User talk:ABISHAI GRACIAS

                                     In the Beginning

                                Genesis 1:1-2; Acts 17: 16-31

Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, for thousands of years, man has been asking questions about his existence, about his beginnings. Man looks at himself and wonders where did I come from? How did I get here? Why am I the way I am Man search for his beginnings necessarily involves asking questions about the beginning of all things. Man feels the earth below his feet, he takes a deep breath of oxygen into his lungs, he looks up and he sees the sun, moon and stars above and he asks Where did all this come from? How did it get here? How and why does all this exist? And so man searches for answers. Man studies nature; man studies animals; man studies ancient civilization, man studies man searching for answers about life. What does he find? In an interview between Nova Magazine and a Harvard professor of natural history, the professor was asked to define life. He gave a very scientific answer, but then he said this: The short answer is we don’t really know how life originated on this planet. And so man’s search continues. Man looks to the distant stars and planets for answers. Nations spend billions of dollars each year launching rockets, orbiters, and shuttles into outer space searching for the answer to our beginnings. This year alone our nation alone has budgeted 16.8 billion dollars for NASA to continue space exploration and discovery. On a related note, last week a European team of astronomers reported a major discovery. They discovered a planet outside our solar system which they say is similar to the earth’s atmosphere. They believe this planet is potentially habitable (in other words, it could sustain human life—never mind that it’s something like a million miles away); but researchers are already touting this discovery as a ‘big step in the search for life in the universe.’ What’s so sad in all this, beloved, is that the answer man is looking for is not to be found under a microscope in the laboratory; nor is this answer to be found at the other end of a telescope, on some distant planet out there somewhere in the vast universe. No. The answer is right in front of us. We’re holding it in our hands. As the Apostle Paul explained to the Athenians, The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would SEEK HIM and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far off from each one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being. The book of genesis tells us the answer. The book of Genesis tells us the story of our beginnings and of the world’s beginnings. It tells the story of the beginning of all life; it tells about the beginnings of civilization; it tells about the beginnings of sin and evil and death. But most significantly of all, it tells us about the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!

That’s what we read about here Genesis 1.  This morning we are going to consider the first two verses.  Here, God’s Word Reveals the Truth about the Beginning. 

1) The Creator who was Before the Beginning

2) The Creation which was Brought forth in the Beginning

1) The Creator who was Before the Beginning

People of God, if someone asked you what was life like before you were born, many of us could answer that by our knowledge of history or by simply remembering the stories that our parents told us about life back before we were born. I was born in 1965, but I could tell you a lot about life before I was born. I could tell you about the major movements in our nation’s history, the wars that were fought. In fact, if I thought long and hard enough, I could probably tell you something of significance that happened in just about every century dating back to the early church (and even a bit beyond that). So it’s not that unusual for us to know something about life before our beginning. That’s just being a good student of history. But within our text this morning we encounter something that is truly mind boggling, something that is beyond all comprehension, beyond all knowledge and thought; it is, in fact, beyond anything we humans can even imagine.

Genesis 1:1 says, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. This verse takes us back to the very dawn of history itself, back to the very origin, to the very beginning of everything that we have come to know, and see, and smell, and feel, and hear, and taste, and touch and breathe. That’s what the name Genesis means—beginnings. But more than that, Genesis 1:1 takes us back before the beginning. Genesis 1:1 takes us back before there was such a thing called earth or space or time. It takes us back before there was such a thing known as man or matter, or atoms, or energy or gravitational force. When we read the opening verse of Scripture In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth the Bible is telling us that God existed before the beginning. Notice, the Bible isn’t interested in making an argument for God’s existence. It merely recognizes the fact that God is. What does that mean? It establishes the supremacy of God as Creator and Lord. It clearly establishes the fact that God is not of this world; God is not of this universe; He is the Almighty Creator (the One of whom the Apostle Paul sing his doxology in Romans 11:36 For from Him and through him and to Him are all things). That’s exactly what we mean when we say that God transcends this world, as well as time and space. We, and everything around us, have been created, brought into existence--we and everything around us have a beginning and an end; but God does not. God is divine; He is eternal; He is uncreated. That’s what makes God, God. Unlike everything else in Creation, God is not subject to change. (God is immutable). Likewise, God is all knowing, all seeing, all powerful and everywhere present. God is infinitely superior; He is immeasurably more powerful; He is inestimably more wise and knowledgeable. The fact that God was there before the beginning, from all eternity, teaches us that God is also wholly and completely a self-sufficient and independent Being. Unlike creatures, God does not rely or depend upon anything or anyone else for His existence. Just take a moment, beloved, to reflect upon our lives here on this planet. Even if we had to, we couldn’t possibly enumerate all the things upon which we depend for our existence in this world. Our existence depends upon the constant gravitational pull of the moon, upon the exact position of the earth in relation to the sun, we depend upon our atmosphere containing the right mixture of nitrogen and oxygen and other gases which make it possible for us and other creatures to breathe. We depend upon fresh water, and crops, and animals for food. But God doesn’t rely upon anything for His existence. Besides that, God is also totally free; He is able to do as He chooses. And God is totally autonomous, which means that God answers to no one. God holds and exercises complete and sovereign control over the universe. From all this beloved, we can that God was under no obligation, He was under no compulsion, He was under no force or pressure to create heaven and earth and mankind. Creation was the result of the will of God; creation was the result of God taking the initiative. God acted first. That is a very significant point here in Genesis 1:1. All our life long we hear that phrase: God comes first; the things of God take priority. We parents try to impress that truth upon our children. Now we know where this truth is first established. Right here, in the beginning. In the beginning, God too the initiative; God created; God acted on behalf of creation. And every other action that we see from this point on is a response to God’s action. The fact that the sun shines, and the wind blows, and the fish swim, and the birds fly, and the dog barks, and the grass grows--all that is attributed to the fact that God acted first. As we know, that theme carries right over from creation to redemption. There too, God initiates. We can follow that theme through Genesis as well--the fact that God initiated His plan of salvation; man disobeyed God and fell into sin, but God in His grace and mercy is right there to pick man up and promise that through the seed of a woman, man’s Redeemer would come!So you see beloved, there is so much meaning, so much significance, so much wonderful knowledge about our God packed within those first three words: in the beginning. Those words tell us about the God who already existed, who always existed before the Beginning.

2) The Creation which was brought forth in the Beginning Secondly, we want to talk about the Creation which was brought forth in the Beginning. Verse 1 goes on to say that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. I want to call your attention there to two things in particular.First we consider the phrase ‘the heavens and the earth’. It refers to the totality of all creation, all of that which God made. Think of this phrase as an overarching introduction to the six days of creation that are about to be described in greater detail in the remainder of the chapter. It’s no different than a wife telling a visitor to her home that her husband built their house (the both floors, the garage, the deck--the totality of everything you can see) by himself. And then she might proceed to tell that person all the details: on the first day he dug the hole and poured the foundation; on the second day he connected the floor joists to the foundation, on the third day he raised the walls, etc. and so forth.But this phrase might also be something more than a mere introduction. Some commentators believe that this phrase indicates the very moment when God created the heavens above (not the firmament or sky we see above us, but the actual heavens in which God dwells in all His glory).That would include the creation of the angels, cherubim and seraphim, all His heavenly hosts. We’re never told in Scriptures when exactly God created the angels, but we know from Job 38 that it was very early on in Creation. Job 38 says that the angels sang when God laid the foundations of the earth. So the angels were there by the time of the creation of the earth. The second item in this verse that demands our close scrutiny is the word created. The word that is used here for ‘created’ is a very significant, a very unique word in the sense that no where in the Scriptures is it ever used in reference to the work of man in making or creating something.This word is only ever used in reference to God’s sovereign and divine activity of making, of creating. That’s essential for us to understand, for it impresses upon our hearts and minds that God’s work of Creation was altogether unique and set apart from anything that man can do.

This word helps us to see, it helps us to understand, that God is truly the One and only Creator. As Creator, God did far more than just fashion and arrange, and give shape and order to the universe as we see it today. No. God did, in fact, create all things—in the truest and purest sense of the word. God brought forth all things—all that we see, all that exists—out of nothing. Boys and girls, man can make many beautiful and wonderful things in this world. Just look around you at this beautiful sanctuary. This was designed and built by human hands. And when you drive home this morning with mom and dad, you’ll be driving in a car that was built by human hands. But where did man get the material to build this sanctuary? Where did man get the steel to build our cars? We get our wood from the forests and our steel comes from minerals buried beneath the ground. And long before we can use it, that wood and steel has to be taken to the mill and it has to be milled and fabricated and processed before it can ever be used. In other words, man cannot walk up to an empty lot with no building materials and suddenly start building a church; and man cannot walk into an empty room and suddenly create a car out of thin air. That’s silly. But yet, that is exactly what God did when he created the heavens and the earth. God brought forth all things into being out of nothing. So in this regard, creation is a singular act of God’s greatness, power, and wisdom that is (and will always remain) unparalleled and unmatched. Now, verse 2 turns our attention specifically to God’s work in the creation of the earth. Verse 2 tells us that the earth was formless (without shape), and empty, and darkness covered the surface, the face of the deep. What that tells us is that the first thing God did in creation was to bring forth His own building supplies; God called forth the substance, the building material which He Himself would use to create the world, the universe, the planets, the oceans, and man himself. Now, some have made the rather unfortunate mistake of referring to this ‘formless and dark and empty’ mass as a chaos (suggesting that God creates order out of chaos); others suggest that the darkness here is the presence of evil. But those are two very inaccurate and extremely unwarranted descriptions. How do we respond to this? In the first place, we know that darkness was as much of a creation and blessing of God as light itself. Later on God will separate light from darkness and call one day and one night. Both serve an important function in life on earth. Besides, evil can only be equated with the presence of sin and Satan, and God’s creation is called good by God. And secondly, the description of this mass as chaos or confusion suggest that the Creator God had made something that was out of His control; it is to suggest that God created a mess, and now somehow God would have to make sense of what he had made—that He would have to somehow bring order and beauty and purpose out of the empty dark, disorderly chaos. But that’s simply not true. That’s simply not what this means. We know that because we know God; we known how he has revealed Himself to us in His Word. God is a God of perfect order, not chaos and confusion. God is the master Architect and Builder; He knows the end from the beginning; He not only has the perfect end in mind, but he also uses the perfect means to accomplish His end, to reach that end. So, the material which God created, which is called ‘earth’ was very much like the lump of clay on the potters wheel, about to be shaped, formed and fashioned by the Hand of the sculptor. In our text, we see further evidence of the perfect order and control of God in Creation. For what does the final part of verse 2 state? It tells us that the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the deep/waters. So in verse 1 we are introduced to this God, this Creator, this Being who exists before the beginning, by verse 2 this God is already providing a self-revelation of who He is.God’s Spirit (literally God’s breath, God’s wind) was hovering over the surface of the deep. In Later on in chapter 1, in verses 26, we read where this One God and Creator says Let us make man in our image. And we know from John 1:1-3 that in the beginning God’s eternal Son was also present; He was with God in and before the beginning. And so here already God reveals to us that He is one simple Being, who exists in three distinct persons--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And so we bear witness to the fact that the Creation proceeds from the Father, through the Word (the Son), and in the Holy Spirit. From these first two verses of Genesis, I hope it is apparent to you, beloved, that the account of creation is so much more than a scientific debate between creationism and evolutionism. I hope you see that the account of creation is so much more than a debate over the origins of man, and the age of the earth, and the length of the creation days. Yes, we absolutely have to talk about those things, and yes we absolutely have to defend against those forms of false teaching. But what we must see first and foremost, above all else, is that this revelation, this Biblical account of creation establishes God’s relationship to man, and man’s relationship to God. We meet God--who is wholly and utterly distinct, who transcends the very creatures and creation he has made, but nonetheless, He is a loving and caring; He is an intimate and personal God who desires the fellowship and communion with His creatures, with His creation. By reason of His own eternal decree, God willed to create, to bring forth the heavens and the earth, man and beast, dry land and sea, fish and fowl, day and night, all for the pleasure and for the glory of His own Name. So, do you it see now? Do you see that in creation God established the very root and foundation of true religion? All that is, and all that lives and breathes, men, women, and children, mountains, trees, and oceans are to give glory and honor and praise to Creations God and King There are countless passages which reinforce this (many Psalm, but I will only quotes from: Psalm 148:1-5 Praise the LORD from the heavens, praise him in the heights above. Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his heavenly hosts. Praise him, sun and moon, praise him, all you shining stars. Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the skies. Let them praise the name of the LORD, for he commanded and they were created. Then there’s the wsie words of the Preacher in Ecclesiastes 12:1 Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say, "I find no pleasure in them"-- Later, in Acts 14:15, when the crowd at Lystra wanted to worship Paul and Barnabus as the Greek gods Zeus and Hermes, Pau land Barnabas shouted: Men, why are you doing this? We too are only men, human like you. We are bringing you good news, telling you to turn from these worthless things to the living God, who made heaven and earth and sea and everything in them. We can’t forget what Paul writes to the Romans, in Romans 1:25, when speaking bout the depravity and sinfulness of mankind, he writes: They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator-- who is forever praised. Amen. Finally, there’s Revelation 4:11 which says, You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being. So clearly, the act of creation—this display of God’s awesome power and wisdom whereby He called forth all things into being from that which was not, this act serves as the foundation, the root, the basis for all service and worship of God. Perhaps Psalm 24:1 says it best; The earth is the LORD’s and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it. As Creation’s Lord, our God has a sovereign right to demand the allegiance and the honor and the worship and the glory of the entire world—of everyone and everything in it! And the wonder of it all, beloved, is that even though we know that Satan would attempt to destroy all that God had made, all that God had designed, all that God had brought forth, God’s plan was still not thwarted. For God knows all things and has all things under His power; God had in His plans not only to create, but also to redeem and restore His lost and fallen creation through His eternal Son, Jesus Christ. Just listen to this from Colossians 1:16-17; 19-20: For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together… For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. There we behold the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God, that creation and redemption are so wonderfully and beautifully intertwined, that even in the beginning, our God and Creator was our redeemer and Lord. What a comfort it is for us to know that the God who created the world is powerful and wise enough to rule the world; He’s powerful enough to keep His promises; when man the creature falls in sin, when we fail to serve God and love Him as we ought, still our God is faithful, and He promises to crush the head of the serpent and provide us with forgiveness and victory in Christ. By God’s power, he has brought us to Christ and by His power He keeps us bound to Christ. He is the Creator of heaven and earth, and He will accomplish all that He has promised and all He has purposed. We are His creatures who called to live in reverence and fear of His name and we are called to walk by faith in ways of Jesus Christ His Son. Amen.

