CASE XII.

XII. ANother great affliction which requireth Patience is, The loss of the sound and serious Preaching of the Gospel, by the death, or Banishment, or silen∣cing of our Teachers, while our own great wants and weakness call for the best assist∣ance. The Soul being more precious than the Body, the welfare of it is more Page  162 valuable, and its loss and famine more lamentable: And we see that God or∣dinarily worketh according to the apti∣tude of means: And when he taketh a∣way such needful means, it is a sad de∣gree of his own forsaking us, and deny∣ing to us further grace: Alas, how bad are we under the best helps, and how dark and doubting under the most clear convincing teaching, and how cold, and dull under the most warm and lively Ministry: And what shall we then be, if God remove our Teachers from us? May we not turn cold, and dull, and worldly, and deceived, under cold, dull, deceiving Worldly, Pastors? And grow careless of our own Souls under those that are careless of their own and ours? If in the Communion of wise and holy Christians, we found it hard to grow in grace, may we not fear declining when we are separated from such, and dwell as Lot in Sodom, and must converse with worldly or Malignant Men?

As to the sad case, 1. You may have the greater comfort, because you make not light of the affliction; and may be the more patient believingly, because you are not patient as contemptuous unbe∣lievers. Page  163 The patience of carnal Men under such a loss, is a greater evil than the loss it self: And the patience of faith is a greater good, than the helps which you lose. Had you been so blind, and dead and bad, as to let go the Gospel, and be easily quiet and content as long as you enjoy your honour, wealth and ease, this had been a far greater misery than a want of Teachers: As a mortal sickness which causeth loathing and digestion, is worse than the hardest fare with appetite and health. Thank God that you are sensible of your loss.

2. If you are true Christians you have the Law and Gospel written upon your hearts, whence none can by violence take it from you, you may lose the provision of your House, and the food on your Tables; yea and cast up that which you have ea∣ten: But if it be digested and turned into your flesh and blood, it is not so easily taken from you. O bless God, that be∣fore he took away the means, he did con∣vert you by them, and taught you effect∣ually before he took away your Teachers. When the word is digested and turned in∣to knowledge, saith, repentance, desire, obedience, patience, hope and love, nei∣ther Page  168 Men nor Devils can take it from you; your heart where it is sown and rooted is not within their reach; unless you will give them the Key, and foolishly betray your selves. When God hath made you his Habitation by his Spirit, and Christ dwelleth in your hearts by faith, and the Kingdom of God, and life Eternal is begun within you, the loss of outward helps will not undo you. I am not imitating them that tell you, that all Men have sufficient light within them, or that call you to undervalue the word written and Preacht, on pretence of that sufficiency, as if you need no other no∣tice of God, and Christ, but to be told that he is in you. But yet rejoyce that God is within you, tho all these outward means were gone: That is, that your Faith and Love have within you such an object to live upon as your Father, Sa∣viour and Sanctifier, and such an Agent as the Spirit to actuate all. When they silence your Teachers, burn your Books, shut up your Church doors, they can∣not shut out the Spirit of Christ, nor deprive you of its Life, and Light, and Love.

3. If Men take away the means fore∣men-mentioned, Page  169 they do not therefore take away all. 1. You have all Gods works to view and study: Sun and Stars, Hea∣ven and Earth, Sea and Land, Cities and Country, Fields and Meadows, Beasts and Men, good and bad: And you are taught already by the Gospel to see not only the great Creator in all these, but also the Gracious Redeemer, purchasing, upholding, and using all as delivered to him for the good of his Elect.

2. You have the daily use of Medita∣tion, as on all these works God, so also on Christ and the Gospel which you have learnt; yea and of the Joys of Heaven.

3. You have daily and hourly leave to open your Case to God; you have ac∣cess to him by Christ in Prayer, Thanks∣giving and Joyful Praise. If you have but an appetite, you have here a continu∣al feast, which you may enjoy in every place; in your Closet, in the Feilds, in your Shop, or in a Prison.

4. Its very likely that you may save your Bibles, and other good Books, and so have Gods word still at hand: It was written in Hebrew and Greek, but God hath used Man to Translate and unseal it to you; And you may choose your time, Page  168 〈1 page duplicate〉 Page  169 〈1 page duplicate〉 Page  166 and choose the Subject which you would read: And the writings of your Teach∣ers are usually more accurate than their speaking; and at a cheap rate you may have choice, and excellent helps. And you may read these in your Families to your Children and Servants, and set up many Teachers for one. Undervalue not these remaining helps.

