17. CHAPTER 17.
CHAPTER 17. The strength of sin evidenced by its resistance to the power of the law. The measure of the STRENGTH of any person or defended city may be well taken from the opposition that they are able to withstand and not be prevailed against. If we hear of a city that has endured a long siege from a potent enemy, and yet it is not taken or conquered, whose walls have endured great batteries and are not demolished, even though we have never seen the place, we may conclude it is strong, if not impregnable. And this consideration will also evidence the power and strength of indwelling sin. It is able to hold out, and not only to live, but also to secure its reign and dominion,222 against very strong opposition that is made to it.
I will instance only the opposition that is made to it by the law, which is often great and terrible, but always fruitless; all its assaults are borne by it, and sin is not prevailed against. There are various things in which the law opposes itself to sin and its power; such as —
1. It reveals it. Sin in the soul is like a secret hectic sickness in the body — its being unknown and unperceived is one great means of its prevalence —it is like traitors in a civil state: while they lie hidden, they vigorously carry on their design. Most men in the world know nothing of this sickness, indeed, death of their souls. Though they have been taught something about the doctrine of it, they know nothing about its power. They do not know it so as to deal with it as their mortal enemy — just as a man who loves his life, whatever he is told, cannot be said to know that he has a hectic fever, if he does not set himself to stop its progress. This then, is what the law does — it reveals this enemy; it convinces the soul that there is such a traitor harboring in its bosom: Romans 7:7, “I would not have known sin, except by the law: for I would not have known lust, unless the law had said, You shall not covet.” “I would not have known it;” that is, fully, clearly, and distinctly. Conscience will somewhat agitate about it; but a man cannot know it clearly and distinctly from that. The law gives a man such a sight of sin as the blind man in the gospel gained upon the first touch of his eyes: “He saw men like trees walking,” — obscurely, confusedly.Mark 8:24 But when the law comes, that gives the soul a distinct sight of this indwelling sin. Again, “I would not have known it;” that is, the depths of it, the root of it, the habitual inclination of my nature to sin, which is here called “lust,” as it is in James 1:14. “I would not have known it,” or not known it to be sin, “except by the law.” This, then, is what the law does — it draws out this traitor from its secret lurking places, from the intimate recesses of the soul. A man, when the law comes, is no longer ignorant of his enemy. If he will now perish by him, it is openly and knowingly; he can only say that the law warned him about his enemy, that it revealed his enemy to him, yes, and raised an assembly of various affections about him in the soul — just as an officer who discovers a thief or robber, calls for assistance to apprehend him.
2. The law not only reveals sin, but reveals it to be a very bad inmate, dangerous, yes, pernicious to the soul:
Romans 7:13, “Was that then, which is good,” — that is, the law — “made death to me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good, so that sin by the commandment might become exceedingly sinful.”
There are many things in this verse in which we are not at present concerned: I only aim at the manifestation of sin by the law — it appears to be sin; and the manifestation of it in its own colors — it appears to be exceedingly sinful. The law lets the soul know the filth and guilt of this indwelling sin — how great they are, how vile it is, what an abomination, what an enmity to God, how it is hated by him. The soul will never more look at it as a small matter, whatever thoughts it had of it before, by which it is greatly surprised.
Just as a man who finds himself somewhat sickly, sends for a skillful physician. When he comes the man requires his judgment about his sickness. The physician, considering his condition, tells him, “Alas! I am sorry for you; the case is far worse for you than you imagine: your disease is mortal, and it has proceeded so far, pressing upon your spirits and infecting the whole mass of your blood, that unless the most effectual remedies are used, I doubt you will live but a very few hours.” So it is in this case. A man may have some trouble in his mind and conscience about indwelling sin; he finds that all is not so well as it should be with him, more from the effects of sin and its continual eruptions than from the nature of it, which he hopes to wrestle with. But now, when the law comes, it lets the soul know that its disease is deadly and mortal — that it is exceedingly sinful, as being the root and cause of all his alienation from God. And thus also, the law proceeds against it [to convict it].
