Of Love — Sermon 7

(GALAT. 5:6)For in Jesus Christ, neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but Faith which works by Love.

THE last thing that we entred upon was the conditions that God requires in our love to him, we went through two of them the last time, we come now to that which remaines.

Thirdly, you shall finde this to be another condition in our love to the Lord, to love him above all, that is, incomparably above all: For, my brethren, we may love many things in the world, we may love our selves, we are commanded to love our brethen as our selves; but this is peculiarly required to the love of God, if it be right in us, and such as the Lord expects at our hands, that we love him above all, for otherwise we doe not love him as God, we love him as a creature: for to say we love him as God, and yet not to love him above all, is a contradiction.

Besides, if we should not reckon him as the chief good, and so prise him above all, some thing would offer it selfe one time or another to us, and draw our affections to it, and then we should leaue the Lord, and take that: Therefore I say, it is required that we love the Lord above all. For every kinde of love is not sufficient, as we see it in other things; that love that will serve a servant, or a common friend, will not serve for a wife, it is another kinde of love; that love that will serve for one will not serve for another: A Parent, a King, and a Master, as they have different relations, so they must be love with different kindes of love. Now then consider what love it is that belongs to the Lord, he must have all, he must have a love that answers him: otherwise if you come with a little pittance of love, and say, Lord, I am willing to bestow this upon you, the Lord will refuse it, he will answer, I will take none of these things at your hands: Even as landlords doe with their tenants, when they bring not all their rent, they refuse it and reject it, because it is not that which they require, and which is due. Even so the Lord deales with us, as he did with the young man in the Gospel, says he, Goe and sell all that you have: My brethren, it was not the act of selling, but it was the affection that was required. Therefore Christ did but try his affection by it; and it was performed by the wise Merchant that solde all, this the Lord requires that we love him above all.

And there is good reason for it, for he is most excellent and most amiable of all.

Besides, I am sure he has done for us more than all, as Paul speakes, Was Paul crucified for you? has not Christ bought you, has not he redeemed you, has not he deserved more than all, and should he not therfore be loved above all?

Againe, is he not the uttermost end, are not all natures else subordinate? God as he is above all, so should we have a love answerable to him.

But you will object, What, to love God above my selfe, how can I doe that?

Yes my brethren, and there is good reason for that too, beeause in so doing we provide best for our selues; it is not so with the creature, if you set your love upon it, if you love any creature above your selves, it may be the destruction of your selves: But the Lord can provide for you and repaire you againe when the creature is destroyed for the Lords sake, when a man is a loser for any thing that he does for the Lord, he is a great gainer by it; for it is the rule that God has appointed the creature, and the perfection of every creature is in comming neere to the rule. Now when the Lord has appointed this to love him above our selues, in so doing we cannot chuse but provide best for our selues, because therein lies our excellencie and perfection. This is therefore another property of this love, we must love God above all, above all riches, above all profits, above all honor and credit, above all learning and delight, above our selues and our lusts: Therefore you shall finde it in the phrase of Scripture how it runnes, those that love pleasures more than God, those that love the praise of men more than God, those that love wealth more than God, you see how they are excluded.

You shall see what it is, not to love the praise of men more than God, it is this, when they come together at some times in competition, as they will ever and anon, still to preferre God before them. As for example, the Lord has commanded you to sanctifie the Sabboth, to pray continually, the least you canst doe is to doe it evening and morning, and to doe it diligently. Now when your profits and your businesse, or your ease shall come and thrust you off from such a duty, now they come together, and here they meete upon a narrow bridge as it were; if you shalt now preferre your profits and your businesse before the service of the Lord, you are a lover of your wealth more than of him. You may bring it to many such examples.

So againe the Lord has commanded to be diligent in your callings, to improue the time to the best advantage, for you shall give an account for it is one of the most precious talents you have: Now if pleasures and sports, and recreations shall come in and allure you, and call you, to draw you away to spend time amisse, now they come in competition; if you doe this ordinarily, you are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.

So againe, God has commanded you that you shouldest not commit adultery, that you shalt not kill, that you shalt forbeare to revenge, and the like: Now if any lust shall come and stand in opposition to such a command, if you preferre this before it, you are a lover of your selfe and of your lusts before God.

In a word, goe through any such thing, in which God and your lusts, your pleasure or your profits come in competition, when you shalt in your ordinary course be ready to preferre that before him, you lovest that before him, you lovest that before the Lord; and though you think that you lovest God, yet notwithstanding know this, that that is not sufficient, you must love him above all.

And if you say, who is able to performe this? who is it that does not at some times preferre his pleasures and profits before the obedience to a command?

