The Work of the Spirit More Particularly, by Which the Soul Is Enabled to Apply Christ
“And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins.” Epu. Bide
We have seen our union with Christ in the general nature of it, and the means by which it is effected, both external by the preaching of the gospel, and znternal by the drawing of the Father. We are now to bring our thoughts yet closer to this great mystery, and consider the bands by which Christ and believers are knit together in a blessed union.
If we heedfully observe the scripture expressions, and ponder the nature of this union, we shall find there are two bands which knit Christ and the soul together: 1. The Sprit, on Christ’s part, quickening us with spiritual life, whereby Christ first takes hold of us; and, 2. Fath on our part, when thus quickened, wheréby we take hold of Christ; accordingly, this union with the Lord Jesus is expressed in Scripture sometimes by the one and sometimes by the other of these means or bands by which it is effected. Christ is sometimes said to be in us; so, Col. 1: 27, “Christ is in you the hope of glory;” and Rom. 8: 10, “And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin.” At other times it is expressed by the other band on our part, as 1 John 5: 20, ‘““We are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ;” and 2 Cor. 5: 17, “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.”
The difference between these is thus aptly expressed by Mr. Case: Christ is in believers by his Spirit. 1 John 4:13. The believer is in Christ by fazth. John 1: 12.
Christ is in the believer by znhabitatzon. Rom.8:10. The believer is in Christ by zmplantation. Rom. 6:5. Christ is in the believer as the head is in the body, Col. 1: 18; as the root in the branches, John 15: 5. Believers are in Christ as the members are in the head, Eph. 1; 23, or as the branches are in the root, John 15:1, 7. Christ in the believer implieth life and influence from Christ. Col. 8:4. The believer in Christ implieth communion and fellowship with Christ. 1 Cor. 1:30. When Christ is said to be in the believer, we are to understand it in reference to sanctification. When the believer is said to be in Christ, it is in order to justification.”
Thus we apprehend being ourselves first apprehended by Jesus Christ. Phil. 3:12. We do not take hold of Christ till first he take hold of us; no vital act of faith can be exercised till a vital principle be first inspired; of both these bands of union we must speak distinctly, and first of Christ quickening us by his Spuit, in order to our union with him, of which we have an account in the scripture before us, ‘You hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;’ in which words we find these two things:
1, The imparting of vital principle of grace. You hath he quickened. ‘The words hath he quickened are necessary to make clear the sense of the apostle, which else would have been more obscure, by reason of the long parenthesis between the first and fifth verses. They import the first vital act of the Spirit of God, or his first enlivening work upon the soul, in order to its union with Jesus Christ; for as the blood of Christ is the fountain of all merit, so the Spirit of Christ is the fountain of all spiritual life; and until he quicken us, impart the principle of divine life into our souls, we can put forth no vital act of faith to lay hold upon Jesus Christ.
This his quickening work is therefore first in the order of nature to our union with Christ, and fundamental to all other acts of grace done by us, from our first closing with Christ throughout the whole course of our obedience; and this quickening act is said, verse 5, to be ‘together with Christ:” either denoting, as some expound it, that it is the effect of the same power by which Christ was raised from the dead, according to Eph. 1: 20; or rather, to be quickened together with Christ, denotes that new spiritual life which is imparted to our dead souls in the time of our union with Christ: for it is Christ to whom we are conjoined and united in our regeneration, out of whom, as a fountain, all spiritual benefits flow to us, among which this vivification or quickening is one, and a most sweet and precious one.
Zanchy Bodius, and many others, will have this quckening to comprise both our justification and regeneration, and to stand opposed both to eternal and spiritwal death, and it may well be allowed; but it most properly imports our regeneration, wherein the Spirit, in an ineffable and mysterious way, makes the soul to live to God, yea, to live the life of God, which soul was before dead in trespasses and sins.
