1. As an Omnipotent and All-sufficient Power, which hath no bounds or limits, but the pleasure and will of God, Dan. 4. 34, 35. He doth according to his will in the armies of Heaven; and among the Inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What dost thou? So Psalm 135. 6. Whatsoever the Lord pleased that did he, in Heaven, and in Earth, in the Seas, and all deep places. You see Divine pleasure is the only rule according to which Divine Power exerts it self in the world; we are not therefore to limit and restrain it in our narrow and shallow thoughts, and to think in this or in that the Power of God may help or secure us; but to believe that he is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think. Thus those Worthies, Dan. 3. 17. by Faith exalted the power of God above the order and common rule of second ⟨p. 174⟩causes. Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O King. Their faith resting it self upon the Omnipotent power of God, expected deliverance from it in an extraordinary way; 'tis true, this is no standing rule for our faith ordinarily to work by; nor have we ground to expect such miraculous Salvations, but yet when extraordinary difficulties press us, and the common ways, and means of deliverance are shut up, we ought by faith to exalt the Omnipotency of God, by ascribing the glory thereof to him, and leave our selves to his good pleasure, without straitening or narrowing his Almighty power, according to the mould of our poor low thoughts and apprehensions of it: For so the Lord himself directeth our faith in difficult cases. Isa. 55. 8, 9. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord; for as the Heavens are higher than the earth; So are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. He speaks there of his pardoning mercy which he will not have his people to contract; and limit according to the model, and platform of their own desponding, misgiving and unbelieving thoughts; but to exalt and glorify it, according to its unbounded fullness; as it is in the thoughts of God, the fountain of that mercy; so it ought to be with respect to his power, about which his thoughts and ours do vastly differ;
1. As an Omnipotent and All-sufficient Power, which hath no bounds or limits, but the pleasure and will of God, Dan. 4. 34, 35. He doth according to his will in the armies of Heaven; and among the Inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What dost thou? So Psalm 135. 6. Whatsoever the Lord pleased that did he, in Heaven, and in Earth, in the Seas, and all deep places. You see Divine pleasure is the only rule according to which Divine Power exerts it self in the world; we are not therefore to limit and restrain it in our narrow and shallow thoughts, and to think in this or in that the Power of God may help or secure us; but to believe that he is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think. Thus those Worthies, Dan. 3. 17. by Faith exalted the power of God above the order and common rule of second ⟨p. 174⟩causes. Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O King. Their faith resting it self upon the Omnipotent power of God, expected deliverance from it in an extraordinary way; 'tis true, this is no standing rule for our faith ordinarily to work by; nor have we ground to expect such miraculous Salvations, but yet when extraordinary difficulties press us, and the common ways, and means of deliverance are shut up, we ought by faith to exalt the Omnipotency of God, by ascribing the glory thereof to him, and leave our selves to his good pleasure, without straitning or narrowing his Almighty power, according to the mold of our poor low thoughts and apprehensions of it: For so the Lord himself directeth our faith in difficult cases. Isa. 55. 8, 9. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord; for as the Heavens are higher than the earth; So are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. He speaks there of his pardoning mercy which he will not have his people to contract; and limit according to the model, and platform of their own desponding, misgiving and unbelieving thoughts; but to exalt and glorifie it, according to its unbounded fulness; as it is in the thoughts of God, the fountain of that mercy; so it ought to be with respect to his power, about which his thoughts and ours do vastly differ;
