A Christian Directory, Part 1: Christian Ethics

by Richard Baxter

III. The reasons why love to God is so great, and high, and necessary a thing, and so much esteemed above other graces, are: 1. It is the motion of the soul that tendeth to the end; and the end is more excellent than all the means as such. 2. The love, or will, or heart is the man; where the heart or love is, there the man is: it is the fullest resignation of the whole man to God, to love him as God, or offer him the heart. God never hath his own fully till we love him. Love is the grand, significant, vital motion of the soul; such as the heart, or will, or love is, such you may boldly call the man. 3. The love of God is the perfection and highest improvement of all the faculties of the soul, and the end of all other graces, to which they tend, and to which they grow up, and in which they terminate their operations. 4. The love of God is that spirit or life of moral excellency in all other graces in which (though not their form, yet) their acceptableness doth consist, without which they are to God as a lifeless carrion is to us. And to prove any action sincere and acceptable to God, is to prove that it comes from a willing, loving mind, without which you can never prove it. 5. Love is the commander of the soul, and therefore God knoweth that if he have our hearts, he hath all, for all the rest are at its command; for it is, as it were, the nature of the will, which is the commanding faculty; and its object is the ultimate end which is the commanding object. Love setteth the mind on thinking, the tongue on speaking, the hands on working, the feet on going, and every faculty obeyeth its command. 6. The obedience which love commandeth, participateth of its nature, and is a ready, cheerful, sweet obedience, acceptable to God, and pleasant to ourselves. 7. Love is a pure, chaste, and cleansing grace; and most powerfully casteth out all creature pollution from the soul:[115] the love of God doth quench all carnal, sinful love; and most effectually carrieth up the soul to such high delights, as causeth it to contemn and forget the toys which it before admired. 8. The love of God is the true acknowledging and honouring him as good. That blessed attribute, his goodness, is denied, or despised, by those that love him not. The light of the sun would not be valued, honoured, or used by the world, if there were no eyes in the world to see it. And the goodness of God is to them that love him not, as the light to them that have no eyes. If God would have had his goodness to be thus unknown or neglected, he would never have made the intellectual creatures. Those only give him the glory of his goodness that truly love him. 9. Love (in its attainment) is the enjoying and delighting grace: it is the very content and felicity of the soul: both as it maketh us capable to receive the most delightful communications of God's love to us; and as it is the soul's delightful closure with its most amiable felicitating object. 10. Love is the everlasting grace, and the work which we must be doing in heaven for ever. These are the reasons of love's pre-eminence.

IV. The love of creatures hath its contraries on both extremes, in the excess and in the defect; but the love of God hath no contrary in excess: for Infinite Goodness cannot possibly be loved too much (unless as the passion may possibly be raised to a degree distracting or disturbing the brain). The odious vices contrary to the love of God are, 1. Privative; not loving him. 2. Positive; hating him. 3. Opposite; loving his creatures in his stead: all these concur in every unsanctified soul. That they are all void of the true love of God, and taken up with creature love, is past all doubt; but whether they are all haters of God, may seem more questionable. But it is as certain as the other; only the hatred of God in most doth not break out into that open opposition, persecution, or blasphemy, as it doth with some that are given up to desperate wickedness; nor do they think that they hate him. But the aversation of the will is the hatred of God; and if men had not a great aversation to him, they would not forsake him, and refuse to be converted to him, notwithstanding all the arguments of love that can be used to allure them. Displacency, nolition, and aversation are hatred.

