and unprofitableness under the means of Grace and that for ever Remember Christians that Death that is a Trap door to let some down into hell shall be a Portal or Gate to let you into heaven That that stroke of the King of terrors that shall separate your souls from your bodies shall separate sin likewise from you souls Your sorrowes now are mixt with your joyes your darknesse with your light you have indeed some rest while you labour how full then will your rest be when you shall rest from your labours and work no more this is your day of working hereafter is your day of rewarding this is your seed-time hereafter is your harvest Si Deus tam bonus sequentibus quam bonus fuerit consequentibus though here you sigh and mourn yet hereafter you shall sing and rejoyce though here you are as Pearles hid in and besmeared with durt yet hereafter you shall shine as the Sun Then you shall see the fruit of the travels of your souls then you shall not repent of your mortification and repentance Then finally will it appear that that man is happier that hath had Saint Pauls Coat with his heavenly graces then the Purple Robes of Princes with all their Kingdomes Fifthly By way of Advice to all That they may so carry themselves while they live that their works may gloriously follow them when they die To which purpose First Bee importunate at the Throne of Grace that ye may be made the workmanship of God which you must be before you can do the work of God Fiamus opus Dei ut facimus opus Dei your natures must be renewed before you can doe new actions A bad man can never Theologically do good works morally he may but he that doth a moral work only shall have a moral reward only as the wheele turns round not to the end it may be made round But on the contrary as the stemms must first be grafted on the stock before they can bring forth fruit so we must be Branches in Christ united to and made one with him before we can be fruitful in good works The Church in the Canticles is described no where by the beauty of her hands or fingers though oft by the beauty of other parts of her body because a Christian should abound in good works and yet in silence without boasting Or Secondly because it is Christ alone that works all our works in us and Grace is not our Creature but the manufacture of Christ Bona opera non praecedunt Justificandum sed sequntur Justificatum Secondly If you would have your good works to follow you send them before you Now Repent now Believe and hereafter you shall have the reward of your Repentance and of your Faith and as for Charity part with that you cannot keep that you may obtain that you cannot lose When the world shall leave you your good works shall follow you your gracious actions your good works are an inexhaustible fountain that shall never be dryed up a durable spring that shall never fail they are acts of time short in performance yet eternal in their recompence Non transeunt opera nostra sicut transire videntur sed velut aeternitatis semina jaciuntur Though they are sown in this world they shall spring in the next that which you lay out for Christ on earth you lay up for your selves in Heaven the hand of the poor is the Treasury the Gazophylacium of Christ and by charity in a Gospel sense you make your Maker your Debter and surely if thou be the Creditor of the Almighty it will not be long ere he come out of thy Books How foolish are they that fear to lose their wealth by giving it and fear not to lose themselves by keeping it He that lays up his Gold may be a good Jailor but he that lays it out is a good steward Merchants traffick thither with a commodity where 't is precious in regard of scarcity We do not buy Wines in England to carry them to France Spices in France to carry them to the Indies so for labor and work repentance and mortification there is none of them in Heaven there is Peace and Glory and the favor of God indeed Their works in my Text go with them they dare not go without their fraught A Merchant without his Commodity hath but a sorry wellcome God will ask men that arrive at Heaven Gates ubi opera Rev. 22.12 His reward shall be according to our works Thou hast riches here and here be objects that need thy riches the poor in Heaven there are riches enough but no poor therefore by faith in Christ make over to them thy monies in this world that by Bill of Exchange thou mayest receive it in the world to come that onely you carry with you which you send before you Do good while it is in your power relieve the oppressed succor the fatherless while your Estates are your own when you are dead your riches belong to others one light carryed before a man is more serviceable then twenty carryed after him In your compassion to the distressed or for pious uses let your hands be your Executors and your eyes your Overseers and that I may not be mistaken let your Charity have these two Qualifications 1. Let your works be done in Faith as without works we cannot profit men so without Faith we cannot please God we must be marryed to Christ or our children are not Legitimate our works are not right All our surviving out of the Ark will not save us from the deluge of Gods wrath As Isaac said to Abraham Father here is the Altar and the wood but where is the sacrifice so at last day when you shall knock at Gods door and seek to enter and hold up your Lamps and cry Lord we are Virgins we are Christians we were hospitable and charitable according to thy command let our neighbors be witnesses of our good works but will the Lord reply True here are your duties and your works but where is my grace of Faith Are these a satisfaction to my Justice where is my Benjamin the righteousness of my Son to plead for you My Beloved There seems to be less glory in Faith then in any other Grace it seemed but a sorry Grace a Grace of no great vertue Holiness is acceptable because it honors God Charity is noble because it profits men Thankfulness is melodious because its the tune of Angels Other works seem to make God a Debter to give as it were something to God but ad quid fides What is Faith good for Yes it is good for every good purpose it s the root of all the Graces it s the richest Grace because its the inriching Grace if Faith go before Works will follow Vbi Christus non est boni operis fundamentum ibi nullum est bonum aedificium 2. As works of Charity must be qualified with Faith or else our haec ego
