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of a child of God; for he will no more arrogate any thing to him self. Then shall the Holy Spirit be fully bestowed, when the flesh shall no longer resist it, but be itself changed into an angelical condition, being clothed upon with the incorruption of the Holy Spirit: when the body, which by being born with the soul, and living through it, could only be called an animal one, shall now become spiritual, whilst by the Spirit, it rises into eternity.

Every thing in Christianity is some kind of anticipation of something that is to be at the end of the world. If the Apostles were to preach by their Master's command, "that the kingdom of God drew nigh" the meaning was, that from henceforth all men should fix their eyes on that happy time, foretold by the Prophets, when the Messiah should come and restore all things; that by renouncing their worldly conversation, and submitting to the gospel institution, they should fit themselves for, and hasten that blessing. "Now are we the sons of God," as St. John tells us: and yet what he imparts to us at present will hardly justify that title, without taking in that fulness of his Image, which shall then be displayed in us, when we shall be "the children of God, by being the children of the resurrection."

True believers, then, are entered upon a life, the sequel of which they know not; for it is "a life hid with Christ in God." He, the forerunner, hath attained the end of it, being gone unto the Father; but we can know no more of it than appeared in him while he was upon earth. And even that we shall not know but by following his steps: which if we do, we shall be so strengthened and renewed day by day in the inner man, that we shall desire no comfort from the present world, through a sense of "the joy set before us;" though as to the outward man, we shall be subject to distresses and decays, and treated as the off-scouring of all things.

Well may a man ask his own heart, "Whether it is able to admit the Spirit of God?" For where that Divine Guest enters, the laws of another world must be observed. The body must be given up to martyrdom, or spent in the Christian warfare, as unconcernedly, as if the soul were already provided of its house from heaven; the goods of this world must be parted with as freely, as if the last fire were to seize them to-morrow; our neighbour must be loved as heartily, as if he were washed from all his sins, and demonstrated to be a child of God by the resurrection from the dead. The fruits of this Spirit must not be mere moral virtues, calculated for the comfort and decency of the present life; but holy dispositions, suitable to the instincts of a superior life already begun.

Thus to press forward, whither the promise of life calls him, to turn his back upon the world, and comfort himself in God, every one that has faith, perceives to be just and necessary, and forces himself to do it every one that has hope, does it gladly and eagerly, though not without difficulty; but he that has love, does it with ease and singleness of heart.

The state of love, being attended with "joy unspeakable and full

of glory," with rest from the passions and vanities of man, with the integrity of an unchangeable judgment, and an undivided will, is, in a great measure, its own reward: yet not so as to supersede the desire of another world. For though such a man, having a free and insatiable love of that which is good, may seldom have need formally to propose to himself the hopes of retribution, in order to overcome his unwillingness to his duty: yet surely he must long for that which is best of all; and feel a plain attraction towards that country, in which he has his place and station already assigned him; and join in the earnest expectation of all creatures, which wait for the manifestation of the sons of God. For now we obtain but some part of his Spirit, to model and fit us for incorruption, that we may, by degrees, be accustomed to receive and carry God within us; and, therefore, the Apostle calls it, "the earnest of the Spirit;" that is, a part of that honour which is promised us by the Lord. If, therefore, the earnest abiding in us, makes us spiritual even now, and that which is mortal is, as it were, swallowed up of immortality; how shall it be, when rising again, we shall see him face to face? When all our members shall break forth into songs of triumph, and glorify him who hath raised them from the dead, and granted them everlasting life? For if this earnest or pledge, embracing man into itself, makes him now cry, "Abba, Father;" what shall the whole grace of the Spirit do, when being given at length to believers, it shall make us like unto God, and perfect us through the will of the Father?

And thus I have done what was at first proposed: I have considered the nature of our Fall in Adam; the person of Jesus Christ; and the operations of the Holy Spirit in Christians.

The only inference I will draw from what has been said, and principally from the account of man's fall, shall be, The reasonableness of those precepts of self-denial, daily suffering, and renouncing the world, which are so peculiar to Christianity, and which are the only foundation whereon the other virtues, recommended in the New Testament, can be practised or attained, in the sense there intended.

This inference is so natural, that I could not help anticipating it in some measure all the while. One would think it should be no hard matter to persuade a creature to abhor the badges of his misery; to dislike a condition or mansion which only banishment and disgrace have assigned him; to trample on the grandeur, refuse the comforts, and suspect the wisdom of a life whose nature it is to separate him from his God.

Your Saviour bids you "hate your own life." If you ask the reason, enter into your heart, see whether it be holy, and full of God? or whether, on the other hand, many things that are contrary to him, are wrought there, and it is become a plantation of the enemy? or if this be too nice an inquiry, look upon your body. Do you find there the brightness of an angel, and the vigour of immortality? If not, be sure your soul is in the same degree of poverty, nakedness, and absence from God. It is true, your soul may sooner

be re-admitted to some rays of the light of God's countenance, than your body can but if you would take any step at all towards it, to dislike your present self, must be the first.

You want a reason, why you should renounce the world? indeed you cannot see the prince of it walking up and down, "seeking whom he may devour;" and you may be so far ignorant of his devices, as not to know that they take place, as well in the most specious measures of business and learning, as in the wildest pursuits of pleasure. But this, however, you cannot but see, that the world is not still a Paradise of God, guarded and ennobled with the light of glory it is, indeed, a place where God has determined he will not appear to you, at best, but leave you in a state of hope, that you shall see his face when this world is dissolved.

