receive the sentence either of Come ye blessed or go ye cursed After which sentence once pronounced there shall never question be made of the end of the joy of the one or the ease of the torments of the other But here ariseth a question you know the world consists but of two sorts of persons beleevers and unbeleevers For the beleever it is evident and plain Joh. 5.24 He is passed already from death to life he hath everlasting life already he shall not come into judgement And for the unbeleever it is as plain Joh. 3.18 that he is already condemned even already both are judged already both the beleever and unbeleever the beleever is saved already the unbeleever is damned already what need therefore a general a second Judgement To this I answer that there is a very great need of it both in respect of the justice and of the mercy of God whose property it is alway to reward the godly and to punish the wicked which seeing he doth not to the full in this life it must needs be that a day will come that he will fully do it You know the course of the Lord as David speaks good men have bands in their death and wicked men are lusty and strong good men are in evil condition and wicked men in prosperity Diogenes the Cinnick seeing Harpalus a thief long in prosperity he was bold to say that wicked Harpalus his living long in prosperity it was an argument to Diogenes that God had cast off his care of the world that he respected not mens affairs And indeed the prosperity of the wicked hath brought the Saints of God to a stand Davids foot slipped almost in seeing the prosperity of the wicked It made Job to say Job 24.12 Men groan out of the City by reason of oppression and the souls of the slain cry out and yet God chargeth them not with folly This made Jeremiah to expostulate his cause with the Lord Jerem. 12. Let me talk with thee of thy judgments Why doth the wicked prosper and they that transgress thy commandements This makes the godly take up that passionate complaint Psal 73.11 How doth God know it is there any knowledg in the most high Certainly we have cleansed our hearts in vain in vain we have washed our hands in innocency in vain we labour to live godly lives Why Every day we are chastened for the Lord corrects us every morning And these have the wealth of the world they have the world at will We in Christianity know this to be true Dives hath the world at will while poor Lazarus is shut out of doors hungry and thirsty cold and naked full of necessity every way This being so the day must needs come that the one shall have fulnesse of glory and the other of misery But to answer those places before cited To the former Joh. 5. where it is said The beleever is passed already from death to life he hath everlasting life already It is true he is passed already from death to life by faith he hath it already and by hope he shall not come into judgement that is of condemnation so we must understand it but there is a judgement of absolution that is to be executed and so when the Lord Jesus Christ shall descend from heaven with the sound of a Trumpet and the voyce of the Archangels then the dead in Christ shall rise first and be caught up in the clouds to meet Christ and then they shall be set at his right hand and hear that heavenly sentence Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the kingdom prepared for you before the beginning of the world You see the answer to that that beleevers shall not come into judgement that is not the judgement of condemnation but of absolution at the last day Now for the other place where it is said Joh. 3.18 the unbeleever is condemned already It is true he is condemned already and that three wayes First of all he is condemned already in the counsel of God Secondly he is condemned already in the word of God Thirdly he is condemned already in his own conscience First in the counsel of God God hath made an eternal decree of Predestination whereby he hath elected some to salvation and predestinated them thereto and others to damnation In this Gods eternal decree the unbeleever is already condemned nay before ever he came into the world as you have it in the example of Jacob and Esaâ—… Rom. 9. before ever they had done good or evil God hated the one and loved the other Secondly in the word of God he is condemned Jo. 3.18 Why because he hates the light and loves darkness Thirdly in his own conscience he is condemned for the continual horrour thereof gives him no rest day nor night there is a worm continually gnawing there and a sting tormenting him but the full execution thereof is to be in the day of wrath when he shall be set at the left hand of Christ and hear the sentence Goe ye cursed into eternal fire prepared for the divel and his Angels O what a terrible day will this be to all the wicked workers of iniquity for Christ Jesus the Judge shall come then to give them their reward This shall be a black a sad a woful dismal day to them they shall not be able to look on the Judge he shall be so terrible to them You see the terriblness of the Judge set down by Saint John Revel 20.10 11. where it is said he saw a great white throne and one sitting thereon from whose face fâ—…ed heaven and earth and their place was no more found Heaven and earth are great and mighty creatures insensible creatures that have not sinned they flie and tremble and hide themselves at the coming of the great Judge and shall man silly sinful man think to stand before the Judge without trembling Indeed if a man could present himself spotless without blame he needed