Take Up the Cross

And the men, which Moses sent to search the land, who returned, and made all the congregation to murmur against him, by bringing up a slander upon the land,
— Numbers 14:36

How that they told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts.
— Jude 1:18

To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
— Jude 1:15

Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment: thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor honour the person of the mighty: but in righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbour.
— Leviticus 19:15

An Exposition Upon the Epistle of Jude, Verse 16, by William Jenkyn. The following contains an excerpt from his work.

These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having men’s persons in admiration because of advantage.
— Jude, Verse 16

In this verse our apostle excellently applies the forementioned prophecy of the last judgment unto these seducers, showing by sundry apt and pregnant proofs that these seducers were guilty of that ungodliness for which the wicked at the last day were to be judged. And they discover their ungodliness these four ways.

By being murmurers, complainers.

By following their lusts.

3. By boasting; speaking great swelling words. 4. By their admiration of  men’s persons.

1. They discover their ungodliness by showing themselves “murmurers, complainers.

Obs. 3. For our words we are responsible before the tribunal of Christ. Words pass away in respect of the sound, not in respect of the guilt and effect; even of idle words men shall give account, Matt. xii. 36, άργα, workless words, which benefit not, and administer no grace to the hearer; how much more then for hurtful words! If a man may sin by silence, how much more by hurtful speaking! The sins of the tongue much dishonour God. Of all creatures, man alone had the glory of speech bestowed upon him; and indeed to what end should an irrational creature be furnished with language? his tongue was to proclaim his reason, and that by setting forth the glory of his Maker. Man was made to glorify God, and the tongue is that instrument whereby he should principally do it. To offend God then by the tongue, is to fight against him with his own weapon, and to turn his own artillery upon himself. Further, the sinful tongue, of all other parts, does most injury to others, not only by vexing and afflicting them with calumnies, reproaches, disgraces, but also infecting them, and scattering its poison to tempt and draw to sin and error. How great should our care be to throw the salt of grace into the streams of our words, to labour that our speech should be always gracious, and, as the apostle speaks, seasoned with salt! Col. iv. 6; and that both by cleansing the fountain, the ❘ complainers.” heart, as also by setting a watch before the door of our lips, and by giving entrance to no expressions but such as can bring a pass from the Scripture; adding to that double guard, the teeth and lips, with which nature has hedged in the tongue, a third, namely, the fear of God, which is the best keeper both of heart and tongue; always remembering, that though words seem to vanish and to die as soon as we have spoken, yet that our words have not done with us when we have done with them, but that even of our seemingly perished expressions, and forgotten, if sinful, words, shall we at the last day be convinced. The arrows of our words, shot so high that they seem to be lost and out of sight, will afterward fall upon the heads of those who shot them up.

Obs. 4. Christ accounts the words spoken against his people as uttered against himself. These troublesome, rugged-tongued sectaries handled the names of others rudely; but at the last day Christ will convince them of these hard speeches; their foolish tongues shall recoil upon themselves, and rebound, like an arrow shot against a brazen wall, from the reviled innocents to the nocent revilers.

Jesus Christ will give his saints more than treble damages, nay, fourfold restitution, for all the reproaches which they have sustained; sinners shall restore the stolen reputations of saints, and that with interest. It is a righteous thing with God to render tribulation to all who even this way trouble his people. Christ well knows that all the hard speeches against his servants were uttered for his sake; because they did not run with the wicked to the same excess of riot, they were therefore followed by them with excessive reproaches. David said it was for his sake that Saul killed the priests of the Lord; he could not come at David, and therefore he destroyed his friends. The wicked cannot reach the person, and therefore they tear the picture; but Christ will hereafter suffer none to be losers by him that have been losers for him: the revilings uttered against saints will at the last appear to have been spoken against the truly great ones,

I shall herein show who are here meant by “murmurers, complainers;” and then why Jude expresses himself against them, or what is the greatness or heinousness of this their sin, in being “murmurers,

(1.) Who are here meant by “murmurers, complainers.”

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The first word, γόγγυσται, “murmurers,” imports an expressing of discontentedness against another in our words; and that not aloud, with a high voice, but with a voice somewhat low, muttering, and grumbling. The word γογγύζω comes, say some, from γρύζω, grunnio, to grunt as fat swine; and so Suum more grunimports secretly to speak against others, nire. Murmure, saith Gerard, with hatred and impa- tus denotatur, et tience. Thus they who received but a penny for their work, thinking them- dere videtur. selves wronged, ἐγόγγυζον, “murmured against the good man of the house,” Matt. xx. 11. And the scribes and Pharisees ἐγόγγυζον, murmured against Christ and his disciples for eating with publicans and sinners. And “the Jews murmured,” ἐγόγγυζον, ” at him, because he said, I am the bread of life,” John vi. 41. So ver. 43, 61, of the same chapter. So 1 Cor. x. 10, “Neither murmur ye,” μήδε γογγύζετέ, “as some of them also murmured,” ἐγόγγυσαν, “and were destroyed of the destroyer.” Though sometimes, as Beza notes, the word is taken for any Submissa voce close, secret whispering of a matter without offence and indignation, as John vii. 12, 32, yet most frequently and properly it is used in the former signification. This murmuring may be either against men, or against God himself; the word here used by Jude, by its own force, signifies not one more than another. Against man have frequently murmured, as the Israelites against Moses and Aaron; nor is any thing more usual, than for people to murmur, especially against their governors, out of envy, impatience, or discontent; a sin questionless which these seducers were deeply guilty of, who despised dominions, and spake evil of dignities: and yet because the apostle had accused them for that sin before, ver. 8, and also threatened destruction against them for it, ver. 11; because also the next word, complainers, wherein the apostle shows the cause of their murmuring, notes a complaining of men that lot, portion, and condition set out by God for us; I rather conceive that this murmuring here, with which Jude charges these seducers, was their muttering of impatient, discontented expressions against God himself, with whom they were angry and displeased; a distemper which, allowed, is an evident sign of an ungracious, ungodly heart, the thing which also Jude here intends to prove, and contrary to that quiet and silent submissiveness of the godly, who, with David, are dumb, and open not their mouth, because the Lord doth it, Psal. xxxix. 9, who will be pleased with God, and with whatever he does, when he is most angry with them, who will justify him when he seems to condemn them. A sin likewise is this murmuring…does not believe that God is his portion…

