which you must follow if ever you will with comfort look the Lord Jesus in the face at the hour of Death or in the Day of Iudgement THE first Direction is this See that your souls be sincerely established in the Belief of this Judgement and everlasting life For if you do not soundly believe it you will not seriously prepare for it If you have the Judgement and belief of an Infidel you cannot have the Heart or the Life of a Christian Unbelief shuts out the most of the world from heaven see that it do not so by you If you say You cannot Believe what you would I answer Feed not yor â—â—belieâ— by wilfulness or unreasonableness Use Gods means to overcome it and shut not your eyes against he light and then try the issues Heb. 3. 12 13 15 16 17 18 19. THE second Direction Labour diligently to have a sound understanding of the nature of the Laws and Judgement of God On what terms it is that he dealeth with mankinde and on what terms he will Judge them to Life or Death and what the Reward and punishment is For if you know not the Law by which you must be Judged you cannot know how to prepare for the Judgement Study the Scripture therefore and mark who they be that God promiseth to save and who they be that he threatneth to Condemn For according to that Word will the Judgement pass THE third Direction See that you take it as the very business of your Lives to make ready for that day Understand that you have no other business in this world but what doth necessarily depend on this What else have you to do but to provide for everlasting and to use means to sustain your own bodies and others of purpose for his work till it be happily done â— Live therefore as men that make this the main scope and care of their Lives and let all things else come in but on the by Remember every morning when you awake that you must spend that day in preparation for your Account and that God doth give it you for that end When you go to bed examine your hearts what you have done that day in preparation for your last Day And take that time as lost which doth nothing to this end THe fourth Direction Vse frequently to think of the Certainty neerness and dreadfulness of that day to keep Life in your Affections and Endeavours lest by Inconsiderateness your souls grow stupid and negligent Otherwise because it is out of sight the heart will be apt to grow hardened and secure And do not think of it sleightly as a common thing but purposely set your selves to think of it that it may rouze you up to such Affections and Endeavours as in some measure are answerable to the nature of the thing THE fifth Direction Labour to have a lively feeling on thy heart of the evil and weight of that sin which thou art guilty of and of the misery into which it hath brought thee and would further bring thee if thou be not delivered and so to feel the need of a Deliverer This must prepare thee to partake of Christ now and if thou partake not of him now thou canst not be saved by him Then It is these souls that now make light of their sin and misery that must then feel them so heavy as to be pressed by them into the infernal flames And those that now feel little need of a Saviour they shall then have none to save them when they feel their need THE sixth Direction Vnderstand and Believe the sufficiency of that Ransom and Satisfaction to Justice which Christ hath made for thy sins and for the world and how freely and universally it is offered in the Gospel Thy sin is not uncurable or unpardonable nor thy misery remediless God hath provided a remedy in his Son Christ and brought it so neer thy hands that nothing but thy neglecting or wilful refusing it can deprive thee of the Benefit Settle thy soul in this belief THE seventh Direction Vnderstand and Believe that for all Christs satisfaction there is an Absolute Necessity of sound Faith and Repentancte to be in thy own self before thou canst be a Member of him or be Pardoned Adopted or Justified by his blood He dyed not for final Infidelâ—ty and Impenitency as predominant in any soul As the Law of his Father which occasioned his suffering required perfect Obedience or suffering So his own Law which he hath made for the conveyance of his Benefits doth require yet true Faith and Repentance of men themselves before they shall be pardoned by him and sincere Obedience and Perseverance before they shall be glorified THE eighth Direction Rest not therefore in an unrenewed unsanctified state that is till this Faith and Repentance be wrought on thy own soul and thou be truly broken of from thy former sinful course and from all things in this world and art Dedicated Devoted and Resigned unto God Seeing this change must be made and these graces must be had or thou must certainly perish in the fear of God see that thou give no ease to thy mind till thou art thus changed Be content with nothing till this be done Delay not another day How canst thou live merrily or sleep quietly in such a Condition as if thou shouldst dye in it thou shouldst perish for ever Especially when thou art every hour uncertain whether thou shalt see another hour and not be presently snatch away by death Methinks while thou art in so sad a case which way ever thou art going or what ever thou art doing it should still come into thy thoughts Oh what if I should Dye before I be Regenerate and have part in Christ THE ninth Direction Let it be the daily care of thy soul to mortifie thy fleshly desires and overcome this world and live as in a continual Conflict With Satan which Will not be ended till thy life do end If any thing destroy thee by drawing away thy heart from God it will be thy carnal self thy fleshly desires and the allurements of this world which is the matter that they feed upon This therefore must be the earnest work of thy life to subdue this flesh and set light by this world and resist the Devil that by these would destroy thee It is the common case of miserable hypocrites that at first they list themselves under Christ as for a fight but they presently forget their state and work and when they are once in their own conceit Regenerate they think themselves so safe that there is no further danger and thereupon they do lay down their Arms and take that which they miscall their Christian Liberty and indulge and please that flâ—sh which they promised to mortifie and close with the world which they promised to contemn and so give up themselves to the Devil whom they promised to fight against If once you apprehend all your Religion lieth in meer Believing
be cast out of the presence of Christ and his Saints for ever I have now finished the Directions which I tender to you for your preparation for the Day of the Lord and withall my whole Discourse on this weighty point What effect all this shall have upon your hearts the Lord knows it is not in my power to determine If you are so far blinded and hardened by sin and Satan as to make light of all this or coldly to commend the Doctrine while you go on to the end in your carnal worldly condition as before I can say no more but tell thee again that Iudgement is neer when thou wilt bitterly bewail all this too late And among all the rest of the Evidence that comes in against thee this book wil be one which shall testifie to thy face before Angels and men that thou wast told of that Day and intreated to prepare But if the Lord shall shew thee so much mercy as to open thy eyes and break in upon thy heart and by sober Consideration turn it to himself and cause thee faithfully to take the warning that hath here been given thee and to obey these Directions I dare assure thee from the word of the Lord that this Iudgement which will be so dreadful to the ungodly and the beginning of their endless terror and misery will be as joyful to thee and the beginning of thy glory The Saviour that thou hast believed in and sincerely obeyed will not condemn thee Psal 1. 5 6. Rom. 8. 1. Iohn 3. 16. It is part of his business to Iustifie thee before the world and to glorifie his merits his Kingly power his holyness and his rewarding Iustice in thy Absolution and Salvation He will account it a righteous thing to recompence Tribulation to thy Troublers and Rest to thy self when the Lord Iesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty Angels in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Iesus Christ who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power Even then shall he come to be glorified in his Saints and to be admired in all them that believe in that day Even because his servants Testimony and his Spirits among them was believed 2. Thes 1. 6 7 8 9 10. That day will be the great marriage or the Lamb and the Reception of thee and all the Saints into the glory of thy beloved to which they had a Right at their first Consent and Contract upon earth And when the Bridegroom comes thou who art Ready shalt go in to the Marriage when the door shall be shut against the sleepy negligent world and though they Cry Lord Lord open to us they shall be repulsed with a Verily I know you not Mat. 25. 10 11 12 13. For this day which others fear maist thou long and hope and pray and wait and comfort thy self in all troubles with the remembrance of it 1 Cor. 15. 55 56. 57 58. 1 Thes 4. 17 18. If thou were â—â—ady to be offered to death for Christ or when the time of thy departing is at hand thou maist look back on the good fight which thou hast sought and on the course which thou hast finished and on the Faith which thou hast kept and maist confidently conclude that henceforth there is laid up for thee a Crown of Righteousness which The Lord the Righteous Judge shall give thee at that day and not to thee only but unto all them also that Love his Appearing 2 Tim. 4. 6 7 8. Even so Come Lord Jesus Rev. 22. 20. FINIS This Sermon was proached in the time of the Ecclipse
