SERMONS UPON GENESIS 24:63

SERMON VII

And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the even-tide.— GEN. 24: 63.

SECONDLY, I am now to propose to you another object of meditation, which is the sinfulness of sin, an argument very necessary and practical.
It is necessary in several respects.
Partly to humble us; we have low thoughts of sin, and therefore we are but slight in the matter of humiliation. Until we understand the evil of sin sufficiently, we do not think it worthy of a tear or one hearty sigh; but when the understanding is once opened, the heart is deeply affected: Ps.6: 6, 'I am weary with my groaning ; all the night make I my bed to swim ; I water my couch with my tears.' We see such filthiness in sin as cannot be washed away without a deluge of sorrow.
And it is necessary partly to awaken us to a greater care and conscience. Who would adventure upon a sin that doth but know and seriously consider what it is? Gen. 39:9, ' How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?' That will be the issue of such a consideration. The child will thrust his fingers into the fire that doth not know the pain of being scalded, or play with a snappish cur that hath not been bitten. Men are the more bold in adventuring upon sin because they do not know the danger. And it is necessary partly to urge us to come to Christ; none look to the brazen serpent but those that are stung, so none regard salvation but those that have been stung with some remorse in their consciences for the great evil of sin; when the poor soul feels the weight and burden of sin, then it will come to Christ. And it is necessary partly that we may more loathe ourselves when we come into the presence of God. Gracious men are most self-abhoring. Elijah covered himself with a mantle; Isaiah 6: 5, 'Woe is me, for I am un-done, because I am a man of unclean lips.' Peter had such a sense of his sins that he says, Luke 5: 8, ' Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord !' Though there was something of excess and sin in these dispositions, that is, so far as they do exclude the encouragements of the gospel, but yet there is somewhat worthy of imitation, so far as they had a deep sense of their own unworthiness.
It is a necessary argument you see, and of much practical use, but very large, and will yield great plenty of thoughts; it will be harder to know what we should omit in the consideration of it, than what we should pitch upon. I shall pursue it in this method—
1. I shall give you some general rules and observations concerning meditating on the sinfulness of sin.
2. What arguments you should propound to your souls to work your hearts to a sense of it.
I. For the general observations and rules concerning the sinfulness of sin.
1. None can know the utmost evil of sin perfectly but God. There is a kind of infiniteness in sin, because it is committed against an infinite object, and therefore a finite and limited understanding cannot conceive of the evil of it. The greatness of sin is known by the party offended and the party satisfying; both are infinite: 1 John 3:20,' If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things.' As if he had said, Your heart doth not suggest half the evil that there is in sin, for the infinite God knows there is a great deal more evil in it than you can conceive. What is our light to the eye of God? We are the guilty parties, and so are apt to be partial in our own cause; but God is the party offended, and therefore he can best judge of the measure of the offence. Again, God's whole nature setteth him against it; we have but a drop of indignation against sin, God hath an ocean; he is most good, and therefore most hateth what is evil. The truth is, there is nothing properly an object of divine hatred but sin; it is wholly and only carried out against it, and therefore he seeth more evil in it than any creature possibly can.
2. Man's knowledge of sin is more clear at some times than at others. When conscience is opened there is not a greater load and burden. David could say, Ps. 40:12, ' Innumerable evils have compassed me about; mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of my head, therefore my heart faileth me.' It is a rule in philosophy, Elementa non gravitant in suis locis—Elements are not heavy in their proper place. A fish in the water feeleth no weight, though it would break the back of a man if that weight of water lay upon him; so wicked men are in their element when they are in the heat of their sinful pursuit; here they sport and play, and feel not the burden of sin. Sometimes when men come to die conscience is touched, and then they cry out of the burden of sin: 1 Cor. 15: 56, ' The sting of death is sin ;' then their hearts are filled with a sad despair ; this makes death to be dreadful and terrible to the soul, and keeps the soul in bondage: Heb. 2:15, ' Through fear of death they were all their lifetime subject to bondage.' But certainly it shall be at the day of judgment, then we shall see the folly of it; conscience shall then be extended and enlarged, and the sinner shall remember the wickedness of his past life. You will then find the devil, that is now a tempter, will prove an accuser. Oh! what kind of apprehensions will you have when the devil shall come forth and plead, Lord, adjudge this person to me ; I never died for him, I never shed my blood for him, I could promise him no heaven and glory, yet he easily hearkened to my temptations ? Tuus esse noluitper gratiam, sit metis per culpam ; ostende tales luos munerarios, O Christe. He would not be thine for all the grace and kindness thou didst show him, and all the rewards thou didst propound and promise to him. Then all disguises will be laid aside. A little consideration and search, and prayer for conviction for the present, would help us to the same apprehensions. If conscience should be now extended as it will be then, we should soon be weary of our lives. At least, do not rest in your own valuation and account, for then the secrets of all hearts shall be opened.
