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The Riches of Bunyan

J >> Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin >> The Riches of Bunyan




And to Christians who are neither authors nor preachers, this life
of romantic privacy and illustrious obscurity has its lessons, alike
to awe and to cheer, of solemn warning and of sustaining hope. No
scene or station of all the earth that can eye paradise, or catch
the gleams of the atoning cross, is truly ignoble or utterly
forlorn. He who promised that, in the last days, the inscription
which shone on the front of the high-priest's mitre, "HOLINESS UNTO
THE LORD," should be written also on the very bells of the horses,
and that "every pot" in Jerusalem, and its outlying streets should
become holy as the consecrated furniture of his own temple and
altar, can in like manner render the lowliest scenes of human art
and toil and traffic the schools of truth and duty and peace,
schools ministering alike to the truest happiness and to the most
perfect holiness of our race. He who gave, as in Bunyan's case he
did, to the maker or mender of culinary vessels the sacred skill to
grave the all-holy Name, as one dignifying and consecrating them, on
all the objects and scenes and accompaniments of his humble labors,
can, in our times and in our various stations, make each allowable
task of our earthly life to become also "HOLINESS TO THE LORD;" and
as the Christian's body is made a TEMPLE of the Holy Grhost, so can
he render the Christian himself, in all his social relations and
enterprises, "A PRIEST AND A KING UNTO GOD." And the great principle
of conciliation amid earth's jarring tribes and clashing interests,
and of true and helpful communion among mankind, is not external but
internal, not material but spiritual, not, terrene but celestial;
and is found in the blending by this one divine Spirit, of all
earth's inhabitants, in a common contrition before a common
redemption, tending as these inhabitants are, under a common sin and
doom, to the same inevitable graves; but all of them invited, in the
one name of one Christ, to aspire to the same heaven of endless and
perfect blessedness.

WILLIAM R. WILLIAMS.
NEW YORK, January, 1851.






THE RICHES OF BUNYAN.

I. GOD.

GLORY OF GOD.





God is the chief good--good so as nothing is but himself. He is in
himself most happy; yea, all good and all true happiness are only to
be found in God, as that which is essential to his nature; nor is
there any good or any happiness in or with any creature or thing but
what is communicated to it by God. God is the only desirable good;
nothing without him is worthy of our hearts. Right thoughts of God
are able to ravish the heart; how much more happy is the man that
has interest in God. God alone is able by himself to put the soul
into a more blessed, comfortable, and happy condition than can the
whole world; yea, and more than if all the created happiness of all
the angels of heaven did dwell in one man's bosom. I cannot tell
what to say. I am drowned. The life, the glory, the blessedness, the
soul-satisfying goodness that is in God, are beyond all expression.

It was this glory of God, the sight and visions of this God of
glory, that provoked Abraham to leave his country and kindred to
come after God. The reason why men are so careless of and so
indifferent about their coming to God, is because they have their
eyes blinded--because they do not perceive his glory.

God is so blessed a one, that did he not hide himself and his glory,
the whole world would be ravished with him; but he has, I will not
say reasons of state, but reasons of glory, glorious reasons why he
hideth himself from the world and appeareth but to particular ones.

What is heaven without God? But many there be who cannot abide God;
no, they like not to go to heaven, because God is there. The nature
of God lieth cross to the lusts of men. A holy God, a glorious holy
God, an infinitely holy God; this spoils all. But to the soul that
is awakened, and that is made to see things as they are, to him God
is what he is in himself, the blessed, the highest, the only eternal
good, and he without the enjoyment of whom all things would sound
but empty in the ears of that soul.

Methinks, when I consider what glory there is at times upon the
creatures, and that all their glory is the workmanship of God, "O
Lord," say I, "what is God himself?" He may well be called the God
of glory, as well as the glorious Lord; for as all glory is from
him, so in him is an inconceivable well-spring of glory, of glory to
be communicated to them that come by Christ to him. Wherefore, let
the glory and love and bliss and eternal happiness that are in God,
allure thee to come to him by Christ.

MAJESTY OF GOD.

What is God's majesty to a sinful man, but a consuming fire? And
what is a sinful man in himself, or in his approach to God, but as
stubble fully dry?