I answer, it is a thing that has beene done and is done by all the Saints: Therefore if you looke into Deut. 30:6. says the Lord,I will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seede, and you shalt love me with all your heart: He speakes it there of a thing that is acted indeed, of a thing that is to be done by those that are regenerate, I will circumcise you, and then you shall doe it. And, my brethren, a man that has the least measure of grace, if he be once in Christ, he loves God above all; that is, let a man be himself at any time, let not his lusts get the upper ground of him, as sometimes it does, when he is in passion and transported; indeed then fear may prevaile as it did with Peter, and lusts may prevaile as it did with David: But the meaning is, let a man be himself in his ordinary course, and still he preferres the Lord before any thing in all his actions.

You will say, this is a thing that no man can doe to love God above all.

Yes, my beloved, therefore you must understand it thus, that comparatively you may reach it; all those that are sanctified doe love him above all, although there be many degrees of love you cannot reach to, yet you love him above all: Even as it is in marriage, a man may love his wife with such a degree of Iove as is meete for her, yet there may be a greater degree of love, continuance of time may increase that love upon further knowledge, &c. So we may love the Lord above all, and yet come short of that degree that we may have after longer communion, and greater familiarity. So much for this third condition, to love him above all.

But yet this is not enough, we finde another condition required in this love in the Eph: 3:17. That you be rooted and grounded in love, that is, that as you must not love the Lord by halues, so you must not love him by fits and by starts, it must be a fixed love, a permanent love, you must bee rooted and grounded in it, otherwise as it is said of him that is unstabe in the faith, as Iam. 1:12.He is as a wave of the Sea, tossed too and froe, the same may be said of him that wavers in his love, he is tossed too & fro, that is some times he comes with great purposes, with aboundance of promises and resolutions, that seeme as bigg as mountaines, but stay a while and they come to nothing, they vanish away. Suppose it were your own case, that a man should come to you, with an expression of as much love, as that there could be no more for a day or two, but presently afterward, he is as strange as if he had never seene you, wouldest you regard such a love as this? No surely, but as we use to doe with franticke men, though that they be sober for a while, yet we reckon them franticke, because they are more constantly franticke, such account does the Lord make of such, as doe love him by fitts and by flashes.

But you will say, who is there that is alwayes at the same stay? It is true my brethren, I deny not but that the best of the Saints have their love some times in the full tide, and some times in the lowest ebb; but you must knowe that there is a great deale of difference betweene these degrees, and that love, that is as the morning dew & presently dryed up againe, therefore you must alwayes remember, that this must be added to that that formerly has been spoken, that you must be rooted and grounded in love.

You will say how shall we doe that?

Remember but these two things. Labour to be rooted and grounded in Faith, and then you shall be rooted and grounded in love, as in that place I named before in Ephes. 3:17. he prayeth that Christ may dwell in their hearts by Faith, that so being rooted and grounded in love, they may comprehend &c. Let a man consider well upon what ground he has persuaded himself of the Lords favor and love to him, let him not build upon a hollowe sandie foundation, but let him build the assurance of his salvation upon a rock, that is, let him examine his grounds to the bottome, let him search it well, let him consider all the objections that may be made against his assurance, and not give over till he be fully convinced, that the Lord his heart is perfect with him, and when he is thus rooted and grounded in faith, he will likewise be rooted and grounded in love.

Againe, remember to pitch your love upon the person; not to love him for by-respects for other matters, but set your eye upon the very person of Christ, to behold him in his glory, in his purenesse, in his attributes, in all his excellencies, and so to love him, for that will continue; for if you love the Lord because he deals wel with you, because you have hope he will save you, because you have escaped such and such judgements through his providence, if any of these bee the ground of your love, these are mutable; but if you love him for himself, because of that amiablenesse that is in him; for my brethren, he is the same, there is no shadow of change in him. Therefore if you love him thus, your love will be constant; this was the case of Job, his love was right, he loved the very person of God, therefore he was willing to take good and evil at the hand of God, and yet his love remained sure: take another man that has not known God, that is not acquainted with him, it may be when the Lord has brought him into prosperity, he will forget the Lord, as Demas embraced the present world, the prosperity of such a man drawes him from God. Another man, when persecutions and trialls come, he forsakes the Lord, because indeed he pitched not his love upon his person, therefore he loves him not constantly. But to goe on.

The next is that property you shall finde in the 1 Thess 1:3. Diligent love: that is the last which I will name to you, I say, it must be a diligent love wherewith you love the Lord, and not an idle and negligent love, not a love that is in show onely, but a love that is operative, for that God requires.

You will say, in which should our love be diligent.