2. The words “hath he quickened” imply also the total indisposedness of the subjects by nature: they are dead in respect to condemnation, being under the damning sentence of the law, and dead in respect to the privation of spiritual life; dead in opposition to justification, and dead in opposition to regeneration and sanctification. And the fatal instrument by which their souls died is here showed them: you were dead in, or by ¢respasses and sims; this was the sword that killed your souls, and cut them off from God, Some curiously distinguish between trespasses and sins, as if one pointed at original, the other at actual sins; but I suppose they are promiscuously used here, and serve to express the cause of their ruin, or means of their spiritual death and destruction: this was their case when Christ came to quicken them, dead mm sim; and being so, they would never move themselves towards union with Christ, but as they were moved by the quickening Spirit of God. Hence,
Those souls which have wnion with Christ are quackened with a supernatural principle of life by the Spirit of God.
The Spirit of God is not only a living Spirit, but he is the Spirit of life, or the life-giving Spirit. And without his breathing life into our souls, our union with Christ is impossible. We close with Christ by faith, but that faith being a vital act, presupposes a principle of life communicated to us by the Spirit; therefore it is said, ‘‘ Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die,” John 11: 26: the vital act and operation of faith springs from this quickening Spirit. So, Rom. 8: 1, 2, the apostle, having shown the blessed state of them that are in Christ, shows us in the second verse how we come to be in him: “The Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.”
There is indeed a quickening work of the Spirit which is subsequent to regeneration, consisting in his exciting, recovering, and actuating of his own graces in us; and from hence is the growth of a Christian; but I am here to speak of a quickening act of the Spirit en our regeneration, from which proceeds the spiritual life of a Christian, and will show what this spiritual life is in its nature and properties; in what manner it is wrought or inspired into the soul; for what end this life is so inspired; that this work is wholly supernatural; and why this quickening must be antecedent to our actual closing with Christ by faith.
J. THE NATURE AND pRopERTIES of this life consists in that wonderful change which the Spirit of God makes wpon the Srame and temper of the soul, by implanting in it the principles of grace.
A change it makes upon the soul, and that a marvellous one, no less than from death to life; for though a man be physically a living man, his soul hath union with his body, yet his soul having no union with Christ, he is sp7- itwally dead. Luke 15: 24, and Col. 2:18. Alas, it deserves not the name of life to have a soul serving only to preserve the body a little while from corruption; to carry it up and down the world, and enable it to eat and drink, and talk and laugh, and then die. We begin to live when we begin to have union with Christ the Fountain of life by his Spirit communicated to us: from this time we are to reckon our life as some have done. There be many changes made upon men besides this: many are changed from profaneness to civility, and from mere civility to formality and a shadow of religion, who still remain in the state and power of spiritual death; but when the Spirit of the Lord is poured out upon us, to quicken us with the new spiritual life, this is a wonderful change indeed: it gives us a new supernatural being, called a new creature, the new man, the hidden man of the heart. The natural essence and faculties of the soul still remain, but it is divested of the old qualities and endowed with new ones: “Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”. 2 Cor. 5:17.
And this change is not made by altering and rectifying the disorders of the life only, leaving the temper and frame of the heart still carnal; but by implanting a supernatural, permanent principle in the soul. It shall be in him a well of water. John 4:14. Principles are to a course of action, as fountains or springs to the streams and rivers that flow from them, and are maintained by them; and hence the constancy of renewed souls in the course of godliness.
Nor is this principle or habit acquired by accustoming ourselves to holy actions, as natural habits are acquired by frequent acts, which beget a dsposition, and thence grow up to a habit or second nature; but it is implanted in the soul by the Spirit of God. So we read, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you,” Ezek. 36: 25; it grows not up out of our natures, but is wrought in us. As it is said of the two witnesses, Rev. 11: 11, who lay dead in a civil sense three days and a half, that “the Spirit of life from God entered into them;” so it is here in a spiritual sense, the Spirit of life from God enters into the dead, carnal heart. But we shall more fully discern the nature of this spiritual life by considering the properties of it; among which these are very remarkable.
1. The soul that is joined to Christ is quickened with a dwine fe; so we read 2 Pet. 1: 4, where believers are said to be ‘‘partakers of the divine nature;” a very high expression, and that must be understood in a way proper to believers; we partake of it by the inhabitation of the Spirit of God in us: “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” 1 Cor. 3: 16. The Spirit who is God by nature dwells in and actuates the soul whom he regenerates, and by sanctifying it causes it to live a divine life; from this life of God the unsanctified are said to be alienated, Eph. 4: 18, but believers are partakers of it.
