A Christian Directory, Part 4: Christian PoliticsBaxter, Richard
Religion
A Christian Directory, Part 4: Christian Politics
Baxter, Richard
Casuistry; Christian sociology
6. Lastly, the failings and weaknesses of the upright are pardoned,
and therefore they shall certainly be saved, Rom. vii. 24, 25; viii. 1.
The upright may say in all their weaknesses as Solomon; "I know
also, my God, that thou triest the heart, and hast pleasure in
uprightness; as for me, in the uprightness of my heart, I have
willingly offered all these things," 1 Chron. xxix. 17. "God will do
good to them that are good, and to them that are upright in their
hearts," Psal. cxxv. 4. The upright love him, Cant. i. 4, and are loved
by him. "No good thing will he withhold from them," Psal. lxxxiv. 11.
The way to right comforting the mind of man, is to show to him his
uprightness, Job xxxiii. 23. "And whoso walketh uprightly shall be
saved," Prov. xxviii. 18. "For the high way of the upright is to
depart from evil; and he that keepeth his way, preserveth his soul,"
Prov. xvi. 17. I conclude with Psal. xxxvii. 37, "Mark the upright
man, and behold the just, for the end of that man is peace."
II. The true rules of an upright life are these that follow.
1. He that will walk uprightly must be absolutely devoted and
subjected unto God: he must have a God, and the true God, and but one
God; not notionally only, but in sincerity and reality: he must have a
God whose word shall be an absolute law to him; a God that shall
command himself, his time, his estate, and all that he hath, or that
he can do; a God whose will must be his will, and may do with him what
he please; and who is more to him than all the world; whose love will
satisfy him as better than life, and whose approbation is his
sufficient encouragement and reward.[1]
2. His hope must be set upon heaven as the only felicity of his soul:
he must look for his reward and the end of all his labours and
patience in another world; and not with the hypocrite, dream of a
felicity that is made up first of worldly things, and then of heaven,
when he can keep the world no longer. He that cannot, that doth not in
heart, quit all the world for a heavenly treasure, and venture his
all upon the promise of better things hereafter, and forsaking all,
take Christ and everlasting happiness for his portion, cannot be
upright in heart or life.[2]
3. He must have an infallible teacher (which is only Christ) and the
encouragement of pardoning grace when he faileth, that he sink not by
despair; and therefore he must live by faith on a Mediator. And he
must have the fixed principle of a nature renewed by the Spirit of
Christ.[3]
4. He that will walk uprightly, must have a certain, just, infallible
rule; and must hold to that, and must try all by it; and this is only
the word of God. The teachings of men must be valued as helps to
understand this word; and the judgments of our teachers, and those
that are wiser than ourselves, must be of great authority with us in
subordination to the Scripture. But neither the learned, nor the
godly, nor the great, must be our rule in co-ordination with the word
of God.[4]
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