What mean the tremblings, the tears, those breakings and shakings of
heart that attend the people of God, when in an eminent manner they
receive the pronunciation of the forgiveness of sins at his mouth,
but that the dread of the majesty of God is in their sight mixed
therewith? God must appear like himself, speak to the soul like
himself; nor can the sinner, when under these glorious discoveries
of its Lord and Saviour, keep out the beams of his majesty from the
eyes of its understanding.

Alas, there is a company of poor, light, frothy professors in the
world, that carry it under that which they call the presence of God,
more like to antics than sober, sensible Christians; yea, more like
to a fool of a play, than those who have the presence of God. They
would not carry it so in the presence of a king, nor yet of the lord
of their land, were they but receivers of mercy at his hand. They
carry it even in their most eminent seasons, as if the sense and
sight of God, and his blessed grace to their souls in Christ, had a
tendency in it to make men wanton: but indeed it is the most
humbling and heart-rending sight in the world; it is fearful.

OBJECTION. But would you not have us rejoice at the sight and sense
of the forgiveness of our sins?

ANSWER. Yes; but yet I would have you, and indeed you shall when God
shall tell you that your sins are pardoned indeed, "rejoice with
trembling;" for then you have solid and godly joy: a joyful heart
and wet eyes in this, will stand very well together; and it will be
so, more or less. For if God shall come to you indeed, and visit you
with the forgiveness of sins, that visit removeth the guilt, but
increaseth the sense of thy filth; and the sense of this, that God
hath forgiven a filthy sinner, will make thee both rejoice and
tremble. O, the blessed confusion which will then cover thy face,
while thou, even thou, so vile a wretch, shalt stand before God to
receive at his hand thy pardon, and so the first-fruits of thy
eternal salvation. "That thou mayest remember, and be confounded,
and never open thy mouth any more, because of thy shame, when I am
pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord
God." Jer. 33:8, 9; Ezek. 16:63.

Since the NAME of God is that by which his nature is expressed, and
since he naturally is so glorious and incomprehensible, his name
must needs be the object of our fear; and we ought always to have a
reverent awe of God upon our hearts at what time soever we think of
or hear his name; but most of all when we ourselves do take his holy
and fearful name into our mouths, especially in a religious manner;
that is, in preaching, praying, or holy conference.

Make mention then of the name of the Lord at all times with great
dread of his majesty on your hearts, and in great soberness and
truth. To do otherwise is to profane the name of the Lord, and to
take his name in vain.

Next to God's nature and name, his service, his instituted worship,
is the most dreadful thing under heaven. His name is upon his
ordinances, his eye is upon the worshippers, and his wrath and
judgment upon those that worship not in his fear.

His presence is dreadful; and not only his presence in common, but
his special, yea, his most comfortable and joyous presence. When God
comes to bring a soul news of mercy and salvation, even that visit,
that presence of God is fearful. When Jacoh went from Beersheba to
Haran, he met with God in the way by a dream, in the which he
apprehended a ladder set upon the earth, whose top reached to
heaven. Now in this dream, at the top of this ladder, he saw the
Lord, and heard him speak unto him, not threateningly, not as having
his fury come up into his face, but in the most sweet and gracious
manner, saluting him with promise of goodness after promise of
goodness, to the number of eight or nine. Yet, I say, when he awoke,
all the grace that discovered itself in this heavenly vision to him
could not keep him from dread and fear of God's majesty: "And Jacob
awoke out of his sleep and said, 'Surely the Lord was in this place,
and I knew it not;' and he was afraid, and said, 'How dreadful is
this place; this is none other but the house of God, and this is the
gate of heaven.'"

At another time, when Jacob had that memorable visit from God, in
which he gave him power as a prince to prevail with him; yea, and
gave him a name, that by his remembering it he might call God's
favor the better to his mind; yet, even then and there such dread of
the majesty of God was upon him, that he went away wondering that
his life was preserved. Man crumbles to dust at the presence of God;
yea, though he show himself to us in his robes of salvation. Gen.
28:10-17; 32:30.

JUSTICE OF GOD.

You may see a few of the sparks of the justice of God against sin
and sinners, by his casting off angels for sin from heaven and hell,
by his drowning the old world, by his burning of Sodom and Gomorrah
to ashes.