not to fear but alas it is far otherwise there is none that doth good and sinneth not saith Solomon The most righteous before men are stained and poluted in the sight of God and may cry with the Leper Unclean unclean what is man that he should be pure or the son of man that he should be just with God The Angels of heaven are impure in his sight how much more filthy man that drinketh iniquity as water Job 15. So in Psal 14.2 When God looks down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there were any that would uuderstand and seek after God Will he find any that frames themselves according to the rule of perfection that he requires surely no but this he finds they are all corrupt and abominable in their doings there is none that doth good no not one so sinful is man in his whole race sinful in his conception he is conceived in sin before ever he sees light in this
are without we leave them they are condemned in the sight of all the world but we speak of those that are now in the Church of those that go somewhat forward in the profession of Religion and hope and are perswaded that they are in a good case and yet have little care to set things right between God and themselves but though such and such actions be condemned by the Law yet they hope that there is a general mercy that will pardon it though they never sue out their pardon I say the Law shall pass on thee till thou do that that concerns thee to be released from the rigour and sentence of the Law he that confesseth and forsakes his sins shall find mercy Prov. 28.13 This must be done and so in other particulars the Scripture is large in these things and somewhat must be done by us to sue out this pardon that though there be an act of pardon in God a free act yet there must somewhat be done by us to sue out this pardon for our selves or else we stand in the state of condemned persons But these things I leave to your meditations and so I fall upon the next point which I will briefly touch and that is no more but thus that since there shall be a proceeding in the day of judgement by the Law wherein mens actions and words shall be brought to account therefore The consideration of the day of judgement should be an effectual insentive and provocation to stir men to a holy and conscionable walking in this life So speak and so do as those that shall be judged by such a Law Since the Apostle makes this use of it to direct us both in our speeches and actions I say we may learn hence that the consideration of the judgement to come wherein Christ will proceed according to the Law it should be an effectual means to make us careful of holiness and new obedience so to speak and so to do as those whose words and actions must be brought to judgement Now that this is so and is intended so and hath prevailed with the servants of God I might prove many wayes I will rank and order the proof under these heads First I will shew you how this hath been a means to draw some to the wayes and duties of obedience Secondly how it hath been the way to direct and guide others in those actions Thirdly how it hath confirmed and strengthned them in those actions and by this we shall see what it should be to us Frst we shall see how it hath been a way to draw men to the actions of obedience How are men drawn to be obedient First they are drawn from their own sins from their own evil wayes Now the consideration of the judgment to come it hath prevailed and been used for this purpose to draw men from their sins As we see in Eccles 11. saith Solomon to the young man Rejoyce now in thy youth it is Ironnically spoken but now saith he that for these things thou shalt come to judgment That is let this cool thy courage and moderate thy excessive joy know that thou shalt come to judgment Act. 17.30 Now saith he God calls upon all men every where to repent because he hath appointed a time in which he will judge the world He calls men to repentance by this argument because he will judge the world and hath appointed a time for it You know repentance it is nothing else but to forsake our former evils Now he calls them to repentance because he will judge the world and so calls as he draws men from sin First he draws men from the world to God by this You know that even worldly affections hinder men from coming to the obedience of Christ therefore saith the Apostle I account all as dung c. Philip. 3.7 Why because he looked for a Resurrection his thoughts were upon that and saith he vers 20. our conversation is in heaven from whence we look for the Lord Jesus Christ Therefore we are drawn to this holy course of obedience because we look for Christ from heaven And then again in the disposing of men to new obedience there is not only a forsaking of sin and the world but besides that there is an inward qualifying of the heart Now the heart is qualifyed that is it is fitted by certaine qualities to the service of God by the help of this consideration as we see Eccles 12.10 You see the sum of all fear God and keep his Commandements for God will bring every work to judgment Upon this ground he minds them to fear God which is that quality that disposeth a man to keep his Commandements he perswades them upon this ground because God will bring every work to judgement Let us have grace in our hearts to serve the Lord with reverenee and fear Heb. 12. I say this qualifies and disposeth us to the service of God and we are fitted to seek and to serve God with due reverence and fear by the consideration of the judgment to come that he is a God that will judge