3. The less sin appeareth, many times it is the greater sins are not to be measured by the smallness of the matter of them, but by the offence done to God. The first sin to a vulgar and common apprehension was but the eating of an apple; it seemed a small matter if we did not consider the offence against God. It is an aggravation mentioned by the prophet, Amos 2: 6, ' They sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes;' that is, upon so small an occasion, or for such a contemptible matter they would oppress the poor. The lesser the occasion and temptation is, the greater the impudence, the imprudence and the unkindness; the greater the impudence that they will dare God to his face for a trifle; the greater is the imprudence that we will hazard our souls for a mean thing; the greater is the unkindness that we will stand with God for a little. Sins that are accounted small in the matter of them have been overtaken with the sad revenges of God; he that denied a crumb could not receive a drop of water to cool his tongue. The contempt of God is the greater when we break with God for a small matter, and transgress his commandments upon every light occasion. In short, sin is in no case small, but only in regard of God's mercy and Christ's merits.
4. None are exempted from bewailing the evil of sin. Though the children of God shall never feel it, nor have the dregs of God's displeasure wrung out to them for it, yet they must bewail the evil that there is in sin. The death and merit of Christ doth not change the nature of sin nor put less evil into it. Why should we look upon it with a different eye after conversion than we did before? Sin is still damning in its own merit and nature, and it is still the violation of an holy righteous law, and an affront to the holy God, and an inconvenience to the precious soul. Sin is the same as it was before, though the person be not the same. Nay, the children of God are not altogether exempted from the effects of sin neither; it is a disease, though not a death ; and who would not groan under the heat of a burning fever though he be assured of life ? God hath still a bridle upon you to keep the soul in awe; and though the godly can never lose their right in the covenant, that doth remain, yet they may lose the fruition of it, and this is enough to make a child of God mourn. Notwithstanding all the privileges of grace, you may be branded, though not executed; and though the Lord hath made them vessels of mercy, yet he doth not use and employ them as vessels of honour, but they are set aside as useless vessels. Sin will still be inconvenient, it will bring disgrace to religion and discomfort to your souls, and furnish the triumphs of hell, and make Satan rejoice, and eclipse the light of God's countenance; and who can brook the loss of God's favour and of intimate communion with him without sadness and bemoaning his case? I may ask you that question, Job 15: 11, 'Are the consolations of God small with thee? ' Do you make so little reckoning of those rich comforts of the Holy Ghost? .Though you cannot be damned, for ' there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ,' Rom. 8:1, yet your pilgrimage may be made very uncomfortable; and he that prizeth communion with God would not lose the comfort of it for the least moment. Besides, if there were no inconvenience, yet love is motive enough to a gracious person? Where is your love? Christians, you sin against mercy; the warm beams of mercy should melt the heart: Ezek. 36: 31, ' Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities, and for all your abominations.' As long as there is love in the heart, you can never want an argument to represent the odiousness of sin. Put the matter in a temporal case; it would be ill reasoning for an heir to say, I know my father will not disinherit me, therefore I do not care how I offend him. Where is your love to God if you do not hate sin? Ps. 97:10, ' Ye that love the Lord, hate evil.' Though your right in the covenant be safe, yet you should still have the evil of your own doings in remembrance.