THREE TREATISES Tending to awaken Secure Sinners viz. 1. The terror of the day of Judgment 2 COR. 5. 10. 2. The danger of slighting Christ and his Gospel MATT. 22. 5. 3. True Christianity or Christs absolute Dominion 1 COR. 6. 19 20. And Mans necessary Self-Resignation and Subjection unto Christ PSA 2. 10 11 12. By Richard Baxter To be sold by John Rothwell at the Fountain in Goldsmiths-row in Cheapside 1656. TRUE Christianity OR Christs absolute Dominion and Mans necessary Self-resignation and subjection In two Assize Sermons preached at WORCESTER By RICH. BAXTER LONDON Printed for Nevil Simmons bookseller in Kidderminster 1656. A Sermon OF The absolute Dominion of God-Redeemer and the necessity of being devoted and living to him Preached before the Honorable Judge of Assize at Worcester Aug. 2. 1654. By Rich. Baxter Rom. 14. 9. For to this end Christ both dyed and rose and revived that he might be Lord both of the dead and Living London Printed for Nevil Simmons Bookseller in Kidderminster 1656. To the Right Honourable Serjeant Glyn Now Judge of Assise in this Circuit My Lord COuld my excuse have satisfyed you this Sermon had been confined to the Auditory it was prepared for I cannot expect that is should find that Candor and favour with every Reader as it did with the Hearers When it must speak to All the guilty will hear and then it will gall Innocency is patient in hearing a reproof and charitable in the interpretation but Guilt will smart and quarrel and usually make a fault in him that findeth one in them Yet I confest this is but a poor justification of his silence that hath a Call to speak Both my Calling and this Sermon would condemn me if on such grounds I should draw back But my Backwardness was caused by the reason which I then tendred your Lord-ship as my excuse viz. Because here is nothing but what is common and that it is in as common and homely a dress And I hope we need not fear that our labours are dead unless the Press shall give them life We bring not Sermons to Church as we do a Corps for a burial If there be life in them and life in the Hearers the connaturality will cause such an amicable closure that through the Reception Retention and operation of the soul they will be the immortal seed of a life everlasting But yet seeing the press hath a louder voice then mine and the matter in hand is of such exceeding necessity I shall not refuse upon such an invitation to be a rememberancer to the the world of a Doctrine and duty of such high concernment thongh they have heard it never so oft before Seeing therefore I must present that now to your eyes which I lately presented to your ears I shall take the boldness to add one word of Application in this Epistle which I thought not seasonable to mention in the first delivery and that shall be to your Lordship and all others in your present case that are elected members of this expected Parliament Be sure to remember the interest of your soveraign the great Lord Protector of Heaven and Earth And as ever you will make him a comfortable accompt of your Power Abilities and Opportunities of serving him see that you prefer his interest before your own or any mans on earth If you go not thither as sent by Him with a firm resolution to serve him first you were better sit at home forget not that he hath laid claim to you and to all that you have and all that you can have and all that you can do I am bold with all possible earnestness to entreat you yea as Christs Minister to require you in his Name to study and remember his business and interest and see that it have the chief place in all your consultations Watch against the incroachments of your own carnal interests consult not with flesh and blood nor give it the hearing when it shall offer you its advice How subtilly will it insinuate how importunately will it urge you how certainly will it marr all if you do not constantly and resolvedly watch O how hard but now happy is it to conquer this carnal self Remember still that you are not your own that you have an unseen Master that must be pleased whoever be displeased and an unseen Kingdom to be obtained and an invisible soul that must be saved though all the world be lost Fix your eye still on him that made and redeemed you and upon the ultimate end of your Christian race and do nothing wilfully unworthy such a Master and such an end Often renew your self-resignation and devote your self to him sit close at his work and be sure that it be His both in the Matter and in your Intent If Conscience should at any time ask Whose work are you now doing or a man should pluck you by the sleeve and say Sir Whose Cause are you now pleading See that you have the answer of a Christian at hand delay not Gods work till you have done your own or any ones else You 'l best secure the Common-wealth and your own interest by looking first to His. By neglecting this and being carnally wise we have wheel'd about so long in the Wilderness and lost those advantages against the Powers of Darkness which we know not whether we shall ever recover again It is the great astonishment of sober men and not the least reproach that ever was cast on our holy Profession to think with what a zeal for the work of Christ men seemed to be animated in the beginning of our disagreements and how deeply they did engage themselves to him in solemn Vows Protestations and Covenants what advantages carnal self hath since got and turned the stream another way so that the same men have since been the instruments of our calamity in breaking in pieces and dishonouring the Churches of Christ yea and gone so neer to the taking down as much as in them lay the whole Ministry that stand approved in the Land O do not by trifling give advantage to the Temper to destroy your work and you together Take warning by the sad experiences of what is past bestir you speedily and vigoruosly for Christ as knowing your opposition and the shortness of your time Blessed is that servant whom his Lord when he commeth shall find so doing If you ask me wherein his interest of Christ doth consist I shall tell you but in a few unquestionable particulars 1. In the main that truth godliness and honesty be countenanced and encouraged and their contraries by all fit means suppressed 2. In order to this that unworthy men be removed from Magistracy and Ministry and the places supplyed with the fittest that can be had 3. That a competent maintenance may be procured where it is wanting especially for Cities and great Towns where more Teachers are so necessary in some proportion to the number of souls and on which the
rule them as his redeemed ones and make for them such new Laws of grace for the conveyances of his benefits as might demonstrate the wisdom and mercy of our Redeemer and be most suitable to his ends The world is now morall dead in sin though naturally alive Christ hath redeemed them but will cure them by the actuall conveyance of the benefits of Redemption or no at all He hath undertaken to this end himself to be their Physitian to cure all that will come to him and take him so to be and trust him and obey him in the Application of his Medicines He hath erected an Hospitall his Church to this end and commanded all to come into this Ark. Those that are far distant he first commandeth to come nearer and those that are neare he inviteth to come in Too many do refuse and perish in their refusall He will not suffer all to do so but mercifully boweth the wills of his Elect and by an insuperable powerfull drawing compells them to come in You may see then that here is a Novum us Dominii Imperii a new right of Propriety and rule founded on the new bottom of Redemption But that this doth not destroy the old which was founded on Creation but is in the very nature and use of it an emendative addition Redemption is to mend the Creature not of any defect that was left in the Creation but from the ruine which came by our defacing transgression The Law of grace upon this Redemption is superadded to the Law of nature given on the Creation not to amend any imperfections in that Law but to save the sinner from its unsufferable penalty by dissolving its obligation of him thereto And thus in its nature and use it is a remedying Law And so you may see that Christ is now the Owner and by right the Governor of the whole world on the Title of redemption as God before was and still is on the Title of Creation 3. By this you may also percive in whit sense we are not our own In the strictest sence there is no proprietary or absolute Lord in the world but God No man can say this is fully and strictly mine God gives us indeed whatever we enjoy but his giving is not as mans we part with out Propriety in that which which we give but God gives nothing so His giving to us makes it not the less his own As a man giveth his goods to his steward to dispose of for his use or instruments to his servant to do his work with so God giveth his benefits to us Or at the utmost as you give cloathes to your child which are more yours still then his and you may take them away at your pleasure I confess when God hath told us that he will not take them away he is as it were obliged in fidelity to continue them but yet doth not hereby let go his propriety And so Christ bids us call no man on Earth Father that is our absolute Lord or Ruler because we have but one such master who is in Heaven Mat. 23. 