Antichristian Crew These are the primo geniti diaboli and may be called the Devils Janizaries Of these we may say as Eliphaz doth of the wicked They stretch out their hand against God and strengthen Job 15. 25 26. themselves against the Almighty they run upon him even on his neck upon the thick bosses of his Bucklers But as many and as mighty as all these be yet sooner or later they shall all be overcome and shall yield either to the Scepter of his Grace O blessed Conquest or else be broken in peices by a Rod of Iron But we are now speaking of such as fight a good fight that are come on to Gods side and are engaged for God and Christ against those principalities and powers and rulers of the 〈…〉 6. 12. darkness of this World. You have heard who the Combatants are 2. In the next place we may enquire when they were first listed and enroll'd into Christs Army and became ingaged in this Holy Warfare Why this was not from their first entrance into the World Alas no! we were all at first on the other side born Enemies to God and in condition of Servitude and Bondage to the Devil All by Nature in a state of Rebellion against God and Self-destroyers but we become and were made so by Grace The time of our first being Listed under Christs Banner takes its Date from our Conversion When we are brought to a hearty and sincere Closure with and Entertainment of Christ as our Lord and Saviour as offered to us in and by the Gospel which is that great instrument by the joyful sound of which Christ by his Ambassadors goes forth and invites and calls poor Sinners off from the Devils Camp and to yield themselves to him And when these outward Calls are accompanied by the efficacious workings of Gods Spirit then Sinners are made willing in the day of Christs power Christ and his Gospel where they come do 〈…〉 10. 3. not find sinners willing at the first motion to hearken to his Counsel nor quit their Arms nor submit to him but he makes them willing and from that time of their yielding to Christ they declare War against the World the Flesh and the Devil And these Enemies upon this grow more enraged than before which young Converts are not so well aware of many times drawing very uncomfortable and unwarrantable Conclusions against themselves thinking they are now worse than before because they find their enemies more busie and enraged than in time past But remember this the Devil and our Lust are ordinarily most destructive where they are lest disturbing Whilest the strong man armed keepeth his Palace 〈…〉 1. 21. his goods are at peace 3. Enquiry might be made what Enemies the Christian Soldier hath to encounter with these you know are commonly reduced to three Heads viz. the Devil the World and the Flesh First The Devil from whose Tyrannical dominion Believers are enabled to escape He is our old Adversary he is call'd a murtherer from the beginning Oh the many ways Joh. 8. 44. and stratagems by which he carries on his pernicious designs 2 Cor. 2. 1◠against poor Souls both to retain and hold fast such as he hath taken in his snare by whom they are carried captive at his 2 Tim. 2. 2◠will and that which is most sad by the consent of their own will too and also to reduce and bring back again such as have fled to Christ for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before them Heb. 6. 18. Against whom Christians are warned to keep their eye upon 1 Pet. 5. 8 9 Be sober be vigilant because your adversary the devil as a roaring lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour Whom resist stedfast in the faith Secondly The World Which not as made by God but as marr'd by Sin is an inveterate Enemy against the Christian which therefore we are caution'd against by no means to give entertainment to in our Affections Love not the 1 Joh. 2. 15. world neither the things that are in the world if any man love the world the love of the father is not in him This World is a Witch a Delilah what unspeakable detriment have Christians been exposed to when once by her Allurements they have been enticed to take a nap and lay their Heads in the Lap of the Profits Pleasures or Honours of this World What advantage hath Satan hereby taken to cut their Locks and abate their strength which many times hath scarce been recovered to their dying day Thirdly The flesh which though mentioned in the last place yet is not the least of those Enemies the Christian hath to encounter with but rather the worst and greatest For what could Satan or the World do without if it were not for the Flesh within By Flesh I mean not the Body but the remainders of the corrupt Nature that inward and unseen depravity which like a Leprosie hath over-spread us from head to foot that body of Sin the blessed Apostle complain'd of which warred against the law of his mind and brought him into captivity to the Law of sin which was in his Members This like a Rom. 7. 23 25. Traytor in a City or Castle is always ready upon every occasion to open the gates and let in the Enemies that lye in siege gainst it Fourthly We might further enquire what those Weapons are both Offensive and Defensive with which Believers must be armed to encounter with these Enemies and which upon their first listing themselves they are to put on and so to put on as never to put them off till they have gained a perfect Conquest To which I briefly answer you may find them summed up in one Chapter where you have the Christians Armory or Magazine to which the Soul upon its closure with Christ and first Ingagement must repair and with which he must furnish himself Never thinking to encounter these Enemies naked with success nor with any other Weapons which are not of this make You have them set down by the Apostle Ephes 6. from the 11th to the 18th verse of that Chapter where we are exhorted ver 11. Put on the whole Armour of God that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil This Counsel is repeated ver 13 the several pieces of this Spiritual Armour are set down in the following Verses viz. 14 15 16 17. The girdle of truth and the breast-plate of righteousness the feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of Peace the Shield of Faith the Helmet of Salvation the Sword of the Spirit These things I cannot now open only observe the Title that is put upon them all they are stiled the Armour of God amongst other reasons for these two to note to us that they are all of Divine institution and of divine constitution All other Weapons which are of Humane make and invention as I might instance in many especially
