Commentary on the Gospels and Acts, Commentary 1 · Chapter 6 · Verse 21 – Verse 22
Verse …. For where your treasure is, &c.]
i. e. Where your chief happinesse is, there your affections will be setled; Where the carcase is, there will the Eagles be also. Beetles delight … muck-hils: but Christs Eagles are never in their pride, till farthest off from the earth: they are said (even here) to be set … …. 2 6.with Christ in heavenly places. The Church in the Canticles, hath this given her for an high commendation, That she had a nose like …. 7. 4.the tower of Lebanon, Siverborum faciem spectemus, saith an Interpreter,… … poter it mag is dici ridiculum? The words at first sight seem somewhat strange: for what so great a praise is it, to have … nose like a tower? But by this … is notably set forth that spirituall sagacity and sharpnesse of …, whereby the Saints resent and savour the things above, being carried after Christ the true carcase, with unspeakable desire and delight. The earthlyminded, that have their bellies filled with Gods hid treasure, the … … 17. 14.of this world, and take it for their portion; these have their heads so stuft, and their eyes so stopt with the dust of …, that they neither see nor savour heavenly things. As they are of the earth, so they speak of the earth, and the earth hear's them. As the…. 3. Grashopper is bred, liveth and dieth in the same ground: so … terrigenae fratres, these muck-minded men, are wholly earth in their whole …. And as the Grashopper hath wings, but flieth not: sometimes she hoppeth upwards a little, but falleth to the ground again: so these have some light and short motions to …, when they hear a piercing Sermon, or feel a pressing affliction, or see others snatcht away by sudden death before them: but this is not of any long continuance, they return to their former worldlinesse. The devil hath got full possession of them, as once of Judas by this sin, and could a man … up their hearts, he might finde there fair-written, The God of this present world. He…. 4. 4. holds his black hand before their eyes, lest the light of the … Gospel should shine upon them. We cry, O earth, earth, earth, Hear the Word of the Lord: but the devil hath made a path way … their hearts, so that the seed cannot enter. Earth … cold and …, so are earthly-minded men to any holy duty. Earth is heavy and bears downward: so do earthly affections. Earth doth often keep down the hot exhalations, that naturally would ascend: so do those holy motions and meditations. Earth stands still, and hath the whole circumference carried about it: so are Gods mercies and judgements about earthly-minded men, and they are no whit moved thereat. Grace, on the other side, as fire, is active and aspiring. And as Moses would not be put off with an Angel to go before the people: he would have God himself, or none: so the true Christian must have Christ, or nothing will give him content. Christ is his treasure, and hath his heart: all his cry is, None but Christ, none but Christ. As the Sun draws up …, so doth the Sun of righteousnesse, the affections of his people. And as the hop in it's growing, windeth it self about the pole, alwaies following the course of the Sun, from East to West, and can by no means be drawn to the contrary, chusing rather to break then yeeld: so the Saints (as well militant as triumphant) do follow the Lamb wheresoever he goeth; and being risen with Christ, and spiritualized by him, they seek the things that are above: their thoughts feed upon the fairest objects (such as are those set down by the Apostle, Phil. 4. 8.) and run withDan. 12. much content, upon that firmament, and those starrs in Daniel, foreign.That inheritance undefiled and unfadable in Peter; those palms and1 …. 1. 4. white robes in the Revelation. They take ever and anon a turn or two on Tabor, and are there transfigured with Christ; or on Mount Olivet, where he was taken up, and have thence continuall ascensions in their hearts. And as our Saviour in the Interim betweenAct. 1. 3. 1 Ioh. 2 6.his Resurrection and Ascension, whiles he walked here on thePsal. 45. 1. earth, spake of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God, andNusquam origenes non ardet, sed … est ardentior, quam ubi …. mones … tractat. …. waited for his exaltation into heaven: So the faithfull Christian (that hath his part in the first resurrection) walks in his measure, … Christ walked, talks as he talked, he speaks of the things concerning the King, and therein his tongue is as the pen of a ready Writer. Of Origen it is said, that he was ever earnest, but never more then when he treats of Christ. And of S. Paul it is well observed, that when he speaketh of heaven, he useth a …, lofty kinde of language, his speech riseth higher and higher, as 2 Cor. 4. 