Chapter 4. Of the Entireness of Our Furniture — It Must Be the Whole Armor of God

THe third Branch in the Saints furniture is, the entirenesse thereof, The whole Armour of God. The Christians Armour must be compleat, and that in a threefold respect.

SECT. 1.

First, he must be armed in every part cap-a-pe, soul and body, the powers of the one, and senses of the other, not any part left naked. A dart may flie in at a little hole, (like that which brought a message of death to Ahab, through the joynts of his harnesse) and Satan is such an Archer, who can shoot at a penny breadth. If all the man be armed, and only the eye lest without, Satan can soon shoot his fire-balls of lust in at that loophole, which shall set the whole house on flame. Eve look't but on the tree, and a poisonous dare struck her to the heart. If the eye be shut, and the ear be open to corrupt communication, Satan will soon wriggle in at this hole; If all the outward senses be guarded, and the heart not kept with all diligence, he will soon by his own thoughts be betrayed into Satans hands. Our enemies are on every side, and so must our armour be, on the right hand and on the left, 2 Corinthians 6:7. The Apostle calls sin [illegible], an enemy that surrounds us. If there be any part of the line unguarded or weakly provided, there Satan falls on; we see the enemy often enter the city at one side, while he is beat back on the other, for want of care to keep the whole line. Satan divides his temptations into several squadrons, one he employes to assault here, another to storme there. We reade of fleshly wickedness and spiritual wickedness; while you repellest Satan tempting you to fleshly wickedness, he may be entring your city at the other gate of spiritual wickedness. Perhaps you have kept your integrity in the practical part of your life; but what armour have you to defend your head, your judgement? If he surprise you here, corrupting that with some errour, then you will not long hold out in your practice. He that could not get you to profane the Sabbath among Sensualists and Atheists, will under the disguise of such a corrupt principle as Christian liberty prevail. Thus we see what need we have of universal armour, in regard of every part.

SECT. II.