7 8 9 10. So that you may see by this what Propriety is left us and what right we have to our selves and our Possessions Even such as a steward in his Masters goods or a servant in his tools or a child in his coat which is a propriety improper subordinate and secundum quid and will secure us against the usurpation of another One servant may not take his fellows instrument from him nor one child his brothers coat from him without the Parents or Masters consent They have them for their use though not the full propriety It may be called a propriety in respect to our fellow servant though it be not properly so as we stand in respect to God We have right enough to consute the Leveller but not to exempt either us or ours from the claim and use of our absolute Lord. 4. For the fourth Question What it is to glorifie God in body and spirit I answer in a word It is when upon true believing apprehensions of his right to us and of our great obligations to him as our Redeemer we heartily and unfeignedly devote our selves to him and live as a people so devoted so bending the chiefest of our care and study how to please him in exactest obedience that the glory of his mercy and holiness and of his wise and righteous Laws may be seen in our conversations and that the holy conformity of our lives to these Lawes may shew that there is the like conformity in our minds and that they are written in our hearts when the exellency of the Christian Religion is so appareut in the excellency of our lives causing us to do that which no others can imitate that the lustre of our good works may shine before men and cause them to glorifie our Father in Heaven To conclude when we still respect God as our only Soveragin and Christ as our Redeemer and his Spirit as our Sanctifier and his Law as our Rule that the doing of his will and the denying of our own is the daily work of our lives and the promoting of his blessed ends is our end this is the glorifying of God that hath Redeemed us 5. The last question is who they be that are may be urged to glorifie God on this ground that the hath bought them Doubtless only those whom he hath bought but who are those It discourageth me to tell you because among the godly it is a controversie but if they will controvert points of such great moment they cannot disoblige or excuse us from preaching them Among the variety of mens opinions it is safe to speak in the Language of the holy Ghost and accordingly to believe viz that as by the offence of one Judgement came upon all men to condemnation even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men to Justification of life Rom. 5. 8. And that he gave himself a ranâ—ome for all and is the only Mediator between God and man 1 Tim. 2. 5 6. That he is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world 1 John 2. 2. That God is the Saviour of all men especially of those that believe 1 Tim. 4. 10. That he is the Saviour of the world John 4. 42. 1 John 4. 14. 15. That he tasteth death for every man Heb. 2. 9. with many the like It is very sad to consider how mens unskilfulness to reconcile Gods general grace with his special and to assign to each its proper part hath made the Pelagians and their Successors to deny the special grace and too many of late no less dangerously to deny the general grace and what contentions these two errroneous parties have maintained and still maintain in the Church and how few observe or follow that true and sober mean which Austin the Maul of the Pelagians and his
please and make us such Laws and Conditions as seem best to his wisdom upon which our justification and salvation should depend He hath resolved that this shall be the only condition and way and that as no man shall be justified by a meer Christ or his death abstracted from Faith that is of Age and use of Reason so this Faith shall be the condition upon which they shall be justified or as a Christ neglected shall save no man so the accepting or receiving of him shall justifie and save them as the conditon of the Covenant performed under which Notion it is that Faith justifieth 2. Yet other improper or subordinate Reasons which receive their life from the former and without it would be no Reasons may be given as 1. From the equity and 2. From the sutbleness and conveniency 1. It is but equal that he who hath bought us and that so dearly and from a state so deplorable and desperate as we were in should be acknowledged and accepted for our Saviour and our Lord and that we who are not our own but are bought with a price should glorifie him with our bodies and souls which are his 1 Cor. 6. 20. 7. 23. Epecially when for that end he both dyed aud rose again that he might rule or be Lord over both quick and dead Rom. 14. 9. If one of you should buy a man from the Galleyes or Gallowes with the price of your whole estate or the life of your only Son would you not expect that he should be at your dispose that he should love you depend on you and be subject to you 2. And as salvation by free Grace through Christ is a way most sutable to Gods honor and to our own necessities and low condition so in subordination thereto the way of believing is most rationally conducible to the same ends As we could not have had a fitter way to the Father then by Christ so neither could there be a fitter way to Christ or means to partake of him then by Faith For though I cannot call it the instrumental Cause of our justification either Active or Passive yet is this Faith or Acceptation of Christ for our Saviour and King which is here called Kising the Son the fairest condition that we could reasonably expect and the most apparently tending to the honor of our Redeemer applying and appropriating to our selves the person righteousness and benefits procured and offered but noâ— the least of the houor of the Work All we do is but to accept what Christ hath procured and that must be by the special assistance of his Spirit too 4. The fourth thing I promised is to shew you Why no other Priviledge or Power in the world can save him that doth not kiss the Son It may here suffice that I have shewed you Gods determination to the contrary But further consider if any shonld hope to scape by their Dignities Titles Friends Strength or any other endowments or virtuous qualifications 1. What is their task 2. What is their power to perform it 1. They must resist the unresistible will of God They must do that which Heaven or Earth Men or Devils were never able yet to do They have resisted his Laws and his love but they could never resist his purpose or his power The power that undertaketh to save the Enemy or Neglecter of Christ must first overcome the power of the Almighty and conquer him that doth command the World And who hath the strength that is sufficient for this Sinner before thou venture thy soul upon such a mad conceit or think to be saved whether God will or not try first thy skill and strength in some inferiour attempt Bid the Sun or Moon stand still in the Firmament invert the several seasons of the year Bid the snow and frost to come in Summer and the flowers and fruits to spring in Winter command the streams to turn their course or the Tide its times or the winds their motion If these will obey thee and thy word can prevail with them against the Law of their Creator then maist thou proceed with a greater confidence and courage and have some hopes to save the neglecters of Christ Or try first whether thou canst save thy present life against the course of nature and will of God call back thine age and years that are past command thy pains and sickness to be gone chide back this bold approaching death Will they not obey thee Canst thou do none of these How then canst thou expect the saving of thy soul against the determinate will and Way of God Where dwelleth that man or what was his name that did neglect Christ and yet escape damnation Who hath hardned himself against him and hath prospered Job 9. 4. And dost thou think then to be the first Thou maist perhaps knock boldly at the Gate of Heaven and plead thy Greatness thy virtues thy Almsdeeds and formal devotion but thou shalt receive a sadder answer then thou dost expect Jesus we know and obediential Faith in him we know but who are ye 2 He that will save the soul that loveth not dependeth not on and subjecteth not himself to Christ must first make false the word of God and make the true and faithful God a lyer this is another part of his task God hath given it under his hand for truth That he that believeth not is condemned already Joh. 3. 18. That he shall not see life but the wrath of God abideth on him Joh. 3. 36. That they who are invited to Christ and make light of it or make excuses shall never taste of his Supper Luke 14. 24. Mat. 22. 5. 8. That it shall be easier for Sodom in the day of Judgement then for that City which refuseth the offers of the Gospel Mat. 12. 15. That whosoever would not have Christ to raign over them shall be brought forth at last and destroyed before him as his Enemies Luk. 19. 27. That they shall all be damned that believe not the truth but have pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thes 2. 12 c. And hath the Almighty said that thus it shall be Who then is he that dare say it shall not be Is this the concluded Decree of Heaven what power or policy is able to reverse it hath God said it wil he not do it Thus you see his task that will undertake to save one neglecter of Christ 2. Let us now consider what Power that is that must perform it If it be done it must be either 1. By Wisdom or 2. By Strength whereas the chiefest of men even the Kings and Judges of the Earth are both ignorant and Impotent 1. Ignorant Though Judges are learned in the repute of the World Alas poor crawling breathing dust Do you know the secrets of your Masters counsel and are you able to over reach them and frustrate his designs Doth this Book know what is written in it Can the Seat you sit on over-top your
better Master say as Peter Wither shall we go Lord thou hast the words of eternal life And when thou knowest once where to be better then go thy way part with Christ and spare not If thy merry company or thy honour or thy wealth or all thy friends and delights in the world will do that for thee which Christ hath done and which at last he will do if thou stick to him then take them for thy Gods and let Christ go In the meane time let me prevaile with thee as thou are a man of reason sell not thy Saviour till thou know for what sell not thy soul till thou know why sell not thy hopes of Heaven for nothing God forbid that thy wilfull folly should bring thee to Hell and there thou shouldst lie roaring and crying out for ever This is the reward of my neglecting Christ he would have led me to Glory and I would not follow him I sold heaven for a few merry hours for a little honour and ease and delight to my flesh here I lie in torment because I would not be ruled by Christ but chose my lusts and pleasure be fore him Sinner do not think I speak harshly or uncharitably to call this neglect of Christ thy folly As true as thou livest and hearest me this day except thy timely submission do prevent it which God grant it may thou wilt one of these dayes befool thy self a thousand times more then I now befool thee and call thy self mad and a thousand times mad when thou thinkest how fair thou wast for heaven and how ready Christ was to have been thy Saviour and thy Lord and how light thou madest of all his offers Either this will prove true to thy cost or else am I a fals Prophet and a cursed deceiver Be wise therefore be learned and kiss the Son The former Considerations were drawn from Aggravations of the sinne the following are drawn from the Aggravations of the punishment and that fom the words of the Text too 1. God will be angry if you kiss not the Son His wrath is as fire and this neglect of Christ is the way to kindle it If thou art not a Believer thou art condemned already but this will bring upon thee a double condemnation Believe it for a truth All thy sinnes as they are the Covenant of Works even the most hainous of them are not so provoking destroying as thy slighting of Christ Oh what will the Father say to such an unworthy wrecth Must I send my Son from my bosome to suffer for thee must he groan when thou shouldst groan and bleed when thou shouldst bleed and dye when thou shouldst dye And canst thou not now be perswaded to embrace him and obey him must the world be courted while he stands by must he have the naked title of thy Lord and Saviour while thy fleshly pleasures and profits have thy heart what wrath can be too great what hell too hot for such an ungrateful unworthy wretch Must I prepare thee a portion of the blood of my Son and wilt not thou be perswaded now to drink it must I be at so much cost to save thee and wilt thou not obey that thou maist be saved Go seize upon him justice let my wrath consume thee let hell devour thee let thy own Conscience for ever torment thee seeing thou hast chosen death thou shalt have it and as thou hast rejected Heaven thou shalt never see it but my wrath shall abide upon thee for ever Joh. 3. 36. Woe to the sinner if this be once thy sentence thou wert better have all the world angry with theeâ— and bound in an oath against thee as the Jews against Paul then that one drop of his anger should light upon thee thou wert better have Heaven and Earth to fall upon thee then one degree of Gods displeasure 2. As this wrath is Fire so is it a consuming fire and causeth the sinner utterly to perish All this is plain in the Text not that the Being of the soul will cease such a perishing the sinner would be glad oâ— A happy man would he think himself if he might dye as the bruits and be no more but such wishes are vain It is but a glimpse of his own condition which he shall see in the great combustion of the world when he seeth the heaven and earth on fire he see 's but the picture of his approaching wo. But alas it is he that must feel the devouring fire The world will be but refined or consumed by its fire but there must he burn and burn for ever and yet be neither consumed nor refined The Earth will not feel the flames that burn it but his soul and body must feel it with a witness Little know his friends that are honourably interring his Corps what his miserable sonl is seeing and feeling Here endeth the story of his prosperity and delights and now begins the Tragedy that will never have end Oh how his merry days are vanished as a dream and his jovial life as a Tale that is told His witty jests his pleasant sports his Cards and Dice his merry company and wanton dalliance his Cups and Queans yea his hopes of heaven and confident concerts of escaping this wrath are all perished with him in the way As the wax melteth before the fire as the chaff is scattered before the wind as the stubble consumeth before the flames as the flowers do wither before the scorching Sun so are all his sinful pleasures withered consumed scattered and melted And is not the hearty embracing of Christ and subjection to him a cheap prevention of all this Oh who among you can dwell with the devouring fire Who can dwell with the everlasting burnings Isai 33. 14. This God hath said he will surely do if you are able to gain-sâ—y and resist him try your strength read his ehal enge Isai 27. 4. Who would set the briars and thorns agaist me in battel I would go through them I would burn them together 3. This perishing will be sudden and unexpected in the way of their sin and resistance of Christ in the way of their fleshly delights and hopes They shall perish in the way l Thes 5. 3. Mat. 24. 37 As fire doth utterly break out in the night when men are sleeping and consumeth the fruit of their long labours so will this fire break forth upon their souls and how neer may it be when you little think on it A hundred to one but some of us present shall within a few moneths be in another world and what world will it be you may easily conceive if you do not embrace and obey the Son How many have been smitten with Herod in the midst of their vain glory How many like Ahab have been wounded in fight and dunged the Earth with their flesh and blood who left the Lords people to be fed with bread and water of affliction in confidence of their own return
in peace How many have been swallowed up like Pharaoh and his Host in their rash and malicious persuit of the godly Little thinks many an ignorant careless soul what a change of his condition he shall shortly find Those thousands of souls that are now in misery did as little think of that doleful state while they were merily pleasing the flesh on earth and forgetting Christ and their eternal state as you do now they could as contemptuously jeer the Preacher as you and verily believe that all this talk was but words and wind and empty threats and ventured their souls as boldy upon their carnal hopes Little thought Sodom of the devouring fire when they were fnriously assaulting the door of their righteous reprover As little do the raging enemies of godliness among us think of the deplorable state which they are hasting to They will cry out themselves then Little did I think to see this day or feel these torments Why thou wouldst not thâ—nk of it or else thou mightest God told thee in Scripture and Ministers in their preaching but thou wouldst not believe till it was too late A little of Gods wrath will bring down all this upon those that embrace not and obey not the Son If his wrath be kindled yea but a little c. As his mercy being the mercy of an infinite God a little of it will sweeten a world of crosses so therefore will a little of his wrath consume a world of pleasures one spark fell among the Bethshemites and consumed fifty thousand and seventy men but for looking into the Ark till the people cry out Who can stand before this Holy Lord God 1 Sam. 6. 19 20. How then will the neglecters of Christ stand before him Sirs me thinks we should not hear of this as strangers or unbelievers There did but one spark fall upon England and what a combustion hath it cast this Kingdom into how many Houses and Towns hath it consumed How many thousand of people hath it impoverished how many children hath it left fatherless and how many thousand bodies hath it bereaved of their souls And though there are as many hearty prayers and tears poured forth to quench it as most Kingdoms on earth have had yet is the fire kindled afresh and threatneth a more terrible desolation then before as if it would turn us all to ashes One spark fell upon Germany another upon Ireland and what it hath done there I need not tell you If a little of this wrath do but seize upon thy body what cryes and groans and lamentations doth it raise If it be on one member yea but a tooth how dost thou roar with intolerable pain and wouldst not take the world to live for ever in that condition If it seize upon the Conscience what torments doth it cause as if the man were already in the suburbs of Hell He thinketh every thing he seeth is against him he feareth every bit he eateth should be his bane If he sleep he dreams of death and judgement when he awaketh his Conscience and horror awake with him he is weary of living and fearful of dying even the thoughts of heaven are terrible to him because he thinks it is not for him Oh what a pittiful sight is it to see a man under the wrath of God! And are these little little sparks so intolerable hot What then do you think are the Everlasting flames Beloved Hearers if God had not spoke this I durst not have spoke it The desire of my soul is that you may never feel it or else I should never have chosen so unpleasing a subject but that I hope the foreknowing may help you to prevent it But let me tell you from God that as sure as the heaven is over your head and the earth under your feet except the Son of God be nearer thy heart and dearer to thy heart then friends or goods or pleasures or life or any thing in this world this burning wrath will never be prevented Mat. 10. 37. Luke 14. 26. 5. When this wrath of God is throughly kindled the world will discern the blessed from the wretched Then blessed are they that trust in him It is the property of the wicked to be wise too late Those that now they esteem but precise fools will then be acknowledged blessed men Bear with their scorns Christians in the mean time they will very shortly wish themselves in your stead and would give all that ever they were masters of that they had sought and loved Christ as earnestly as you and had a little of your oyl when they find their lamps are out Mat. 25. 