(2.) Why Jude expresses himself against their murmuring and complaining, or what is the heinousness considerable in this their sin. I answer, our apostle by charging them herewith, as I said, intends to prove them ungodly men, and such bold sinners as uttered hard speeches against God. Now how much ungodliness lays open itself by this sin of murmuring discontentedness against God’s administrations, appears, by considering what those sins are whereof this sin is made up and consists, and wherewith it is ever accompanied against God, of which the ungodly Israelites are frequently accused; as Deut. i. 27; Exod. xv. 24; and for which they were severely punished. Concerning those who by murmuring showed themselves displeased with God, the apostle tells us that God was not well pleased with them, for they were overthrown in the wilderness: their displeasure was wicked and sinful, but yet weak and impotent; God’s was holy and righteous, and withal potent and irresistible. Man has no ability with his anger; he may hate God, but he cannot hurt him; nay, instead thereof, he only hurts himself; every arrow which he shoots up to God falling down upon his own head.

The other expression whereby Jude sets forth their sin is μεμψίμοιροι, translated complainers, which does not, as indeed I think no one word can, fully express the force of the word used by the apostle, which sigfies complainers, blamers, or accusers of that part, portion, or allotment which was set out for them in the world; the word being made up of two, the one μέμψις, which signifies blaming or complaining; the other μοῖρα, a lot, portion, or division. The apostle then by this word μεμψίμοιροι, complainers of their lot and portion, explains the former, γογγυσταὶ, murmurers; by it showing what it was at which these people murmured, namely, that their condition in the world was not so rich, great, and honourable as was that of some others; they murmured, as if God had unequally distributed their estate and portion; because they had not as much as others, they thought they had not enough, nay, nothing. Haply they were displeased that they were not the governors of the world, that any were above them; and indeed this was the true reason why they spake evil of dignities, and opposed magistrates, not because they hated ruling, but because they themselves were not the rulers. And this further clearing of their sin by the apostle further proves them ungodly, the apostle’s scope; for in complaining of their lot and portion, what did they, but accuse God either of want of righteousness or wisdom in his distributions and dispensations, ions, as if either he had defrauded them of their due, not understood fitly to proportion their estates? And what can be more contrary to godliness, which, as the apostle speaks, is joined with contentment or self-sufficiency, 1 Tim. vi. 6, than discontentedly never to be sufficed with what God has laid out for us? what more unlike that holy disposition of saints, whereby they say with David, “The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance: the lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage?” Psal. xvi. 5, 6. Discontentedness with our times and estates is that which the Holy Ghost deservedly chargeth with sinful folly. Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these? for thou dost not inquire wisely concerning this, Eccl. vii. 10; that is, Do not, by considering of the goodness of former times, complain discontentedly of God’s providence in ordering thee to live in those which he has allotted for thee.

1. In this is contained that great sin of unbelief and distrustfulness. He who complains of his portion…supply him accordingly. He who believes that God is his portion, needs not complain of his portion; no, he that can say with David, “The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance,” will undoubtedly add, “the lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; I have a goodly heritage,” Psal. xvi. 5, 6. That God who is self-sufficient is all-sufficient; sufficient for the soul, fills every corner thereof. The bee in the hive puts not forth its sting, nor doth the soul, when centred upon God, disquiet us. So that this murmuring discontentedness clearly argues that the soul departs from the living God, and looks not upon him as a God able and willing to relieve it in its exigences; a sin, doubtless, very heinous, and such as much dishonours God’s all-sufficiency, and that which God oft punished in Israel, and which was the companion, or rather the cause, of all their murmurings against him; as appears Psal. lxxviii. 19, 20, “Can God furnish a table in the wilderness? He smote the rock,” but “can he give bread also? can he provide flesh for his people?”

