Directions for the glorifying God in our Lives

Direct. I. Our lives then glorify God, when they are such as his excellencies most appear in: and that is, when they are most divine or holy; when they are so managed, that the world may see, that it is God that we have chiefly respect unto, and that HOLINESS TO THE LORD is written upon all our faculties and affairs. — So much of GOD as appeareth in our lives, so much they are truly venerable, and advanced above the rank of fleshly, worldly lives. God only is the real glory of every person, and every thing, and every word or action of our lives. And the natural conscience of the world, which, in despite of their atheism, is forced to confess and reverence a Deity, will be forced (even when they are hated and persecuted) to reverence the appearance of God in his holy ones. Let it appear therefore, 1. That God’s authority commandeth you, above all the powers of the earth, and against all the power of fleshly lusts. 2. That it is the glory and interest of God that you live for, and look after principally in the world, and not your own carnal interest and glory: and that it is his work that you are doing, and not your own; and his cause, and not your own, that you are engaged in. 3. That it is his word and law that is your rule. 4. And the example of his Son that is your pattern. 5. And that your hearts and lives are moved and acted in the world, by motives fetched from the rewards which he hath promised, and the punishments which he hath threatened, in the world to come. 6. And that it is a supernatural, powerful principle, sent from God into your hearts, even the Holy Ghost, by which you are inclined and actuated in the tenor of your lives. 7. And that your daily converse is with God, and that men and other creatures are comparatively nothing to you, but are made to stand by, while God is preferred, and honoured, and served by you; and that all your business is with him, or for him in the world.

Direct. II. The more of heaven appeareth in your lives, the more your lives do glorify God. — Worldly and carnal men are conscious, that their glory is a vanishing glory, and their pleasure but a transitory dream, and that all their honour and wealth will shortly leave them in the dust; and therefore, they are forced, in despite of their sensuality, to bear some reverence to the life to come. And though they have not hearts themselves to deny the pleasures and profits of the world, and to spend their days in preparing for eternity, and in laying up a treasure in heaven; yet they are convinced, that those that do so, are the best and wisest men; and they could wish that they might die the death of the righteous, and that their last end might be like his. As heaven exceedeth earth, even in the reverent acknowledgment of the world, though not in their practical esteem and choice; so heavenly christians have a reverent acknowledgment from them, (when malice doth not hide their heavenliness by slanders,) though they will not be such themselves. Let it appear in your lives, that really you seek a higher happiness than this world affordeth, and that you verily look to live with Christ; and that as honour, and wealth, and pleasure command the lives of the ungodly, so the hope of heaven commandeth yours. Let it appear that this is your design and business in the world, and that your hearts and conversations are above, and that whatever you do or suffer, is for this, and not for any lower end; and this is a life that God is glorified by.

Direct. III. It glorifieth God, by showing the excellency of faith, when we contemn the riches and honour of the world, and live above the worldling’s life; accounting that a despicable thing, which he accounts his happiness, and loseth his soul for. — As men despise the toys of children, so a believer must take the transitory vanities of this world, for matters so inconsiderable, as not to be worthy his regard, save only as they are the matter of his duty to God, or as they relate to him, or the life to come. Saith Paul, 2 Cor. iv. 18, “We look not at the things which are seen,” (they are not worth our observing or looking at,) “but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.” The world is under a believer’s feet, while his eye is fixed on the celestial world. He travelleth through it to his home, and he will be thankful if his way be fair, and if he have his daily bread: but it is not his home, nor doth he make any great matter, whether his usage in it be kind or unkind, or whether his inn be well adorned or not. He is almost indifferent whether, for so short a time, he be rich or poor, in a high or in a low condition, further than as it tendeth to his Master’s service. Let men see that you have a higher birth than they, and higher hopes, and higher hearts, by setting light by that, which their hearts are set upon as their felicity. When seeming christians are as worldly and ambitious as others, and make as great a matter of their gain, and wealth, and honour, it showeth that they do but cover the base and sordid spirit of worldlings, with the visor of the christian name, to deceive themselves, and bring the faith of christians into scorn, and dishonour the holy name which they usurp.