the world So in Revel 14. he would have the Nations to fear God because he will come to judge the world So much for the first thing you see the consideration of the judgment to come prepares men to holiness Secondly besides that it quickens them to all the actions of obedience when they are in it when now a man is in a good course and his heart is prepared to seek God aright yet nevertheless there are many temptations and many corruptions that sometimes indispose and unfit his heart again Now then the consideration of the judgment to come it serves to revive and quicken the heart to these actions too Those of a mans particular Calling Those of his general Calling For his particular calling the Apostle exhorts Timothy and charged him before God and Christ that shall judge the quick and the dead to be faithful in his ministery He would have him faithful in his ministery upon this ground because Christ will come with his elect Angels to judge the quick and the dead And so for our general Calling Act. 24. I desire to keep a good conscience before God and men upon this ground because I beleeve the Resurrection and so a judgement to come So in 2 Pet. 3.11 Seeing all these things shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness Why all these things shall be dissolved therefore we had need to be other manner of persons then we are to be better kind of persons then we have been Thus I say the servants of God quicken themselves to more holiness upon consideration of the judgment to come Thirdly they have been confirmed and strengthened upon this ground for when the heart of man is brought to this plight that he must be ever chearful and
commanded fire from heaven yet you see how he bore with them and rebuked his Disciples You know not of what spirit you are He was lead as a lambe dumb before the shearers and he opened not his mouth Again you have the examples of the servants of God Take my brethren faith Saint James the Prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an ensample of suffering affliction and of Patience The Prophets suffered long and endured the frowns of the world and the rage of Princes they endured a thousand miseries and all to discharge their duty But amongst all the servants of God You have heard of the Patience of Job and what end the Lord made with him Every man can speak of the patience of Job but this was written for our ensample to teach us to be patient as he was Whatsoever things were written afore-time were written for our learnings that we through Patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope Again secondly as it is necessary for a Christian to strive for the perfection of Patience in the degrees of it because of the conformity that should be between him and those examples of God of Christ and of the Saints between God the Father and beleevers his children between Christ the head and beleevers his members between the Saints of God children of the same Father and servants of the same Master that should honour him in the same grace of Patience So There is a necessity likewise of it in respect of the tryals whereunto a Christian may be put you had need to strive that you may be perfect in Patience because you know not what tryals ye shall be put to what times ye are reserved to Every man must expect troubles and afflictions they are called Tribulations and you know what Tribulum was the Iron ball that was full of pikes round about so that wheresoever it was cast it did stick and Engine used in war Tribulations are unavoydable they will fall and stick ye cannot escape them on any side by any turning to the right hand or to the left It is the will of God that through many tribulations we should enter into the kingdome of heaven and whosoever will live Godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution Now beloved is this so that this is a Statute in heaven decreed and ordained by God and will not be reversed like the lawes of the Medes and Persians that every man must passe to heaven through tribulation and affliction upon earth then it concerns every one to be armed to get such a measure of patience as may support him in such afflictions Ye know not what afflictions ye may have what particular tryals God may put ye to In what a miserable case then is a man if he be to seek of his armour when he is in the middest of the pikes if he be then to get patience when he is in the middest of tryals when he is disturbed and distracted with vexation of spirit What foolish disorderly speeches proceed from men in the time of affliction We may see it in David so foolish was I and ignorant and in this point a beast before thee What foolish sensual beastly speeches unreasonable absurd passages proceed from men in those times of trouble if they have not got to themselves before hand this grace and are not fitted to a Christian carriage in time by patience Thus ye see the necessity of patience to the perfection of a Christian and the necessity of the perfection of patience to the ornament of a Christian Now we come to make use of both these together First it serveth for the just reproof of Christians that are careful for other parts and acts of religion and are not so seriously mindful of this duty of patieuce as they should be but are so farre from striving for patience that they seem rather to strive for impatience that make their crosses more heavy and their afflictions more bitter then they would be Indeed we make Gods Cup that of it self is grievous enough to nature and to sense by putting into it our own