The Kingdom of God Among Men, Tract 1 · Chapter 1
CHAP. I.
The Nature of Christianity, and the Character of true Christians.
THe Names and Titles, by which real Christians are in Holy Scripture distinguished from other men, are not mean and common, but high and excellent, as, a Chosen generation, a royal Priesthood, a holy Nation, a peculiar People, the first-fruits of Gods creatures, the houshold of God, children of Light, children of Wisdom, heirs of the heavenly Kingdom, and the Title of Saints, was one of their ordinary appellations. Doubtless the true difference between them and others lyes not in mere names, but in some peculiar excellencies of quality and condition thereby signified. And so much is abundantly set forth in the several expressions of Christianity, as, the Regeneration, the new Creation, a transformation in the renewing of the mind, a participation of the divine nature, the life of God, conformity to the image of the Son of God, and such like. Thus from the Scripture stile it is evident, that true Christianity is of an other nature then that carnal, formal, and lifeless profession, with which multitudes confidently take up; and that in its true professors there must needs be found something of a higher strain and nobler kind; and which indeed makes them meet for that holy and Blessed state to come, unto which it leads them.
It is indeed an excellent name and nature, the regenerate State and divine life, which is begun in the new birth, wherein the Soul retaining the same natural faculties, is changed from a carnal into a spiritual frame, by the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost, and the word of truth.
In this change the mind is illuminated unto an effectual acknowledgment of the truth which is after godliness, as containing the highest good, and appearing in such evidence as makes earthly things to be seen (what they are indeed) but as dross and dung in comparison thereof. The will is drawn by the force of the truth, acknowledged to an absolute conversion and adhesion to God, as the great and ultimate object of the souls love, desire, joy, reverence, observance, acquiescence, zeal, and intire devotion. In this absolute conversion to God, is included the renouncing of all self dependence, and of that perverse self-seeking, which follows the lapsed state, and an unlimited self resignation to God, which is the only true self-seeking and self-love. For God having made our felicity immutably coherent with his glory, but subordinate thereunto, a true Convert turning from poor, empty, nothing, self to the infinite God, exchanges insufficiency, poverty, vanity and misery for immensity, almightiness, all-sufficiency and infinite fullness; and so he loseth self, as it is a sorry thing and a wretched Idol, and findeth the blessed God, and self-eternally blessed in him.
And forasmuch as all have sinned and fallen away from God, and cannot be brought back to him, but in the hand of a Redeemer and Reconciler, our Religion stands also in the sensible knowledg of sin, and of our deplorable state under the power and guilt thereof, with an humiliation sutable thereunto; and in a lively faith towards our Lord Jesus, the eternal Son of God made man in the fulness of time, who gave himself for us to redeem us from sin and death to a life of grace and glory. Which Faith is the worthy receiving of him in the full capacity of a Redeemer, the intire and hearty acceptance of the grace of God in him, the Souls resignation to him, to be conducted to God by him, and the securing of all that is hoped for in his hands, with an affiance in his all-sufficiency and fidelity.
This Faith worketh by love towards God and man. For through faith we love God, because he loved us first, and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. And through faith we resolve, that if God so loved us, then ought we also to love one another. And this love eminently contains in it all the virtues of moral honesty towards men, as truth, justice, mercy, peaceableness, kindness, faithfulness, humility, meekness, modesty, and towards inferiors moderation, equity, and condescention, and towards Superiors reverence, and submission.
Christianity is a root of true goodness that brings forth its fruit in due season, in the first place the internal and immediate actings of faith, hope and love, which may be called radical duties, as lying next the root; then the inseparable effects thereof, such as are holy meditation and prayer among the acts of devotion towards God; and among the acts of charity towards men, justice, fidelity, mercy, which are called the weightier matters of the Law. And further, it shoots forth into an universal regard of Gods commandments in all particularities, not slighting the lowest or remotest duties, which indeed cannot be slighted without the contempt of that Authority, which injoyned the greatest and most important.
The Spirit of Christianity is a spirit of Wisdom and prudence, that guides in a perfect way. It sets right the superior governing faculties, and holds the inferior under the command and government of the Superior. It awakens reason to attend to the souls great concernments, to mind the danger of temptations, the madness of depraved affections, and the mischief and banefulness of all sin. It is no inconsiderate, licentious, presumptuous, dissolute spirit, but strict, circumspect and self suspitious, solid serious and universally conscientious. It is pure; grave, sober, shunning every unseemly speech, all foolish and light behaviour, and much more that which hath a filthy savour, and smels rank of impurity and dishonesty. It watcheth the motions of the animal life and sensitive appetite, and curbs them, when they are extravigant, and renounceth whatsoever things tend to vitiate the soul, and work it below its spiritual happiness. It is a spirit of patience, and of true rational courage, and of resolved submission to the will of God. It is above wordly riches and poverty, and glory and ignominy, and fleshly pain and pleasure. But self-conceit, excessive self estimation, asperity towards others, and domineering cruelty over conscience, is no part of the above-mentioned and commended strictness and severity. For as it hates flattery and base compliance with others in prophaness or lukewarmness, so it is ever qualified with meekness, lowliness of mind, peaceableness, patience, that it may gain upon others and win them to its own advisedness, steddiness, purity and soberness.
