they had this house not made with hands in present possession They speak as men that belong to two Countreyes and have estates in this and in another Kingdom who if they leave one are owners of Lands Revenews and Houses elsewhere Such men may say we have a building and still go to their own when they have left or lost one of their habitations Though they cannot dwell in both their houses at once yet they call them both theirs And when they remain in one they reckon the other their own though it be at a distance from them and they must travell a great way before they can be in it In this manner the Apostle discourses of their habitation with God He made account it belonged to them and might be called theirs though they lived as yet in another place For 1. They had a right and title to it And 2. They had good Deeds and Evidences as I have told you to shew for it 3. Which proved that it was setled on them by the Will and Testament of Jesus Christ their Lord and Master 4. To which they had the witness of the Spirit in their hearts which was the Earnest of the inheritance whereby they were sealed to the day of redemption 5. So that in conclusion they might lay claim to it when they departed this world They might challenge it as their own and lay hold on eternal life by vertue of his Promise and that Testament of his which he had written and sealed with his own blood and further confirmed by his Resurrection from the dead and the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven And therefore our Lord himself uses the self-same language assuring his Disciples that his Doctrine being heartily received was a feed of immortal life in them and knit them so to himself that they could no more perish than He who lives for ever Verily verily I say unto you he that believeth on me hath everlasting life Who so eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day He dwelleth in me and I in him As the living Father hath sent me and I live by the Father so he that eateth me even he shall live by me John 6. 47. 54 56 57. USE The proper Use of which Doctrine is contained in those words of this Apostle 1 Cor. 15. ult Therefore my dearly beloved Brethren be ye stedfast unmovable alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. Which words instruct and put us in mind 1. That we must work in this earthly house wherein we dwell We are in a place of labour and not of idleness and sport There is some serious business in which we are to be imployed if we mean to approve our selves good Tenants to the great Lord of the world and be preferred by him to better possessions 2. And that this work is the work of the Lord which we must carefully attend or else our pains and travell is but a busie idleness We were not sent hither only to toil and sweat for the goods of this life Nor do we acquit our selves like honest men meerly by diligence in the works of our Calling and making a careful provision for our selves and families But our business is to mortifie all immoderate desires after riches or any other earthly enjoyments to purge our selves from covetousness from lust from intemperance from envy and wrath from pride and uncharitableness and all other sins to acknowledge the bounty of our Creator and Redeemer to live by faith in God to love him above all things to resign our selves intirely to his wise and holy will to imitate him in doing of good and faithfully to acquit our selves in all other duties which he expects from us For as he is a good Tenant who performs his contract and makes good the Covenant that is between him and the person of whom he holds so he is a good Christian who uprightly and sincerely endeavours to perform the duties wherein he stands engaged to our Lord by whose will he hath promised to be governed and not by his own We are all bound to him in a very sacred Covenant and stand obliged to him in several services If we desire then to have his favour and hope for a kind reception by him into a better habitation when we remove from hence let us tye our selves strictly to the work which he hath prescribed us and use our best diligence that we may never violate the bonds that are between us For which end it highly concerns us to remember the Vows we made at our entrance into his service to read often over the tenor of the Covenant which we then signed and sealed diligently to peruse those Sacred Writings to which we have consented and to understand compleatly the blessed Gospel of Christ which tells us that not every one who calls him Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven but be that doth the will of his Father which is in Heaven Which will he hath faithfully reported to us and assured us that he is the way the truth and the life whose Doctrine and example if we follow not we vainly hope to inherit the Kingdom of God In short there is great reason we should work because we expect some reward and that we should do his work and live up to the Rules of his Religion because we expect this Reward from our Lord. Nay 3 We must be abundant in the work of the Lord labouring to purifie our selves as he is pure to be merciful as he is merciful and to be filled with all the fruits of righteousness which are by Christ Jesus unto the glory and praise of God The reason is because we expect such a great and plentiful reward