The Breathings of Love
2. I Proceed to the second general Branch of the Text, the Persons interested in this Privilege, and they are doubly qualified.
1. They are Lovers of God: All things work together for good, [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], to them that love God. Despisers and Haters of God, have no lot or part in this privilege, it is children's bread, it belongs only to them that love God. Because love is the very heart and spirit of Religion, I shall the more expatiate upon this; and for the further discussion of it, I shall clear these five things.
- 1 The Nature of love to God. - 2 The Ground of love to God. - 3 The Kinds of love to God. - 4 The Properties of love to God. - 5 The Degree of love to God.
1. The Nature of divine love. Love is an expansion of soul, or the inflaming of the affections, whereby a Christian breathes after God as the supreme and sovereign good. Saint Austin in his second Tome, calls love Pondus animae: Love is to the soul as the weights to the Clock, it sets the soul a going towards God; it is the wing by which we fly to Heaven; by love we cleave to God, as the Needle to the Loadstone.
2. The Ground of love to God, and that is, knowledge. Ignoti nulla cupido — We cannot love that which we do not know. That our love may be drawn forth to God, we must know these three things in him.
1. A fullness, Colossians 1.19. He hath a fullness of grace to cleanse us, and of glory to crown us, a fullness not only of sufficiency, but redundancy; he is a Sea of goodness without bottom and banks.
2. A freeness. — Fluit acrius amne perenni —God hath an innate propenseness to dispense mercy and grace, he drops as the Honey-comb, Revelation 22.17. Whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely: God doth not require we should bring money with us, only appetite.
3. A Propriety. We must know this fullness in God is ours, Psalm 48.14. This God is our God. Here is the ground of love, Deity and Propriety.
3. The Kinds of love, which I shall branch into these three.
1. There is a love of Appreciation, when we set an high value upon God, as being the most sublime and infinite good; we so esteem of God, as if we have him we care not though we want all things else. The Stars vanish when the Sun appears: All creatures vanish in our thoughts when the Sun of righteousness shines in his full splendour, Canticles 1.13. A bundle of Myrrh is my well-beloved unto me, and as a cluster of Camphire.
2. A love of Complacency and delight: So Aquinas defines love to be complacentia amantis in amato: As a man takes delight in a friend whom he loves. The soul that loves God rejoiceth in him, as in his treasure, and rests in him, as in his Center. The heart is so set upon God as it desires no more, John 14.8. Show us the Father, and it sufficeth.
3. A love of Benevolence, which is a wishing well to the Cause of God. He that is endeared in affection to his friend, wisheth all happiness to him. This is to love God, when we are well-wishers, we desire that his Interest may prevail; our Vote and Prayer is, that his name may be had in honor; that his Gospel, which is the Rod of his strength, may like Aaron's Rod, blossom, and bring forth Almonds.
4. The Properties of love. 1. Our love to God must be entire, and that ex parte subjecti, in regard of the Subject, it must be with the whole heart. Mark 12.30. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], with all thy heart. In the Old Law, an High Priest was not to marry with a Widow, nor with an Harlot; not with a Widow, because he had not her first love, nor with an Harlot, because he had not all her love. God will have the whole heart. Hosea 10.2. Their heart is divided. The true Mother would not have the child divided; nor God will not have the heart divided: God will not be an Inmate, to have only one Room in the heart, and all the other Rooms let out to sin. It must be an entire love.
2. It must be a sincere love, Ephesians 6.24. Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉] in sincerity. Sincere, quasi sine cera; it alludes to Honey that is pure, and hath no Wax in it: Our love to God is sincere, when it is pure, and without self-respects: This the Schoolmen call, Amor amicitiae, a love of friendship. We must love Christ propter Christum (as Austin saith) for himself: as we love sweet Wine for its taste. God's Beauty and Love must be the two Loadstones to draw our love to him. Alexander had two friends, Ephestion and Craterus; Ephestion saith he, loves me because I am Alexander: Craterus loves me because I am King Alexander: The one loved his person, the other loved his benefits. Many love God because he gives them Corn and Wine, and not for his intrinsical excellencies. Lycurgus would have Virgins to be married without dowry, because their Husbands should marry them purely for love. We must love God more for what he is, than for what he bestows. True love is not mercenary: You need not hire a Mother to love her child: A soul deeply in love with God needs not be hired by rewards; he cannot but love him for that oriency of beauty that sparkles forth in him.
3. It must be a fervent love. The Hebrew word for love[〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉] signifies ardency of affection. Saints must be Seraphims, burning in holy love. To love one coldly, is all one as not to love him. The Sun shines as hot as it can. Our love to God must be intense and vehement; like the Coals of Juniper, which are most acute and fervent, Psalm 120.4. Our love to transitory things must be indifferent; we must love quasi non, as if we loved not, 1 Corinthians 7.30. But our love to God must flame forth. The Spouse was amore perculsa, Sick of Love to Christ, Canticles 2.5. We can never love God as he deserves: As God's punishing us is less than we deserve, Ezra 9.13. so our loving him is less than he deserves.