8. And now Hearers what is your resolution perhaps you have been enemies to Christ under the name of Christians Will you be so still Have you not loathed this busie diligent serving of him and hated them that most carefully seek him more then the vilest drunkard or blaspemer Have not his word and service and sabbaths been a burthen to you Have not multitudes ventured their lives against his Ordinances and Government Nay is it not almost the common voice of the Nation in effect Give us our sports and liberty of sinning give us our Readers and singing-men and drunken Preachers give us our Holy-daies and Ceremonies and the Customes of our fore-fathers Away with these precise fellows they are an eye-sore to us these precise Preachers shall noâ— controll us this precise Scripture shall be no Law to us and consequently this Christ shall not Rule over us How long hath England rebelled against his Government Mr. Vdal told them in the days of Queen Elizabeth that if they would not set up the Discipline of Christ in the Church Christ would set it up himself in a way that would make their hearts to ake I think their hearts have aked by this time and as they judged him to the Gallowes for his Prediction so hath Christ executed them by thousands for their Rebellion against him and yet they are as unwilling of his Government as ever The Kings of the Earth are afraid lest Christs Government should un-king them The Rulers are jealous lest it will depose them from their Dignities even the Reformers that have adventured all to set it up are jealous lest it will incroach upon their power and priviledges Kings are afraid of it and think themselves but half kings where Christ doth set up his Word and Discipline Parliaments are afraid of it lest it should usurp their Authority Lawyers are afraid of it lest it should take away their gains and the Laws of Christ should over-top the Laws of the Land The people are afraid of it lest it will compel them to subjection to that Law and way which their souls abhor Indeed if men may be their own judges then Christ hath no enemies in England at all we are his friends and all good Christians It is Precisians and Rebels that men hate and not Christ It is not the Government of Christ that
that his Service was making more adoe then needs and didst grudge at those that were more diligent then thy self but for the World how heartily and how constantly didst thou seek and serve it and yet wouldst thou now perswade the Judge that thou didst love God above all He will shew thee thy naked heat and the course of thy former life which shail convince thee of the contrary The Second Excuse I lived not in any gross sin but only in small Infirmities I was no Murderer or Adulterer or Fornicator or Thief nor did I deceive or wrong any or take any thing by violence Answ Was it not a gross sin to love the world above God and to neglect Christ that dyed for thee and never to do him one hours hearty service but meerly to seek thy carnal self and to live to thy flesh God will open thine eyes then and shew thee a thousand gross sins which thou now forgettest or makest light of and it is not only Gross sins but All sin great or small that deserveth the wrath of God and will certainly bring thee under it for ever if thou have not part in Christ to relieve thee Wo to the man that ever he was born that must answer in his own name for his smallest offences The Third Excuse I did it ignorantly I knew not that there was so much required to my Salvation I thought less adoe might have served the turn and that if I lookt to my body God would take caâ—e of my soul and that it was better to trust him what would become of me hereafter then to trouble my mind so much about it Had I known better I would have done better Answ If you knew not better who was it long of but your self Did God hide these things from you Did he not tell them you in his Word as plainly as the tongue of man can speak That except you were regenerate and born again you should not enter into the Kingdom of God John 3. 3â— 5. That without holiness none should see God Heb. 12. 14. That you mist strive to enter in at the strait gate for many shall seek to enter and shall not be able Luke 13. 24. That if you lived after the flesh you should dye and if by the Spirit you mortified the deeds of the body you should live Rom 8. 13 That if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8. 9. And to be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and peace Rom. 8. 9. That you must not lay up for your selves a treasure on earth where rust and moths do corrupt and thieves break through and steal but must lay up for your selves a treasure in heaven where rust and moths do not corrupt and thieves break through and steal Mat. 6. 19 20. That you must seek first the Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof Mat. 6. 23. and not Labour for the food that perisheth but for the food that endureth to everlasting life which Christ would have given you John 6. 27. That if you be risen with Christ you must seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God and not the things that are on earth Col. 3. 1 2 3. Yea Your very Conversation should be in Heaven Phil. 3. 19. 20. 21. What say you Did not God tell you all this and much more aud plainly tell it you Turn to your Bibles and see the words and let them witness against you 2. And could you think with any Reason that your souls being so much move precious then your bodies you should yet do so much more for your bodies then your souls could you think all the labour of your lives little enough for a frail body that must lie shortly in the dirt and that your Immortal souls should be no more reâ—arded Could you think with any Reason that your souls should do so much for a life of a few years continuance and do no more for a life that shall have no end 3. And whereas you talk of trusting God with your souls you did not trust him You did but on that pretence carelesly disregard them If you trust God shew any word of Promise that ever he gave you to trust upon that ever an Impenitent Carnal Careless person shall be saved No he hath told yon enough to the contrary And could you think that it was the will of God that you should mind your bodies more then your souls and this life more then that to come Why he hath bid you strive and run and sight and labour and care and seek and use violence and all diligence for the safety of your souls and for the life to come But where hath he bid you do so for your bodies No he knew that you were prone to do too much for them and therefore he hath bid you Care not and Labour not that is Do it as if you did it not and let your care and Labour for earthly things be none in comparision of that for heavenly things You know God can as well maintain your lives without your care and labour as save your souls without it And yet you see he will not he doth not You must plough and sow and reap and thresh for all Gods Love and Care of you and not say I will let all alone and trust God And must you not much more use diligence in much greater things If you will trust God you must trust him in his own way and in the use of his own means The fourth Excuse I was never brought up to learning I cannot so much as read Nor did my Parents ever teach me any of these things but only set me about my worldly business and provide food and rayment for me but never once told me that I had a soul to save or lose and and an everlasting life to provide and prepare for And therefore I could not come to the knowledge of them Answ The greater is their sin who thus neglected you But this is no sufficient Excuse for you Heaven is not prepared for the Learned only nor will Christ ask you at Judgement whether you are good Scholars or not no nor so much as whether you could write or read But consider well was not Gods word so plainly written that the unlearned might understand it Did he not put it into the most familiar stile though he knew it would be offensive to the proud Scholars of the world of purpose that he might fit it to the capacities of the ignorant And if you could not read yet tell me Could not you have learned to read at 20 or 30 years of age if you had been but willing to bestow now and then an hour to that end Or at least did you not live near some that could Read and could you not have procured them to read to you or to help you And did you not hear these things read to
you in the Congregation by the Minister or might have done if you would And if your Parents did neglect you in your youth yet when you came to a fuller use of Reason and heard of the matters of salvation from Gods Word did it not concern you to have looked to your selves and to have redeemed that time which you lost in your youth by doubling your diligence when you came to riper years The Apostles gathered Churches among Heathens that never heard of Christ before and converted many thousand souls that were never once told of a Saviour or the way to salvation till they had past a great part of their lives If you loitered till the latter part of the day it behoved you then to have bestirred your selves the more and not to say Through the fault of my Parents I lost the beginning of my life and therefore I will lose all they taught me not then therefore I will not learn now hav you not seen som of your neighbours who were as ill educated as your selves attain to much knowledge afterwards by their Industry And why might not you have done so if you had been as Industrious as they May not God and Conscience witness that it was because you cared not for knowledge and would not be at pains to get it that you knew no more Speak truth man in the presence of thy Judge was thy heart and mind set upon it Didst thou pray daily for it to God Didst thou use all the means thou couldst to get it Didst thou attend diligently on the word in publike and think of what thou heardest when thou camest home Didst thou go to the Minister or to others that could teach thee and intreat them to tell thee the way to salvation Or didst thou not rather carelesly neglect these matters and hear a Sermon as a common tale even when the minister was speaking of Heaven or of Hell It was not then thine unavoidable Ignorance but thy