Direct. IV. It much honoureth God, when his servants can quietly and fearlessly trust in him, in the face of all the dangers and threatenings which devils or men can cast before them; and can joyfully suffer pain or death, in obedience to his commands, and in confidence on his promise of everlasting happiness. — This showeth that we believe indeed that “there is a God,” and that “he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him,” Heb. xi. 6; and that he is true and just; and that his promises are to be trusted on; and that he is able to make them good, in despite of all the malice of his enemies; and that the threats or frowns of sinful worms are contemptible to him that feareth God. Psal. lviii. 11, “So that men shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous: verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth,” and that at last will judge the world in righteousness. Paul gloried in the Thessalonians, “for their faith and patience, in all their persecutions and tribulations which they endured; as a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God, that they might be accounted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which they suffered. Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble us, and rest with his saints to those that are troubled,” 2 Thess. i. 4-7. “If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified,” 1 Pet. iv. 14. “If any man suffer as a christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf,” ver. 16. When confidence in God, and assurance of the great reward in heaven, Matt. v. 11, 12, doth cause a believer undauntedly to say as the three witnesses, Dan. iii. “We are not careful, O king, to answer thee in this matter: the God whom we serve is able to deliver us:” when by faith we can go through the trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, of bonds and imprisonment, to be destitute and afflicted, yea, and tortured, not accepting deliverance, (upon sinful terms,) thus God is glorified by believers. “Lift up your voices,” O ye afflicted saints, “and sing, for the majesty of the Lord. Glorify ye the Lord in the fires, even the name of the Lord God of Israel in the isles of the sea,” Isa. xxiv. 14, 15. Sing to his praise with Paul and Silas, though your feet be in the stocks. If God call for your lives, remember that “you are not your own, you are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your bodies and spirits which are his,” 1 Cor. vi. 20. Rejoice in it, if you “bear in your bodies the marks of the Lord Jesus,” Gal. vi. 17; and if you “always bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in your bodies,” 2 Cor. iv. 10. And “with all boldness,” see that “Christ be magnified in your bodies, whether it be by life or death,” Phil. i. 20. He dishonoureth and reproacheth Christ and faith, that thinks he is not to be trusted even unto the death.

Direct. V. It much honoureth God, when the hopes of everlasting joys do cause believers to live much more joyfully than the most prosperous worldlings. — Not with their kind of doting mirth, in vain sports and pleasures, and foolish talking, and uncomely jests; but in that constant cheerfulness and gladness, which beseemeth the heirs of glory. Let it appear to the world, that indeed you hope to live with Christ, and to be equal with the angels. Do a dejected countenance, and a mournful, troubled, and complaining life, express such hopes? or rather tell men that your hopes are small, and that God is a hard master, and his service grievous? Do not thus dishonour him by your inordinate dejectedness; do not affright and discourage sinners from the pleasant service of the Lord.

Direct. VI. When christians live in a readiness to die, and can rejoice in the approach of death, and love and long for the day of judgment, when Christ shall justify them from the slanders of the world, and shall judge them to eternal joys: this is to the glory of God and our profession. — When death, which is the king of fears to others, appeareth as disarmed and conquered to believers; when judgment, which is the terror of others, is their desire; this showeth a triumphant faith, and that godliness is not in vain. It must be something above nature that can make a man “desire to depart and be with Christ, as best of all,” and “to be absent from the body and present with the Lord,” and to “comfort one another” with the mention of the glorious coming of their Lord, and the day when he shall judge the world in righteousness, Phil. i. 21; 2 Cor. v. 8; 1 Thess. iv. 18; 2 Thess. i. 10.

Direct. VII. The humility, and meekness, and patience of christians, much honour God and their holy faith; as pride, and passion, and impatience dishonour him. — Let men see that the Spirit of God doth cast down the devilish sin of pride, and maketh you like your Master, that humbled himself to assume our flesh, and to the “death of the cross,” and to the contradiction and reproach of foolish sinners, and “made himself of no reputation,” but “endured the shame” of being derided, spit upon, and crucified, Phil. ii. 7-9; Heb. xii. 2; and stooped to wash the feet of his disciples. It is not stoutness, and lifting up the head, and standing upon your terms, and upon your honour in the world, that is the honouring of God. When you are as little children, and as nothing in your own eyes, and seek not the honour that is of men, but say, “Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to thy name be the glory,” Psal. cxv. 1; and are content that your honour decrease and be trodden into the dirt, that his may increase, and his name be magnified; this is the glorifying of God. So when you show the world, that you are above the impotent passions of men, not to be insensible, but to be “angry and sin not,” and to “give place to wrath,” and not to resist and “avenge yourselves,” Rom. xii. 19; and to be “meek and lowly in heart,” Matt. xi. 29. It will appear that you have the wisdom which is “from above,” if you be “first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and hypocrisy,” James iii. 17. “But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth,” as if this were the wisdom from above which glorifieth God; for this “wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, and devilish,” ver. 14, 15. “A meek and quiet spirit is of great price in the sight of God,” 1 Pet. iii. 4; an ornament commended to women by the Scripture, which is amiable in the eyes of all.

