fort in time of trouble. Nothing but God and Christ to be trusted in, and trusted to, and there is enough in them to support and comfort us, as hath been shewed: but no confidence to be put in the creature; there is a curse upon such confidence, but a blessing on them that trust in God. No trusting in friends, riches, gifts, or any thing; for so to do, is idolatry, to give that to the creature, which is due to God alone.

Fifthly, Hence we see the reason why so many faint in the day of adversity, and sin under trouble; and others use unlawful means to prevent trouble, or to get out of it. It is, because they want this faith in God and Christ; and for want of it, too many miscarry under affliction.

The second use is, by way of exhortation to all the disciples of Christ, in the word of the text; let not your hearts be troubled, but believe in God, and believe in Christ. You must get and act faith in God and Christ, this is the only preventive, the only remedy against heart trouble. Our Lord in this text commands it, and commends it: we must needs get faith above all gettings; next to Christ, we must get faith, for we cannot have Christ without faith: go to God for it, it is his work, his gift, yea, it is his operation; yea, the same power that raised up Jesus from the dead, must be put forth upon a soul to work faith, Eph. i. 19, 20. The exceeding great and mighty working of the power of God, to raise

up the soul to God and Christ, and to enable it to lay hold on God and Christ: for such is our natural proneness to live by sense and carnal reason; and such is the most transcendent excellency of God and Christ, and of divine things, which faith looks unto; and so great an inclination we have to self-sufficiency, and so much rooted in self-love, and inordinate love of the creature, and so hard to take off the soul from false bottoms; and because we are such strangers to God naturally; and because there is so much guilt of sin still remaining on us, by our renewed provocations, that we are afraid to entertain serious thoughts of God; and because of that infinite distance between God and us, we can never come to believe in him, and rely upon him, until our hearts be renewed by the pow er of grace, and this divine grace of faith infused into them. Therefore must we go to God and Christ, and put up strong cries and prayers to God to work faith in us, and ne ver give over, until it be wrought in us.

And having got faith, we must act and exercise it upon God in Christ; upon God, E say, he only is the object of faith, and is wor thy of it; for a man can be in no condition, in which God is at a loss, and cannot help him. If comforts and means of deliverance be wanting, God can create comforts, and command deliverance, Isa. lvii. 19. He can bring light out of darkness, to him all things are possible.

1. Then, faith assents to, and is persuaded that there is a God, the infinite first, and best being of all things, and who giveth being to all things, Heb. xi. 6.

2. That in this blessed being are three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and all the object of our faith.

3. Faith must always act on God in Christ, and not otherwise; for in Christ God reconciles the world. In Christ, God becomes our friend, is at peace with us; by Christ, the enmity between God and us is taken away; in Christ God becomes our father, John i. 12. Gal. iii. 26.

4. Faith is acted by meditation on, considering of, and applying, and appropriating of God in Christ to the soul, laying claim to all that God is, and to all that God hath as its own.

5. It must also act upon the promises of God in his word, and upon God and Christ in them. God hath opened all his heart to us in his word, making many sweet promises, exceeding great and precious promises, 2 Pet. i. 4. and also, he hath made a covenant of grace with us, to bestow himself and all good things upon us, upon which we must live, until promises end in performances. These promises are our spiritual treasury: promises of pardon of sin, upon repentance and faith: promises of renewing sanctifying grace; promises of the spirit, of heaven, of eternal life and glory, of mansions in the father's house,

and of all things needful in the way to the kingdom, that we shall want no good thing, and that all things shall work together for our good, &c.

Lastly, That our hearts may not be troubled, but fully satisfied and comforted, we must by faith lay hold on God, take hold of God's strength, which is his mercy in Christ and most solemnly, most considerately, and most sincerely take God for our God in Christ, and actually enter into covenant with him: this covenant is founded upon Jesus Christ, his satisfaction and righteousness; and therefore we must also believe in Christ, taking him for our only Lord and saviour, receiving him by faith as he is offered to us in the gospel, to be all in all to us.

As God offers, so faith receives; God offers himself in Christ, and so faith receives him. God doth, as it were say, in the gospel, O poor lost sinner, come to my son Jesus, take him for the only Lord and saviour; and by him come to me, and take me for thy God and father: and by faith the poor believer echoeth back, my Lord and my God, I humbly and heartily come to thee, accept of thee, close with thee: and so by faith the believing soul becomes one with God and Christ; and hereupon the soul by faith cleaves to God and Christ, and unfeignedly, and unreservedly, resigns and gives up its whole self to God in Christ, taking God in Christ for his, and entirely surrenders up itself to be the Lord's." My beloved

iş mine, and I am his." Now faith thus acted, will certainly cure all heart troubles.

In order then to obtain solid comfort in all our distresses, let us carefully look whether these acts of faith have really passed upon our souls have we thus actually, understandingly, and sincerely believed in God, and in Christ? Have we unfeignedly entered into covenant with God in Christ? Can we conclude that God is our God in Christ, by our being his? If we be entirely his, he is ours for certain, 1 John iv. 19. Cant. ii. 16. If we place all our happiness in him, Psal. Ixxiii. 25. If we give him the throne in our hearts, subjecting our whole selves to his government, making Godin Christ all our love, our trust, joy, desire, delight, fear, our all, cleaving to him alone and above all, depending upon him as our chief good; contending ourselves with him as all-sufficient for us, resigning up ourselves to his good will, to be, to do, and suffer what he will: if we can and do engage ourselves to sincere obedience, that none of his commandments be grievous to us: if in all things we give Christ the pre-eminence; if we have received the spirit of Christ, as Rom. viii. 9. Gal. iv. 6. which joins us to him, and makes us one spirit with him, and which is a spirit of adoption, whereby the soul seeing his interest in God as his father, can freely go to God in all his straits. If we have the graces of the spirit, as "love, meekness, patience, humility, &c." If we have a resemblance of our father in us, a likeness of disposi