Chapter 18: The New Heart of Covenanters

Quest. 6. When are we to judge, that we have a new heart? And when do we know that it is not the old heart?

Ans. 1 Propos. As physically, so also morally, the heart is the man, the good heart, the good man, the evil heart, the evil man, and God weighs men by the weight, not of the tongue, of the hands of the outward man, but by the weight of the heart: Asa his heart was perfect (2 Chronicles 15:17), the heart of Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 17:3) was perfect. And (Psalm 78:37) their heart was not right: the perverse heart is the perverse man (Proverbs 3:32). For there is a man speaking within a man, and a heart within a heart acting, as if it were a man made up of soul and body. You have said in your heart, I will ascend up to Heaven, so the King of Babylon (Isaiah 14:13). So the heart acts Heaven or Hell within the man (Psalm 14:1; Luke 12:19), they have a heart [illegible] busied in the College, studying and reading covetousness (2 Peter 2:14).

2. Propos. When the Lord tries the man, he tries the heart and the reins (Proverbs 15:11). Hell and the heart both are naked before him (Proverbs 17:3). Theodoret. God acts the noon-day sun meridionaliter in every heart: the man himself is without, and God within (Jeremiah 17:9). Man searches not his own heart and reins, for there are plottings and inclinations to evil in the heart, which the heart knows not (2 Kings 8:12-13). Peter has a better heart than all men in the books of his own heart (Matthew 26:33), but it is not so indeed.

3. Propos. The washed heart that lodges not vain thoughts (Jeremiah 4:14), purged from dead works, by the blood of Christ (above all the blood of bullocks and goats) (Hebrews 9:14), purified by faith (Acts 15:14), is the good heart. It is a better heart according to the heart of God (1 Kings 15:5), that turns not aside (1 Samuel 13:14), of God's seeking out and finding, than the first heart created of God (Ephesians 4:24; Colossians 3:10). And ah! we seek a good ruler, a good physician, when we are sick, a good house to dwell in, and (which is strange) a good horse, but not to have a good heart.

4. Propos. The excellent acts of God, in a manner (with glory to his Highness) to mind his first work, to create a better heart than the first which he created, says, that there is great need of a good heart (Psalm 51:10), of a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26). It is beyond all admiration, to create so [reconstructed: rare] a piece as the sun out of nothing, and a beautiful lily out of mire and dirt, out of common clay to bring forth sapphires, carbuncles, and in lieu of a stony heart (for grace is not educed out of the potency of any created thing) to create a new heart, which God loves to dwell in, rather than in heaven, the high and holy place (Isaiah 57:15), which so ravishes the heart of Christ (Song of Solomon 4:7, 9), and is of more price with God, than gold, or any corruptible thing, even a meek and quiet spirit (1 Peter 3:3-4), is the rarest piece of the works of God.

It is an excellent act of God to keep the vessel in a spiritual season, as David prays (1 Chronicles 29:18). To make room for Christ dwelling by faith, and for love to comprehend love (Ephesians 3:17-18), and who puts such a thing in the heart (Ezra 7:27). When a spark of fire from flint falls on water or green timber, there is no firing from there. But when actual influences fall upon a heavenly habit, as the Lord can cast in a coal, or a lump and flood of love (Song of Solomon 2:5-6; Luke 24:32; Song of Solomon 6:12), there are most heavenly actings of the soul.

3. He bows and inclines the heart to the Lord's testimonies, and to cleave to him without declining (Jeremiah 32:39-40; Psalm 119:39; Song of Solomon 1:4; Psalm 141:4).

4. We are to beware of 1. the reigning evils of the heart, of a rotten and unsound heart (1 Timothy 6:5; Psalm 119:82). 2. Of an unsavory stinking heart, that smells of hell and the second death, of all sort of unrighteousness and malice, like a green opened grave (Psalm 5:9). 3. Of an uncured heart, that never came through the hands of the physician (Proverbs 14:13: A sound heart is the life of the flesh.) Of an unsound, unsavory and a rotten heart (Ephesians 4:29) compared with verse 23, from where issue rotten words, borrowed from rotten and worm-eaten trees which speak an uncured heart.

5. We are to look to deadness of heart in all the branches of it. As (1.) sullenness and dumpish sadness, in refusing comforts, and being full of unbelieving heaviness, in David (Psalm 69:20; Psalm 42:11), whereas we are always to rejoice (Psalm 119:52; Philippians 4:4). (2.) Fainting at the greatness of the affliction (Isaiah 20:3; John 14:1), from where comes withering of heart (Psalm 102:4; Psalm 27:13). (3.) An overwhelmed and unbelieving swooning heart (Psalm 61:2; Psalm 142:3; Psalm 143:3-4). (4.) Deadness in going about the service of God (Psalm 119:37): Quicken me in your way, of this elsewhere. (5.) Narrowness to take in God, opposed to an enlarged and wide heart (Psalm 119:32; Psalm 81:10), and straitening of heart, when the soul is so hampered, that he cannot speak (Psalm 77:4); unbelief clips the wings of the Spirit, and lays on fetters, which may come from the wicked company, and may be laid on by ourselves (Psalm 39:1-2). (6.) There is an atheist heart to hate the existence of God, of Christ, of a Gospel (James 2:19; Matthew 8:29) compared with (Psalm 14:1; Ephesians 2:12). Some believers are near to say, I take my leave of Christ, I'll pray no more, for it is in vain (Jeremiah 20:9; Psalm 73:13-14), but it is not a fixed resolution: of this elsewhere.