4. Love to God must be active; it is like fire, which is the most active element; it is called, The Labour of Love, 1 Thessalonians 1.3. Love is no idle grace, it sets the head a studying for God, the feet a running in the ways of his Commandments: The love of Christ constrains, 2 Corinthians 5.13. Pretences of love are insufficient. True love is not only seen at the Tongues end, but at the Fingers end; 'tis the labour of love. Those living creatures, Ezekiel 1.8. had wings, and hands under their wings: an Emblem of a good Christian; he hath not only the wings of faith to fly, but hands under his wings he works by love, he spends and is spent for Christ.
5. Love is Liberal; it hath Love-tokens to bestow, 1 Corinthians 13.4. Charity [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉] is kind: Love hath not only a smooth tongue, but a kind heart. David's heart was fired with love to God, and he would not offer that to God which cost him nothing, 2 Samuel 24.24. Love is not only full of Benevolence, but Beneficence. Love which enlargeth the heart, never straitens the hand. He that loves Christ, will be liberal to his Members; he will be eyes to the blind, feet to the lame; the backs and bellies of the poor, shall be the furrows where he sows the golden Seeds of liberality. Some say they love God, but their love is lame of one hand, they give nothing to good uses. Indeed faith deals about invisibles, but God hates that love which is invisible: Love is like new Wine which will have vent; it vents itself in good works. The Apostle speaks it in honor of the Corinthians, that they gave to the poor Saints, not only to, but beyond their power, 2 Corinthians 8.2. Love is bred at Court, it is a Noble Munificent grace.
6. Love to God is peculiar: He who is a Lover of God, gives him such a love, as he bestows upon none else. As God gives his children such a love as he doth not bestow upon the wicked, electing, adopting love; so a gracious heart gives to God such a special distinguishing love, as none else are sharers in, 2 Corinthians 11.2. I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste Virgin to Christ. A Wife espoused to an Husband, gives him such a love as she hath for none else; she doth not part with her conjugal love to any, but her husband: So a Saint espoused to Christ, gives him a peculiarity of love, a love incommunicable to any other, namely, a love joined with adoration. Not only the love is given to God, but the soul, Canticles 4.8. A garden enclosed, is my Sister, my Spouse. The heart of a Believer is Christ's Garden, the Flower growing in it, is love mixed with Divine Worship, and this Flower is for Christ alone to smell to; the Spouse keeps the Key of the Garden, that none may come there but Christ.
7. Love to God is permanent; it is like the fire the Vestal Virgins kept in Rome, it doth not go out; true love boils over, but doth not give over. Love to God, as it is sincere without hypocrisy, so it is constant without apostasy. Love is like the Pulse of the body, always beating; 'tis not a Land-flood, but a Spring. As wicked men are constant in love to their sins; neither shame, nor sickness, nor fear of Hell, will make them give over their sins: so nothing can hinder a Christian's love to God: Nothing can conquer love, not any difficulties, or oppositions, Canticles 8.6. Love is strong as the Grave. The Grave swallows up the strongest bodies; so Love swallows up the strongest difficulties, Canticles 8.7. Many waters cannot quench love: Neither the sweet waters of pleasure, nor the bitter waters of persecution: love to God abides firm to the death, Ephesians 3.17. Being rooted and grounded in love. Light things, as Chaff and Feathers, are quickly blown away; but a tree that is rooted, abides the storm; he that is rooted in love endures: True love never ends but with the life.
5. The Degrees of love. We must love God above all other objects, Psalm 73.25. There is nothing on earth I desire in comparison of thee. God is the quintessence of all good things, he is superlatively good; now the soul seeing a super-eminency in God, and admiring in him that constellation of all excellencies, is carried out in love to him in the highest degree. The measure of our love to God, saith Bernard, must be to love him without measure. God who is the chief of our happiness, must have the chief of our affections, Canticles 8.2. I would cause thee to drink of my spiced Wine, of the juice of my Pomegranate. If the Spouse hath any love better than other, a Cup more juicy and spiced, Christ shall drink, of that. The creature may have the Milk of our love, but God must have the Cream. Love to God must be above all other things, as the Oil swims above the Water.
1. We must love God more than Relations: As in case of Abraham's offering up Isaac; Isaac being the son of his old age, no question he loved him entirely, and doted on him; but when God saith, Abraham offer up thy son; though it were a thing might seem, not only to pose his Reason, but his Faith, for the Messiah was to come of Isaac, and if he be cut off, where shall the world have a Mediator? yet such was the strength of Abraham's faith, and the ardency of his love to God, that he will take the sacrificing Knife, and let out Isaac's blood. Our blessed Saviour tells us of hating Father and Mother, Luke 14.26. Christ would not have us unnatural; but if our dearest Relations lie in our way, and would hinder us from Christ, either we must step over them, or tread upon them, Deuteronomy 33.9. Though some few drops of love may run beside to our Kindred and Alliance, yet the full torrent must run out after Christ; Relations may lie in the bosom, but Christ must lie in the heart.
2. We must love God more than Estate, Hebrews 10.34. Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods. They were glad they had any thing to lose for Christ. If the world be laid in one Scale, and Christ in the other, he must weigh heaviest. And is it thus? Hath God the highest room in our affections? Plutarch saith, When a Dictator was created in Rome, all other Authority was for the time suspended: So when the love of God bears sway in the heart, all other love is suspended, and is as nothing in comparison of this love.
