he gospel, how it
is inseparably chained and linked into this, "that we sin not." We are
called to fellowship with the Father and the Son, and herein is his glory
and our happiness. Now, this proclaims with a loud voice, "that we sin
not," for, what more contrary to that design of union and communion with
God, than to sin, which disunites and discommunicates the soul from God.
The nature of sin you know, is the transgression of his law, and so it is
the very just opposition of the creatures will to the will of him that
made it. Now, how do ye imagine that this can consist with true friendship
and fellowship, which looseth that conjunction of wills and affections,
which is the bond of true friendship, and the ground of fellowship? _Idem
velle atque idem nolle, haec demum vera amicitia est._(251) The conspiracy
of our desires and delights in one point with God's, this sweet
coincidency makes our communion, and what communion then can there be with
God, when that which his soul abhors is your delight, and his delight is
not your desire? "What communion hath light with darkness?" Sin is
darkness. All sin but especially sin entertained and maintained, sin that
hath the full consent of the heart, and carrieth the whole man after it,
that is Egyptian darkness, an universal darkness over the soul. This
being interposed between God and the soul, breaks off communion, eclipses
that soul totally. Therefore, my beloved, if you do believe that you are
called unto this high dignity of fellowship with God, and if your souls be
stirred with some holy ambition after it, consider that "these things are
written that ye sin not." Consider what baseness is in it, for one that
hath such a noble design, as fellowship with the Highest, to debase his
soul so far and so low, as to serve sinful and fleshly lusts. There is a
vileness and wretchedness in the service of sin, that any soul, truly and
nobly principled, cannot but look upon it with indignation, because he can
behold nothing but indignity in it. "Shall I who am a ruler," saith
Nehemiah, "shall such a man as I flee? and who is there that being as I
am, would flee?" Neh. vi. 11. A Christian hath more reason. Shall such a
man as I, who am born again to such a hope, and called to such a high
dignity, shall I, who aim and aspire so high as fellowship with God,
debase and degrade myself with the vilest servitude? Shall I defile in
that puddle again, till my own clothes abhor me, wh