3. The law judges the person, or it lets the sinner plainly know what he is to expect on account of this sin. This is the law’s proper work; its revealing property is only preparative to its judging. The law is itself when it is in the throne. Here it does not mince the matter with sinners, as we usually to do with one another, but it tells him plainly, “‘You are the man’ 2 Samuel 12:7 in whom this exceedingly sinful sin dwells, and you must answer for the guilt of it.” This, I think, if anything, should rouse a man to set himself in opposition to it; yes, to utterly destroy it. The law lets him know that on account of this sin he is subject to the curse and wrath of the great God against him; indeed, it pronounces the sentence of everlasting condemnation upon him on that account. “Abide in this state and perish,” is its language. It does not leave the soul without this warning in this world, and that will leave it without excuse on that account in the world to come.
4. The law so follows on its sentence, that it disquiets and frightens the soul, and does not allow it to enjoy the least rest or quietness in harboring its sinful inmate. Whenever the soul has indulged its commands, and made provision for it, the law immediately flies upon it with the wrath and terror of the Lord, and makes it quake and tremble. The soul will have no rest, but is like a poor beast that has a deadly arrow sticking in its sides, that makes it restless wherever it is and whatever it does.
5. The law does not stay here, but it also slays the soul: Romans 7:9 “For I was alive without the law once; but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died;” that is, by the soul’s conviction of the nature, power, and deserving of this indwelling sin, the law deprives the one in whom sin is found, of all that life of self-righteousness and hope which he formerly sustained himself with — it leaves him as a poor, dead, helpless, and hopeless creature. And all this is in pursuit of that opposition it makes against this sin. May we not expect that now sin’s power will be quelled and its strength broken — that it will die away before these strokes of the law of God? But the truth is, such is its power and strength that it is quite otherwise. Like the one whom the poets pretend to be born of the earth, when one thought to slay him by throwing him to the ground, by every fall he recovered new strength, and was more vigorous than before.223 So is it with all the falls and repulses that are given to indwelling sin by the law: for —
(1.) It is not conquered. A conquest infers two things in respect to the conquered — first, loss of dominion; and, secondly, loss of strength. Whenever anyone is conquered, he is stripped of both these; he loses both his authority and his power. So the armed strong man, being prevailed against, is bound and his goods are taken.Matthew 12:29 But now, neither of these befalls indwelling sin by the assaults of the law. It does not lose one jot of its dominion or strength by all the blows that are given to it. The law cannot do this thing: Romans 8:3; “For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh” — it cannot deprive sin of its power and dominion, for one that “is under the law is also under sin;” — that is, whatever power the law has upon the conscience of a man, so that he fears to sin lest the sentence and curse of it befalls him, sin still reigns and rules in his heart. Therefore the apostle says, Romans 6:14, “Sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not under the law, but under grace;” This plainly intimates that however much a person is in subjection to the authority of the law, that will not exempt and acquit him from the dominion of sin. Indeed, by all its work on the soul, the law incidentally increases the soul’s misery and bondage greatly, instead of freeing and acquitting it from the reign and bondage of sin — just as the judge’s sentence against a malefactor, adds to his misery. The soul is under the dominion of sin and, it may be, abides in its woeful condition in much security, fearing neither sin nor judgment. The law setting upon him in this condition, by all the ways mentioned before, brings him into great trouble and perplexity, fear and terror; but it does not deliver him at all. So it is with the soul as it was with the Israelites when Moses had delivered his message to Pharaoh; they were so far from getting liberty by it, that their bondage was increased, and “they found that they were in a very evil case,” Exodus 5:19. Yes, and we will see that sin does like Pharaoh: finding that its rule is disturbed, it grows more outrageously oppressive, and doubles the bondage of their souls. This is not then the work of the law: to destroy sin, or deprive it of that dominion which it has by nature. Nor, by all these strokes of the law, does sin lose any of its strength. It continues both its authority and its force; it is neither destroyed nor weakened. Indeed —
(2.) It is so far from being conquered that it is only enraged. The whole work of the law only provokes and enrages sin, and causes it, as it has opportunity, to exert its strength with more power, vigor, and force than formerly. The apostle shows this at large:
Romans 7:9 I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slayed me. 12 Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. 13 Was then that which is good made death to me? God forbid! But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good, so that sin, by the commandment, might become exceedingly sinful. But you will say, “Do we not see by experience, that many are worked upon by the preaching of the law to relinquish many sins and amend their lives, and to greatly contend against the eruptions of those other corruptions which they cannot yet mortify? And it cannot be denied that the power and efficacy of the law is great when preached and applied to the conscience in a due manner.” I answer —
[1.] It is acknowledged that the power of the law of God is very great and effectual. Great are the effects wrought by it, and it shall surely accomplish every end for which it is appointed by God.Isaiah 55:11 Yet subduing sin is none of its work — it is not designed by God for that purpose; and therefore it is no dishonor if it cannot do what is not its proper work, Romans 8:3.
