Chapter 5: Reasons Showing the Necessity of Laying Up Heart-Treasure

At last we come to the confirmation of this doctrine; that a good treasure in the heart, is necessary to good expenses in the life, and the

Ground is taken from nature and reason, which prompts to us, those undoubted maxims, that a thing must first be, before it can act, nothing can give what it has not, such as the cause is, such are the effects: of nothing, nothing can be made, without a miracle of creation, and we cannot expect to be fed by miracles, where ordinary means are proposed, and supposed to be used: If we willfully neglect to lay in provision while we have a season for it, we are guilty of groundless presumption, if we imagine we can lay out in a necessitous condition: How can any expect liquor from the still, meat from the cupboard, garments from the wardrobe, where none of these were laid in? What mad man would think to reap without sowing, or teach others when he has no learning himself? Was there ever a bringing forth without a conception? Is it not fond dotage in a shopkeeper to think to sell wares, that has none? And is this preposterous in naturals, and can it hold in spirituals? Joseph could not supply the Country with corn without a store. A tree cannot bring forth good fruit, unless it is good: The Scripture says, Can a fig tree bear olive berries, or a vine figs? And can we think men can act graciously without a principle of grace?

Reason is drawn from the offices of Christ, the second person in the sacred Trinity, was filled with a treasure, that he might fill the saints with a treasure of grace: In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in Christ. And for this very end has God stored Christ, that he might supply his members, that of his fullness we may receive, and grace for grace (John 1:16). The plain simple sense of which text, says Calvin, is that, what graces God heaps on us, they all flow from this fountain, therefore are we watered with the graces that are poured upon Christ. For observe it, this is the nature of gospel dispensations; what spiritual good things the saints receive, they have them not now from God as creator, so much as through the hands of Jesus Christ as the great mediator of the new covenant, he is the channel or cistern, or rather fountain of all grace, that our souls expect or receive: He is our Aaron anointed above his fellows, that the oil of grace might in its proportion fall from the head to the members. Hence it is that he is called Christ, and we Christians, from this holy unction: For this end was our Lord Jesus advanced to be the head of the Church, that he might fill it with all gracious supplies: and hence it is, that the Church is called his body, the fullness of him that fills all in all (Ephesians 1:23). That is, the effect of Christ's fullness, who fills all the saints, in all ordinances and means of conveyance of gracious influences: Truth of grace is from him, growth and strength of grace are from him; both the least measure and a large treasure are to be had in him; (John 10:10) I came that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. That is, the essence and abundance are both from him. So then we see Christ is designed to be our Joseph, to furnish our souls with a treasure, and therefore he that neglects to stock his heart from this storehouse does undervalue the great office of Christ, and does what he can, to frustrate God of his end in souls' supply: This is horrible ingratitude.

Reason is drawn from the end and design of all providences and ordinances: They are given to be helps to promote this heart-treasure: God puts a price into our hands that we may have grace in our hearts; He gives us a summer season to lay up for this pinching winter. Naturalists say, that while the bird called Halcyon sits on her nest, there's calmness and serenity upon the sea: Such halcyon days of tranquility, and gospel opportunities have we enjoyed in this tempestuous sea of the world, not to feather our nests below, much less to hatch the cockatrice eggs of sin, but to warm and ripen the brood of grace in our souls, and to lay up a precious treasure for the evil days of old age, sickness, or persecution, and for the long day of eternity. When God affords a season, he expects things should be done in that season, and if man neglects it, his misery will be great upon him. The very ant lays up for winter, and reads a lecture to man, of good husbandry: Gathering in summer is a token of wisdom, but sleeping in harvest, is a sinful, shameful, beggaring practice. God expects that we should work in the light, and walk in the day, while this day of grace lasts (John 12:35); It is a sad, astonishing thing, that God should hold men a candle for them to play by; especially, when time is short, uncertain; death and eternity are so near, and of such vast consequence. Oh, what a confounding question will that be one day? (Proverbs 17:16) Why is there a price in the hand of a fool to get wisdom, seeing he has no heart to it? Observe it, God takes a strict account of our helps, and of our hoard, and expects a due proportion. Oh, what a sad reckoning will many make, whose negligence will be condemned by the diligence of brute creatures, and heathen philosophers in moral studies? Indeed, by the light of their own consciences.

