the Covenant of grace hath been exhibited under two dispensations First to the Jewes under the old Testament-dispensation in tipes and shadowes when the Ceremoniall Law was the Jewes Gospel And secondly to Jewes and Gentiles under the new Testament dispensation in truths and and substances and this is that Salvation that the Apostle seemes here to commend and exalt above other Salvations that Salvation which in the manifestation of it is grown up to more ripenesse of yeares and perfection of Statâ—e since the fullnesse of time than ever it was before And since we are speaking comparatively of it let us take in one consideration more though it may serve only for a pleonasme for having spoken of the greater we need not doubt of the lesse It may be called great Salvation if compared with temporall and corporall deliverances such as those from Aegypt and Babylon those were great deliveraâ—ces and great Salvations but that was of bodies thâ—s of soules that was temporall and this aeternall and therefore in every respect 1. If compared with Salvation by the law 2. If compared with the old Testementmanifestations 3. If compared with temporall deliverances We must give acclamation to it to be great Salvation And as for dreaming of any other Salvation properly and strictly so called we must keep close to those true sayings of God Acts 4.12 Neither is there Salvation in any other for there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved and 1. Tim. 2.5 unicus est mediator There is one onely mediatour betwixt God and man the Man Christ Jesus The doubt being cleared we proceed to clear the doctrine 1. By improving the Text. 2. By Testimonies of Scripture 3. By pregnant and ponderous Reason First by improving the Text where the spirit of God gives it a rise three degrees high 1 Salvation 2 great Salvation 3 so great Salvation which last is a sic without a sicut as one saith of Gods love from that Scripture God so loved the World so that the tongues of men or Angells are not able to expresse nor the imaginations of men or Angells able to comprehend Or what if we suppose it better to illustrate those three gradations by the three degrees of comparison we may shew you at large how Gospel-Salvation is 1. Positively great Salvation 2. Comparatively greater than all other 3. Superlatively the greatest of all 's But all this was hinted in that that went before Secondly to shew you the consent of Scripture and how harmoniously they attest unto this truth Psal 130.7 Let Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is mercy and with him is plenteous redemption let redemption but lead us to a redeemer and we shall find such plenty of it in Jesus Christ that out of his fullness we may be all receivers and grace for grace Luke 1 69. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel that hath raised up for us an horne of Salvation in the house of his servant David It s a figurative expression taken from beasts whose strength is in their hornes It is such mighty Salvation that it can push down all power that opposes it the Apostle applies it Rom. 8.33 34. It is God that justifieth who is it that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again who sitteth at the right hand of God who also maketh intercession for us who shall separate us from the love of Christ c. Hebr. 7.25 He is able to save to the uttermost all those that come unto God by him seeing be ever liveth to make intercession for them Put all these together 1. Plentifull redemption 2. A horne of mighty Salvation 3. Salvation to the uttermost And they do univocally bear wittness to this great truth that Gospel-Salvation is great Salvation Thirdly to come to Reasons take into close consideration these three things 1. Ab hoc From what 2. Ad hoc To what 3 Per hoc By what we are saved And from hence we shall lay downe these three Reasons to prove it to be great Salvation 1. Because it saves us from great evills 2. Because it advances to great happiness 3. Because it doth all by great meanes 1 Ab hoc 1 Reason It saves from great Evills as is easy to shew in a multitude of particulars 1. From the wrath of God which buâ—nes like a conâ—uming fire and all the wicked upon earth are huâ—â— straw and stubble before it It burnes to the bottome of hell and setts on fire the foundations of the Mountaines and burnes up the earth with its increase The burning Tophet is kindled with his displeased breath as with a river of brimstone Isay 30.33 the old World was drowned in it and the new shall be burned in it It tumbled the Angels that fell out of Heaven and hurled them into Hell to be reserved in chaines under darkness to the judgment of the great day It brought such a curse upon the whole creation for Adams sin that the whole creation groanes under it Rom. 8.22 Man sweats under it and Woman is in labour of it It hath tumbled Monarchy upon Monarchy the Assyrian Persian Graecian Roman it hath reprobated the greatest part of men and women that ever were in the World are or shall be It hath cast off the Jewes and unchurhed many famous churches of the Gentiles It hath layed flourishing states on ruinous heapes and hath brought to pass those desolations even to wonder and aston shment by sword famine and pestilence which our fathers have told us of It hath done that worke that strange worke in our daies and in these parts of the World which our eyes have seen and may long be for a Lamentation In a word it brought that confluence of indignation upon Christ Gods only begotten and only beloved Son when he stood in our roome and became our surety that it made him sweat blood and cry out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me We may say of all the punishments personall and nationall that have befallen us or can befall us of all things that we feel or fear as the prophet doth Is there any Evil in the City Land World and the Lord hath not done it Ames 3.6 Ex ungue leonem all that see it may say This hath God done for they cannot but see that it is his work we may know it to be the Lord by his very footsteps for as none can deliver and save like him so none can punish and destroy like him Solomon tells us the wrath of a King is like the roring of a Lion Prov. 19.12 but Moses tells us that he cannot tell us the pâ—wer of Gods wrath Psal 90.11 Who knoweth the power of thine anger even according to thy fear so is thy wrath and this wrath we are saved from by this great Salvation 2. It saves from the curse of his law that binds over to that wrath cursed is every one that continueth not in
