The Works of John Bunyan, vol 3, John Bunyan [ebook reader color screen TXT] 📗

building of this city, a mighty angel is said to come down from heaven to lay hold of the dragon, that old serpent, called the devil and Satan, and to bind him a thousand years; which done, he casts him into the bottomless pit, and there shuts him up, to the end he should deceive the nations no more (Rev 20:1-3). The effect of which will be not only a delivering of the saints from outward persecution, but also from being any more assailed with either wicked and erroneous doctrine, or fierce and fiery darts from the prince of darkness, which now many of them are so much annoyed and afflicted with; now the church will be free from those hellish suggestions to blaspheme, to despair, and the like, that her members do yet most dreadfully and sadly meet with. For observe, this old tempter is said to be tied up, or to be cast into the bottomless pit, first as he is a dragon, under which name he goeth in this book, in his persecuting the church (Rev 12). Secondly, he is said to be shut up, as he goeth under the name of a serpent, under which name he went when he fomented his devilish and damning seducing doctrine to our first parents; the which the Spirit expressly seems to relate unto, and therefore calls him that old serpent; that old serpent that deceived us at the first (Gen 3:1-5). Thirdly, he is said to be shut up also, as he goeth under the name of the devil, and Satan, under which name he goeth commonly in the New Testament, when he provoketh and stirreth up our lusts, and when he labours to drive us into all manner of unbelief, distrust, despair, and so consequently into murmurings and blasphemy against God (Matt 4:1,5,8; Luke 4:2-6; Acts 5:1-3; Eph 6:11; 2 Cor 2:7,11).

Wherefore, I say, that at the day that this wall is set up in all its glory, and when it performs every part and piece of its office to the full, then shall Satan be bruised under our feet indeed, and then shall Jerusalem be called the joyous city, and her people a joy; for her former sorrows shall be past and forgot (Rom 16:20: Rev 21:4).

If thou still objectest: But I have yet an evil heart, and therefore if I be not rid of that at that day, should I live till then, why though there should be no devil to afflict me, I shall feel and meet with sorrow and trouble enough. I answer thee: First, I dare not say that at this day thou shalt be in every sense without thy evil heart in the midst of all this glory, tempted soul. Yet I say thus much to thee-

First. Where there is no devil to tempt, though the saints will yet be imperfect, and come short of a glorified state, yet they, by his absence, will be delivered from many dreadful, vexing, and burning, and hellish darts, that will otherwise confound and afflict the soul like arrows whose heads are poisoned. Christians have a great deal of ease, when God doth, even at this day, withhold the devil for a season, though yet they have their own lusts, over they have when the devil and their own lusts are suffered to meet and work together. Yea, the Lord Jesus himself, who had no sin, yet in the temptation was fearfully handled and afflicted with the devil, though all the while, I say, he kept him at staves end,[13] and did not suffer him in the least to annoy his person; and therefore it is said that when he was in the wilderness, in the conflict, the angels came to minister to him (Mark 1:12,13; Col 2:14,15). At the time of his agony also-in which agony, doubtless, Satan had a great hand to afflict him-you see his complaint, how that he was sore amazed, and exceeding sorrowful, even unto death, being so laden with heaviness and sorrow that he was scarce able to stand or wag under the burden of it (Luke 23:44; Mark 14:33,34).

Satan, even from himself, besides the workings of our own lust, doth do us wonderful injury, and hits our souls with many a fiery dart that we think comes either from ourselves, or from heaven, and God himself; but not by this wall, this broad wall, this sorrow will be cut off.

Secondly. Again, when Satan is thus tied up, we shall, together with this mercy, receive such a plentiful pouring forth of the Holy Ghost, that though there will remain in us still remainders of our corruptions, yet, by the plentiful indwelling of the Holy Ghost, and the joy and peace and heavenly sweetness thereof, these things shall lie like lean, withered, blasted things. The reason of that power and that strength, that our lusts have to this day in our hearts, it is because they are so lean, and thin, and weak in the things of God. Strong grace makes corruptions weak, and strikes them thorough, laying them at the point of death, always gasping for life. Thus it was with Moses, he had such grace in his soul, and such communion with God, that though he had yet a body of sin within him, it was a rare thing for him to see his wretchedness (Num 11:14,15); that is, to see it pert, lively, and powerful in him. Indeed God saith, that upon the land of his people shall come up briars and thorns; ‘yea, upon all the houses of joy in the joyous city; because the palaces shall be forsaken, the multitude of the city shall be left, the forts and towers shall be for dens for ever, a joy of wild asses, a pasture of flocks; until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field,’ &c. (Isa 32:13-15). And then ‘the Lord shall defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David, and the house of David shall be as God, as the angel of the Lord before them’ (Zech 12:8). ‘The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick; the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity’ (Isa 33:24).