not suffer him to go in with him So in a sense Faith guards us to Heaven Gates and when it hath done its office there it leaves us Faith follows a Christian as the shadow doth the Sun from one point of the Compass or Dyal to another until it comes to the Miridian and there it leaves it but love is a Royal Grace an Heavenly Peer with State and Majesty it enters into Glory and dwells with the King of Glory himself to all Eternity As Dr. Preston said when a dying I shall change my place but not my company his Graces followed him Thirdly Their Works follow them in respect of the comfort of them as the wicked onely leave their duties behinde them and carry their sins with them so the godly leave their sins behinde them and carry their graces with them they put off their garments when they go to bed And here 1. After death a childe of God is comforted with the success of his works How comfortable at the last day will it be for a Master of a Family to present his servants at the Tribunal Bar before the Lord and to say Lord Here am I and my servants with me that not onely wear my Livery but also obeyed thy commands For the Ministers of the Gospel that have been faithful to present their flocks before the great Bishop and Shepheard of souls and to say Here are the purchase of thy blood the travail of our souls the fruit of our labors and tears As the Ancient sweetly brings in the Apostles like so many File-leaders severally bringing up their Converts to the Judgement-Seat Peter attended with the converted Jews John leading up the Asiatiques Thomas the Indians and Paul the Gentiles Et nos hic Pastores vocati sumus ibi greges non ducemus And it is the perswasion of many great Divines That the spiritual Fathers in Christ shall know their children in Christ at that day Their success will advantage their comfort and therefore it is part of our duty to labor for success though it must be acknowledged that God rewards us not according to the success of our labors properly but according to our labors for success Let none be discouraged that their faithful works have not their success with men for as the good Physician always heals not so the good Preacher always converts not The success of our labors is his work not ours and God rewards us not according to his own work simply and abstractly taken by the leave of that yet true and famous affirmation God crowns his own works in us but according to our works He shall give to every man according to his works 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we had better have one work writ in Heaven then a thousand on Earth and though men may forget labors of love on earth yet the comfort is they shal be reminded rewarded by Christ in heaven those that convert souls and run like stars on Earth shall at last be Crowned and shine like stars in Heaven Dan. 12.3 4. 2. After death a childe of God shall be comforted with the Testimony of his Conscience And thus 1. His Integrity shall follow or accompany him Miserable is he whose conscience condemns him though all the world acquit him but thrice happy is he whose conscience acquits him though all the world accuse him A man may have hypocrisie in him and yet be no Hypocrite he may slumber and sleep with the foolish Virgins yet be no foolish Virgin while we are on this side our Fathers house we cannot but trip and stumble though we keep the way while we are on this side Paradice we cannot behold a Pomgranate that hath no rotten grain in it This may support that if we bring our Graces to the Touch-stone the Lord himself will never bring them to the Balance the charge of Hypocrisie is familiar and easie the proof is laborious and hard We are not made Lord Judges of mens Consciences and therefore notwithstanding private suspitions we must forbear and refer the censure of the full and final estate of man to God It s the work of God to discover Hypocrites not of man while a man goes about to discover an Hypocrite let him beware lest in seeking to finde out one he discover two the searched and the searcher Quam immensa est laetitia de recordatione transacti operis Possibly it may be said concerning many Christians who never studied to be conformable to the Critical Religion of the World as it was said of Father Paul the Venetian because men knew not how to convince him either in his Profession or Life they had onely this common plea against him That he was an Hypocrite But what a testimony will Samuel bring with him at that day to say in the audience of Men and Angels Whose Ox have I stoln For blessed Paul to manifest at that day This is the testimony of my conscience that in godly simplicity I have behaved my self in the world My Beloved get a good conscience for that is a thousand witnesses and a thousand witnesses will not at that day be so good as a good conscience How amiable will the face of true Grace be then How abominable will the vizor and counterfeit be 2. His Charity and Love shall witness for him Many have no greater sensible evidence of their loving Christ then by the love they bear to his servants that wear his Livery to his Children that bear his Image But then the scruples of the upright shall be dissolved resolved and they shall not need so to puzle their brains to finde the love of the Brethren in their hearts How refreshing will it be then for a Believer to have occasion to say by way of Praise and Testimony the Lord gave me the loaf and I grudged not to give others the crums God made my cup full and I made it to run over for the relief of others It will I am sure it will be more comfortable for a man to say I have been good and I have done good in the World then to say I had all the goods of the World Good works are a Treasure and will follow you good and cordial Prayers are a Treasure and they will go before you and Faith and Hope are a Treasure and they will go with you It is strange to consider how many bad words men have for good works as if to be charitable were to be Popishly affected but if charity be Antichristianism Christ is the Pope and Rome is at Jerusalem Rev. 14.13 Acts 7.59 Luke 23.43 Make to your selves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness that when ye fail they may receive you into everlasting habitations Luke 16.9 Not by way of merit but by way of concomitancy every acting of every Grace will stand us in stead a charitable act as well as a repenting act Quicquid pauperibus spargimus nobis colligimus I shall not impose on your belief But it is reported that