GREAT SALVATION BY JESVS CHRIST TENDERED To the greatest of Sinners and in particular to such as have been Refusers of it if God shall now at last make them willing to receive it By RICHARD EEDES Teacher of the Church at Beckford in Gloucester-shire LONDON Printed by TW for the Author 1659. To the Right Honourable the Lady VEERE Grace and Peace Right Honorable most Honored Madam MY ambition to invite your Honour to be Surety to my First-Borne hath offered violence to my modesty in this Dedication yet I know not why I may not dedicate my labours unto you to whom I have long agoe dedicated my selfe When I had once the happiness to entertaine your Ladyship for a very short time I found you so ready to take meane things in the best part that I do the less scruple here to invite you to take part of the Churches Ordinary The great Salvation that this weak hand holds out may well beseeme the greatest Personages not only to own but to have in highest estimation and I am perswaded that you have so long made the attainment of it next to God the Giver and Christ the Purchaser of it your chiefest interest that you have now with your namesake in the Gospel made the better part so sure unto you that it can never be taken from you yet dear Madam it is not unknown unto you that sin is so deceitfull to deceive and the heart so deceitfull to be deceived that we can see small ground of security though some of safety on this side Heaven It s our taking heed of falling that keepes us standing and Caveats against sin and condemnation may be of excellent use to keep the Soul in awe and reverend Dr Sibbs tells us that fear is the awe-band of the soul I am not insensible that Scoffers may say that here is more Porch than house but that was so far from being an oversight that it was a part of my design I dare not inclose nor impropriate that which the Apostle hath called the common Salvation Jude 3. v. That mysticall City that was called the holy Jerusalem descending from Heaven Revel 21.10 Tipifying the Church was said to have 12 Gates which noted out the confluence of Beleivers that should come into the preaching of the Gospel and should fly unto that great Salvation like Doves unto their windows and the discourse herein offered is so like the Pool of Bethesda a common Bath or Fountaine opened for sin and for uncleanness that I thought it convenient to make the more Porches and if I could direct a particular Epistle to every particular Soul the Soules excellency would acquit me from folly in so doing I have deservedly given your Honour the Preeminence in opening unto you the first Gate and the more to ennoble it have written your honourable name upon it that it may be called beautifull and followers may throng in after you and when they are entred if they will but learne of you they may count the feet and much more the faces of them beautifull that bring unto their Soules the glad tidings of Salvation But when they have made their entrance they will find that here is house as well as porch yea and that it is very roomthy for these three Stories Salvation Sin and Damnation do resemble Heaven Earth and Hell Salvation hath Heaven at the top of it and Damnation hath Hell at the bottome of it and Sin like its Father the Divell having the whole Earth for its walke is the worst Companion that the sonns of men have Madame you are here presented with a strange sight a poor sinner hanging betwixt Heaven and Hell if he will but accept of Salvation offered Heaven is his but if he neglect in this his day to know the things that belong unto his Peace he will fall into Hell and ther 's no escaping It 's a sad thing to see so many wallowing in sin like swine in the myre under such warnings and very sad to see many of the Godly to drive so low and dull a trade with Heaven that it may be sayd of them as of poor Tradesmen whom the World favours not that they are still buying selling and live by the losse What sad lives do we lead and what comfortable lives do we lose by not bringing our practises up to the principles of invisible Christianity and for want of more intimate acquaintance with the beauty of holines and power of godlines Gregory the great was said to be the last of the good Bishops of Rome and first of the bad his life was such a medley of good and evill and therefore some Interpreters have thought him to be that Angell in the Revelation that was said to fly betwixt Heaven and Earth And Salomon's life was so particoloured that an antient Limner drew him halfe in Heaven and halfe in Hell and such is the pittifull case of many a Christian they do so halt betwixt God and the World so half it betwixt the Spirit and the Flesh that they may be thought by themselves as well as others to hang equally poysed betwixt Fear of Hell and Hope of Heaven Oh how low are souls in their consolations for want of close and circumspect walking and for want of a laborious and costly serving of God Madam you may here stand safe upon the Rock of your salvation and behold the dead and red Sea of the Almighties wrath upon which multitudes of dead Souls ly floating like the Carcases of the drowned Aegyptians when the Israelites were passed over And while you are standing upon safe ground you may here behold that Rock of Gospel-refusing which hath shipwrack'd many and that Gulfe of Damnation which hath devoured them whereas you through Grace are brought nere unto the harbour and within sight of the Haven where you would be Let Faith and Patience hold out but a little longer for yet a little while he that shall come will come and will not tarry So desiring that the God only wise may guide you with his Counsell and stablish your Mind Heart with his Truth and Grace and lead you through militant holiness into tryumphant happiness I humbly crave pardon for this boldness take leave and rest Beckford Jan. 1st 1658. Madame Your unworthy Remembrancer at the Throne of Grace RICHARD EEDES 1 Tim. 1.15 This is a true and faithfull saying and worthy of all acceptation that Jesus Christ came into the World to save sinners of whom I am chief Hebr. 7.25 He is able to save to the uttermost all them that come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them 2 Tim. 2.24 25 26. The servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men apt to teach patient In meeknesse instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the Divell who
business that I have with you I came not hither to take tythes but to winn Soules The malevolent adversaries of the standing Ministry of England call us hirelings and it s a miracle of providence that we have our lives for a prey in the midst of such a blood-thirsty generation of unreasonable men but we so much more desire you than yours that if you would make this our hire to give up your selves to God by our Ministry that by taking heed unto our selves and to the doctrine we may save both our selves and them that hear us let them call us Divells and it should but adde unto our Crown while we all study to be what I desire to approve my selfe A Servant of Christ for the furtherance of your Salvation Richard Eedes To the Reader Reader BEhold I bring unto thee glad tidings of great joy That whatever thy life hath been for the time past and whatever thy sinnes unrepented of are for the present If God shall render thee teachable and willing to be counselled thou maist yet die happily if thou wilt but be perswaded to live holily for the short remainder of thy few and evill daies I desire to approve my selfe a true friend unto thy Soul in my indeavour to bring this to pass and nothing can hinder it if the Tempter do not still prevaile to make thee continue thine own greatest enemy If thou be young thou canst not set out upon such work too soon which is of everlasting concernment to thy Soul and tends to the sure-making of thy Salvation If thou be old and hast spent much time already in the service of sin it is more than time that thou shouldst awake out of that dead sleep least the sleep of death surprize thee and if thou should'st be taken out of the world by death before thou be taken out of the World by grace which God forbid it had been better that