An expository comment, doctrinal, controversial, and practical upon the whole first chapter to the…An expository comment, doctrinal, controversal, and practical upon the whole first chapter to the…

2. There is a two-fold joy, which I may call a direct and reflex one: The one is ¹when we are carried with delight to that which is holy and good. The other is, when we know and feel that we are thus carried out, joy is a fruit of faith, 1 Pet. 1. 8. In whom believing ye rejoice with joy unspeakable. Now as faith acteth two ways, so also doth joy. Faith acteth directly by going directly to Christ; and then faith acts reflexly, by looking upon this, that I do rest on Christ. Thus there is a joy that doth directly go to God and Christ by way of delight and enlargement, ⟨p. 176⟩being thus apprehended by faith. Of such a joy in holy things Solomon speaketh Prov. 21. 15. The Prophet Isaiah also Chap. 64. 5. And then there is a joy flowing from the apprehension of this, that we do delight in holy things. For a man may rejoice to find he can rejoice in what is good; a man may be comforted in finding that Christ and heavenly objects, are matter of delight to him. Now as it is with those two acts of faith, the former, which is the direct one, that is absolutely necessary, by that we are justified, by that Christ is made ours, by that we are in him, and he in us; but the latter is not of the same necessity. It is no where said, If ye know that ye do believe, and if ye be assured that ye do believe, but if ye do believe, then ye shall be saved. It would be sad with many of Gods children, if none were justified, but he that knoweth he believeth. Thus it is also for joy, joy in its direct acts, it's a necessary grace. It is our duty to rejoice in God and heavenly things, as well as love them. And indeed there cannot be any grace of love, but there is also the grace of joy. Hence Gal. 5. joy is made the fruit of the Spirit, with other graces. And Rom. 14. The Kingdom of Heaven is said to consist in righteousness, and in joy in the holy Ghost. So that there is a joy, which being a grace, is part of the new creature, and there cannot be godliness without it; as is our love, so is our joy. But then there is joy as a privilege, which (as you heard) ariseth from the knowledge of our being in the state of grace, and this is communicable at Gods pleasure. Those that have the most of Gods grace, may for a time have the least of it in sense, as we see in Christ himself. So that we are to distinguish between joy as a grace, and joy as a privilege.