make a difference between dying for and dying in the Lord as if that belonged onely to Martyrs this to all true Professors Martyres hic intelligi concedimus solos vero negamus Gorhan But the substance is That when Gods children have done their work they go to bed their Lusts die in them and they themselves die in the Lord as Children in their Fathers arms Secondly As we have the work so likewise we have the wages or rather reward of Christians And that 1. Generally They are said to be blessed Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord They are blessed in Hope while they live and blessed in Possession when they die As a Christian cannot be fully happy before death so he cannot at all be miserable after death 2. Particularly and Punctually And that 1. Negatively Because they rest from their Labors their labors in suffering their labors under sin the labors of their Callings and subjection unto Temptations The World was their Tempestuous Sea Heaven is their Port and Harbor the Earth was the place of their working Heaven the place of their resting In portu navigunt quare sopor fessis 2. Positively and their works do follow them Though they leave the world yet they leave not their works behinde them The authority and warrant of all this is premised This Oracle is not the Invention of man but the voice of God It is the Spirit of God who knows the minde of God that saith so Thus saith the Spirit Quaery Why is it said from henceforth Were not those that dyed in the Lord before happy Answer Some say the Emphasis on this Particle henceforth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 q. d. Times will now be troublesome and as it was their blessedness that lived to the Lord at any time to die for the Lord so especially it is their Blessedness to die then It is some mercy to die before times of Judgement as it is a mercy for some to die in times of judgment Secondly Others refer it to their Blessedness immediately after their death that is their Souls sleep not in their Bodies till the Resurrection as some dreamingly affirm they are immaterial and immortal and â—o sooner do they go out of their earthly Tabernacles but presently they ascend to Heaven It is probable that the Spirit hereby would also presignifie by way of contradiction the Opinion of the Papists about Purgatory as if the souls of good men did take that stage in their way to Glory No saith the Spirit their Purgatory is in this world here they are purified and immediately upon the dissolution of the union between their souls and Bodies as their Bodies are blessed in the hope of a Resurrection so their Souls are presently blessed in possession those that die in the Lord are thenceforth or immediately blessed But I principally on this solemn occasion pitch on the last clause And their works do follow them First for the Explication then for the Application 1. For the Explication here are two Quaeries to be answered Quaerie 1. What is meant by works Answ There are 1. Evil works as there are evil workers The works of the flesh are manifest uncleanness idolatry strife and contentions Gal. 5.19 20. At death the sins of the godly leave them and their Graces onely follow them there sins shall be cast not into a shallow river where they may appear and swim up aloft upon the waters but into a deep Sea of Oblivion We must remember our evil works and God will forget them we must forget our good works and God will remember them 2. There are also good works or as the Apostle phraseth it fruits such as are gentleness and joy temperance and meekness Gal. 5.22 23. And these are those works that follow those that die in the Lord. 1. Specially works of Charity as they say of Oswald King of Denmark that in regard of his liberallity to the poor his right hand though he was dead withered not Works of Charity are in Scripture in a peculiar maner called good works 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of principality and eminency above many other works that yet are good in regard of the influence they have for to produce and give a lustre to all good works 2. More largely Though works of charity be good works and necessary to salvation yet there are many good works besides works of charity Faith is the work of God and a good work repentance is the work of God and a good work Charity is a Caelestial Orb but not large enough for all the stars of good works to shine and move in Therefore when the Apostle speaks here of good works we are thereby to understand in general all works that are good not onely a single Work not onely their Charity but their Faith their Repentance their Holiness they all do follow them Quaerie 2. What is meant by their works A. 1. Here is noted propriety Their own works follow them not the works of other men which Criticism suggesteth to us 1. The Absurdity of the Papist who maintains that a man may be so righteous as that he may not onely merit Heaven for himself but for others also It was an arrogant saying of a Romish Pharisee That he had done all for his own Salvation many years ago and staid in the world after that onely to gather treasure for others But as a wicked man shall perish by the hand of his own unbelief so the Just shall live by his own faith not the Prayers and Performances not the duties and doings of others but their own works follow them 2. The formal interest