4. Another reason is taken from our hearts' natural emptiness of a treasure of good: In me (says Paul) that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing (Romans 7:18). This barren soil has the more need to be manured; this empty house to be well furnished, lest the heart continue still destitute of all saving good, and the soul depart out of this world as naked of saving grace, as it entered. 'Tis pity so brave a house should stand empty of inhabitant, and furniture. The souls of God's people are vessels that are to be well-fraught with the liquor of all saving graces, that they may be fitted for, and filled with eternal glory (Romans 9:23). The Christian is to be holily covetous of these riches of glory, that amends may be made for his natural vacuity. Oh the vast chaos of an unregenerate heart! A long time, and great pains must go to the replenishing of it: there are many waste corners to be filled, even after the truth of grace is planted, before the soul be enlarged to a due capacity of service here, and heaven hereafter. The soul of a believer, says one, is a house well-built, where faith lays the foundation: hope helps up the walls, knowledge sets open the windows, and love covers the roof, and this makes a room fit for Christ. And I add, there must be every day a sweeping, and watching, and decking of this house with further degrees of grace, embellishing it with divine ornaments, and furnishing it: and every room, I mean every faculty, with a rich treasure of heavenly blessings. It will be some cost and toil to hang every room of the heart with lively pictures of the divine image: for it is altogether empty of that which is truly and spiritually good, or may be called a treasure: but that's not all; for

5. The soul is by nature filled with an evil treasure: the heart is desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). Every imagination of the thoughts of man's heart is only and continually evil (Genesis 6:5). The mind, will and affections are stuffed with a world of blindness, hardness and wildness: the soul is naturally propense to evil, averse to good, and therefore a treasure of good is necessary to preponderate and extrude this treasure of wickedness: to season and seize upon the soul for God, as sin did for Satan. The love of God is to be shed abroad into those veins and channels of the heart, where sin did run with a violent current; the Christian is to be circumcised in the most polluted part. And certainly, 'tis not a little grace that will obstruct the active motions of sin, for though grace be of greater worth, yet it's disputable, whether it attain to greater strength than corruption, even in the hearts of the sanctified, in this life. But certainly, the greater measure of grace and treasure of sanctifying truths, the more power against corruption: the whole armor of God, (which is also the saints' treasure) resist inward lusts and Satan's assaults (Ephesians 6:12, 14). The Spirit is compared to wind, now some have called the winds the besoms of the world. But I am sure the spirit of grace with the fruits thereof, are choice besoms to sweep the filth of sin out of the soul, and also to adorn it with divine jewels, and assist it with notable antidotes against corruption. These are as water to wash the heart from filthiness: the smallest measure helps against sin, but the more grace, the less sin in the heart. Grace is a principle of life and opposes dead works, which otherwise will lead the soul to the chambers of death: therefore this treasure is of absolute necessity, and the same might we say of the word, which being hid in the heart helps against sin in the life.

6. Another reason is taken from the inbred motions of human nature: all men on earth seek after a treasure, it is the harmonious inquest of all rational creatures, who will show us any good, any thing to make a treasure of? Man has a capacious soul, an active and laborious spirit; the whole world is not a morsel big enough for his capacious swallow. Our covetous desires, says one, are a long sentence without a period: finite things are dry meat to a hungry soul, they sooner glut than fill. Nay, they put on this busy bee to buzz about one flower after another, till it has wearied itself in vain, and sit down in utter despair of comfort and satisfaction. Only interest in the God of heaven, and the image of the God of heaven make up all defects: see Psalm 73:25-26. A Christ alone to justify, and a Christ within to sanctify, make the soul completely happy; for Christ within is the hope of glory. A glorified and a gracious Redeemer, is the Christian's only treasure, his all in all. God has furnished man with an immortal soul, learning may widen it, but grace fills it: nothing else will reach its large dimensions. Man is a little world himself, nay bigger and better than this greater, by Christ's own verdict, who is truth itself; the soul itself is better than the world, and it must have something better than itself to be a treasure for it. Philosophy seeks, Christianity shows, the sound believer only finds true happiness, which the wise merchant fetched out of the field of the Gospel, into the cabinet of his own heart.

7. Whatever men have or love, they desire a treasure thereof, no man but would have a large treasure of a precious commodity, he that has gold and silver would heap it up to a treasure: he that has wisdom and learning would still have more: men join house to house, and field to field to procure for themselves and heirs, a fair demesne, a large estate. How many rich men are still as eager for more, as if they had not enough to purchase a meal's meat? Yet these seek for earth, as if abundance thereof would purchase heaven; like the partridge, they sit close on these eggs, though they hatch them not, nor are ever likely to bring them to their desired maturity; oh the unhallowed thirst after filthy lucre! Many think to fill their souls with wealth, whereas they cannot fill one of the least members of their body: the eye which yet a nutshell will cover; the world at the best is like Pasotes' Banquet, which when the guests began to eat, vanished into nothing: and shall so many men set their eyes (and hearts too) on that which is not? And shall not God's children make a treasure of that which is enduring substance? Shall men think to make a treasure of coals, and chaff, and empty shadows? And shall not the Christian gather store of pearls and jewels for his treasure? Shall the children of the world be more wise and wary for earth, than the children of light for Heaven? God forbid. Surely the Christian has as great reason to heap up as any; these commodities are more rare, rich and necessary than any other, and why then should they not get a heart-treasure? For in these reasons I would both convince the judgment, and persuade the affections; these are the chief motives I have: for I would spend most time in Direction.