2. This sin discovers, as a fruit of the former, the going out of the heart after some other portion besides God, nay, more than God; which because it cannot obtain in so large a measure as it desires, like a child that cries because it is pinched in a strait coat much too little for it, a man becomes unquiet and complaining. Now how great an impiety is it to lament and complain more for the want of trifles, than for the want of that great soul-satisfying good, namely, that God who has all in him that may do or make us good! like a foolish mother, who, having many lovely children, will not look upon them, but only regards and delights herself with dolls, or puppets made of rags. How deservedly great is that complaint of God, “They have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and have hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water!” How inexcusable a wickedness was it for the king of Israel, instead of seeking God, to go to Baal-zebub the god of Ekron for the recovery of his health! What greater disloyalty, than for a soul, like Potiphar’s wife, to wrangle and rage because it cannot obtain its servant, the creature, to satisfy its unclean desires, and to despise the chaste and truly comfortable embracements of its Lord, to whom it is married, and tied by dearest and strictest bonds!

3. This murmuring discontentedness discovers the great sin of unthankfulness for what portion we enjoy. A murmurer cannot be thankful; nor can he who is thankful for what he has murmur for what he is without; but he wonders that God should give him any thing, not frets because God does not give him every thing: he saith, (with Jacob,) ” I am less than the least of all thy mercies;” and does not mutter against God for not bestowing upon him greater. This distemper of discontent, contrarily, causes men to think so much of what they want, that they quite forget what they already have received. Thus the Israelites discontentedly murmured for what they had not, and unthankfully forgat what they had. Discontentedness makes heavy mercies to sink to the bottom, and to be forgotten, and light wants and troubles to swim on the top; and it makes men so fretful in that a few are above them, that they are utterly unthankful for their being above so many. God loses a friend in the discontented person for but doing with his own as he pleases.

4. In this is manifested the sin of a proud conceit of our own worth and deservings, a sinful self-justification when God’s dispensations are severe and afflictive. He who complains of God’s dealing, secretly applauds his own deservings; he who murmurs against God’s hand, shows that he is not angry with his own heart; he always saith, See, what have I lost! how many comforts I want! but he never saith, What have I done? how many corruptions has my heart, which make me unfit to enjoy a fuller portion in the world! All the fault is laid upon God, nothing upon himself, as if his sin never threw one mite into the treasury of his sufferings; he counts God a hard master, and himself a good servant; and if it be a great sin in the courts of men to acquit the wicked, and to condemn the innocent, how inexcusable a wickedness is it to condemn God and acquit ourselves! A discontented complainer saith not with David, “I and my father’s house have sinned: these sheep, what have they done?” nor with the humble soul, “The Lord is righteous; and I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him;” but flies in the face of God, instead of falling down at his feet. In one word, this discontent is a shield for sin, and is a sword against God.

5. This sin unduly and sacrilegiously usurps God’s own seat and throne: what does he who complains of God’s administrations, but in effect profess that he would be in the room of God, to order the world after his own mind; and that he has more wisdom, care, justice, and therefore fitness, to dispose of men, and to allot them their portions, than God himself? Interpretatively, he says, like Absalom, There is none that takes care to order men’s affairs: oh that I were king of the world! then should things be better ordered than now they are. And he saith to God, as that master of the feast to his self-advancing guest, Come down, sit lower, and give way to thy betters to sit above thee. Whereas, alas, should such silly Phaetons as we but govern the world, as they fable he did the chariot of the sun, for one day, we should set all things on fire; nay, should we be left to cut out our own portions, and be our own carvers, how soon should we cut our own fingers! And how can He whose will is the rule of rectitude do any thing unrighteously? Man does a thing because it is just, but therefore is a thing just because God does it: “Far be it from God,” saith Elihu, “that he should do wickedness; and from the Almighty, that he should commit iniquity,” Job xxxiv. 10: who can be more careful than He who is more tender over his, than a mother is over her sucking child? who so wise as the only wise God, whose eyes run to and fro throughout the whole earth; nay, who indeed is all eye to behold all the concernments of the sons of men ?

6. Lastly This sin of discontentedness with our own private allotments takes men off from minding the more public and weighty concernments of God’s church; making them disregard and forget it in all her sufferings and hazards. What more than this sin causes men to mind their own, and not the things of Jesus Christ, and to lose the thoughts thereof in a crowd of discontented cares for themselves? It is impossible for him that is overmuch in mourning for himself to be mindful of or mournful for Zion. Now what an unworthy distemper is this, for men to live as if God had made them only to mind their own private conditions in the world, to regard only the painting of their own cabins, though the ship be sinking; and so as it may be well with themselves, to be careless how it fares with the whole church of Christ! We should rejoice that God would set up a building of glory to himself, though upon our ruins; and that Christ rises, though we fall; that his kingdom comes, though ours goes; that he may be seen and honoured, though we stand in a crowd and be hidden.

Obs. 1. God has divided, set out for every one his portion here in the world. These seducers, in complaining of their part and allotment, show that God appoints to every one his demensum or proportion that he thinks fittest for them. God is the great Householder of the world, and Master of that great family; and as it was the custom of ancient times to divide and give to every one his portion of meat and drink, and his set allowance of either, whence we read, Psal. xi. 6, of the portion of the wicked’s cup; so God deals out to every one what estate he thinks meetest. To some he gives a Benjamin’s portion in the world, five times so much as to others; he is the sovereign disposer of us and of all our concerns, and he best knows what is best for us; and to his people he ever gives them that allotment which best suits with their obtaining the true good, himself, and ever affords them, if not what they would, yet what they want. Oh how should this consideration work us to a humble contentedness with all our allotments, and make us bring our hearts to our condition, if we cannot bring our condition to our hearts! In a word, when we see that the condition of others is higher than ours, let us consider that it is better to wear a fit garment than one much too big, though golden.