The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm

                     The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm 
                                   Matthew XI. 12
          The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

John the Baptist, hearing in prison of the fame of Christ, sends two of his disciples to Him with this question, Art Thou He that should come, or do we look for another? verse 3. Not (as Tertullian thinks) that John Baptist knew not that Jesus Christ was the true Messiah, for he was confirmed in this both by the Spirit of God and by a sign from heaven (John i:33). But John Baptist hereby endeavored to correct the ignorance of his own disciples who had a greater respect for him than for Christ.

In the fourth verse Christ answers their question, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, &c. Jesus Christ demonstrates Himself to be the true Messiah by His miracles which were real and occular proofs of His divinity. John's disciples being departed, Christ falls into a high praise and commendation of John Baptist, Verse 7. What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind? As if Christ had said, John Baptist was no unconstant man, fluctuating in his mind and being shaken as a reed from one opinion to another; he was no Reuben, unstable as water, but was fixed and resolute in religion, and a prison could make no alteration in him.

Verse 8. But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? John did not indulge his senses; he wore not silks, but camel's hair; nor did he affect to live at court, but in a wilderness, Matt. iii. 3,4.

Again, Christ commends John as being His forerunner who prepared the way before him; verse 10. He was the morning star which did precede the Sun of Righteousness; and that Christ might sufficiently honor this holy man, He does not only parallel him with, but prefers him before, the chief of the prophets. Verse 9. What went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet" Verse 11. Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: he was eminent both for dignity of office and perspicuity of doctrine; and so our text is ushered in: From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. In these words there is,

1. The preface, or introduction: from the days of John the Baptist until now. John Baptist was a zealous preacher, a Boanerges, or son of Thunder; and after his preaching, people began to be awakened out of their sins.

Hence learn, what kind of ministry is likely to do most good, namely, that which works upon the consciences of men. John Baptist lifted up his voice like a trumpet, he preached the doctrine of repentance with power, Matt. iii. 2. Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand: He came hewing and cutting down men's sins, and afterwards preached Christ to them. First, he poured in the vinegar of the law, then the wine of the gospel. This was that preaching which made men studiously seek after heaven. John did not so much preach to please as to profit; he chose rather to discover men's sins than to show his own eloquence. The best mirror is not that which is most gilded, but that which shows the truest face. -- That preaching is to be preferred which makes the truest discovery of men's sins and shows them their hearts. John Baptist was a burning and shining light; he did burn in his doctrine and shine in his life; and therefore men pressed into heaven. Peter, who was filled with a spirit of zeal, humbled his hearers for their sins and opened to them a fountain in Christ's blood, they were pricked in their heart, Acts ii. 37. 'Tis the greatest mercy to have a soul-searching ministry. If one had a desperate wound, he would desire to have it searched to the bottom. Who would not be content to have their souls searched so they may have them saved?

2. The matter in the text: the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

What is meant by the kingdom of heaven? Some interpret it as the doctrine of the gospel which reveals Christ and heaven. -- So Erasmus. But I rather, by the kingdom of heaven, understand glory; and so learned Beza and others.

This kingdom 'suffereth violence.' 'Tis a metaphor from a town or castle that holds out in war, and is not taken but by storm. So the kingdom of heaven will not be taken without violence: 'The violent take it by force.'

The earth is inherited by the meek Matt. v: 5. Heaven is inherited by the violent. Our life is military. Christ is our Captain, the gospel is the banner, the graces are our spiritual artillery, and heaven is only taken in a forcible way. These words fall into two parts.

1. The combat,-- suffereth violence, 2. The conquest, -- the violent take it by force.

The right way to take heaven is by storm; or thus, none get into heaven but violent ones.

This violence has a double aspect. It concerns men as magistrates; they must be violent,

1. In punishing the guilty. When Aaron's Urim and Thummim will do no good, then must Moses come with his rod. The wicked are the bad humours and surfeit of the commonwealth which, by the care of magistracy, are to be purged out. God has placed governors 'for the terror of evildoers,' 1 Peter ii. 14. They must not be like the sword-fish which has a sword in his head but is without a heart. They must not have a sword in their hand, but no heart to draw it out for the cutting down of impiety. Connivance in a magistrate supports vice, and by not punishing offenders he adopts other men's faults and makes them his own. Magistracy without zeal is like the body without spirit. Too much leniency emboldens sin and doth but shave the head which deserves to be cut off.

2. In defending the innocent. The magistrate is the asylum or altar of refuge for the oppressed to fly to. Charles, Duke of Calabri, was so in love with doing justice that he caused a bell to be hung at his palace gate, and whosoever would ring it, was sure presently to be admitted into the duke's presence, or have some officers sent out to hear his cause. Aristides was famous for his justice, of whom the historian saith that he would never favor any man's cause because he was his friend nor do injustice to any because he was his enemy. The magistrate's balance is the oppressed man's shield.

This violence concerns men as Christians. Though heaven be given us freely, yet we must contend for it, Eccles. ix. 10. 'What thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.' Our work is great, our time short, our Master urgent. We have need therefore to summon together all the powers of our souls and strive as in a matter of life and death, that we may arrive at the kingdom above: We must not only put forth diligence, but violence. For the illustrating and clearing of this proposition, I will shew.

1. What violence is not meant here: The violence in the text excludes, 1. An ignorant violence; to be violent for that which we do not understand, Acts xvii. 23. 'As I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, to the unknown god.' These Athenians were violent in their devotions, but it might be said to them, as Christ said to the woman of Samaria, John iv. 22. 'Ye worship ye know not what.' Thus the Catholics are violent in their religion. Witness their penance, fasting, dilacerating themselves till the blood comes, but it is a zeal without knowledge; their mettle is better than their eye-sight.-- When Aaron was to bum incense upon the alter, he was first to light the lamps, Exod. xxv. 7. When zeal like incense burns, first the lamp of knowledge must be lighted.

2. It excludes a bloody violence, which is twofold: First, when one goes to lay violent hands upon himself. The body is an earthly prison where God has put the soul; we must not break prison, but stay till God by death lets us out. The centinel is not to stir without permission from his captain; nor must we dare to stir hence without God's permission. Our bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost, 1 Cor. Vi.19.; When we offer violence to them, we destroy God's temple: The lamp of life must bum so long as any natural moisture is left, like oil, to feed it.

Secondly, When one takes away the life of another. There's too much of this violence nowadays. No sin has a louder voice than blood, Gen iv. 10. The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto Me from the ground. If there is a curse for him that smiteth his neighbour secretly, Deut. xxvii. 24, then he is doubly cursed who kills him. If a man had slain another unawares, he might take sanctuary and fly to the altar, but if he had done it willingly, the holiness of the place was not to protect him, Exod, xxi ,14, "If a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, to slay him with guile; thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die." Joab, being a man of blood, King Solomon sought to slay him even though he caught hold on the horns of the altar, 1 Kings viii. 29. In Bohemia, formerly, a murderer was to be beheaded and put in the same coffin with him whom he had killed. Thus we see what violence the text excludes.

2. What violence is meant here - it is a holy violence. This is twofold. 1. We must be violent for the truth. Here Pilate's question will be cited, "What is truth?" Truth is either the blessed Word of God which is called the Word of truth; or those doctrines which are deduced from the Word, and agree with it as the dial with the sun or the transcript with the original; as the doctrine of the Trinity, the doctrine of the creation, the doctrine of free grace, justification by the blood of Christ, regeneration, resurrection of the dead, and the life of glory. These truths we must be violent for, which is either by being advocates for them or martyrs.

Truth is the most glorious thing; the least filing of this gold is precious: what shall we be violent for, if not for truth? Truth is ancient; its grey hairs may make it venerable; it comes from him who is the ancient of days. Truth is unerring, it is the Star which leads to Christ. Truth is pure, Psalm cxix. 140. It is compared to silver refined seven times, Psalm xii. 6. There is not the least spot on truth's face; it breathes nothing but sanctity. Truth is triumphant; it is like a great conqueror; when all his enemies lie dead, it keeps the field and sets up its trophies of victory. Truth may be opposed but never quite deposed. In the time of Dioclesian things seemed desperate and truth ran low. Soon after was the golden time of Constantine, and then truth did again lift up its head. When the water in the Thames is lowest, a high tide is ready to come in. God is on truth's side and so long as there is no fear it will prevail: The heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, 2 Peter iii. 12. but not that truth which came from Heaven, 1 Peter. i. 25.

Truth has noble effects. Truth is the seed of the new birth. God does not regenerate us by miracles or revelations, but by the word of truth, James i. 18. As truth is the breeder of grace, so it is the feeder of it, 1 Tim. iv. 6. Truth sanctifies: John xvii. 17. Sanctify them through Thy truth. Truth is the seal that leaves the print of its own holiness upon us; it is both speculum and lavacrum, a glass to show us our blemishes and a laver to wash them away. Truth makes us free, John xviii. 32. it bears off the fetters of sin and puts us into a state of Sonship, Rom. viii.11, and Kingship, Rev. i. 6. Truth is comforting; this wine cheers. When David's harp and viol could yield him no comfort, truth did, Psalm cxix. 50. 'This is my comfort in my affliction, for thy word hath quickened me.' Truth is an antidote against error. Error is the adultery of the mind; it stains the soul, as treason stains blood. Error damns as well as does vice. A man may as well die by poison as by pistol; and what can stave off error but truth? The reason so many have been tricked into error is because they either did not know, or did not love, the truth. I can never say enough in the honor of truth. Truth is basis fidei, the ground of our faith; it gives us an exact model of religion; it shows us what we are to believe. Take away truth and our faith is fancy. --Truth is the best flower in the church's crown; we have not a richer jewel to trust God with than our souls, nor He a richer jewel to trust us with than His truths. Truth is insigne honoris, an ensign of honor; it distinguishes us from the false church, as chastity distinguisheth a virtuous woman from an harlot. In short, truth is ecclesiae praesidium, that is, the bulwark a nation: 2 Chron. xi. 17. it is said, the Levites (who were the antesignani, that is, the ensignbeaners of truth) strengthened the kingdom. Truth may be compared to the capitol of Rome, which was a place of the greatest strength; or the Tower of David, on which 'there hang a thousand shields,' Cant. iv. 4. Our forts and navies do not so much strengthen us as truth. Truth is the best militia of a kingdom; if once we part with truth and espouse popery, the lock is cut where our strength lies. What then should we be violent for, if not for truth? We are bid to contend as in an agony 'for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints,' Jude verse 3. If truth once be gone, we may write this epitaph on England's tomb-stone, Thy glory is departed.

