_Fourthly_, If he that is in CHRIST be a new creature, then this may be prescribed as an infallible rule for every person of whatever denomination, age, degree or quality, to judge himself by; this being the only solid foundation, whereon we can build a well-grounded assurance of pardon, peace, and happiness.
We may indeed depend on the broken reed of an external profession; we may think we are good enough, if we lead such sober, honest, moral lives, as many heathens did. We may imagine we are in a safe condition, if we attend on the public offices of religion, and are constant in the duties of our closets. But unless all these tend to reform our lives, and change our hearts, and are only used as so many channels of divine grace; as I told you before, so I tell you again, christianity will profit you nothing.
Let each of us therefore seriously put this question to our hearts: Have we received the Holy Ghost since we believed? Are we new creatures in CHRIST, or no? At least, if we are not so yet, is it our daily endeavour to become such? Do we constantly and conscientiously use all the means of grace required thereto? Do we fast, watch and pray? Do we, not lazily seek, but laboriously strive to enter in at the strait gate? In short, do we renounce our own righteousness, take up our crosses and follow CHRIST? If so, we are in that narrow way which leads to life; the good seed is sown in our hearts, and will, if duly watered and nourished by a regular persevering use of all the means of grace, grow up to eternal life. But on the contrary, if we have only heard, and know not experimentally, whether there be any Holy Ghost; if we are strangers to fasting, watching and prayer, and all the other spiritual exercises of devotion; if we are content to go in the broad way, merely because we see most other people do so, without once reflecting whether it be the right one or not; in short, if we are strangers, nay enemies to the cross of CHRIST, by lives of worldly-mindedness, and sensual pleasure, and thereby make others think, that christianity is but an empty name, a bare formal profession; if this be the case, I say, CHRIST is as yet dead in vain, to us; we are under the guilt of our sins; and are unacquainted with a true and thorough conversion.
But beloved, I am persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though I thus speak; I would humbly hope that you are sincerely persuaded, that he who hath not the Spirit of CHRIST is none of his; and that, unless the Spirit, which raised JESUS from the dead, dwell in you here, neither will your mortal bodies be quickened by the same Spirit to dwell with him hereafter.
Let me therefore (as was proposed in the _last_ place) earnestly exhort you, in the name of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, to act suitable to those convictions, and to live as christians, that are commanded in holy writ, to “put off their former conversation concerning the Old Man, and to put on the New Man, which is created after GOD in righteousness and true holiness.”
It must be owned indeed, that this is a great and difficult work; but, blessed be GOD, it is not impossible. Many thousands of happy souls have been assisted by a divine power to bring it about, and why should we despair of success? Is GOD’s hand shortened, that it cannot save? Was he the GOD of our Fathers, is he not the GOD of their children also? Yes, doubtless, of their children also. It is a task likewise, that will put us to some pain; it will oblige us to part with some lust, to break with some friend, to mortify some beloved passion, which may be exceeding dear to us, and perhaps as hard to leave, as to cut off a right-hand, or pluck out a right-eye. But what of all this? Will not the being made a real living member of CHRIST, a child of GOD, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven, abundantly make amends for all this trouble? Undoubtedly it will.
The setting about and carrying on this great and necessary work, perhaps may, nay assuredly will expose us also to the ridicule of the unthinking part of mankind, who will wonder, that we run not into the same excess of riot with themselves; and because we deny our sinful appetites, and are not conformed to this world, being commanded in scripture to do the one, and to have our conversation in heaven, in opposition to the other, they may count our lives folly, and our end to be without honour. But will not the being numbered among the saints, and shining as the stars for ever and ever, be a more than sufficient recompense for all the ridicule, calumny, or reproach, we can possibly meet with here?