5. And if God continue to you in the publick Assemblies, but sound Doctrine and lawful Communion, do not say all means are gone. If it be but the Reading of the Holy Scriptures, and Singing Psalms, and Praying no worse than is expressed in the Liturgy of this Nation, it is a mercy not to be despised: It was but a little part of the New-Testament, which was contained in Peters Speech which Converted three thousand, Act. 2. And but a little part which was in the words of Paul, which the Gentiles de∣sired might be again spoken to them the next day: And but a little part which Paul wrote to any one Church, when he required them to Read it publickly, and to Read that to one Church, which was written to another: Christs own Ser∣mon Luk. 4. And that to his Disciples Page  167 Math. 5. Were but a little of what bare Reading now can tell us. Ezra was put to spend much of the day in a Pulpit to Read the Law, and make them under∣stand the Reading: That is, when by their Captivity they had lost the Lan∣guage in which the Law was written, he was fain as he Read it in Hebrew, to Translate it by word of mouth, and turn the Hebrew into the Chaldean Tongue which they understood. This was far less than the bare Reading of both Law and Gospel already Translated doth for you. The quantity of one or two of our Chapters, were received in the daies of the Apostles, with great joy, to the con∣version of many Souls. And in Queen Maries daies some poor Women would hire a Boy secretly in a Corner to Read to them a little of the English Bible, yea of the Primer. But the full Soul loaths the Hony Comb, when to the hungry every bitter thing is sweet.

There are some ignorant Christians that think it enough to charge any thing in Worship or Religion to be unlawful because it is humane, the work of Man. Its like these will not be grieved that their Teachers are silenced: For they Page  172 were Men. And as Men have written some forms of Prayer, so they are Men that have written the many hundred holy Books that are now among us: And Preaching and Praying, are the words and works of Men: The Singing Psalms were turned into Metre by Men: Yea all your English Bibles were made Eng∣lish by Men, and you Read and hear no English words but the words of Men, tho they signifie the word of God: The dividing of the Scripture into Chapters and Verses, is the invention and work of Men: And I think they were but Men that taught you to speak and Read. God worketh by Man on Man, as sociable fit Instruments: And if you despise all in Religion, that is the work of Man, you will despise the word and work of God, and shew that you are less than Men.

4. When God taketh Teachers from one People (before death) he usually sends them to another: And it proveth oft to the advantage of the Church. When the Disciples were all driven a∣way from Jerusalem, they went Preach∣ing the Gospel into all Countries about. Persecution drove the Apostles all over Page  169 the world: It sent Paul to Rome to Preach it at the doors of Nero: When he and Barnabas were driven from one City, they carryed the Gospel to another: Persecution had a great hand in send∣ing the Gospel to most Nations in the World that had it. Yea the very Ban∣ishment of such as Nestorius, Dioscorus, and others such as Hereticks, for some formes of Speech, had a great hand in the sending of Christianity into Persia, India, and many remote parts of the East, South and North, and of late to New-England, and other Plantations in America, it was sent by the Prelates, and other Rulers from this Land. A Captive Maid its said, began the Con∣version of the Iberians as Frumentius and Edisius did of the Indians (or rather planted a Ministry in Habassea, miscalled India, which before had none but Lay Christians since the Eunuchs daies.)

And every good Christian is of a pub∣lick Spirit, and loveth Christs greatest interest with the greatest Love, and therefore loveth the Church and the world better than himself, or his native soil: Why than should we not the more patiently bear the loss of those Labourers, Page  172 〈1 page duplicate〉 Page  169 〈1 page duplicate〉 Page  170 whom God sends to do greater work a∣broad: Is it like that Mr. John Eliot, would ever have done half the good in England that he hath done in America? We pray that Gods name may be hallowed, and his Kingdom come, and his Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven, and England is a very little part of the Earth.

5. We must have our time of Rest with Christ when we have had our time of Labour: If God call home his Ser∣vants to himself, rejoyce with them that there rejoyce, and have fought a good fight, and have finished their Course, and do receive the Crown of Righteousness: Grudge them not their Rest and Happiness. God sent them hither to work, run, and fight, and not to Reign or long abide: It may seem hard to us that so holy a Men as Stephen should do Christ no longer ser∣vice in his Church; and that James who hoped to have sit next Christ in his Kingdom on Earth, should so quickly be taken from the work of his Apostleship: But he had his Petition to be near to Christ in a better manner than he desi∣red: And Stephen and he did more in a day by dying than most others do by living long: The Foundation of the Page  171 Church was to be laid in Blood; and none is too preclous for so great work, for which Christs blood was not too precious.

6. Ministers be idle or useless when they are silencnd: They are Pray∣ing for the Church, and they are Lights in the Houses and Company where they come, and Christ disdained not oft to Preach to one Woman or Man, (as Joh. 4. and 9. &c.) And some of them pub∣lish Gods truth by writing, and that to a far greater extent and number, than ever they could have done by voice: The word of God is not bound when we are bound.