thou hadst never been born or hadst been created a Toade or Viper than a Man or Woman Deferr not a day not an houer not a moment longer to consider thy waies and to turne to God hearken to this call of God while it is called to day least deferring till to morrow it should be to late whiles the breath is yet in thy body and the Lord yet offers to breathe the breath of life into thy Soul let not the Divel World and Flesh so bewitch thee as to obstruct thy seasonable and serious closing with God upon a Covenant-accompt and with Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour So shalt thou breake off that Great Sin of Gospel-refusing and escape that Great Damnation that is due to it and attaine unto that Great Salvation which is here faithfully commended and heartily wished to thee by him who is Thy Soule Friend Richard Eedes To the Reader Reader IT is the glory and happiness of the Age and country in which thou livest to have the plaine and plentifull teachings of the Lord that while we see not God or the life to come with open face by immediate intuition to our full satisfaction we may yet see him in a glass by reason sanctifyed and guided and elevated by faith so far as to quicken our desires after more and to cheer and strengthen us as a fore-tast and earnest of the everlasting inheritance Though the invisible things of God may be so farr seen in the things that are made as to leave all those without excuse that know not God or glorify him not as God Rom. 1.20 21. yet is the Gospel the much clearer glass though not as to the sensible manner of Revelation yet as to the fullness and cleerness of Discovery In this glass thou maist certainly see on earth the things that will be done in Heaven and Hell to all Eternity Thou maist know if thou canst but know thy heart both where and in what case thou must live for ever Whether with God or Divells whether in joy or torments whether in the end I less sence of the love of God and in his Soul-ravishing vision and fruition and highest returnes of Love and praise with Christ and all the Heavenly Host or in the endless feeling of his confounding to wrath and pangs of conscience for thy former willfullness and folly and comfortless despairing lamentations of thy misery This certaine glass that from God foretelleth all these things is contained in the Holy Scriptures and daily held before thee by thy teachers who are commanded to call upon thee to try and know thy selfe hereby and to prevent the eternall misery fore-seen and set thy heart on the revealed glory and make out after it with the greatest care and desire of thy Soul that it may be thine for ever This glass is here held out unto thee by this faithfull Reverend Minister of Christ a member of our Association in these united Churches who hath judiciously and concisely yet seriously and pathetically told thee how great a Price is in thy hand if thou have but a heart to the blessedness to be procured by it and the improvement of it for that blessedness He hath told thee also what a sin and desperate folly it is to slight â—nd neglect this great Salvation and turne of that God that Heaven with a triâ—le or with the leaving of this contemptable World who is thy All and should have All and will have thy First and Best or nothing He hath told thee of that great Damnation that will certainely be thy Portion if thou go on to neglect this great Salvation Bless God for this seasonable call and admonition and harden not thy heart but hear if thou have but eares to hear Abuse not a God of Love that deserves not to be abused Turne not away from him that speaketh unto thee from Heaven Deny not thy Redeemer thy first and deepest thoughts and cares thy strongest love and most resolved labours that denyed thee not his blood his doctrine and his example Away with sin Man tread downe the World or use it for the World to come Crucify the flesh that hitherto thou hast served Heaven is before thee thou art made and redeemed to be equall with the Angels Dally not about so great a matter as everlasting joy or torment is God is not mocked and therefore do not mock thy selfe by preferring the tâ—yes of the World before him What needs all this adoe for thy daily bread Having food and rayment be therewith content Get well to Heaven and all is done and thou shalt never want lose that and lose all and thou wilt certainly lose it if thou seth it not first and give it not the chiefest roome in thy heart How thinkest thou to escape if thou neglect this Salvation Will a despised or neglected Christ be thy Saviour or a neglected Heaven be thine Inheritance Dost thou think to come back from the dead into this World to mend that which now thou dost amiss or canst thou escape against Gods will and word Reader
The Kingdome of glory 1. We are saved to the state or Kingdome of grace we are brought into Jerusalem the Holy and led through it into Ierusalem the happy we are conducted through holyness into happiness and made to pass through the porch of grace into the palace of glory 1. Salvation bestows upon us the first grace It s therefore called a Creation which we call regeneration and this as well as the first creation is ex nihilo the creating of grace where there was none before If any be in Christ saith the Apostle he is a new creature 2 Cor. 5.17 and David prayes create in me a clean heart O God Psal 51.10 And the promise is A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart that is your body and I will give you an heart of flesh Ez. 36.26 2. It causes us to increase in grace 1. By Addition adding grace unto grace and proceeding from vertue to vertue observe the Apostles direction 2. Pet. 1.5 giving all diligence adde unto faith vertue and unto vertue knowledge and unto knowledge temperance and unto temperance patience and unto patience godliness and unto godliness brotherly kindness and unto brotherly-kindness love there is no grace that a gracious Soul would want 2. By Multiplication heaping grace upon grace knowledge upon knowledge faith upon faith repentance upon repentance obedience upon obedience indeavouring to advance to higher degrees in grace labouring that grace may not not only be in us but that it may abound in us 2 Pet. 1.8 As there is no grace for kind so there is no degree of grace for measure that a gracious Soul would want 3. And it doth not only prevent us with grace by giving us the first grace and enabling us to will and bestow upon us the second grace by assisting us with grace and enabling us to do as well as to will according to that saying Nolentem praevenit deus ut velit volentem subsequitur ne frustra velit God prevents us with his grace to make willing and God followes us with his grace to make able But it also keepes us in grace Paul gloryed that he had kept the faith which was by being kept in the faith according to that of Peter Yee are kept by the power of God through faith unto Salvation 1. Pet. 1.5 2. By this great Salvation we are saved to the Kingdome of glory as well as to that of grace Christ teacheth us to pray for both at once in that Petition Thy Kingdome come 1 let the Kingdome of sin and Satan be domolished in us and others and let thy Kingdome of grace come in the room of it and let us and others be kept in it and do thou also hasten the Kingdome of glory David mentions both by way of promise Psal 84.11 The Lord