Secondly, the Christian must be in compleat armour, in regard of the several pieces and weapons, that make up the whole Armour of God. Indeed there is a concatenation of graces, they hang together like links in a chain, stones in an arch, members in the body; prick one vein, and the blood of the whole body may run out at that sluce; neglect one duty, and no other will do us good. The Apostle Peter, in his second Epistle, chap. 1. ver. 5, 6, 7. presses the Christian to a joynt endeavour, to encrease the whole body of grace; indeed, that is health when the whole body thrives. Adde (says he) to your faith vertue; Faith is the file-leading grace. Well, have you faith, adde vertue: True, faith is of a working stirring nature; without good works it is dead or dying. Fides pinguescit operibus, Luther. 'Tis kept in plight and heart by a holy life, as the flesh which plaisters over the frame of mans body, though it receives its heat from the vitals within, yet helps to preserve the very life of those vitals; thus good works and gracious actions have their life from faith, yet are necessary helps to preserve the life of faith; thus we see sometimes the child nursing the Parent that bare it, and therein performes but his duty. You are fruitful in good works, yet you are not out of the devils shot, except you addest to your vertue knowledge. This is the candle without which faith cannot see to do its work. Art you going to give an almes? if it be not oculata charitas, if charity has not this eye of knowledge to direct when, how, what, and to whom you are to give, you may at once wrong God, the person you relievest, and your self. Art you humbling your selfe for your sin? for want of knowledge in the tenour of the Gospel, Satan may play upon your ignorance, and either perswade you you are not humbled enough, when, God knowes, you are almost quackled with your teares, and even carried down by the impetuous torrent of your sorrow into despair, or else showing you your blubber'd face, may flatter you into a carnal confidence of your humiliation. Perhaps you seest the Name of God dishonoured in the place where you livest, and your spirit is stirred within you, (as Pauls at Athens) now if knowledge sits not in the saddle to reine and bridle in your zeal, you will be soon carried over hedge and ditch, till you fallest into some precipice or other by your irregular acting. Neither is knowledge enough, except you beest arm'd with Temperance, which here (I conceive) is that grace, whereby the Christian (as Master of his own house) so orders his affections (like servants to reason and faith,) that they do not irregularly move, or inordinately lash out into desires of, cares for, or joy in the creature-comforts of this life, without which Satan will be too hard for you. The Historian tells us, that in one of the famous battels between the English and French, that which lost the French the day was a shower of English arrowes, which did so gall their horse, as put the whole army into disorder, their horse knowing no ranks, did tread down their own men: The affections are but as the horse to the Rider, on which knowledge should be mounted, if Satans barbed arrows light on them, so that your desires of the creature prove unruly, and justle with your desires of Christ, your care to keepe your credit or estate, put your care to keep a good conscience to disorder, and your carnal joy in wife and child trample down, or get before your joy in the Lord, judge on which side victory is like to fal. Well, suppose you marchest provided thus far in goodly array towards heaven, while you are swimming in prosperity; most you not also prepare for foule way and weather, I mean, an afflicted estate? Satan will line the hedges with a thousand temptations, when you comest into the narrow lanes of adversity, where you can not run from this sort of temptation, as in the Champaigne of prosperity: Possibly, you that did escape the snare of an alluring world, may be dismounted by the same when it frownes; though temperance kept you from being drunk with the sweet wines of those pleasures, yet for want of patience you may be drunk with the wine of astonishment, which is in afflictions hand: therefore, says the Apostle, to temperance adde patience; either possess your self in patience, or else some raving devil of discontent will possess you. An impatient soul in affliction is a bedlam in chains, yea, too like the devil in his chaines, that rageth against God, while he is fettered by him. Well, have you patience? an excellent grace indeed, but not enough; you must be a pious man as well as a patient. Therefore says the Apostle, to patience? adde godliness. There is an atheistical stupid patience, and there is a godly Christian patience: Satan numbs the conscience of the one, and no wonder he complains not that feels not; but the Spirit of Christ sweetly calmes the other, not by taking away the sense of paine, but by overcoming it with the sense of his love. Now godliness comprehends the whole worship of God, inward and outward. If you beest never so exact in your morals, and not a worshipper of God, then you are an Atheist. If you doest worship God, and that devoutly, but not by Scripture-rule, you are an idolater. If according to the rule, but not in Spirit and truth, then you are an hypocrite, and so fallest into the devils mouth. Or if you doest give God one piece of his worship, and denyest another, still Satan comes to his market. Proverbs 28:9 He that turns back his eare from hearing the Law, his prayer is an abomination to the Lord. Yet (Christian) all your Armour is not on. Your godliness indeed would suffice, wert you to live in a world by your self, or had nothing to do but immediate communion with God; But (Christian) you must not always dwell on this mount of immediate worship, and when you descendest, you have many brethren and servants to your Father, who live with you in the same family; and you must comport your self becomingly, or else your Father will be angry. First, you have brethren, heires of the same promise with you, therefore you must adde to godliness brotherly kindness. If Satan can set you at odds, he gives a deep wound to your godliness. You will hardly joyne hearts in a duty, that cannot joyne hands in love. Secondly, there are not only brethren, but servants, a multitude of profane carnal ones, who though they never had the names of sons and daughters, yet retain to Gods family, and your heavenly Father will have you walk unblameably, yea, winningly to those that are without, which that you may do, you must adde to brotherly kindness charity; by which grace you shalt be willing to do good to the worst of men; when they curse you, you must pray for them, yea, pray for no lesse then a Christ, a heaven for them. Father, forgive them, said Christ, while they were raking in his side for his heart-blood. And truly, I am perswaded the want of this last piece of armour, has given Satan great advantage in these our times. We are so afraid our charity should be too broad, whereas in this sense, if it be not as wide as the world, it is too strait for the command which bids us do good to all. May not we Ministers be charged with the want of this? when the straine of our preaching is solely directed to the Saints; and no paines taken in rescuing poor captived souls, yet uncall'd, out of the devils clutches, who may hale them to hell without any disturbance, while we are comforting the Saints, and preaching their priviledges; but in the mean time let the ignorant be ignorant still, and the profane profane still, for want of a compassionate charity to their souls, which would excite us to the reproving and exhorting of them, that they might also be brought in to the way of life, as well as the Saints encouraged, who are walking therein. We are stewards to provide bread for the Lords house; the greatest part of our hearers cannot, must not have the childrens bread, and shall we therefore give them no portion at all? Christs charity pitied the multitude, to whom in his publike preaching he made special application, as in that famous Sermon, most part of which is spent in rowsing up the sleepy consciences of the hypocritical Pharisees, by those thunderclaps of woes and curses, so often denounced against them, Mat. 23. Again, how great advantage has Satan from the want of this charity in our families? Is it not observ'd, how little care is taken by professing Governours of such Societies, for the instructing their youth? Nay, 'tis a principle which some have drunk in, that 'tis not their duty. O where is their charity in the mean time, when they can see Satan come within their own walls, and let him drive a child, a servant in their ignorance and profanenesse to hell, and not so much as sally out upon this enemy by a word of reproof or instruction, to rescue these silly souls out of the murtherers hand? We must leave them to their liberty forsooth, and that is as faire play as we can give the devil; give but corrupt nature enough of this rope, and it will soon strangle the very principles of God and Religion in their tender years.