themselves the expectation of the promised reward in the other World at their Death or day of Retribution This is a plain and undoubted Truth no well-grounded expectation of our Reward till we have first finished our Work. Christ himself who was both a Son and a Servant sent by his Father into the World had work appointed him to do a work of the greatest weight and importance that ever was put into the hands of any to dispatch the reparation of his Fathers Glory eclipsed by Man's Rebellion and Apostacy and the Redemption and Salvation of all the Elect depended upon Christ's finishing this work and a work to be done within a limited time as may be inferred from what our Saviour speaks I must work the works of him that sent me while John 9. 4. it is day the night cometh when no man can work A work that had many works in it Here was doing work and here was suffering work and upon his faithful discharge of this great work a glorious Reward was insured to Christ and you may observe that though the work he was ingaged in was difficult and hard too difficult for all the Angels in Heaven or Creatures on Earth to undertake In the doing of which he met with inexpressible Discouragements and Oppositions both from Friends and Enemies And the reward he expected was a high and glorious reward such a massy Crown as could fit no Head but Christ's which might well put him upon earnest longing for it as you see he did by what the Apostle tells us Heb. 12. 2. speaking of this Blessed Jesus Looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of God. Yet we never find that either the consideration of the one the difficulty of his work or the consideration of the other the beauty and brightness of his reward did put him upon desiring or expecting the possession of his promised Glory till he could say he had done his work and then indeed you will see him addressing his Father in this manner I have glorified thee on the Earth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do 〈…〉 17. 4 5. And now O Father glorifie thou me with thine own self with the Glory which I had with thee before the world was q. d. I have done my work and I expect my reward Truly thus it is in all our cases That God who hath sent us into the World and hath appointed our time and limited our 〈…〉 14. boundt beyond which we cannot pass This God hath also prescribed our work what we are to do in this short time allotted for us He hath not sent us hither only to gaze about us or to feed and gratifie the carnal and sensual inclinations of a corrupt heart in spending these precious hours in sports and pastimes No no as God hath given us work to do so he hath furnished us with talents to be improved for the Glory 〈…〉 25. 15. of that God who gave us our beings He hath committed the care of precious Souls one of which is more in value than 〈…〉 16. 26. Ten Thousand Worlds to be recovered out of that lapsed and lost Estate into which they are fallen He hath given his Word for our Direction hath promised his Spirit for our help he hath betrusted us with choice advantages and opportunities for the facilitating of what work we have to do He hath appointed a day for the calling us to an account and a Acts 17. 3 Judge to give forth a Righteous Retribution according to what we have done in the Flesh whether it be good or evil He hath proposed and promised a blessed and glorious Reward not as merited by our work but as consequential upon it a Reward not of Debt but of meer Grace and Favour He hath threatned an Everlasting Punishment as the demerit of our neglect of that great Salvation set before us Cutting us off from Heb. 2. 3. all hopes of enjoying the former and of escaping the latter without finishing the work he hath given us to do These things are so evident in Scripture that you whose lot is cast under the Dispensation of these Divine Revelations cannot plead ignorance so that if your days be finished and your work unfinished Wo be to that Man or Woman it had been better for them they had never been born But on the other side If we can say with Paul in my Text That we have fought the good fight and finished our course c. Then when Death comes thou mayest entertain it with a smile and triumph over it and though it closes thine Eyes so as to hinder thy beholding of all thy amiable enjoyments here on Earth Thou shalt see them no more but must bid adieu to them all for ever Yet wilt thou then by an Eye of Faith with Stephen See the Heavens opened and the Son of Acts 7. 56 Man standing on the right hand of God ready to receive thee and bid thee welcom to that glorious Inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for you 1 Pet. 1. 4. Having thus for brevity's sake hudled matters together in general I shall now in order to further instruction reduce the whole under two heads 1. With respect to the work which we have to do here on Faith What it is and how and when it may be said to be finished 2. Somewhat with respect to the promised reward in Heaven which follows What that is and upon what basis our hopes and expectations of it are bottomed In the managing of both these I shall follow the guidance of my Text. 1. Then as to the work we have to do in this Life What it is I hope I need not mind you that the work I am speaking to relates not to the Duties of your particular Callings as Men and as disposed by the Conduct of Divine Providence into this and that civil and secular Employment which are many and various and which are so to be managed as may best subserve your general Calling as Christians But the work I am to speak to is of a far higher Nature that which doth not so immediately nor primarily respect our beings or well-beings with respect to time as what respects our well-beings to Eternity A work that hath some resemblance and bears some parity to the great work that Jesus Christ the Son of God came into the World for though to be performed in a far different manner Christ's work was reducible to two general heads First The glorifying of his Father So you read John 17. 4. I have glorified thee on the Earth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do q. d. Father that was the work which thou sentest me into the World for and that work I have done Secondly Christ's work was to
them in the time of her former Life yet now her expressions and behaviour a little before her Death were so much more satisfactory that they left no room for the least doubt or suspicion of her Blessedness Her Mother putting it to her whether she remembred any particular time when God first wrought upon her she answered No but God had begun to work upon her almost as soon as she had a Being or at least as soon as she was come to the use of Reason only she recollected that she had some remarkable impressions made by the Spirit at the hearing of a Sermon repeated from these words Now we are the Sons of God but it doth not yet appear what we shall 1 John 3. 2. be and another time at the hearing of a Sermon preacht upon the Glory of the Gospel from that Text In whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not 2 Cor. 4. 4. lest the light of the Glorious Gospel c. When I came to her that morning before she dyed being sent for at her urgent request she desired me to Preach her Funeral Sermon upon the subject which you have heard readily repeating both the verses without any haesitation adding that she desir'd it not upon her own account but for the sake of Religion that the world might be convinced there was somewhat in that how much soever despised which would bear up the heart in a dying hour With great gravity she exhorted me to go on and Preach the Gospel praying that my Ministry might not be in vain whereupon telling her that I hop'd it had not been in vain to her she with much heartiness replyed No I bless God it hath not Another Neighbouring Minister being call'd in the same morning to her at her request when he first came and askt her how she did she chearfully answered very well how can I be better for I am going to my Heavenly Father He then asking her whether she was willing to leave this World she replyed Yes most willing for why should I desire to live any longer in it He telling her that she had now a great work to do she answered Yes but I bless God I am prepared for it and I fear not Death for Christ by his Blood hath taken out the sting The question being propos'd to her whether she would have him to pray with her she said Yes I would have you to pray that God would continue to lift up the light of his countenance upon me to the last as he does now And before he came away from her she prayed that the Lord would be with him and help him to preach so as that the World might have no occasion to jeer at Religion She was much concerned for the Publick and in her Addresses and Ejaculations to God forgot not to mention Zion but prayed for the downfal of those three Enemies of the Church the Turk Antichrist and Satan And as to her self she prayed sometimes in these words Lord chase away the Tempter and suffer him not to darken my evidences now And again she prayed That when he came to her as he did to Christ he might find nothing in her When she was speaking of the sensible decayes of her Body and near approaches to the Grave she said I feel my self as it were like the Sun going down into another World. And when some drink was offered her she cryed I shall soon have done eating and drinking here but am going to drink new Wine with Christ in my Fathers Kingdom Her want of Sleep being spoken of by a stander by she said In a little while I shall sleep in the Lord which is better than any I can take here When the sharpness and violence of her pains was mentioned she said that indeed she could never have been able to endure them if God had not strengthened her and given in such extraordinary comforts to her for she was never so sensible of his love as when she was in the greatest misery And then she added But alas what are my pains in comparison of what my dear Saviour underwent when he sweat drops of Blood for my sins Some weeping loud in the room she beg'd them to forbear saying Why should you cry for such a lump of dirt It will do me no good but make me dye the harder and I count it rather an Argument of hatred than of love to me When one spoke in her hearing of the troubles of the times she said God is hiding me in the hollow of his Hand from the Besom of Destruction which may be coming She very largely exprest her earnestness to be dissolved at several times and more especially when she found that her Death was deferred longer than she had supposed it would be she cryed out I have tasted so much of the Joys of Heaven that I loath the Earth What should I do in this Dunghil World where I hear the Name of my God so often blasphemed I am weary of it my Heart is ready to break because I may not go home to my Father Oh! to have such a sense of the Love of God and then be put back again I cannot bear it I am sure I shall go to Heaven I wish that I might go quickly I shall never enjoy my self till I am there One askt her whether if she might recover she could be willing to return again into this World and she answered with some vehemency No. Yet notwithstanding all this she was not irregularly impatient to be gone as appeared by that passage The Lord look upon me and enable me to wait his time She mingled the Praises of God with her Prayers to him and was heard sometimes to utter those words Grace Grace She gave very serious Counsels to those that came to see her and stood about her she spoke to her Brother and Sisters in a way sutable to their Capacities and amongst other things strictly caution'd them against the Sin of Lying and advised them to be very dutiful and good Children to their Father and Mother and to love as Brethren and Sisters Taking her leave of one whom she blest God for as an Instrument of bringing her to the Knowledge of God in her tender years She said I am going from you now but hope to meet you again hereafter in Heaven And to the same purpose she spoke to some others of whose good Estate she was perswaded To another she said Be sure above all things to get an interest in Christ for this is all which we have to do in this World. She counselled and intreated all to walk as becomes the Gospel that they might not dishonour God nor provoke him to take the Gospel from them Her Mother asking her what she had to say to her she answered I pray God to support you and I hope he will be your everlasting support She had alwayes carryed her self so well towards her Parents that she was able with a good Conscience to tell her Father in this sickness that she had never wilfully offended him in her whole Life She was very conscientious in observing of the Lords Day and those parts of it which were not taken up in publick or in Family-Worship she spent in her own private Retirements the Fruit whereof abundantly appeared She had made her Bible her dayly delightful Companion for such a considerable time and profited so much in it that she could recite