Soldiery Spiritualized, Sermon
1 COR. 9.26. So Fight I, not as one that beats the Air.
IT is commonly and not inconveniently said, that a Mans general and particular Calling are the two Legs on which he Travels through the Wilderness of this World, from Egypt to Canaan, he that fail… in either of them will prove a lame Christian, he may happily hop or creep, but will not be able to go uprightly, much less will he run the Race that is set before him so as to obtain. To use both these Legge, and yet to set the best Legg foremost, I mean his General Calling, and to make the other, viz, that of his Part…cular subservient to his General, is the Duty of every one that will be and appear to be a Christian indeed. But so to do, we may say of it, this is a labour, this is a work. Oh how hard is it for these not to Interfere one upon another, and Interfereing how dangerous, how pernicious! And the more, because the General Calling, and so the One thing necessary usually comes by the worst of it. The many things do so clamorously and cogently call for Attendance, and we are so ready to be at their Beck when they call, that it is many to one, if the one thing be not neglected and overlookt by means of the many.
To prevent this, besides the Cautious, Counsels, Warnings, Commands, Promises and Threatnings that the Scripture is full of, to make us look to the main chance, to mind the great business that is before us: I say besides all these means, the Lord takes care to make us spiritual in all our Imployments, by spiritualizing all our Imployments. Yea, all our Relations and Conditions as well as Imployments, are so improved to our Hands by the Spirit of God in his Word as that they may be useful both as Monitors and Helpers to mind us of, and further us in those matters that are of most solemn and momentous, because of Eternal Concernment. Thus our hungring, thirsting, eating, drinking▪ sleeping, wakeing, walking, sitting, wo…k…ng, resting, &c. Thus the Relations of Husband, Wife, Parents, Children, Masters, Servants, &c. are particularly mentioned as full of precious and practical Instructions.
Thus our Call…ngs, Functions, or Occupations, whether mo…e liberal or Mechanick ▪ each of them bears twins, and there is none barren among them. The Lesons the God i… teaching us out of our proper Vocations are so many, so spiritual, & so pertinent, that they are enough to leave us without excuse, if we are not spiritual in them, and learn not to be more spiritual whiles about them. To give a Tast in a few Instnaces.
The Physitian and Chirurgion when visiting or administring to the sick or lame, giving Purges, Cordials, &c. setting bones, applying Plaisters, &c. may be minded of his own Condition by nature, convinced of his need of Christ, directed to apply himself to Him, as the great Physitian, Soul-Physitian, who is anointed and appointed by the Father to bind up, heal, recover, yea to do that which is out of the reach of all Physick, viz. to quicken the dead, Joh. 5.25. see also Hos. 6.1, 22. Psal. 146.8. and 147.3. Jer. 8.22 Mal. 4.2. Luk. 4.18. Psal. 51.8.
The Merchant is advised among all his dealing and trading in the world, to act the part of that wise Merchant, by selling all for the Pearl, which will be the best, and should be the first bargain he makes, Math. 13.45, 46. And he is assured by Christ the wisdome of the Father, that he can deal in no Commodities that will yield him like Profit, Prov. 8.11, 18, 21. but what ever else he may get, if he neglect this, will come to a bad market at last.
The Factour that is imployed by others, having an estate of theirs to manage to whom he must give an Account; His very calling minds him of his Relation to God the High Possessor of Heaven and Earth, from whom he ha's those daily Consignments of Life, Health, Food, Raiment, Gospel, and all the precious things thereof, of all which great Betrustments he must one day give an Account to his Principal, and woe to him, if through his Sloth, profuseness, or otherwise he disenables himself from rendring to his Owner his Own with Advantage. Indeed we are all Stewards of the manifold Grace of God, (1 Pet. 4.10.) And that Text, that awful Text should lye down and rise up with us, and keep upon our hearts all the day long, Luk. 16.2. Give an Account of thy Stewardship, for thou maiest be no longer Steward.