SECT. III.

Thirdly, the entirenesse of the Saints armour may be taken not only for every part and piece of the Saints furniture, but for the compleatnesse and perfection of every piece. As the Christian is to endeavour after every grace, so is he to presse after the advance and increase of every grace, even to perfection itself; as he is to adde to his faith vertue, so he is to adde faith to faith; he is ever to be compleating of his grace. It is that which is frequently prest upon believers, Matthew 5:48. Be ye perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. And purifie your selves, as God is pure. Where we have an exact copy set, not as if we could equallize that purity and perfection which is in God, but to make us strive the more, when we shall see how infinitely short we fall of our copy, when we write the fairest hand. So James 1:3. Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be entire, wanting nothing, or wanting in nothing. You who makest a hard shift to carry a little burden with your little patience, wouldest sink under a greater, therefore there is need that patience should be ever perfecting, lest at last we meet a burden too heavy for our weak shoulders. Take a few reasons why the Christian should thus be compleating of his grace.

First, because grace is subject to decayes, and therefore ever needs compleating, as in an army especially which often engags in battel, their armes are batter'd and broken, one man has his helmet bent, another his sword gap't, a third his pistol unfix't; and therefore recruits are ever necessary. In one temptation the Christian has his helmet of hope beaten off his head, in another his patience hard put to it. The Christian had need have an Armourers shop at hand to make up his losse, and that speedily, for Satan is most like to fall on, when the Christian is least prepared to receive his charge; Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to sift you; he knew they were at that time weakly provided, (Christ their Captain now to be taken from the head of their troop, discontents among themselves, striving who should be greatest, and their recruits of stronger grace, which the Spirit was to bring, not yet come.) Now he has a design to surprise them: and therefore Christ carefully to prevent him, promiss speedily to dispatch his Spirit for their supply, and in the mean time sends them to Jerusalem, to stand as it were in a body in their joynt supplications, upon their guard, while he comes to their relief, showing us in the weakness of our graces what to do, and where to go for supply.

Secondly, because Satan is compleating his skill and wrath. 'Tis not for nought that he is call'd the old Serpent, subtil by nature, but more by experience; wrathful by nature, yet every day more and more enraged; like a bull, the longer he is baited, the more fury he shewes. And therefore we who are to grapple with him, now his time is so short, had need come well appointed into the field.

Thirdly, it is the end of all Gods dispensations, to compleat his Saints in their graces and comforts. Wherefore does he lop and prune by afflictions, but to purge,that they may bring forth more fruit (that is, fuller and fairer?) Tribulation works patience; 'Tis Gods appointment for that end: It works, that is, it encreass the Saints patience, it enrags indeed the wicked, but meekens the Saints. 'Tis his design in the Gospel preached to carry on his Saints, from faith to faith, Romans 1:17. And accordingly he has furnished his Church with instruments, and those with gifts, for the perfecting of the Saints, and for the edifying of the body of Christ, Ephesians 4:14. Wherefore does the Scaffold stand, and the Workman on it, if the building go not up? For us not to advance under such means, is to make void the counsel of God: Therefore the Apostle blames the Christian Jewes, Hebrews 5:12. for their non-proficiency in the School of Christ. When for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the Oracles of God.

