in what it is about, but do not render it acceptable unto God, and he shall assuredly find somewhat of the power and some of the effects of this aversation. It begins in loathness and indisposition, goes on with entangling the mind and affections with other things, and will end, if not prevented, in weariness of God, which he complains of in his people, Isa. xliii. 22. They ceased from duty because they were weary of God.