2. This holy violence is also when we are violent for our own salvation, 2 Peter i. 10. 'Give diligence to make your calling and election sure' The Greek word signifies anxious carefulness, or a serious bearing of one's thoughts about the business of eternity, such a care as sets head and heart at work. In this channel of religion all a Christian's zeal should run.

3. The third thing is, what is implied in this holy violence? It implies three things: 1. Resolution of will. 2. Vigor of affection. 3. Strength of endeavor.

1. Resolution of the will. Psalm cxix. 6. 'I have sworn, and I will perform it, that I will keep thy righteous judgments.' Whatever is in the way to heaven, (though there be a lion in the way) I will encounter it like a resolute commander that charges through the whole body of the army. The Christian is resolved, come what will, he will have heaven. Where there is this resolution, danger must be despised, difficulties trampled upon, terrors contemned. This is the first thing in holy violence: resolution of will; I will have heaven whatever it costs me, and this resolution must be in the strength of Christ.

Resolution is like the bias to the bowl, which carries it strongly. Where there is but half a resolution, a will to be saved and a will to follow sin, it is impossible to be violent for Heaven. If a traveller be unresolved, sometimes he will ride this way, sometimes that; he is violent for neither.

2. Vigor of the affections. The will proceeds upon reason; the judgment being informed of the excellency of a state of glory and the will being resolved upon a voyage to that holy land, now the affections follow and they are on fire in passionate longings after heaven. The affections are violent things, Psalm xlii. 2. 'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.' The Rabbins note here, that David saith not, My soul hungereth, but thirsteth, because naturally we are more impatient with thirst than hunger. See in what a rapid, violent motion David's affections were carried after God. Affections are like the wings of the bird which make the soul swift in its flight after glory; where the affections are stirred up, there is offering violence to heaven.

3. This violence implies strength of endeavor, when we strive for salvation as though a matter of life and death. 'Tis easy to talk of Heaven, but not to get to Heaven; we must operam navare, put forth all our strength, and call in the help of heaven to this work.

4. The fourth thing is, how many ways a Christian must offer violence: namely, four ways; He must offer violence, 1. To Himself, 2. To the World, 3. To Satan, 4. To Heaven.

The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm

                             The Thomas Watson Reading Room
       The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm (Part 1, taking heaven by violence)
                              Matthew XI. 12

The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

John the Baptist, hearing in prison of the fame of Christ, sends two of his disciples to Him with this question, Art Thou He that should come, or do we look for another? verse 3. Not (as Tertullian thinks) that John Baptist knew not that Jesus Christ was the true Messiah, for he was confirmed in this both by the Spirit of God and by a sign from heaven (John i:33). But John Baptist hereby endeavored to correct the ignorance of his own disciples who had a greater respect for him than for Christ.

In the fourth verse Christ answers their question, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, &c. Jesus Christ demonstrates Himself to be the true Messiah by His miracles which were real and occular proofs of His divinity. John's disciples being departed, Christ falls into a high praise and commendation of John Baptist, Verse 7. What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind? As if Christ had said, John Baptist was no unconstant man, fluctuating in his mind and being shaken as a reed from one opinion to another; he was no Reuben, unstable as water, but was fixed and resolute in religion, and a prison could make no alteration in him.

Verse 8. But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? John did not indulge his senses; he wore not silks, but camel's hair; nor did he affect to live at court, but in a wilderness, Matt. iii. 3,4.

Again, Christ commends John as being His forerunner who prepared the way before him; verse 10. He was the morning star which did precede the Sun of Righteousness; and that Christ might sufficiently honor this holy man, He does not only parallel him with, but prefers him before, the chief of the prophets. Verse 9. What went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet" Verse 11. Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: he was eminent both for dignity of office and perspicuity of doctrine; and so our text is ushered in: From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. In these words there is,

1. The preface, or introduction: from the days of John the Baptist until now. John Baptist was a zealous preacher, a Boanerges, or son of Thunder; and after his preaching, people began to be awakened out of their sins.

Hence learn, what kind of ministry is likely to do most good, namely, that which works upon the consciences of men. John Baptist lifted up his voice like a trumpet, he preached the doctrine of repentance with power, Matt. iii. 2. Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand: He came hewing and cutting down men's sins, and afterwards preached Christ to them. First, he poured in the vinegar of the law, then the wine of the gospel. This was that preaching which made men studiously seek after heaven. John did not so much preach to please as to profit; he chose rather to discover men's sins than to show his own eloquence. The best mirror is not that which is most gilded, but that which shows the truest face. -- That preaching is to be preferred which makes the truest discovery of men's sins and shows them their hearts. John Baptist was a burning and shining light; he did burn in his doctrine and shine in his life; and therefore men pressed into heaven. Peter, who was filled with a spirit of zeal, humbled his hearers for their sins and opened to them a fountain in Christ's blood, they were pricked in their heart, Acts ii. 37. 'Tis the greatest mercy to have a soul-searching ministry. If one had a desperate wound, he would desire to have it searched to the bottom. Who would not be content to have their souls searched so they may have them saved?

2. The matter in the text: the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

What is meant by the kingdom of heaven? Some interpret it as the doctrine of the gospel which reveals Christ and heaven. -- So Erasmus. But I rather, by the kingdom of heaven, understand glory; and so learned Beza and others.

This kingdom 'suffereth violence.' 'Tis a metaphor from a town or castle that holds out in war, and is not taken but by storm. So the kingdom of heaven will not be taken without violence: 'The violent take it by force.'

The earth is inherited by the meek Matt. v: 5. Heaven is inherited by the violent. Our life is military. Christ is our Captain, the gospel is the banner, the graces are our spiritual artillery, and heaven is only taken in a forcible way. These words fall into two parts.

1. The combat,-- suffereth violence, 2. The conquest, -- the violent take it by force.

The right way to take heaven is by storm; or thus, none get into heaven but violent ones.

This violence has a double aspect. It concerns men as magistrates; they must be violent,

1. In punishing the guilty. When Aaron's Urim and Thummim will do no good, then must Moses come with his rod. The wicked are the bad humours and surfeit of the commonwealth which, by the care of magistracy, are to be purged out. God has placed governors 'for the terror of evildoers,' 1 Peter ii. 14. They must not be like the sword-fish which has a sword in his head but is without a heart. They must not have a sword in their hand, but no heart to draw it out for the cutting down of impiety. Connivance in a magistrate supports vice, and by not punishing offenders he adopts other men's faults and makes them his own. Magistracy without zeal is like the body without spirit. Too much leniency emboldens sin and doth but shave the head which deserves to be cut off.

2. In defending the innocent. The magistrate is the asylum or altar of refuge for the oppressed to fly to. Charles, Duke of Calabri, was so in love with doing justice that he caused a bell to be hung at his palace gate, and whosoever would ring it, was sure presently to be admitted into the duke's presence, or have some officers sent out to hear his cause. Aristides was famous for his justice, of whom the historian saith that he would never favor any man's cause because he was his friend nor do injustice to any because he was his enemy. The magistrate's balance is the oppressed man's shield.

This violence concerns men as Christians. Though heaven be given us freely, yet we must contend for it, Eccles. ix. 10. 'What thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.' Our work is great, our time short, our Master urgent. We have need therefore to summon together all the powers of our souls and strive as in a matter of life and death, that we may arrive at the kingdom above: We must not only put forth diligence, but violence. For the illustrating and clearing of this proposition, I will shew.

1. What violence is not meant here: The violence in the text excludes, 1. An ignorant violence; to be violent for that which we do not understand, Acts xvii. 23. 'As I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, to the unknown god.' These Athenians were violent in their devotions, but it might be said to them, as Christ said to the woman of Samaria, John iv. 22. 'Ye worship ye know not what.' Thus the Catholics are violent in their religion. Witness their penance, fasting, dilacerating themselves till the blood comes, but it is a zeal without knowledge; their mettle is better than their eye-sight.-- When Aaron was to bum incense upon the alter, he was first to light the lamps, Exod. xxv. 7. When zeal like incense burns, first the lamp of knowledge must be lighted.

2. It excludes a bloody violence, which is twofold: First, when one goes to lay violent hands upon himself. The body is an earthly prison where God has put the soul; we must not break prison, but stay till God by death lets us out. The centinel is not to stir without permission from his captain; nor must we dare to stir hence without God's permission. Our bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost, 1 Cor. Vi.19.; When we offer violence to them, we destroy God's temple: The lamp of life must bum so long as any natural moisture is left, like oil, to feed it.

Secondly, When one takes away the life of another. There's too much of this violence nowadays. No sin has a louder voice than blood, Gen iv. 10. The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto Me from the ground. If there is a curse for him that smiteth his neighbour secretly, Deut. xxvii. 24, then he is doubly cursed who kills him. If a man had slain another unawares, he might take sanctuary and fly to the altar, but if he had done it willingly, the holiness of the place was not to protect him, Exod, xxi ,14, "If a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, to slay him with guile; thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die." Joab, being a man of blood, King Solomon sought to slay him even though he caught hold on the horns of the altar, 1 Kings viii. 29. In Bohemia, formerly, a murderer was to be beheaded and put in the same coffin with him whom he had killed. Thus we see what violence the text excludes.

2. What violence is meant here - it is a holy violence. This is twofold. 1. We must be violent for the truth. Here Pilate's question will be cited, "What is truth?" Truth is either the blessed Word of God which is called the Word of truth; or those doctrines which are deduced from the Word, and agree with it as the dial with the sun or the transcript with the original; as the doctrine of the Trinity, the doctrine of the creation, the doctrine of free grace, justification by the blood of Christ, regeneration, resurrection of the dead, and the life of glory. These truths we must be violent for, which is either by being advocates for them or martyrs.

Truth is the most glorious thing; the least filing of this gold is precious: what shall we be violent for, if not for truth? Truth is ancient; its grey hairs may make it venerable; it comes from him who is the ancient of days. Truth is unerring, it is the Star which leads to Christ. Truth is pure, Psalm cxix. 140. It is compared to silver refined seven times, Psalm xii. 6. There is not the least spot on truth's face; it breathes nothing but sanctity. Truth is triumphant; it is like a great conqueror; when all his enemies lie dead, it keeps the field and sets up its trophies of victory. Truth may be opposed but never quite deposed. In the time of Dioclesian things seemed desperate and truth ran low. Soon after was the golden time of Constantine, and then truth did again lift up its head. When the water in the Thames is lowest, a high tide is ready to come in. God is on truth's side and so long as there is no fear it will prevail: The heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, 2 Peter iii. 12. but not that truth which came from Heaven, 1 Peter. i. 25.