will give grace and glory and therefore he makes mention of both in his prayer Lord guide me with thy counsell and after that receive me to glory which is as much as if he had said Lord lead me through thy Kingdome of grace into thy Kingdome of glory Now as David said of the Jerusalem upon Earth we may much more of the Heavenly Jerusalem Many excellent things are spoken of thee thou City of God We may more easily give you a Negative description of it by telling you what is not there than a positive by telling you what is there yet take somwhat though but a touch of both 1 Negatively 1. There shall be no sin no unclean thing can enter into that Kingdome 1 Cor. 6.9 The Angells at the last day shall gather out of Christs mixt Kingdome the Churchmilitant all things that offend and that worke iniquity Mat. 13.41 that nothing but what is pure and undefiled may be gathered into the Church triumphant the Kingdome of glory 2. There shall be no labour that is called the rest that remaines for the people of God Earth was their place of labour and there was nothing else though some be so strong that they live to fourscore years yet is their strength then but labour and sorrow labour and labour labour upon labour labour for the body and labour for the Soul but blessed are the dead that die in the Lord even so saith the spirit that they rest from their labours Heaven is their resting place and there shall be nothing but rest rest upon rest rest from their body labours and rest from their soul-labour only they shall be restles in the prayses of their God but that restlesness is the best part of heavens rest they shall not cease in ascribing praise and glory and honour and power and dominion and thanksgiving unto him that sits upon the throne to the Lamb for ever and ever 3. There shall be no sufferings as they shall cease from their labours and all sweat shall be wiped from their browes so they shall rest from their sufferings and all tears shall be wiped from their eyes there shall be nothing of want and weakness there no corruption nothing of infirme nature that which was sowne in dishonour corruption weakness nature shall be raised in honour incorruption power and spirit 1. Cor. 15.42 43 44. 2 Positively 1. There shall be fullness of joy joy not capable of addition or augmentation Christ told his disciples that their joy should be full Iohn 15.11 2. There shall be pleasures for evermore not only joy uncapable of augmentation but pleasures uncapable of diminution and therefore our Saviour in the same breath that he told them their joy should be full he also promised them that their joy should no man take from them John 16.22 All that the World could present them with were but shells without kernels a few mock-consolations which brought them much labour in geting more care in keeping and most sorrow in losing such things as they could not enjoy themselves with them In a word they were empty and transitory but the joyes of Heaven are commended to us by 2 most lovely and contrary qualities two They are full as opposite to the Worlds emptiness 2. They are lasting everlasting and so opposed to the Worlds transitoriness 3. Gods saved-ones shall not only enjoy a Kingdome of prepared pleasures but they shall enjoy God with them that they shall enjoy a Kingdome of prepared pleasures read Mat. 25.34 Come ye blessed children of my father receive the Kingdome prepared for you must not that be the confluence of all Beatitudes which hath taken up the love and wisedome of God in preparing them And that they shall enjoy God with them read 1 Thes 4.17 so shall we be for ever with the Lord the Apostle desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ Phil. 1.23 It s the misery of unbeleevers upon earth that they are without Christ and without God in the World Eph. 2.12 but it shall be the imcomparable happiness of believers in Heaven that they shall
guilty and to bless themselves in their hearts and to flatter themselves till their abomminable wickedness be found out I confess its common with men and women to hang upon the outside of a Saviour as the Antidiluvians did on the outside of the Arke but those that will have a protection from condemnation and fly from wrath to come must get into this Saviour as Noah did into his arke Ther 's no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus Rom. 8.1 We must not think as the Papists do that when we have blest our selves with the signe of the Cross or superstitiously used as a spel or conjuration the sillables of the name of Jesus that then we may bid defiance to the Divel and his Angells can then have no power over us this doth but confirme them in their delusion and make them much more the children of the Divel than others and yet the hope of the common sort of ignorant hearers is but little better If they can but say they beleive in Jesus Christ and they beleive he came into the world to save sinners and they have beleived this ever since they can remember and they will never be beaten out of it while they live and yet all this while they are Refusers of Christ and such notorious Refusers of him that they refuse him in all his Offices as I shall indeavour towards their undeceiving If God will to make so plaine that those whose eyes have been anointed with eye salve from above may even run and read it 1. Gospel-refusing is a refusing of Christ in his priestly office we begin with that because here they think themselves to be cock-sure and every one will profess their willingness to be saved by Christ and to be ready to take him to be their Jesus and Saviour I easily confess that ther 's a naturall propensity in man to desire good for himself and the principle of self-love is so deeply rooted that so long as man is master of his reason he will not yeild willingly to be miserable but we must further know that as there is a spirituall so there is a carnall desire of Christ and happiness which cannot be called a serving of Christ but our selves upon him This may not so properly be called a taking of Christ as a catching at him consider that Christ offers himself unto sinners in the Gospel in all his offices jointly and not in any one of them singly and he that will rightly receive him must receive him wholly and not catch at him by piecemeale we must have all Christ or no Christ and therefore we must give up our selves to be taught by him as by our Prophet and to be ruled by him as by our King if we will be saved by him as by our Priest Are we willing to take Christ for himselfe as well as for our selves otherwise we do frustrate the very end of his saving us for we are therefore saved by him that he may be served by us in righteousness and holyness all our daies Luke 1.74 75. To be saved from wrath and not from sin is but the lesser halfe of Gospel Salvation and such as are not willing of both can have neither What God hath joyned together we must not put asunder It s a most disingenious and unreasonable thing to be all on the receiving and nothing on the returning hand to expect all from him and to give nothing back indeed his redeemed ones can give him nothing but his owne which made the Apostle say Ye are not your owne but are bought with a price therefore glorify God both with your bodies and soules which are his and as we must give him our whole selves bodies soules and spirits so we must take