Where per there is no fear. God and among all saith: Forgive this people, or put me out of the book that thou hast written. As who should say, they be thy people and thou commandest me to love them. And for thy sake I love them and teach them and care for them, as a mother that had borne them and love them no less than myself. Wherefore if thou love me as fect love is thou promisest me, then save them with me; or if not, then cast me away with them, and let me have such part as they take. And Paul said as much, Rom. ix. Look upon worldly love, and see what pageants she playeth now and then, and how drunken a thing it is: and be sure, where the love of God is perfect, she will not only go between bodily death and her lover, but also between him and hell. If a man would take of this, that a man might be so perfect in this life, that he might not be perfecter, it would not follow. For though the spirit at a time get the upper hand of the flesh, and winneth herself to God, that she cannot tell whether she be in the body or no; yet the flesh will pull her down again and not let her continue, and now and then pluck off some of her feathers, for mounting so high again. For Moses fell through un belief well enough after that ferventness. We love him, because he loved us first. We deserve not the love of God first, but he deserveth our love, and loveth us first, to win us and to make us his friends of his enemies. And as soon as we believe his love, we love again. And so faith is mother of all love. Faith is And as great as my faith is, so great is love, though faith cannot be perfectly seen, but through the works of love and in the fire of temptation. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For how can he that loveth not his brother whom he seeth, love God whom he seeth not? And this commandment have we of him, That he which loveth God, love his brother also. the mother of love. A sure rule. If we love God, we must do his To love a man's neighbour in God, is a sure rule to know that we love God and not to love him, is a sure token that we love not God: and to hate our neighbour is to hate God. For to love God is to do his commandments, as Christ saith, (John xv.) Ye are my lovers if ye do those things which I have commanded you: and the commandment is, to love our neighbours: then he that loveth not his neighbour, loveth not God. And likewise to hate the commandment, is to hate God that commanded it: and the commandment is to love our neighbours: he our neigh- then that hateth his brother whom God biddeth him love, hateth God. command ments, and his commandment is to love bours. THE FIFTH CHAPTER. Faith maketh us God's sons. What it is to believe that Jesus is Christ. ALL that believe that Jesus is Christ, are born of God. And all that love him which begat love him that is begotten of him. In this we know that we love the sons of God, when we love God and keep his commandments. For this is the love of God that we keep his commandments. This is a sure conclusion that we be born of God through faith. And that faith maketh us God's sons, in that we believe that Jesus is Christ: as the first chapter of John also testifieth, he gave them power to be the sons of God, in that they believed in his name. What it is to believe that Jesus is Christ, may be understood by that which is above rehearsed. It is a far other thing than as the devil believed it, against his will and to his great pain or as they believe it which to fulfil their sin, envy the glory of Christ, and persecute his gospel, forbidding to preach it or to read in it. To believe that Jesus is Christ, is to believe in Christ: that is, to believe earnestly, and to put all thy trust therein, and to lay the price of thy soul thereupon: that the son of Mary whom the angel commanded to be called Jesus, because he should save his people from their sins, is that Christ, that Messias, and that anointed which God promised the fathers should come and bless all nations, and anoint them with the oil of his Spirit, and with mercy and grace, and to deliver them fro.n death of their souls, which is the consenting to sin, and to make them alive with consenting unto the law of God, and in certifying them that they be the sons of God: And to put the whole trust in all that he suffered in his flesh for thy sake, and all promises of mercy that are in him; and that thou be full persuaded that there is no other name under heaven given unto men to be saved from sin by, or to purchase forgiveness of the least sin that ever was committed. Whosoever loveth God, For all that love him that begotten of him: and all Another conclusion is this, loveth all that believe in God. begetteth, love them that are that believe in God are begotten of God through that belief, and made his sons: then all that love God, love all that believe in God. : Another conclusion is this, When we love God and his law, then we love the sons of God. Which is this wise proved the love of God is to keep the law of God: by the text before and after the law of God, is to love our neighbours, and therefore if we love God in keeping his laws we must needs love the sons of God. But John should seem to be a very negligent disputer to many men, in that he here certifieth us of the love of our neighbours by the love of God, when above he certifieth us that we love God because we love our neighbours. He seemeth to do, as I heard once a great clerk in Oxford, stand half an hour in a pulpit to prove that Christ was a true prophet by the testimony of John Bap The love of the love of my neigh bour are inseparable. Works set forth and declare faith. tist; and another half hour to prove that John the Baptist a true prophet by the authority of Christ; as we say, Claw me, claw thee: and as every thief might lightly prove himself a true man, in bearing record to another as false as he, and taking record of the same again. Which kind of disputing schoolmen call Petitio principii, the proving of two certain things, each by the other; and is no proving at all: as our holy father proveth the authority of Scripture by his decrees, (for the Scripture is not authentic but as his decrees admit it) and to make his decrees shine and appear glorious, and to obtain authority, he allegeth the Scripture after his juggling manner, to make fools stark mad. But it is not so here, for both the demonstrations are certain, both the proof of the love of God and his law, by the love of my neighbour, and the proof of the love of my neighbour by the love of God and his law. For when two things are so joined together that they cannot be separated, then the presence of the one uttereth the presence of the other, whithersoever thou first seest. As if I see fire, I am sure that something doth burn. And if I smell burning, I am certified of fire. Even so the love of God is the cause why I love my neighbour; and my love toward my neighbour is the effect of the love of God. And these two loves are ever inseparable, so that whithersoever I feel first, the same certifieth me of the other. John calleth the love of a man's neighbour the deeds of love, after the Hebrew speech, as to help at need. For the deed declareth what the man is within. Neither can my love to God and faith be seen to the world, save through the works. And by the works doth Christ command us to judge. So that if a man have evil works and continueth therein, he loveth not God nor knoweth God, no though he call himself master doctor, or God's vicar. Neither understandeth he God's word for all his high divinity; but is in all his preaching an hypocrite, a false prophet, and a liar, though his preaching please the world never so well. Nevertheless, a man is certified that he loveth God ere he come at the work, by the testimony of the Spirit which is given him in earnest. The Spirit, saith Paul, (Rom. viii.) testifieth unto our spirit that we be the sons of God: and then it testifieth that we believe in God: for through faith are we sons. And then it certifieth me that I love God. For faith and love are inseparable. The Spirit through faith certifieth my conscience that my sins are forgiven, and I received under grace and made the very son of God, and beloved of God. And then naturally mine heart breaketh out into the love of God again, and I seek how to utter my love, and to do God some pleasure. And because I can neither do service nor pleasure unto his own person, my neighbour is set before me, to do God service and pleasure in him, and to be to him as Christ is in me, because he is my brother, bought with Christ's blood as I am. And I consent unto that law, and love it ere I come at the deed, and long after the deed. And then when I love my neighbour in the deed according to this law, I am sure that I love him truly. Or else if I examined not my love by this law, I might be deceived. For some love their neighbours for pleasure, profit, glory, and for their doing service only, as our spiritualty love us, and of that blessed love, do their busy cure to keep us in darkness: which love is a sign that a man hateth God and his neighbour thereto, and loveth himself only. But God's law is, that I should' abstain from mine own pleasure and profit, and become my neighbour's servant, and bestow life and goods upon him, after the ensample of Christ. Wherefore if I love' my neighbour out of the love of Christ, and after the ensample of his law, I am sure that I love him truly. And his commandments are not grievous. For all that is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. To do good to my neighbour is to do God good service. |