264 OF SPIRITUAL MINDEDNESS. earthly things, and you believe not, how shall ye be- lieve if I tell you heavenly things l The heavenly things are the deep and mysterioús counsels of the will of God. These renewed affections cleave to, with holy admiration, and . satisfactory sub- mission, captivating the understanding, to what it can- not comprehend. So the apostle declares it, Rom. xi. 83-36. '0 the depth of the riches both of the wis- dom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments; and his ways past finding out ! for who hath known the mind of the Lord:, or who bath been his counselor ? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed to him again l For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things, to whom be glory for ever. Amen.' What the mind cannot com- prehend, the heart doth admire and adore, delighting in God, and giving glory to him in all. The earthly things intended by our Saviour in that place, are the work of God upon the souls of men in their regeneration, wrought here in the earth. To- wards these the affections act themselves with delight, and with great thanksgiving. The experience of the grace of God in and upon believers is sweet to their souls. But one way or other they cleave to them all, they have not a prevailing aversation to any of them. They have a regard to all God's precepts, a delight in all his counsels, a love to himself and all his ways. Whatever other change is wrought on the affections, if they be not spiritually renewed, it is not so with them. For as they do not cleave to any spiritual things, in their own true, proper nature, in a due man- ner, because of the evidences of the presence of God in them ; so there are always some of them, whereto those whose affections are not renewed, maintain an
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