2. And being divine, it must be the most evcellent and transcendent life that any creature can live in this world: it surmounts the natural, rational, and moral life of the unsanctified, as much as the angelical life excels the life of flies and worms of the earth. Some think it a rare life to live in sensual pleasures, while Scripture will not allow so much as the name of life to them, but tells us they are dead while they live. 1 Tim. 5:6. Certainly it is a wonderful elevation of the nature of man to be quickened with this divine and spiritual life. There are two ways wherein the blessed God hath honored poor man above the very angels of heaven. One was by the union of our nature, in Christ, with the divine nature; the other is by uniting us to Christ, and thereby communicating spiritual life to us: this latter is a most glorious privilege, and in one respect a more singular mercy than the former; for the honor which was done to our nature by Christ assuming it, is common to all, good and bad, even they that perish have yet that honor; but to be implanted in Christ by regeneration, and live upon him as the branch does upon the vine, this is a peculiar privilege, a mercy kept from the world that is to perish, and only communicated to God’s people, who are to live eternally with him in heaven.
3. This life imparted by the regenerating Spirit, is a most pleasant life. All delights, all pleasures, all joys, which are not fantastic and delusive, have their spring and origin here: ‘To be spiritually-minded is life and peace,” Rom. 8:6, a most serene, placid life; such a soul becomes, so far as it is influenced and sanctified by the Spirit, the very region of life and peace: it hath its pleasures in it, such as a stranger intermeddles not with. Prov. 14:10. Regeneration is the point from which all true pleasure commences; you never live a cheerful day till you begin to live to God: therefore it is said when the prodigal son was returned to his father and reconciled, then “they began to be merry.” Luke 15:24. None can by words make another understand what that pleasure is which the renewed soul feels in its communion with the Lord, and in the sealings and witnessings of his Spirit. That is a very apt and well-known similitude which Peter Martyr used, and the Lord blessed to the conversion of the noble marquis Galeacus: If, said he, a man should see a company of people dancing upon the top of a remote hill, he would be apt to conclude they were a company of wild, distracted people; but if he draw nearer, and behold the excellent order and hear the ravishing sweet music that are among them, he will quickly alter his opinion of them, and be for dancing with them himself. All the delights in the sensual life are but as the putrid waters of a corrupt pond where toads lie croaking and spawning, compared to the erystal streams of the most pure and pleasant fountain.
4, This life of God, with which the regenerate are quickened in their union with Christ, as it is a pleasant, so it is also a growing, increasing life: “The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” John 4:14. It is not in our sanctification as it is in our justification: our justification is complete and perfect, no defect is found there; but the. new creature labors under many defects: all believers are equally justified, but not equally sanctified. Therefore you read that “the inward man is renewed day by day,” 2 Cor. 4:16; and Christians are exhorted “to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour.” 1 Pet. 3:18. If this work were perfect, and finished at once, as justification is, there could be ro renewing day by day, nor growth in grace. The apostle indeed prays for the Thessalonians, that God would sanctify them wholly, perfectly. 1 Thess. 5:23. And this is matter of prayer and hope; for at last it will grow up to perfection; but this perfect holiness is reserved for the perfect state in the world to come, and none but deluded, proud spirits boast of it here; but when “that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.” 1 Cor. 13:10. And upon the imperfection of the new creature in every faculty, that warfare and daily conflict spoken of, Gal. 5:17, and experienced by every Christian, is grounded; grace rises gradually in the soul, as the sun doth in the heavens, “that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.” Prov. 4:18.
5. This life with which the regenerate are quickened, is also an everlasteng life. ‘This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.” 1 John 5:11. This principle of life is the seed of God; and that remains in the soul forever. 1 John 3:9. It is no transient, vanishing thing, but a fixed, permanent principle, which abides in the soul for ever. A man may lose his gifts, but grace abides; the soul may and must be separated from the body, but grace cannot be separated from the soul: when all forsake us, this will not leave us. This principle implanted by the Spirit is therefore vastly different, both from the extraordinary gifts of prophecy wherein the Spirit was sometimes said to come upon men under the Old Testament, 1 Sam.’10: 6, 10, and from the common vanishing effects he sometimes produces in the unregenerate, of which we have frequent accounts in the New Testament. Heb. 6:4, and John 5:85. It is one thing for the Spirit to visit a man in the way of present influence and assistance, and another thing to dwell in a man as in his temple.