7. There is an evil heart of unbelief to depart from the Living God (Hebrews 3:12).

8. A heart that devises, plows, or delves wicked imaginations (Proverbs 6:18). As (Proverbs 3:29): Plow not evil against your neighbor. (Hosea 10:13) You have plowed iniquity, such plots are forged against the people of God (Matthew 27:1; Nahum 1:11).

9. A proud heart (1.) resisted of God. (2.) Farthest from the lowly and meek heart of Christ (Matthew 11:29; Philippians 2:5-7). (3.) Most near to Satan's heart (1 Timothy 3:6).

Q. Why are we more ashamed of an unclean lustful heart, than of a proud heart? Ans. A proud heart is deeper guiltiness, and nearer to Satan's nature; and pride and unbelief are sins more reproachful to God, and encroach more upon his Throne, but there is more flesh in us than Spirit, and we think that there is more of a beast in uncleanness.

Quest. But we are more ashamed of lying, falsehood, and stealing, than of pride? Ans. There's more of being ashamed before men, it being a carnal sort of passion, than of being ashamed before God, and falsehood and lying to men are fleshly evils against common honesty, but pride is a more angel-sin, or a more God-like sin, a spiritual sin, and pride is a sort of heart-heresy, by which we judge but blindly, we have reason to ascend and climb aloft to God's room (Genesis 3:5-6; Isaiah 14:13), because of knowledge, parts, power.

10. There is deceitfulness and self-deceiving in the heart (Isaiah 44:20); the idolater feeds on ashes, a deceived heart has turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, is there not a lie in my right hand (Obadiah 3). The heart is the greatest liar on earth, to say and gainsay.

11. There is a wicked fearfulness in the heart to do evil (Jude 12), feeding themselves without fear. 2 Samuel 1:14: was you not afraid (says David to the Amalekite) to put out your hand to destroy the Lord's Anointed? It's a godly fear to tremble always, at feasting, speaking, hearing, sleeping, company (Proverbs 28:14; 1 Peter 1:17; Philippians 2:13; Job 1:5). And in all there lie snares within, and without the house.

12. There is a wicked flintiness of heart; we shall have peace, though we both hear cursing and walk loosely (Deuteronomy 29:19). We are fallen, but Ephraim's stout heart (2) will rise whether God will, or not (Isaiah 9:9). And (3) the King of Assyria's stout heart will be as strong as God (Isaiah 10:12-13). And (4) it's wicked stoutness to say godly mourning before the Lord is in vain (Malachi 3:13-14). (5) It's wicked stoutness to rest upon your own righteousness and refuse to treat with God (Isaiah 46:12-13). (6) And vain stoutness to dare God in his own quarters and fight him (Exodus 14:8, 23; Exodus 23:8, 13; Isaiah 36:10-11, 36-37), if it were in his own seas as Pharaoh and the Egyptians would do.

13. There is a wicked hardening of the heart, when men make the Lord his word and mighty works the contrary party (Exodus 5:1-3; Exodus 7:10, 13, 16, 20, 23; Exodus 8:5-7, 15, 17-19; Isaiah 6:9-10; Zechariah 7:8-9, 11-12; Ezekiel 2:3-4; Ezekiel 3:7-8; Matthew 13:13-15; Acts 13:44-46), and oppose God in his word and works.

14. There is a sinful dullness upon the heart, by which men are as weaned children; line upon line, line upon line, can do them no good (Isaiah 29:9-11). Here it is to be observed that we cannot preach Omnipotency, nor persuade a world to be created, nor a new heart to be infused, nor can we preach to a wolf to become a meek lamb, nor threaten the sun to rise at midnight. We but speak words about the new birth; the husbandman but breaks the earth with his plough, but God makes the corn to grow, and he only. Not that the word is not the instrument of conversion of souls (Romans 1:16; Romans 10:14), but how, to the act of infusion of a new heart, the word concurs as a moral and suasory instrument, is above my capacity.