from our Lord who hath given us exceeding great and pretious promises that by these we might be partakers of a divine nature having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust And therefore giving all diligence add to your faith vertue and to vertue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temgerance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindedness and to brotherly kindness charity For so an entrance shall be ministred unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ And I may add that if these things be in us and abound they will highly raise and enoble our natures before we arrive at those heavenly places For this poor earthly house wherein we now are will by this means be turned into a goodly Temple So this Apostle calls even the body of holy Christians the Temple of the Holy Ghost 1 Cor. 6. 19. What a glorious change is this What a strange alteration doth the new Creature make Corpus istud Platonicâ sententiâ carcer Apostolicâ Templum cum in Christo est as Tertullian speaks in his Book of the Soul This
and liberty joy and pleasure constancy and settlement than our present condition affords It was a matter of certainty which they made no scruple to assert It was not a probable opinion but an undoubted conclusion There were sound Arguments which led them to this strong perswasion necessary causes which made them of this unmovable belief What they were must be our enquiry at this time And upon due examination I make no question we shall find that their judgement was setled upon substantial Reasons and that they did not pretend to a knowledge without such solid grounds as were able to sustain so great a confidence as they express in all their writings and actions 1. For they knew that Jesus their Master who made discovery of these things to them had certain knowledge of them himself and could not deceive them They knew I mean that he came out from God that he descended from Heaven to lay open that place and shew us what God hath provided there for those that love him This was very effectual to perswade them of a building of God because one that came from God assured them of it and they doubted not of an house in the Heavens because they were told it by one that had been there himself and knew very well the state of that Heavenly Countrey which he described He was not like to many idle persons who draw Mapps of such Territories as they never saw wherein they paint Chimaera's and whatsoever extravagant fancies come into their minds but he was acknowledged by more than themselves to be a Teacher that came from God and therefore acquainted with the glory of the other world and the happy condition which God intends for souls there This he set before their eyes to their great satisfaction both because the heavenly Countrey was described by him that had been in it and which is more by him that was the owner and possessor of it How could they refuse to surrender their belief to such a person To him that came down from Heaven even the Son of man who is in Heaven John 3. 13. That which our Saviour saith to Nicodemus in that place V. 11. was their assurance in all cases Verily verily I say unto thee we speak that we do know and testifie that we have seen This he told them over and over again that he had seen the Father that he was the living bread which came down from Heaven and that thither he should ascend up where he was before John 6. 46 51 62. and divers other places Nor did he only say it but he proved it too by doing such things as none could do but one that had the power of Heaven Which made Nicodemus say John 3. 2. We know that thou art a Teacher come from God for no man can do these Miracles that thou dost except God be with him And the blind man also concludes John 9. 32 33. That if he were not of God he could not have done such a thing as was never heard of since the world began These and such like wonders made the Apostles cry out We believe and are sure that thou art Christ the Son of the living God Joh. 6. 69. We know that the Son of God is come and hath given us understanding that we may know him that is true This is the true God and eternal life 1 John 5. 20. And the certainty of this made them sure of all the rest For why should they question the words of such a Master Why should they make any doubt of that which was averred by one of such credit If they questioned any thing it must be whether he came from Heaven or no. But this being granted they might very well say they knew they had a building of God eternal there Now of that they had assurance by Voices from Heaven by Miraculous Works by his Resurrection from the dead and by the Holy Ghost sent down from thence Before which coming of the Holy Ghost they were confident of this and therefore much more after they had received it For that our Saviour testified of them in his Prayer to the Father before his departure John 17. 8. I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me and they have received them and have known surely that I came out from thee and have believed that thou didst send me II. They knew likewise that this person who could not but speak the truth had promised to purified souls that they should see God It is one of the first encouragements that he gave to them in his Sermon on the Mount Matth. 5. 8. to become his followers From whence they could not but plainly discern not only that there is a felicity hereafter for holy men but that it is so exceeding great and glorious that we must be very much heightned and inlarged in all our faculties before we can be capable to enjoy it We must be strangely changed they knew both in soul and body neither of which he promised should perish before we can be rendred fit for conversation with the Most High and Holy One the blessed and only Potentate who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto whom no man hath seen nor can see For in this body we cannot bear the sight of an Angel in his brightness The lustre of one of those coelestial creatures dazzles the eyes of flesh and made men anciently think they should exspire presently when they were admitted to their company The reason of which perhaps was that they concluded this earthly state in this corruptible body was not strong enough to endure such manifestations from above How can we behold then the Glory of God unless we be made over again and moulded into a new shape How can we be able to look upon the Splendor of the Divine Majesty unless all our powers be mightily raised widened and fortified beyond the highest of our present conceptions We must shine forth as the Sun according to our Saviours Promise Matth. 13. 43. in the Kingdom of the Father That transforming sight of God which the Apostle speaks of which shall so alter our souls as to render us like unto him must be in an habitation where we shall be capable to know more of him and look longer and more stedfastly upon him than we can in this dark and narrow dwelling For though it doth not fully appear what we shall be yet thus much we know saith St. John 1 Epist 3. 2. that when he shall appear we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is III. Of this change they saw an instance in our Lord himself Whose very body as soon as he was raised from the grave was so clarified and refined that they could not but be sensible of a marvellous transmutation to be made in themselves and of a better dwelling which their souls should one day have Especially since his Resurrection also was the great thing to
which he appealed for a proof of the truth of all his Promises They perceived a manifest difference in his condition now from what it was before and that his body was become more subtil and aiery than it was when he dwelt among them For on a sudden he appeared in the midst of them and again in a moment he vanished out of their fight His body was now in a preparation to an higher state and therefore though they felt really flesh and bones yet he shewed them by the hasty disappearance of it into what a pure substance it was shortly to be turn'd They saw it was to be so thin and rarified that it would be a Spirit rather than a body and was to suffer such a change that now it was not fit for them to converse withal while they were in this earthly tabernacle This was the reason that he came to them only at certain seasons and continued not alwayes with them and that he charged Mary not to touch him John 20. 17. as if she mean't to hold him fast and keep him with her For though he intended to afford them some of his company being not yet ascended to the Father yet he would have her know they must not expect his stay with them after his wonted manner but go to his Brethren the Disciples and say to them I ascend to my Father and your Father and to my God and your God IV. Accordingly they knew that he did ascend up to Heaven forty dayes after his Resurrection For they themselves saw him transported thither and had his own word for it that he went to prepare a place for them and would come again and receive them unto himself that where he was there they might be also John 14. 3. For this they had also the word of two of the Heavenly Court who stood by them in bright rayment as they gazed upon him when he was taken up saying This same Jesus which is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come in like manâ—â—â— as ye have seen him go into Heaven Acts 1. 10. And how glorious his body was made after he came thither they also very well knew For St. Stephen at his tryal saw the Heavens opened and beheld the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God This he openly testified to the whole Council before whom he stood accused Acts 7. 55 56. and it signifies the illustrious condition wherein he was for as he was the Son of man he stood next to the Divine Majesty and was arrayed with the glory of God St. Paul also who so little believed Steven's words that he was consenting to his death as if he had been a Blasphemer saw our Saviour not long after this as he was journeying to Damascus But he beheld him in such an astonishing brightness that it struck him to the ground and put out his eyes which were not able to endure the glory of it Acts 9. 3 4 c. Which in his Apology to the people he calls a great light that shone round about him Acts 22. 6. and in his Apology to Agrippa a light from Heaven at mid-day above the brightness of the Sun Acts 26. 13. To these two you may add the Testimony of the beloved Disciple who when he was in the Isle of Patmos for the testimony of Jesus saw him in a Majestick shape and his countenance was as the Sun shineth in his strength And when he saw him he was so dismayed that he fell as dead at his feet Rev. 1. 