13. *Then thou learnest of him to be lowly of heart. And this is the true, genuine, Christian humility, which flows from a sense of thelove of God, reconciled to us in Christ Jesus. Poverty of spirit, in this meaning of the word, begins, where a sense of guilt and of the wrath of God ends; and is, a continual sense of our total dependence on him, for every good thought or word or work; of our utter inability to all good, unless he water us every moment: and an abhorrence of the praise of men, knowing that all praise is due unto God only. With this is joined a loving shame, a tender humiliation before God, even for the sins which we know he hath forgiven us, and for the sin which still remaineth in our hearts, although we know it is not imputed to our condemnation. Nevertheless the conviction we feel of inbred sin, is deeper and deeper every day. The more we grow in grace, the more do we see, of the desperate wickedness of our heart. The more we advance in the knowledge and love of God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, (as great a mystery as this may appear, to those who know not the power of God unto salvation) the more do we discern of our alienation from God, of the enmity that is in our carnal mind, and the necessity of our being entirely renewed in righteousness and true holiness.
II. 1. It is true, he has scarce any conception of this, who now begins to know the inward kingdom of heaven. In his prosperity he saith, I shall never be moved; Thou, Lord, hast made my hill so strong. Sin is so utterly bruisedbeneath his feet, that he can scarce believe it remaineth in him. Even temptation is silenced and speaks not again: it cannot approach, but stands afar off. He is borne aloft in the chariots of joy and love: he soars as upon the wings of an eagle. But our Lord well knew, that this triumphant state does not often continue long. He therefore presently subjoins, Blessed are they that mourn; for they shall be comforted.
2. Not that we can imagine this promise belongs to those, who mourn only on some worldly account: who are in sorrow and heaviness, merely on account of some worldly trouble or disappointment; such as the loss of their reputation, or friends; or the impairing of their fortune. As little title to it have they who are afflicting themselves, through fear of some temporal evil: or who pine away with anxious care, or that desire of earthly things which maketh the heart sick. Let us not think, these shall receive any thing from the Lord: he is not in all their thoughts. Therefore it is that they thus walk in a vain shadow, and disquiet themselves in vain. And this shall ye have of mine hand, saith the Lord, ye shall lie down in sorrow.
3. The mourners of whom our Lord here speaks, are those that mourn on quite another account: they that mourn after God, after him in whom they did rejoice, with joy unspeakable, when he gave them to taste the good, the pardoning word, and the powers of the world to come.But he now hides his face and they are troubled; they cannot see him through the dark cloud. But they see temptation and sin, which they fondly supposed were gone never to return, arising again, following after them amain, and holding them in on every side. It is not strange if their soul is now disquieted within them, and trouble and heaviness take hold upon them. Nor will their great enemy fail to improve the occasion; to ask, “Where is now thy God? Where is now the blessedness whereof thou spakest? The beginning of the kingdom of heaven? Yea, hath God said, Thy sins are forgiven thee? Surely God hath not said it. It was only a dream, a mere delusion, a creature of thy own imagination. If thy sins are forgiven, why art thou thus? Can a pardoned sinner be thus unholy?”—And if then, instead of immediately crying to God, they reason with him that is wiser than they, they will be in heaviness indeed, in sorrow of heart, in anguish not to be exprest. Nay even when God shines again upon the soul, and takes away all doubt of his past mercy, still he that is weak in faith may be tempted and troubled, on account of what is to come: especially, when inward sin revives, and thrusts sore at him that he may fall. Then may he again cry out,
“I have a sin of fear, that when I’ve spun
My last thread, I shall perish on the shore!”
Lest I should make shipwreck of the faith, and my last state be worse than the first:
“Lest all my bread of life should fail
And I sink down unchang’d to hell.”
4. Sure it is that this affliction for the present is not joyous but grievous. Nevertheless, afterward it bringeth forth peaceable fruit unto them that are exercised thereby. Blessed therefore are they that thus mourn, if they tarry the Lord’s leisure, and suffer not themselves to be turned out of the way, by the miserable comforters of the world; if they resolutely reject all the comforts of sin, of folly and vanity; all the idle diversions and amusements of the world, all the pleasures which perish in the using, and which only tend to benumb and stupify the soul, that it may neither be sensible of itself nor God. Blessed are they who follow on to know the Lord, and steadily refuse all other comfort. They shall be comforted by the consolations of his Spirit, by a fresh manifestation of his love; by such a witness of his accepting them in the Beloved, as shall never more be taken away from them. This full assurance of faith swallows up all doubt, as well as all tormenting fear; God now giving them a sure hope of an enduring substance and strong consolation through grace. Without disputing, whether it be possible for any of those to fall away, who were once enlightened and made partakers of the Holy Ghost,it suffices them to say, by the power now resting upon them, [54]Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? I am persuaded, that neither death nor life, nor things present, nor things to come: nor height nor depth—shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord!