say there is an expectation in this patience even as the hireling waits for the end of the day and the watchman watches for the morning so do the people of God wait for the promised redemption we through the spirit do wait for the hope of righteousness by faith for we are saved by hope as the Apostle says in Rom. 8. But hope that is seen is not hope so as that now from henec we gather this that where there is not an expectation there patience will be found very weak and impoteut and indeed that will be found to be the account of our impatience want of faith and hope so is the strength and firmness of our patience Abraham saw the day of Christ he waited with a great firmness of patience because he saw my day and rejoyced and was glad and therefore let me tell you friends upon this account before I pass from this particular it is your interest as well as your duty I say it is your interest to study the promises to study the prophecies and to study the times these three things are to be studyed it is your interest as well as your duty to do it I know that you will grant the first that it is your interestto study the promises but alas this is a lame business the studying of the promises if you do not study the prophecies and study the times for to have a promise that some time or other there shall be a new state of things and not have the time discovered to you this is but a languishing tomfort alas say many it will not be in our days as that good man comforted himself that the evil threatned would not be in his days So patience is very lame upon this account because they know not whether it will be in their days or nor that is the cause of so great slightness in this respect they leave these things to others say they you have leizure you can study the times and the promises and so they take it upon the words of other men but we may speak long enough ere we can bear a solid ground of comfort into your hearts if you have it only from our words unless as the Samaritans said to the woman ye have heard and seen it your selves and so know that the time doth draw near And if you say how should we alas how should we discern those difficult those obscure periods that are delivered so darkly in the Revelations and other places let me tell you I desire to be free with you I know not whether it will suit with me or no to speak oft among you espetially this winter time though if I were among you I should embrace the call to be often among you for it is my comfort but let me tell you I have in these my poor labours among you directed you to Dan. 12. that you might take it and make somthing of it which you may if you wait upon God the words are plain that from that time of taking away the daily sacrifice and setting up the abomination of desolations it should be 1290 days If one should tell you that at such a time or at the end of such a period such an estate should fall to you or such a kingdom beyond sea would you not study it when this time would come up though it were set a little darkly it is nothing but that you have not a heart to it I beseech you bear with me it lies upon my spirit as a grief that people complain so of the times are so weary of the times and would be at better things in that regard and yet they will take no pains to look into the times of the promises if any should give you bonds will you lay them up in your desk will you never look when these bonds will be due I confess it is too plain and I have no ground to recall my word I stand to the reckoning that I have made among you that from the time of Julian the Apostate who in opposition to Christianity was engaging to repair Judaism from that time to 1650. or 1653. the 1290. days came up and that from thence there are but 45 years to come to the blessed period would you have any thing plaincr and if the Lord hath so considered us in such a Scripture as this we ought in thinkfulness to him to set our hearts to the understanding of it if all the interpreters be out yet we may fetch the sence of it from heaven strive then with God that he would give you some account of the prophecies as to the times having brought this glorious hope so near as I have done or as God haâ—h done to me and I to you as within a little more then 20 years now I lay aside all my books and all my reckonings though the evidence thereof abids with me still I cannot bring it nearer nor can I fee how it is further off I am now studying the times and there is a self evidencing light in the times in the dispensations of God and in his dealings with his people and his manifesting himself in their spirits and forming them it is a self evidencing property that is in the dispensations of God to acquaint us what they are and what Gods connsel and purpose is in them And I have sound great comfort in this reflecting upon the times our Saviour says it is that that may afford us light yea heathens can discern the face of the sky and yet cannot we discern the signes of the times there is as much light to be gathered from the times if we wisely consider them as our Astrologers gather from the face of the sky as our Saviour instances of them in some things as in a cloud arising out of the west and the blowing of the Southwind c. and have we not now a notable cloud arising in this western part of the world so that I say there is a light in the times and truly to give you one iustance I do apprehend that we may clearly see in the times both dissolution and restitution though more of the former then of the latter you know it is said that there must be a dissolution before there be a restitution the first heaven and earth fled away from the face of him that fate upon the throne and seeing all these things must be dissolved what manner of persons ought we to be Then I pray answer me this in your own spirits whether this generation or age that we have lived in from the times of our childhood at least the most of us that are here whether it hath not been a dissolving age Remember the first Scripture that I pitch't upon to give evidence of the times from that Mat. 24. There shall be signes in the sun and in the moon and how I opened them this is that I say we have seen in this part of the world a little model of the great dissolution of