If you think it impossible that men can hate God, whom they confess to be infinitely good, consider for the true understanding of this hatred, 1. That it is not as good that they hate him; 2. and it is not God simply in himself considered; 3. and therefore it is not all in God; 4. and it is not the name of God; 5. but it is, 1. God as he seemeth unsuitable to them, and unfit for their delight and love: which seeming is caused by their carnal inclination to things of another nature, and the sinful perverting of their appetites, and the blindness and error of their minds. 2. And it is God as he is an enemy to their carnal concupiscence; whose holy nature is against their unholiness, and hateth their sin, and his laws forbid them the things which they most love and take delight in: and so they hate God, as a madman hateth his keeper and physician, and takes them for his enemies; and as a hungry dog doth hate him that keepeth him from the meat which he loveth, or would take it out of his mouth. 3. And they hate God, as one who by his holiness, justice, and truth is engaged to condemn them for their sin, and so (consequently to their sin) is their enemy that will destroy them (unless they forsake it): when their wills are enslaved to their sins, and they cannot endure to be forbidden them, and yet see that God will damn them in hell-fire if they cast them not away: this filleth them with displacency against God, as holy and just. 4. And then, consequently, they hate him in the rest of his attributes: as his omniscience, that he always seeth them; his omnipresence, that he is always with them; his omnipotency, that he is irresistible and able to punish them: his very mercy as expressed to others, when they must have no part in it; yea, his very immutability, eternity, and being, as he is to continue an avenger of their iniquity: so that the wicked in despair do wish that there were no God; and in prosperity, they wish he were not their Governor and Judge, or were unholy and unjust, allowing them to do what they list without account or punishment. Thus God is hated by the wicked according to the measure of their wickedness, and carnal interest, and concupiscence which he is against. Where you may note, 1. that the hatred of God beginneth at the sensual love of things temporal which he forbiddeth; 2. that the wicked great ones of the world, and those that have the strongest concupiscence, are usually the greatest haters of God, as having the greatest adverse interest, and being most in love with the things which he prohibiteth and will condemn.

V. The counterfeit of love to God is something that seemeth like it, and yet is consistent with prevalent hatred, or privation of true love, and maketh self-deceiving hypocrites. 1. One is when so much of God is loved as men think hath no opposition to their lusts and carnal interest (as his mercy and readiness to forgive); and then they think that they truly love God, though they hate his holiness and other attributes. 2. Another counterfeit is, to love God upon mistakes, imagining that he is of the sinner's mind, and will bear with him and not condemn him, though he continue sensual and ungodly: this is not indeed to love God, but something contrary to God. If men's fantasies will take God to be like the devil, a friend to sin, and no friend to holiness, and false in his threatenings, &c. and thus will love him; this is so far from being indeed the love of God, that it is an odious blaspheming of him. 3. Another counterfeit is, to love God only for his temporal mercies, as because he preserveth and maintaineth them, when yet he is resisted when he would give them things spiritual. 4. Another is, when the opinionative approbation of the mind, and honouring God with the lips and knee, are mistaken for true love. In a word, whatever love of God respecteth him not as God indeed, and is not superlative, but is subservient to creature love, is but a counterfeit.

VI. The directions for the exercise of the love of God are these:

Direct. I. Consider well, that the love of our Creator, Redeemer, and Regenerator, is the very end for which we are created, redeemed, and regenerate; and how just it is that God should have the end of such excellent works, and that by neglecting or opposing the love of God, which is the end, we neglect or oppose the works of creation, redemption, and regeneration themselves.—Let us plead these works of God with our hearts, and say,—1. O sluggish soul! dost thou forget the use for which thou wast created, and for which thou wast endowed with rational faculties? Dost thou repent that thou art a man, and refuse the employment of a man? What is the means or instrument good for, but its proper end, and use, and action? God made the sun to shine, and it shineth; he made the earth to support us and bear fruit, and it doth accordingly: and he made thee to love him, and wilt thou refuse and disobey? How noble and excellent is thy employment in comparison of theirs! Is the fruit of the earth, or the labour of thy beast, or the service of any inferior creature, so sweet and honourable a work as thine, to know and love thy bountiful, glorious Creator? How happy is thy lot! how blessed is thy portion in comparison of theirs! And dost thou forsake thy place, and descend to more ignoble objects, as if thou hadst rather been some silly, sordid animal? If thou hadst not rather be a beast than a man, why choosest thou the love and pleasures of a beast, and refusest the love and pleasures of a man? Is creation, and the image of God in a rational, free soul, a thing thus to be contemned for nothing? What is the sun good for, if it should yield no light or heat? And what art thou good for more than the beasts that perish, if thou know not and love not thy Creator? If God should offer to unman thee, and turn thee into a horse or dog, thou wouldst think he thrust thee into misery; and yet thou canst voluntarily and wilfully unman thyself, and take it as thy ease and pleasure. If death came this night to dissolve thy nature, it would not please thee; and yet thou canst daily destroy thy nature, as to its use and end, and not lament it! It were better I had never been a man, nor never had a heart or love within me, if I use it not in the holy love of my Creator. It is true, I have a body that is made to eat, and drink, and sleep; but all this is but to serve my soul in the love of him that giveth me all. Life is not for meat, or drink, or play; but these are for life, and life for the higher ends of life.