ingredients that are inbred in our own passions and pride and self-will and our own earthly minds farre more bitter then else it would be But how doth a man make afflictions worse There are divers wayes that men take wherein they are so far from perfecting Patience in themselves that they wholly destroy Patience The first is by their agravating of their afflictions by all the several circumstances that possible they can invent All their eloquence is used in expressing the grievousness of that cross and affliction that is upon them They that in the times of mercy could scarce ever drop a word in thankfulness and acknowledgement of Gods goodness to them now they can pour out flouds of sentences in expression of Gods bitter and heavy dealing with them in such afflictions and crosses and distresses that befal them As the Church speaks in the Lamentations Consider all that pass by is there any affliction like my affliction wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me The like speech you have ordinarily in the mouths of persons Is there any affliction like mine there is no body so wronged in their name as I nor hath such pain in their body nor never went with such an heavy heart as I never any man suffered so many injuries by freinds and enemies and all sorts of people as I have done at if all the afflictions in the world the flouds and waves of tryalls were all met upon one person This is the language of men whereby they aggravate their afflictions and increase impatience in themselves Again another way whereby they do is is this By giving vent and free course to their passions Passions are like a wild horse if they have not reines put upon them if they be not pulled in they will flie out to all excesse If once we give our Passions vent there is no stoping of them David we see checks himself he had a curb to bridle his passions Why art thou cast downe oh my soule But otherwise when men give the reines to their passion and doe not stop their course but think they have reason for it they break out into all exhorbitancie Ionah when the Lord challenged him for his anger Dost thou well to be angry I saith he I doe well to be angry even to the death So David Oh Absalom my sonne would God I had died for thee Oh Absalom my sonne my sonne What hurt was done to David what wrong had the man to take on thus his sonne was tooke from him but it was Absalom Absalom died but it was Absolom that would have killed his father and yet he takes on as if the father could not live because the sonne that sought his death was tooke from him Such unreasonable Passions such causelesse distempers oft-times are in the soules of men that
they mistake Gods wayes and that very way that he intendeth them good in they complain of as if it were their utter undoing Again thirdly another way whereby men increase their impatience and distemper is when they will not give way to comfort they will not only be exceeding vehement and intent upon their Passions but besides stop all passages and in-lets against comfort It was Iacobs fault concerning the death of Joseph When he heard that Joseph was dead not onely his heart sunck within him but he rends his garments and covereth himselfe with sack-cloth he takes on so that when his sonnes and children rose up to comfort him he would not be comforted Why Because Joseph was not and I will go to the grave to Joseph nothing would comfort Jacob but he would goe downe to the grave to Joseph by all means What a great matter was this He only heard that Joseph was dead he was alive he knew not so much but he heard a present sound of fear and he was carried away with that So it is with us the very apprehension of our feares are as bad to us as the things themselves could possible be Nay we multiply upon our selves our fears and we will not hear counsel and comfort as Rachel that mourned for her children and would not be comforted because they were not Again a fourth thing whereby men increase impatience in themselves and aggravate their sorrowes is this when men look only upon the present afflictions and not upon the mercies they have as if they had but one eye to behold all objects with as if they could look but upon one thing at once there should be a looking upon the affliction and there should be a looking upon the mercy too This was Hamans case when he was vexed that Mordecay did not do him reverence all his wealth and his honours could do him no good he had much wealth and the glory of his house was increased he had the favour of the King and was inclining to have the honour of the Queen put upon him yet all this availeth me nothing saith he so long as I see Mordecay the Jew sitting in the Kings gate He looks only on this particular that vexed and grieved him and not upon the rest So it is with us if there be but one particular affliction upon us we fix our eyes upon that Like a Flie that flieth about the glass and can stick no where till she come to some crack or as a Gnat that cometh about the body of a beast that will be sure to stick on the galled part or some sore or other So it is with these disquieted thoughts of men that are of no other use but to further Sathans ends to weaken their faith and discourage their own hearts men stick on the gall on the sore of any affliction there they will rest It is true God hath given us such and such favours and mercies hath offered us such and such opportunities but what is this this and that particular affliction is upon me This is that that increaseth impatience when a man will not look on the mercies he