[2.] Whatever effects it has on some, we see that in most, such is the power and prevalence of sin, that it makes no impression on them at all. May you not see everywhere, men living many years in congregations where the law is powerfully preached, and applied to the consciences as to all the ends and purposes for which the Lord is pleased to make use of it, and yet they are not once moved by it? — they receive no more impression from its strikes than blows with a straw would give to an adamant?224 They are not convinced by it, nor terrified, nor awed, nor instructed; but they continue deaf, ignorant, senseless, and secure, as if they had never been told of the guilt of sin or the terror of the Lord. Congregations are full of these who proclaim the triumphing power of sin over the dispensation of the law.
[3.] When any of the effects mentioned are wrought, it is not from the power of the letter of the law, but from the actual efficacy of the Spirit of God putting forth his virtue and power for that end and purpose; and we do not deny that the Spirit of the Lord is able to restrain and quell the power of lust when he pleases, and we have previously considered some ways by which he is pleased so to do. But —
[4.] Notwithstanding all that may be observed of the power of the law upon the souls of men, it is yet most evident that lust is not conquered, not subdued, nor mortified by the law; for —
1st. Though the course of sin may be repelled for a season by the dispensation of the law, yet the spring and fountain of it is not dried up by it. Though it withdraws and hides itself for a season, it is, as I have shown elsewhere, but to shift out of a storm, and then to return again. A traveler meeting with a violent storm of thunder and rain on his way, may immediately turn out of his way to some house or tree for his shelter; yet this does not cause him to give up his journey — as soon as the storm is over he returns to his way and progress again; so it is with men who are in bondage to sin. They are in a course of pursuing their lusts; the law meets with them in a storm of thunder and lightning from heaven, terrifies and hinders them on their way. This turns them for a season out of their course; they run to prayer or amend their life for some shelter from the storm of wrath which is feared coming upon their consciences. But is their course stopped? Are their principles altered? Not at all; as soon as the storm is over, they begin to wear down that sense and the terror that was upon them; they return to their former course in the service of sin again. This was the state with Pharaoh time and again.
2dly. In such seasons, sin is not conquered, but diverted. When it seems to fall under the power of the law, indeed it is only turned into a new channel; it is not dried up. If you go and set a dam against the streams of a river, so that you allow no water to pass in the old course and channel, but it breaks out another way, and turns all its streams in a new course, you would not say that you have dried up that river, even though some who come and look into the old channel may think, perhaps, that the waters are utterly gone. So it is in this case. The streams of sin, it may be, run in open sensuality and profaneness, in drunkenness and viciousness. The preaching of the law sets a dam against these courses — the conscience is terrified, and the man does not dare to walk in the ways in which he was formerly engaged. His companions in sin, not finding him in his old ways, begin to laugh at him, as one that is converted and growing precise;225 professors themselves begin to be persuaded that the work of God is upon his heart, because they see his old streams dried up. But if there has only been a work of the law upon him, there is a dam put to his course, but the spring of sin is not dried up; its streams have only been turned another way. It may be that the man has fallen upon other more secret or more spiritual sins; or if he is beaten away from them also, the whole strength of lust and sin will take up its residence in self-righteousness, and thereby pour out streams that are as filthy as any other way whatsoever. So that notwithstanding the whole work of the law upon the souls of men, indwelling sin will keep alive in them still: which is another evidence of its great power and strength.