Truth has noble effects. Truth is the seed of the new birth. God does not regenerate us by miracles or revelations, but by the word of truth, James i. 18. As truth is the breeder of grace, so it is the feeder of it, 1 Tim. iv. 6. Truth sanctifies: John xvii. 17. Sanctify them through Thy truth. Truth is the seal that leaves the print of its own holiness upon us; it is both speculum and lavacrum, a glass to show us our blemishes and a laver to wash them away. Truth makes us free, John xviii. 32. it bears off the fetters of sin and puts us into a state of Sonship, Rom. viii.11, and Kingship, Rev. i. 6. Truth is comforting; this wine cheers. When David's harp and viol could yield him no comfort, truth did, Psalm cxix. 50. 'This is my comfort in my affliction, for thy word hath quickened me.' Truth is an antidote against error. Error is the adultery of the mind; it stains the soul, as treason stains blood. Error damns as well as does vice. A man may as well die by poison as by pistol; and what can stave off error but truth? The reason so many have been tricked into error is because they either did not know, or did not love, the truth. I can never say enough in the honor of truth. Truth is basis fidei, the ground of our faith; it gives us an exact model of religion; it shows us what we are to believe. Take away truth and our faith is fancy. --Truth is the best flower in the church's crown; we have not a richer jewel to trust God with than our souls, nor He a richer jewel to trust us with than His truths. Truth is insigne honoris, an ensign of honor; it distinguishes us from the false church, as chastity distinguisheth a virtuous woman from an harlot. In short, truth is ecclesiae praesidium, that is, the bulwark a nation: 2 Chron. xi. 17. it is said, the Levites (who were the antesignani, that is, the ensignbeaners of truth) strengthened the kingdom. Truth may be compared to the capitol of Rome, which was a place of the greatest strength; or the Tower of David, on which 'there hang a thousand shields,' Cant. iv. 4. Our forts and navies do not so much strengthen us as truth. Truth is the best militia of a kingdom; if once we part with truth and espouse popery, the lock is cut where our strength lies. What then should we be violent for, if not for truth? We are bid to contend as in an agony 'for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints,' Jude verse 3. If truth once be gone, we may write this epitaph on England's tomb-stone, Thy glory is departed.

2. This holy violence is also when we are violent for our own salvation, 2 Peter i. 10. 'Give diligence to make your calling and election sure' The Greek word signifies anxious carefulness, or a serious bearing of one's thoughts about the business of eternity, such a care as sets head and heart at work. In this channel of religion all a Christian's zeal should run.

3. The third thing is, what is implied in this holy violence? It implies three things: 1. Resolution of will. 2. Vigor of affection. 3. Strength of endeavor.

1. Resolution of the will. Psalm cxix. 6. 'I have sworn, and I will perform it, that I will keep thy righteous judgments.' Whatever is in the way to heaven, (though there be a lion in the way) I will encounter it like a resolute commander that charges through the whole body of the army. The Christian is resolved, come what will, he will have heaven. Where there is this resolution, danger must be despised, difficulties trampled upon, terrors contemned. This is the first thing in holy violence: resolution of will; I will have heaven whatever it costs me, and this resolution must be in the strength of Christ.

Resolution is like the bias to the bowl, which carries it strongly. Where there is but half a resolution, a will to be saved and a will to follow sin, it is impossible to be violent for Heaven. If a traveller be unresolved, sometimes he will ride this way, sometimes that; he is violent for neither.

2. Vigor of the affections. The will proceeds upon reason; the judgment being informed of the excellency of a state of glory and the will being resolved upon a voyage to that holy land, now the affections follow and they are on fire in passionate longings after heaven. The affections are violent things, Psalm xlii. 2. 'My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.' The Rabbins note here, that David saith not, My soul hungereth, but thirsteth, because naturally we are more impatient with thirst than hunger. See in what a rapid, violent motion David's affections were carried after God. Affections are like the wings of the bird which make the soul swift in its flight after glory; where the affections are stirred up, there is offering violence to heaven.

3. This violence implies strength of endeavor, when we strive for salvation as though a matter of life and death. 'Tis easy to talk of Heaven, but not to get to Heaven; we must operam navare, put forth all our strength, and call in the help of heaven to this work.

4. The fourth thing is, how many ways a Christian must offer violence: namely, four ways; He must offer violence, 1. To Himself, 2. To the World, 3. To Satan, 4. To Heaven. [The Christian Soldier Index] [Part 2]

The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm III

                     The Christian Soldier; or Heaven Taken by Storm 

1. We must provoke ourselves to reading of the word. What an infinite mercy it is that God hath honoured us with the Scriptures! The barbarous Indians have not the oracles of God made known to them; they have the golden mines, but not the Scriptures which are more to be desired 'than much fine gold,' Psalm xix. 10. Our Savior bids us 'search the Scriptures', John v.39. We must not read these holy lines carelessly, as if they did not concern us, or run over them hastily, as Israel ate the passover in haste; but peruse them with reverence and seriousness. The noble Bereans did 'search the Scriptures daily,' Acts xvii.11. The Scripture is the pandect of divine knowledge; it is the rule and touchstone of truth; out of this well we draw the water of life. To provoke to a diligent reading of the word, labor to have a right notion of Scripture.

Read the word as a book made by God Himself. It is given 'by divine inspiration' 2 Tim. iii.16. It is the library of the Holy Ghost. The prophets and apostles were but God's amanuenses or notaries to write the law at his mouth. The word is of divine original, and reveals the deep things of God to us. There is a numen, or sense of deity engraven in man's heart and is to be read in the book of the creatures; quaelibet herba Deum; but who this God is, and the Trinity of persons in the Godhead, is infinitely, above the light of reason; only God Himself could make this known. So for the incarnation of Christ; God and man hypostatically united in one person; the mystery of imputed righteousness; the doctrine of faith: what angel in heaven, who but God himself, could reveal these things to us? How this may provoke to diligence and seriousness in reading the word which is divinely inspired. Other books may be written by holy men, but this book is indicted by the Holy Ghost.

Read the word as a perfect rule of faith; it contains all things essential to salvation. "I adore the fullness of Scripture," saith Tertullian. The word teaches us how to please God; how to order our conversation in the world. It instructs us in all things that belong either to prudence or piety. How we should read the word with care and reverence, when it contains a perfect model and platform of religion and is "able to make us wise unto salvation" (2 Tim. 3:15)!

When you read the word, look on it as a soul-enriching treasury. Search here as for a 'vien of silver' Prov. ii.4. In this word are scattered many divine aphorisms; gather them up as so many jewels. This blessed book helps to enrich you; it fills your head with knowledge, and your heart with grace; it stores you with promises: a man may be rich in bonds. In this field the pearl of price is hid: What are all the world's riches compared to these? Islands of spices, coasts of pearl, rocks of diamonds? These are but the riches that reprobates may have, but the word gives us those riches which angels have.

Read the word as a book of evidences. -- How carefully doth one read over his evidences! Would you know whether God is your God? search the records of Scripture, 1 John iii. 24. 'Hereby we know that he abides in us.' Would you know whether you are heirs of the promise? you must find it in these sacred writings. 2 Thes. Ii. 13. 'He hath chosen us to salvation through sanctification.' They who are vessels of grace, shall be vessels of glory.

Look upon the word as a spiritual magazine, out of which you fetch all your weapons to fight against sin and satan. 1. Here are weapons to fight against sin. The word of God is a consecrated sword that cuts asunder the lusts of the heart. When pride begins to lift up itself, the sword of the Spirit destroys this sin, 1 Peter iv. 5 'God resists the proud.' When passion vents itself, the word of God, like Hercules's club, beats down this angry fury: Eccles. V. 9. 'Anger rests in the bosom of fools.' When lust boils, the word of God cools that intemperate heat, Ephes. V. 5. 'No unclean person hath any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ.' 2. Here are weapons to fight against Satan. The word fenceth off temptation. When the devil tempted Christ, he three times wounded the old serpent with the sword of the Spirit. 'Tis written, Matt. Iv. 7. Satan never sooner foils a Christian than when he is unarmed, and without Scripture weapons.

Look upon the word as a spiritual glass to dress yourselves by: It is a looking-glass for the blind, Psalm xix. 8. In other glasses you may see your faces; in this glass you may see your hearts, Psalm cxix. 104. 'Through Thy precepts I get understanding. This looking-glass of the word clearly represents Christ; it sets him forth in his person, nature, offices, as most precious and eligible, Cant.vi. 16. 'He is altogether lovely; he is a wonder of beauty, a paradise of delight. Christ who was veiled over in types, is clearly revealed in the mirror of the Scriptures.

Look upon the word as a book of spiritual receipts. Basil compares the word to an apothecary's shop, which has all kinds of medicines and antidotes. If you find yourselves dead in duty, here is a receipt, Psalm cxix. 50. 'Thy word hath quickened me.' If you find your hearts hard, the word doth liquify and melt them; therefore it is compared to fire for its mollifying power, Jer. xxiii. 29. If you are poisoned with sin, here is an herb to expel it.

Look upon the word as a sovereign elixer to comfort you in distress. It comforts you against all your sins, temptations, and afflictions. What are the promises but divine cordials to revive fainting souls. A gracious heart goes feeding on a promise as Samson on the honeycomb, Judges xiv. 9. The word comforts against sickness and death, 1 Cor xv. 55. 'O death, where is thy sting?' A Christian dies embracing the promise, as Simeon did Christ, Heb. xi. 13.

Read the word as the last Will and Testament of Christ. Here are many legacies given to them that love him; pardon of sin, adoption, consolation. This Wwill is in force, being sealed in Christ's blood. With what seriousness doth a child read over the will and testament of his father, that he may see what is left him.

Read it as a book by which you must be judged: John xii. 48. 'The word that I have spoken shall judge him at the last day.' They who live according to the rules of this book, shall be acquitted; they who live contrary to them, shall be condemned. There are two books God will go by, the book of Conscience, and the book of Scripture: the one shall be the witness, and the other the judge. How should every Christian then provoke himself to read this book of God with care and devotion! This is that book which God will judge by at the last. -- They who fly from the word as a guide, shall be forced to submit to it as a judge.

2. The second duty of religion wherein we must provoke ourselves, is, in hearing of the word. We may bring our bodies to the word with ease, but not our hearts without offering violence to ourselves. When we come to the word preached, we come to a business of the highest importance, therefore should stir up ourselves and hear with the greatest devotion. Constantine the emperor was noted for his reverent attention to the word: Luke xix. 48. 'All the people were very attentive to hear him.' In the Greek it is 'they hung upon his lip.'-- When the word is dispensed, we are to lift up the everlasting doors of our hearts that the King of glory may enter in.

1. How far are they from offering violence to themselves in hearing, who scarce mind what is said, as if they were not at all concerned in the business: they come to church more for custom than conscience: Ezekiel xxxiii. 31. 'They come to thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them.' If we could tell them of a rich purchase, or of some place of preferment, they would diligently attend; but when the word of life is preached, they disregard it.

2. How far are they from offering violence to themselves in hearing, who come to the word in a dull, drowsy manner, as if they came to church to take a receipt to make them sleep. The word is to feed; it is strange to sleep at meat. The word judgeth men: it is strange for a prisoner to fall asleep at the bar. To such sleepy hearers God may say, sleep on. He may suffer them to be so stupefied, that no ordinance shall them: Matt. iii. 25. 'While men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares.' The Devil is never asleep, but sows the tares of sin in a drowsy hearer.

That we may, when we come to the word, offer violence to ourselves, and stir up ourselves to hear with devotion, consider,

1. It is God that speaksto us. If a judge gives a charge upon the bench, all listen.-- If a king speaks, all pay attention. When we come to the word, we should think thus with ourselves, we are to hear God in this preacher. Therefore Christ is said, now to speak to us from Heaven, Heb. xii. 25. -- Christ speaks in his ministers, as a king speaketh in the person of his ambassador. When Samuel knew it was the Lord that spake to him, he lent an ear, 2. Sam. iii. 5. 'Speak Lord, thy servant heareth.' They who slight God speaking in His word shall hear him speaking in his wrath, Psalm ii. 5. 'Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath.'

2. Let us consider the weightiness of the mattersdelivered to us. As Moses said to Israel, Deut. xxx. 19. 'I call Heaven and Earth to record this day, that I have set before you life and death.' We preach to men of Christ and of eternal recompenses; here are the magnalia legis, the weighty matters of the law; and doth not all this call for serious attention? There is a great deal of difference between a letter of news read to us, and a letter of special business, wherein our whole land and estate is concerned. In the word preached our salvation is concerned; here we are instructed to the kingdom of God, and if ever we will be serious, it should be now: Deut. xxxvii. 47. 'It is not a vain thing for you, because it is your life.'