negligence Yea further answer as in the presence of God Didst thou obey so far as thou didst know Or didst thou not rather sin against that knowledge which thou hadst Thou knewest that the soul was better then the body and everlasting life more to be regarded then this transitory life But didst thou regard it accordingly Thou sure knewest that God was better then the world and Heaven then earth at least thou was told of it But didst thou accordingly value him and love him more Thou knewest sure that there was no salvation without Faith and Repentance and newness of life and yet they were neglected In a word many a thousand sins which were committed and duties that were omitted against thy own Knowledge and Conscience will marr this Excuse The fifth Excuse I lived not under a powerfull Minister to tell me of these things but where there was no Preaching at all Answ And might you not have gone where a powerfull Minister was with a little pains Yea did not the very plain Word that you heard read tell you of these things and might you not have had a Bible your selves and found them there The Sixth Excuse I was a Servant and had no time from my labour to mind these matters I lived with a hard master that required all his own work of me but would allow me no time for the service of God Or else I was a poor man and had a great charge to look after and with my hard labour had much adoe to live so that I had no time for heavenly things Answ 1. Who should be first served God or man What should be first sought after heaven or earth Did not Christ cell thee One thing is necessary Luke 10. 41 42 Was it not as needfull to see that you escape Damnation and get safe to Heaven when this life is ended as to see that you had food and raiment for your selves and yours 2. Did you spend no time in Recreation nor Idleness nor vain talking why might not that at least have been spent about Heavenly things 3. Could you have taken no time from your rest or eating or at other Intermissions Mans Body will not endure so great Labours as have no Intermission And why then might not godliness have been your ease and recreation 4. Or might you not have minded these things even when you were about your labour if you had but a heart to them 5. At least you might have spent the Lords own Day in hearing reading and pondering of these matters when you were forced to forbear your worldly labours even by the wholsom Law of the Land These therefore are all but vain Excuses and God will shortly make thee speak out and plainly confess It was not so much for want of Time or Helps or warning as for want of a heart to use them well I should have found some time though it had been when I should have slept if my heart had been but set upon it The Seventh Excuse Little did I think â—o have seen this day I did not Believe that ever God would be so severe I thought his Threatnings had been but to keep men in awe and I suspected either that the Scripture was not his word or else I thought he would be better then his word I thought all that I heard of another life had been uncertain and therefore was loth to let go a certainty for an uncertainty and lose my present pleasures which I had in hand for the hopes of that which I never did see Answ He that will not know his misery by believing to prevent it shall know it by feeling to endure it You were told and told again what your unbelief would bring you to Did Gods Word make Heaven and Earth doth it support them and secure them and is not his Word sufficient security for you to have trusted your souls upon did you know where was any better security to be had and where was any surer ground for your confidence And did you think so basely and blasphemously of God that he would falsifie his Word lest such as you should suffer and that he was fain to rule the world by a Lye Did God make the world so easily and can he not govern it by true and righteous means what need God to say that which he will not do to awe sinners can he not awe them by Truth is it not just that those should eternally perish that will entertain such desperate thoughts of God and then by such wicked imaginations encourage themselves in sin against him And for the Truth of Scripture God did not bid you believe it without Evidence He stamped on it the Image of his own Purity and Perfection that you might know it by that Image and superscription if you had eyes to see them He sealed it by uncontrouled multitudes of Miracles He delivered it down to your hands by infallible witnesses so that he left you no room for rational Doubting And you knew that the matters
of this world were not only uncertain but certainly vain and transitory and would shortly come to nothing and leave you in distress If it had then been uncertain whether there were a Glory and Miâ—ery hereafter as it was not should not Reason have taught you to prefer the least probabilities of an everlasting unspeakable happiness before that which is certainly perishing and vain These vain Excuses will but condemn you The Eighth Excuse I was so enticed and perswaded by sinner to do as they did that I could not deny them they would never let me rest Answ And were you not as earnestly perswaded by God to forsake sin and erve him and yet that would not prevail with you You could not deny the Devils and fools but you could deny God and all his Messengers Were not Ministers as earnest with you every week to repent and amend What did men entice you with with a little deluding fleshly pleasure for a few daies And what did God entice you with with the Promise of endless unconcievable felicity And if this were a smaller matter in your eyes then the other then you have had your choice be content with it and thank your selves In your life time you had the good things which you chose and preferred before heaven and therefore cannot expect to have heaven besides The ninth Excuse I lived among ungodly persons that derided all that feared God so that if I had not done as I they did but had made any more ado to be saved should have been the very scorn of the place where I lived Answ And was not heaven worth the enduring of a scorn Is not he worthy to go without it that thinks so basely of it Did not Christ tell you that if you were ashamed of him before men he would be ashamed of you before his Father and the Angels of heaven Mark 8. 38. He sufferered more then scorns forth you and could not you suffer a scorn for im and your selves seeing you chose rather to endure everlasting Torment than a little derision from ignorant men take that which you made choice of And seeing so small a matter wonld drive you from heaven and part God and you as a mock as the wind of a mans mouth No wonder if you be commanded to Depart from him into everlasting fire The tenth Excuse I had ungodly persons to my Parents or Masters or Landlord or Governors who threatned to undo me if I had addicted my self to so strict a life and if I would not believe and do as they did Answ What if they threatned you with present Death Did not God also threaten you with everlasting Death if you were not ruled by him And whose threatning should you have chiefly feared Is man more dreadful than God Is death more terrible then Hell Did not Chirst bid you Fear not them that can kill the body and after that can do no more but fear him that is able to destroy both body and soul in hell sire yea I say unto you fear him Mat. 10. 28. Luke 12. 4 5. and Isa 51. 7. Fear ye not the Reproach of men neither be afraid of their revilings For the moth shall eat them up like a Garment the worm shall eat them like wool but My Righteousness shall be for ever ard my salvation from Generation to Generation Seeing therefore you have chosen rather to suffer from God for ever for your sin then to suffer small matters for well-doing for a moment you must ever bear your own choice Christ told you before hand that if you could not forsake all the world and your own lives for him you could not be his Disciples Match 10. 37 38 39. And seeing you thought his terms too hard would needs seek you out a better service even take what you have chosen and found The eleventh Excuse I saw so many follow their pleasure and their worldly business and never look after these higher things and so few go the other way that I thought sure God would not damn so great a part of the world and therefore I ventured to do as the most did Answ God will make good his word upon many or few Did you doubt of his will or of his power I For his will he hath told it you in his word For his power he is as ab e to punish many as one man What is all he world to him but as a drop of a Bucket as the dust of the ballance He told you before hand that the gate was strait and the way to heaven was narrow and few did find it and the gate to destruction was wide and the way was broad and many did enter in at it Mat. 7. 13 14. And if you would not Believe him you must bear what your unbelief hath brought you to Whaâ— if you had twenty children or servants or friends and the greater part of them should prove false to you and seek your destruction or prove disobedient and turn to your enemy would you think it a good excuse if the rest should do the like because of their example will you therefore wrong God because you see others wrong him would you spit in the face of your own Father if you saw others do so God warned you that you should not follow a multitude to do evil Exod. 23. 2 And if yet you will do as most do you must even speed as most speed You should not so much consider who they be as what they do and whither they go and who they forsake and what they lose and what strength is in the Reasons that move them to do this And then you would find It is God they forsake it is sin they choose it is heaven they lose it is hell they run into and it is no true reason but Satans delusion and sensual inclinations that lead them to it And should men be imitated be they many or be they few in such a course as this The twelfth Excuse I saw so many faults in those that were accounted Godly and saw so much Division among them that I thought they were as bad as others and among so many opinions I knew not what Religion to be of Answ 1. A spot is soonest seen in the fairest cloth And the malicious world useth to make such far worse then they are 2. But suppose all were true that malice saith of some you could not say the like by others 3. Or if you could yet it was Gods Law and not mens faults that was made the Rule for you to live by Will it excuse you that others are bad 4. And from their diverse opinions you should have taken counsel at Gods word which was right Did you first search the Scripture impartially as willing to know the Truth that you might obey it and did you pray daily that God would lead you into the truth and did you obey as much as you knew Did you joyn with the godly so far as they are