I will still touch on some other evidences of the same truth that I have under consideration; but I will be brief in them. In the next place then,
1. The great endeavors of men, ignorant of the righteousness of Christ for subduing and mortifying sin, which are all fruitless endeavors, evidence the great strength and power of sin.
Men who have no strength against sin, may yet be made sensible of the strength of sin. The way by which, for the most part, they come to that knowledge, is by some previous sense that they had of the guilt of sin. Men have this by the light of their consciences; they cannot avoid it. This is not a thing in their choice — whether they will or not, they cannot help but know that sin is evil, and such an evil that it renders them liable to the judgment of God. This galls the minds and consciences of some so far as that they are kept in awe, and dare not sin as they would. Being awed with a sense of the guilt of sin and the terror of the Lord, men begin to endeavor to abstain from sin, at least from those sins which they have been most terrified about. While they have this design in hand, the strength and power of sin begins to reveal itself to them. They begin to find that there is something in them that is not in their own power; for notwithstanding their resolutions and purposes, they still sin; and they so sin, or sin in such a manner, that their consciences inform them that they must therefore perish eternally. This puts them on self-endeavors to suppress the eruption of sin, because they cannot be quiet unless they do so, nor do they have any rest or peace within. Now, being ignorant of that only way by which sin is to be mortified — that is, by the Spirit of Christ — they fix on many ways in their own strength to suppress it, if not to slay it; because being ignorant of the only way by which consciences burdened with the guilt of sin may be pacified — that is, by the blood of Christ — they endeavor by many other ways to accomplish that end in vain: for no man, by any self-endeavors, can obtain peace with God.
We must look into some of the ways by which they endeavor to suppress the power of sin (which throws them into an unquiet condition), and their insufficiency for that end:
(1.) First, they will promise and bind themselves by vows from those sins which they have been most liable to, and so have been most perplexed with. The psalmist shows that this is one great engine by which false and hypocritical persons endeavor to extricate and deliver themselves from trouble and perplexity. They make promises to God which he calls “flattering him with their lips.”226 So it is in this case. Being freshly galled with the guilt of any sin that, by the power of their temptations, they may have been frequently overtaken in, they vow and promise that (at least for some limited space of time) they will not commit that sin again. And this course of proceeding is prescribed to them by some who pretend to direct their consciences in this duty. Conscience of this 227 now makes them watch over themselves as to the outward act of the sin that they are galled with. And so it has one of these two effects: either they abstain from it for the time they have prefixed, or they do not. If they do not, as they seldom do — especially if it is a sin that has a particular root in their nature and constitution, and is ingrained by custom into a habit — if any suitable temptation is presented to them, their sin is increased, and with it, their terror. They are woefully discouraged in making any opposition to sin. And therefore, for the most part, after one or two vain attempts or maybe more, knowing no other way to mortify sin than this vowing against it, and keeping that vow in their own strength, they give up all contests. They wholly become the servants of sin, being bounded only by outward considerations, without any serious endeavors for a recovery.