God is resolved to have the mastery. God is merciful, and is come
forth into the world by his Son, tendering grace unto sinners by the
gospel, and would willingly make a conquest over them for their good
by his mercy. Now he being come out, sinners like briars and thorns
do set themselves against him, and will have none of his mercy.
Well, but what says God? Saith he, "Then I will march on. I will go
through them, and burn them together. I am resolved to have the
mastery one way or another; if they will not bend to me and accept
of my mercy in the gospel, I will bend them and break them by my
justice in hell-fire."

HOLINESS OF GOD.

The holiness of God makes the angels cover their faces, and crumbles
Christians, when they behold it, into dust and ashes.

SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD.

The will of God is the rule of all righteousness, neither knoweth he
any other way by which he governeth and ordereth any of his actions.
Whatsoever God doeth, it is good because he doeth it; whether it be
to give grace or to detain it, whether in choosing or refusing. The
consideration of this made the holy men of old ascribe righteousness
to their Maker, even when yet they could not see the reason of his
actions; they would rather stand amazed and wonder at the heights
and depths of his unsearchable judgments, than quarrel at the most
strange and obscure of them.

SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD IN CONVERSION.

Mercy may receive him that we have doomed to hell, and justice may
take hold on him whom we have judged to be bound up in the bundle of
life. We, like Joseph, are for setting of Manasseh before Ephraim;
but God, like Jacob, puts his hands across, and lays his right hand
upon the worst man's head and his left hand upon the best, Gen. 48,
to the amazement and wonderment even of the best of men.

PROVIDENCE OF GOD IN CONVERSION.

Doth no man come to Jesus Christ by the will, wisdom, and power of
man, but by the gift, promise, and drawing of the Father? Then here
is room for Christians to stand and wonder at the effectual working
of God's providence, that he hath made use of as means to bring them
to Jesus Christ.

What was the providence that God made use of as a means, either more
remote or near, to bring thee to Jesus Christ? Was it the removing
of thy habitation, the change of thy condition, the loss of
relations, estate, or the like? Was it the casting of thine eye upon
some good book, the hearing thy neighbors talk of heavenly things,
the beholding of God's judgments as executed upon others, or thine
own deliverance from them, or thy being strangely cast under the
ministry of some godly man? O take notice of such providence or
providences. They were sent and managed by mighty power to do thee
good. God himself hath joined himself to this chariot, yea, and so
blessed it that it failed not to accomplish the thing for which it
was sent.

CONDESCENSION OF GOD.

Notwithstanding there is such a revelation of God in his word, in
the book of creatures, and in the book of providences, yet the
scripture says, "Lo, these are parts of his ways, but how little a
portion is heard of him;" so great is God above all that we have
read, heard, or seen of him, either in the Bible, in heaven, or
earth, or sea, or what else is to be understood. But now that a poor
mortal, a lump of sinful flesh, or, as the scripture phrase is, poor
dust and ashes, should be in the favor, in the heart, and wrapped up
in the compassions of such a God! O amazing; O astonishing
consideration! And yet, "this God is our God for ever and ever, and
he will be our guide even unto death."

MERCY OF GOD.

As God has mercies to bestow, and as he has designed to bestow them,
so those mercies are no fragments or the leavings of others, but
mercies that are full and complete to do for thee what thou wantest,
wouldst have, or canst desire. As I may so say, God has his bags
that were never yet untied, never yet broken up, but laid by him
through a thousand generations for those that he commands to hope in
his mercy.

I tell you, sirs, you must not trust your own apprehensions nor
judgments of the mercy of God; you do not know how he can cause it
to abound: that which seems to be short and shrunk up to you, he can
draw out and cause to abound exceedingly. There is a breadth and
length and depth and height therein, when God will please to open
it, that for its infiniteness can swallow up not only all thy sins,
but all thy thoughts and imaginations, and that also can drown thee
at last. "Now unto him that is able," as to mercy, "to do exceeding
abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power
that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus
throughout all ages, world without end. Amen."

This therefore is a wonderful thing, and shall be wondered at to all
eternity, that the river of mercy, that at first did seem to be but
ancle deep, should so rise and rise that at last it became "waters
to swim in, a river that could not be passed over." Ezck. 47:5.

GOD THE JUSTIFIER.

