Works (Vol 4) - Sibbes - XII - A glance of heaven concluded

Required reading
The Works Volume 4 by Richard Sibbes (Available from Amazon or free here) - Conclude 'A glance of heaven' by reading 'The Fourth Sermon'.

My summary
This week we finish Sibbes' sermons on 1 Corinthians 2:9 'But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.'

In this final sermon Sibbes continues to speak of what it means to be one of those that love God.  Sibbes explains that in love there are three things: affection, passion and grace.

He then handles some objections:
(i) may we not love anything but God and holy things?;
(ii) but what if my love to God is faint and little?;
(iii) what is the reason that sometime meaner Christians have more love than great scholars?

Next Sibbes gives some directions on how to come to love God:
(i) have a heavenly light to discover what are in ourselves and our emptiness;
(ii) consider his wonderful goodness - meditate and think of it.

Then picking up on his last point about meditating on God's goodness, Sibbes exhorts us to consider some particularities of God's favours to us more than others.  Consider:
(i) how God hath followed thee with goodness outwardly, when others have been neglected;
(ii) those examples of loving of those that have then lived in former times;

Sibbes then explains some ways to direct you to love God:
(i) get a new nature;
(ii) converse with those that are affectionate;
(iii) beg the Spirit of sanctification for the discovery of God's love to us;
(iv) labour to grow more in the assurance of God's love;
(v) labour for love;
(vi) consider that when we place our affections upon anything else it is vanity.

What grabbed me
I enjoyed hearing about how privileged Christians are when compared to those in previous ages: 'Again, to help us to stir up this grace of love, consider those examples of loving of those that have then lived in former times. Take David, and Paul, and other holy men. David wonders at his own love : ' Lord, how do I love thy law ! ' Ps. cxix. 97. And have we not more cause comparing the grounds of our affection, when we have more than they in those times ? What ! did he wonder at his love of God's law, when the canon was so short? They had only Moses, and some few books, and we have the canon enlarged ; we have both the Old and New Testament, shall not we say much more, How do I love thy law, thy gospel, and divine truths ! This should shame us, when they in dark times so loved the truth of God, and we see all clear and open, and yet are cold. '

Yes, it is to our shame that we don't love God's law as much as we should.

Next week's reading
Commence 'The excellency of the gospel above the law' by reading up to the paragraph beginning 'And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.'

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.