The Husbandman should own God in that wisdom he teaches him about his Calling, Isai. 28.24, 29. and know that himself is Gods Husbandry, 1 Cor. 3.9. and that therefore he ought to be so towards God as he expects his Land to be towards him after all the costly and expensive Husbandry that he hath been the Subject of, Isai. 5.1—4. The dealing of Husbandmen is much in Earth, and lest they should lose and bury up their Souls alive therein, and so miss Heaven, God hath put a great deal of Heaven into their Earth and there they may find it, their fencing, clearing, plowing, sowing, weeding, plucking up the thorns, waiting for the former and latter rain, reaping, gathering into the Barn, threshing, winnowing, are all made in Scripture similitudes, and so teachers of Heavenly things, see Math. 13.3—9. and ver. 18—23. with ver. 24, 25. &c. Math. 3.10, 12.
The Fisherman if he will read, Math. 13.47. may thence learn to catch the Kingdome of Heaven in his Net, and some spiritual Good with his Hook and Line. And it is observable that in ver. 52. of that Chapter: he be-speaks his Disciples as persons well instructed unto the Kingdom of Heaven, by means of those similitudes which out of their Secular Affairs and ordinary Imployments he had borrowed and suited to their Use.
It would be endless to particularize, for even from the King upon the Throne to the Hewer of wood and drawer of water, the Lord is in his word teaching us by such familiar and known Metaphore taken from those Callings that we are versed in, in so much that all sorts of men may say concerning the voice of God in his word, as they in another Case. Act. 2 8, 11. How is it that we hear from thence in our own Tongue wherein we were born, and in the proper dialect of those Imployments to which we have been bred, the wonderful Counsels of God declared …o us! the Lords manner of speaking as it helps us to the understanding of what he saith, so his love and Care therein should quicken us to the practise of what we understand. They that would see more of this may consult these and such like Scriptures, Joh. 15.1, 2, 5, 7. Math. 9 16, 17. and 19.24. Luk. 12:19, 20, 21. Jer. 18.1—4, &c. confer Rom. 9.21 Psal. 2 9. Math. 7.24. &c:
But to avoid any further skirmishing at a distance, and to come to a more close Engagement with my Text, in which the Calling or Profession of the Souldier is made use of a… Instructive to the Christian.
My work this day principally is to attend a Call from, and so to speak something to Souldiers, and I knov no better way to speak to their Understandings and Hearts then to speak in their own Dialect ▪ to treat them not only as Christians but also as Souldiers, or as Christian Souldiers. And therefore my discourse shall be a Divinity-Lecture to such, i. e. Military-Divinity or Divine Souldiery, for the doing of which my Text advantageth me, as having in it the great wo…k of a Christian in working out his Salvation, set forth under the Meta…hor of fighting, and the manner of doing that, by the manner of doing this, [So fight I]
I might give you the Coherence of the Text with the former part of the Chapter, and of that with the latter part of the foregoing Chapter, which for brevity sake I omit.
It may suffice to say, that having exhorted them to run the Race that is set before them, and u…ged his Exhortation from the Example of other Runners, and Strivers or Wrestlers, who were careful and intense in their way, though the Argument or Motive to urge them thereto were small and inconsiderable compared with theirs. The one being a Corruptible, the other an Incorruptible Crown. He doth now in ver. 26. reinforce his Exhortation to them by the proposal of his own Example before them, and that under a double Metaphor.
1. Of Running, concerning which he speaks▪
1. Affirmatively, I so Run. 2. Negatively, not as uncertainly.
2. Of fighting, which is before us in the words read, where the Apostle presents himself in the Equipage of a Souldier, whose Business is Fighting, amplified from the manner of his doing it, [So fight I] and how, he sets down in the Text, Negatively, [not as one that beats the Air] In the Context Affirmatively, [I keep under my Body, &c.] Together with the Reason o… the whole [Lest while I preach to others, I my self should be a cast away.]
So] i. e. So as he had before exprest, lawfully, and so as to attain the end, and so as to have that success, the keeping of the Body under.