II. Having seen the nature and properties of the spiritual life, we are concerned, in the next place, to inquire How IT 1s wroveut by the Spirit.
1. And here we must say, first of all, that the work is wrought in the soul very mysteriously; so Christ tells Nicodemus, ‘‘ The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, or whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” John 3:8. There are many opinions among philosophers about the origin of wind, but we have no certain knowledge of it; we describe it by its effects and properties, but know little of its origin: and if the works of God in nature are so abstruse and unsearchable, how much more are these sublime and supernatural works of the Spirit? We are not able to solve the phenomena of nature, we can give no account of our own formation in the womb. Eccl. 11:5. Who can exactly describe how the parts of the body are formed and the soul infused? It is curiously wrought in the lower parts of the earth, as the Psalmist speaks, Psalm 139:15; but how, we know not. Basil saith divers questions may be moved about a fly, which may puzzle the greatest philosopher: we know little of the forms and essences of natural things, much less of the profound and abstruse spiritual things.
2. But though we cannot pry into these secrets by the eye of reason, God hath revealed to us in his word, that it is wrought by dis own almighty power. Eph. 1:19. The apostle ascribes this work to the exceeding greatness of the power of God; and this must needs be, if we consider how the Spirit of God expresses it in Scripture by a new creation — a giving being to something out of nothing. Eph. 2:10. In this it differs from all the effects of human power, for man always works upon some preéxistent matter, but here is no such matter. Nothing is found in man to contribute towards this work; this supernatural life is not, nor can it be educed out of natural principles; this wholly transcends the sphere of all natural power: but of this more anon.
3. This also we may affirm, that the whole soul and spirit is the recipient of this divine life, and thus it is called a new creature, anew man, having an integral perfection and fulness of all its parts and members: it becomes light in the mind, John 17 :3; obedience in the will, 1 Peter 1:2; in the affections a heavenly temper and tenderness, Col. 3:1, 2. And here, we must observe, lies one main difference between a regenerate soul and a hypocrite: the one is all of a piece, as I may say, the principle of spiritual life runs into all and every faculty and affection, and sanctifies or renews the whole man; whereas the change upon the hypocrite is but partial and particular: he may have new light, but no new love; a new tongue, but not a new heart; this or that vice may be reformed, but the whole course of his life is not altered.
4, This imparting of spiritual life is done inmstantancously, as all creation work is; hence it is resembled to that plastic power which, in a moment, made the light to shine out of darkness. So God shines into our hearts. 2 Cor. 4:6. It is true, a soul may be a long time under the preparatory work of the Spirit, under convictions and humiliations, purposes and resolutions; he may be attending means and ordinances, but when the Spirit comes to qvicken the soul it is done in a moment; and O what a blessed moment is this, unon which the whole weight of our eternal happiness depends; for it is Christ in us, Christ formed in us the hope of glory. Col.1:27. And our Lord expressly tells us, that except we be regenerate and born again, we cannot see the kingdom of God.
IIL. Consider dhe prsign anv END of God in this his quickening work, If we consult the Scriptures, we shall find this principle of life is given us in order to our glorifying God in this world by a life of obedience, and our enjoying God in the world to come.:
1. Spiritual life is imparted in order to a course of obedrence wn this world, whereby God is glorified. So we read in Eph. 2:10, ‘Created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them:” habits are to actions as the root is to the fruit, it is for the fruit that we plant the root and ingraff the branches. So in Ezek. 36:27, “I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments and do them.” This is the immediate design not only of the first principle of life imparted to the soul, but of all the exciting, actuating, and assisting works of the Spirit afterwards.
This principle makes a szncere and true obedience when it flows from an inward vital principle of grace. The hypocrite is moved by something from without, as the applause of men, the accommodation of fleshy interests, the force of education; or if there be any thing from within that moves him, it is but self-interest, to quiet a disturbing conscience and support his vain hopes of heaven; but he never acts from a new principle, a new nature, inclining him to holy actions. Sincerity mainly lies in the harmony and correspondence of actions to their principles: from this influence of the Spirit it is that men hunger and thirst for God, and go to their duties as hungry men do to their meals.