his whole selfe as King Prophet and Priest if we can be content to be willing disciples to his propheticall office and willing subjects to his Kingly office then we may reasonably and believingly expect the benefit of his Prie stly office but let us not dreame that Christ will be our Jesus when our hearts tells us and our lives tell all that are neer us that we have not taken him to be our Lord. 2 Gospel-refusing is a refusing of Christ in his propheticall office and nothing is plainer than this that they which set light by the Gospel do refuse Christ to be their Teacher Salvation by the Gospel is the lesson that Christ teaches and can they slight the Lesson and regard the Teacher Observe what the Apostle saith Heb. 2.1 Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard least at any time we should let them slip for if the word spoken by Angells was stedfast c. how shall we escape if we neglect so great Salvation take notice of the Apostles inference Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed c. Wherefore Why because we have so admirable a Teacher for this referrs to the beginning of the foregoing Chapter which tells us in the last dayes that God hath spoken to us by his Son who was the express image of his person and brightness of his glory and more excellent than the Angells Therefore we ought to take heed because a greater then Moses is here the Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ Iohn 1.17 because a greater than the Prophets is here even the great Prophet of his Church Acts. 3.22 23. Moses truely said unto the Fathers A Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your Bretheren like unto me him shall ye hear in all things that he shall say unto you And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that Prophet shall be destroyed from among the people And behold a greater than the Angells is here even the Angell of the Covenant of whom Paul saith Heb. 12 2â— See that ye refuse not him that speaketh for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth much more shall not we escape if we turne away from him that speaketh from Heaven To be taught of God and Christ is a thing that should be the glory of the disciples of the Church though some giddy spirit have learned hence to exclude mans teaching which Gods teaching and the teaching of the spirits anointing includes we read of certaine Sectaries in Corinth that would not be of Paul nor Apollos nor Cephas but not Christ 1. Cor. 1.12 But those Gospel-refusers that we are speaking of are such a monstrous sort of Recuâ—ants that they refuse the teaching of Christ himselfe and are such deafe adders that they will not hearken to the most alluring charmes though they come from him that spake as never man spake But as the neglecters of Christ will say at the last day Lord when did we see thee hungry and not feed thee c. So the refusers of Christ will be ready to say when did we hear Christ speaking and we slight him
if God must have the whole heart and strength the whole body soul and spirit what remains then for other Lords O you self-seeking and Salvation-refusing souls why do ye halt thus betwixt two opinions If God be God serve him if you can find out a better Master serve him but know assuredly when God shall send you for succour at a dying hour to the Gods that ye have chosen and to the Idols that you have set up in your hearts you will be forced to say of them as Job of his false friends miserable comforters ye are all Though the Scripture is most express that we must dedicate all our Talents of time and gifts and parts and interests and callings to the advantage of our great Lord to the serving of our generation to the benefit of other souls and to the furtherance of our own accompt yet how ordinary a thing is it for men and women to be of Agrippa's temper almost Christians of a Laodicean frame of spirit luke-warm and betwixt hot and cold They will sometimes read and perhaps pray in their families and come to the Assembly on the Sabaoth if their lusts will give them leave and much of the easiest and cheapest part of Religion they will practice and be willing to adventure as far as a name to live and a form of godliness will bear them out but still with Herod they will set themselves a stint hitherto they will go and no further ere his right eye should out by parting with his Herodias his reprovers head should off and ere these will cut off their right hands by forsaking their evil practises and their right feet by forgoing their evil company and saying away ye wicked I will keep the Commandements of my God they will do as the rich young man did when he heard that command forsake all and follow me he thought it a hard saying and forsook his Counsellor though it were a Saviour Many will be perswaded to do as much as the Jewes did Isay 2. Offer sacrifice burne incence and observe dayes and like hasty messengers run away with half their errand leaving all of substance and power behind them but for close and costly services these are hard and irksome God must have them excused for such and for the suffering part of Christianity they are meat strangers to that yea and very enemies to the crosse of Christ These are they that in praying pray not and in hearing hear not and use the things that tend to Salvation as though they used them not 3. They may passe for neglecters of this great Salvation that do not make it their greatest care God is the highest good and not to love him with the highest love is interpretatively to hate him Mistake me not I do not mean it absolutely that we must love God in the highest degree here while we are in our imperfect militant condition to know but in part to be sanctifyed but in part and to love but in part We may love sincerely on earth but we shall not love perfectly till we come to Heaven where perfect love shall cast out all fear but my meaning is that in a comparative sense we should love him best and most more than the creature or our selves more than the interests of the world or flesh for whosoever loveth the World or any thing in the World more than God is not worthy of him and whosoever loves not God and Christ more than any thing than all things in the World loves them not in sincerity Those that are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God lovers of Mammon more than lovers of God they are not better than haters of God Salvation by Christ is the greatest happiness and therefore our greatest care and pains should be spent upon it It 's the unum necessarium the only thing necessary and therefore ought to be the unicum maximum that should carry away the flowre and cream of our affections and indeavours It 's common with the vulgar to judge of the things of the third Heaven as they do by the things of the second the Moon and the Stars they think the Moon to be biggest because it is nearest and seems so when stars of a greater magnitude are thought little because they are farther off So we are ready to look upon the perishing vanities of this transitory World as great matters because they are at hand and near us and the joyes of Heaven and felicities above to be but small and inconsiderable because they are far above and out of our sight But you have heard before that the Scripture bids us strive to enter in at the streight Gate and to give all diligence to make all sure and to