16 17. By these means they knew to what an amazing glory they should one day be exalted a little glimpse of which in this mortal nature they were not strong enough to bear V. For they knew withal that their very bodies should be made like unto his 1. They remembred how he called them Brethren and told them that his Father was their Father and his God their God and therefore doubted not that what was done for him should be done for them 2. And how he prayed that they might be with him where he was and behold i. e. enjoy his glory which the Father hath given him John 17. 24. 3. And how he assured them it was the will of him that sent him that every one who seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life and he should raise him up at the last day John 6. 40. Which made the Apostle say as you heard in the Chapter before my Text V. 14. they knew that he who raised up the Lord Jesus would raise us up by Jesus 4. And being raised up they knew that they should be carried into the air to meet the Lord 1 Thess 4. 17. Now these bodies which we wear at present are not of an aërial nature but altogether of an earthly They are not fit to be transported beyond this lower Region nor were made to live in any other Element than that in which they are Nay it would be a great terror to us in this body to be caught and lifted up above we should be in continual dread of falling down to this earth whether the heaviness of them doth incline us And therefore they must be changed if we go to meet the Lord in the air as he hath promised we shall For the Apostle saith he spake this by the word of the Lord V. 15. 5 And he promised by the same word that so we shall be ever with him Ib. V. 17. Which we cannot conceive how this earthly body should endure It would soon be weary of that strange place and groan and sigh there as much as the soul doth here It would be pined for want of meat and drink as the Spirit now is often too much stifled with them And therefore in pursuance of his Promise they must be made another kind of bodies fitted to that Countrey to which they shall be transported Where there is no earth nor water nor such creatures as live in them but pure light of unconceivable brightness Lastly they knew that the Members must needs be made conformable to the head and therefore his body being glorious so must this vile body of ours be made too as the Apostle tells us Phil. 3. 21. It would be but an ugly sight among us to behold an hansome beautiful face of the purest complexion joyned to a body black and sooty whose limbs were all deformed and dis-proportioned And much more ill-favoured to see an head of light glistering like the Sun and all the Members dark as pitch resembling this sluggish Earth They made no question therefore but that when he should appear again visibly with them attending on him they should be conformed to the condition and quality of his person to whom they related as members of his body that so he might be admired in his Saints and glorified in all that believe They look't for him to come from Heaven and fashion them after his own image i. e. to make them
to them by all these means that he that hath the Son i. e. effectually believes in Christ and is his faithful follower hath life And these things they have written unto us that believe on the Name of the Son of God that we may know that we have eternal life 1 John 5. 12 13. For faith is a certain and sure way of knowledge as well as any else And our Faith relies you see on the Testimony of the Men of God who did not follow cunningly devised fables when they made known the power and coming of our Lord Jesus but were eye witnesses of his Majesty c. 2 Pet. 1. 16 17. And as St. Paul speaks in Ver. 2. of the fore-going Chapter had renounced the hidden things of dishonesty not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully but by manifestation of the truth commending themselves to every mans conscience in the sight of God There appeared nothing of fraud and guile in any of their speeches or actions but the greatest simplicity ingenuity and singleness of heart that can be imagined They abominated all dishonest dealing and did not pretend to receive things from the Lord when they were but the devices or dreams of their own brains But as the Apostle tells them in this Epistle Chap. 12. 12. the signs of his being sent of God were wrought among them in all patience in signs and wonders and mighty deeds That which they had heard which they had seen with their eyes which they had looked upon and their hands had handled of the word of life they declared unto the world For the life was manifested saith St. John and we have seen it and bear witness and shew unto you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested unto us 1. John 1. 