Or, secondly, suppose that they have success in their resolutions, and do abstain from actual sins for their appointed season. Commonly, one of these two things ensues: either they think that they have well discharged their duty, and so they may a little now, at least for a season, indulge their corruptions and lusts; and so they are entangled again in the same snares of sin as formerly. Or else they reckon that their vow and promise has preserved them, and so they sacrifice to their own net and drag, setting up a righteousness of their own against the grace of God. This is so far from weakening indwelling sin, that instead it strengthens sin in its root and principle, so that it may hereafter reign in the soul in security. Or, at most, the best success that can be imagined for this way of dealing with sin, is but restraining some outward eruptions of it — which does not at all tend to weaken its power. Therefore such persons, by all their endeavors, are very far from being freed from the inward toiling, burning, disquieting, perplexing power of sin. And this is the state of most men who are kept in bondage under the power of conviction. Hell, death, and the wrath of God, are continually presented to their consciences. This makes them labor with all their strength against that thing in sin which most enrages their consciences and most increases their fears — that is, the actual eruption of sin. Because, for the most part, while they are freed from that eruption, they believe they are safe; though in the meantime, sin lies agitating in and defiling the heart continually. As with running sores, outward repelling medicines may skin them over, and hinder their corruption from coming forth, but the result of such medicines is that they cause the sores to fester inwardly. And so prove, though maybe less stinking and offensive than they were before, yet far more dangerous. So is it with this repelling of the power of corruption by men’s vows and promises against it — external eruptions may be restrained for a season, but the inward root and principle is not weakened in the least. And most commonly this is the result of this way of dealing with it: that sin, having gotten more strength, and being enraged by its restraint, breaks all its bounds, and captivates the soul to all kinds of filthy abominations. This is the principle, as observed before, of most of the visible apostasies which we have in the world:
2 Peter 2:19, While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. 20 For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them, and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning. The Holy Ghost compares sinners to lions, bears, and asps, because of the odious, fierce, and poisonous nature of this indwelling sin.228 Now, this is the excellency of gospel grace: that it changes the nature and inward principles of these otherwise passionate and untamed beasts, making the wolf like the kid, the lion like the lamb, and the bear like the cow, Isa 11.6-9.229 When this is effected, they may safely be trusted in — “a little child may lead them.” But these self-endeavors do not at all change the nature, but only restrain their outward violence. The man who takes a lion or a wolf and keeps him from ravening, while the creature’s inward violence yet remains, the man may well expect that at one time or another they will break their bonds, and fall back into their former ways of rapine and violence. However, shutting them up does not, as we see, change their natures, but only restrains their rage from open destruction. So it is in this case: it is grace alone that changes the heart and takes away that poison and fierceness that is in them by nature; men’s self-endeavors only coerce them as to some of their outward eruptions But —
(2.) Beyond bare vows and promises — along with some watchfulness to observe themselves in a rational use of ordinary means — men have put (and some still put) themselves onto extraordinary ways of mortifying sin. This is the foundation of all that has a show of wisdom230 and religion in the Papacy: their hours of prayer and fastings; their confining and cloistering of themselves; their pilgrimages, penances, and self-torturing discipline — all spring from this root. I will not speak of the innumerable evils that have attended these self-invented ways of mortification, and how all of them have been turned into means, occasions, and advantages to sin; nor of the horrible hypocrisy which evidently clings to most of their observers; nor of that superstition which gives life to them all, being a thing that is rivetted in the natures of some; and their constitutions, fixed on others by inveterate prejudices, and which is taken up by others for secular advantages.
Rather, I will suppose the best that can be made of it, and it will be found to be a self-invented design of men who are ignorant of the righteousness of God, to check this power of indwelling sin of which we speak. It is almost incredible what fearful self-macerations and horrible sufferings this design has carried men to; and undoubtedly their blind zeal and superstition will rise in judgment and condemn the horrible sloth and negligence of most of those to whom the Lord has granted the saving light of the gospel. But what is the end of these things? The apostle gives us a brief account in Romans 9:31-32. They do not attain the righteousness aimed at; they do not come to a conformity to the law: sin is not mortified, nor is its power weakened. But what sin loses in sensual, carnal pleasures, it makes up with great advantage in blindness, darkness, superstition, self-righteousness, and soul-pride; in contempt for the gospel and its righteousness, and reigns no less in believers than in the most profligate sinners in the world.
2. Lastly, the strength, efficacy, and power of this law of sin may be further evidenced from its life and in-being in the soul — notwithstanding the wound that is given to it at the soul’s initial conversion to God; and in the continual opposition that is made to it by grace. But this is the subject and design of another endeavor.
It may now be expected that we would add here the special uses of all this discovery that has been made of the power, deceit, prevalence, and success of this great adversary of our souls. But as for what concerns that humility, self-abasement, watchfulness, diligence, and application to the Lord Christ for relief — which becomes those who find, by experience, that the power of this law of sin is at work in them — these have been occasionally mentioned and inculcated through the whole preceding discourse. As for what concerns the actual mortification of it, I will only recommend to the reader, for his direction, another small treatise written long ago for that purpose;231 I suppose he may do well to consider it together with this one, if he finds these things are a concern for him.
“To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.”232
FINIS.