10. _We have had our conversation in the world_; even in the world of the ungodly: not only among the children of God (that were, comparatively, a little thing:) but among the children of the devil, among those that _lie in wickedness_, ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ, _in the wicked one_. * What a world is this! How throughly impregnated with the spirit it continually breathes! As our God is good and doth good, so the God of this world, and all his children, are evil, and do evil, (so far as they are suffered) to all the children of God. Like their father, they are always lying in wait, or _walking about, seeking whom they may devour_: using fraud or force, secret wiles or open violence, to destroy those who are not of the world: continually warring against our souls, and by old or new weapons and devices of every kind, labouring to bring them back into the snare of the devil, into the broad road that leadeth to destruction.
11. _We have had our_ whole _conversation in_ such _a world, in simplicity and godly sincerity_. First, _in simplicity_. This is what our Lord recommends, under the name of a _single eye. The light of the body_, saith he, _is the eye. If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light._ The meaning whereof is this. What the eye is to the body, that the intention is, to all the words and actions. If therefore this eye of thy soul be single, all thy actions and conversation, shall be _full of light_, of the light of heaven; of love and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.
We are then simple of heart, when the eye of our mind is singly fixt on God: when in all things we aim at God alone, as our God, our portion, our strength, our happiness, our exceeding great reward, our all, in time and eternity. This is simplicity; when a steddy view, a single intention of promoting his glory, of doing and suffering his blessed will, runs thro’ our whole soul, fills all our heart, and is the constant spring of all our thoughts, desires and purposes.
12. _We have had our conversation in the world_, secondly, _in godly sincerity_. The difference between simplicity and sincerity seems to be chiefly this: simplicity regards the intention itself, sincerity, the execution of it. And this sincerity relates not barely to our words, but to our whole conversation, as described above. It is not here to be understood in that narrow sense, wherein St. _Paul_ himself sometimes uses it, for speaking the truth, or abstaining from guile, from craft and dissimulation. But in a more extensive meaning, as actually hitting the mark which we aim at by simplicity. Accordingly it implies in this place, that we do in fact speak and do all to the glory of God; that all our words are not only pointed at this, but actually conducive thereto; that all our actions flow on in an even stream, uniformly subservient to this great end: and that in our whole lives, we are moving strait toward God, and that continually; walking steddily on in the highway of holiness, in the paths of justice, mercy and truth.
13. This sincerity is termed by the apostle, godly sincerity, or the sincerity of God, (εἰλικρίνεια Θεοῦ,) to prevent our mistaking or confounding it with the sincerity of the Heathens: (for they had also a kind of sincerity among them, for which they professed no small veneration) likewise to denote the object and end of this, as of every Christian virtue; seeing whatever does not ultimately tend to God, sinks among _the beggarly elements of the world_. By styling it, the sincerity of God, he also points out the author of it, the _Father of lights, from whom every good and perfect gift descendeth_: which is still more clearly declared in the following words, _Not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God_.
14. _Not with fleshly wisdom._ As if he had said, We cannot thus converse in the world, by thy natural strength or understanding, neither by any naturally-acquired knowledge or wisdom. We cannot gain this simplicity, or practise this sincerity, by the force either of good sense, good nature, or good breeding. It overshoots all our native courage and resolution, as well as all our precepts of philosophy. The power of custom is not able to train us up to this, nor the most exquisite rules of human education. Neither could I _Paul_ ever attain hereto, notwithstanding all the advantages I enjoyed, so long as I was _in the flesh_, in my natural state, and pursued it only by _fleshly_, natural _wisdom_.