The truly blessed man

1. If he should cease thus to strive, the means would do you no good. He hath chosen the means to come in, and apply his grace to our Souls, and we are diligently to attend on them for this end: ⟨p. 351⟩and the neglect of so doing is an affront put upon the Spirit. However, all the saving efficacy of it depends on his influencing them: if he apply them with power, we are savingly benefited by them, if he withhold that from them, there will be no such blessed effect flow from them; it is not Pauls Planting, &c. God often affords as eminent means to a declining people, as to those that flourish in a profession: but they have not the same effect, because he comes not in them with life; if then you send him away, you hinder your own profiting. What a sad remark was that of Moses? Deut. 29.2, 3, 4.

1. If he should cease thus to strive, the means would do you no good. He hath chosen the means to come in, and apply his grace to our Souls, and we are diligently to attend on them for this end: ⟨p. 351⟩and the neglect of so doing is an affront put upon the Spirit. However, all the saving efficacy of it depends on his influencing them: if he apply them with power, we are savingly benefited by them, if he withold that from them, there will be no such blessed effect flow from them; it is not Pauls Planting, &c. God often affords as eminent means to a declining people, as to those that flourish in a profession: but they have not the same effect, because he comes not in them with life; if then you send him away, you hinder your own profiting. What a sad remark was that of Moses? Deut. 29.2, 3, 4.

2. Nay, on his withholding, the means have a contrary operation. Instead of softening, they will harden; instead of drawing you nearer to God, they will put you at a farther distance from him. There are two contrary effects of the means on mn,