Obs. 2. No estate of outward fulness can quiet the heart, and still its complaints. These seducers feasted sumptuously, fed themselves to the full, and fared high; and yet, for all that, they murmured and complained. The rich man in the gospel, in the midst of all his abundance, cries out, “What shall I do?” Luke xii. 17. Neither the life, nor the comfort of the life, consists in the abundance of the things which we enjoy. None complain so much as they who have the greatest plenty. Though Nabal had in his house the feast of a king, yet soon after his heart died in him, and he became like a stone, I Sam. xxv. 37. Nabal’s heart was like the kidney of a beast, which though enclosed in fat, is itself lean. Solomon in his glory reads a lecture of the creature’s vanity. Ahab and Haman were as discontented in heart, as great in estate. Vast is the disproportion between the soul and all worldly objects, for they being but momentary and vanishing, dead and inefficacious, earthy and drossy, are unsuitable to the soul’s excellency and exigences. It is not the work of worldly abundance to take away covetousness, but of grace in the heart: the lesson of contentment must be learned in a higher school than outward plenty.

Obs. 3. They who deserve worst complain and murmur most, and are most ready to think that they are most hardly dealt with. None are so unthankful as the unworthy. Israelites murmur. Absalom is discontented. Haman cries out, “What doth all this avail me?” &c. Whereas Jacob tells God that he was not worthy of the least of all the mercies and truth which God had showed him, Gen. xxxii. 10. Job praised and submitted to God when he took from him as well as when he gave to him. None see their unworthiness so little as they who are fullest of unworthiness; and till a man see himself deserving nothing, he will ever complain of God when mortify no lusts, and therefore they are angry when their lusts are not fulfilled; but especially they look not upon God as their portion in Christ: and who can be content or praise God that has no spiritual blessings to bless him for? How readily then, instead of being angry with God’s dispensations, should we chide our own corruptions, and oft blush, that so many saints have been so patient under mountains, and that such sinners as we should so complain under feathers!

Obs. 4. It is our duty to take heed of this sinful distemper of murmuring against and complaining of God’s dealing with us. To this end, in the most unpleasing dispensation of providence, (1.) Study more what thou deservest, than consider what thou sustainest. Whatever thy condition be, thou hast deserved that it should have been worse. The fire is not answerable to thy fuel. Wonder more at what good thou hast, than at what thou wantest; and at the evil thou art without, than at that which thou undergoest. The godly say, “He hath not dealt with us after our sins, nor rewarded us after our iniquities.” It is his mercy that we are not consumed. Our God hath punished us less than our iniquities. (2.) Mourn more for thy incorrigibleness under, than the unpleasantness of any providence; that thou hast been so long in the fire, and lost no more of thy dross; that folly is still so bound up in thy heart, notwithstanding all thy rods of correction, and that thou | art that foolish child which stays so long in the place of breaking forth of children, Hos. xiii. 13. (3.) Labour more to make thy shoulder strong than to get thy burden taken off, and rather to be fit to endure cross providences than to have them ended. To this end, 1. Look more upon providence as concluding than as at present, Prov. xxiii. 18; in the end thou shalt say the wilderness was the best way to Canaan, and that God dealt better by thee than thou couldst have done by thyself. Wait the winding up of providence, prejudge not God’s proceedings; he oft turns water into wine. God’s farthest way about will prove better than thy shorter cut. 2. Clear up thy interest in Christ, and so possess thyself of true riches. If God be thy portion, thou wilt never complain it is small or smart. 3. Labour to kill lust, which is the sting of every trouble, making a sweet condition bitter, and a bitter condition more bitter. Rather mend thy house than complain of the rain getting into it. Get affections weaned from the world. Count the greatest worldly gain small, and then thou wilt never think the greatest loss great. Love every thing, besides Christ, as about to leave and loathe it. 4. Endeavour after submissiveness of heart. Say rather, Oh that I had patience under than riddance from my trouble! Study for an annihilated will, or rather to have thy will losing itself in God’s. 5. Compare thy lot with theirs who have less than thou hast, and yet deserve more than thou dost. If thy drink be small, others drink water; if thine be water, others drink gall; if thine be gall, others drink blood; if thine be blood, others drink damnation. 6. Consider more whence every providence is than what it is: it is bitter in the stream, but sweet in the fountain. Observe the hand of a sovereign Lord, a wise Governor, a merciful Father, a righteous Judge. In precepts, consider not what is commanded, but who commands. In providence, not what is the correction, but who is the Corrector: the former will make thee obedient in doing; the latter, in suffering.

(4.) Remember, if thou hast a murmuring tongue, God has a hearing ear. God hears thee when thou mutterest most secretly, most inwardly. He who blings of thine. “The Lord,” saith Moses, “heareth your murmurings,” Exod. xvi. 7-9. If his ear be open, let thy mouth be stopped; be afraid thy God should hear thee. Murmuring is a great provocation.