O how few are there who endeavour thus to promove in their spiritual state, and labor to perfect what is yet lacking in their knowledge, patience, and the rest. First, tell some of adding faith to faith, one degree of grace to another, and you shall finde they have more minde to joyne house to house, and lay field to field; their souls are athirst, ever gaping for more, but of what? not of Christ, or Heaven: It is earth, earth they never think they have enough of, till death comes and stops their mouth with a shovel-full, digg'd out of their own grave. What a tormenting life must they needs have, who are alwayes crying for more weight, and yet cannot presse their covetous desires to death? O Sirs, the only way, (if men would believe it) to quench this thirst to the creature, were to enkindle another after Christ and Heaven. Get but a large heart vehemently thirsting after these, and the other will die alone. As the Fevourish thirst does when nature comes to her temper. Secondly, others labor not thus to perfect grace, because they have a conceit they are perfect already, and upon this fancy throw away praying, hearing, and all other Ordinances, as strings for those babes in grace, to be carried by, who are not arrived to their high attainments. O what fooles does pride make men! Truly Heaven were no such desirable place, if we should be no more perfect, then, thus a sort of people that are too high for this world, and too low for another. The way by which God cures this phrensie of pride, we have in these days seen to be something like that of Nebuchadnezzar, To give them a heart of a beast, (I mean) for a time, suffer them to fall into beastly practices, by which he shewes them how far they are from that perfection they dreamed of so vainly. Thirdly, others who have true grace, and desire the advancement of it, yet are discouraged in their endeavour for more, from too deep a sense of their present penury. Bid some such labor to get more power of corruption, more faith on, and love to God, that they may be able to do the Will of God chearfully, and suffer it in the greatest afflictions patiently, yea, thankfully; and they will never believe, that they whose faith is so weak, love so chill, and stock so little in hand, should ever attain to any thing like such a pitch: You may as well perswade a beggar with one poor penny in his purse, that if he will go and trade with that, he shall come to be Lord Major of London before he die: But why, poor hearts, should you thus despise the day of small things? Do you not see a little grain of mustard seed spread into a tree, and weak grace compar'd to it for its growth at last as well as littlenesse at first? Darest you say you have no grace at all? If you have but any, (though the least that ever any had to begin with) I dare tell you, that he has done more for you in that, then he should in making that which is now so weak, as perfect as the Saints grace is now in heaven. First, he has done more, considering it as an act of Power. There is a greater gulfe between no grace & grace, then between weak grace and strong, between a Chaos and nothing, then between a Chaos and this beautiful frame of heaven and earth. The first days work of both Creations is the greatest. Secondly, consider it as an act of grace, it is greater mercy to give the first grace of conversion, then to crown that with glory. It is more grace and condescent in a Prince to marry a poor Damosel, then having married her to cloth her like a Prince; he was free to do the first or not, but his relation to her pleads strongly for the other. God might have chose whether he would have given you grace or no, but having done this, your relation to him and his Covenant also do oblige him, to adde more and more till he has fitted you as a Bride for himself in glory.

The third aspect of the saints' equipment is its completeness: the full armor of God. The Christian's armor must be complete — and that in three respects.

Section I.

First: he must be armed in every part from head to foot — soul and body, the powers of the one and the senses of the other — with no part left bare. A dart can fly through a small gap (like the arrow that brought death to Ahab through the joints of his armor), and Satan is just such a marksman, able to shoot at a target the width of a penny. If the whole man is armored but only the eye is left exposed, Satan can easily shoot a fireball of lust in through that opening and set the whole house ablaze. Eve only looked at the tree — and a poisonous dart struck her to the heart. If the eye is shut but the ear is open to corrupt conversation, Satan will wriggle in through that hole. If all the outward senses are guarded but the heart is not kept with all diligence, the soul will soon be betrayed into Satan's hands through its own thoughts. Our enemies are on every side, and so our armor must cover every side — "on the right and on the left" (2 Corinthians 6:7). The apostle speaks of sin as an enemy that surrounds us. If any part of the line is unguarded or poorly held, that is where Satan strikes. We often see the enemy enter a city at one side while being driven back at the other, simply because no one was watching the whole perimeter. Satan divides his temptations into several squadrons — one he sends to assault here, another to storm there. We read of both fleshly wickedness and spiritual wickedness. While you are repelling Satan's attack of fleshly wickedness, he may be entering your city through the other gate of spiritual wickedness. Perhaps you have kept your integrity in the practical areas of your life — but what armor do you have to defend your mind and judgment? If he catches you off guard there and corrupts your thinking with some error, your practice will not hold out much longer. The one who could not get you to profane the Sabbath through open sensuality and atheism may succeed through the cover of a corrupt principle like misguided Christian liberty. So we see the need for comprehensive armor protecting every part.

