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you must remember, that it is one thing for God to love you, and another thing for God to tell you that he loves you. Your happiness lies in the first, your comfort in the second. God has stopped his ears against the prayers of many a precious soul, whom he has dearly loved. The best of men have at times lost that quickening, ravishing, and comforting presence of God, which once they have enjoyed. And, verily, he who makes sense and carnal reason a judge of his condition, will be happy and miserable, blessed and cursed, saved and lost, many times in a day, yea, in an hour.

The counsel that I would give to such a soul as is apt to set up reason in the room of faith, is this-whatsoever thy estate and condition be, never make sense and feeling the judge of it, but only the word of God. Did ever God appoint carnal reason, sense and feeling, to be a judge of thy spiritual estate? Surely no; and why then wilt thou subject thy soul to their judgments? God will judge thee at last by his word; The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge you in the last day. Carnal reason is an enemy to faith, it is ever crossing and contradicting faith. It fills the mind full of cavils and prejudices, full of pleas and arguments to keep Christ and the soul asunder, and the soul and the promise asunder, and the soul and peace and comfort asunder. It will never be well with thee, so long as thou art swayed by carnal reason, and reliest more upon thy five senses, than upon the four Evangelists. Remember Job was as famous for his confidence, as for his patience; Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him, Job xiii. 15. As the body lives by breathing, so the soul lives by believing.

IV. We come now to the last thing propounded, and that is, the duties of strong saints to those that are weak. I intend at this time to finish this point, and therefore shall not speak every thing that might be spoken: being not of their minds, who think a man never speaks enough, that speaks not all that may be spoken to an argument. I shall, as nearly as I can, instance in those duties which are most weighty and worthy: and surely those souls that are serious and conscientious in the discharge of these, cannot and will not be negligent in the discharge of the rest.

Now there are eleven duties which strong saints are to perform to those that are weak.

1. And the first is this-those that are strong, ought to bear with the infirmities of the weak.

We then that are strong, says the apostle, ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves, Rom. xv. 1. The word rendered to bear, signifies to bear as pillars bear the weight and burden of the house; to bear as porters bear their burdens, or as the bones bear the flesh, or rather as parents bear their babes in their arms. Bear the infirmities. Mark, he does not say the enormities, but the infirmities; he does not say the wickedness, but the weakness. The strong ought to bear with the infirmities of the weak. The Lord bears with the weakness of his children. Peter is weak, and sinful through weakness; he will not let the Lord Jesus wash his feet; but the Lord Jesus knowing that this was from weakness, and not from wickedness, passes it over; and, notwithstanding his unkind refusal, he washes his feet. Thomas is very weak. I will not believe, says he, except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side. Now this Christ bears with much tenderness and sweetness, as you may see in John xx. 27; Then said he to Thomas, Reach hither thy fingers, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless, but believing. The Lord Jesus does, as it were, open his wounds afresh; he overlooks his weakness. Well,' says he, seeing it is so, that thou wilt not believe, I will rather bleed afresh than thou shalt die in thy unbelief.' So the three disciples that Christ had singled out to watch with him one hour. They shewed a great deal of weakness to be sleeping, when their Lord was sorrowing, to be slumbering when their Saviour was sighing; yet Christ bears this, and carries it sweetly towards them, and excuses their weakness; The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. O, how sweetly does the Lord carry it! Every new man is two men; he has a contrary principle in him, the flesh and the Spirit. The Spirit, the noble part, is willing; but the flesh, the ignoble part, is weak and wayward.

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Now shall the Lord thus bear with his weak ones, and

shall not strong saints bear also? Remember, strong Christians, there was a day when you were as weak as others; as apt to fall as others; as easily conquered as others; and if then the Lord carried it sweetly towards you, let the same spirit be in you towards those that are weak. It will be no grief of heart to you, if in this you act like your Lord and Saviour. If you do not bear with the infirmities of the weak, who shall? who will? This wicked world cannot, and will not. The world will make t them transgressors for a word, and watch for their halting; and therefore you had need to bear with them so much the more. The world's cruelty should stir up your compassion.

2. As it is your duty to bear with them, so it is your duty to receive them into communion with you.

Him that is weak in the faith, receive you, but not to doubtful disputations, Rom. xiv. 1. Him that is weak in the faith, receive; that is, him that is not thoroughly persuaded of all things pertaining to Christian liberty about things indifferent. Him that is weak in the faith, receive. He does not say, Him that has no faith, receive; for there is no rule for the saints or churches to receive them into communion who have no faith, who have no fellowship with the Father and the Son; but him that is weak in faith, receive.

The word that is here rendered receive, signifies to receive into our bosom with charitable affection. The Greek word signifies three things-it signifies to receive weak saints as our own bowels; to receive them with the greatest tenderness, affection, pity, and compassion, that possibly can be. So the same Greek word is used in the epistle to Philemon, where Paul entreats Philemon to receive Onesimus as his own bowels. The word there is the same word with this in the text. So must the strong receive the weak, even as their own bowels; receive them with the greatest affection, with the greatest compassion that possibly can be.-The word signifies patiently to bear with the weak when they are received: and not to take them into your bosoms, into your communion, one day, and cast them out the next, but patiently to bear with them, as well as affectionately to receive them. It was a

heathen prince that crowned his steersman in the morning, and beheaded him in the evening of the same day.The word signifies also fatherly instruction to seek to restore them. It is not the will of Christ that weak saints should be rejected, or that the door of entrance should be shut against them, till they are stronger, or till they have attained to such heights and such perfections of grace, and divine enjoyments of God, as others have attained. Remember this, as the weakest faith, if true, gives the soul a right to all that internal and eternal worth that is in Christ, so the weakest faith, if true, gives a man a real right unto all the external privileges and favours that come by Christ. Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God, Rom. xv. 7.-This is the standing rule for all the saints and churches in the world to go by. It is not their wills, but these two scriptures last cited, that are the standing rules by which all the churches on earth are to go by in the admission of members.

Them that are weak in the faith are to be received by you, because the Lord Jesus has received them. Christ does not receive the strong to the glory of God, and cast off the weak. No, the Lord Jesus gathers the weak into his bosom. He receives the weak to glory, as well as the strong; therefore, says the apostle, "As the Lord hath received them, so do you." Bucer ejected none, in whom he saw any thing of Christ, but gave them the right hand of fellowship. Such persons and churches can never answer it to Christ, that keep the door of admission shut against souls truly gracious, though they are but weak in grace, though they have not attained to such a measure of light, or degrees of love, or to such perfections in holiness, as such and such have done. No, the standing rule is, him whom the Lord hath received, receive. If weak saints shall desire communion, and be willing to walk in the ways which Jesus Christ has appointed his saints to walk in, the churches ought to give them the right hand of fellowship. And that is the second duty that lies upon the strong, they are to receive the weak into communion and fellowship with them, and that

with the greatest affection, love, and compassion, that possibly can be.

3. A third duty that lies upon strong saints to the weak, is this-they must look more upon their

upon their weaknesses.

graces, than It is a sad thing when they shall borrow spectacles to behold their weak brethren's weaknesses, and refuse looking-glasses wherein they may see their weak brethren's graces. Saints that are strong, ought to look more upon the virtues of weak saints, than upon their miscarriages. When Christ saw but a little moral good in the young man, the text says, that he looked upon him, and loved him. And shall not we look upon a weak saint, and love him, when we see the love of God and the image of God upon him? Shall moral virtue take the eye and draw the love of Christ; and shall not supernatural grace in a weak Christian, take our eyes and draw our hearts? Shall we eye a little gold in much earth; and shall we not eye a little grace where there is much corruption?

But

It is an insufferable weakness, I had almost said, for persons to suffer their affections to run out only to such as are of their judgments; and to love, prize, and value persons according as they suit their opinions, and not according to what of the image of God shines in them. if this is not far from a gospel spirit, and from that Godlike spirit that should be in saints, I know nothing. It speaks out much of Christ within to own where Christ owns, and love where Christ loves, and embrace where Christ embraces, and to be one with every one that is practically one with the Lord Jesus. Christ cannot but take it very unkindly at our hands, if we should disown any upon whom he has set his royal stamp. And I bless his grace that has drawn out my desires and endeavours to love, own, and honour the people of Christ, according to what of the appearance of Christ I see in them. And if I am not much mistaken, this is the highway to that joy, peace, and comfort, the want of which makes many a man's life a hell. God looks more on the bright side of the cloud, than he does on the dark, and so should we. It was the honour of Vespasian, that he was more ready

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