(5.) Meditate of the folly and vanity of this sin of discontented murmuring against God. 1. Consider it cannot benefit and relieve us, Eccl. vii. 10. I may say of sinful complaining as Christ of sinful care, Which of you by complaining can add one cubit to his stature? Never did any find ease or obtain their desire by contending with God. An impatient murmurer is like a man sick of a burning fever, who tumbles and tosses from one side of the bed to the other for coolness, but till his distemper be removed he gets no ease. God must have his will; there is no escaping from him but by submitting to him. It is a vain thing for a man in a boat, by pulling with a cable at the rock, to think to draw the rock to him. 2. It is a distemper which disquiets him most in whom it is. The impatient murmurer is his own martyr, his afflictions are self-created. He would take it very ill to have another do half so much against him, as he does against his own soul. All his trouble is from his own pride, through which comes all contention with God and man. It is fulness of the stomach which makes a man sea-sick, and the proud heart which causes all the vexation in a troublesome estate. The arrow of murmuring shot up against God, falls down upon the head of him who shot it. The wild bull in the net, instead of breaking it, does by struggling the more hamper himself. 3. This sin of discontentedness deprives a man of all that spiritual benefit which he may reap by the troublesomeness of his worldly allotments. Were not men peevish and unsubmissive, they might take honey out of the carcass of every lion-like and tearing trouble. They might learn those lessons of heavenly-mindedness, meekness, faith, mortification, which would countervail for every cross. The silent and submissive acceptance of a severe dispensation turns every stone thrown at us into a precious stone, and produces the peaceable fruit of righteousness; whereas murmuring discontentedness makes us spend that time in beating ourselves, and wrangling with God, which we might profitably improve in labouring for a sanctified use of every dispensation.

This for the first proof that these seducers were those ungodly ones who shall be judged at the last day, viz. because they were “murmurers, complainers.”

2. “Walking after their own lusts.”

Two things are here to be opened. 1. Their guides who led them; “their own lusts.” 2. Their following these guides; they walked after them.

(1.) Their guides are set down, 1. By way of specification; it is said they were “lusts.” 2. By their relation, or their appropriation to these seducers ; and so they are said to be “their own.”

1. They are specified and denominated “lusts.” Two things here are considerable. 1. What is meant by lusts. 2. Wherein their hurtfulness stands. 1. The word ἐπιθυμία, lust, is indifferently used concerning lust, good or bad, denoting by its proper force only an ardent, earnest desire. And therefore there are lusts not only lawful and indifferent, being the motions of the concupiscible power, desiring such objects as tend to the preservation of nature, as meat, drink, rest, &c., Luke xvi. 21; but also holy and spiritual; in which respect the Spirit is said to lust against the flesh, Gal. v. 17, in regard of that new and holy inclination of the regenerate, whereby they endeavour to put off the old man, and to put on the new.

That which in insensible things is ὄρεξις, in the sensible and rational is ἐπιθυμία. But here, as elsewhere very frequently, the word ἐπιθυμία intends carnal, sinful, and corrupt lust. And this is twofold.

1. Original; that inordinate disposedness, that inbred and primitive pravity of nature, standing in an aversion from all good, and propension to all evil; the root not only of all wicked desires in the will, but also of all the evil thoughts in the understanding; and it is called lust, because it principally discovers itself by sinful lustings, and by them manifests its vigour and strength. And of this speaks the apostle James, chap. i. 15, “When lust hath conceived,” &c.

2. Actual, is every sinful rising or inordinate motion against the law of God, every evil desire springing from the root of original concupiscence. And of these speaks the apostle, Eph. ii. 3, “We had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh,” &c.; and also Eph. iv. 22, “That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.” “Let not sin reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof,” Rom. vi. 12. Our natural corruption is the root which sends forth these lusts as its branches, and upon them grow those bitter fruits mentioned Gal. v. 19, 20, “Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, heresies,” &c. Now these lusts are of two sorts. 1. The vicious inclinations of our minds, or of the upper or rational soul. We must not restrain lusts to the sensitive or lower part of the soul only, which they call the unreasonable, exempting the mind and reason from these blemishes; these lusts of the flesh into which the radical pollution of nature has diffused itself belonging to the understanding and reason also, as well as to the other inferior faculties; the very wisdom of the flesh being, as the apostle speaks, enmity against God, and such as cannot be subject to his law and will, Rom. viii. 7; for from hence is all impiety, idolatry, superstition, heresy, rejection of the truth; and indeed all those sins which directly are committed against the first table; and the apostle expressly mentions the wills of the mind, Eph. ii. 3, whereby he understands that superior part called διανοητική, intellective and discursive; and the apostle, speaking of those who drew others to the superstitious worship of angels, discovers that flesh is found in their very mind or understanding, in these words, “vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind,” ὑπὸ τοῦ νόος τῆς σαρκὸς αὐτοῦ, Col. ii. 18. 2. The lower and more brutish appetites in the sensitive part of the soul, the motions to uncleanness, drunkenness, gluttony, the lusts called “of the flesh,” 1 John. ii. 16, the vehement motions of the soul after sensual delights and carnal pleasures, which oft degenerate into beastly excess. These are called the θελήματα σαρκός, the wills of the flesh, Eph. ii. 3; joined also with pleasures, “serving divers lusts and pleasures,” Tit. iii. 3; and called “worldly lusts,” Tit. ii. 12; Rom. xiii. 14; 1 Pet. i. 14; ii. 11.