Direct. VIII. It honoureth God and our profession, when you abound in love and good works; loving the godly with a special love, but all men with so much love, as makes you earnestly desirous of their welfare, and to love your enemies, and put up wrongs, and to study to do good to all, and hurt to none. — To be abundant in love, is to be like to God, who is love itself, 1 John iv. 7, 11; and showeth that God dwelleth in us, ver. 12. “All men may know that we are Christ’s disciples, if we love one another,” John xiii. 35. This is the “new” and the “great commandment; the fulfilling of the law,” Rom. xiii. 10; John xv. 12, 17; xiii. 34. You will be known to be the “children of your heavenly Father, if you love your enemies, and bless them that curse you, and pray for them that hate and persecute you, and despitefully use you,” Matt. v. 44. Do all the good that possibly you can, if you would be like him that doth good to the evil, and whose mercies are over all his works. Show the world that you “are his workmanship, created to good works in Christ Jesus, which he hath ordained for you to walk in,” Eph. ii. 10. “Herein is your Father glorified, that ye bring forth much fruit,” John xv. 8. “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven,” Matt. v. 16. “Honour God with thy substance, and with the first-fruits of all thy increase,” Prov. iii. 9. “And those that honour him he will honour,” 1 Sam. ii. 30; when barren, worldly hypocrites, that honour God only with their lips, and flattering words, shall be used as those that really dishonour him.

Direct. IX. The unity, concord, and peace of christians, do glorify God and their profession; when their divisions, contentions, and malicious persecutions of one another, do heinously dishonour him. — Men reverence that faith and practice which they see us unanimously accord in. And the same men will despise both it and us, when they see us together by the ears about it, and hear us in a Babel of confusion, one saying, This is the way, and another, That is it; one saying, Lo here is the true church and worship, and another saying, Lo it is there. Not that one man or a few must make a shoe meet for his own foot, and then say, All that will not dishonour God by discord, must wear this shoe: think as I think, and say as I say, or else you are schismatics. But we must all agree in believing and obeying God, and “walking by the same rule so far as we have attained,” Phil. iii. 15, 16. “The strong must bear the infirmities of the weak, and not please themselves; but every one of us please his neighbour for good to edification; and be like-minded one towards another, according to Christ Jesus, that we may with one mind and one mouth glorify God: receiving one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God,” Rom. xv. 1, 2, 5-7.

Direct. X. Justice commutative and distributive, private and public, in bargainings, and in government, and judgment, doth honour God and our profession in the eyes of all: when we do no wrong, but do to all men as we would they should do to us, Matt. vii. 12: that no man go beyond or defraud his brother in any matter; for the Lord is the avenger of all such, 1 Thess. iv. 6. — That a man’s word be his master, and that we lie not one to another, nor equivocate or deal subtilly and deceitfully, but in plainness and singleness of heart, and in simplicity and godly sincerity, have our conversation in the world. Perjured persons and covenant-breakers, that dissolve the bonds of human society, and take the name of God in vain, shall find by his vengeance that he holdeth them not guiltless.

Direct. XI. It much glorifieth God to worship him rationally and purely, in spirit and in truth, according to the glory of his wisdom and goodness; and it dishonoureth him to be worshipped ignorantly and carnally, with spells, and mimical, irrational actions, as if he were less wise than serious, grave, understanding men. — The worshippers of God have great cause to take heed how they behave themselves; lest they meet with the reward of Nadab and Abihu, and God tell them by his judgments, “that he will be sanctified in all them that come nigh him, and before all the people he will be glorified,” Lev. x. 1-3. The second commandment is enforced by the jealousy of God about his worship. Ignorant, rude, unseemly words, or unhandsome gestures, which tend to raise contempt in the auditors; or levity of speech, which makes men laugh, is abominable in a preacher of the gospel. And so is it to pray irrationally, incoherently, confusedly, with vain repetitions and tautologies, as if men thought to be heard for their babbling over so many words, while there is not so much as an appearance of a well composed, serious, rational, and reverent address of a fervent soul to God. To worship God as the papists do, with images, Agnus Dei’s, crucifixes, crossings, spittle, oil, candles, holy water, kissing the pax, dropping beads, praying to the Virgin Mary, and to other saints, repeating over the name of Jesus nine times in a breath, and saying such and such sentences so oft, praying to God in an unknown tongue, and saying to him they know not what, adoring the consecrated bread as no bread, but the very flesh of Christ himself, choosing the titular saint whose name they will invocate, fasting by feasting upon fish instead of flesh, saying so many masses a day, and offering sacrifice for the quick and the dead, praying for souls in purgatory, purchasing indulgences for their deliverance out of purgatory from the pope, carrying the pretended bones or other relics of their saints, the pope’s canonizing now and then one for a saint, pretending miracles to delude the people, going on pilgrimages to images, shrines, or relics, offering before the images, with a multitude more of such parcels of devotion, do most heinously dishonour God, and, as the apostle truly saith, do make unbelievers say, “They are mad,” 1 Cor. xiv. 23, and that they are “children in understanding,” and not “men,” ver. 20. Insomuch as it seemeth one of the greatest impediments to the conversion of the heathen and Mahometan world, and the chiefest means of confirming them in their infidelity, and making them hate and scorn christianity, that the Romish, and the eastern, and southern churches, within their view, do worship God so dishonourably as they do: as if our God were like a little child that must have pretty toys bought him in the fair, and brought home to please him. Whereas, if the unreformed churches in the east, west, and south were reformed, and had a learned, pious, able ministry, that clearly preached and seriously applied the word of God, and worshipped God with understanding, gravity, reverence, and serious spirituality, and lived a holy, heavenly, mortified, self-denying conversation, this would be the way to propagate christianity, and win the infidel world to Christ.

