The Works of John Bunyan, vol 1 by John Bunyan (books to read to improve english .TXT) 📕

[Second. A direction to the well managing of the duty of hope.]

I shall therefore come, in the next place, to treat of the well managing of this duty with reference to this primary object, which is the Lord himself. ‘Let Israel hope in the Lord.’ There is a general object of hope, and there is a particular object; there is a common object, and there is a special one. Of the general and common object, to wit, of heaven and happiness, I have said something already; wherefore it remains that now we come and treat of this particular and special object of our hope: ‘Let Israel hope in the Lord.’ The Lord, therefore, is to be the particular and special object of our hope: ‘Let Israel hope in the Lord.’ Now in that there is not only a duty here exhorted to, but a direction for the better management of that duty, to the particular and special object upon which this duty should be exercised, it suggesteth, how apt good men are, especially in times of trouble, the case of Israel now, to fix their hopes in other things than on the Lord. We have seen a great deal of this in our days; our days indeed have been days of trouble, especially since the discovery of the Popish plot, for then we began to fear cutting of throats, of being burned in our beds, and of seeing our children dashed in pieces before our faces. But looking about us, we found we had a gracious king, brave parliaments, a stout city, good lord-mayors, honest sheriffs, substantial laws against them, and these we made the object of our hope, quite forgetting the direction in this exhortation, ‘Let Israel hope in the Lord.’ For indeed the Lord ought to be our hope in temporals, as well as in spirituals and eternals. Wherefore Israel of old were checked, under a supposition of placing their hope for temporals in men; ‘It is better to trust in the Lord, than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord, than to put confidence in princes’ (Psa 118:8,9). And again, ‘Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help’ (Psa 146:3). This implieth that there is in us an incidency to forget God our hope, and to put confidence in something else. And to be sure we shall find it the more difficult to make the Lord our hope only, when things that are here, though deceitfully, proffer us their help.[12] But my design is not to treat of the object of hope but with reference to the next world. And as to that we must take heed that we set our hope in God, in God in the first place, and in nothing below or besides himself. To this end it is that he has given us his word, and appointed a law to Israel.

I. Because of his own grace he is become the special object of hope, designating himself in the most special sense to be the portion of his people (Psa 78:5-7)—‘The Lord is my portion, saith my soul, therefore will I hope in him’ (Lam 2:24). Wherefore this we must look well to, and take heed that we miss not of this object (Psa 146:5). This is the special object, the ultimate object, the object that we cannot be without; and that, short of which, we cannot be happy as, God willing, shall be showed more anon (Jer 50:7). God is not only happiness in himself, but the life of the soul, and he that puts goodness into every thing in the next world, in which goodness shall be found (Jer 17:13). And this our Lord Jesus Christ himself affirmeth, when he saith, ‘I am the way,’ to wit, the way to life and happiness. And yet he saith, ‘I am the way to the Father,’

for that it is HE that is the fountain and ocean of happiness and bliss.

So then, that we might in the next world be heirs of the highest good, God has made us heirs of his own good self; ‘Heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ’; heirs of God through Christ (Rom 18:17; Gal 4:7). This God, this eternal God, therefore, is of necessity to be the object of our hope, because he is, of grace, become our hope. The church in heaven, called the body and temple of God, is to be an habitation for himself, when it is finished, to dwell in for ever and ever. This then we hope for, to wit, to be possessed at that day with eternal life; eternal glory (1 Tim 6:12,19). Now this eternal life and eternal glory is through God the hope of his people (1 Peter 5:10; 1 John 5:20). And for this end, and to this bliss, are we called and regenerate in this world, ‘That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs, according to the hope of eternal life’ (Titus 3:7). Nor can it be, that heaven and happiness should ever be the portion of them that make not God their hope, any more than such a lady should hope to enjoy the estate of such a lord, who first makes not the lord himself her husband.[13]

Heaven, heaven is the talk of the ignorant, while the God of heaven they cannot abide. But shall such ever come to glory? But, II. God must be the special object of our hope, and him in special that must be enjoyed by us in the next world, or nothing can make us happy. We will suppose now, for the illustrating of this matter, that which is not to be supposed. As,

1. Suppose a man, when he dieth, should go to heaven, that golden place, what good would this do him, if he was not possessed of the God of it? It would be, as to sweetness, but a thing unsavoury; as to durableness, but a thing uncertain; as to society, as a thing forlorn; and as to life, but a place of death. All this is made to appear by the angels that fell; for when fallen, what was heaven to them? Suppose they staid but one quarter of an hour there after their fall, before they were cast out, what sweetness found they there, but guilt? What stay, but a continual fall of heart and mind?