3. If the word be not regarded, it will not be remembered. Many complain they cannot remember; here is the reason, God punisheth their carelessness in hearing with forgetfulness. He suffers Satan to take away the word from them, Matt. xiii. 4. 'The fowls of the air came and devoured the seed.' The Devil is no recursant; he comes to church, but it is not with any good intent; he takes away the word from men. How many have been robbed of the sermon and their souls both at once.

4. It may be the last time that God will ever speak to us in His word; it may be the last sermon that ever we shall hear; and we may go from the place of hearing, to the place of judging. Did people think thus when they come into the house of God; perhaps this will be the last time that God will counsel us about our souls, the last time that ever we shall see our minister's face, with what devotion would they come! how would their affections be all on fire in hearing? We give great attention to the last speeches of friends. A parent's dying words are received as oracles. Oh let all this provoke us to diligence in hearing; let us think this may be the last time that Aaron's bell shall sound in our ears and before another day, we shall be in another world.

Why We Need the Puritans

Horse Racing is said to be the sport of kings. The sport of slinging mud has, however, a wider following. Pillorying the Puritans, in particular, has long been a popular pastime both sides of the Atlantic, and most people's image of Puritanism still has on it much disfiguring dirt that needs to be scraped off. 'Puritan' as a name was, in fact, mud from the start. Coined in the early 1560's, it was always a satirical smear word implying peevishness, censoriousness, conceit, and a measure of hypocrisy, over and above its basic implication of religiously motivated discontent with what was seen as Elizabeth's Laodicean and compromising Church of England.