Direct. XII. If you will glorify God in your lives, you must be above a selfish, private, narrow mind, and must be chiefly intent upon the public good, and the spreading of the gospel through the world. — A selfish, private, narrow soul brings little honour to the cause of God: it is always taken up about itself, or imprisoned in a corner, in the dark, to the interest of some sect or party, and seeth not how things go in the world: its desires, and prayers, and endeavours go no further than they can see or travel. But a larger soul beholdeth all the earth, and is desirous to know how it goeth with the cause and servants of the Lord, and how the gospel gets ground upon the unbelieving nations; and such are affected with the state of the church a thousand miles off, almost as if it were at hand, as being members of the whole body of Christ, and not only of a sect. They pray for the “hallowing of God’s name,” and the “coming of his kingdom,” and the “doing of his will throughout the earth, as it is in heaven,” before they come to their own necessities, at least in order of esteem and desire. The prosperity of themselves, or their party or country, satisfieth them not, while the church abroad is in distress. They live as those that know the honour of God is more concerned in the welfare of the whole, than in the success of any party against the rest. They pray that the gospel may have free course and be glorified abroad, as it is with them, and the preachers of it be “delivered from unreasonable and wicked men,” 2 Thess. iii. 1, 2. The silencing the ministers, and suppressing the interest of Christ and souls, are the most grievous tidings to them: therefore they “pray for kings, and all in authority,” not for any carnal ends, but that “we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty,” 1 Tim. ii. 1-3. Thus God must be glorified by our lives.

Grand Direct. XVI. Let your life on earth be a conversation in heaven, by the constant work of faith and love; even such a faith as maketh things future as now present, and the unseen world as if it were continually open to your sight; and such a love as makes you long to see the glorious face of God, and the glory of your dear Redeemer, and to be taken up with blessed spirits in his perfect, endless love and praise.

My Treatise of “The Life of Faith,” and the fourth part of “The Saints’ Rest,” being written wholly or mostly to this use, I must refer the reader to them, and say no more of it in this direction.

Grand Direct. XVII. As the soul must be carried up to God, and devoted to him, according to all the foregoing directions, so must it be delivered from carnal selfishness, or flesh-pleasing, which is the grand enemy to God and godliness in the world; and from the three great branches of this idolatry, viz. the love of sensual pleasures, the love of worldly wealth, and the proud desire and love of worldly honour and esteem: and the mortifying of these must be much of the labour of your lives.

Of this also I have written so much in a “Treatise of Self-denial,” and in another called “The Crucifying of the World by the Cross of Christ,” that I shall now pass by all, save what will be more seasonable anon under the more particular directions, in the fourth part, when I come to speak of selfishness, as opposed to the love of others.

I have now given you the general grand directions, containing the very being and life of godliness and christianity; with those particular subdirections which are needful to the performance of them. And I must tell you, that as your life, and strength, and comfort principally depend on these, so doth your success in resisting all your particular sins: and therefore, if you first obey not these general directions, the more particular ones that follow will be almost useless to you, even as branches cut off from the stock of the tree, which are deprived thereby of their support and life. But upon supposition that first you will maintain these vital parts of your religion, I shall proceed to direct you first in some particulars most nearly subordinate to the forementioned duties, and then to the remoter branches.