7. Yea the silence and sufferings of Christs faithful Ministers, do powerful∣ly Preach: It maketh Men see the evil of that proud and Malignant Spirit, which hateth such Men, and cannot en∣dure them: The vulgar are hardly brought to wisdom by meer words, or to know the difference between good and evil, till by sense and experience they feel and tast the several fruits: The Cured blind Man, John 9. could quickly dis∣cern that God heareth not sinners, but if any Man be a (true) Worshipper of God, him he heareth: And that he must needs be of God that could open his eyes: Page  172 And that therefore those Men were not of God that hated and Persecuted him that did so much good. The vulgar hate Popery far more for Queen Maries Bone∣fires, and the Inquisition, and the French, Bohemian, Polonian, Piedmont and Irish Massacres, than for any Doctrinal Errour in their Religion: And when long ex∣perience hath assured them that the Per∣secuted Ministers Preached the true Gos∣pel of Jesus Christ with great plainness, seriousness, and love to Souls, and that they sought no Worldly gain or Ho∣nour, but Mens Salvation; and that they lived as they Preacht, and when they see that it is this very sort of Men that Pa∣pists bend their malice against, and study to extirpate, silence and destroy, and that Godliness and Conscience, is the intolle∣rable Enemy, which they would drive out of the Land, and that the most wicked, sensual, filthy, debaucht, unconscionable Malignants, are their Agents, and the Men that they employ and trust, who will obey them before God, and against him; This loudly tells the people what they are; and by their fruits, Wolves, Thorns and Thistles, are known: They can tell whose Servants they are by their Page  173 works, better than by their Livery, Cloathing or names. To hinder the Gospel and good of Souls, and make the Godly a hated scorned Persecuted Peo∣ple, and cause Men of no Conscience to be better thought of, is the Devils work, yea his chiefest work in the World: And they are so far his Servants that do it; by what Names or Titles soever they be called. And as humane nature hateth cruelty, and Christianity hateth ungod∣liness, Malignity and Persecution, so these works do effectually Preach to the People, and tell them who are their friends, and who their foes: What to love and what to hate.

8. God will do his work by others when we are dead and gone. Successive Generations must pertake of his mercies, and do his service here, and not the same Men still continue. And when we grow dull with age and weakness, young Men of greater vigour and alacrity shall succeed us.

9. And it hath hitherto been Gods way, to carry on his work with great mutations and variety in the world. As he causeth Winter and Summer, Nights and Dayes, so his Church hath had hi∣therto Page  174 its turns of prosperity and adver∣sity: And prosperity hath increased the number of Christians, and adversity hath tryed them, and increased the grace of those that persevere.

10. It is more our diligence and faith∣ful use of means, by which we grow in grace, than by the enjoyment of the best, if we be slothful under it: And some∣time God seeth that fullness breedeth wantonness and loathing; and like fool∣ish Children we play with our meat, or quarrel about it; And then its time to take it away, and let fasting help us to a better appetite. I have known those that when they lived among the ignorant, and could hardly hear a good Sermon without going divers Miles for it, and hardly borrow a good book, and rarely speak with a serious Christian, were so hungry, affectionate and diligent, that they evidently profited very much: But when they came where they had variety, choice and fulness of Teachers, Books and Religious converse, some grew more no∣tional, wordy, and cold, and some turned self-conceited, proud and quarrelsome, and some down-right Heretical or Schis∣matical: And do we need any more to Page  175 justifie the afflicting Providence of God, in taking away and silencing Ministers, than the sad review of our common miscarriages? Have not pious Ministers been disgracefully guilty of over-valuing their own Judgments and Opinions, and laying Life and Death on Words which they understood not, and raising Hatred, censures and contempt, against their Brethren that differed from them, though wiser and better than them∣selves? What shameful and doleful work did the Nestorian, and Eutychian, and Monathelite Controversies make? The doleful Wars about Predestination, Grace, and Free-will, which have torn the Church and destroyed Love, these twelve hundred years; I have fully pro∣ved to be shameful and sinful, most a¦bout ambiguous words, or unrevealed things (in a Book called Catholick Theo∣logy). We have heard with grief what unchristian contentions there have long been beyond Sea, among Protestants called Lutherans and Calvinists; and how oft the former have persecuted the latter: We have heard of late, how some represent Calvinists, as if they were as bad as Heathens; and some in Page  176 the Pulpits say, the Religion of the Ar∣minians is the Religion of the Devil: If none of these speak the words of Truth or Charity, nor know either what they say, or what manner of Spirit they are of; is it not just with God to silence them all? What dreadful work hath the Interest and Controversies of Dio∣cesanes, Liturgy and Ceremonies here made? And when we cannot bear with one another, it is just with God to bear with none of us. How long have Episcopal, Presbyterians, Indepen∣dants and Anabaptists, been censuring, condemning, and some of them persecu∣ting one another; and been teaching the People to believe, that those that they accuse deserve it? And if we thus shew that we all deserve it how can we open our Mouths against Gods Justice if he reject us all?

11. As when God taketh away strength, hea•lfe frth and liom the Age, they must be thankful that they enjoyed all these so long, and consider how they used them while they had them; so when he taketh away Ministers and publick Helps, we must be thankful that we had so long peaceable enjoyment of them; Page  177 and consider whether it be not for our abuse that we are deprived of them.

12. God is not tyed to outward helps, though he tye us to them while we may have them: If he take them from us, he can give us that grace in our secret Closets, which we had in the publick Assemblies; and we may expect his as∣sistance and blessing in any means which he appointeth us to use.