Later, the word gained the further, political connotation of being against the Stuart monarchy and for some sort of republicanism; its primary reference, however, was still to what was seen as an odd, furious, and ugly form of Protestant religion. In England, anti-Puritan feeling was let loose at the time of the Restoration and has flowed freely ever since. In North America it built up slowly after the days of Jonathan Edwards to reach its zenith a hundred years ago in post-Puritan New England. For the past half-century, however, scholars have been meticulously wiping away the mud, and as Michelangelo's frescoes in the Sistine Chapel have unfamiliar colours today now that restorers have removed the dark varnish, so the conventional image of the Puritans has been radically revamped, at least for those in the know. (Knowledge, alas, travels slowly in some quarters.) Taught by Perry Miller, William Haller, Marshall Knappen, Percy Scholes, Edmund Morgan, and a host of more recent researchers, informed folk now acknowledge that the typical Puritans were not wild men, fierce and freaky, religious fanatics and social extremists, but sober, conscientious, and cultured citizens: persons of principle, devoted, determined, and disciplined, excelling in the domestic virtues, and with no obvious shortcomings save a tendency to run to works when saying anything important, whether to God or to man. At last the record has been put straight. But even so, the suggestion that we 'need' the Puritans - we late twentieth-century Westerners, with all our sophistication and mastery of technique in both secular and sacred fields - may prompt some lifting of eyebrows. The belief that the Puritans, even if they were in fact responsible citizens, were comic and pathetic in equal degree, being naive and superstitious, primitive and gullible, superserious, overscrupulous, majoring in minors, and unable or unwilling to relax, dies hard. What could these zealots give us that we need, it is asked. The answer, in one word, is maturity. Maturity is a compound of wisdom, goodwill, resilience, and creativity. The Puritans exemplified maturity; we don't. We are spiritual dwarfs. A much-traveled leader, a native American (be it said), has declared that he finds North American Protestantism, man-centered, manipulative, success-oriented, self-indulgent and sentimental, as it blatantly is, to be 3,000 miles wide and half an inch deep. The Puritans, by contrast, as a body were giants. They were great souls serving a great God. In them clear-headed passion and warm-hearted compassion combined. Visionary and practical, idealistic and realistic too, goal-oriented and methodical, they were great believers, great hopers, great doers, and great sufferers. But their sufferings, both sides of the ocean (in old England from the authorities and in New England from the elements), seasoned and ripened them till they gained a stature that was nothing short of heroic. Ease and luxury, such as our affluence brings us today, do not make for maturity; hardship and struggle however do, and the Puritans' battles against the spiritual and climatic wildernesses in which God set them produced a virility of character, undaunted and unsinkable, rising above discouragement and fears, for which the true precedents and models are men like Moses, and Nehemiah, and Peter after Pentecost, and the apostle Paul. Spiritual warfare made the Puritans what they were. They accepted conflict as their calling, seeing themselves as their Lord's soldier-pilgrims, just as in Bunyan's allegory, and not expecting to be able to advance a single step without opposition of one sort or another. Wrote John Geree, in his tract 'The Character of an Old English Puritane or Noncomformist (1646)': 'His whole life he accounted a warfare, wherein Christ was his captain, his arms, praiers and tears. The Crosse his Banner and his word [motto] Vincit qui patitur [he who suffers conquers].' The Puritans lost, more or less, every public battle that they fought. Those who stayed in England did not change the Church of England as they hoped to do, nor did they revive more than a minority of its adherents, and eventually they were driven out of Anglicanism by calculated pressure on their consciences. Those who crossed the Atlantic failed to establish new Jerusalem in New England; for the first fifty years their little colonies barely survived. They hung on by the skin of their teeth. But the moral and spiritual victories that the Puritans won by keeping sweet, peaceful, patient, obedient, and hopeful under sustained and seemingly intolerable pressures and frustrations give them a place of high honor in the believers' hall of fame, where Hebrews 11 is the first gallery. It was out of this constant furnace-experience that their maturity was wrought and their wisdom concerning discipleship was refined. George Whitefield, the evangelist, wrote of them as follows: " Ministers never write or preach so well as when under the cross; the Spirit of Christ and of glory then rests upon them. was this, no doubt, that made the Puritans... such burning lights and shining lights. When cast out by the black Bartholomew-act [the 1662 Act of Uniformity] and driven from their respective charges to preach in barns and fields, in the highways and hedges, they in an especial manner wrote and preached as men having authority. Though dead, by their writings they yet speak; a peculiar unction attends them to this very hour...." Those words come from a preface to a reprint of Bunyan's works that appeared in 1767; but the unction continues, the authority is still felt, and the mature wisdom still remains breathtaking, as all modern Puritan-readers soon discover for themselves. Through the legacy of this literature the Puritans can help us today towards the maturity that they knew, and that we need In what ways can they do this? Let me suggest some specifics. First, there are lessons for us in the integration of their daily lives. As their Christianity was all-embracing, so their living was all of a piece. Nowadays we would call their lifestyle holistic: all awareness, activity, and enjoyment, all 'use of the creatures' and development of personal powers and creativity, was integrated in the single purpose of honoring God by appreciating all his gifts and making everything 'holiness to the Lord'. There was for them no disjunction between sacred and secular; all creation, so far as they were concerned, was sacred, and all activities, of whatever kind, must be sanctified, that is, done to the glory of God. So, in their heavenly-minded ardour, the Puritans became men and women of order, matter-of-fact and down-to-earth, prayerful, purposeful, practical. Seeing life whole, they integrated contemplation with action, worship with work, labour with rest, love of God with love of neighb our and of self, personal with social rest, love of God with love of neighbour and of self, personal with social identity, and the wide spectrum of relational responsibilities with each other, in a thoroughly conscientious and thought-out way. In this thoroughness they were extreme, that is to say far more thorough than we are, but in their blending of the whole wide range of Christian duties set forth in Scripture they were eminently balanced. They lived by 'method' (we would say, by a rule of life), planning and proportioning their time with care, not so much to keep bad things out as to make sure that they got all good and important things in - necessary wisdom, then as now, for busy people! We today, who tend to live unplanned lives at random in a series of non-communicating compartments and who hence feel swamped and distracted most of the time, could learn much from the Puritans at this point. Second, there are lessons for us in the quality of their spiritual experience. In the Puritans' communion with God, as Jesus Christ was central, so Holy Scripture was supreme. By Scripture, as God's word of instruction about divine-human relationships, they sought to live, and here, too, they were conscientiously methodical. Knowing themselves to be creatures of thought, affection, and will, and knowing that God's way to the human heart (the will) is via the human head (the mind), the Puritans practised meditation, discursive and systematic, on the whole range of biblical truth as they saw it applying to themselves. Puritan meditation on Scripture was modeled on the Puritan sermon; in meditation the Puritan would seek to search and challenge his heart, stir his affections to hate sin and love righteousness, and encourage himself with God's promises, just as Puritan preachers would do from the pulpit. This rational, resolute, passionate piety was conscientious without becoming obsessive, law-oriented without lapsing into legalism, and expressive of Christian liberty without any shameful lurches into license. The Puritans knew that Scripture is the unalterable rule of holiness, and never allowed themselves to forget it. Knowing also the dishonesty and deceitfulness of fallen human hearts, they cultivated humility and self-suspicion as abiding attitudes, and examined themselves regularly for spiritual blind spots and lurking inward evils. They may not be called morbid or introspective on this account, however; on the contrary, they found the discipline of self-examination by Scripture (not the same thing as introspection, let us note), followed by the discipline of confessing and forsaking sin and renewing one's gratitude to Christ for his pardoning mercy, to be a source of great inner peace and joy. We today, who know to our cost that we have unclear minds, uncontrolled affections, and unstable wills when it comes to serving God, and who again and again find ourselv es being imposed on by irrational, emotional romanticism disguised as super-spirituality, could profit much from the Puritans' example at this point too. Third, there are lessons for us in their passion for effective action. Though the Puritans, like the rest of the human race, had their dreams of what could and should be, they were decidedly not the kind of people that we could call 'dreamy'! They had no time for the idleness of the lazy or passive person who leaves it to others to change the world! They were men of action in he pure Reformed mould - crusading activists without a jot of self-reliance; workers for God who depended utterly on God to work in and through them, and who always gave God the praise for anything they did that in retrospect seemed to them to have been right; gifted men who prayed earnestly that God would enable them to use their powers, not for self-display, but for his praise. None of them wanted to be revolutionaries in church or state, though some of them reluctantly became such; all of them, however, longed to be effective change agents for God wherever shifts from sin to sanctity were called for. So Cromwell and his army made long, strong prayers before each battle, and preachers made long, strong prayers privately before ever venturing into the pulpit, and laymen made long, strong prayers before tackling any matter of importance (marriage, business deals, major purchases, or whatever). Today, however, Christians in the West are found to be on the whole passionless, passive, and, one fears, prayerless; cultivating an ethos which encloses personal piety in a pietistic cocoon, they leave public affairs to go their own way and neither expect nor for the most part seek influence beyond their own Christian circle. Where the Puritans prayed and laboured for a holy England and New England, sensing that where privilege is neglected and unfaithfulness reigns national judgement threatens, modern Christians gladly settle for conventional social respectability and, having done so, look no further. Surely it is obvious that at this point also the Puritans have a great deal to teach us. Fourth, there are lessons for us in their program for family stability. It is hardly too much to say that the Puritans created the Christian family in the English-speaking world. The Puritan ethic of marriage was to look not for a partner whom you do love passionately at this moment, but rather for one whom you can love steadily as your best friend for life, and then to proceed with God's help to do just that. The Puritan ethic of nurture was to train up children in the way they should go, to care for their bodies and souls together, and to educate them for sober, godly, socially useful adult living. The Puritan ethic of home life was based on maintaining order, courtesy, and family worship. Goodwill, patience, consistency, and an encouraging attitude were seen as the essential domestic virtues. In an age of routine discomforts, rudimentary medicine without pain-killers, frequent bereavements (most families lost at least as many children as they reared), an average life expectancy of just under thirty years, and economic hardship for almost all save merchant princes and landed gentry, family life was a school for character in every sense, and the fortitude with which Puritans resisted the all-too-familiar temptation to relieve pressure from the world by brutality at home, and laboured to honor God in their families despite all, merits supreme praise. At home the Puritans showed themselves (to use my overworked term) mature, accepting hardships and disappointments realistically as from God and refusing to be daunted or soured by any of them. Also, it was at home in the first instance that the Puritan layman practised evangelism and ministry. 'His family he endeavoured to make a Church,' wrote Geree, '...labouring that those that were born in it, might be born again to God.' In an era in which family life has become brittle even among Christians, with chicken-hearted spouses taking the easy course of separation rather than working at their relationship, and narcissistic parents spoiling their children materially while neglecting them spiritually, there is once more much to be learned from the Puritans' very different ways. Fifth, there are lessons to be learned from their sense of human worth. Through believing in a great God (the God of Scripture, undiminished and undomesticated), they gained a vivid awareness of the greatness of moral issues, of eternity, and of the human soul. Hamlet's 'What a piece of work is man!' is a very Puritan sentiment; the wonder of human individuality was something that they felt keenly. Though, under the influence of their medieval heritage, which told them that error has no rights, they did not in every case manage to respect those who differed publicly from them, their appreciation of man's dignity as the creature made to be God's friend was strong, and so in particular was their sense of the beauty and nobility of human holiness. In the collectivised urban anthill where most of us live nowadays the sense of each individual's eternal significance is much eroded, and the Puritan spirit is at this point a corrective from which we can profit greatly. Sixth, there are lessons to be learned from the Puritans' ideal of church renewal. To be sure, 'renewal' was not a word that they used; they spoke only of 'reformation' and 'reform', which words suggest to our twentieth-century minds a concern that is limited to the externals of the church's orthodoxy, order, worship forms and disciplinary code. But when the Puritans preached, published, and prayed for 'reformation' they had in mind, not indeed less than this, but far more. On the title page of the original edition of Richard Baxter's 'The Reformed Pastor', the word 'reformed' was printed in much larger type than any other, and one does not have to read far before discovering that for Baxter a 'reformed' pastor was not one who campaigned for Calvinism but one whose ministry to his people as preacher, teacher, catechist and role-model showed him to be, as we would say, 'revived' or 'renewed'. The essence of this kind of 'reformation' was enrichment of understanding of God's truth, arousal of affections God-ward, increase of ardour in one's devotions, and more love, joy, and firmness of Christian purpose in one's calling and personal life. In line with this, the ideal for the church was that through 'reformed' clergy all the members of each congregation should be 'reformed' - brought, that is, by God's grace without disorder into a state of what we would call revival, so as to be truly and thoroughly converted, theologically orthodox and sound, spiritually alert and expectant, in character terms wise and steady, ethically enterprising and obedient, and humbly but joyously sure of their salvation. This was the goal at which Puritan pastoral ministry aimed throughout, both in English parishes and in the 'gathered' churches of congregational type that multiplied in the mid-seventeenth century. The Puritans' concern for spiritual awakening in communities is to some extent hidden from us by their institutionalism; recalling the upheavals of English Methodism and the Great Awakening, we think of revival ardour as always putting a strain on established order, whereas the Puritans envisaged 'reform' at congregational level coming in disciplined style through faithful preaching, catechising, and spiritual service on the pastor's part. Clericalism, with its damming up of lay initiative, was doubtless a Puritan limitation, and one which boomeranged when lay zeal finally boiled over in Cromwell's army, in Quakerism, and in the vast sectarian underworld of Commonwealth times; but the other side of that coin was the nobility of the pastor's profile that the Puritans evolved - gospel preacher and Bible teacher, shepherd and physician of souls, catechist and counselor, trainer and disciplinarian, all in one. From the Puritans' ideals and goals for church life, which were unquestionably and abidingly right, and from their standards for clergy, which were challengingly and searchingly high, there is yet again a great deal that modern Christians can and should take to heart. These are just a few of the most obvious areas in which the Puritans can help us in these days. The foregoing celebration of Puritan greatness may leave some readers skeptical. It is, however, as was hinted earlier, wholly in line with the major reassessment of Puritanism that has taken place in historical scholarship. Fifty years ago the academic study of Puritanism went over a watershed with the discovery that there was such a thing as Puritan culture, and a rich culture at that, over and above Puritan reactions against certain facets of medieval and Renaissance culture. The common assumption of earlier days, that Puritans both sides of the Atlantic were characteristically morbid, obsessive, uncouth and unintelligent, was left behind. Satirical aloofness towards Puritan thought-life gave way to sympathetic attentiveness, and the exploring of Puritan beliefs and ideals became an academic cottage industry of impressive vigour, as it still is. North America led the way with four books published over two years which between them ensured that Puritan studies could never be the same again. These were: William Haller, 'The Rise of Puritanism' (Columbia University Press: New York, 1938); A.S.P. Woodhouse, 'Puritanism and Liberty' (Macmillan: London, 1938; Woodhouse taught at Toronto); M.M. Knappen, 'Tudor Puritanism' (Chicago University Press: Chicago, 1939); and Perry Miller, 'The New England Mind Vol I; The Seventeenth Century' (Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA, 1939). Many books from the thirties and later have confirmed the view of Puritanism which these four volumes yielded, and the overall picture that has emerged is as follows. Puritanism was at heart a spiritual movement, passionately concerned with God and godliness. It began in England with William Tyndale the Bible translator, Luther's contemporary, a generation before the word 'Puritan' was coined, and it continued till the latter years of the seventeenth century, some decades after 'Puritan' had fallen out of use. Into its making went Tyndale's reforming biblicism; John Bradford's piety of the heart and conscience; John Knox's zeal for God's honor in national churches; the passion for evangelical pastoral competence that is seen in John Hooper, Edward Dering and Richard Greenham; the view of Holy Scripture as the 'regulative principle' of church worship and order that fired Thomas Cartwright; the anti-Roman, anti-Arminian, anti-Socinian, anti-Antinomian Calvinism that John Owen and the Westminster standards set forth; the comprehensive ethical interest that reached its apogee in Richard Baxter's monumental 'Christian Directory'; and the purpose of popularising and making practical the teaching of the Bible that gripped Perkins and Bunyan, with many more. Puritanism was essentially a movement for church reform, pastoral renewal and evangelism, and spiritual revival; and in addition - indeed, as a direct expression of its zeal for God's honor - it was a world-view, a total Christian philosophy, in intellectual terms a Protestantised and updated medievalism, and in terms of spirituality a reformed monasticism outside the cloister and away from monkish vows. The Puritan goal was to complete what England's Reformation began: to finish reshaping Anglican worship, to introduce effective church discipline into Anglican parishes, to establish righteousness in the political, domestic, and socio-economic fields, and to convert all Englishmen to a vigorous evangelical faith. Through the preaching and teaching of the gospel, and the sanctifying of all arts, sciences, and skills, England was to become a land of saints, a model and paragon of corporate godliness, and as such a means of blessing to the world. Such was the Puritan dream as it developed under Elizabeth, James, and Charles, and blossomed in the Interregnum, before it withered in the dark tunnel of persecution between 1660 (Restoration) and 1689 (Toleration). This dream bred the giants with whom this book is concerned. The present chapter is, I confess, advocacy, barefaced and unashamed. I am seeking to make good the claim that the Puritans can teach us lessons that we badly need to learn. Let me pursue my line of argument a little further. I must by now be apparent that the great Puritan pastor-theologians - Owen, Baxter, Goodwin, Howe, Perkins, Sibbes, Brooks, Watson, Gurnall, Flavel, Bunyan, Manton, and others like them - were men of outstanding intellectual power, as well as spiritual insight. In them mental habits fostered by sober scholarship were linked with a flaming zeal for God and a minute acquaintance with the human heart. All their work displays this unique fusion of gifts and graces. In thought and outlook they were radically God-centered. Their appreciation of God's sovereign majesty was profound, and their reverence in handling his written word was deep and constant. They were patient, thorough, and methodical in searching the Scriptures, and their grasp of the various threads and linkages in the web of revealed truth was firm and clear. They understood most richly the ways of God with men, the glory of Christ the Mediator, and the work of the Spirit in the believer and the church. And their knowledge was no mere theoretical orthodoxy. They sought to 'reduce to practice' (their own phrase) all that God taught them. They yoked their consciences to his word, disciplining themselves to bring all activities under the scrutiny of Scripture, and to demand a theological, as distinct from a merely pragmatic, justification for everything that they did. They applied their understanding of the mind of God to every branch of life, seeing the church, the family, the state, the arts and sciences, the world of commerce and industry, no less than the devotions of the individual, as so many spheres in which God must be served and honored. They saw life whole, for they saw its Creator as Lord of each department of it, and their purpose was that 'holiness to the Lord' might be written over it in its entirety. Nor as this all. Knowing God, the Puritans also knew man. They saw him as in origin a noble being, made in God's image to rule God's earth, but now tragically brutified and brutalised by sin. They viewed sin in he triple light of God's law, Lordship, and holiness, and so saw it as transgression and guilt, as rebellion and usurpation, and as uncleanness, corruption, and inability for good. Seeing this, and knowing the ways whereby the Spirit brings sinners to faith and new life in Christ, and leads saints, on the one hand to grow into their Savior's image, and, on the other, to learn their total dependence on grace, the great Puritans became superb pastors. The depth and unction of the 'practical and experimental' expositions in the pulpit was no more outstanding than was their skill in the study of applying spiritual physic to sick souls. From Scripture they mapped the often bewildering terrain of the life of faith and fellowship with God with great thoroughness (see 'Pilgrim's Progress' for a pictorial gazetteer), and their acuteness and wisdom in diagnosing spiritual malaise and setting out the appropriate biblical remedies was outstanding. They remain the classic pastors of Protestantism, just as men like Whitefield and Spurgeon stand as its classic evangelists. Now it is here, on the pastoral front, that today's evangelical Christians most need help. Our numbers, it seems, have increased in recent years, and a new interest in the old paths of evangelical theology has grown. For this we should thank God. But not all evangelical zeal is according to knowledge, nor do the virtues and values of the biblical Christian life always come together as they should, and three groups in particular in today's evangelical world seem very obviously to need help of a kind that Puritans, as we meet them in their writings, are uniquely qualified to give. These I call restless experientialists, entrenched intellectualists, and disaffected deviationists. They are not, of course, organised bodies of opinion, but individual persons with characteristic mentalities that one meets over and over again. Take them, now, in order. Those whom I call restless experientialsts are a familiar breed, so much so that observers are sometimes tempted to define evangelicalism in terms of them. Their outlook is one of casual haphazardness and fretful impatience, of grasping after novelties, entertainments, and 'highs', and of valuing strong feelings above deep thoughts. They have little taste for solid study, humble self-examination, disciplined meditation, and unspectacular hard work in their callings and their prayers. They conceive the Christian life as one of exciting extraordinary experiences rather than of resolute rational righteousness. They well continually on the themes of joy, peace, happiness, satisfaction and rest of souls with no balancing reference to the divine discontent of Romans 7, the fight of faith of Psalm 73, or the 'lows' of Psalms 42, 88, and 102. Through their influence the spontaneous jollity of the simple extrovert comes to be equated with healthy Christian living, while saints of less sanguine and more complex temperament get driven almost to distraction because they cannot bubble over in the prescribed manner. In her restlessness these exuberant ones become uncritically credulous, reasoning that the more odd and striking an experience the more divine, supernatural, and spiritual it must be, and they scarcely give the scriptural virtue of steadiness a thought. It is no counter to these defects to appeal to the specialised counselling techniques that extrovert evangelicals have developed for pastoral purposes in recent years; for spiritual life is fostered, and spiritual maturity engendered, no by techniques but by truth, and if our techniques have been formed in terms of a defective notion of the truth to be conveyed and the goal to be aimed at they cannot make us better pastors or better believers than we were before. The reason why the restless experientialists are lopsided is that they have fallen victim to a form of worldliness, a man-centered, anti-rational individualism, which turns Christian life into a thrill-seeking ego-trip. Such saints need the sort of maturing ministry in which the Puritan tradition has specialised. What Puritan emphases can establish and settle restless experientialists? These, to start with. First, the stress on God-centeredness as a divine requirement that is central to the discipline of self-denial. Second, the insistence on the primacy of the mind, and on the impossibility of obeying biblical truth that one has not yet understood. Third, the demand for humility, patience, and steadiness at all times, and for an acknowledgement that Holy Spirit's main ministry is not to give thrills but to create in us Christlike character. Fourth, the recognition that feelings go up and down, and that God frequently tries us by leading us through wastes of emotional flatness. Fifth, the singling out of worship as life's primary activity. Sixth, the stress on our need of regular self-examination by Scripture, in terms set by Psalm 139:23-24. Seventh, the realisation that sanctified suffering bulks large in God's plan for his children's growth in grace. No Christian tradition of teaching admin isters this purging and strengthening medicine with more masterful authority than does that of the Puritans, whose own dispensing of it nurtured a marvellously strong and resilient type of Christian for a century and more, as we have seen. Think now of entrenched intellectualists in the evangelical world: a second familiar breed, though not so common as the previous type. Some of them seem to be victims of an insecure temperament and inferiority feelings, others to be reacting out of pride or pain against the zaniness of experientialism as they have perceived it, but whatever the source of their syndrome the behaviour-pattern in which they express it is distinctive and characteristic. Constantly they present themselves as rigid, argumentative, critical Christians, champions of God's truth for whom orthodoxy is all. Upholding and defending their own view of that truth, whether Calvinist or Arminian, dispensational or Pentecostal, national church reformist or Free Church separatist, or whatever it might be, is their leading interest, and they invest themselves unstintingly in this task. There is little warmth about them; relationally they are remote; experiences do not mean much to them; winning the battle for mental corr ectness is their one great purpose. They see, truly enough, that in our anti-rational, feeling-oriented, instant-gratification culture conceptual knowledge of divine things is undervalued, and they seek with passion to right the balance at this point. They understand the priority of the intellect well; the trouble is that intellectualism, expressing itself in endless campaigns for their own brand of right thinking, is almost if not quite all that they can offer, for it is almost if not quite all that they have. They too, so I urge, need exposure to the Puritan heritage for their maturing. That last statement might sound paradoxical, since it will not have escaped the reader that the above profile corresponds to what many still suppose the typical Puritan to have been. But when we ask what emphases Puritan tradition contains to counter arid intellectualism, a whole series of points springs to view. First, true religion claims the affections as well as the intellect; it is essentially, in Richard Baxter's phrase, 'heart-work' Second, theological truth is for practice. William Perkins defined theology as the science of living blessedly for ever; William Ames called it the science of living to God. Third, conceptual knowledge kills if one does not move on from knowing notions to knowing the realities to which they refer - in this case, from knowing about God to a relational acquaintance with God himself. Fourth, faith and repentance, issuing in a life of love and holiness, that is, of gratitude expressed in goodwill and good works, are explicitly called for in the gospel. Fifth, the Spirit is given to lead us into close companionship with others in Christ. Sixth, the discipline of discursive meditation is meant to keep us ardent and adoring in our love affair with God. Seventh, it is ungodly and scandalous to become a firebrand and cause division in the church, and it is ordinarily nothing more reputable than spiritual pride in its intellectual form that leads men to create parties and splits. The great Puritans were as humble-minded and warm-hearted they were clear-headed, as fully oriented to people as they were to Scripture, and as passionate for peace as they were for truth. They would certainly have diagnosed today's fixated Christian intellectualists as spiritually stunted, not in their zeal for the form of sound words but in their lack of zeal for anything else; and the thrust of Puritan teaching about God's truth in man's life is still potent to ripen such souls into whole and mature human beings. I turn finally to those whom I call disaffected deviationists, the casualties and dropouts of the modern evangelical movement, many of whom have now turned against it to denounce it as a neurotic perversion of Christianity. Here, too, is a breed that we know all too well. It is distressing to think of these folk, both because their experience to date discredits our evangelicalism so deeply and also because there are so many of them. Who are they? They are people who once saw themselves as evangelicals, either from being evangelically nurtured or from coming to profess conversion with the evangelical sphere of influence, but who have become disillusioned about the evangelical point of view and have turned their back on it, feeling that it let them down. Some leave it for intellectual reasons, judging that what was taught them was so simplistic as to stifle their minds and so unrealistic and out of touch with facts as to be really if unintentionally dishonest. Others leave because they were led to expect that as Christians they would enjoy health, wealth, trouble-free circumstances, immunity from relational hurts, betrayals, and failures, and from making mistakes and bad decisions; in short, a flowery bed of ease on which they would be carried happily to heaven - and these great expectations were in due course refuted by events. Hurt and angry, feeling themselves victims of a confidence trick, they now accuse the evangelicalism they knew of having failed and fooled them, and resentfully give it up; it is a mercy if they do not therewith similarly accuse and abandon God himself. Modern evangelicalism has much to answer for in the number of casualties of this sort that it has caused in recent years by its naivet of mind and unrealism of expectation. But here again the soberer, profounder, wiser evangelicalism of the Puritan giants can fulfill a corrective and therapeutic function in our midst, if only we will listen to its message. What have the Puritans to say to us that might serve to heal the disaffected casualties of modern evangelical goofiness? Anyone who reads the writings of the Puritan authors will find in them much that helps in this way. Puritan authors regularly tell us, first, of the 'mystery' of God: that our God is too small, that the real God cannot b put without remainder into a man-made conceptual box so as to be fully understood; and that he was, is, and always will be bewilderingly inscrutable in his dealing with those who trust and love him, so that 'losses and crosses', that is, bafflement and disappointment in relation to particular hopes one has entertained, must be accepted as a recurring element in one's life of fellowship with him. Then they tell us, second, of the 'love' of God: that it is a love that redeems, converts, sanctifies, and ultimately glorifies sinners, and that Calvary was the one place in human history where it was fully and unambiguously revealed, and that in relation to our own situation we may know for certain that nothing can separate us from that love (Rom.8:38f), although no situation in this world will ever be free from flies in the ointment and thorns in the bed. Developing the theme of divine love the Puritans tell us, third, of the 'salvation' of God: that the Christ who put away our sins and brought us God's pardon is leading us through this world to a glory for which we are even now being prepared by the instilling of desire for it and capacity to enjoy it, and that holiness here, in the form of consecrated service and loving obedience through thick and thin, is the high road to happiness hereafter. Following this they tell us, fourth, about 'spiritual conflict,' the many ways in which the world, the flesh and the devil seek to lay us low; fifth, about the 'protection' of God, whereby he overrules and sanctifies the conflict, often allowing one evil to touch our lives in order thereby to shield us from greater evils; and, sixth, about the 'glory' of God, which it becomes our privilege to further by our celebrating of his grace, by our proving of his power under perplexity and pressure, by totally resigning ourselves to his good pleasure, and by making him our joy and delight at all times. By ministering to us these precious biblical truths the Puritans give us the resources we need to cope with 'the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune', and offer the casualties an insight into what has happened to them that can raise them above self-pitying resentment and reaction and restore their spiritual health completely. Puritan sermons show that problems about providence are in now way new; the seventeenth century had its own share of spiritual casualties, saints who had thought simplistically and hoped unrealistically and were now disappointed, disaffected, despondent and despairing, and the Puritans' ministry to us at this point is simply the spin-off of what they were constantly saying to raise up and encourage wounded spirits among their own people I think the answer to the question, why do we need the Puritans, is now pretty clear, and I conclude my argument at this point. I, who owe more to the Puritans than to any other theologians I have ever read, and who know that I need them still, have been trying to persuade you that perhaps you need them too. To succeed in this would, I confess, make me overjoyed, and that chiefly for your sake, and the Lord's. But there, too, is something that I must leave in God's hands. Meantime, let us continue to explore the Puritan heritage together. There is more gold to be mined here than I have mentioned yet. THE END