all agreed they are all agreed in the Fundamental Articles of Christianity and in all things absolutely necessary to a holy Life and to salvation that all known sin is to be forsaken and all known duty to be done Why did you not so far then agree with them Alas the imperfections of the godly and the false Accusations of the malicious world will prove but a poor cover for your wilful ungodliness and Christ will convince you of the vanity of these Excuses The thirteenth Excuse The Scriptures were so dark that I could not understand them And I saw the wisest men differ so much in the exposition of them that I thought it was in vain for me to trouble my self about them If God would have had us live according to the Sriptures he would sure have written them plainly that men might understand them Answ 1. It is all plainly written according to the nature of the subject But a prejudiced disaffected yea or but untaught disused soul cannot at first understand the plainest Teaching The plainest Greek or Hebrew Gramer that can be written will be utterly obscure to him that is but newly entred the English School yea after many years time that he spends in learning Did you study hard and pray for Gods teaching and enquire of others and wait patiently in Christs School that you might come to further knowledge by Degrees and were you willing to know even those Truths that called you out to self-denyal and that did put you on the â—ardest flesh displeasing duties Had you done thus you would have admired the Light of the Holy Scripture and now have rejoyced that ever you saw them and not have quarrelled at its seeming Darkness This word might have made you wise to salvation as it hath done others Act. 20. 32. 2. Tim. 3. 15 16 17. This Law of the Lord is perfect converting the soul the Testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple The statutes of the Lord are Right Rejoycing the heart the Commandment of Lord is pure enligtning the eyes Psal 19. 7 8. 2. So much as is of Necessity to salvation is as plain as you could desire Yet if you be Judged by these you will be condemned For you did not obey that which was most plain What darkness is in such words as these Except ye Repent ye shall All perish Luk. 13. 3. 5. Love not the world nor the things in the world if any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him 1 John 2. 15 He that will come after me let him deny himself c. Matth. 16. 24. 3. If there had been nothing that seemed difficult to you would you not have despised its simplicity and have thought your selves wise enough at the first Reading and needed no more The fourteenth Excuse There were so many seeming Contradictions in the Scripture and so many strange improbable things that I could not believe it Answ The contradictions were in your fancy that did not understand the word which you read Must the raw unexperienced Learner despise his book or Teacher a oft as in his ignorance he thinks he meets with contradictions Did you think God was no wiser then you and understood not himself because you understood him not Nor could reconcile his own words because you could not reconcile them You would needs be a Judge of the Law instead of obeying it and speak evil of it rather then do it Jam. 4. 11. 2. And those things which you called improbable in the word were the wonders of God of purpose to confirm it If it had not been confirmed by wonders you would have thought it unproved and yet now it is so confirmed you will not believe the Doctrine because the witness seems incredible And that is because they are matters above the power of man As if they were therefoe above the power of God! You shall at last have your eyes so far opened as to see those seeming contradictions reconciled and to certainty of those things which you accounted Improbable that you may be forced to confess the folly of your Arrogancy and Unbelief and then God will â—udge you in Righteousness who presumed unrighteously to Judge him and his word The fifteenth Excuse It seemed so unlikely a thing to me that the merciful God should damn most of the world to everlasting fire that I could not believe it Answ 1. And did it not seem as unlikely to you that his word should be false 2. Should it not have seemed as unlikely that the Governor of the world should be unjust and suffer his Law to be unexecuted and â—he worst to speed as well as the best and to suffer vile sinful dust to despise his mercy and abuse his patience and turn all his Creatures against him without due punishment 3. Did you not feel pain and misery begin in this life 4. You saw Toads and Serpents which had never sinned And you would rather live in any tolerable suffering then to be a Toad And is it not Reason that it should go worse with contemptuous sinners then with those creatures that never sinned 5. Could you expect that those should come to heaven that would not believe there was such a state but refused it and preferred the world before it And to be out of heaven is to be out of all Happiness and he that is so out of all happiness and knows that he lost it by his own folly must needs Torment himself with such considerations were there no other Torments And as man is capable of greater felicity then bruits so must he needs be capable of more misery The sixteenth Excuse The things which God promised in heaven and threatned in Hell were all out of my sight and therefore I could not heartily believe them Had I but once seen them or spoke with one that had seen them I should have been satisfied and have contemned the things of the world Answ Will you not believe till you see or feel was not Gods word sufficient Evidence would you have beleived one from the dead that had told you he had seen such things and would you not believe Stephen that saw them Act. 7. 56. Or Paul that heard and saw them 2 Cor. 12. 3 4. Nor Christ that came purposely from heaven to reveal them why flesh and blood cannot see them You see not God will you not therefore Believe that there is a God indeed whatever you imagine if you would not Believe Moses and the Prophets Christ and his Apostles neither would you have believed though one had risen from the dead For Gods word is more credible then a dead mans and Christ did rise from the dead to attest it Blessed are they that have not seen and yet believed Noah saw no rain when he was preparing the Ark but because he believed he made ready and escaped Heb. 11. 7. when the world that would not Believe did perish But seeing Gods word was of no more
weight with you and no knowledge would serve your turn but by seeing and feeling you shall see and feel everlastingly to your sorrow The seventeeth Excuse It was so strict a Law that God would have Ruled me by and the way to Heaven was so strait and difficult that I could not endure it I was not able to deny my flesh and live such a life Answ 1. You were not Able because you were not Willing â—hat was there but your own wicked hearts that should make such a life seem grievous to you Every thing is hard and grievous to him who loaths it and whose heart is against it The chief thing that God called you â—o was to love him and make him your Delight And are Love and Delight such grievous things It was not grievous to you to love your meat or drink or money It was no hard matter to you to love a friend that loved you no nor to love your sin which was your enemy And what should make it seem hard to love God but a wicked heart Is not he better and more Lovely then all these And had you but Loved him all the rest of his service would have seemed easie to you To think of him to speak of him to pray to him to praise him yea to deny all and suffer for him would have been sweet and pleasant to you so far as you had Loved him It was not God therefore but your own naughty hearts that made his work seem grievous to you and the way to heaven seem hard He told you truly that his yoak was easie and his burden light and his Commandments were not grievous Mat. 11. 29. 