5. Many speak much of the evil of sin in prayers and confessions, yet loathe it never the more, yea, the less. What should be the reason of it? All their thoughts are spent in empty declamations and forms of satire or anger, and these do not subdue affections. Or else it may be we only paint sin in our fancies, and that worketh no more than a picture or image, which doth not allure and draw love so much as a living beauty; it only pleases and tickles a little. Things foul in their nature are pleasant in their picture and description. What more dreadful than war ? and yet what more pleasant than in a strain of poetry or rhetoric, or in a lively picture to describe the fury and heat of battle ? What more ugly than a toad? and yet a toad painted to the life pleaseth. So when we merely paint sin by the help of the imagination or fancy, it moves only the lighter part of the soul. It is good to be rational in our considerations, and where there is the less art, it leaveth the deeper stroke upon the heart. Imagination and fancy is a great instrument in the work of meditation, but still it must be wisely ordered and guided by reason. Sound conviction by God¡¯s blessing doth the work, or else they rest in generals; they are not serious, particular practical discourses, brought home to their own case against the sin they are struggling with. Lusts take the throne by turns, and that our thoughts may fall with the greatest sense and feeling upon our souls, it is good to bend the strength of our thoughts against our iniquity. It is good to be particular, to fetch the aggravations of sin out of thine own heart, or else men soar high, and in affected strains. To draw an arrow always to the head breaketh the bow. Sin, Christ, heaven, and hell admit of an hyperbole, but yet a man may strain too much, that a soul may be discouraged by it, and much hurt may be done. Men look upon matters of religion as abstracted ideas, and high strains, and matters of fancy. Certainly the more simple and natural your thoughts are, the more working. Forced, high-flown arguments, if they raise the affections, it is but like fire in stubble, that flashes for the present, not like a fire furnished with fit materials, that yields a constant heat. Modest arguments fitted to our present state do better. I will bring it to the matter in hand. Men usually overlash, while they should set out sin as exceeding heinous, and forget those material and natural arguments that should work the soul into a hatred of it. That saying of Anselm is justly censured by Mr. Fox, Si hic peccati pudorem, et illic inferni horrorem, &c. If here were the filthiness of sin, and there were the horrors of hell, I had rather be in hell without sin than in heaven with it. These expressions do not come from a modest virtue, but the over-daring of fancy, and besides they leave a snare and temptation upon weak Christians. God doth not put us to that trial to choose hell or sin, and, as Mr. Fox urgeth, God in the gospel will bring sinners though sanctified to glory. Or else if they use solid reasons and arguments, they rest in their own discourse and reason, and then it is said, Job 6: 25, 'What doth your arguing reprove ?'
II. Having premised these observations, I will give you a few arguments whereby you may come to understand a little of that evil that there is in sin. And they shall be drawn—
(1.) From the nature of sin;
(2.) From the effects of sin;
(3.) From the circumstances and aggravations wherewith sin may be clothed.
1. From the nature of sin, and so it may be considered as to God and as to ourselves.
[1.] Consider the nature of sin as to God.
(1.) It is an aversion from God, a turning from the chiefest good to the chiefest evil. The very nature of sin is punishment enough to itself; it is misery enough to depart from God, the centre of rest, and the fountain of life and blessing. It is a dishonour to God and a disadvantage to ourselves. A dishonour to God to prefer carnal sweets and the satisfaction of sin before the comforts of his presence, and yet this is the root of every sin: 2 Tim. 3: 4, ' Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.' Every natural man loves the pleasures of sin more than communion with God. You are angry at Judas for betraying Christ, and at the Jews for preferring Barabbas before Christ, a murderer before a saviour, and yet you do the same almost every day: Job 15:12, ' Why doth thine heart carry thee away? and what do thine eyes wink at ? ' You forfeit the best things for the basest, as children part with a pearl for an apple or a nut. Nay, I may go higher; it is a preferring the devil before God. Sins are called his lusts: John 8: 44, ' Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father you will do; and duty is enforced by God's law, and will you gratify the devil and displease God ? You will find him to be an ill master at length. He that now tempts will hereafter accuse, and that for this very thing, that you were so easy to be entreated to leave God and follow him, as Austin brings him in pleading against us to God, Though thou didst try him by thy grace, and direct him by thy law, though thy Son did die for him, yet he would not be thine, and therefore let him be mine: I never died, and shed my blood for him, I could not promise him heaven and glory; I only brought him the bait and temptation, and he easily hearkened unto me. When the tempter shall thus become an accuser, you will know what it is to turn from God and to prefer the devil before a Saviour. Then it is a great disadvantage to yourselves; you turn your back upon your own happiness. Sin will make you shy of God's presence, and it will make you hated of God, that he will not endure your presence; he will have no communion with you, nor you with him. It is the comfort of God's children, whatever befalls them in the world, that they can go in secret, and their eyes can pour out tears to God; but now God will turn away from you, God who is the centre of your rest, the God of your mercies, and then to whom will you unbosom yourselves? Isa. 59: 2. ' Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.' They set you at a distance from God, and God at a distance from you. Oh! reason thus with yourselves : Shall I commit that which will cause me not to endure God, nor God to endure me ? that I shall not care to have to do with him, nor he with me? Sin has always been attended with a casting out from God. It cast the angels out of heaven, where God is present in a glorious manner; it cast Adam out of paradise, where God was present by his own image; and it cast Cain out of the church, where God was present in his ordinances and worship, and it will make God cast you out as an abominable branch. If you are not sensible of this at present, yet you will be sensible hereafter, when God shall say, ' Depart, ye cursed.'