Interpreting John Calvin

                        Interpreting John Calvin: Introduction 

Hesselink makes mention of his indebtedness to Battles for his new translation of Calvin’s Institutes, published in 1960. Hesselink was in the midst of his doctoral dissertation and was forced to utilize the Allen translation of this work when Battles emerged with this new translation with cross-references, notes and indices which remain invaluable until today. Though the work of Battles remains important, Battles was not a theologian, but more precisely, a historical theologian. Battles did not believe himself to be a systematic theologian, but rather gathered the facts of history in a scholarly manner.

Upon meeting Hesselink, Battles invited him to take part in research surrounding a new study concerning the shaping of Calvin’s theology as a young man and the sources and influences that aided in that transformation. Battles, like Calvin, had a desire to work with the original sources for one’s theology, and the original languages in which they were written. Battles, then, was a profound linguist in Latin, German and French in order to read the first source and secondary source materials for Calvin’s theology and life.

Battles’ focus was to emphasize the main areas of Calvin’s life and theology which clarity. He demonstrates Calvin’s goal in his writings as “lucid brevity.” His conversion, Battles says, is progressive over a series of five stages, and we have little that helps us to see his conversion as instantaneous. Battles also focused on Calvin’s piety (pietas), and was the first to take this aspect of Calvin to scholarly levels. Battles demonstrates that Calvin was committed to discussing fine points of theology, but at the same time remained firm as a herald of the simple Gospel.

Interpreting John Calvin, Introduction Part 2

Donald McKim introduces us to the “Calvinian Works” of Ford Lewis Battles. Battles was a master at dealing with first sources, and behind everything he wrote about Calvin and his theology were the primary sources in the original languages they were written.

The work in question, Interpreting John Calvin, is divided up into two sections. The first five articles explain the origin and structure of Calvin’s theology, where the next four deal with Calvin as poet, his piety, and his morality. Concerning the origin and structure of Calvin’s theology, Battles covers Calvin’s humanistic education, primarily focusing in on the sources of Calvin’s Seneca commentary and the influences surrounding Calvin in order to write this work. Next he deals with the Institutes of the Christian Religion in its first printing, demonstrating it to be in the form of a Protestant Catechism. Next, Battles deals with Calvin’s doctrine of accommodation, since it is primary in understanding Calvin’s approach to Scripture and his hermeneutics in the process of the creature’s capacity to have a true “knowledge of God”.

Battles confirms Calvin’s poetry was “doxological, christological and soteriological.” Calvin’s Psychopannychia exhibits early on that Calvin had an cute sense of poetry, demonstrating chiasms, parallelisms, and anaphora structures. His piety is clearly expressed through the meaning of faith (pietas) and his morality through Justitia.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 1, Calvin’s Humanistic Education

From 1523-1533, there are three universities that Calvin attended: Paris, Orleans and Bourges. In 1523, at age fourteen, Calvin enrolled in the university of Paris at the will of his father who desired him to study in the priesthood. He spent the first three months in the College de la Marche and then transferred to the College de Montaigu. Here he spent four years pursing a degree in the arts. Calvin then attended the university of Orlẻans to study law (which had earlier been a center for medieval scholasticism) from 1528-1529 and then later again in 1532-33. He then attended the university at Bourges and continued his education in political law. Finally, he went back to Paris for a second stopover, when Francis I was in prison and the university desired to extricate reform.

Six of Calvin’s teachers are worthy of note. Calvin dedicated his Commentary on 1 Thessalonians to Mathurian Cordier (1523). Cordier taught Calvin Latin and his Grammatica Latina went through many editions. Peirre de l’Estoile (1528) is paid high esteem in Calvin’s introduction to the Antapalogia of another student (his first published piece) and had forced conservativism upon Calvin for his views on law. Andrea Alciati (1529-30) affected Calvin in a negative way where he wrote in the same introduction against Alciati for opposing l’Estoile. Melchior Wolmar (1530-31) was Calvin’s first Greek teacher. Calvin also relied heavily on Guillaume Bude (1531-32) for his understanding of legal terms, political philosophy and literature. Pierre Dane (1531) may have been a teacher of Calvin, but this is unconfirmed, though Calvin desired to sit under him. All of these men influenced Calvin’s thought, and his educational plan for Geneva.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 2, The Sources of Calvin’s Seneca Commentary

Calvin’s commentary on Seneca’s De Clementia was his first complete published work. Its form and content underlie the style and formative mind that Calvin would later demonstrate in his Institutes, though by a converted heart. Thus, this former work under-girds in many respects the later Institutes as “typical Calvin,” though primitive. The theme of this commentary is that the “mighty” (Alexander in this case) should rule with mercy since such rulers are held morally responsible before God for their actions.