Section II.

Second: the Christian must be in complete armor in regard to all the individual pieces and weapons that make up the full armor of God. Indeed the graces are linked together — they hang like the links of a chain, the stones in an arch, or the members of a body. Pierce one vein, and the blood of the whole body may drain out through that opening. Neglect one duty, and none of the others will serve us well. In his second letter, chapter 1, verses 5 through 7, the apostle Peter presses the Christian to a joint effort to grow the entire body of grace — for health is when the whole body is thriving. "Add to your faith virtue," he says. Faith is the lead grace. Very well — you have faith; add virtue. True faith is active and stirring by nature; without good works it is dead or dying. Faith grows strong through active works, as Luther said. Good works are sustained and kept in good condition by a holy life: just as the flesh covering the frame of the body, though it receives its heat from the vital organs within, yet helps to preserve the life of those very organs — so good works and gracious actions derive their life from faith, yet are necessary helps in preserving the life of faith. So we see a child sometimes nourishing the parent who bore it, which is only doing its duty. You are fruitful in good works, yet you are not out of the devil's reach unless you also add to your virtue knowledge. This is the candle without which faith cannot see to do its work. Are you about to give alms? If it is not a charity with eyes — if charity does not have this eye of knowledge to direct when, how, how much, and to whom you should give — you may at once wrong God, the person you are helping, and yourself. Are you humbling yourself for your sin? Without knowledge of the tenor of the Gospel, Satan may play on your ignorance. He may convince you that you are not humbled enough, when God knows you are nearly overwhelmed by your tears and carried away by the torrent of sorrow toward despair. Or he may show you your own tear-stained face and flatter you into a carnal confidence in your humiliation. Perhaps you see the name of God being dishonored in your community and your spirit is stirred within you, as Paul's was at Athens. If knowledge is not seated in the saddle to rein in your zeal, you will soon be carried over hedge and ditch until you fall off some cliff by irregular action. Neither is knowledge enough — you must also be armed with self-control, which here I take to be the grace by which the Christian, as master of his own house, orders his affections as servants to reason and faith, so that they do not move irregularly or lurch out in disordered desire for, anxiety about, or delight in the creature-comforts of this life. Without this, Satan will be too much for you. The historian tells us that in one of the famous battles between the English and the French, what lost the day for the French was a shower of English arrows that so enraged their horses as to throw the whole army into disorder — their horses, now without any control, trampled down their own men. The affections are like the horse under the rider, on which knowledge should be mounted. If Satan's barbed arrows hit them, so that your desires for created things become unruly and jostle with your desires for Christ — if your care to keep your reputation or finances throws your care to keep a good conscience into disorder, and your carnal joy in wife and child tramples down or gets ahead of your joy in the Lord — then you can judge for yourself which side victory will fall on. Now suppose you are marching in good order thus far toward heaven while swimming in prosperity. Must you not also prepare for rough road and bad weather — I mean an afflicted season? Satan will line the hedges with a thousand temptations when you enter the narrow lanes of adversity, where you cannot run from this sort of trial as you could in the open country of prosperity. Perhaps you escaped the snare of an alluring world, yet may be thrown down by that same world when it frowns. Though self-control kept you from being drunk with the sweet wines of prosperity's pleasures, for lack of patience you may be drunk with the wine of astonishment that is in affliction's hand. Therefore the apostle says: to self-control add patience. Either possess your soul in patience, or else some raging spirit of discontent will possess you. An impatient soul in affliction is like a madman in chains — indeed, too much like the devil in his chains, raging against God while bound by Him. Very well — do you have patience? An excellent grace indeed, but not sufficient by itself. You must be a godly person as well as a patient one. Therefore the apostle says: to patience add godliness. There is a cold, atheistic patience, and there is a warm, Christian patience. Satan numbs the conscience of the one — no wonder the person who feels nothing does not complain. But the Spirit of Christ gently calms the other — not by removing the sense of pain, but by overwhelming it with the sense of His love. Now godliness includes the whole worship of God, inward and outward. If you are ever so correct in your morals but not a worshiper of God, you are an atheist. If you worship God, and devoutly, but not according to the rule of Scripture, you are an idolater. If according to the rule, but not in spirit and truth, you are a hypocrite — and so fall into the devil's mouth. Or if you give God one part of His worship and deny another, Satan still comes away with his goods. "He who turns away his ear from listening to the law, even his prayer is an abomination" (Proverbs 28:9). And yet, Christian, your armor is still not complete. Your godliness would indeed be sufficient if you were to live in a world by yourself, with nothing to do but enjoy immediate communion with God. But you will not always dwell on this mountain of immediate worship — and when you come down from it, you have many brothers and servants of your Father living with you in the same household. You must conduct yourself fittingly, or your Father will be displeased. First: you have brothers, heirs of the same promise as yourself. Therefore you must add to your godliness brotherly kindness. If Satan can set you at odds with them, he strikes a deep wound in your godliness. It is hard to join hearts in prayer when you cannot join hands in love. Second: there are not only brothers but also servants — a multitude of ungodly, worldly people who, though they have never been called sons and daughters, still belong to God's household as His creatures, and your heavenly Father wants you to walk blamelessly before them — indeed, to walk in a way that wins them. To do this, you must add to brotherly kindness love — by which grace you will be willing to do good even to the worst of people. When they curse you, you must pray for them — indeed, pray for nothing less for them than Christ and heaven. "Father, forgive them," said Christ, while they were digging into His side for His heart's blood. Truly I am persuaded that the lack of this final piece of armor has given Satan great advantage in our times. We are so afraid our love will be too broad — whereas in this sense, if it is not as wide as the world it is too narrow for the command that bids us do good to all. May not we ministers be charged with lacking this? When all our preaching is directed only to the saints, and no effort is made to rescue poor, uncalled captive souls from the devil's grip — who may be hauled to hell without any interference while we are comforting the saints and preaching their privileges — we leave the ignorant to remain ignorant and the profane to remain profane, for want of a compassionate love for their souls that would move us to rebuke and exhort them so they might also be brought into the way of life, just as the saints who are already walking in it are being encouraged. We are stewards to provide bread for the Lord's household. The greatest part of our hearers cannot and must not have the children's bread — but shall we give them no portion at all? Christ's love pitied the multitudes, and in His public preaching He made special application to them — as in that famous sermon of Matthew 23, most of which is spent in rousing the sleepy consciences of the hypocritical Pharisees with those thunderclaps of woes repeatedly pronounced against them. Again, how great an advantage has Satan from the lack of this love in our homes? Is it not observed how little care is taken by professing heads of households to instruct their young people? Indeed, some have drunk in the principle that it is not their duty. O where is their love in the meantime, when they can see Satan come within their own walls and drive a child or a servant to hell in their ignorance and wickedness, without so much as venturing a word of correction or instruction to rescue these poor souls from the murderer's hand? We must leave them to their freedom, it seems — and that is about as fair a deal as we can give the devil. Give corrupt nature enough of this rope, and it will soon strangle the very principles of God and religion in their tender years.