receiveth but only looks on that that he wanteth Again a fifth course that men take to aggravate their sorrows and increase impatience in themselves is this They look upon the instrument of their sorrows and afflictions but never look up to God that ruleth and over-ruleth these things Men look upon such a person such a man and no more Ye see how David was disquieted at this If it had been an enemie that reproached him then he could have born it but it was thou my freind my equall my guid my acquaintance that sate at my table we took sweet counsel together and walked unto the house of God in company This troubled him and see how he multiplied his sorrows when he looked upon the instrument till he looked upon God and then I was dumb I opened not my mouth because thou didst it There is no quiet in the heart when a man looks upon man till he looks upon God that ordereth all things by his wisdom and counsel Lastly men aggravate their sorrows and increase their impatience by another course they take that is when they look on their sorrows and afflictions only and not upon the benefit of affliction they look only upon that that flesh would avoyd but not that which if they were spiritual and wise they would desire No affliction faith the Apostle is joyous for the time that is to flesh and nature but grievous nevertheless afterward it yeeldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them which are exercised thereby Now men look upon that only which is grievous in affliction upon the smart of it but not upon the profit of affliction the quiet fruit of righteousness that cometh by it As a man when he hath a Corroding plaister put to a sore he cryeth and complaineth of the smart it putteth him to but takes no notice of the healing that cometh by it and the cure that followeth Thus it is with men they complain of God as if he envied them the comfort of their lives as if he intended to rob them of all conveniencies and to make them utterly miserable to begin a Hell with them on earth when they never look how God by this means fitteth them for heaven by this means purging out corruption and strengthening grace in them We are afflicted of the Lord that we may not be condemned of the world Men look upon the affliction not upon their freedom from condemnation So much for that I come now to a second use You see here the way whereby men aggravate affliction and get causes of impatience in themselves and if we seriously consider it we shall find one of these the ordinary causes of all distempers and impatience in losses in sicknesses in distress of mind in crosses upon a mans name or whatsoever befalleth him amiss in the world that which makes him flie out that which makes him that he cannot submit unto God it is some of these particulars here spoken of Let it therefore in the second place stir us up evety one in the presence of God to set our selves upon this task of Christianity to labour for Patience that we may be perfect Christians and to be perfect in Patience Let Patience have her perfect work But all the question is how a man may get it As there are two sorts of afflictions in a mans life so Patience hath two offices One affliction is those present evils that a man undergoeth and suffereth Patience is to support him in those present miseries and calamities Another sort of tryal is when the good that a man expects is delayed and is not presently granted and here patience is necessary in this case also I will shew ye how a man may set patience a work in both these and so conclude First for the
share wherein being exercised with many years weakness as those that knew her knew very well but yet in such fatherly dealings she shewed her patience her perseverance her prosiciency and being a Mourner for the stobbornness of the wicked she was a gainer likewise by them too and all because she looked up to God who sees and weighs all our paths In which I have briefly recollected upon the matter the sum of the whole things contained in the text so that so long as this Text is in the Bible and so long as the Bible is in the Church and so long as any thing though unworthy of this Sermon remaines in your memories she cannot want either a sweet memorial of her vertues in the book of God or a stately Monument in the Church and in your hearts too Happily some may scoffe and some may doubt as though this commendation flew too high or out of sight To whom I shall briefly answer both For the former It is reported of two great Tragedians learned and famous in their time Sophocles and Euripides Euripides presented upon the Scaene all naughty women and Sophocles presented all vertuous women and the ordinary observation of the wits of the times was as men are apt to be vainly witted in these things they thought that Euripides that presented them bad presented women as they were and Sophocles that presented them good presented them as they should be If I had nothing else to say to the scoffs of any but only this I suppose it will be sufficient I do beleeve fully that I have presented her as she was but howsoever you can take no hurt if you do but consider that it is spoken as what you should be I am sure and I know I have presented what you should be And for any that shall doubt yet that it may seem to high I would desire them only to consider this I describe in the Text the very temper and character of one that is truly godly such as I conceive her to have been and the truth is there is none that is truly godly but in some degree or measure must attain and do attain to participate in a