One Hundred and Ninety Sermons on Psalm 119

2. Some desire to see their children well bestowed, or to free their Estate from incumbrance; this is distrust, as if we did not leave a God behind us, who hath promised to be a father of the fatherless, and to take care of our little ones. Can we venture our selves in Gods hands, and can we not venture our families with him, whose goodness extendeth to all his creatures? Some are loth to leave such as are dear to them, Wife, and Children, and Friends; and is not God better, and Christ better? These must be loved in God, and after God. We set friends in the place of God and Christ, when we can be content to be absent longer from God merely upon this ground, because we are loth to be separated from our friends. He that loveth father and mother, and husband and wife, more than me, is not worthy of me, saith Christ. Oh how far are these from any Christian affection! surely to a believer it is a piece of self-denial ⟨p. 106⟩to be kept out of heaven longer; therefore it must be sweetened by some valuable compensation; something there must be to calm the mind contentedly to spare the enjoyment of it for a while. Now next to the good pleasure of God, which is the reason of reasons, there is some benefit which we pitch upon; nothing is worthy to be compared but our service, if God may have glory, if our lives may do good. A gracious heart must be satisfied with gracious reasons. Some may desire life, because they are dismayed with the terrors of death; but this is unbelief; hath not Christ delivered us not only from the hurt of death, but the fear of death? Heb. 2. 14. And deliver them who through fear of death were all their life-time subject to bondage. Where is your faith? death is yours, 1 Cor. 3. 16. It is a sin simply to desire life, but look to the causes and ends of it.

2. Some desire to see their children well bestowed, or to free their Estate from incumbrance; this is distrust, as if we did not leave a God behind us, who hath promised to be a father of the fatherless, and to take care of our little ones. Can we venture our selves in Gods hands, and can we not venture our families with him, whose goodness extendeth to all his creatures? Some are loth to leave such as are dear to them, Wife, and Children, and Friends; and is not God better, and Christ better? These must be loved in God, and after God. We set friends in the place of God and Christ, when we can be content to be absent longer from God meerly upon this ground, because we are loth to be separated from our friends. He that loveth father and mother, and husband and wife, more than me, is not worthy of me, saith Christ. Oh how far are these from any Christian affection! surely to a believer it is a piece of self-denial