The first cause of justification before God dependeth upon the will
of God, who will justify because he will; therefore the meritorious
cause must also be of his own providing, else his will cannot herein
be absolute; for if justification depend upon our personal
performances, then not upon the will of God. He may not have mercy
upon whom he will, but on whom man's righteousness will give him
leave; but his will, not ours, must rule here, therefore his
righteousness and his only. So then, men are justified from the
curse in the sight of God, while sinners in themselves.

GLORY OF GOD IN REDEMPTION.

In redemption by the blood of Christ, God is said to abound towards
us in all WISDOM. Here we see the highest contradictions reconciled;
here justice kisseth the sinner; here a man stands just in the sight
of God, while confounded at his own pollutions; and here he that
hath done no good, hath yet a sufficient righteousness, "even the
righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ."

The JUSTICE of God is here more seen than in punishing all the
damned.

The MYSTERY OF GOD'S WILL is here more seen than in hanging the
earth upon nothing; while he condemneth Christ though righteous, and
justifieth us though sinners, while he "maketh him to be sin for us,
and us the righteousness of God in him."

The POWER of God is here more seen than in making heaven and earth;
for, for one to hear and get the victory over sin when charged by
the justice of an infinite Majesty, in so doing he shows the height
of the highest power; for where sin by the law is charged, and that
by God immediately, there an infinite Majesty opposeth, and that
with the whole of his justice, holiness, and power; so then, he that
is thus charged and engaged for the sin of the world, must not only
he equal with God, but show it by overcoming that curse and judgment
that by infinite justice is charged upon him for sin.

When angels and men had sinned, how did they fall and crumble before
the anger of God! They had not power to withstand the terror, nor
could there be worth found in their persons or doings to appease
displeased justice. Here then is power seen: sin is a mighty thing;
it crusheth all in pieces, save him whose Spirit is eternal. Heb.
9:14. Set Christ and his sufferings aside, and you neither see the
evil of sin nor the displeasure of God against it; you see them not
in their utmost. Jesus Christ made manifest his eternal power and
godhead more by bearing and overcoming our sins, than in making or
upholding the whole world. 1 Cor. 1:24.

The LOVE AND MERCY of God are more seen in and by this doctrine than
any other way. Here is love, that God sent his Son--his darling--his
Son that never offended--his Son that was always his delight!
Herein is love, that he sent him to save sinners--to save them by
bearing their sins, by bearing their curse, by dying their death,
and by carrying their sorrows! Here is love, in that while we were
yet without strength, Christ died for the ungodly!

GOD A FATHER.

O how great a task is it for a poor soul that comes, sensible of sin
and the wrath of God, to say in faith but this one word, Father! I
tell you, however hypocrites think, yet the Christian that is so
indeed finds all the difficulty in this very thing; he cannot say
God is his Father. O, saith he, I dare not call him Father. And
hence it is that the Spirit must be sent into the hearts of God's
people for this very thing, to cry Father; it being too great a work
for any man to do knowingly and believingly without it. When I say
knowingly, I mean knowing what it is to be a child of God and to be
born again; and when I say believingly, I mean for the soul to
believe, and that from good experience, that the work of grace is
wrought in him. This is the right calling of God, Father; and not as
many do, to say in a babbling way the Lord's prayer by heart. No,
here is the life of prayer, when in or with the Spirit, a man being
made sensible of sin and how to come to the Lord for mercy, he
comes, I say, in the strength of the Spirit, and crieth, Father.
That one word spoken in faith, is better than a thousand prayers in
a formal, cold, lukewarm way.

Naturally the name of God is dreadful to us, especially when he is
discovered to us by those names that declare his justice, holiness,
power, and glory; but the word FATHER is a familiar word; it
frighteth not the sinner, but rather inclineth his heart to love and
be pleased with the remembrance of him. Hence Christ also, when he
would have us to pray with godly boldness, put this word FATHER into
our mouths, saying, "When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in
heaven;" concluding thereby that in the familiarity which by such a
word is intimated, the children of God may take more holdness to
pray for and ask great things. I myself have often found that when I
can say but this word, FATHER, it doth me more good than when I call
him by any other scripture name.

