they say they want assurance; for, what better assurance would you have than the word? If you have his word, you need no better assurance. If a man of credit, whom you can depend upon it, and say you are assured of it; for you have his word. There is an assurance of sense, that is the assurance of the work, when you have got the thing that is promised; this is not properly assurance, it is enjoyment: but the assurance of faith is the assurance of a word. And tho the assurance of sense be sweetest, yet the assurance of faith is the surest assurance: for, what you get in hand from God you may soon lose the benefit and comfort of it; but what you have upon band in the promise, is still to the fore. If you take God’s promise, you have the best assurance in the world; but if you say you want faith, you cannot take his word, or trust his word, then this is plain dealing: I fear this indeed be the case of the most; then you want assurance indeed, because you want faith, and cannot take his word, nor give him so much credit. But if any be saying, that is indeed my case; I cannot believe his word: doth God say nothing to me? Is there any word suited to my case? Yes, there are promises of faith as well as to it: Zeph. iii. 12. "I will leave in the midst of them a poor and afflicted people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord. In him shall the Gentiles trust."--Hath the author of faith so promifed? Then, O take him at his word; cry for faith, saying, Lord, Do as thou hast said.
But may one say I would desire not only to have the word, but the accomplishment of the word; I would not only have the promise, but the performance; and there are some promises, I have been looking to, some ten or twenty years- old promises,that I think I got the faith of, but; alas! the accomplishment is not yet come; there are some prayers and petitions I have had long tabled upon the ground of the promise; what doth God say to one that hath never got these promises accomplished, nor these prayers answered? Why, man, be thankful, if you have got grace to believe the promife; for so much faith as you have to take God’s word, so much assurance you have that the word will be made out. If you be waiting upon a promising God, give him his time, and behold the womb of the promise will shortly open and bring forth; for it will not travel beyond its time; "Belied is she that believed; for there shall be a performance of those things that were told her from the Lord," Luke i. 45. And your fits and