offer violence to the Kingdome of Heaven and tells us that the righteous are scarcely saved and with greatest difficulty and therefore not to lay out our selves our whole selves and that to our uttermost possibility is to be neglecters of this great Salvation Now the good Lord be mercifull to us and help us and give us seeing eyes hearing eares and understanding hearts to hear and feele and consider this for if this be to neglect this great Salvation not to make it our highest care not to bestow the most serious thoughts of our minds the most ardent desires of our hearts and the most effectuall indeavours of our lives upon it what will become not of loose and carnall libertines but of the greatest part of those that take themselves and are taken by others to be good Christians 2 USE Shall be of Direction for the use and benefit of such as being confounded with the greatness of the sin of setting light by this Salvation and being pricked in their hearts and covered with confusion shal be ready to cry out Men and Brethren what shall we do I shall prescribe them a remedy in foure branches of direction In regard Gospell-Salvation is great salvation and our setting light by it is great sin Therefore that this sin may not be our ruine There must be 1. Great thoughts of heart 2. Great searchings of heart 3. Great humblings of heart 4. Great changes of heart about it These have such necessary dependance one upon another that they are preparative one to another 1. Great thoughts are antecedent to great searchings 2. Great searchings are preparative to great humblings 3. Great humblings to great changings 1 There must be great thoughts of heart about this great sin When Reuben was separated from the other Tribes of Jsrael the text saith for the divisions of Reuben there were great thoughts of heart but when men and women shall be separated from God by their iniquities yea by such a partition wall as this of Gospel-refusing these divisions should beget great thoughts of heart in such whose consciences cry guilty Thoughts are the seeds of action as evil actions proceed from evill thoughts so good actions from gracious thoughts The Scripture saith out of the heart proceed first
yet that which doth tantamount is implyed in the question How shall we escape which is as much as to say ther 's no possibility of escaping And what is it that we cannot escape why a just recompence of reward for our transgression and disobedience if we look back to the verse before the Text yea a severer judgement more fiery indignation and a sorer punishment than the transgressors of Moses Law if we look forward to Ch. 10.27 28 29. And what the spirit of God speaks short here is spoken out and at large to the Scribes and Pharises hypocrites that slew the Prophets that were sent unto them and refused servants and Son too that came to require fruit of the vineyard Mat. 23.33 Ye Serpents ye generation of vipers how can ye escape the Damnation of Hell And observe that Mat. 25.41 It s called the Divels damnation depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Divel and his Angels The harmonious discord that dwells in the antithesis which opposes this great damnation to that great Salvation is very elegant and observable The Salvation refused is called the Salvation of God all the ends of the earth have seen the Salvation of our God The Damnation incurred by such a refusall is called the damnation of the Divel The Salvation slighted is the Salvation of Heaven The Damnation deserved is the Damnation of Hell I observed in the handling of the first that the mercy of Salvation is much magnifyed and made mervelous by three degrees And now we are to observe that the justice of damnation is made glorious by the same degrees for these two contraries have the same dimensions the most righteous God that gives the one and inflicts the other being as infiniâ—e in justice as in mercy Observe then in order to such an illustration of it 1. That it is positively great Damnation 2. That it is comparatively greater than other 3. That it is superlatively the greatest of all 1 That it is Great Damnation you may easily conclude from what is allready spoken that it is the damnation of Hell and the Divels Damnation and the very word gives such an astonishing sound to such as can apprehend both name and thing that to discover it to be great it will need no more than the naming but since we have to do with such as are brutifyed and must fight with beasts after the manner of men since our work lies much with dead men such as are dead in trespasses and sinns and though they bear the names of men and women that are reasoable creatures yet they are further from knowledge than the Ox and the Asse Isay 1.3 And as senseless and stupid as stocks and stones as the inanimate globes of Heaven and Earth Isay 1.2 We must therefore use all possible means and all little enough to awaken them to things of highest Consequence and everlasting Concernment and such are the things that we have in hand Matters of Salvation and Damnation matters of life and death for ever and ever Study with me but this one point that the Damnation that we are speaking of and about to aggravate is not Damnation barely for the breach of Gods Law but for refusing the mercy of the Gospel that was offered to make up that breach its Damnation for the refusal of Salvation of which refusers we may use the Apostles words Rom. 3.8 Whose Damnation is just There can be no greater justice than this when life and death are set before men and they will choose death that they should have it when Salvation and Damnation are both held out in the promise and threatning that the refusers of Salvation should fall into damnation observe Ioh. 3.16 God so loved the world that be gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him might not perish but have everlasting life and in the next verse God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved In both verses is declared both posivetily and negatively for what end Christ came into the world 1 He came to save sinners 2 He came to save and not to damne But as God by his creating power brought light out of darkness so men by their destroying sin bring darkness out of light and like the Spiders do gather poyson from the sweetest flowers and most wholsome hearbs They do wilfully aggravate their condemnation by the gracious offers of Salvation and treasure up for themselves severest wrath from sweetest mercy And this is that that brings this great damnation as you may see there in the very next verse but one ver 19. This is the condemnation that light is come into the world and men love darkness more than light that mercy is offered and wrath is chosen that Salvation is tendered and Damnation is taken men deal so Jewishly with Christ that they prefer Barrabbas a murderer before him and this is rightly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Damnation 2. It is comparatively greater than other condemnations we proved Gospel-Salvation to be greater than other Salvations And the sin of Gospel-refusing to be greater than other sins And now are to shew that this damnation is greater than other condemnations 1. Greater than condemnation by mans law sentences in Courts of humane Judicature reach But 1. Either to the estate as fining or confiscation 2. Or to the body as imprisonment