conformity with this Character and therefore I have neither done you as I conceive any wrong and yet done her right too And to draw to an end She hath left this honour behind her that she lived beloved and died desired And who is there here almost that suffereth not a loss in her Her Husband hath lost a loving wife that honoured him highly Her children have lost a loving Mother that loved them tenderly that tendered them duly Her servants have lost a loving Mistress that governed them gently and was every way beneficial to them Her Brothers and Sisters have lost a loving Sister that answered them in their loves sweetly Her Neighbours have lost a loving neighbour full of courtesie to the rich full of charity to the poor And my self have lost I hope there is none here so weak to suspect that I blast the living to blazon the praise of the dead or that I do rob or strip the living to cloath the dead with their spoyles but I think I may truly say I have lost as truly and cordially a loving friend as any she hath left behind though I esteem many her Peeres and I cannot complain of any But to end all Her gain in Christ countervaileth and sweetneth all our losses She was a disciple of Love she loved her Lord and loved all his Saints and servants and therefore I doubt not that she was a beloved disciple and resteth in the bosome of her Love where not to disquiet her happiness and detain your patience any longer I shall leave her in that blessed place and commend you to the blessing of God THE EXPECTATION OF CHRISTS COMING OR A MOTIVE To a Holy Conversation SERMON XVI PHIL. 3.20 21. For our Conversation is in Heaven from whence we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself IN the seventh verse of this Chapter the blessed Apostle Saint Paul exhorteth the Philippians to be followers together of him and to mark them which walk so as they had him for an ensample And that he might the better direct them in the duty the imitation of his ensample he sheweth that there is a great difference between others that pretended themselves to be the Apostles of Christ and indeed were not and himself Many saith he walk of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping that they are the enemies of the Cross of Christ whose end is destruction whose God is their belly and whose glory is their shame who mind earthly things These ensamples he would have them to avoid follow not such but be ye followers of us for our conversation is in heaven from whence we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ c. and follow those which walk so as ye have us for an ensample This is the example he would have them imitate In the words you have these things considerable First What the conversation of these men was whom the Apostle would have the Philipians to follow Their conversation was a heavenly conversation Our conversation is in heaven Secondly the reason or incouragement that they had to this imitation to walk so heavenly while they were on earth because from thence we look for a Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Thirdly the benefit by that Saviour whom they look for from heaven He shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like to his glorious body Fourthly the means by which this great work shall be effected According to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself For the first to touch it only in a word there is from that these two Observations clearly arising First That there is a heavenly conversation of the Saints on earth Secondly That while they are on earth they are now stated in heaven Our conversation is in heaven He saith not only it shall be in heaven though there it shall be perfected but it is now in heaven in regard of our present state and possession Concerning the first that the Saints on earth have a heavenly conversation You must know that the word here Politeuma translated conversation signifieth such a course of life and of traffique as is in Cities and Corporations where many are knit and united together in one common society in one common freedome Our conversation is in heaven that is we have a kind of heavenly traffique a heavenly trade while we are upon earth There are divers things wherein there is an agreement between the carriages and conditions of men in Cities and Societies here on earth and this of the Saints of God that have their conversations in heaven I will
Election God hath elected them to it Secondly in respect of vocation they are begotten again to a lively hope They have now the Word which giveth them a promise of heaven They have now the spirit which is the seal of their inheritance you are sealed by the spirit of Promise to the day of redemption Eph. 1.13 Secondly in regard of possession they are now already in present possession not in full possession but in present possession A possession not in themselves but in Christ by vertue of the union and communion they have in him By the union and contract that is between Christ and the soul Christ is become the Husband the Christian the Spouse So that as a Wife if her Husband should travel into a far Countrey and in her name should take possession of those lands that were left her by her Father the Wife now is possest of those lands in her Husband who in her name hath taken possession of them so Christ entring into heaven hath took possession of heaven which is given to us by the will of God It is your Father pleasures to give you a kingdom Christ hath possessed it in our name I go faith he to prepare a place for you and it is my will that