I answer, you must be diligent in preparing for the Lords comming, that you may receive the King of glorie, that he may enter into your hearts, for there is a diligence of love in that; to doe as John Baptist came to doe, to prepare the way of the Lord, what was that? To bring downe the mountaines, and to raise up the valleyes, that is, those high thoughts, those high lusts that stand in opposition against the Lord, that barre the doore against him, that will not let him enter into your hearts, bring downe those mountaines: againe, the valleyes must be raised up, that God may come and dwell in your hearts; the diligence of love is showed in opening to the Lord when he knockes, that when a thing shall be suggested to you, it is for the Lords advantage to embrace it, for it is the nature of true love, it enlargeth and wideneth the heart.

Againe, love is diligent in adorning it selfe, and beautifying the soul for the approach of the lover, such is this love that we speake of, it will make you make your selves new creatures; express your diligence therefore in labouring to adorne your hearts with graces that the Lord may take a delight to dwell in you; be diligent also in cleansing your selves from all pollution of flesh and spirit, that when the Lord comes he may finde no sluttish corner within you, for the Lord hateth these: As the Israelites were to goe with a paddle, and cover every filthy thing, because, says the text, The Lord walketh among you, so must we doe, keepe our hearts cleane if we will have the Lord delight to dwell with us, we must be diligent to remove out of his sight whatever he hateth.

Lastly, we must be diligent in keeping his commands; wilt you say you lovest God, and yet doest disobey him and rebellest against him from day to day? The Lord careth for no such love, for indeed love cannot be otherwise judged of than in obeying: to say you lovest him, and keepest not his commands, it is but a dead love, and a picture of love, it is not love indeed, it is but as the Apostle says, to doe it in word, and not in truth; for when you love him in deede, you doe the things he would have you to doe: Therefore so much diligence in keeping his commands, so much love, he that doeth most loves most. And so you see the conditions that are required in this love, what a kinde of love it is that God will have at your hands, or else he will not take it of you.

Now my brethren, there remaines but one thing more, wherewith we will conclude this point, that is, now I have beene so large in showing you what this love is, in which you cannot blame us if we presse you to it, because it is one of the greatest and most radicall vertues, faith and love, therefore we have beene the larger in describing it to you; I say now you have heard what it is, what remains but this, to show you the great danger in not loving? and that we wil make to be the last consectary that we will draw from this doctrine:

I say, consider how dangerous a thing it is to neglect it; the Lord you see requires it upon paine of damnation, whatever you have, yet notwithstanding if you have not this love, you are not in Christ, and so you shall be excluded. Let no man think that this is exaction, that it is a hard thing that the Lord requires it with this exaction: for what is it that he requires? If he had required of you to offer sacrifice, as he did in the olde law, then the poore man might have objected, he had not where withall; if he had required us to fight battells, the weake man might have said he could not doe it, he was not able: but now young and olde, rich and poore, all can love.

Besides if we consider who it is that requires this love, is it not the great God of heaven and earth? is it not the Sonne? If he had commanded you the hardest thing in the world, if he had said, you shalt cast your selfe into the fire, you shalt sacrifice children to me, you are his creatures, and you must obey him: But when he requires this onely at your hands, to love him, is it not equall?

Besides, when he requires this, it is for your benefit, for when you have given the Lord your hearts, the Lord gives you them againe; even as the earth, the water it receives from the sea, it returnes it better back againe in springs and fountaines, and pure streames; so does the Lord give you your hearts backe againe, when you have bestowed them upon him, and withall he gives you leave to b[•]stow them upon other things, to love all things that you may and ought to love, and which is good for you to love; therefore the Lord may require it upon this penalty, for he askes but his own, and what he has deserved at your hands, therefore it is a most reasonable and equall request. For what does the Lord your God require of you, says Moses, but onely that you love the Lord your God? So I say to you, what else does the Lord your God require of you?

But againe know this, that as it is a command full of equity and reasonablenes, so the danger is the greater if you doe it it not; and what that is I will show you but by one place, that is, 1 Cor. 16:22.Cursed is he that loves not the Lord Jesus, indeed let him be had in execration to the death: That is the place I would have you consider, that now when you have beene acquainted with this whole doctrine of love, you might know the danger of not performing and doing it; whoever loues not the Lord Jesus, let him be Anathema Maranatha, he curseth him in two languages, to show that it is a peremptory curse.

But what is that to be cursed?