1 2 3. Let us not therefore be faithless but believe the testimony of men so well assured For to think that there is no habitation for us in the Heavens after we depart from these earthly houses because we were never there is as foollish and senseless as if a man but poorly bred and that had never stirred beyond the door of his Cottage should imagine that all the goodly buildings he hears of at London or which are shown him from the top of an Hill some Miles distance from it are but so many Clouds and phantasms in the Air and have no real being Let us but a little awaken our souls to look beyond this house of clay Let us but go out of doors in our thoughts and meditations stretching our minds further than the things of sense and we shall clearly discern in this light of God which hath shone from Heaven upon us that there is a far more glorious state in a building not made with hands eternal in the Heavens For these things saith the Amen the faithful and true witness the beginning of the Creation of God Rev. 3. 14. These things say the Servants of Christ the Stewards of the Mysteries of God in all things approving themselves to be his Ministers 1 Cor. 4. 1. 2. 6. 4. We ought therefore to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard lest at any time we should let them slip How shall we escape if we neglect such great salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and with divers Miracles and Gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his will 2 Heb. 1. 3 4. II. And that you may be moved to the greater attension to these things and not to slight the report of our Lord himself and of men chosen of God to be his witnesses give me leave to speak a few words of the other remaining Heads mentioned at the beginning which will add some strength and force to what you have heard It is considerable then that this was a matter generally known a thing wherein they were all agreed They had a knowledge as I have told you of them and not a meer opinion It was not only a probable but a certain truth which they preached to the world And yet an opinion that is not private but common is very much respected and carries no small Authority with it We are all very much over-awed by that which is universally received and inclined to follow that which is every where had in reverence How much more then is this to be regarded and worthy of all acceptation which stands upon such solid foundations and to which there was also a common consent They were all satisfied that this was the very truth of God there was no dispute or division among them about this Doctrine It was the thing which they had heard from the beginning that this is the promise which he hath promised us even eternal life 1 John 2. 24 25. This was every Apostles sense this they all preached this every Christian believed It was the common Faith of Gods elect the common hope of their heavenly calling and in one word the common salvation Titus 1. 1 2 4. Ephes 4. 4. Jude 3. It was not the belief of St. Paul alone he was not the only man that published this glad tydings to the world But they all heard the voice of Christ they all beheld his glory the glory as of the only begotten of the Father they all were witnesses of his resurrection and all felt the same miraculous change wrought in their souls and as our Lord prayed that they might be one as he and the Father were John 17. 9. so they unanimously delivered that which they received 1 Cor. 15. 3. 11. and preached this hope of the Gospel to every creature which is under heaven Col. 1. 23. teaching every man in all wisdom that they might present every man perfect in Christ Jesus Whereunto I also labour saith the same Apostle striveing according to his working which worketh in me mightily Ib. V. 28 29. This shews that they had no slight and superficial thoughts of the life to come but that they were exceeding serious in the belief of it being rooted and grounded in this truth Which will more fully appear if you go on to consider III. That they knew these things so clearly and were so abundantly satisfied in the certainty of them that they made them their scope and their aim to which they directed and at which they levelled all their desires and endeavours This the Particle FOR puts us in mind of which sends our thoughts back to the words before and gives us an account of that character which we there find of the Apostles of our Lord who looked * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not at the things which were seen but at the things which were not seen They were so perswaded of this happy state hereafter that it was alwayes in their eye and they made it the mark to which they bent all their thoughts
the first begotten from the dead and the Prince of the Kings of the Earth as gone into the Heavens and there sat down at the right hand of the Throne of God Angels and Authorities and Powers being made subject to him as the Lord of life and glory who is gone to prepare a place for us and will come again and receive us to himself that where he is there we may be also Then will these spiritual things be as much valued by us as now they are despised and we shall as much slight all these bodily enjoyments as now they are overprized We shall not consent for any good in this world to lose our portion with him but chuse rather to dye a thousand deaths than not receive the Crown of life In short the Faith of Christians will then be able to do as much as Sense now doth As that now disparages and thrusts by the things of Faith because they seem Nothing or Uncertain so Faith will put by all the temptations of sense and bid them stand aside because it apprehends coelestial things to be sure and certain too For if they appear as real and certain things they must as I told