O reader, pause a little upon this ere thou pass on, ask thy heart whether it be so with thee: are holy duties natural to thee? Does thy soul move and work after God by a kind of supernatural instinct? This then will be to thee a good evidence of thy integrity.
From this principle of life also results the excellence of our obedience; for by virtue thereof it becomes free and voluntary, not forced and constrained; it drops like honey, of its own accord, out of the comb, Song 4:11; or as waters from the fountain, without forcing. John 4:14. An unprincipled professor must be pressed hard by some weight of affliction, ere he will yield one tear or pour out a prayer. ‘‘ When he slew them, then they sought him.” Psalm 78:34. The freedom of obedience is the excellence of it, God’s eye is much upon that, 1 Cor. 9:17; yea, and the wniformty of our obedience, which is also a special part of the beauty of it, results from hence: this is it which makes us holy tn all manner of conversation, or in every point and turning of our conversations, as the original imports. 1 Pet. 1:15. Whereas he that is moved by this or that external accidental motive must needs be very uneven, like ‘the legs of a lame man,” as the expression is, Prov. 26:7, which “are not equal:” now a word of God, and then the discourse runs muddy and profane or carnal again. All the evenness and uniformity in the several parts of a Christian’s life are the effect of this principle of spiritual life.
2. Another aim and design of God in imparting this principle of life is, thereby to prepare and qualify the soul for the enjoyment of himself zn heaven: ‘ Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 8: 3. All that shall possess that inheritance must be begotten again to it, as the apostle speaks, 1 Pet. 1: 8, 4: This principle of grace is the very seed of that glory; it is eternal life in the root and principle. John 17:3. By this the soul is attempered and qualified for that state and employment. What is the life of glory but the vision of
God, and the soul’s assimilation to God by that vision? From both which results that unspeakable joy and delight which passeth understanding. But what vision of God, assimilation to God, or delight in God can that soul have which was never quickened with the supernatural principle of grace? The temper of such souls is expressed in that sad character, “My soul loathed them, and their soul also abhorred me.” Zech. 11:8. For want of this vital principle it is that the very same duties and ordinances which are the delight and highest pleasure of the saints, are no better than a mere drudgery and bondage to others. Mal. 1: 18. Heaven would be no heaven to a dead soul; this principle of life, in its daily growth and improvement, is our meetness as well as our evidence for heaven.
IV. Tuts QUICKENING WORK IS WHOLLY SUPERNATURAL; it is the sole and proper work of the Spirit of God. So Christ himself expressly asserts it: “That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spifit is spirit: the wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” John 3: 6-8. Believers are the birth or offspring of the Spirit, who produceth the new creature in them ina manner unintelligible even to themselves. So far is it above their own ability to proluce, that it is above their capacity to understand the way of its production: as if you should ask, Do you know from whence the wind comes? No. Do you know whither it goes? No. But you hear and feel it when it blows? Yes. So is every one that is born of the Spirit; he feels the efficacy and discerns the effects of the Spirit on his own soul, but cannot understand or describe the manner of their production. This #3 not only above the carnal, but above the renewed mind to comprehend. We really contribute nothing to the production of this principle of life. We may indeed be said to concur with the Spirit in it; there is found in us a capacity, aptness, or receptiveness of it; our nature is endowed with such faculties and powers as are meet subjects to receive and instruments to act it; but God only quickens the rational nature with spiritual life. ‘‘Who maketh thee to differ from another? And what hast thou that thou didst not receive?” 1 Cor. 4:7. The Scriptures not only assert that without him we can do nothing, and that our sufficiency is of God, John 15:5; Matt. 12:34; 2 Cor. 3:5; but they declare that the carnal mind “is enmity against God,” and that we were ‘enemies in our minds by wicked works.” Rom. 8:7; Col. 1:21. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, a perishing thing; but this principle of spiritual life is not subject to dissolution, it is the water that springs up into everlasting life, John 4:14; the seed of God, which remaineth in the regenerate soul. 1 John 3:9. And all this, because it is born not of corruptible, but of incorruptible seed. 1 Pet. 1:23. Our new birth is represented to us in the Scriptures as a resurrection from the dead, a new creation, Eph. 5:14; 4:24; and thus all is ascribed to grace.
