Introduction (11)

2.  It is sinful; because it is wrought by sinful flesh; for all legal righteousness is a work of the flesh; Rom. iv. 1, &c.; Phil. iii. 3–8.

A work, I say, of the flesh; even of that flesh, who, or which also committeth the greatest enormities; for the flesh is but one, though its workings are divers: sometimes in a way most notoriously sensual and devilish, causing the soul to wallow in the mire.

But these are not all the works of the flesh; the flesh sometimes will attempt to be righteous, and set upon doing actions that in their perfection would be very glorious and beautiful to behold.  But because the law is only commanding words, and yieldeth no help to the man that attempts to perform it; and because the flesh is weak, and cannot do of itself that, therefore this most glorious work of the flesh faileth.

But, I say, as it is a work of the flesh it cannot be good, forasmuch as the hand that worketh it is defiled with sin; for in a good man, one spiritually good, that is “in his flesh, there dwells no good thing,” but consequently that which is bad; how then can the flesh of a carnal, graceless man (and such a one is every Pharisee and self-righteous man in the world), produce, though it joineth itself to the law, to the righteous law of God, that which is good in his sight.

If any shall think that I pinch too hard, because I call man’s righteousness which is of the law, of the righteous law of God, flesh, let them consider that which follows: to wit, That though man by sin is said “to be dead in sin and trespasses,” yet not so dead but that he can act still in his own sphere; that is, to do, and choose to do, either that which by all men is counted base, or that which by some is counted good, though he is not, nor can all the world make him, capable of doing any thing that may please his God.

Man, by nature, as dead as he is, can, and that with the will of his flesh, will his own salvation.  Man, by nature, can, and that by the power of the flesh, pursue and follow after his own salvation; but then he wills it, and pursues or follows after it, not in God’s way, but his own; not by faith in Christ, but by the law of Moses.  See Rom. ix. 16, 31; x. 3, 7.

Wherefore it is no error to say, that a man naturally has will, and a power to pursue his will, and that as to his own salvation.  But it is a damnable error to say, that he hath will and power to pursue it, and that in God’s way: for then we must hold that the mysteries of the gospel are natural; for that natural men, or men by nature, may apprehend and know them, yea, and know them to be the only means by which they must obtain eternal life; for the understanding must act before the will; yea, a man must approve of the way to life by Jesus Christ, before his mind will budge, or stir, or move, that way: “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God (of the gospel); for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

He receiveth not these things; that is, his mind and will lie cross unto them, for he counts them foolishness; nor can all the natural wisdom in the world cause that his will should fall in with them, because it cannot discern them.

Nature discerneth the law, and the righteousness thereof; yea, it discerneth it, and approveth thereof; that is, that the righteousness of it is the best and only way to life, and therefore the natural will and power of the flesh, as here you see in the Pharisee, do steer their course by that to eternal life; 1 Cor. ii. 14.

The righteousness of the law, therefore, is a work of the flesh, a work of sinful flesh, and therefore must needs be as filth, and dung, and abominable as to that for which this man hath produced it and presented it in the temple before God.

Nor is the Pharisee alone entangled in this mischief; many souls are by these works of the flesh flattered, as also the Pharisee was, into an opinion, that their state is good, when there is nothing in it.  The most that their conversion amounteth to is, the Publican is become a Pharisee; the open sinner is become a self-righteous man.  Of the black side of the flesh he hath had enough, now therefore with the white side of the flesh he will recreate himself.  And now, most wicked must he needs be that questioneth the goodness of the state of such a man.  He, of a drunkard, a swearer, an unclean person, a Sabbath-breaker, a liar, and the like, is become reformed, a lover of righteousness, a strict observer, doer, and trader in the formalities of the law, and a herder with men of his complexion.  And now he is become a great exclaimer against sin and sinners, denying to be acquaint with those that once were his companions, saying, “I am not even as this Publican.”

To turn therefore from sin to man’s righteousness, yea, to rejoice in confidence, that thy state is better than is that of the Publican (I mean, better in the eyes of divine justice, and in the judgment of the law); and yet to be found by the law, not in the spirit, but in the flesh; not in Christ, but under the law; not in a state of salvation, but of damnation, is common among men: for they, and they only, are the right men, “who worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.”  Where, by “flesh,” must not be meant the horrible transgressions against the law (though they are also called “the works of the flesh,” Gal. iv. 29); for they minister no occasion unto men to have confidence in them towards God: but that is that which is insinuated by Paul, where he saith, he had no “confidence in the flesh,” though he might have had it; as he said, “though I might also have confidence in the flesh.”  “If any other man,” saith he, “thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more,” Phil. iii. 3, 4; and then he repeats a twofold privilege that he had by the flesh.

