Signs of one truly bruised. Means and measure of bruising, and comfort to such

BUT how shall we know, whether we are such as those that may expect mercy ?

By bruising here is not meant those that are brought low only by crosses, but such as by them are brought to see their sin, which bruiseth most of all. When conscience is under the guilt of sin, then every judgment brings a report of God’s anger to the soul, and all less troubles run into this great trouble of conscience for sin. As all corrupt humours run to the diseased and bruised part of the body; and as every creditor falls upon the debtor, when he is once arrested ; so when conscience is once awaked, all former sins and present crosses join together to make the bruise the more painful: now he that is thus bruised will be ‘content with nothing but with mercy from him that hath bruised him, He hath wounded, and he must heal. Lord, thou hast bruised me deservedly for my sins, ‘bind up my heart again, &c. 2. Again, a man truly bruised, judgeth sin the greatest evil, and the favour ‘of God the greatest good. 3. He had rather hear of mercy than of a kingdom. 4. He hath mean conceits of himself, and thinketh he is not worth the earth he treads on. 5. Towards others he is not censorious, as being taken up at home, but is full of sympathy and compassion to those that are under God’s hand. ‘6. He thinketh those that walk in the comforts of God’s spirit the happiest men of the world. 7. He trembleth at the word of God, Isa. Ixvi. 2, and honoureth the very feet of those blessed instruments that bring peace unto him, Rom. x. 15. 8. He is more taken up with the inward exercises of a broken heart, than with formality, and yet careful to use all sanctified means to convey comfort.

But how shall we come to have this temper?

First, we must conceive of bruising either as a state into which God bringeth us, or as a duty to be performed by us: both are here meant; we must join with God in bruising of ourselves; when he humbles us, let us humble ourselves, and not stand out against him, for then he will redouble his strokes ; and let us justify Christ in all his chastisements, knowing that all his dealing towards us is to cause us to return into our own hearts; his work in bruising tendeth to our work in bruising ourselves. Let us lament our own untowardness, and say, Lord, what a heart have I that needs all this, that none of this could be spared ? we must lay siege to the hardness of our own hearts, and aggravate sin all we can: we must look on Christ, who was bruised for us, look on him whom we have pierced with our sins. But all directions will not prevail, unless God by his Spirit convinceth us deeply, setting our sins before us ; and driving us to a stand. Then we will make out for mercy. Conviction will breed contrition, and this, humiliation. Therefore desire God, that he would bring a clear and a strong light into all the corners of our souls, and accompany it with a spirit of power to lay our hearts low.

A set measure of bruising ourselves cannot be prescribed; yet it must be so far, as 1. we may prize Christ above all, and see that a Saviour must be had : and 2. until we reform that which is amiss, though it be to the cutting off our right hand, or pulling out our right eye. There is a dangerous slighting of the work of humiliation; some alleging this for a pretence for their overly dealing with their own hearts, that Christ will not break the bruised reed; but such must know that every sudden terror and short grief is not that which makes us bruised reeds; not a little hanging down our heads like a bulrush, Isai. lviii. 5, but a working our hearts to such a grief, as will make sin more odious unto us than punishment; until we offer a holy violence against it: else favouring ourselves, we make work for God to bruise us, and for sharp repentance afterwards. It is dangerous, I confess, in some cases with some spirits, to press too much and too long this bruising; because they may die under the wound and burthen before they be raised up again. Therefore it is good in mixed assemblies to mingle comfort, that every soul may have its due portion. But if we lay this for a ground, that there is more mercy in Christ, than sin in us, there can be no danger in thorough-dealing. It is better to go bruised to heaven than sound to hell. Therefore let us not fore the cure be wrought, but keep ourselves under this work till sin be the sourest, and Christ the sweetest of all things. And when God’s hand is upon us in any kind, it is good to divert our sorrow for other things to the root of all, which is sin: let our grief run most in that channel, that as sin bred grief, so grief may consume sin.

But are we not bruised unless we grieve more for ‘sin than we do for punishment ?

Sometimes our grief from outward grievances may lie heavier upon the soul, than grief for God’s displeasure ; because in such cases the grief works upon the whole man, both outward and inward, and hath nothing to stay it, but a little spark of faith: which by reason of the violent impression of the grievance, is suspended in the exercises of it: and this is most felt in sudden distresses which come upon the soul as a torrent or land-flood, and especially in bodily distempers, which by reason of the sympathy between the soul and the body, work upon the soul so far, as ‘they hinder not only the spiritual, but often the natural acts. Hereupon Saint James wisheth in affliction to pray ourselves, but in case of sickness to send for the elders, Jam. y. 14; that may, as those in the Gospel, offer up the sick person to God in their prayers, being unable to present their own case. Hereupon God admitteth of such a plea from the sharpness and bitterness of the grievance, as in David, Psalm vi. &e. The Lord knoweth whereof we are made, he remembereth we are but dust, Psalm ciii. 14;

that our strength is not the strength of steel. It isa branch of his faithfulness unto us as his creatures, whence he is called a faithful Creator, 1 Pet. iv. 19; God is faithful, who will not suffer us to be tempted above that we are able, 1 Cor. x. 13. There were certain commandments which the Jews called the hedges of the law: as to fence men off from cruelty, he commanded they should not take the dam with the young, nor seethe the kid in the mother’s milk, Exod. xxiii. 19, nor muzzle the mouth of the ox, 1 Cor. ix. 9. Hath God care of beasts, and not of his more noble creature? and therefore we ought to judge charitably of the complaints of God's people, which are rung from them in such cases: Job had the esteem with God of a patient man, notwithstanding those passionate complaints; faith overborne for the present will get ground again ; and grief for sin, although it come short of grief for misery, in violence, yet it goeth beyond it in constancy; as a running stream fed with a spring holdeth out, when a sudden swelling brook faileth.

For the concluding of this point, and our encouragement to a thorough work of bruising, and patience under God's bruising of us, let all know that none are fitter for comfort than those that think themselves furthest off. Men, for the most part, are not lost enough in their own feeling, for a Saviour. A holy despair in ourselves is the ground of true hope, Hos, xiv. 3. In God the fatherless find mercy: if men were more fatherless, they should feel more God’s fatherly affection from heaven: for God that dwelleth in the highest heavens, Isai. lxvi. 2, dwelleth likewise in the lowest soul. Christ’s sheep are weak sheep, and wanting in something or other ; he therefore applieth himself to the necessities of every sheep. He ‘seeks that which was lost, and brings again that which was driven out of the way, and binds up that which was broken, and strengthens the weak, Ezek. xxxiv. 15, his tenderest care is over the weakest. The ‘lambs he carrieth in his bosom, Isai. xl. 11: Peter, feed my lambs. He was most familiar and open ‘to the troubled souls. How careful was he that Peter and the rest of the apostles should not be too much ‘dejected after his resurrection? Go tell the disciples, and tell Peter, Mark xvi. 7: Christ knew ‘that guilt of their unkindness in leaving of him ‘had dejected their spirits. How gently did he endure ‘Thomas his unbelief? and stooped so far unto his weakness, as to suffer him to thrust his hand into his side.