Part 64 HOLINESS, the Only Way to Happiness
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Part 65 HOLINESS, the Only Way to Happiness
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[3.] Thirdly, I answer, That it is not holiness—but wickedness, it is not godliness—but impiety, which is the reproach, the dishonor, the disgrace, and disparagement of man. Proverbs 14:34, "Righteousness exalts a nation; but sin is a reproach to any people," or as the Hebrew has it, "to nations." The world usually accounts either beggarliness of estate, or badness of situation, or crudeness of behavior, or changes in government, or dullness of invention, or some suchlike imperfections, to be the reproach of nations. But the Holy Spirit tells us that it is sin, it is sin which is the reproach of nations, which is the shame of nations, which is the contempt and scorn of nations, and which blots and blurs all the excellencies and glories of nations. Impious people makes the nations infamous; and the more impious any nation, city, or person is—the more infamous that nation, city, or person is.
Proverbs 6:32, 33, "But a man who commits adultery lacks judgment; whoever does so destroys himself. Blows and disgrace are his lot, and his shame will never be wiped away." [What an indelible blot was this still upon David—namely, that his heart was upright in all things—except in the matter of Uriah.] There is nothing that is such a blemish and such a wound to a man's honor—as sin. Sin leaves such a blot, such a blur, and such a reproach upon a man's name, fame, and reputation—that no art, no pains shall ever be able to wipe it out. All the water in the sea cannot wash away, nor all the rubbing in the world cannot wipe away—the disgrace, disdain, and contempt, that enormities, which wickednesses lays a people under. Jer. 24:9, "I will make them an object of horror and evil to every nation on earth. They will be disgraced and mocked, taunted and cursed, wherever I send them." It was not for their holiness, their godliness—but for their wickedness and ungodliness, that God was resolved to make them disgraced and mocked, taunted and cursed.
Proverbs 10:7, "The memory of the just is blessed; but the name of the wicked shall rot." The wickedness of the wicked heaps so much disgrace, disparagement, and dishonor upon them, that it makes their very names to rot and stink above-ground. Their carcasses do not more rot and stink under-ground, than their very names do rot and stink above-ground. The wickedness of the wicked will make their very names such a detestation and such an abhorring, that they shall either not be remembered at all, or if they are, they shall be only remembered as a rotten, stinking, putrified thing. As the curse of God follows the soul of a wicked man to hell—just so, the curse of God follows the name of a wicked man on earth—so that it becomes most noisome and loathsome among the sons of men.
Sin does so debase and bebeast the great ones of the world, that the prophets use to set forth wicked kings by the names of beasts—as the goat, the ram, the leopard, the bear—to note the beastliness of their conditions, and because they commonly maintain and exercise their government by brutish violence and tyranny, Dan. 7:3-7; Proverbs 28:15-16. And Christ himself, who never spoke treason nor sedition, terms king Herod a fox in Luke 13:32, "And he said unto them, Go you and tell that fox." Herod was as crafty and as subtle as a fox, he was as cruel and as fradulent as a fox, and therefore he is very fitly termed by Christ a fox. And so Paul describes Nero by the name of a lion. 2 Tim. 4:17, "And I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion"— that is, out of the mouth of Nero, who for his power and cruelty was like a lion, for he was a most cruel and desperate persecutor of the Christians, and made a bloody decree, that "whoever confessed himself a Christian, should immediately be put to death as a convicted enemy of mankind." Now, by what has been said, you see that it is not holiness but wickedness that is the greatest disgrace, dishonor, and disparagement imaginable to the sons of men; and therefore there is no reason why the great ones of the world should disdain to pursue after holiness upon the account of this objection. But,
[4.] Fourthly, I answer, That this objection savors strongly of cursed pride, and of hellish loftiness and arrogance of spirit; for who are you, O great man! or what are you, O mighty man—but that you may be dishonored and disparaged for holiness' sake? What are your great swelling honors and titles—but as so many baby-rattles? And what is all your worldly greatness—but a wind that may blow you the sooner to hell? What is all your glory, but a glorious fantasy, a great nothing; and this Haman and Herod found by experience, and so did Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar. Bajazet, who was one of the greatest commanders in the world, was carried about in an iron grate to be a footstool to an insulting conqueror. And Belisarius, the most famous general that the latter age of the Roman empire knew, and in greatest favor with Justinian his prince, was reduced to that great poverty that he was glad to beg his bread. And thus in all ages men have quickly fallen from the highest pinnacle of honor, to sit with Job upon the ash-heap.
O you great piece of vanity—who makes this objection—your true honor does not lie in your coat of arms, nor in your great titles, nor in your great lordships and manors, nor in your high birth, etc.—but in your interest in Christ, in your new birth, in your being an heir of the promises, in your title to heaven, and in your pursuit after holiness. Truly, if you should live and die without these things, it had been ten thousand times better that you had been brought up in a cave, than that you had been brought up at court; and that you had all your days lain under a hedge, than that you have sit so long upon seats of honor; and that you had begged your bread from door to door, than that you have had your full cups and full tables; and that you had been clothed with rags, than that you have put on costly robes—for the great things of this world does but lay men the more open to great temptations, and to great provocations, even to commit the greatest abominations.
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Part 65 HOLINESS, the Only Way to Happiness
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