you be preferred because they are infinitely better than all other and have nothing to disparage them but only their seeming uncertainty They will undoubtedly make us do and suffer the will of our Lord with all chearfulness and patient perseverance while we are here and make us ready to go from hence with the like cheerfulness when or howsoever it shall be his will and pleasure to call for us And what if he send for some of our Friends and dear relations to come away before us Will not the belief of these things make us with some cheerfulness or contentment resign them to him There can be no greater comfort than this Discourse against the grief we are apt to conceive at their departure For death is but the pulling down of an earthly house that they may pass out into an heavenly And it is not the going of our Friends quite away but only their going before and if they be godly they are gone into a better dwelling Why should we mourn then immoderately as those that have no hope Would we not have our Friends advanceed Do we grieve that they are possessed of a more plentiful estate And weep perpetually that they live like Kings and reign with Christ in glorious Pallaces O let not the tears flow too fast Look upon the Heavens and dry your eyes for out of an earthly hole all purified souls take their flight above those spatious Vaults From cold hunger thirst and nakedness they go to a place where there are none of these necessities Would you have your Children lye alwayes in their swadling-clothes Or when they are grown bigger do you desire they should alwayes go in their side-coates Do you sigh to see them beyond their non-age and grown to the state of men and women Would you have them return to their infancy again and become little children meerly that you may play with them Why do you take it ill then that your Friends are grown to an higher stature Why do you lament so heavily that they are stript of their raggs to put on richer apparel Why do you not rather comfort your selves that they are in the condition of Angels and numbred among the Sons of glory being entred into the family of God above in the Court of Heaven Consider I beseech you that too long continued bewailings of the loss of our holy Friends doth betray our Ignorance or forgetfulness of the glory of the other world It is a sign we do not know or else not think of that which the Apostle here preaches We are but in a dream of happiness all this while and see but the shadows and images of it There is little or nothing of this felicity which we touch and feel or that strongly affects our heart For if it did we should be satisfied both because they are gone to it and we may one day follow them If they loved our Lord in sincerity he hath better provided for them than if they had staid in our company And if we love him too and so be perswaded of his love to us they are but poor thoughts that we have of him which cannot supply the place of a Friend a Brother an Husband or a Wife and but low thoughts that we have of his happiness if there be not a great deal more in it to quiet and compose us than there is in the loss of any thing in this world to trouble and disturb us It was a notable saying of one of the Antients that the souls of Philosophers have the Body for their house but they that are ignorant enjoy it but as their prison The truth of which is too apparent For the unbelieving and ungodly are shut up close in their Bodies and fettered within those walls of flesh They are tyed to them by as many chains as they have Members and have no other light but what comes in at the holes of their eyes no other comfort but what they receive by the means of the rest of their bodily senses Whereas all faithfull souls enjoy a greater freedome They can go out of doors and are at liberty to walk abroad and take a view of unseen enjoyments They can look up a while to the highest Heavens and behold in the light of God the glory of our Lord the innumerable company of Angels and the Spirits of just men made perfect The shortest glimpse of whose happiness is able to cheer and refresh their souls in the most disconsolate condition And if they can but think of their Friends departed as Members of that blessed Society the remembrance of them will never fail to be accompanied with such a taste of joy as shall take away the bitterness of all their sorrows Into that glorious assembly of Saints our good Friend I make no question is gone whose earthly house we come here to lay for a time in its Grave In whom you might have seen an example of the force of this Divine Faith which as it was the guide and principle of the actions of his life so it was the exceeding joy and comfort of his heart at death For that he seemed to fear no more than he did his sleep He went as willingly out of this body as he was wont to do out of his own house into this place the House of God and left the dearest relations with such satisfaction as if he were taking a journey to them A very noble degree of Christian confidence And yet no more than might be expected to wait on a long train of other excellent qualities which were eminent in him Of which if I proceed to speak a few words not meerly to comply with Custome but to furnish you with a worthy example as I am sure I shall not wrong the truth so I hope I shall as little