of a Believer in his works They are his works not because he is the fountain but because he is the subject of his Graces Sin otherwise is most of all things ours yet in a favorable sense as nothing is so much our own before we work as our will so nothing is so much our own as our works when they are done they cleave to us whether as fomentations to nourish us or as Corrasives to gnaw upon us that lies in the nature of the work but ours they are and cling to us our Work seem to be more ours then our Faith is ours our Works are ours as we have done them our Faith ours as we have received it Faith is ours as our Goods are ours Works are ours as our Children are ours Certè nos operamur sed Deus operatur in nobis ut operemur Querie 3. What is meant by this that our Works are said to follow us A. Though the acts of Grace be transient yet their vertue is everlasting They follow us Notes 1. Their company to glory As a Christian follows his work on earth so his works shall follow or accompany him to heaven he goes not out of the world naked and void of grace as he came into the world but he carries the garments of salvation the extrinsick and Red coat of Justification the intrinsick and internal
feci haec ego feci this and that have I done are but faeces dregs as Luther saith aptly so they must be qualified with sincerity while the peny is in the hand let Gods glory be in the heart Your lights must shine so that men seeing your good works may glorifie God but not that men should see your works and glorifie you and cry you up and down There goes a charitable man there goes a great worker Men judge of the heart by the work but God judgeth of the work by the heart At the Judgement Bar it will be no excuse before God if the matter of the work be ill to plead the goodness of the heart to say Though I was a common Blasphemer of thy name a common neglecter of holy duties yet I had an honest heart so when the heart is naught there is no pleading before God the goodness of the work you fasted and professed and were charitable Will the Lord say as he did to the Jews but was it for my Glory for the exaltation of my name out of the sense of my love Cains works had been good if Cains heart had not been evil How sad will it be for some to behold at the last day the mites of others to be received and their own talents rejected the good works of many to leave them and their evil works onely to follow them Christus opera nostra non tam actibus quam finibus pensat 3. Work while you have time to work cast up your accompts before you come to give up your accompts or your accompts will cast up you How vainly do many talk of working for Heaven when they are going from the place of working to the place of rewarding of doing the greatest work to repent to believe when they have least strength to do them of turning their souls to God when they can hardly turn their bodies on their beds Believe it believe it Christians its too much for one man and that at one time to look after a sick soul and a sick body together if ever you would have your works to follow you when dead follow you your works while you live be earnest in self-examination industrious in making your Calling and Election sure like wise Virgins Get not onely lamps into your hands but oyl also into your lamps The Grave is a place for resting from out works not of working for rest The Judgement Bar is a place for the distribution of Justice not for the dispensation of Mercy now or never now if ever work out your salvation get the one thing necessary Surgunt impii non ad judicium sed ad condemnationem The wise man tells us There is no work to be done in the Grave that 's not a shop to work in but a Grave to rest in that 's not a time for the killing of the worm of guilt in our souls when the worms are gnawing and feeding on our bodies God will not send Prophets to the grave nor set up a Pulpit in Hell for the Preaching of salvation to the dead or damned Lastly I might adde Take examples from Gods Oracles and from Providence follow them that have so followed Christ as ever you would have your persons follow Gods servants to glory let your faith love follow their examples that are left behinde on earth FINIS Good Reader IN regard of the known exemplariness of the conversation of this vertuous Lady deceased I am perswaded from arguments brought as to the common good that this her following Character be annexed to my Sermon It is reported of a great man that he had good Intellectuals but bad Morals This honorable Lady had a good head and also the addition of a good heart not to mention her acquaintance with several Languages she was best versed in the Language of Canaan she was able solidly to maintain the controversies of the Church of God against Papists Socinians c. It was her Honor while other Ladies spent their time in reading Romances and painting their faces that she spent her time in reading the Oracles of God and adorning her soul Her private family duties justled not out her publique attendance on Gods Ordinances nor on the contrary some few have hearts but want time most have time but want hearts but as God gave her time so he also gave her a heart to serve him She never thought the Sabbath to be over till the duties of the Sabbath both publique and private were over She was able to comport her self with the highest yet she usually condescended both in discourse and behavior to the lowest and meanest of Gods children She brought forth much fruit and made but a little noise She had much glory by her Face but as Reverend Hall says of Moses in her proportion she had more glory by her vail I never heard she was reconciled to any for indeed I never heard she had an enemy The Ministry have lost a judicious Favorer the Poor a Physician her endeared Husband the best Companion in this troublesome world And that which is the Crown of all she acknowledged the imperfection of her own Duties and the necessity of Christs righteousness To conclude she was of the number of those few that lived and dyed in honour she hath done her work and is gone to sleep FINIS