2. Look unto thy Redeemer, drowsy soul! and consider for what end he did redeem thee: Was it to wander a few years about the earth, and to sleep, and sport awhile in flesh? Or was it to crucify thee to the world, and raise thee up to the love of God? He came down to earth from love itself, being full of love, to show the loveliness of God, and reconcile thee to him, and take away the enmity, and by love to teach thee the art of love. His love constrained him to offer himself a sacrifice for sin, to make thee a priest thyself to God, to offer up the sacrifice of an inflamed heart in love and praise; and wilt thou disappoint thy Redeemer, and disappoint thyself of the benefits of his love? The means is for the end; thou mayst as well say, I would not be redeemed, as to say, I would not love the Lord.

3. And bethink thyself, O drowsy soul, for what thou wast regenerated and sanctified by the Spirit? Was it not that thou mightst know and love the Lord? What is the Spirit of adoption that is given to believers, but a Spirit of predominant love to God? Gal. iv. 6. Thou couldst have loved vanity, and doted on thy fleshly friends and pleasures, without the Spirit of God: it was not for these, but to destroy these, and kindle a more noble, heavenly fire in thy breast, that the Spirit did renew thee. Examine, search, and try thyself, whether the Spirit hath sanctified thee or not. Knowest thou not, that if "any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the same is none of his?" 2 Cor. xiii. 5; Rom. viii. 9. And if Christ and his Spirit be in thee, thy love is dead to earthly vanity, and quickened and raised to the most holy God. Live then in the Spirit, if thou have the Spirit: to walk in the Spirit is to walk in love. Hath the regenerating Spirit given thee on purpose a new principle of love, and done so much to excite it, and been blowing at the coals so oft, and shall thy carnality or sluggishness yet extinguish it? As thou wouldst not renounce or contemn thy creation, thy redemption, and regeneration, contemn not and neglect not the love of thy Creator, Redeemer, and Regenerator, which is the end of all.

