A27017:1122
The Saints' Everlasting Rest
The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is showed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is shewed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed by Rob. White for Thomas Underhil and Francis Tyton, 1650
THE SAINTS Everlasting REST. PART. III. › Chapter 7 › Section 13
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
SECT. XIII.
14. And yet further is the trouble of these poor Souls increased, in that They know not the ordinary way of Gods conveying these expected Comforts.2 When they hear that they are the free gifts of the Spirit, they presently conceive themselves to be merely passive therein, and that they have nothing to do but to wait when God will bestow them: Not understanding, that though these Comforts are Spiritual, yet are they Rational; raised upon the Understandings apprehension of the Excellency of God our Happiness, and of our Interest in him; and by the rolling of this blessed Object in our frequent Meditations. The Spirit doth advance and not destroy our Reason: It doth rectify it, and then use it as its ordinary instrument for the conveyance of things to our Affections, and exciting them accordingly; and not lay it aside, and Affect us without it. Therefore our Joys are raised discoursively; and the Spirit first revealeth our Cause of Joy, and then helpeth us to Rejoice upon those revealed grounds: So that he who Rejoiceth groundedly, knoweth why he Rejoiceth ordinarily. ⟨p. 407⟩Now these mistaken Christians lie waiting when the Spirit doth cast in these Comforts into their hearts, while they sit still and labour not to excite their own Affections; Nay while they Reason against the Comforts which they wait for.3 These men must be taught to know, that the matter of their Comfort is in the Promises, and thence they must fetch it as oft as they expect it: And that if they set themselves daily and diligently to Meditate of the Truth of those Promises, and of the rare excellency contained in them, and of their own title thereto, in this way they may expect the Spirits assistance for the raising of holy Comfort in their Souls. But if they lie still bewailing their want of Joy, while the full and free Promises lie by them, and never take them, and rip them up, and look into them, and apply them to their hearts by Serious Meditation, They may complain for want of Comfort long enough before they have it, in Gods ordinary way of conveyance. God worketh upon Men as Men, as Reasonable Creatures: The Joy of the Promises, and the Joy of the Holy Ghost, are one Joy.