and scourging 3. Or to the name as stigmatizing or burning in the hand or forehead 4. Or if capitall to the life as hanging beheading c. 5. Or in case of treason to the family and posterity But this transcends all those condemnations as we may gather from Luke 12.4 5. which were the words of our Saviour to his Disciples I say unto you my freinds be not afraid of them that kill the body and after that have no more that they can do but I will forewarn you whom you shall fear fear him which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell yea I say unto you fear him Provoking sinners are said to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath Rom. 2.5 Though they catch many a rap here that 's nothing in comparison of what 's behind This is the day of grace wherein God exerciseth patience and long-suffering towards them but if the goodness of God do not bring them to repentance there 's another day a coming where they must give another manner of reckoning a fearfull and terrible day a day all of Wrath Then righteous Judgement will be impartially dispensed without respect of persons here below in mens judicatories it falls out oftentimes as with fish in a net great ones are caught when little ones creep through and sometimes again as with flies in the Spiders webb the little ones are held when the great ones break through but that day will surprize High and Low Rich and Poor one with another We must all appear before the Judgement Seat of
into everlasting fire But we also promised to clear this point unto you by evidence of reason as I did the former for if such truths were but believingly received in the evidence of them they would surely be mighty in operation and pierce to the dividing of the Soul and Spirit If our everlasting doors were but opened to entertain such mighty Doctrines can we think that men and women that have reasonable Souls and the principles of self-love and self-preservation in them and the passion of fear in them I say can it be once imagined that they can be so bruitish to cast away all care what will become of them in another world and with both hands to pull down upon bodies and souls this swift damnation Know then that the damnation that we are treating of which men draw upon their own heads by setting light by Gospel-Salvation is monstrous great for these ensuing reasons 1. Reason Because it proceedeth from so great a God If we would know the greatness of this Damnation let us study the greatness of that God that inflicts it The wrath of a King is like the roring of a Lyon but let those that can tell what the wrath of the King of Kings is surely Moses his words do advance it above all that can be spoken or thought of it Psal 90.11 Who knows the power of thine anger for according to thy fear is thy wrath i.e. let such as have the most enlightned and most enlarged understandings graspe as much as they can in comprehending thy displeasure yet when they are come unto their wits end it is infinitly beyond their reach The Lord doth all things like himself If he do but speak concerning a Nation and concerning a Kingdom to build and to plant it his very word will bring it to pass it brought the world out of nothing with as little ado for he did but speak the word and they were made he commanded and they were created and again if he do but blow upon it and speak against it to destroy it whether it be a Nation or all the Nations of the world he can command a Floud or a Fire to do his strange work When he will deliver none can deliver like him and when he will destroy none can destroy like him Davids question puts all out of question that there is no resistance to be made against him Who may stand in his sight when he is angry Dare we provoke the Lord to jealousie oh foolish people and unwise are we stronger than he Can stubble stand before a deavouring fire or chaffe stand against a scattering whirlwind Though hand joyne in hand the wicked shall not go unpunished for he that judgeth them is a strong Lord. Though they could sore as high as Heaven or fall as low as Hell or fly to the uttermost coasts of the Earth or Sea though they should lie buried under Mountaines a thousand miles deep or all the rocks of the Sea and Land were piled upon them yet there is no hiding them from the wrath of this mighty God who is no less omniscient than he is omnipotent Those that desire to know more of the greatness of this God let them study the 40 Chapter of Isay And there they shall find v. 12. That he measureth the waters in the hollow of his hand and metes the Heaven with a span and comprehends the dust of the earth in a measure and weighs the mountaines in scales and the hills in a ballance And v. 15. All nations are as a drop of a bucket and are counted as the small dust of the ballance and v. 17. All nations before him are as nothing and they are counted less than nothing and vanity And v. 22. It is he that setteth upon the circle of the earth and the inhabitants thereof are as grashoppers that stretcheth out the Heavens as curtaine and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in That bringeth the Princes to nothing and maketh the Judges of the earth as vanity Considering all this greatness and considering further that one halfe is not told you the more we study it the more we are overwhelmed and confounded with the glory of it what can be too hard for the Lord or who can stand in the judgement before this mighty God to whom vengeance belongeth We may easily be confirmed in the truth of all that is said all that can be said of the greatness of damnation when we do but hear from whence it comes even from the dreadfull Jehovah who is able with a word or a frown or a displeased breath to turn all the wicked into hell and all the people that forget God 2. Reason why this Damnation is so great is because it is for despising and setting light by so great a Saviour an undervaluing of the highest Love in its lowest condescention This must be a reason coequall with the former because Christ is the Son coequall with the Father The mercy of heaven never put the sons of men to a quid amplius in any thing more than this What could I do more for an unthankfull world than this Let the Sons of invention set their wits upon the rack and tell us if they can what God could do more than to turn himself wholly into LOVE 1 John 4.16 and having but one Son who was Heyr of all things his orâ—â—â—â— begotten and onely beloved who thought it no robbery to be equall with himself to send him out of his own bosome to empty himself of his glory to take our sin and curse with our nature upon him that we who were children of disobedience and wrath and heyrs apparent to hell and condemnttion might be received into the glorious liberty of the Sons and Daughters of the Lord God Almighty Now for men to be so desperatly rebellious is to slight this love and so stubbornly mad as to refuse this Saviour can the greatest judgements in Gods storehouse or the hottest place in that fire that burns to the bottom of hell be a proportionable recompence for such dâ—ing provocations Shall wicked miscreants slight and trample upon that which the Saints admire and the Angels adore O stupendious madness It s a thousand wonders that the great eye of Heaven doth not wink the earth into utter darkness the very Sun take its leave of the world abhorring to see men to be such incarnate Devils and to see the Earth tainted with such hellish abominations hellish do I say nay in this the wickedness of man is so great in the Earth that it justifies the Devils for they being left without hope of a Redeemer were never guilty of setting light by a Saviour and knowing so much of the terrours of the Lord as doth accompany their initial Damnation in their chains of darkness wherein they are reserved to the judgement of the great day and trembling to believe 〈◊〉 much more of the consummation of it fâ—â—â—â—night be put to tryall whether they wouâ—