(2.) It is enmity against God. It is not only a turning from God, but an opposition to and turning against God: Rom. 8: 7, ' The carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.' The more the heart is set upon sin, the more it hateth God formally or virtually. The soul hates God as a lawgiver though not as a creator, because he comes in with a restraint between us and our carnal desires: Col. 1: 21, ' You were sometime alienated, and enemies in your mind by wicked works.' In the original it is 'echthrous te dianoia entois ergois tois ponerois by your mind in wicked works;' because your minds were set upon wicked works, you were vexed God should restrain your desires; for we cannot endure one should restrain the exercise of our carnal affections. Now this enmity is mutual; God hates us, and we hate God. On man's part it is driven on with fury; he doth so hate God that he seeks the destruction of his being; as he that hates another seeketh the destruction of his goods, life, and honour, so he that hates God seeks to un-God him.
The sinner wishes there were no such being as a God in the world: Ps.14: 1, ' The fool hath said in his heart there is no God.' The heart is the seat of desires; these are the fool's wishes; it is a sweet pleasing thought to him. Though he cannot get rid of these impressions of a Godhead, yet he wishes he could. A man that would live at liberty could wish there was no judge to call him to an account; he could let loose the reins of vile affections if there were no God; were it not for this restraint he could live as he list. Nay, they deny God in their lives: Titus1:16, ' They profess that they know God, but in works they deny him.' Sin in effect doth lay God aside, and, to put the greater affront upon him, it sets up something base in his stead; it sets up the belly for God: Phil. 3:19, ' Whose god is their belly;' the choicest respects of the soul run out upon the sensual part. Or it sets up a little wealth for God. Or if sin cannot take away the being of God, yet it strikes at his honour, and would make him to be an unjust or an evil God. Sin deprives God of the honour of all his attributes; of his omnisciency, for though we are ashamed to sin before man, yet, though God seeth all things, we do not blush if we can carry on a wicked design under the veil of darkness, and dig deep to hide our counsels from the Lord. Doth such a sinner think God is all-seeing and all-knowing? Jer. 2:26, 'A thief is ashamed, when he is found;' when the eye of man hath surprised him, but alas ! we are always found of God. It robs him of his omnipotency and power, as if he were impotent and weak, as if we could make our party good with him. The apostle useth a smart question, 1 Cor. 10:22, ' Do we pro-voke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?' As if he had said, Man, consider what thou doest; by sinning thou dost enter into the lists with God, and art thou able to deal with him? It is a contest with God, as if we could arm our lusts against his mighty angels. Will you contend with him that can command legions of angels? When you go about to sin, you do as it were wage war with heaven, and enter into combat with God. That is the reason the Lord by the prophet asketh sinners, What do you think? Is there such a thought in thee as if thou wast able to deal with me? Ezek. 22:14, ' Can thy heart endure, or can thine hands be strong in the day that I shall deal with thee? ' Are you able to grapple with my omnipotent arm, and snatch judgment out of my hands, and oppose my mighty angels? Can thy heart endure when my almighty hand shall seize upon thee, and divine displeasure shall break out against thy soul? The angel when contending with the devil' durst not bring a railing accusation,' Jude 9. He knew the mighty God would avenge him, therefore he durst not be malicious; yet we dare enter the lists with heaven. Thus is sin an enmity against God; it would either have no God, or an impotent, unjust, unwise God. Nay, there is an enmity in sin against every person in the Holy Trinity. Against God the Son: When Christ came into the world, his great work was to dissolve the works of Satan: 1 John3: 8, ¡®For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil;' that he might unravel all those webs which Satan had been weaving, and you strive as much as in you lies to set it up, and make his death of none effect. Heb.10: 29, 'Of how much sorer punishment shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden underfoot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing?' You make a low thing of it, tread it underfoot; it is an allusion to the sprinkling of the lintels of the door, but they sprinkled it on the threshold. And it puts an affront upon the Holy Ghost; it grieveth and vexeth the Spirit of God; it is a setting up lust against lust, and a direct thwarting of his motions and impulses: Gal. 5: 17, 'The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.' You do as it were reproach him, and say he shall do no good upon your hearts, this shall not gain upon you. Moses, when he speaks of a presumptuous sinner, saith, Num.15: 30, ' The soul that doth ought presumptuously, the same reproacheth the Lord;' when you do thus deliberately sin, you do as it were reproach the Spirit of God, Likewise on God's part; he hateth us too, and though he be full of kindness, yet he cannot give sin a good look Hab. 1:13, ' Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity.' God loveth all his creatures, and loveth to look upon them, but he hateth that which is properly man's creature, and that is sin; there is no antipathy greater than between these two natures. You may sooner reconcile fire and water, light and darkness, cold and heat, than God and sin. The enmity of all creatures is as their beings are, finite and limited; but God 's being is infinite; his whole nature sets him against sin; therefore there is no comparison which serves to set out the indignation the Lord hath against sin, there is no antipathy like it.
