(5.) But lastly, where all other things concur, yet if the person promising be changeable, if he may alter his reso- lution, a man may justly doubt and debate in himself, the accomplishment of any promise made to him. It is true, may he say, he now speaks his heart and mind, but who can say he will be of this mind to-morrow? May he not be turned, and then what becomes of the golden mountains that I promised myself upon his engagement? Wherefore, in the last place, the Lord carefully rejects all sinful surmises concerning the least change or alteration in him, or any of his engagements. 'He is the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning;' James i. 18. No shadow, no appearance of any such thing. ' I am the Lord,' saith he, ' I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed ;' Mai. iii. 6. The Lord knows, that if any thing in us might prevail with him to alter the word that is gone out of his mouth, we should surely perish. We are poor provoking creatures, therefore he lays our not being consumed only on this, even his own unchangeable- ness. This we may rest upon, he is of one mind, and who can turn him ?
And in these observations have I given you the first demonstration of the point : all staggering is from our own unbelief.
2. The experience which we have of the mighty workings of God, for the accomplishment of all his promises, gives light unto this thing. We have found it true, that where he is once engaged, he will certainly go through unto the ap- pointed issue, though it stand him in the laying out of his power and wisdom to the uttermost. Hab. iii. 9. * Thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the tribes, thy word.' If God's oath be passed, and his word engaged, he will surely accomplish it, though it cost him the ' making
280 THE STEADFASTNESS Of PROMISES,
of his bow quite naked,' the manifestation of his power to the utmost.
It is true, never did any wait upon God for the accom- plishment and fulfilling of a promise, but he found many difficulties fall out between the word and the thing. So was it with Abraham in the business of a son : and so with David in the matter of a kingdom. God will have his pro- mised mercies to fall as the dews upon the parched, gasping earth ; or *as the' shadow of a great rock in a weary land,' Isa. xxxii. 2. very welcome unto the traveller, who hath had the sun beat upon his head in his travel all the day. ' Zion is a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, as a royal diadem in the hand of her God ;' Isa. Ixii. 3. The precious stones of a diadem must be cut and polished, before they be set in beauty and glory. God will have ofttimes the pre- cious living stones of Zion to have many a sharp cutting, before they come to be fully fixed in his diadem; but yet in the close, whatever obstacles stand in the way, the promise hath still wrought out its passage : as a river, all the while it is stopped with a dam, is still working higher and higher, still getting more and more strength, until it beardown all before it, and obtain a free course to its appointed place. Every time opposition lies against the fulfilling of the pro- mise, and so seems to impede it for a season, it gets more and more power, until the appointed hour be come, and then the promise bears down all before it.
Were there any thing imaginable, whereof we had not experience, that it had been conquered to open a door for the fulfilling of every word of God, we might possibly, as to the apprehension of that thing, stagger from some other principle, than that of unbelief.
What is there in heaven or earth, but God and his mi- nistering spirits, that hath not, one time or other, stood up to its utmost opposition, for the frustrating of the word, wherein some or other of the saints of God have put their trust? Devils in their temptations, baits, subtilties, accusa- tions, and oppositions ; men in their counsels, reasonings, contrivances, interests, dominions, combinations, armies, multitudes, and the utmost of their endeavours ; the whole frame of nature, in its primitive instituted course, fire, water.
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day, iilght, age, sickness, death, all in their courses have fought against the accomplishment of the promises. And what have they obtained by all their contendings ? All dis- appointed, frustrated, turned back, changed, and served only to make the mercy of the promise more amiable and glorious.
I would willingly illustrate this demonstration with an instance, that the almighty, all-conquering power that is in the promise, settling all staggering upon its own basis of un- belief might be the more evident.
I might here mention Abraham, with all the difficulties and appearing impossibilities which the promise unto him did pass through, and cast to the ground the mercy of it at length, arising out of the grave; for he 'received his son from the dead in a figure ;' Heb. xi. 19. Or I might speak of Joseph, Moses, or David ; but I shall rather choose a president from among the works of God, in the days wherein we live, and that in a business, concerning which we may set up our Eben-ezer, and say, Thus far hath God been a helper.