beautie of holiness and power of Godliness giving up themselves bodys souls and spirits unto God upon the account of the Covenant desiring nothing more than that their hearts may be whole with God and they could be stedfast in his Covenant making God and Jesus Christ the joy of their hearts and breath of their lives and resolve to continue so doing to the death God hath provided for them suitable joyes and pleasures in the life to come Rationall delights for their reasonable souls and sensible delights for their glorified bodys Mistake not far be it from me to say or you to imagine that the glorified Saints shall enjoy such carnall delights in heaven which sensuall and flesh pleasing men do make their heaven upon earth that were a conceite better beseeming a Turk than a Christian the Proselytes of Mahomet have dreamed of such an earthly or rather hellish heaven by fancying such an Utopian Paradise into which the unclean may enter and the pleasures of sin shall meet them The sensible pleasures to be enjoyed there are such as sort and suite with the sublimated senses of glorified bodies and no other And as God hath prepared such suitable joyes and pleasures for such as love and serve him in sincerity even joyes for Soules and pleasures for bodâ—es for those that glorify him with Soules 〈…〉 so on the contrary those that will 〈…〉 â—ting call nor close with his 〈…〉 in accepting his dear Son 〈…〉 great Salvation offered with him but remaine sworne vassalls to the Divell World and Flesh giving up the parts and powers of their Soules and Bodies to serve sin in the lust of it These shall receive wages according to their work as they polluted themselves with filthiness of the flesh and spirit and dishonoured God with their Soules and Bodies so God will punish them accordingly their Soules with rationall punishments tribulation and anguish shall be upon the Soul of every one that doth evill and their bodies with sensible which the word shaddows out by fire and brimstone These two sorts of Torments are breifly contained in those Scriptures Isay 66.24 Mark 9.44 In the worme that dyeth not and the fire that never goeth out In which expressions expositors conceive the holy Ghost alludeth unto two Kinds of burialls of dead corpses some were interred in the earth and out of those wormes would breed which would eat them up and never leave devouring till all were consumed an Ancient gives this account of the degrees of that annihilation which resolves the body into its principle of nullity Caro in putredinem putredo in vermes vermis in pulvere pulvis in nihilum redigitur The flesh is turn'd into rottenness that rottenness into wormes those wormes into dust and that dust is reduced to nothing Other bodies were not buryed in the earth but were burned with fire and reduced to ashes and those ashes were reserved in urnes Only here is the difference this worme is not like that that devours bodies for when the body is consumed that worme dies nor is this fire like that that burnes carcasses for when the carcases are burnt that fire goes out but this is ignis inextinguibilis unquenchable fire By this never dying worme we are to understand the worme of an accusing and tormenting conscience that is ever gnawing and hereby we may understand all rationall torments of which the buffetings of conscience are the cheifest And by this fire that never goes out we are to understand the torments of sense set off by burning because that was the most torturing death that was inflicted by the Jewes but to open these a little more fully we will take them as they lie before us and speak of them apart 1 Rationall torments provided for damned Soules are a part and the greatest part of the torments of Hell for which this deserves to be called Great Damnation Now as the Soul is distributed into the understanding will and affections so we may assigne unto these soveral faculties their peculiar torments I only intend to touch upon them to give you a tast and not to enter upon any topicall and methodicall discourse concerning them 1 They shall be plagued in their understandings by seing and knowing and feeling themselves to be irrecoverably lost and intolerably miserable Here the messengers of the Lord knowing the terrors of the Lord did cry alowd to give warning of their sin and danger and duty they did throw Hell-fire in their faces and so gaster them with the thunder and lightning of Hell and damnation that they could never be at quiet but were even tormented before their time and when they had done their uttermost when they had studyed and preacht and prayed and waited and wept themselves into consumptions in seeking to them and to God for them that they might be saved they could make no better a report of their embassy to him that sent them but to this effect Lord who hath believed our report or to whom hath the arme of the Lord been revealed In which seat doth that Souâ— siâ— in what town is his habitation or in what family dwells he that was dead and is alive that was lost and is found Some of us thy unworthy servants Lord have through undeserved mercy been preachers ten some twenty some thirty some forty yeares and more to such and such congregations we have preacht some hundreds some of us thousands of Sermons and through grace we have indeavoured to do it faithfully in our measure we have taught publikly and from house to house we have spoken with authority and dealt personally and familiarly with the soules of refusers and all was but lost labour upon them though not a labour in vaine to our selves Will not this be a sad hearing for thousands when those that have been watchmen for their souls must come to give up this account with griefe But what will the Lord say to this Will he say to those that would not be taught be ignorant still and to those that would not be reformed be disobedient still no surely it may well be doubted whether the Lord had not formerly seared them up in their ignorance and prophaneness with such an hardning of their hardness by inflecting senslesness for their affecting senslesness But now it shall be otherwise the ignorant shall be no longer ignorant the drunkard swearer who monger sabboth-breaker shall be so no longer they shall see with their eyes and hear with their eares and understand with their hearts though they shall never be converted nor be healed Lord thy hand is lifted up said the Prophet Isay and they will not see thy wrath was in the threatning they saw a black clowd rising and a driving storme coming and would not beware but now they shall see volentes nolentes willing or nilling they shall hear and understand and be ashamed and confounded Then shall the damned know good and evill as the Angels that kept not their first estate know it and as the