This new nature, while it is lodg'd in the earthly tabernacle, is clogg'd with many adverse things, especially the relicks of the old nature, which cause much vanity of thoughts, indisposedness of mind, motions to evil, and aversations from good, and somtimes more sensible disorders of affections, and eruptions of unruly passion, and aberrations in life and conversation. The same divine principal is in some Christians more firm, lively and active than in others, yet it is habitually prevalent in them all; and it resists and overcomes the contrary principle, even in the case of most beloved sins and strongest temptations, and perseveres in earnest and fearful indeavours of perfecting holiness in the fear of God. And whatsoever degree of sanctity is obtained, it ascribes wholly to the praise of Gods grace in Christ, and the power of his spirit.
Christianity being known what it is, it may easily be known what it is not, and so the false disguises of it may easily be detected. Forasmuch as it looks far higher than the temporal interests of mankind in the settlings of this life (though it doth not overlook them) it cannot be thought to have done its work in making men meerly just-dealers, good neighbours and profitable members of the Common-wealth, for such may be some of them that are without Christ, without the hope of the Gospel, and without God in the world.
Moreover, it cannot lie so low, as in a bare belief of the Gospel, and an observance of its external institutes, accompanied with a civil conversation. As for such as rest in these things, what are they more in the eye of God, than the heathens that know him not? And wherein do they differ from them, except in a dead faith, and outward form taken up by education, tradition, example, custom of the country, and other such like motives.
Nor doth it lie in unwritten doctrines, and ordinances of worship devised by men, nor yet in curiosities of opinion or accidental modes of Worship, discipline, or Church-government; nor in ones being of this or that Sector party, nor in meer Orthodoxality, all which being rested in, are but the false coverings of hypocrites.
It is not the lax and easie, low and large rule, by which Libertines, and Formalists, yea some pretended perfectionists do measure their own righteousness, who assert their perfectness by disannulling, or lessening the law of God.
In a word, it is not any kind of morality or vertue whatsoever, which is not true holiness, or intire dedication to God; and therefore much less is it, that loose and jolly religion of the sensual gang, who keep up a superficial devotion in some external forms, but give up themselves to real irreligion and profaneness, and bid defiance to a circumspect walking and serious course of Godliness.
And now it is too apparent, what multitudes of them, that prophess the faith of Christ, are Christians in name only and not indeed. Their alienation from the life of God, and their enmity against it, and their conformity to the course of this world in the lusts thereof, doth testifie, that they have not received the grace of God in truth. But Christians indeed according to the nature of Christianity above expressed (which is now in them though not in the highest, yet in a prevalent degree) do make it their utmost end to know, love, honour and please God, to be conformable to him, and to have the fruition of him, in the perfection of which conformity and fruition, they place the perfection of their blessedness. In the sence of their native bondage under the guilt and power of sin, they come to the Mediator Jesus Christ, and rest upon him, by the satisfaction and merit of his obedience and suffering, to reconcile and sanctifie them to God, and accordingly they give up themselves to him, as their absolute Teacher and Ruler & all-sufficient Saviour. Having received not the Spirit of the world, but that which is of God, they are crucified to the honours, profits and pleasures of the world, and have their conversation in heaven, and rejoyce in the hope of glory, and prepare for sufferings in this life and by faith overcome them. The law of God is in their hearts, and it is the directory of their practice from day to day, by the touchstone of Gods word they prove their own works, and come to the light thereof, that their deeds may be made manifest to be wrought in God. They draw nigh to God in the acts of religious worship of his appointment, that they may glorifie him, and enjoy spiritual communion with him, and be blessed of him, especially with spiritual blessings in Christ: and as God is a Spirit, they worship him in Spirit and in truth. It is their aim, care and exercise to keep consciences void of offence towards God and towards men, and to render to all their dues both in their publick and private capacities, and to walk in love towards all, not excluding enemies, and to do all the good they can both to the souls and bodies of men; but those that fear God they more highly prise and favour. The remainder of corruption within themselves they know feelingly, and watch and pray, and strive that they enter not into temptation, and maintain a continual warfare against the Devil the world and the flesh, under the conduct of Jesus Christ their Leader, according to the laws of their holy profession, with patience and perseverance. In the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, they indeavour to be blameless and harmless as the Sons of God, and to shine as lights in the world, and by the influence of their good conversation to turn others to righteousness.
Such is the Character of those persons upon whose souls the holy doctrine of the Gospel is impressed, and in whom the Christian religion hath its real being, force and vertue. These are partakers of the heavenly calling, and set apart for God to do him service in the present world, and afterwards to live in glory with him for ever. These are the true Church of God (the Church being here taken as mystical, not as visible) and these are all joyned together by one Spirit, in one Body under Christ their Head, in the same new nature, having one rule of their profession, and one hope of their calling.
These are a great multitude, which no man can number of all nations and kindreds, and people and tongues, yet hitherto not proportionable to the rest of mankind. And they continue throughout all ages, but in greater or lesser numbers, and more or less refined from Superstition or other corruptions, and more or less severed from the external communion of the Antichristian State, according to the brightness or darkness of the times and places wherein they live.