The original contagion of man’s nature having poisoned and corrupted all the cogitations of the mind and conceptions of the heart, from them diffuses itself through the affections and inferior appetites, stirs up innumerable inordinate passions, to the breach of the second table of the law. And from the corruption of this inferior part the whole depravation of nature is, I conceive, called flesh; it drawing the unregenerate from things above and heavenly, to such as are below and earthly; from spiritual to corporal objects; from the Creator to the creature; and after a sort transforms a man into a beast. And these carnal desires, sensual lusts, are the guides which our apostle saith these seducers followed, as is evident from what he had expressed against them in the fourth verse, “turning the grace of God into lasciviousness;” and ver. 8, “filthy dreamers defile the flesh;” and ver. 10, “what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves;” and ver. 12, “feeding themselves without fear,” &c. And from these ungodly lusts, as he after calls them, the apostle may well prove them ungodly men.

2. The sinfulness of these sensual lusts appears in respect, 1. Of their objects, when such things are desired and craved as are forbidden, whether persons or things. 2. Of their measure, when things lawful are desired unlawfully because excessively; the desires after food, apparel, sleep, recreations, or any other sensual delights, being boundless, and concupiscence unlimited; when in eating men so gluttonize that their souls in their bodies are like a candle in a greasy lantern; when we grasp the world till we make our sinews crack. Oh how unsuitable is it for men to grow cold in prayer and hearing, and to sweat in the world; to account a little grace enough, and enough wealth a little! 3. Of their end, when things are desired not for the glory of God, but for our own pleasure, greatness, and benefit; not for the advancing of God, but ourselves; when we seek great things for ourselves, not for fitting us to duty, but for our carnal interest: all the good things we crave should be scaffolds to erect a building of honour to God, not to erect a structure of glory to ourselves. It is the part of an epicure, not of a Christian, to make his enjoyments centre in himself, and to sing with that sensualist in the midst of abundance, ” Soul, thou hast much goods,” &c., “take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” 4. Of their effects; and so they are sinful in being, 1. Entangling and encumbering; like long garments, which being let down about the heels, hinder from walking, and trip up in the race; and therefore the apostle commands us to gird up the loins of our minds. Hence by some they are not unfitly called the bird- viscus spiritualilime of our spiritual wings; and by um pennarum. others compared to a string tied to a bird’s leg, with which, flying unto the trees, she is hampered in the boughs. Inordinate lusts stop the Christian’s progress heavenward; they hinder him in prayer, meditation, hearing, practising; they “choke the word,” Mark iv. 19; and from the lusting of the flesh against the Spirit, the apostle saith, “Ye cannot do the things that ye would,” Gal. v. 17: women are led into error with divers lusts, 2 Tim. iii. 6.

(2.) These lusts are deceitful; so they are called expressly by the apostle, ἐπιθυμίαι τῆς ἀπάτης, cupiditates deceptionis, Eph. iv. 22, and that in several respects. 1. They are not what they seem to be. All the pleasures which are found in them are but false and appearing, not true, and real, and proper. But secondly, and especially, they are termed lusts of deception or error, because they do not what they promise; they are deluding and disappointing of that expectation which they raise up in any one. They promise honour, pleasure, riches, &c., but they perform nothing less, and make a man more miserable after all his endeavouring to satisfy them, than he was before; by their embraces they strangle. They who sow to the flesh, of the flesh reap corruption: lusts end in death, and therefore in disappointment. Like a chimney-piece, they are fair without, black within. They promise a Rachel, they give a Leah. They give not what, but contrary to what, they promise. What was Achan’s wedge of gold, but an instrument to rive his body and soul asunder? and what did his Babylonish garment clothe him with, but confusion? Hence they who will be rich are said to fall into many foolish lusts; that is, such as make them fools who fall into them, 1 Tim. vi. 9. Solomon speaks of a lustful fool, who went “as an ox to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks.”

(3.) These lusts are defiling; they are unclean lusts, corrupt and corrupting. The old man is said to be “cor corrupt according ng to deceitful lusts,” Eph. iv. 22.

Christ tells us that the lusts which are within defile a man, Matt. xv. 18. They corrupt and defile the very body, as I have shown before, much more the soul, making it an unclean cage of unclean birds; they defile all we are, yea, all we do, prayers, hear ings, sacraments. We lift up impure hands if in wrath.

(4.) Disquieting lusts; they are called noisome or hurtful, βλαβερας ἐπιθυμίας, damosas cupiditates, 1 Tim. vi. 9. Every man set upon lust troubles his own flesh. How many more are made martyrs to their lusts than to God himself! Oh the diseases, losses, torments, disgraces that uncleanness, drunkenness, ambition, wrath, covetousness, &c., have brought upon their vassals, who indeed are no other than very hackneys, whipped and driven through thick and thin in obedience to their lusts! But most of all do they fight against the soul, 1 Pet. ii. 11; by reason of their contrariety they tear and pull it several ways. They disquiet the conscience. The very worst and foulest days of a saint are better than the days of a sinner’s sunshine. How many racks and silent scourges do sinners carry in their bosoms for satisfying their lusts! In a word, they drown the soul in perdition, and produce an eternity of pain for a moment of pleasure. To all this I might add the unquietness of men’s lusts to others who live near them: “From whence,” saith James, ” come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts?” chap. iv. 1.