It is worth your noting, that to call God by his relative title was
rare among the saints in Old Testament times; but now in New
Testament times, he is called by no name so often as this, both by
the Lord Jesus Christ himself and by the apostles afterwards. Indeed
the Lord Jesus was he that first made this name common among the
saints, and that taught them in their discourses, in their prayers,
and in their writings, so much to use it; it being more pleasing to,
and discovering more plainly our interest in God, than any other
expression. For by this one name we are made to understand that all
our mercies are the offspring of God, and that we also who are
called are his children by adoption.

FAITHFULNESS OF GOD.

Faithfulness in him that rules is that which makes Zion rejoice,
because thereby the promises yield milk and honey. For now the
faithful God, that keepeth covenant, performs to his church that
which he told her he would. Wherefore our rivers shall run and our
brooks yield honey and butter. Job 20:17.

Let this teach all God's people to expect, to look, and wait for
good things from the throne. But O, methinks this throne out of
which good comes like a river, who but would be a subject to it? who
but would worship before it?

PRESENCE OF GOD.

God's presence is renewing, transforming, seasoning, sanctifying,
commanding, sweetening, and lightening to the soul. Nothing like it
in all the world: his presence supplies all wants, heals all
maladies, saves from all dangers, is life in death, heaven in hell,
all in all.

GOD'S REPENTING.

"And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth."
Repentance in us is a change of the mind, but in God a change of his
dispensations; for otherwise he repenteth not, neither can he,
because it standeth not with the perfection of his nature. "In him
is no variableness, nor shadow of turning."

Wherefore it is man, not God, that turns. When men reject the mercy
and ways of God, they cast themselves under his wrath and
displeasure; which, because it is executed according to the nature
of his justice and the severity of his law, they miss of the mercy
promised before; which that we may know, those shall one day feel
that shall continue in final impenitency. Therefore God, speaking to
their capacity, tells them he hath repented of doing them good. It
repented the Lord that he had made Saul king; and yet this
repentance was only a change of the dispensation which Saul by his
wickedness had put himself under; otherwise the Strength, the
Eternity of Israel will not lie nor repent.

The sum is, therefore, that men had now by their wickedness put
themselves under the justice and law of God; which justice, by
reason of its perfection, could not endure they should abide on the
earth any longer; and therefore now, as a just reward of their deed,
they must be swept from the face thereof.

PROVIDENCE OF GOD.

We should tremblingly glory and rejoice when we see God in the
world, though upon those that are the most terrible of his
dispensations. God the Creator will sometimes mount himself and ride
through the earth, in such majesty and glory that he will make all
to stand in the tent-doors to behold him. O how he rode in his
chariots of salvation, when he went to save his people out of the
land of Egypt. How he shook the nations. Then his glory covered the
heavens, and the earth was full of his praise. His brightness was as
the light: he had horns coming out of his hand, and there was the
hiding of his power.

These are glorious things, though shaking dispensations God is
worthy to be seen in his dispensations as well as in his word,
though the nations tremble at his presence. "O that thou wouldest
rend the heavens, that thou wouldest comedown," saith the prophet,
"that the mountains might flow down at thy presence."

"We know God, and he is our God, our own God; of whom or of what
should we be afraid? When God roars out of Zion, and utters his
voice from Jerusalem, when the heavens and the earth do shake, the
Lord shall be the hope of his people and the strength of the
children of Israel."

He that knows the sea, knows the waves will toss themselves; he that
knows a lion, will not much wonder to see his paw or to hear the
voice of his roaring. And shall we that know our God, be stricken
with a panic fear when he cometh out of his holy place to punish the
inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity? We should stand like
those that are next to angels, and tell the blind world who it is
that is thus mounted upon his steed, and that hath the clouds for
the dust of his feet, and that thus rideth upon the wings of the
wind: we should say unto them, "This God is our God for ever and
ever, and he shall be our guide even unto death."

There are providences of two sorts, seemingly good and seemingly
bad; and those do usually as Jacob did when he blessed the sons of
Joseph, cross hands and lay the blessing where we would not. There
are providences unto which we would have the blessings entailed; but
they are not. And these are providences that smile upon the flesh,
such as cast into the lap health, wealth, plenty, ease, friends, and
abundance of this world's good: because these, as Manasseh's name
doth signify, have in them an aptness to make us forget our toil,
our low estate, and from whence we were; but the great blessing is
not in them.

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