Section III.

Third: the completeness of the saints' armor may be understood not only as having every individual piece of equipment, but as the completeness and advancement of each individual piece. Just as the Christian is to pursue every grace, so he is to press toward the growth and increase of every grace, even toward perfection itself. Just as he is to add to his faith virtue, so he is to add faith to faith — always advancing his grace. This is frequently pressed on believers: "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48). And: "Purify yourselves, just as He is pure." Here we are given an exact standard to aim for — not as if we could actually equal the purity and perfection that is in God, but to make us strive all the harder when we see how infinitely short of that standard we fall, even when we write our best. Similarly, James 1:4: "Let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." You who can barely manage a small burden with your little patience would sink under a greater one — therefore patience must always be growing, or eventually we will meet a burden too heavy for our weak shoulders. Consider a few reasons why the Christian should be constantly growing in grace.

First: because grace is subject to decay and therefore always needs replenishing. As in any army that frequently engages in battle, weapons are battered and broken — one man's helmet is bent, another's sword is nicked, a third's pistol is broken. Recruits and repairs are always needed. In one temptation the Christian's helmet of hope is knocked off his head; in another his patience is sorely pressed. The Christian needs an armorer's shop close at hand to repair his losses promptly — for Satan is most likely to attack when the Christian is least prepared to receive him. "Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you like wheat" (Luke 22:31) — Christ knew they were poorly equipped at that moment: their Captain about to be taken from the head of their troop; arguments among themselves about who would be greatest; and the supplies of stronger grace that the Spirit was to bring not yet arrived. Now Satan had a scheme to surprise them. Therefore Christ, to forestall him, promised to quickly dispatch His Spirit for their supply, and in the meantime sent them to Jerusalem to wait together in united prayer — standing, as it were, as a body on guard while He came to their relief. This shows us what to do and where to go for supply when our grace is weak.