If nature could produce in any degree this spiritual life, then the best natures would be soonest quickened with it; and the worst natures not at all, or last, and least of all: but we find apparently the worst natures often regenerated, and the best left in the state of spiritual death. With how many sweet virtues was the young man adorned, Mark 10:21, yet graceless: and what a sink of sin was Mary Magdalene, Luke 7: 37, yet sanctified. And there is scarce any thing that affects and melts the hearts of Christians more than this comparative consideration, when they consider vessels of gold cast away, and leaden ones chosen for such noble uses. So that it is plain enough to all wise and humble souls, that this new life is wholly of supernatural production.
V. I shall briefly represent THE NECESSARY ANTECEDENCY of this quickening work of the Spirit to our first closing with Christ by faith; and this will appear if you consider the nature of the vital act of faith, which is the soul’s receiving of Christ and resting upon him for pardon and salvation; in which two things are necessarily included:
1. The renownang of all other hopes and dependences whatsoever. Self in all its acceptations, natural, sinful, and moral, is now to be denied and renounced for ever, else Christ can never be received, Rom. 10: 3, not only self in its vilest pollutions, but self in its richest ornaments and endowments; but this is as impossible to the unrenewed and natural man, as it is for rocks or mountains to start from their centre and fly like wandering atoms in the air: nature will rather choose to run the hazard of everlasting damnation, than escape it by a total renunciation of its beloved lusts or self-righteousness; this supernatural work necessarily requires a supernatural principle. Rom. 8: 2.
2. The opening the heart fully to Christ, without which Christ can never be received, Rev. 3: 20, is also the effect of the quickening Spirit, the Spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus. Sooner may we expect to see the flowers and blossoms open without the influence of the sun, than the heart and will of a sinner open to receive Christ without a principle of spiritual life first derived from him; and this will be past doubt to all that consider not only the impotence, but the ignorance, prejudice, and aversion of nature, by which the door of the heart is barred and chained against Christ. John 5:40. So that if any have the heart opened to receive him, it is the Lord that opens it by his almighty power.
Inrerence 1. If such be the nature and necessity of this principle of divine life, it follows that wnregenerate men are no better than dead men. So the text represents them, “You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins:” spiritually dead though naturally alive, yea, and lively too as any other persons in the world, r12 THE METHOD OF GRACE.
To all those things that are natural, they are alive: they can understand, reason, discourse, project, and contrive, as well as others; they can eat, drink, and build, plant, and receive the natural comfort of these things, as much as any others. So their life is described, Job 21: 12: they ‘‘take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ; they spend their days in wealth” And James 5: 5, “Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth,” as the fish lives in the water, its natural element, and yet this natural, sensual life is not allowed the name of life, 1 Tim. 5: 6; such persons are dead while they live; it is a base and ‘ignoble life to have a soul only to preserve the body, or to enable a man for a few years to eat and drink, and talk and laugh, and then die. But spiritually considered, they are dead; without life, sense, or motion towards God and the things that are above: their understandings are dead, 1 Cor. 2: 14, and receive not the things that are of God; their wills are dead, and move not towards Jesus Christ. John 6:65. Their affections are dead, even to the most excellent and spiritual objects; and all their duties are dead duties, without life or spirit. This is the sad case of the unregenerate world.
2. This speaks encouragement to ministers and parents to expect success at last, even with those that yet give little hope of CONVEY STON,
The work you see is the Lord’s; when the Spirit of life comes upon their dead souls they shall believe, and be made willing; till then we do but plough upon the rocks; yet let not our hand slack in duty; pray for them and plead with them; you know not in which prayer or exhortation the Spirit of life may breathe upon them. ‘Can: these dry bones live?” Yes, if the Spirit of life from God breathe upon them they can, and shall live: what though their dispositions be averse to all things that are spiritual and serious, yet even such have been regenerated when more sweet and promising natures have been passed by and left under spiritual death. Mr. Ward said of his brother, a man of great gifts, yet of a very bad temper, though my brother Rogers has grace enough for two men, he has not half enough for himself. It may be you have prayed and striven long with your relations and to little purpose, yet be not discouraged. How often was Mr. John Rogers, that famous and successful divine, a grief of heart to his relations in his younger years, proving a wild young man, to the great discouragement of his pious friends; yet, at last, the Lord graciously changed him, so that Mr. Richard Rogers would say, when he would exercise the utmost degree of charity or hope for any that at present were vile and worthless, L well never despair of any man for John Rogers’ sake.