17. a degree above the superlative: so Phil 1. 23. to be withHic oratio … assurgit, &c. Rolloc. Christ, is far far the better: so 1 Thess. 2. 19. See how the Apostles mouth is opened, his heart enlarged, he cannot satisfie himself, nor utter his conceptions. This a Christian can do, he can sigh out a cupio dissolvi, I desire to be with Christ: whom as he more or … here, in the same measure he is merry; like as … never sing so sweetly, as when they are … in the air, or on … top of trees. As when Christ with-draws his gracious … and influence, he is all amort, you may take him up for a … man. … cries after Christ, as idolatrous Micah did after his lostJudg 18. 14. gods: And as King Edward the third having the King of … prisoner here in England, and feasting him one time most …, pressed him to be merry, the French King answered, … can we sing songs in a strange land? So the good soul is in great …, while Christ absents himself, and never heartily …, till she get home to him, till she lay hold on him, whom her … loveth.
Verse 22. The light of the body is the eye, &c.]
Here our … Saviour illustrateth what he had said before, of laying up, not … earth, but in heaven, by a fit similitude. Like as the eye is the light of the whole body: so is the minde of the whole man. If …. 4. 9.therefore thine eye be single, that is, if thy minde be sincere: If … …. …. 19.have that one eye of the Spouse in the Canticles, that one heart promised in the new Covenant, set upon God alone, and not divided, and as it were cloven asunder (which is to have a heart … … Cor. 11. 3.a heart) but minding the one thing necessary, as the main; and be not double-minded, or corrupted from the simplicity of Christ; then shall thy whole body, that is, thy whole, both constitution and … be lightsom, diaphanous, transparent, as a … that hath a candle in it, or as a crystall glasse with a light in the midst, which appeareth through every part thereof. There will be an uniformity, aequability, ubiquity and constancy of holinesse running thorow thy whole course, as the warp doth thorow theforeign. woof; when a double-minded man (that hath not cleansed his…. …. 8. heart, nor washt his hands of worldly lusts) is unstable and … Jam. 1 8.in all his waies. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy minde, Luk. 10. 27. And with my minde I serve the Law of God, saith Paul, which he acknowledged to be spirituall, though he were carnall in part, sold under sin. The old man is still corrupt …. 4. 22.according to the deceitfull lusts (which sometimes so … and beguile the judgement, that a man shall think there is some sense in sinning, and that he hath reason to be mad) but be ye renewed … 23.in the spirit of your mindes, in the bosom and bottom of the soul, in the most inward and subtile parts of the soul, and as it were the … of it. Reserve these upper rooms for Christ, and be not ye conformed to the world (who minde earthly…. 3. …. things, and have damnation for their end) but be ye transformedRom. …. …. by the renewing of your mindes, that ye may see and prove by good experience (not by a Nationall knowledge only) what that good, and holy, and acceptable will of God is. Concerning the East-gate of that Temple in Ezekiel, Thus saith the Lord;Ezek. 44. 2. This gate shall be shut, and shall not be opened, and no man shall enter by it, because the Lord God of Israel hath … by it. Here through signifying, saith a Divine, that although the heart of a Christian, which is the temple of the holy Ghost, may let many things enter into it at other gates, yet must it keep the East-gate, the most illuminate and highest power and part of it, continually shut against all men, yea against all the world; and opened only to one thing, I mean to God, who hath already entered into it, and … it with his Spirit. That as at the windows of … Ark, there entred in no mist nor water, nothing else but one thing only which is light: so at this East-gate, no mist of humane errours, no water of worldly cares may enter in, but only the light of heaven, and a sanctified desire to be fast knit, and perfectly united by faith and love to God.