they be where I am I go to my Father and your Father to my God and your God All that Christ hath in heaven He hath it for us He is gone before that we may follow after we cannot possibly lay claime to heaven we cannot hope hereafter fully and personally to possesse it if Christ had not first taken possession of heaven for us The Use of this in a word shall be to stir up every one to look to his hope of heaven It is usual for men to profess their hope to be saved and scarse any but they will say they hope if they die they shall go to heaven Yea but thou must now possesse it if ever hereafter thou mean to enjoy it and thou must possesse it first in Christ thou must be united to him by faith and love those are the bonds whereby the Spirit of God tyeth us unto Christ therefore Christ is said to dwell in our hearts by faith Which shewes the horrible presumption of many and how they add to their other sins this that they presume that they have right and title to heaven and yet are not united to Christ by faith as if a man should give out that he were the heir apparant to a Crown or the son of a King and yet nevertheless should indeed be the son of a Beggar and have nothing to shew for his pretended title to the Crown and Kingdom what would this be accounted but high treason against the King What a height of sin is this that is in many men which to their other sins add a presumptuous claim to heaven when they have no right to it I Remember that in the time of Ezra we shall read of many that laid title and claim to the Priest-hood but Ezra searched the book of the Genealogies and finding none of their names Registred there he presently concluded that they were none of the Priest-hood therefore they were accounted polluted and put from the Priest-hood If any man lay claim to heaven God will search his book of Genealogies as it were he will search the Register of heaven and if he find that his name be not inrolled there if he be not found to have interest in Jesus Christ all will be nothing he shall be cast out to his greater confusion This should therefore stir up every one to make good his claim to heaven now either now to be possest of heaven now to sit in heavenly places with Christ ore lse look not to come to heaven afterward But to leave this and to come to that I mainly intend namely the Argument or reason or ground of the Apostles heavenly conversation Our conversation is in heaven from whence we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ The Apostle observeth here a kind of speech and that which seems not so Gramaticall that he may thereupon build a sound and substantial truth in Divinity He had said before Our conversation is in the heavens in the Plural number but now when he speaks of Christs coming thence he speaks of it in the Singular number Our conversation is in the heaven from whence from which particular place We look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Of purpose to shew us thus much that though Christ in respect of his Deity and divine nature he be in all places filling heaven and earth yet in respect of his bodily presence he remaineth now and so will till his second coming which the Saints look for in heaven Against those Ubiquitaries that will have the body of Christ to be every where In Heaven say they visible in this place invisible The Papists hence build the Doctrine of Transubstantiation they will have the body of Christ even that very body that was born of the Virgin to be now Bread and the bread turned into it The Lutherans will have the same Body about the bread No faith the Apostle there is no such matter from thence from that very place that very individual particular single place from the third heavens where the body of Christ is We look for the Saviour he remaineth there and so will continue till his coming to Judgement So again in another place Collos 3.1 Set your affections on things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God Above that is in heaven where Christ sitteth and continueth and will remain till his second coming Our Saviour told his Disciples in the dayes of his flesh that the poor they should have alwayes with them but me faith he you shall not have alwayes If this be true that they say then Christ hath not said true for he is still in respect of his bodily presence and hath been alwayes with us But I let pass that The thing I note hence is this That that which most soundly and effectually settleth the heart of a man in a heavenly conversation upon earth is the looking for the Saviour of the world even the Lord Jesus Christ to come from thence I say there is nothing that so settleth the heart of a man in a heavenly conversation upon earth nothing that makes him so heavenly minded nothing that ordereth him in so heavenly a course as this if he rightly look for Christ to come from thence That you may conceive this the better you may please to take notice that there are two things included in this point First that all the Saints of God while they are on earth their continual expectation is for Christ to come from heaven Secondly that nothing is so effectual to settle a man in a holy course while he liveth on earth as this expectation These two things I will open to you at this time The