15. There is a froward heart (Proverbs 17:20) that perverts and is crafty [illegible] to pervert.

16. A wicked heart (Proverbs 26:23) set on evil (Ecclesiastes 8:11, 17); foolishness is bound to the heart (Proverbs 22:15); a dissembling heart, when seven abominations are in it (Proverbs 26:25). (1) We take no heed to the imaginations, and are not grieved for the constitution of the heart, for actual sins make original sin to swell, as two floods running into one makes a huge river. (2) We take not heed to the young births of the heart; with the concurrence of the mind, fancy and imagination, there are multitudes of forgeries, clay-pots, and imaginations framed, as a potter devises vessels of earth of many quantities, figures, shapes, great, small, narrow, wide, round, cornered, for the word is a potter's word (Genesis 6:5; 1 Chronicles 28:9). With all keeping, keep your heart (Proverbs 4:23); the word is to keep as the keepers of the walls (Song of Solomon 3:5), as shepherds, for it's in danger to be stolen away (Hosea 4:11; 2 Samuel 17:6; Hosea 7:11). Ephraim is like a silly dove without heart, but we take no heed to the entry, to see what goes in, what comes out. (1) What if there be no God? (Psalm 14:1). (2) What if God see not? (Ezekiel 9:9). (3) What if man perish as the beasts? (Ecclesiastes 3:19). It may be there is no heaven, nor hell. (4) What if there be no Christ, nor Gospel, but only questions of words? Such clay-pots were framed by Gallio, and Festus (Acts 18:14-15; Acts 25:11, 19). Hence come imaginations of things impossible (Isaiah 14:13): I'll ascend to heaven, says Babylon, I will set my nest among the stars (Obadiah 4). Tyre says, I am god, I sit in the seat of God. And new wild-fire flights which are indeed old heresies, are of this kind; such are dreamers, who see seven lean kine eat seven fat kine — in reality, it's a lie. (5) A new heart is the office-house of Christ, and a heart delighting in God's ways is a new heart, where the law is imprinted and engraved in the heart (Isaiah 51:7): Hearken, you people in whose heart is my law. Psalm 40:8: I delight to do your will, O God, your law is within my heart. It's true there is a new delight in the heart, but not a delight of the new heart (Isaiah 58:2; John 5:35), for a delight in the Gospel as a good thing, not as a good Gospel, a delighting in Christ as a Prophet that feeds them, not in Christ as a Redeemer (John 6:26) that saves them, is not a new heart.

2. The new heart is a universal heart, wholly for God as God; there is an entireness in it, when the whole spirit and soul and body is kept blameless (1 Thessalonians 5:23; 1 Peter 1:18), in holy conversations and godliness (2 Peter 3:11). Half a globe, though exquisitely planed, or half a cart wheel, is not a globe nor a cart wheel. External things may be divided; one may be a hearing professor, and a drunken professor, and a praising, a singing professor in public, and not a praying nor a believing professor in private. Spiritual duties cannot be divided: half a faith, half a love, is no faith, no love; saving grace is an essence that consists in indivisibili, and cannot be parted.

3. A new heart is a fixed and established heart by grace, it's a new state, not a new transient flash, a new heart (Deuteronomy 5:27). All that the Lord our God will speak to you, we will hear, but the Lord says, verse 19, O that there were such a heart in them, but it is not in them.

4. (1 Samuel 10:9) God gave Saul another heart, then a changed heart is not a new heart, a new spirit or a new gift in Jehu is not a new heart. It's not newness that makes the heart new, but God's new engraving (Jeremiah 31:33).

5. A heart kept with all keeping is a new heart (Proverbs 4:23), both the words note exact diligence in keeping as watchmen and shepherds with all keeping, at all times (Psalm 119:119). Some pull their hearts to pray and hear, but not until the Sabbath, or under a storm of conscience. And the heart is a word in some company, not at other times and in other company.

6. The heart is new where the affections are all faith (as it were) and all sanctified, reason and zeal is a lump of angry reason, and fear a mass of shining reverence, and love only soul sickness and pure adherence to God, the instinct of faith wholly on God, as the last and only end. (2.) The heart is new when the affections are equivocally, or at least, at the second hand set upon the creature, but as nothing can be seen, but what either is color, or affected with color, so nothing is fixedly sought after, but God, he only feared and served (Matthew 4:10; Deuteronomy 10:20), only desired (Psalm 73:25), only loved (Deuteronomy 10:12; Song of Solomon 3:2-3), the soul sick of love for only Christ (Song of Solomon 2:5; Song of Solomon 5:8), he only trusted in (Jeremiah 17:5, 7; Psalm 62:5). (1.) Nothing is all good and all desirable but God, and God in Christ (Matthew 19:17; Song of Solomon 5:16), the shadow of the sun in the fountain is not the real sun. The stirrings of the pulse of the affections towards the shadowed good of the creature should be lent, and like the beating of the pulse of a dying man, with a godly contradiction, loving and not loving, joying and not joying (1 Corinthians 7:29-30), mourning and not mourning.