after a while finds evidently, that unless this be embraced, all other things wherein it hath to do with God, will not be of value to the soul; this will quickly be made to appear. Of all that communion which is here between God and man, founded on the revelation of his mind and will unto him, which makes way for his enjoyment in glory, there are these two parts: 1. God's gracious communication of his love, goodness, &c. with the fruits of them unto man: 2. The obedience of man unto God in a way of gratitude for that love, according to the mind and will of God revealed to him. These two comprise the whole of the intercourse between God and man. Now, when the mind of man is exercised about these things, he finds at last that they are so wrapped up in the doctrine of the Trinity, that without the belief, receiving, and acceptance of it, it is utterly impossible that any interest in them should be obtained or preserved. For the first, or the communication of God unto us in a way of love and goodness, it is wholly founded upon, and inwrapped in this truth, both as to the eternal spring and actual execution of it. A few instances will evince this assertion. The eternal fountain of all grace, flowing from love and goodness, lies in God's election, or predestination. This being an act of God's will, cannot be apprehended, but as an eternal act of his wisdom or word also. All the eternal thoughts of its pursuit, lie in the covenant that was between the Father and the Son, as to the Son's undertaking to execute that purpose of his. This I have at large elsewhere declared. Take away then the doctrine of the Trinity, and both these are gone; there can be no purpose of grace by the Father in the Son, nó covenant for the putting of that purpose in execution; and so the foundation of all fruits of love and goodness is lost to the soul. As to the execution of this purpose, with the actual dispensation of the fruits of grace and goodness unto us, it lies wholly in the unspeakable condescension of the Son unto incarnation with what ensued thereon. The incarnation of the eternal Word, by the power of the Holy Ghost, is the bottom of our participation of grace. Without it, it was absolutely impossible that man should be made partaker of the favour of God. Now this inwraps the whole doctrine of the Trinity in its bosom; nor can once be apprehended, without its acknowledgment. Deny the Trinity, and all this means of the communication of grace, with the whole of the satisfaction and righteousness of Christ, falls to the ground, Every tittle of it speaks this truth: and they who deny the one, reject the other. Our actual participation of the fruits of this grace, is by the Holy Ghost. We cannot ourselves seize on them, nor bring them home to our own souls. The impossibility hereof I cannot now stay to manifest. Now whence is this Holy Ghost? is he not sent from the Father, by the Son? Can we entertain any thought of his effectual working in us, and upon us, but it includes this whole doctrine? They, therefore, who deny the Trinity, deny the efficacy of its operation also. So it is, as to our obedience unto God, whereby the communion between God and man is completed. Although the formal object of divine worship be the nature of God; and the persons are not worshipped as persons distinct, but as they are each of them God; yet as God they are every one of them distinctly to be worshipped. So is it, as to our faith, our love, our thanksgiving, all our obedience, as I have abundantly demonstrated in my treatise of distinct communion with the Father in love, the Son in grace, and the Holy Ghost in the privileges of the gospel. Thus without the acknowledgment of this truth, none of that obedience which God requireth at our hands, can in a due manner be performed. Hence the Scripture speaks not of any thing between God and us, but what is founded on this account. The Father worketh, the Son worketh, and the Holy Ghost worketh. The Father worketh not, but by the Son and his Spirit; the Son and Spirit work not, but from the Father. The Father glorifieth the Son; the Son glorifieth the Father; and the Holy Ghost glorifieth them both. Before the foundation of the world, the Son was with the Father, and rejoiced in his peculiar work for the redemption of mankind. At the crea tion, the Father made all things, but by the Son, and the power of the Spirit. In redemption, the Father sends the Son; the Son by his own condescension undertakes the work, and is incarnate by the Holy Ghost. The Father as was said, communicates his love, and all the fruits of it unto us by the Son; as the Holy Ghost doth the merits and fruits of the mediation of the Son. The Father is not known nor worshipped, but by and in the Son; nor Father or Son, but by the Holy Ghost, &c. Upon this discovery the soul that was before startled at the doctrine in the notion of it, is fully convinced that all the satisfaction it hath sought after in its seeking unto God, is utterly lost, if this be not admitted. There is neither any foundation left of the communication of love to him, nor means of returning obedience unto God. Besides, all the things that he hath been inquiring after, appear on this account in their glory, beauty, and reality unto him: so that, that which most staggered him at first in the receiving of the truth, because of its deep mysterious glory, doth now most confirm him in the embracing of it, because of its necessity, power, and heavenly excellency. And this is one argument of the many belonging to the things of the Scripture, that upon the grounds before mentioned, hath in it, as to my sense and apprehension, an evidence of conviction not to be withstood. Another consideration of the like efficacy, may be taken from a brief view of the whole Scripture with the design of it. The consent of parts, or harmony of the Scripture in itself, and every part of it with each other, and with the whole, is commonly pleaded as an evidence of its divine original. Thus much certainly it doth evince beyond all possible contradiction, that the whole proceedeth from one and the same principle; hath the same author; and He wise, discerning, able to comprehend the whole compass of what he intended to deliver and reveal. Otherwise, or by any other, that oneness of Spirit, design, and aim, in unspeakable variety and diversity of means of its delivery, that absolute correspondency of it to itself, and distance from any thing else, could not have been attained. Now it is certain, that this principle must be summum in its kind; either bonum or malum. If the Scripture be what it reveals and declares itself to be, it is then unquestionably the 'word of the living God,' truth itself; for that it professeth of itself, from the beginning to the ending; to which profession all that it reveals, answers absolutely and unquestionably in a tendency to his glory alone. If it be not so, it must be acknowledged that the author of it had a blasphemous design to hold forth himself to be God, who is not so; a malicious design to deceive the sons of men, and to make them believe that they worship and honour God, and obey him when they do not; and so to draw them into everlasting destruction; and that to compass these ends of blasphemy, atheism, and malice, he hath laid out, in a long course of time, all the industry and wisdom that a creature could be made partaker of: now he that should do thus, must be the devil, and none else; no other creature can possibly arrive at that height of obstinacy in evil. Now certainly whilst God is pleased to continue unto us any thing, whereby we are distinguished from the beasts that perish; whilst there is a sense of a distance between good and evil abiding amongst men, it cannot fall upon the understanding of any man, that that doctrine which is so holy and pure, so absolutely leading to the utmost improvement of whatever is good, just, commendable, and praiseworthy, so suitable to all the light of God, of good and evil that remains in us; could proceed from any one everlastingly hardened in evil, and that in the pursuit of the most wicked design, that that wicked one could possibly be engaged in; namely to enthrone himself, and maliciously to cheat, cozen, and ruin the souls of men; so that upon necessity the Scripture can own no author but him, whose it is, even the living God. As these considerations are far from being the bottom and foundation of our faith, in our assenting to the authority of God in the word; so on the supposition of what is so, they have a usefulness, as to support in trials and temptations, and the like seasons of difficulty: but of these things so far. |