What society, but to be abandoned of all? And what life, but death in its perfection? Yea, if it be true that some think, that for the promoting of grace, they are admitted yet to enter that place to accuse the saints on earth, yet what do they find there but what is grievous to them? It is the presence of God that makes heaven Heaven in all its beauteousness. Hence David, when he speaks of heaven, says, ‘Whom have I in heaven but thee?’ (Psa 73:25). As who should say, What would heaven yield to me for delights, if I was there without my God? It is the presence of God that will make heaven sweet to those who are his. And as it is that that makes the place, so it is interest in him that makes the company, and the deeds that are done there, pleasant to the soul. What solace can he that is without God, though he were in heaven, have with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the prophets and angels? How could he join in their thanks, and praises, and blessings of him for ever and ever, in whose favour, mercy, and grace, they are not concerned?

2. Suppose a man, when he dieth, should be made to live for ever, but without the enjoyment of God, what good would his life do him?

Why, it would be filled full of horror, darkness, desolation, sorrow, and all things that would tend to make it bitter to the soul. Witness they that live in hell; if it be proper to say they live in hell? It is no more possible for a man to live happily, were he possessed of all that heaven and life could afford him, suppose him to be without interest in God, than it is for a man that hath all the enjoyments of this world, if the sun was taken from him out of the firmament. As all things, whether it be heaven, angels, heavenly pleasures and delights, have had their being of him, so their being is continued by him, and made sweet of him.

Now, for the well managing of our hope, with reference to this special object of it, there are these things to be considered. And now I speak to all. We must know him right, we must come to him right. (1.) We must know him right. It is essential to happiness, and so to the making of the God of heaven our hope, to know him rightly (John 17:1-3). It is not every fancy, or every imagination of God, that thou mayst have, that will prove that therefore thou knowest God aright. In him there ‘is no variableness, neither shadow of turning’ (James 1:17). He only is what he is, what imaginations soever we have of him. We may set up idols and images of him, as much in our minds as some do in their houses and in their temples, and be as great, though not so gross idolaters as they.[14] Now if thou wouldst know him, thou must diligently feel for him in his works, in his Word, and in his ways, if perhaps thou mayst find the knowledge of him (Prov 2:1-5; Acts 17:27). (2.) Beware, when thou hast found him, that thou go to him by his Son, whom he has sanctified and sent into the world, to be the way for sinners to go to God; and see that thou keepest in this path always, for out of him he is found intolerable, and a consuming-fire. (3.) Busy thyself with all thy might to make an interest in his Son, and he will willingly be thy Saviour, for he must become thine before his Father can be the object of thy hope (John 3:36). He that hath the Son, hath the Father, but contrariwise, he that hath not him has neither (2 John 9). (4.) Stay not in some transient comforts, but abide restless till thou seest an union betwixt thee and this Blessed One; to wit, that he is a root, and thou a branch; that he is head, and thou a member. And then shalt thou know that the case is so between thee and him, when grace and his Spirit has made thee to lay the whole stress of thy justification upon him and has subdued thy heart and mind to be ‘one spirit’ with him (Rom 4:4,5; 1 Cor 6:17). (5.) This done, hope thou in God, for he is become thy hope, that is, the object of it. And for thy encouragement so to do, consider that he is able to bear up thy heart, and has said he will do it, as to this very thing, to all those that thus hope in him. ‘Be of good courage and he shall strengthen thine heart,’ all ye that hope in the Lord (Psa 31:24). It is manifest, as was said before, that many difficulties lie in the way of hoping; but God will make those difficulties easy, by strengthening the heart of him that hopeth, to hope. He has a way to do that, which no creature can hinder, by the blessed work of his Holy Spirit. He can show us he loves us, that he may encourage our