This for the first particular, the denomination of these guides which these seducers followed; they were “lusts.”

2. The relation of these lusts to these seducers is mentioned; the apostle calls them “their own;” and so they were in several regards, 2 Tim. iv. 3; James iv. 1, 3; 2 Pet. iii. 3; Jude 18.

(1.) In respect of propagation and derivation. Lust is the legacy left by our progenitors. It is a natural, inbred, hereditary propensity to sin, from which all those unholy motions and inordinate inclinations proceed, after which these seducers walked. Men are carried to the service of lust by the tide of nature as well as by the wind of temptation. Lusts are more truly ours than any thing left us by our parents.

(2.) In respect of seat and habitation. Lusts are our own because they are in us, in our hearts; they lie liegers for Satan in the soul, and there they are his proxies, spokesmen, and advocates. And therefore Christ saith, “Out of the heart proceed murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts,” &c., Matt. xv. 19. Men lodge not strangers, but their own: “My children are with me in bed,” Luke xi. 7. Lusts are our own, then, because we harbour them, lodge them, bed them, give them house-room, heart-room.

(3.) Their own in point of provision. Men provide for their own children and charge; and much more do they for their own lusts. The apostle speaks of making ” provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof,” Rom. xiii. 14. The high fare, the impure dalliances, unclean objects of these seducers, were all provisions for their lusts. The work of the covetous, glutton, proud, &c., is to project for and provide fuel for lusts, like the poor Israelites, who painfully gathered stubble to please their task-masters.

(4.) Their own in point of protection and defence: as men provide for, so likewise protect their own. These seducers would not endure the wind to blow upon their lusts; hence it was that they spake evil of dignities appointed to curb their lusts. Hence they were raging waves, and gave the faithful hard words. Sometimes sinners protect their lusts with denial, with excuses, allegations of Scripture, appearances of sanctity; and if none of these will do, with fire and sword, open rage and opposition; yea, with tears and lamentations, as those women who wept for Tammuz, as if some gainful good were taken from them; as Micah cried for his gods; and as the harlot’s bowels yearned over her own child.

(5.) Lastly, Their own in point of peculiarity of delight and dearness. Some lusts are peculiarly a man’s own: such as to which he is given by constitution; so some men are addicted to gluttony, drunkenness, some to uncleanness, some to covetousness, others to ambition, &c. By interest; calling, the time, age, or place wherein he lives. David kept himself, as he saith, from his own iniquity, Psal. xviii. 23; that is, as I conceive by the subject of that psalm, from murdering Saul, a sin to which his interest tempted him. The reason why some men follow not some lusts, is because some are not so peculiarly their own; but stop them in the prosecution of their own, and then they show themselves.

Thus of the first branch of explication, the guides. 2. The following of these guides; walking after,” &c. Πορευόμενοι, “walking;” a usual metaphor in Scripture to set forth the course of a man’s life, whether good or bad. Zacharias and Elisabeth “were righteous,” πορευόμενοι, “walking in all the commandments,” &c., &c.. Luke i. 6. False teachers the apostle calls πορευομένους, those who “walk after the flesh,” 2 Pet. ii. 10. So 2 Pet. iii. 3; 1 Pet. iv. 3.

And most fitly is this their following their lusts called a walking, in respect, 1. Of their motion, labour, and unquietness in the prosecution of them. A man who walks, sits not still, but is laborious and restless. None are such true drudges as they who serve their lusts, as Paul speaks, Tit. iii. 3. 2. It is called walking in respect of skilfulness. They who walk in a path are versed in it, and skilled in it, know every step of it: wicked men are wise to do evil, they are curious and witty workers of iniquity, Matt. vii. 23. 3. Walking, because of progressiveness. He who walks stands not at a stay, but goes on from step to step: the wicked grow worse and worse, they daily add something to their stature in sin; they add sin to sin; they never think they have done enough for lust; they are daily throwing some more mites into the treasuries of God’s wrath and their own wickedness. 4. Walking, because they are going and tending to some term or place. The wages of sin, and the end of every lust, is death; though hell be not the end of the worker, yet is it of the work: every lust is hell in the bud, and it has fire and brimstone in the substance of it; damnation is its centre. 5. Walking, in point of a voluntary obsequiousness. Wicked men obey their lusts, willingly walk after the commands and dictates thereof. Saints are dragged, sinners walk after lust; they are not driven; they seek after their own heart, and their own eyes, after which they go a whoring, Numb. xv. 39. They are taken captives of the devil at his will, 2 Tim. ii. 26, ἐζωγρημένοι; taken alive by his baits without any resistance. Whatever lust, the devil’s spokesman, dictates, they obey.