My brethren, to be cursed is to be separated, to be set apart or appointed to evil, so that all that love not the Lord Jesus, they are men separated and set apart to evil, so that no man may meddle with them, no man may touch them to doe them good, as the Saints and those that love the Lord they are set apart that no man may touch them for hurt; so it is here, when a man is cursed, the meaning is this, he is set apart, secluded from all good things, that none are to meddle with him, he is set apart for evil, all things shall concurre together to doe him hurt; this is when the Lord curseth any man, and this is the case of every man that loves not the Lord Jesus.

Our businesse when we preach the Gospel is but to offer the Lord Jesus to you, that is all that we have to doe; and all that you have to doe that hear us, is to take Jesus Christ, to beleeve in him, to love him: Now says the Lord, if you will not doe this, if you will not love him, every such one let him be accursed. Now when the Lord shall curse a man, as Isaac said, I have blessed him, and he shall be blessed: So whom the Lord curseth, he shall be cursed, and it is a fearful thing if you consider it; and therefore we will a little open it, and show you in which this curse consists:

Which I urge the more, because it is an usuall thing among men, when they come to consider their sinnes in particular, wherewith they have provoked God to anger, they looke upon this or that grosse sinne, but this defect and omission of love they scarce put into the number of their sinnes. But that you may know now what it is not to love him, you may consider by the greatnesse of the punishment, and that you see here is a curse: Now that you may know what this curse is, know that it consists in these foure things.

First it consists in this, he shall be separated from grace and goodness, from holinesse; and this is the curse upon his soul in this respect, in regard of exclusion from grace, which is to the soul as an obstruction in the liver is to the body, as a theefe in the candle is to the candle, which causes it to waste and consume, and weare away; so it is in this curse, when God shall lay it upon the soul of any man, he shall not thrive in grace, his inward man shall not prosper at all, he shall be still in the wearing hand, & the Lord shall take away from him that which he seemes to have; when the Lord shall say to you as to the figtree, Never fruit grow more on you, that is a fearful curse, when the Lord shall curse, and say to a man, though you have some leaves upon you, there are some things that seeme to be good in you, yet because you have not love, never fruite shall grow upon you more. What a curse is it think you that shall make the soul of a man to wither, as the figtree withered after the speech of Christ, that is, when every thing shall drive a man off from that which is good, and carry him on to destruction; whatever befalleth him in poverty, in prosperity, riches, and friends or enemies, every thing shall breed his hurt: he shall have riches when he is most ready to abuse them, he shall have adversity then when it is worst for him to be in adversity, that shall be to him as the lopping of trees out of season; he shall be as an unthrifty sonne, set him to a trade in the Citty, there he goes downe the wind, put him to husbandry in the Country, that thrives not with him; such is the case of every one that loves not Christ. So my brethren, when Christ is preached to you, when you will not receive the doctrine, but refuse it, you see the doome here, says the Apostle, let him be accursed; this causes men to goe away from the Lord, Because they receive not the love of the truth, therefore he gives them up to beleeve lies, because that men receive not Christ in the love of the Gospel, he gives them up to a reprobate sense, from one degree to another, till there be no remedy. We see by experience, are there not many that are given up to the sinne of drinking and idlenesse, and company-keeping, and others, to other sinnes; you see many plod on in an olde tracke of sinne, some lying a long time in a dead sottish course, so as the most powerfull ministery in the world will not stirre them, which is an evidence that the Lord has cursed such, therefore the ministry can doe them no good. And this is the first curse upon men that love not the Lord Jesus.

But perhaps you regardest not this curse because you regardest not grace and holinesse from which it sequestreth you, but yet there is another branch of it, you shalt be separated from the presence of the Lord, that is, from the joy, from the influence, from the protection of God; and this is a very fearfull curse. You know what it was to Cain in the fourth of Genesis, when the Lord had cursed him, says he, I am hid from your face: that was the great curse that was laid upon him, of which he was most sensible that he was separated from the presence of the Lord. And my brethren, this is no small thing, because God is the God of all comfort, and to be separated from his presence is the worst thing that can befall us in this life: It was Sauls case, when the Lord had once cast him off, he was separate from the presence of God, so that when he came to aske counsell, the Lord would answer him no more, he would have no more to doe with him: you know how fearful and how bitter this was to Saul. On the other side, see how much Moses magnifies this presence of God; Lord, says he, if you goe not with us, carry us not hence: as if the presence of God were the greatest comfort in the world, as indeed it is. This is another thing in which you shall be cursed.

Againe, there is yet another branch of it, yee shall not onely be separated from grace, and from the presence of the Lord, but there shall be a curse upon your outward estate. It is said of Cain in the same chapter, you shalt be cursed from the earth: it may be many that hear of being cursed from grace, and of separation from the presence of the Lord, are of that minde that they care not for it, that they regard it not; it may be you care not to be cursed from heaven: but to be cursed from the earth is that which goes neere to you, and that is a thing which the most earthly-minded man in the world is sensible of. Now you must know that whoever loves not the Lord Jesus shall be cursed from the earth, that is, there shall be a curse upon you in all earthly things, in all things that belong to this present life whatever they are.