However, there is a way to rescue ourselves, in great measure, from the ill consequences of our captivity; and our Saviour has taught us that way. It is by suffering. We must not only "suffer many things," as he did, and so enter in our glory; but we must also suffer many things, that we may get above our corruption at present, and enjoy the Holy Spirit.

The world has no longer any power over us, than we have a quick relish of its comforts; and suffering abates that. Suffering is, indeed, a direct confutation of the pretences which the flattering tempter gains us by: for I am in human life, and if that life contains such soft ease, ravishing pleasure, glorious eminence, as you promise, why am I thus? Is it because I have not yet purchased riches to make me easy, or the current accomplishments to make me considerable? Then I find that all the comfort you propose, is by leading me off from myself; but I will rather enter deep into my own con. dition, bad as it is perhaps I shall be nearer to God, the Eternal Truth, in feeling sorrows and miseries that are personal and real, than in feeling comforts that are not so. I begin already to find, that all my grievances centre in one point; there is always at the bottom one great loss or defect, which is not the want of friends or gold, of health or philosophy. And the abiding sense of this may possibly become a prayer in the ears of the Most High: a prayer not resulting from a set of speculative notions, but from the real, undissembled state of all that is within me; nor indeed so explicit a prayer as to describe the thing I want, but considering how strange a want mine is, as explicit an one as I can make. Since then suffering opens me a door of hope, I will not put it from me as long as I live: it helps me to a true discovery of one period of my existence, though it is a low one; and bids fairer for having some connexion with a more glorious period that may follow, than the arts of indul gence, the amusements of pride and sloth, and all the dark policy of this world, which wage war with the whole truth that man must know and feel, before he can look towards God. It may be, while I continue on the cross, I shall, like my Saviour, "put off principalities and powers;" recover myself more and more from the subjection I am indeed in (which he only seemed to be) to those wicked rulers,

and to "triumph over them in it." At least it shall appear, in the day when God shall visit, that my heart though grown unworthy of his residence, was too big to be comforted by any of his creatures; and was kept for him, as a place originally sacred, though, for the present, unclean.

But supposing that our state does require of us to "die daily," to sacrifice all that this present life can boast of, or is delighted with, before we give up life itself; supposing also, that in the hour we do somewhat of this kind, we receive light and strength from God, to grow superior to our infirmities, and are carried smoothly towards him in the joy of the Holy Ghost: yet how can a man have such frequent opportunities of suffering? Indeed, martyrdoms do not happen in every age, and some days of our lives may pass without reproaches from men: we may be in health, and not want food to eat and raiment to put on, (though health itself and nutrition itself, oblige us to the pain of a constant correction of them;) yet still, the love of God and heavenly hope, will not want something to oppress them in this world.

Let a man descend calmly into his heart, and see if there be no root of bitterness springing up; whether at least his thoughts, which are ever in motion, do not sometimes sally out into projects suggested by pride, or sink into indolent trifling, or be entangled in mean anxiety? Does not he find a motion of anger, or of gayely, leavening him in an instant throughout; depriving him of the meekness, and steady discernment, he laboured after? Or, let him but conceive at any time, that unfeigned obedience, and watchful zeal, and dignity of behaviour, which is suitable, I do not say to an angel, but to a sinner that has "a good hope through grace," and endeavour to work himself up to it; and if he find no sort of obstacle to this within him, he has indeed then no opportunity of suffering. In short, if he is such an abject sort of creature, as will, unless grace should do him a perpetual violence, relapse frequently into a course of thinking and acting entirely without God; then he can never want occasions of suffering, but will find his own nature to be the same burden to him, as that "faithless and perverse generation was to our Saviour, of whom he said, "How long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?"

I will conclude all with that excellent Collect of our Church:"O God, who in all ages has taught the hearts of thy faithful people, by sending to them the light of thy Holy Spirit; grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort, through the merits of Christ Jesus our Saviour, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the same Spirit, One GOD, world without end. Amen."

VOL. 7.-I i

SERMON CXXXVII.

THE CHRISTIAN'S REST.

Preached by Mr. Wesley at St. Mary's in Oxford, on Sunday, September 21, 1735, one month before he went to Georgia.

"There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest."-JOB iii. 17.

WHEN God at first surveyed all the works he had made, behold, they were very good. All were perfect in beauty; and man, the Lord of all, was perfect in holiness: and as his holiness was, so was his happiness; knowing no sin, he knew no pain. But when sin was conceived, it soon brought forth pain: the whole scene was changed in a moment. He now groaned under the weight of a mortal body, and what was far worse, a corrupted soul. That Spirit, which could have borne all his other infirmities, was itself wounded and sick unto death. Thus in the day wherein he sinned, he began to die; and thus, "in the midst of life we are in death;" yea, "the whole creation groaneth together, being in bondage to sin," and therefore to misery.

The whole world is indeed, in its present state, only one great infirmary: all that are therein are sick of sin, and their one business there is to be healed. And for this very end the great Physician of souls is continually present with them, marking all the diseases of every soul, and giving medicines to heal its sickness. These medicines are often painful too; not that God willingly afflicts his creatures, but he allots them just as much pain as is necessary to their health; and for that reason, because it is so.

The pain of cure must then be endured by every man, as well as the pain of sickness. And herein is manifest the infinite wisdom of Him who careth for us, that the very sickness of those with whom he converses may be a great means of every man's cure. The very wickedness of others is, in a thousand ways, conducive to a good man's holiness. They trouble him it is true; but even that trouble is "health to his soul, and marrow to his bones." He suffers many things from them; but it is to this end, that he may be made perfect through those sufferings.

But till perfect holiness be found on earth, so neither will perfect happiness: While some remains of our disease be felt, some physic will be necessary to heal it. Therefore we are more or less subject

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