consider that I desire to draw out my heart to you it is the greatest comfort I have when I finde weaknesse in my self I have a great desire to live to see the glorious time of the Church and when at any time as the devil is wonderful busy to cast in his fiery darts and discouragements into the soul when I finde I am either assaulted with a sudden fear or that I cannot see how that little vigour and strength I have should hold out I finde a great deal of comfort in reflections of this nature that the Lord is more concern'd in and for me then I am in and for my self and whoever can do so shall finde and feel the benefit of it hath not the Lord given his son for me and he that gives his own son how shall be not with him freely give us all things are we not his peculiar treasure then I say leave your selves to God and say look thou to it we may with a holy freedom say to the Lord look thou to it it is not for us though we are to serve the providence of God and the publique yet it is Gods concern he is to look to it cast it upon God but 3ly A third consideration is his I have told you once and again and now also that I cannot bring tho time neerer the time of our hopes then I have done but yet consider this this time that is yet to run out before that very period comes wherein he is pronounced blessed that waits comes to that time I say those times that are to run out will be filled with wonders and with glory that shall give strength unto us from day to day from year to year to await the end to the last issne for although it is not said that Daniel shall stand in his lot until the end of those days and then it is promised he shall ye I say there may goundedly be an expectation of higher more transcendent and wonderfull works of God that shall entertain his people during their watching and waiting for you know who is there that needs watchers at any time but will provide them entertainment during their watching they shall have strong-waters or something by them and so shall the Lords people you will say what entertainment shall we have I must tell you I look upon the 45 years as well night half expyred which is the time in which Christ employs instruments for the throwing down of the remainder of his enemies throughout this whole western world and the Eastern too the great Turk the whole seat of the 4th Monarchy all the enemies in these two Empires the Eastern and the Western Christ takes this time to bring them down and wonderfully brought down they must be and come to their end this abundance of Scriptures tels us he will shake heaven and earth and the desire of all nations shall come and so he says in Joel he will gather the heathens to the vally of Jehoshaphet and so Zach. 14.3 But in Revel 16. you read that at the pouring forth of the 6th Vyal the great river of Euphrates shall be dryed up he is drying up Euphrates at this day and this will be a glorious work to see how Christ gets ground of his enemies and how the house of Saul grows weaker and weaker indeed it would be very little comfort to see destruction and desolation if the new state did not put off the old state as the old nail gives way to the new or as Jacobs supplanting Esan though that new state is not to be seen vulgarly or visibly yet the saints finde it coming on in the spirit and this if you be reasonable men will satisfy you God will satissy his people ere he hath done and it is your mistake if you are not satisfyed with this way he takes so did Israel dig up fouutains and their rock followed them The 4th consideration is this that if we did understand things aright we should rejoyce with all our souls it would turn to us for a testimony that the Lord holds us in so long suspenee being an argument of the greatness of the transcendency of the things that are promised otherwise God would not exercise his people so long in the wayting for them think you that God will exercise his people with waiting for a trifle Esa 64.4 From the begining of the world men have not beard nor perceived by the ear neither hath any eye seen besides thee O God what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him if you expect Christs glorious kingdom any otherwise you will be mistaken there is no common or ordinary thing in that day expect nothing but wonders things that are to put your faith to it to acknowledge them when they come to passe that you will be ready to say are we in a dream as when the Lord brought back the captivity of Sion this is that which makes our patience so lame we represent the kingdom of God in such a pittiful poor way and manner what is the utmost glory that men present it in why that it will be a time of pure ordinances and the ministers shall recover themselves with their people alas alas is this all is this the kingdome of Christ I saw no temple there God will bring his people to immediate converse with himself they shall see eye to eye God intends to bring his people to a state without sin past this state of infirmity I confess men may give such an account of Christs kingdom that may not ballance the charge or trouble of working it about Do you think that God would have suffered Paradise to fall but that he had a better state to bring forth Do you think that the temple had been suffered to miscarry but that he had a better state to present Do you think that the primitive state had been suffered to decline but that he had a better state yea better then the Apostles better then the Prophets We see say they through a glass datkly but in that day Christians shall be known to whom they belong you know a waterman by his badge the name of God shall be written in the foreheads of his people If you look for any thing but wonders in that day you will be mistaken things being working to that issue I say you will see wonders One word more till Christ comes in person let us emprove his spiritual presence with us which by promise shall never be taken away And I tell you as I have told you formerly it is the spirit of Christ in the Saints that is the power by which they shall be changed Christs personal appearance from heaven bears a part it is the glorious example to which we shall be conformed and it hath a ministry likewise of enouragement and strengthning it will call up our faith and the life of the spirit into exercise in us but they must both meet the shout of our faith with the shout