3. How honorable are Christians by ther new birth! They are “born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God,” John 1: 18, not in a mere natural way, but in a spiritual and supernatural: they are the offspring of God, the children of the Most High, as well by regeneration as by adoption; which is the greatest advancement of the human nature, next to its union with the divine nature of Christ. Oh, what honor is this for a poor sinful creature, to have the very life of God breathed into his soul! All other dignities of nature are trifles compared with this; this makes a Christian a sacred hallowed thing, the living temple of God, 1 Cor. 6: 19, the special object of his delight.
4. How deplorable 1s the condition of the unregenerate world. They are but as dead men. As there is no beauly in the dead, all their loveliness goes away at death, so there is no spiritual beauty or loveliness in any that are unregenerate. It is true, many of them have excellences which adorn their conversation in the eyes of men; but what are all these but so many sweet flowers strewed over a body where no life is. The dead have no pleasure or delight; even so the unregenerate are incapable of the delights of the Christian life; “to be spiritually-minded ‘is life and peace,” Rom. 8:6; that is, this is the only serene, placid; and pleasant life. The dead have no heat, they are cold as clay; so are all the unregenerate towards God and things above; their affections to him are cold and frozen: that which makes a gracious heart melt will not make an unregenerate heart move. The dead must be buried, so must the unregenerate .be buried out of God’s sight; buried in the lowest hell, in the place of darkness for ever. John 3:3. Woe to the unregenerate; good had it been for them had they never been born!
5. How greatly are all men concerned to examine ther condition with respect to spiritual life and death! It is very common for men to presume upon their union with and interest in Christ. This privilege is by common mistake extended generally to all that profess the Christian religion and practise the external duties of it, when, in truth, no more are united to Christ than are quickened by the Spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus. Rom. 8:1,2. 0O try your interest in Christ by this rule. If I am quickened by Christ, I have union with Christ. If there be spiritual sense in your souls, there is spiritual life in them. There are senses belonging to the spiritual as well as to the animal life, Heb. 5:14; they can feel and sensibly groan under soul pressures and burdens of sin. Rom. 7:24. - The dead feel not, moan not under the burdens of sin as the living do: they may be sensible indeed of the evil of sin with respect to themselves, but not as against God; damnation may scare them, but pollution doth not; hell may frighten them, but not the offending of God.
If there be spiritual hunger and thirst, it is a sweet sign of spiritual life; this sign agrees to Christians of a day old. Even new-born babes desire the sincere milk of the word. 1 Pet. 2:2. If spiritual life be in you, you know how to expound that scripture, ‘As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God,” Psa.
42:1, without any other interpreter than your own experience; you will feel somewhat like the gnawing of an empty stomach making you restless during the interruption of your daily communion with the Lord.
If there be spiritual conflicts with sin, there is spiritual life in your souls. Gal. 5:17. Not only a combat between light in the higher, and sense in the lower faculties; not only opposition to more gross external corruptions, that carry more infamy and horror with them than other sins do; but the heart will be the seat of war; and the more inward and secret any lust is, by so much the more will it be opposed and mourned over.
In a word, the weakest Christian may, upon impartial observation, find such signs of spiritual life in himself — if he will allow himself time to reflect upon the bent and frame of his own heart — as desires after God; conscience of duties; fears, cares, and sorrows about sin; delight in the society of heavenly and spiritual men; and a loathing and burden in the company of vain and carnal persons.
Oxsection. O, but I have a very dead heart to spiritual things.
Answer. It is a sign of life, that you feel and are sensible of that deadness; and besides, there is a great difference between spiritual deadness and death: the one is the state of the unregencrate, the other is the disease of regenerate men.
Oxssection. Some signs of spiritual life are clear to me, but I cannot close with others.
Answer. If you can really close with any, it may satisfy you, though you be dark in others; for if a child cannot walk, yet if it can take its food — it cannot take its food, yet if it can cry — yea, if it cannot cry, yet if it breathe, it is alive.