Obs. 1. All the visible abominations and notorious extravagancies in the world come from within. Lust is the womb of all the drunkenness, gluttony, adultery, murders: these things come from within, the | them ask themselves whether there be not that within that one word, (how comprehensive!) death. The very | him in their murmuring and complaining of his heart; from the lusts that war in our members come wars and fightings. These seducers fell into all profaneness and licentiousness by following their lusts. A lustful heart makes a lewd life; that is the Trojan horse, from whence issue all hurtful practices. We see then the folly of only external mortification: what is the whipping of the flesh, lying in the ashes, voluntary poverty, outward abstinences, without inward mortification, but the plucking off the leaves without the withering of the root? The lusts must be destroyed inwardly, before ever practices can be with success amended outwardly. Christ so cursed the fig-tree that it withered at the root; that was the way for fruit never to grow on it more.

Obs. 2. In reformation it is not enough to forsake the evils we have no desires after, but we must leave our lusts, yea, our own lusts, those evils to which we are most inclined. Some men will say they are no sectaries, why, heresy is not their lust; others say they are not drunkards, when drunkenness is not their lust; the prodigal pleases himself that he is no covetous griper, &c.: but this is a token of sincerity, to forsake our own evil ways; and like those who, fighting with an enemy, mar every good piece of ground, to strike at those sins, which by custom, constitution, interest we are most addicted to.

Obs. 3. The course of a wicked man in sin is very earnest and impetuous. It is with a sinful lusting and an eager desire. Of this at large before, in Balaam’s running greedily.

Obs. 4. It is the duty of faithful instructers, with holy Jude here, to tell men of their own lusts, to strike at those sins to which they see them most inclined. Thus did the prophets, who lifted up their voice like a trumpet, and told Judah of their transgressions. Thus did Christ, who reproved not only idolatry, but pharisaism and hypocrisy, the sins of his time. Otherwise ministers do but like unfaithful soldiers, who in war discharge not against the enemy, but shoot up into the air: though striking at men’s lusts makes ministers hateful, yet it speaks them faithful.

Obs. 5. Miserable is the condition of the poor misled followers of seducing teachers. The seducer follows his lust, and the follower is led by the seducer; here it is true, the blind leads the blind. In all solicitations to follow others, we should consider whether they are led by Christ or by lust. Be followers of others only as they are led by Christ. You set your watches not by the clock, but by the sun; do so with your hearts.

Obs. 6. Great may be the comfort to God’s people in case of inward, if hateful temptations. When motions come into the godly, and they do not lust after, but dislike them, nor entertain them with spiritual dalliance, they may be assured that those evils shall not be charged upon them. Before a temptation can be a sin, it must have somewhat of lusting in it. Christ was tempted as we are, and yet he sinned not, because he rejected his temptations. How great a comfort may it be, when Christ is thy love, and lust thy load!

Obs. 7. Though wicked men have their own several peculiar lusts, yet they all agree together against Christ. Pilate and Herod consent in this third. Envy moved the high priests against Christ, covetousness stirred up Judas, popularity Pilate, but all these lusts concentred in opposing Christ. Pharisees and Sadducees unite their forces against him, though they were mortal enemies between themselves. A fever and a lethargy are contrary to one another, yet both are against health; and therefore let not people please themselves in opposing some kind of sins, let them that is enmity to Christ. And what a strong argument may this be to the godly, who have their lesser differences, to unite for Christ against sin!

Obs. 8. Every man’s woe and wickedness arise from himself, his own lusts. The root of all is in ourselves. Every man forges his own confusion, and coins his own calamity. None is hurt purely from another. A man, as Augustine saith, is an Eve to himself. We must not altogether blame suggestions and temptations without. The devil tempted David to number the people, and to look at Bathsheba while bathing; but after both he confesses that he had sinned. It may in this case be said, Nolenti non fit injuria; None can hurt him that will not hurt himself. “Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust.” Poison would never hurt unless taken in. The strongest enemy cannot hurt us, nor the falsest delude us, if we will be true to ourselves. Were there not a complying principle, outward objects of sin would draw out nothing but detestations; as in Christ, in whom, because Satan found nothing, he could do nothing against him. And it is the duty of the godly to make use of ungodly examples, not for imitation, but greater abhorrence. Saints, like fire in cold weather, should be hotter and holier for living in times of greatest coldness and profaneness. The best men have oft lived in worst places; as Lot, Elijah, Obadiah, &c., and shined as lights in the midst of a crooked nation; and redeemed the time, although, nay because, the days were evil. It is not outward power and opportunity to sin, but inward poison that makes us sin; and therefore in all our humiliations we should more angrily smite upon our own thighs, than upon any outward occasional furtherances to sin.

Obs. 9. The servitude and slavery of a man that follows his lust is very miserable. “Serving divers lusts,” Tit. iii. 3. Oh how true a drudge is he that is a lackey to his lusts, and who has lusts for his leaders and commanders! (1.) A servant is hindered from doing any thing but what his master pleases. A servant to his lusts is in the bond of iniquity; hindered not only from doing, but even from willing to do any thing but what pleases his lusts; he is alienated from the life of God, cannot hear, pray, meditate holily: sometimes he is in arcta custodia, in close custody, not so much as able to go about the very outward works of holiness; at least he is in libera custodia; he cannot do them any further than his lusts allow, never spiritually; he is Satan’s captive. The Romans cut off the thumbs of their slaves, that so they might be able to handle the oar, but not the sword; so the devil hinders his slaves from holy services, but leaves them in a posture of activity for sin. Satan gives some of his slaves longer line than he gives to others, but he ever keeps them in his power.

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