1.  That he was one of the seed of Abraham, and of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews, &c.

2.  That he had fallen in with the strictest men of that religion, which was such after the flesh, to wit, to be a Pharisee, and was the son of a Pharisee, had much fleshly zeal for God, and “touching the righteousness which is of the law, blameless,” Phil. iii. 3, 5, 6.

But I say still, there is nothing but flesh; fleshly privileges and fleshly righteousness, and so, consequently, a fleshly confidence, and trust for heaven.  This is manifest; when the man had his eyes enlightened, he counted all loss and dung that he might be found in Christ, not having his own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.

And this leads me to another thing, and that is, to tell thee, O thou blind Pharisee, that thou canst not be in a safe condition, because thou hast thy confidence in the flesh, that is, in the righteousness of the flesh.  “For all flesh is grass, and all the glory of it as the flower of the field;” and the flesh, and the glory of that being as weak as the grass, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven, is but a weak business for a man to venture his eternal salvation upon.  Wherefore, as I also hinted before, the godly-wise have been afraid to be found in their righteousness, I mean their own personal righteousness, though that is far better than can be the righteousness of any carnal man: for the godly man’s righteousness is wrought by the Spirit and faith of Christ, but the ungodly man’s righteousness is of the flesh, and of the law.  Yet I say, this godly man is afraid to stand by his righteousness before the tribunal of God, as is manifest in these following particulars.

1.  He sees sin in his righteousness; for so the prophet intimates, when he saith, “All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags” (Isa. lxiv.); but there is nothing can make one’s righteousness filthy but sin.  It is not the poor, the low, the mean, the sickly, the beggarly state of man, nor yet his being hated of devils, persecuted of men, broken under necessities, reproaches, distresses, or any kind of troubles of this nature that can make the godly man’s righteousness filthy; nothing but sin can do it, and that can, doth, hath, and will do it.  Nor can any man, be he who he will, and though he watches, prays, strives, denies himself, and puts his body under what chastisement or hardships he can; yea, though he also get his spirit and soul hoisted up to the highest peg or pin of sanctity and holy contemplation, and so his lusts to the greatest degree of mortification; but sin will be with him in the best of his performances: with him, I say, to pollute and defile his duties, and to make his righteousness speckled and spotted, filthy and menstruous.

I will give you two or three instances for this.

(1.)  Nehemiah was a man (in his day), one that was zealous, very zealous, for God, for his house, for his people, and for his ways; and so continued, and that from first to last, as they may see that please to read the relation of his actions; yet when he comes seriously to be concerned with God about his duties, he relinquisheth a standing by them.  True, he mentioneth them to God, but confesseth that there are imperfections in them, and prayeth that God will not wipe them away.  “Wipe not out my good deeds, O my God, that I have done for the house of my God, and for the offices thereof.”  And again, “Remember me, O my God, concerning this also (another good deed), and spare me according to the greatness of thy mercy; and remember me, O my God, for good;” Neh. xiii.

I do not think that by these prayers he pleadeth for an acceptance of his person, as touching justification from the curse of the law (as the poor blind Pharisee doth), but that God would accept of his service, as he was a son, and not deny to give him a reward of grace for what he had done, since he was pleased to declare in his testament, that he would reward the labour of love of his saints with an exceeding weight of glory; and therefore prayeth, that God would not wipe away his good deeds, but remember him for good, according to the greatness of his mercy.

(2.)  A second instance is that of David, where he saith, “Enter not into judgment with thy servant, O Lord; for in thy sight shall no man living be justified;” Psalm clxiii. 2.  David, as I have hinted before, is said to be a man “after God’s own heart,” Acts xiii.; and as here by the Spirit he acknowledges him for his servant; yet behold how he shrinketh, how he draweth back, how he prayeth, and petitioneth, that God would vouchsafe so much as not to enter into judgment with him.  Lord, saith he, if thou enterest into judgment with me, I die, because I shall be condemned; for in thy sight I cannot be justified; to wit, by my own good deeds.  Lord, at the beginning of thy dealing with me, by the law and my works, I die: therefore do not so much as enter into judgment with me, O Lord.  Nor is this my case only, but it is the condition of all the world: “For in thy sight shall no man living be justified.”

(3.)  A third instance is that general conclusion of the apostle, “But that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God is evident; for the just shall live by faith.”  By this saying of St Paul, as he taketh up the sentence of the prophet Habakkuk, chap. ii. 4, so he taketh up this sentence, yea, and the personal justice of David also.  No man, saith he, is justified by the law in the sight of God: no, no just man, no holy man, not the strictest and most righteous man.  But why not?  Why, because “the just shall live by faith.”