1. Joh. 5 3. They that tryed them found them the very Joy and Delight of their souls and why could not you do so 2. But what if the way to heaven had been harder then it was was not heaven worth your labour were you afraid of being a loser by it Could not God requite your labour or sufferings Doth any Repent when they come to Heaven that it cost them so dear to come thither And is not hell worse then the hardest way to heaven seeing you have chosen hell to save you a labour and suffering in in this life you must have your choice And seeing you thought not everlasting life to be worth so much as God required that is the Accepting thankfully and minding and seeking and preferring it before this life you have none to blame for the loss of it but your selves The eighteenth Excuse It was God that made me of a sensual nature He gave me an Appetite to Meat and Drink and Ease and lust He gave me that flesh which ruled me how then can be condemn me for living according to the nature which he gave me Answ He gave that Appetite to be exercised moderately under the rule of reason for the preservation and propagation of mankind But did he not also give you Reason to govern that Appetite and the Revelation of his will to guide that Reason He gave you your flesh to be a servant and not a master Your beast hath fleshly Appetite without reason and therefore God hath put him under you who have Reason that you should Rule him Will you let your beast do what he list and madly run upon whom he list and say you do but let him live according to his nature which God hath given him Why God that gave him such a nature did intend him to be Ruled by a higher nature even by the Reason which he gave to you And so he did also by your flesh and sensual Appetite The ninteenth Excuse But I lived among so many baits which enticed this flesh that I could not resist them My meat was a snare to me my drink a snare my cloaths my house my land a snare every beauty that I saw was a snare and the better all these were the stronger was my snare If God would not have had my heart ensnared and drawn from him he should not have put so many baits in my way Yea and they were so Neer to me and Daily with me that though I was resolved to forbear them before yet when they were brought to my hand I could not forbear Answ Is this the thanks that God hath for his mercies He sent you all these as favours from his own hand He wrote his own name upon them that in them you might see his power and wisdom and goodness and so be led up to the Consideration of him that you might fall in love with himself who was the fountain the life the end of all And do you overlook God in the creature and live as without him in the world and dote upon that which should have drawn you to himself and then lay the blame on God If he send a Suitor to speak to you in his name and write you a love Letter with his own hand will you fall in Love with the Messengers or the Letter and neglect the Sender and then blame him that wrote his letter on so fair a paper or in so neat a hand or that sent it by such a comely Messenger Certainly these Excuses are too gross to take with the wise and righteous God or to seem sufficient to a well informed Conscience 2. And whereas you speak of the power of these objects was there not much more in God in Christ in the promised glory to have drawn your heart another way why then did not these take as much with you as the other You could not choose forsooth but be enticed with such baits as were fitted to your sensual Appetite and such things as a dog or a swine may enjoy as well as a man But you could chosse when Christ and glory were offered you yea you did choose to refuse the offer and tread them under feet by your neglect When Satan set your Cups and your â—arlots and your profits before you on one side did not God set his favour and everlasting hapiness on the other side And was it wise or equal dealing to preferr your lusts before that glory 3. Moreover it was not in the power of any of those baits to force your will or to necessitate you to choose them They could be but Baits to entice you and it was still in your own choice whethâ—r you would yield to the encicement and choose them or not Shall every man be false to God that hath any bait to entice him from him will you excuse your child or friend if he would be false to you upon as great enticements as these If a cup-of drink or a whore or a little gain could draw him more then all you love and interest I do not think you would hold him excused And whereas you speak of the Neerness and Continuance of these allurements I would fain know was not God as Neer you and Continually neer you to draw you to himself Faith might have â—een him though flesh and blood cannot Did
at his presence and power in your hearts but will you not then be troubled at his presence and tormenting power Asâ— long as you do not see him let him do what he will with you it grieves you little or nothing at all but what will you say wheâ— you must see him and abide with him for ever Oh Sirs his namâ— is easily heard but his company will be terrible to the stoutest heart alive He sheweth you a smiling face when he tempteth you but he hath a grimmer face to shew you when temptations have conquered you and torments must succeed As those that write of Witches say he appeareth at first to them in some comely tempting shape till he have them fast tyed to him and then he beats them and affrights them and seldom appears to them but in some ugly hew Believe it poor sinners you do not hear or see the worst of him when you are merry about your sinful Pleasuers and Rejoycing in your Hopes of the Commodities or Preferments of the world he hath another kind of Voice which you must hear another face to shew you that will make you know a a little better whom you had to do with You would be afraid now to meet him in the dark what will you be to live with him in everlasting darkness Then you will know who it was that you entertained and obeyed and plaid with in your sins 3. And as the Text tells us that it is a fire prepared for the Devil and his Angles So it telleth us that it is An everlasting fire It had a beginning but it shall have no end If these wretches would have chosen the service of God they would have met with no difficulty or trouble but what would have had a speedy end Poverty and Injuries would have had an end scorns and abuses would have had an end fasting humiliation sorrow for sin watching and fighting against our spiritual enemies would all have had an end But to avoid these they chose that ease that pleasure which hath brought them to that torment which never will have end I have said so much of these thing already in my Book called the Saints Rest that I will now say but this much It is one of the wonders of the world how men that do believe or think they do believe this word of Christ to be true that the wicked shall go into Everlastin fire can yet venture on sin so boldly and live in it so fearlesly or sleep quietly till they are out of this unspeakable Danger Only the Commonness of it and the known wickedness of mans heart doth make this less wonderful And were there nothing else to convince us that sinners are Mad and Dead as to spiritual things this were enough That ever the greatest pleasures or profits of the World or the most enticing baits that the Devil can offer them should once prevail with them to forget these endless things and draw them to reject an Everlasting Glory and cast themselves desperately into Everlasting fire Yea and all this under daily warnings and instructions and when it s told them before hand by the God of Truth himself For the Lords sake Sirs and for your souls sakes if you care not what Ministers say or what such as I say yet will you soberly read now and then this 25. Chapter of Matthew and Regard what is told you by him that must be your Iudge and now and then bethink your selves soberly whether these are matters for wise men to make light of and what it is to be Everlastingly in Heaven or in Hell fire 2. We have seen what is the Penalty contained in the sentence against the ungodly The next thing that the Text directs us to is the Cause or Reason of the Sentence vers 42. For I was hungry and ye gave me no meat c. Then Reason is not given expresly either of their sin against the Law of works that is Because they were sinners and not perfectly Innocent Nor yet from their unbelief which is the great sin against the Law of Grace But it is given from their not expressing their Faith and Love to Christ is works of mercy and self-denyal And why is this so 1. We must not suppose that these words of Christ do express the whole Judicial process in every point but the cheif parts It is supposed that all men are convicted of being sinners against the perfect Law of the Creator and that they are guilty of Death for that sin and that there is no way but by Christ to obtain deliverance But because all this must be acknowledged by the righteous themselves as well as by the wicked therefore Christ doth not mention this but that only wchich is the turning point or cuase in the Judgement For it is not all sinners that shall be finally Condemned but all Impenitent Unbeleiving sinners who have Rebelled finally against their Redeemer 2. And the reason why Faith it self is not expressed is 1. Because it is clearly implyed and so is love to Christ as Redeemer in that they should have Relieved Christ himself in his members that is as it s expressed Matth. 10. 42. they should have received a Prophet in the name of Prophet and a Disciple in the name of a Disciple All should be done for Christs sake which could not be unless they Believed in him and Loved him 2. Also because that the bare Act of Believing is not all that Christ requireth to a mans final Juitification and Salvation But holy self denying Obedience must be added And therefore this is given as the Reason of their Condemnation that they did not so obey We must observe also that Christ here putteth the special for the general that is one way of self-denying Obedience and expression of Love instead of such Obedience in general For al men have not ability to relieve those in misery being perhaps some of them poor themselves But all have that Love and self-denyal which will some way express it self And all have hearts and a Disposition to do thus if they had ability without such a Difposition none can be saved It is the fond conceit of some that if they have any love to the godly or wish them well it is enough to prove them happy But Christ here purposely lets us know that whoever doth not Love him at so high a rate as that he can part with his substance or any thing in the world to those uses which he shall require them even to relieve his servants in want and sufferings for the masters sake that man is none of Christs Disciple nor will be owned by him at the last XI THE next point that we come to is to shew you the Properties of this Sentence at Judgement When man had broken the Law of his Creator at the first he was lyable to the Sentence of Death and God presently sate in Judgement on him and sentenced him to some part of the Punishment