Direct. II. Think of the perfect fitness of God to be the only object of thy superlative love; and how easy and necessary it should seem to us to do a work so agreeable to right reason and uncorrupted nature; and abhor all temptations which would make God seem unsuitable to thee.—O sluggish and unnatural soul! should not an object so admirably fit allure thee? Should not such attractive goodness draw thee? Should not perfect amiableness win thee wholly to itself? Do but know thyself and God, and then forbear to love him if thou canst! Where should the fish live, but in the water? And where should birds fly, but in the air? God is thy very element: thou diest and sinkest down to brutishness, if thou forsake him or be taken from him. What should delight the smell, but odours? or the appetite, but its delicious food? or the eye, but light, and what it showeth? and the ear, but harmony? and what should delight the soul, but God? If thou know thyself, thou knowest that the nature of thy mind inclineth to knowledge; and by the knowledge of effects, to rise up to the cause; and by the knowledge of lower and lesser matters, to ascend to the highest and greatest. And if thou know God, thou knowest that he is the cause of all things, the Maker, Preserver, and Orderer of all, the Being of beings, the most great, and wise, and good, and happy; so that to know him, is to know all; to know the most excellent, independent, glorious Being, that will leave no darkness nor unsatisfied desire in thy soul. And is he not then most suitable to thy mind? If thou know thyself, then thou knowest that thy will, as free as it is, hath a natural, necessary inclination to goodness. Thou canst not love evil as evil; nor canst thou choose but love apprehended goodness, especially the chiefest good, if rightly apprehended. And if thou know God, thou knowest that he is infinitely good in himself, and the cause of all the good that is in the world, and the giver of all the good thou hast received, and the only fit and suitable good to satisfy thy desires for the time to come. And yet, shall it be so hard to thee to love, so agreeably to perfect nature, so perfect, and full, and suitable a good? even Goodness and Love itself, which hath begun to love thee? Is any of the creatures which thou lovest so suitable to thee? Are they good, and only good, and perfectly good, and unchangeably and eternally good? Are they the spring of comfort, and the satisfying happiness of thy soul? Hast thou found them so? or dost thou look to find them best at last? Foolish soul! canst thou love the uneven, defective, troublesome creature, if to some one small, inferior use it seemeth suitable to thee? and canst thou not love Him, that is all that rational love can possibly desire to enjoy? What though the creature be near thee, and God be infinitely above thee? He is nearer to thee than they. And though in glory he be distant, thou art passing to him in his glory, and wilt presently be there. Though the sun be distant from thee, it communicateth to thee its light, and heat, and is more suitable to thee than the candle that is nearer thee. What though God be most holy, and thou too earthly and unclean? is he not the fitter to purify thee, and make thee holy? Thou hadst rather, if thou be poor, have the company and favour of the rich that can relieve thee, than of beggars that will but complain with thee. And if thou be unlearned or ignorant, thou wouldst have the company of the wise and learned that can teach thee, and not of those that are as ignorant as thyself. Who is so suitable to thy desires, as he that hath all that thou canst wisely desire, and is willing and ready to satisfy thee to the full? Who is more suitable to thy love, than he that loveth thee most, and hath done most for thee, and must do all that ever will be done for thee, and is himself most lovely in his infinite perfections? O poor, diseased, lapsed soul! if sin had not corrupted, and distempered, and perverted thee, thou wouldst have thought God as suitable to thy love, as meat to thy hunger, and drink to thy thirst, and rest to thy weariness, and as the earth and water, the air and sun, are to the inhabitants of the world! O whither art thou fallen? and how far, how long, hast thou wandered from thy God, that thou now drawest back from him as a stranger to thee, and lookest away from him as an unsuitable good?

Direct. III. Imagine not God to be far away from thee, but think of him as always near thee and with thee, in whose present love and goodness thou dost subsist.—Nearness of objects doth excite the faculties: we hear no sound, nor smell any odour, nor taste any sweetness, nor see any colours, that are too distant from us. And the mind being limited in its activity, neglecteth, or reacheth not things too distant, and requireth some nearness of its object, as well as the sense; especially to the excitation of affections and bodily action. A distant danger stirreth not up such fears, nor a distant misery such grief, nor a distant benefit such pleasure, as that which is at hand. Death doth more deeply affect us, when it seemeth very near, than when we think we have yet many years to live. So, carnal minds are so drowned in flesh, and captivated to sense, that they take little notice of what they see not, and therefore think of God as absent, because they see him not: they think of him as confined to heaven, as we think of a friend that is in the East Indies, or at the antipodes, who is, if not out of mind as well as out of sight, yet too distant for us delightfully to converse with.—Remember always, O my soul, that none is so near thee as thy God. A Seneca could say, of good men, that God is with us, and in us. Nature taught heathens, that in him we live, and move, and have our being. Thy friend may be absent, but God is never absent from thee; he is with thee, when, as to men, thou art alone. The sun is sufficient to illuminate but one part of the earth at once; and therefore must leave the rest in darkness. But God is with thee night and day; and there is no night to the soul, so far as it enjoyeth him. Thy life, thy health, thy love, and joy, are not nearer to thee than thy God: he is now before thee, about thee, within thee, moving thee to good, restraining thee from evil, marking and accepting all that is well, disliking and opposing all that is ill. The light of the sun doth not more certainly fill the room, and compass thee about, than God doth with his goodness. He is as much at leisure to observe thee, to converse with thee, to hear and help thee, as if thou wert his only creature: as the sun can as well illuminate every bird and fly, as if it shined unto no other creature. Open the eye of faith and reason, and behold thy God! Do not forget him, or unbelievingly deny him, and then say, He is not here. Do not say, that the sun doth not shine, because thou winkest. O do not quench thy love to God, by feigning him to be out of reach, and taken up with other converse! Turn not to inferior delights, by thinking that he hath turned thee off to these: and love him not as an absent friend; but as the friend that is always in thy sight, in thy bosom, and in thy heart; the fuel that is nearest to the flames of love.