[1.] This is constancy in profession in a time of danger and per- secution. The hearts of men are often seduced with vain thoughts of holding their faith and love to Christ, which they hope will save them eternally, whilst they omit that profession of them which would endanger them temporally. A duty that also shall be allowed to be; but not of that necessity or importance as not to be omitted totally, or at least partially and gradually, to save our present concerns, especially whilst the substance of faith and love to Christ is in our hearts entirely preserved. This ruined many of the rich and great among the Jews: John xii. 42, “ Among the chief rulers many be- lieved on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue.” They went a great way in believing. And, considering their places and conditions, who would have required more of them? Would you have men, merely on the account of outward profession, hazard the loss of their places, interests, reputation, and all that is dear unto them? I know not well what men think in this case; the censure of the Holy Ghost in this matter concerning them is, “They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God,” verse 43,—than which nothing almost can be spoken with more severity. And these Hebrews were influenced into declensions from the same fallacy of sin. They were fallen into days wherein profession was perilous; and therefore, although they
VER. 12, 18.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 377
would not renounce the faith whereby they hoped to be saved, yet they would let go their profession, for which they feared they should be troubled. So our apostle intimates, Heb. x. 25. In this and the like instances do the subtile reasonings of sin and Satan secretly cor- rupt the minds of men, until they are insensibly, and sometimes irre- coverably engaged in a course of withdrawing from Christ and the gospel. The same may be observed as to other duties, and especially as to degrees of constancy and fervency in the performance of them, From these the minds of men are often driven and diverted by the crafty reasonings of sin, whereby they are entered into apostasy. Some of the churches in the Revelation are charged not absolutely with the loss of their love, but of their “ first love ;” that is, the espe- cial degrees of it in fervency and fruitfulness which they had attained,
[2.] Again, by these reasonings the deceitful principles men- tioned do endeavour an extenuation of the guilt of such evils as lie in a tendency to alienate the heart from Christ and the gospel. An instance hereof we have in the Galatians. The observation of Judaical ceremonies was by false teachers pressed upon them. They did not once attempt to draw them from Christ and the gospel, nor would they have endured the proposal of any such thing. Only they desired that, together with the profession of the gospel and the grace of Christ, they would also take upon them the observation of the Mosaical rites and institutions. Hereunto they propose unto them a double motive:—1st. That they should hereby have wnion with the professing Jews, and so all differences be removed. 2dly. That they should escape persecution, which was then upon the matter alone stirred up by the envious Jews, Gal. vi 12. If both these ends may be obtained, and yet faith in Christ and the gospel be retained, what inconvenience or harm would it be if they should engage into these observances? Accordingly many did so, and took upon them the yoke of Judaical rites) And what was the end of this matter? Our apostle lets them know that what they thought not of was be- fallen them, and yet was the genuine effect of what they did. They had forsaken Christ, fallen from grace, and, beginning in the Spirit, were ending in the flesh; for, under the specious pretences before mentioned, they had done that which was inconsistent with the faith of the gospel. ‘Yea, but they thought not in the least of any de- clension from Christ.’ The matter is not what they thought, but what they did. This they did, and this was the effect of it. The corrupt reasonings of their minds, deceived by the pleas and pre- tences mentioned, had prevailed with them to look on these things as, if not their duties, yet of no ill consequence or importance. So were they deluded by extenuations of the evil proposed unto them, until they justly fell under the censure before mentioned. And the prin- cipal mischief in this matter is, that when men are beguiled by false
378 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [CHAP. IV.
reasonings into unwarrantable practices, their corruptions are vari- ously excited to adhere to and defend what they have been overtaken withal; which confirms them in their apostasies.
[3.] Aggravations of difficulties in the way of profession are made use of to introduce a declension from it. For when thoughts and apprehensions of them are admitted, they insensibly weaken and dishearten men, and render them languid and cold in their duties; which tends unto backsliding. The effect of such discou- ragements our apostle expresseth, Heb. xii. 12, 13: “ Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; and make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way.” Having laid down the afflictions and persecutions which they were to meet withal, and also declared the end and use of them in the grace and wisdom of God, he shows how ready men are to despond and grow heartless under them; which deprives them of all life and spirit in their profession; which he warns them to avoid, lest all end in apostasy. For if men begin once to think hard and strange of the trials that may befall them on the account of their religion, and cannot find that in it which will outweigh their sufferings, they will not long retain it. Nor is it advisable for any man to entertain a profession that will not keep and maintain him in a dear year, but leave him to sink under those troubles which may befall him on the account thereof; as every thing whose real good doth not outbalance the evil that for it, and upon its single account, we must undergo, is certainly ineligible. Herein, then, lies no small part of the deceitful actings of the subtile principles mentioned. They are ready to fill the mind with dismal apprehen- sions of the difficulties, dangers, troubles, reproaches, and persecu- tions that men may undergo on the account of profession. And unless they can make the Lord Christ absolutely to be their end, portion, and measure of all, so as to reckon on all other things not according to their own nature, but according to the respect which they have unto him, and their interest in him, it is impossible but these things will secretly influence them into declensions from their profession. In the meantime aggravating thoughts of trouble please men’s minds; it seems reasonable unto them, yea their duty, to be terrifying themselves with the apprehensions of the evils that may befall them. And when they come indeed, if liberty, if goods, if life itself, be required in the confirmation of our testimony to the gospel, there needs no more to seduce us into a relinquishment of its profession, but only prevailing with us to value these things out of their place and more than they deserve, whereby the evils in the loss of them will be thought intolerable. And it is marvellous to think how the minds of men are insensibly and variously affected with these considerations, to the weakening, if not the ruin, of that zeal for God, that delight in his ways, that “rejoicing in tribula-