(3.) Sin is a transgression of the law. Do but consider what a disgrace sin puts upon the law that forbiddeth it; it doth in effect condemn the law, as if it were not good and useful and righteous, as if it were an idle restraint. There is a notable expression, James 4:11, 'He that speaketh evil of his brother and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law and judgeth the law;' that is, he puts this affront upon the law, as if it were injurious, as if God were not righteous in making such a law against passion and evil-speaking. Therefore Nathan comes to rouse up David's conscience, and tells him his sin: 2 Sam. 12: 9, 'Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in his sight?' In every sin there are some implicit thoughts by which the law is disvalued and disapproved; we secretly tax it of envy, folly, and rigour, as if God had dealt harshly with his creatures; they look upon it as a weak and simple law: Ezek. 18: 26, ' Yet ye say, The way of the Lord is not equal.' The devil, when he inspired the first sin, would suggest to our first parents as if God had envied the perfection of man by prescribing a law to him: Gen. 3: 5, ' God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.'
[2.] Consider the nature of sin with respect to yourselves, and so the evil of it appears in these respects.
(1.) It is a degradation of your natures, and sets you beneath the rank of men, and equals you with beasts: Ps. 49:12, 'Nevertheless man being in honour abideth not; he is like the beasts that perish.' In the original it is, he abideth not for a night. Adam sinned the very same day that he was created. So Ps. 32: 9, ' Be ye not as the horse or as the mule, that have no understanding ;' implying that inconsiderate and rash men, that never consider their ways, are like the horse and mule, which are void of understanding, and are guided only by their own instinct. To what use do men put their reason that do not reflect upon their consciences? It would be an odd sight to see a man with the head of a mule or the feet of a horse, yet there is a greater affinity between the body of a beast and the body of a man than between a beast and a man's soul; the former are in the same degree of being, as material substances.
(2.) It is the defilement of your natures. The scripture, when it speaks of sin, sets it out by 'filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness,' James 1:21, an allusion to the brook Kedron, where the garbages of the sacrifices were wont to be cast. So it is called a blot. These notions are to heighten our souls into a detestation of it. Omnemalum naturam, aut timore, aut pudore perfudit. There is such a filthiness in sin, that it is ashamed of itself, and therefore it always seeketh for a disguise. There needeth no argument against it, but to be seen in its proper colours; it either seeketh a show of virtue, or a veil of darkness. Pray why doth the adulterer seek for the twilight (Prov. 7: 9, ' In the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night') but that he is ashamed of sin? Sin is so monstrous and deformed that it seeks to hide itself from those that love it most, from the conscience of the party that committeth it, or from the sight of others. Nay, there is such a turpitude in it that some sins beget shame in their very name and mention. The apostle speaks of a sin that is not so much as named among the gentiles,' 1 Cor. 5:1; and Eph. 5: 3, ' But fornication, and all uncleanness, and covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints.' Socrates hid his face whenever he spake against wantonness.
(3.) It is the bondage of your natures. Oh! what worser captivity can there be than this, for reason to be put out of its empire, and that you should be under the command of vile affections, a slave to pride, and a drudge to your lusts and carnal pleasures ? Sin is a bondage here and hereafter; here it binds you with the cords of vanity, and hereafter with the chains of darkness. This is the preposterous judgment of men, that they look upon the service of God as their greatest bondage: Ps. 2: 3, ' Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us;' but then it is otherwise, there is no greater freedom than to be employed in the service of God, and to be free for the actions of a holy life: Ps. 119: 45, ' I will walk at liberty, for I seek thy precepts.' The bonds of duty are not gyves, but ornaments and there is no greater bondage than to be a slave to sin: 2 Peter 2:19, ¡®While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption; for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought into bondage.¡¯ What a bondage is this, to be a vassal of hell, to be at the command of our lusts, a slave to pride and uncleanness, and we know not how to help it!
 
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