8. This, and only this does discriminate between persons and persons: my meaning is, this heart-treasure puts a difference between saints and sinners, between weak and strong Christians: as the treasure in the heart is, so is the professor's state, as Solomon says in another case (Proverbs 23:7), As he thinks in his heart, so is he; not as he speaks with his lips: formalists will speak God as fair as any, they honor him with their lips, and flatter him with false and fawning fashions, as though he were an idol; but the heart-searching God is not pleased, except the heart be upright with him, it is the upright in whom he delights: nor is a person as he acts with his hands, or walks with his feet, in many passages of his life. A man may with Ahab walk softly: with Herod do many things: with Simon Magus make large professions of faith: indeed, it is possible a man may suffer many troubles, and even death itself in a good cause, yet, except he have a heart treasured with grace, he is rejected, and may go to hell at last: God judges of the fruits by the root, though men judge of the root by the fruits: a heart after his own heart is better than the tongue of men and angels: the distinction of persons, is in respect of inside principles and workings: a good man may sometimes do an evil work, and a bad man may do a good work, but how are their hearts? The best conferences or performances are not current coin with the God of heaven, except they issue out of the mint of a heart where God's image is stamped: a little good is accounted much when there's a treasure within, much seeming good is looked on as nothing when there's no treasure: this also puts the difference between a strong and weak Christian: let their gifts and outward seemings be what they will, yet the greater or lesser degree of real grace distinguishes their attainments; and accordingly these measures have different influences upon their lives, duties, comforts, or preparedness for death.

9. This treasure does assimilate the soul to God: the great Jehovah is the only self-existent, and self-sufficient good. He is the absolute, complete, and independent Being, and needs no accession of creatures or created powers to make him happy. Nothing can add to, or detract from his infinite and incomprehensible blessedness. He is a treasure of all good, in and to himself; and needs neither gold nor silver to make him rich. Parallel to this in some proportion is the saints' sweet and secret heart-treasure, and solitary recesses. The Christian is a little world, and is purely independent upon the creature to make him happy. He can through grace live comfortably without the world, though not without, but upon God. Indeed God is so much in him, as well as to him, that he can live comfortably when other things are dead. A good man is satisfied from himself (Proverbs 14:14), that is, he shall have sufficient content from his own conscience. [reconstructed: This] is but one word there for a backslider, being [reconstructed: filled] with his ways of sin and guilt, and a gracious soul's satisfaction from the sweet result of his own heart, to show that a man's own conscience is either his heaven or hell, his greatest comforter or tormentor. The world cannot alter the joy or sadness of the heart. A through-paced, well-tried child of God has his rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another (Galatians 6:4). It is a peddling, beggarly life to wander abroad for morsels, but that is a noble kind of living, when a man has all within doors, and needs not the creature's sorry contributions. I speak not of the fancied Familistical deification, which is nothing less than blasphemy, but certainly the sound Christian in a sound sense bears some resemblance of the Divinity in this self-sufficiency. And the more treasure, the more like God; for such a soul is elevated above the creature, and fixed in a higher orb, where storms and tempests cannot reach. In fact, a soul whose conversation is in heaven has no dependence upon, nor intelligence with the creature, in order to completing his felicity. No more than the sun needs the glimmering light of the stars to make day. Who then would not have this treasure? I might also add herein the Christian's resemblance to the infinite Jehovah, because he has a principle of motion within himself, and not from without. For as God is a free agent, indeed a pure act, so in a sense are the saints acting from an inward principle. Hence those Scripture expressions of a man's spirit, making him willing, and the heart smiting a man or witnessing for him, or with him. And in the exercise of repentance, it is said of Lot, he vexed his righteous soul; or put himself upon the rack. Wicked men are dead, but grace is a principle of life, and resembles the Author of it. For that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit (John 3:6). The decayed liberty of the will is in part by grace restored. And so far as the soul is spiritual, the soul of a saint is a flame of fire ascending to, and acting for God, and the greater treasure of this a man has in his breast, the more like he is to God.