‘And he measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the angel.’

‘According to the measure of a man.’ The man Christ Jesus. For the measure of this city, or the golden reed with which this city is thus measured, it is his, his word and law of the New Testament.

All judgment is committed into the hand of the Son; and God ‘hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man’ (John 5:27; 12:48).

‘According to the measure of a man, that is, of the angel.’ This angel is one of the seven that had the seven last plagues to execute upon the man of sin (Rev 21:9), and yet he saith the measure is according to the measure of a man; the meaning is that the city, the New Jerusalem, is to be built according to the word of Christ; but yet by his word as it is in the hand of his angels, that is, his messengers and servants; of which servants, the chief will be those that are his instruments to pour forth the seven vials full of the seven last plagues upon the Antichristian harlot. For they, with their plagues, will both destroy what standeth in implacable opposition, and will subject the rest, and bring them into a correspondency with the word and will of God, as I have showed.

Whence note, that they of his servants that God shall use to pour forth his last and most dreadful plagues upon the whore, they are they that God will use to show us the pattern of this holy city.

Or thus, they that can tell how to plague the whore, they can tell how to measure this city. ‘The righteous men, they shall judge them,’ that is, the Antichristian harlot, with her wicked and adulterous daughters, ‘after the manner of adulteresses, and after the manner of women that shed blood; because they are adulteresses, and blood is in their hands’ (Eze 23:45).

Thus much touching the frame of this city, its walls, gates, and foundations, with the measure of each. And now it remains that I speak of the glory of them.

[THIRD. A RELATION OF THE GLORY OF THE CITY, ITS WALLS, GATES, AND FOUNDATIONS.]

Ver. 18. ‘And the building of the wall of it was of jasper; and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass.’

[The glory of the walls.]

In these words you have a discovery of the glory, both of the wall and city itself; and that, as you see, under the notion of two choice metaphors. The wall is jasper, the chief of stones; and the city is gold, the chief of metals. ‘And the building of the wall of it was of jasper, and the city was pure gold.’

This jasper is that stone, in the light of which this city is said to descend, as in the light of a stone most precious. Now, as there he saith she descended in the light of this stone, so here he saith this stone is the wall thereof. ‘And the building of the wall of it was of jasper.’

This therefore confirmeth unto you what I said of the wall before, to wit, that it was the salvation of God through Christ; wherefore, learn this by the way, that this city shall not be at this day in her own keeping, but in the keeping of Jesus Christ. He with his benefits doth compass her round, and by him alone she lieth down in safety. Wherefore it is from this consideration that God doth say by the mouth of the prophet, I will give them within my house, and within my walls, ‘a place and a name better than that of sons and of daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off’ (Isa 56:5).

‘And the building of the wall,’ &c. By this word building, we are to understand both the materials of the wall, the manner of their placing, and the instruments that God will use for the setting up thereof. Now, to speak properly, this wall being the Lord Jesus Christ himself in his precious merits, benefits, and offices, the builder hereof must needs be God himself, for he it is that hath made this Christ for us a safeguard and defence, by making of him our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, by which he doth encompass us round on every side, and that at every moment to deliver us from the power and destruction both of sin, death, the devil, and hell (1 Cor 1:30; Heb 11:10; 3:4).

But again, the building here spoken of is a building of this wall after the destruction of Antichrist, and so long after Christ was sent, and made these things in his own person, to his beloved and blessed church. Wherefore the building of this wall that is here spoken of, it must be understood of the recovering again the purity of those doctrines, in which the Lord Jesus, with all his benefits, is found and made ours, for our everlasting defence and safety. For we find that the king of Babylon, who was a type of our Antichrist, when he came up against Jerusalem, the type of our primitive church, he brake down their city, destroyed their walls, rifled their houses, and killed their children; whose steps, I say, our Antichrist follows to a hair, in treading down the primitive church, corrupting her doctrines-which are her safeguard and wall-also robbing and spoiling the houses of