hearts, and
speak thus unto them: Have I lived so long a stranger to God, the fountain
of my life? Am I so far bewitched with the deceitful vanities of the
world, as not to think it incomparably better to rise up above all created
things, to communicate with the Father and the Son? And shall I go hence
without God and without Christ, when fellowship with them is daily,
freely, and plentifully holden forth? I beseech you, consider where it
must begin, and what must be laid down for the foundation of this
communion, even your union with Jesus Christ the Mediator between God and
man. And you cannot be one with him, but by forsaking yourselves, and
believing in him; and thence flows that constant abode and dwelling in
him, which is the mutual entertainment of Christ and a soul, after their
meeting together; "Can two walk together except they be agreed?" We are by
nature enemies to God. Now certainly reconciliation and agreement must
intervene by the blood of the cross, before any friendly and familiar
society be kept. Let this then be your first study, and it is first
declared in the gospel. Jesus Christ is holden out as partaking with you
in all your infirmities; he is represented as having fellowship with us in
our sins and curses, in our afflictions and crosses he hath fellowship in
our nature, to bear our sins and infirmities. Now, since he hath partaken
in these, you are invited to come and have fellowship with him in his
gifts and graces, in the precious merits of his death and suffering, in
his rising again and returning to glory. And this is the exchange he makes
and declares in the gospel: I have taken your sins and curses, O come and
take my graces, and that which is purchased by my blood. Now this is the
first beginning of a soul's renewed fellowship with God, and it is the
foundation of all that is to come to embrace this offer, to accept him
cordially as he is represented, and to pacify and quiet our own hearts by
faith in that he hath done. And this being once laid down as the ground
stone, the soul will grow up into more communion with him.

To speak aright of this communion, would require more acquaintance with it
than readily will be found amongst us. But it is more easy to understand
in what it is exercised and entertained, than to bring up our hearts unto
it. Certainly, it must neither be taken so low and wide, as if it
consisted all in these external duties and approaches of men unto God; for
there is no