Fight I] The Greek word here rendred [Fight I] is by the Latine pugilem ago, which most properly notes to fight with the fist. Pugil from pugna; and that from pugnu the Fist, though we use pugna for any manner of Fighting, for a battel or Skirmish where Swords and other Weapons are used; and so Pugil is rendred a Champion or streng Fighter. [Fight I] then may be, I act the part of a Champion, Now a Champion is supposed to be not only a Souldier, but one singularly qualified and eminently accomplisht for what he undertakes, one that is both Strong and Skilful. Hence G…eat Goliah was called the Philistines Champion; 1 Sam. 17 23, 51. So that to Fight like a Champion means to Fight like an able, Skilful, Active man, a man of whose Fighting well, there is Great Expectation, and upon whose so doing there is no small dependance.
Not as one that beats the Air] A very significant Expression borrowed from those that make a Flourish with their Weapon, make a shew of doing much, whereas all they do is but a m…er shew, an empty show; they draw the Sword and wave it too and fro, but hit nothing besides Air with it. This same Apostle hath a Parallel Expression that will give some light to this, 1 Cor. 14.9. He that speaks unintell…gible words, he speaks in the Air, i. e. he speaks insignificantly and unprofitably to his Hearers, whose Ears may have the Sound, but themselves not having the Sense of what he speaks, his words fly into the Air, i. e. are to no purpose. He makes a Great Sound with his high and hard words, but they are Airy, there is nothing in them to the Hearers. So here; some mens Actions are as empty as other mens words, nothing but a Flourish in the Air. This Phrase may be answered by the Latine Ventilare, which (besides other significations) meaneth only to Flourish. The Poet speaking of one that was but a Flash, a Bubble, a Vapour, saith of him, he spreads abroad his Arms indeed, makes a shew, pretends to something, but verberat istibus Anras, He strikes nothing but Air with his Blows. Many will so do, speak big, and look high, make a very fair Flouris… with their Swords, wave their Weapons too and fro, carry them over their Heads, and round about them very neatly and dexterously, so that they appear very Skilful, able and valiant men, that can dare and do much; but this is only while there is nothing but Air before them, upon which they may strike while they will without any danger of being stricken again, such may pass for fair Flourishers, but are no Fighters. It is not so with me (saith Paul) I have something before me besides Air, and therefore have other work to do then to beat That. I have an Enemy before me which I must strike, and strike down too, and that at my utmost peril.
The Summe is, he commends to them by his own Example, Fighting for their work and Imployment, and by his Negation of beating the Air only, he implies and intends the Contrary Affirmative, viz that he was thorough, intense and in good earnest about his work, he did not make a show only, then he did do the thing, there was not an outside, an appearance only, then there was the substance, the reality, and as he did, they ought to do also. Hence take up this plain Doctrine.
Doct. To be in the Equipage or Capacity, and to perform the work of a Souldier, and that vigorous…y, stoutly, strongly, strenuously, is the Duty incumbent upon every Christian. The Calling and Imployment of a Souldier is that also of a Christian, in which he is to acquit himself strenuously and like a man. He that will be a Christian indeed must be a Christian Souldier and that in deed, in reality, not in show or appearance, he must fight not flourish only, be a Souldier and that in actual Service too, [So Fight I] in the present Tense, fighting is with every Christian alwayes in the Present Tense. A Christian must engage in a spiritual warfare, and therein he must not be like one that beats the Air. No, but he must act the part or do the work of a Souldier, and that in good earnest. He must not be the picture of a Souldier, a Fencer, a Stage-player, one that comes on the Stage and for pleasure, sport or in jest only personates a Souldier, when he really is, and means nothing less, but he must buckle to the Business of Fighting like a man that aims to make work of it. In a word, we need not alter the Terms of the Text. It is the Duty of every Christian to look at and carry himself as a Souldier in the Fight, wherein he is to behave or demean himself not like one that beats the Air.
The Doctrine hath two parts in it, The one, the calling or Imployment of a Christian, viz. he is to Fight, the other contains the manner of his doing it, not slightily, but Substantially, not in jest, but in good earnest.
I shall draw forth each part by it self, and speak to each singly by way of Explication and Confirmation, and then make some Application of both together.