But you will say, we see it quite otherwise, we see such men as they, described to be men that abound in outward wealth, in outward blessings.

It may be so in outward show, but yet there is a curse upon them notwithstanding.Abimelech had the kingdom, yet there was a curse that never ceased till he was rooted out of the kingdom: The Israelites had the quailes, but yet there was a curse with them: Ahab had the vineyard, but it was a curse to him. So all these things that are of themselves blessings and mercies in their own nature, yet if the Lord will mingle them with a curse, yee shall finde no ease from them at all: and this is a thing that is well known by experience, if the hearts of men will speake what they know. This is the case of those that love not the Lord, The earth shall not give her increase, you shall not have that sound comfort, that sweetnesse, that influence of comfort from earthly blessings, though you have the creatures about you which naturally have blessings in them, yet they shall not give downe that milke for your comfort, you shall not be satisfied with them, you shall see a constant emptinesse in them, they shall be to you as the shell without the kernell; and so much more shall you be miserable, because you shall finde the least comfort in them when you most expect it: the Lord meetes thus with those that love him not in earthly blessings.

But last of all, there is one branch of this curse which exceedes all the rest, that is the eternall curse that shall be upon men for ever: while yee live here in this life there is a certaine show, a certaine twilight of comfort that the Lord sometimes affords even to evil men; but then there shall be a perfect midnight, then the Sunne of comfort shall set upon you altogether and rise no more: in that day, says the Apostle, it shall be the day of the manifestation of the just wrath of God: in that day when the Lord shall open the treasures of his wrath, those which have beene so long time a gathering. While we live here the clouds of Gods indignation are but gathering, then they shall grow thicke and blacke, and fasten upon you to the uttermost, then all the great deepes shall be broken up, then the flood-gates of Gods judgements shall prevaile and overflow you; that case shall be yours at that time, and this is a time which is to be considered by you now: in Eccles. 1:7.Remember the dayes of darknesse, for they are many. My brethren, eternity is an other thing than we consider it to be while we live in this world. In Psal. 78:38. The Lord called backe his wrath,and stirred not up all his indignation, but at that time the Lord shall stirre up all his wrath; yee doe here but sippe of this cup, but then yee shall drinke up the dreggs of it for ever. This shall be the case of those that love not the Lord.

But you will say, this is afarre off, and therefore the lesse terrible, it is not neere at hand.

Well, though this curse in which we have showed these foure branches, be not presently executed, yet remember this, that when we preach the Gospel to you, as we doe from day to day, and are still offering you Christ, beseeching you to come in, and take him and love him, but yet you will not, know that there is a thunderbolt alwayes following this lightening: when John Baptist came and preached the Gospel, he tells them presently of the curse that ws to follow: You doe not know the time when the Lord will execute this curse; Cain was cursed many yeares before he died: and so Saul, when the Lord had rejected him, and had made a separation between God and him, (for a curse is but a separation, when a man is cast aside and set apart for such a purpose, so Saul was set apart for evil) yet he reigned many yeares after, notwithstanding he was under the curse. So those that the Lord swore in his wrath they should not enter into his rest, there was a curse upon them, yet they lived many yeares in the wildernesse: Therefore though the execution be not presently, and though you be in prosperity for the present, yet it is but Cains prosperity, though he had his life continued, yet the curse lay upon him notwithstanding; therefore I say take heede of refusing and deferring, lest he sweare in his wrath that you shall not enter into his rest; it is a dangerous thing to refuse the Lord Jesus when he is offered the first, second, third and fourth time, and still you will not come in, take heede and remember that speech of the Apostle that we named to you, Whoever loves not the Lord Jesus let him be accursed. When the Apostle looked upon the men to whom he had preached and written, you Corinthians to whom the Gospel has beene plentifully preached and made known, those among you that have heard me, and have beene made acquainted with this doctrine of the freenesse of Gods offering grace to you, if you will not take Christ in good earnest, if you will not love him, let such a man be accursed: and brethren S. Paul was stirred up by the Spirit of God to pronounce this curse. So I say, let these words continue in your mindes, that whoever loves not the Lord Jesus let him be Anathema Maranatha; and he that has eares to hear let him hear what the Spirit says: for happy and blessed are those that love the Lord Jesus, but miserable and cursed are those that doe not love him.

FINIS.