Calvin’s sources for his commentary can be seen by internal citations, however, as much as the citations are important, where he read those citations are equally important. Twice Calvin uses the term “pillars” to point to the authorities he used in citation for his commentary. The first was Erasmus and the second was Budaeus. Both are referred to in the commentary, though Budaeus is relied on more heavily. It is apparent that Calvin leaned on Budaeus’ writings surrounding, legal terms, Roman institutions, political philosophy, abstract philosophy, and literature. Calvin was not a lackey to Budaeus, for he does not quote him verbatim, but rather paraphrases his thought in process. Calvin may have had a third pillar, Philippus Beroaldus the Elder (1453-1505), though he does not mention him directly but does quote him directly, and by other citations was influenced by bibliographic information in Beroaldus’ works. Obviously Calvin used philosophical sources, including Cicero and Seneca’s writings (two ancient pillars) in which he relied heavily, as well as Greek and Latin literature, Latin poets, historians (such as Suetonius), humanists, and rhetoricians.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 3, The First Edition of the Institutes (1536)

Calvin’s original intent for the publication of the Institutes was that of catechizing the reader on the basics and rudimentary intention of piety and Christian faith. This is plainly seen in his introductory letter to Francis I. However turbulent times did not allow Calvin to reach his desired end and the catechism turned into an apology for Christians. (This turbulence of time can be seen in Calvin’s diversion in writing the Psychopannychia (a work dealing with the false teaching of “soul-sleep” and reality of the mediatorship of Jesus Christ.).) Thus, Calvin wrote the Institutes as instruction for the brethren, and to plead their case before the king to stop Protestant persecution.

The first edition of the Institutes comprised a dedicatory letter to the French king, and then six chapters. There were eight parts to the introductory letter: circumstances for writing, persecution of individuals, charges of Catholics against the Reformed faith, the support of the church Fathers in reformed doctrine, against papal tradition and custom for the papacy, the true church is always observable, a defense of the preaching of the Gospel, and then finally a plea to the king. The Institutes then follow chapter divisions: on the Law (an exposition on the Decalogue); on faith (and exposition of the Apostle’s Creed); on prayer (resting on Bucer’s Commentary on the Gospels); on the sacraments (where he rejects the Zwinglian and the Roman view of the Supper, and the Anabaptist view of baptism); on the five false sacraments (where he overthrows Catholic theology) and then a final letter to the King and explanation of proper obedience to the king in truth, even if the king were to remain unjust in his persecuting acts.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 4, God Accommodating Himself to Human Capacity

It is impossible to study Calvin as an exegete without understanding his view of the doctrine of accommodation that permeates the Institutes. Accommodation for Calvin has to do with both the interpretation of Scripture and the whole created reality, of which, “Scripture holds the clue.” The entire creation is an accommodation (i.e. God has accommodated Himself to us, or, adapted through verbal and created representation the matter of His own being so that creatures can apprehend something about Him.) For example, Calvin deals with the manner in which God interacts with man in questioning whether God repents or not (cf. Institutes, 1:17.12f). God makes Saul king, Saul rebels, and God repents that He made Saul king. Calvin’s answer is that God “represents himself to us not as he is in himself [which would be impossible for us to understand being finite creatures] but as he seems to us to accommodate to our weak capacity.”

Calvin recognized that God used certain “portraits” of Himself in verbal revelation as accommodation. Such portraits seem inconsistent, for God does not have feathers (Psalm 91:4 [Open in Logos Bible Software (if available)] ) or hands (Exodus 9:3 [Open in Logos Bible Software (if available)] ). But there were certain “ruling metaphors” for Calvin in this way: God as Father, God as Teacher, and God as Physician. This is in contrast to man as child, schoolboy and sick with sin.

For Calvin (and every Christian) the ultimate remedy for this accommodating gap between God and man is the incarnation of the God-man Christ Jesus explained to us in the accommodation of the Scriptures. The ultimate anthropomorphism of Scripture is the bodily manifestation of Jesus Christ on earth, and his testimony of exegeting the Father.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 5, Structure of the Theology of John Calvin

Calvin’s theology is structured around his view of faith and conversion. His conversion is difficult to pinpoint, yet, based on his textural evidences, it seemed to be a result of Romans 1:21 [Open in Logos Bible Software (if available)] and/or 1:25, as well as Calvin’s emphasis on the Psalms. There are four assumptions surrounding piecing together his conversion: 1) Romans 1:18-25 [Open in Logos Bible Software (if available)] was the trigger for his conversion; 2) a section written to Cardinal Sadolet in 1539 concerning the confession of the layperson before the judgment seat of God; 3) two theological “restatements” of his conversion (one by Pierre Robert, his cousin, in the preface to the French New Testament translation, and the other in the initial pages of the Institutes in 1536); 4) the mediating position Calvin found between following the papacy and the radical Anabaptists who were spiritualists. Calvin does not write out his conversion experience, but it is pieced together based on Calvin’s recantation of false faith, and his apologetic against false views of the soul against Anabaptist theology.

Five theses characterize the structure of Calvin’s theology: 1) the Institutes were based on a reworking of his view of faith through various editions; 2) new additions were a result of mediating between papalism and spiritualism; 3) a true/false structure characterizes this, and underlies the manner in which he thought about theology; 4) these dichotomies of the true/false principle can be blueprinted and worked out in three layers based on the operation of the Spirit in His universal providence, special providence and inner working in the elect; 5) Calvin follows a patterns of “fractioning off” theological ideas expressed in terms of limits to truth.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 5, Appendices A-F

Something must be said for the outstanding work that Battles demonstrates in the six appendices following Calvin’s Theological Structure. Appendix A houses thirty-seven dichotomies in which Battles has outlined Calvin’s Institutes in terms of the true/false principles. Though these tables do not define scriptural exegesis to the conclusions that Battles makes, they do give the reader a formidable outline to follow for Calvin’s thought against what is false. Particular attention should be given the reader to table 6 (law and Gospel) tables 10-17 (the gift and exercise of faith) and tables 27-34 (sacraments). In Appendix B, Battles demonstrates the “web of meaning” of Calvin’s theology and insists, rightly, that Calvin’s meanings of certain words should be taken not in part, but in the whole ensemble of his work in the Institutes. Battles then exemplifies the definition of fides (faith) for Calvin in a helpful diagram (table 39). Appendix C demonstrates the theatrum mundi or theater of the world that comprises Calvin’s history of salvation by God in the realm of the created order. He explains the virtutes Dei (qualities of God) in terms of His accommodation to us, and the exercise of this power and quality of God in the theater of human life (table 42). Appendix D demonstrates Calvin’s’ theology of ascent and descent. Appendix E deals with Calvin’s theology against the Libertines, where he demonstrates God’s care in governing the universe in three ways: 1) universal operation, 2) God’s work in creatures for them to serve him, and 3) He governs his believers by the Holy Spirit. Appendix F is a notation demonstrating Calvin’s twofold knowledge of God possibly being drawn in part from quoting Clement’s Paidagogoes.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 6, Remarks about the “Found” Poetry of John Calvin

As a thoughtful theologian, Calvin was also a poet at times. He was so entrenched with the poetic structures of the biblical record (especially in the books such as Psalms and the Song of Solomon) that he had a tendency to express himself in his writings by poetic structures. For instance, in times where he was most passionate and vehemently contending for the doctrines of Christ, he would enter into poetic composition. Oftentimes this theological burst of meditation and feeling expressed itself in three forms of thought – christological, doxological and soteriological (in other words, as one is in the thrall of praising Christ for salvation, arranged poetry emerges.) Such structure took upon itself four general characteristics in Calvin’s writings: 1) natural division of the text into lines of similar length; 2) parallelism; 3) a division into stanzas; and 4) inclusio or chiastic constructions.

Calvin had dismissed himself as a poet early on, but in his writings he practiced it under the guise of doxological theology. In this way, for the theologian, poetry is necessary. Calvin has many specifically lined structures through all his works, even his Psychopannychia, and his commentary on Seneca, both of which were written before the Institutes (which in itself holds many of these structured poetic sections). One can trace the depth of Calvin by his style and thought in such passages, and the reader, who “outlines” these thoughts, will see more clearly the manner of Calvin’s patterns. This is where his intellectual theology becomes intensely practical, exemplifying both matters of the heart as well as the head.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 7, True Piety According to Calvin

For Calvin, piety was a matter of both what one understands and what one lives out, even amidst persecution. Pietas translates into Calvin’s whole understanding of Christian doctrine of faith and life. Specifically, Calvin says piety is, “that reverence joined with love of God which the knowledge of his benefits induces.” It carries in it both the honor and obedience of God as our Father (an accommodating term used frequently by Calvin) as well as the fear of the Lord in service as the Creator. It includes our walk before God as sons and our walk before our brethren as fellow heirs together in Christ. This theme is even interwoven in Calvin’s own allusions of his conversion in his preface to the Commentary on the Psalms, and more fully developed later in his tract On the Christian Life. Such thoughts are finally developed in later translation of the Institutes as his ideas were born from a sense of controversy in theological reflection.

Calvin wrote a number of tracts that pressed the need for true piety in the Christian life. On Scandals (1550) taught that the Gospel is born of scandal, and the Christian must partake of it. Such scandals emerge intrinsically by those who take offense at the Gospel. Annexed scandals arise when the Gospel is preached and sects and controversy result. Adventitious scandals spring from Gospel hypocrites and covenant breakers. In Excuse to the Nicodemites (1544) he attacks lukewarmness, where God is both Lord of the body and the soul of His elect people, and they should act as such. In What Faithful Men Ought to Do Dwelling Amongst the Papists (1543) Calvin demonstrates a living Reformed faith is best amidst persecution from those without.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 8, John Calvin, Justitia and Old Testament Law

Calvin’s ideas surrounding justice and law emerge from a framework of sixteenth century legal scholarship processed through the grid of the Mosaic Law. Everything that Calvin wrote about law was profoundly influenced by his in-bred conceptions of Graeco-Roman law in his scholastic days as a student at the universities of Orlẻans and Bourges.

Calvin explained a tripartite purpose to the law of God. There was the moral law (or Decalogue) that exemplified the expressed character of God in pure form that binds all rational creatures to it in character and conduct. There was the ceremonial law that was abrogated with the coming of Christ, useful as types and shadows of the Christ to come, now done away with in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Finally the judicial law, for the civil and criminal element of a theocratic kingdom and nation, was a Jewish counterpart of national laws in other countries. His view of the law in the first five books of Moses is harmonized in four heads: 1) preface, 2) Decalogue, 3) supplements to the two tables of the law, 4) the practical application and use of the law.

The “clue” to Calvin’s concept of justice in the law resides in the epieikei, or the clemency and the letter of the law based on the intention of the Lawgiver. He taught that man in his fallen condition still retains enough reason and rationale to be “distinguished from the brute beast (Institutes, 2.2.21).” “Equity, then, is the prime principle for Calvin in understanding true justice.” Such teaching is explicit in the Lawgiver of the Old Testament and made full by the teachings of Christ in the New Testament.

Interpreting John Calvin: Chapter 9, Against Luxury and License in Geneva

A fragment of Calvin’s writings called De Luxo (1546) demonstrates his desire to uphold and improve the piety and private morality of the people in Geneva. The intention of the document is to outline the base pleasures of life that ought not to take precedence over the good of the soul. Calvin quotes Augustine to epitomize the purpose of the tract when he says, “Out of your abundance actors are steeped in luxury, while the poor lack even necessities.”

Calvin attempted to set up a society where the Lord’s Supper remained at the center. This meant that the city-state of Geneva desired to protect against the pollution that immorality brought to the people over holiness. Calvin submitted a number of works to the Genevan council demonstrating the need to make whatever provisions necessary for the attainment of holy morals. Thus, Calvin had an intricate structure laid out for the use of the Law, the use of Punishment to that law, and the use of Church discipline (all of which remained tripartite in their structure (cf. table 59). The end of this crusade, then, was the “protection of communion through moral discipline,” for “a state with defective laws will have defective morals (Seneca, Ep. Mor. 94:38/LCL 3.36f).”

In this document Calvin explains the devilish tendencies of luxury that to him are “childish.” Abstinence should be sought rather than pleasure (luxury). Sensual pleasures in those outwardly shameless affect those who are weak and impressionable. In luxury lust is exemplified, and acts such as dancing, gluttony, drinking and dressing lavishly should be held in contempt. The poor, then, are oppressed by the acts of the rich.

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