Second: because Satan is always perfecting his skill and intensifying his rage. It is not for nothing that he is called the old serpent — subtle by nature, but even more so by experience; wrathful by nature, yet growing more enraged with each passing day. Like a bull that grows fiercer the longer he is baited. Therefore we who must grapple with him now that his time is so short had better come well equipped into the field.

Third: because it is the goal of all God's dealings to perfect His saints in their grace and comfort. Why does He cut and prune by afflictions, if not to purge and cleanse so that they may bring forth more fruit — fuller and better fruit? "Tribulation produces patience" (Romans 5:3) — that is God's purpose in it. It produces — that is, it increases — the saint's patience; it enrages the wicked but softens the saints. It is His purpose in the preached Gospel to carry His saints onward from faith to faith (Romans 1:17). Accordingly He has equipped His church with ministers, and those ministers with gifts, "for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ" (Ephesians 4:12). Why does the scaffold stand with the workman on it, if the building is not going up? For us not to advance under such means is to frustrate the purpose of God. Therefore the apostle rebuked the Hebrew Christians for their failure to grow in the school of Christ: "For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God" (Hebrews 5:12).

How few there are who truly strive to advance in their spiritual condition and labor to fill up what is still lacking in their knowledge, patience, and other graces. First: tell some about adding faith to faith, one degree of grace to another, and you will find they have more mind to add house to house and field to field. Their souls are always thirsting and gaping for more — but for what? Not for Christ or heaven. It is earth, earth they can never get enough of, until death comes and stops their mouths with a shovelful dug from their own grave. What a tormenting life they must have, always crying for more weight and yet unable to press their craving desires to death. O, the only way to quench this thirst for earthly things — if only men would believe it — is to kindle another thirst, one after Christ and heaven. Get a great heart burning fiercely after these, and the other thirst will die on its own, as a fever-thirst dies when the body comes back to its natural temperature. Second: others do not labor to perfect their grace because they have convinced themselves they are already perfect — and on that basis they throw away prayer, hearing, and all other ordinances as childish aids for those babes in grace who have not yet reached their lofty attainments. Oh, what fools pride makes of people! Truly, heaven would not be such a desirable place if we were to be no more perfect there than these people are here — too high for this world, and too low for another. The way God cures this frenzy of pride, we have seen in our day, is something like what He did with Nebuchadnezzar — giving them the heart of a beast, meaning allowing them for a time to fall into beastly practices, by which He shows them how far they are from the perfection they dreamed of so vainly. Third: others who have true grace and genuinely desire to grow in it are nonetheless discouraged in their pursuit by too deep a sense of their present poverty. Tell some such person to labor for more power over corruption, more faith in and love toward God — that they might do God's will cheerfully and endure whatever He appoints in the greatest afflictions patiently, even thankfully — and they will never believe that someone whose faith is so weak, whose love is so cold, and whose stock is so small could ever attain any such height. It is as if you tried to persuade a beggar with one poor penny in his pocket that if he will go and trade with it, he will become Lord Mayor of London before he dies. But why, poor hearts, do you so despise the day of small beginnings? Do you not see a tiny mustard seed grow into a great tree? Weak grace is like it — both in its smallness at the start and in its growth in the end. Dare you say you have no grace at all? If you have any — even the least that any person ever started with — I dare tell you that God has done more for you in that than He would do in making what is now so weak as perfect as the saints' grace is now in heaven. First, He has done more, considered as an act of power. There is a greater gulf between no grace and grace than between weak grace and strong — a greater gulf between chaos and nothing than between chaos and the beautiful order of this heaven and earth. The first day's work of both creations is the greatest. Second, considered as an act of grace: it is greater mercy to give the first grace of conversion than to crown that grace with glory. It is greater grace and condescension in a prince to marry a poor young woman than, having married her, to clothe her like a princess. He was free to do the first or not — but his relationship to her strongly pleads for the second. God might have chosen whether to give you grace or not. But having done so, your relationship to Him and His covenant now obligates Him to add more and more until He has fitted you as a bride for Himself in glory.