set it up with himself before the world was he hath set it up in Christ let me tell you there is nothing lesse then eternal life that God thinks worthy of his people or that they are to account an interest Therefore now if the things we hope for be eternal things then they were before the world was in hope of eternal life which God that cannot lye promised before the world began yea he not only promised it but he did exhibit it in the person of our Lord Jesus 2 Cor. 5. We wait to be clothed upon with our house from heaven the building of God eternal in the heavens this eternal habitation is that that Job speaks of he shall know his habitation and not sin This eternal fair record of our persons and of our life in Christ is that which was by him when he made the world as in Prov 8. Let me tell you this state of ours this contracted dead state which we are in at this present time which is as the rude draught of that suture state that we expect why this state of ours and this seed was comprehended in that state in glory above and did flow as it were from that state grew from that glorious plant and tree it descended by creation into this state of nature that here it might dye and might rise again through a mistical death into it's first state for Christ that is our pattern hath declared the divine processe of this mystery Christ tells us that he was in the bosome of the father before he came into the womb of the virgin and while he was here on earth he had his apartment in glory his rooms his Lodgings in heaven nay the whole was his he was the son of man in heaven though he did come forth from that state into this poor narrow thing the son of man on earth yet he had his relation to that still therefore he says glorify me with that glory that I had with thee before the world began this is the noblenesse of a Christians relation and that consists in two thins especially The one is that the whole work is transacted in the person of Christ we are saved in him circumcised raised in him and the other is that there is the pattern in the mount of all that we shall be that is eternally existent with God in which he doth behold all his works his very last and concluding scene and that is the righteousnesse that sustains him under all the riskes and the adventures that his works do run through in this world and it is a great ground of hope to the saints that they descend from such a state if you could suppose a spring in the city that was as high as the highest tower though it might fall as low as the lowest part of the ground of the whole city yet it would rise again as high as the place from whence it comes and so I say this is a great confirmatiou unto us that we shall arrive at such a pitch because we set forth from such a glory Let others call this a notion if they will I am sure the Scripture gives ground for it I will be bold to say that all that glory as it is in heaven above so it is likewise shut up in narrow bounds in that principle of regeneration that is in the heart of a saint these heavens as they lye in the spirit and person of our Lord Jesus so do they in the principle of regeneration of saith and love as it is in Christ Jesus faith and love you must not understand to be only of Christ efficiently but to be in Christ subjectively our graces would never endure nor keep sweet if they were not kept in Christ because we derive our selves from those dear bowels of the father when he brought forth Christ who is the eternal son of god he brought forth his whole body in him all his members were with him and all the glory that ever they shall have was put upon them there in that pattern in the mount The Second evidence of it is The interest of our Lord Jesus in this whose children whose branches whose seed we are when he shall appear we shall be like him if so be that such poor inconsiderable things as we might alwaies be whelmed under a bushel is Christ so inconsiderable think you shall not he be set on a Candlestick shall he not have his time to appear Till we appear with Christ Christ will not be compleatly glorifyed and when Christ doth appear we cannot but appear with him why so because as we are called in a body so is Christ called in a body too Christ cannot avoid being afflicted in our afflictions I tell you there is no weather-glasse that shews changes in the air as Christs glorifyed person shews all the changes that befals his members and so they represent his glorifyed person as in a glasse and there ill be spots in this moon till the saints are glorifyed with him therefore it is Christs interest the glory of the saints when he shall come to be glorifyed in his saints and admired in all that believe not by them but in them 2 Thes. 1. Therefore let this be the comfort of poor saints that travel under a load of corruption a body of sin and of death of it shall not always be so with the sons of God they shall not always be so kept it shall not always be so with the son of God with the son of righteousness he shall not always be hid with a cloud no no he hath his time to appear the great and only Potentate king of kings and Lord of Lords he must shew this great sight and he will shew it in it's appointed time 1 Tim. 6.15 and lastly now to shew you a little of the power by which it shall be done which possibly will not get an easy entrance into our belief what is the reason we stick at the believing of things but because we do not credit the power by which it shall be done it shall be by Christs appearing It is no more but for Christ to look forth and to present himself and to shew himself and the work is done we may truly say let God arise and his enemies shall be scattered you see every day how that champion the sun comes out of his quarters as a bridgroom out of his chamber and how he no sooner sets forth but all darknesse flyes before him Oh! it is not the stoutest of enemies that thou hast nor that the Church hath can bear the presence and the looking forth of the Lord Jesus but they will presently cry hide us from the face of him that sits upon the throne and from the presence of the lamb my brethren this glory in which Christ shall appear if you do but consider it that the state in which he was upon the earth was but as the seed and in that first appearance bore no greater a