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Vers. 4. They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker: who ceaseth from raising, after he hath kneaded the dough untill it be leavened.
The fourth sin challenged, is, their pronenesse to adultery, bo∣dily or spiritual, or both, of which they were generally guilty. This is illustrate from the similitude of a Baker heating an Oven, and kneading Dough; who ceaseth to raise himself or others to put in the Bread, till it be leavened, and the Oven hot. In ap∣plication
wherof, we need not restrict it particularly to this, that Jeroboam and his faction were hot upon the Idolatry of the calves, of which he was the contriver and Baker, but yet did cease to put it in practcie, till by emissaries the people were leavened and pre∣pared. Nor yet to this, that they were mad upon sin, and yet insensible and carelesse of their case because of it, as a sleeping Baker. But it seemes rather to hold out this general, That they opened their hearts so to Satans fiery tentations, as an Oven is to fire, and were so inflamed and fitted thereby, as presently on an occasion they acted the sins, as an hot Oven will bake the Bread when once it is leavened, and put into it; and as an Oven continues heating, till the Dough be leavened and ready to be put into it; so their heat of lust and tentation, was not extin∣guished till it was satisfied; And further as an Oven into which fire and fuel is put, keeps the heat, and leaven goeth through the lump, though none watch about them, but the Baker and o∣thers sleep; so their hearts being once pestered with sin, did feed themselves therein. Doct. 1. A visible Church not receiving the love of the truth, is justly given over to vile uncleannesse, both in worship and manners, and to be monstrously enflamed thereunto, by Satan and his fire-brands; For, such was Israels condition, They are adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, where the Baker may cast in what fire and fuel he will, and where the heat is most violent, as being kept in compact together. See Rom. 1.21, 24, &c. 2 Thess. 2.10, 11, 12. 2. The more univer∣sal sin be, it doth adde to the Lords controversie against a Land; For, They are all adulterers, that is, they are generally guilty, though not every one, and this is a part of the challenge. 3. What∣ever men may pretend without themselves, as an excuse for their corrupting their wayes; yet upon true triall, they will finde it to flow from their own hearts polluted by Satan; nor will it suffice to acknowledge some infirmity and inadvertencie in their sin, un∣lesse they see it deeper rooted in their hearts; For, whereas they might pretend they followed these courses only to please their Kings,, and obey their commands, the Lord lets them see it was their own hearts enflamed with lusts, and Satans tentations, like an oven heated, that drew them to it, and that this was no sudden fit, but the fruit of deeply corrupted hearts, as an Oven that hath been long heated with much fuel. 4. Albeit that wick∣ed men do not alwayes break forth in actuall wickednesse, yet are they not the more innocent for that; For, 1. Their spirits are pestered and haunted with sin, though they do not act it, as the
Oven is still heating, and the Dough still leavening, though the Baker and others sleep. 2. It is not of them that they do not act sin, it is only through the want of a tentation and occasion; as the hot Oven ceaseth from baking Bread, and the Baker from putting it in, only till it be leavened and ready. 3. Their heat of lust is never extinct, nor do they labour to mortifie it, but it continueth restlesse and furious till it be satisfied; as the Oven still heats and burneth, till the Bread be leavened and put in. Doct. 4. Albeit good motions, when they are most fervent, need frequent cherishing, as being no native plant of our hearts; yet when evil once gets footing, it will entertain and feed it self, and grow upon our hand; For, the Oven will heat, and the Dough leaven, though all should sleep after they have put in the fire and the leaven.