first I say is that the Saints and servants of God while they are on earth do continually expect and look for the Saviour of the world even the Lord Jesus Christ to come from heaven By the coming of Christ you must understand his second coming to judgement For there is a threefold coming of Christ A twofold coming in his Body and one by his Spirit The first was the coming of Christ in the flesh when he came to take our nature upon him and to be born of a Virgin The second is the coming of Christ by his Spirit so he cometh continually and daily in the hearts of men in the preaching of the Gospel in vertue and efficacy His last coming and his second coming in respect of his body is when he shall come to judgement Never look for the coming of Christ in his body upon earth in the sight of men till that great day come when the Lord Jesus shall come with thousands of his Angels in the glory of his Father Now then this being the meaning of it we will prove it And first that it is the continual expectation of all the Saints of God and the continual desire of their hearts their continual waiting is for the second coming of the Lord Christ As it was before the first coming of Christ in the flesh so it shall be before his second coming Before the first coming of Christ after the promise was made to Adam all the expectation and hope of the Fathers and Beleevers was this when the great Messias would come and therefore faith Jacob I have waited for thy salvation and David I have longed for thy salvation meaning Christ the Saviour of the world and the Church groweth to a kind of holy impatiency Oh that thou wouldest break the heavens and come down And immediatly upon the time of Christs coming there were alwayes holy men in those times that were stirred up with a continual expectation of it and therefore it was made a mark of a good man in those dayes It is said of Joseph of Arimathea and Simeon and of divers good women as of Anna and others that they waited for the consolation of Israel they continually waited and expected when the great comforter and Saviour of his people would come So shall the second coming of Christ be from the very time of his Ascension into heaven to the time now and to the time of his last coming to Judgement all the eyes of men will be towards him When I am lifted up faith our Saviour I will draw all men after me which though it be there particularly understood of his lifting up upon the Cross yet it is intended in general of his Ascension into heaven So that as after the promise was given of the Spirit The Disciples waited for the receiving of the gift of the holy Ghost So it is now and will be since the holy Ghost is already given there remaineth nothing to be looked for but Christ himself in his second coming to finish all these dayes of sin And that this is the disposition of all the servants of God appears by divers places of Scripture 2 Tim. 4.8 faith the Apostle there Hence forth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judge shall give me at that day and not to me only but unto them also that love his appearing The Apostle here makes a description of all those that shall be saved and he faith they are such as love the appearing of Jesus Christ now that which a man loveth he desireth and looks and longs for And in Heb. 9.28 Christ died once for many and unto them that look for him shall he appeare the second time unto salvation Salvation is brought to whom to all those and only to those that look for the appearance of Christ Therefore it is said of all the Beleevers in Heb. 12. That they saw things that were invisible and that they had an eye to the recompense of reward and that they saw the promise a far off They looked still for those things that were to appear by Christ This I suppose is sufficiently confirmed by the Scripture let us therefore make some use of it Try now what comfort thou hast in the expectation of that great appearance of the Lord Jesus here spoken of This is the most infalible ground and undoubted evidence and testimony of the truth of grace now and assurance of glory hereafter if God have now stirred up thy heart in faith and holy affection to look for and to long and waite for the appearance of Jesus Christ Without this there is little love to Christ The Church in Cant. 1.2 sheweth her love to Christ Draw me saith she and we will run after thee And chap. 2.4 Stay me with flaggons comfort me with apples for I am sick of love and chap. 5. If you find him whome my soul loveth tell him I am sick of love If thou be of the disposition of the Church thou wilt out of love to Christ desire nothing so much as to enjoy the presence of Christ The Spirit and the Bride say come and let him that heareth say come the Spirit faith come and the Bride because she is stirred up in the same affection by the Spirit she faith come too Christ faith to his Church I come and the Church she faith again Come Here is the agreement between Christ and his Church and the same disposition is in all the members of Christ a waiting and longing and desiring for the coming of Christ There are many that pretend they wait and desire for the coming of Christ When a man is under any affliction or in any trouble then Oh that Christ would come and end these troubles You shall here a man that is abused and wronged by the oppressions and injuries of others and by the unrighteous dealings of wicked and ungodly men crying out Oh that Christ would come and put an end to these evil times Yea but if thou hast this desire of Christs coming that is in a man of a heavenly conversation It will appear in these three things First it will appear by the Ground of it What are the grounds of thy desire what are the motives that incourage thee to long for the coming of the Lord Jesus That which is the ground of faith is the ground of hope that is the promises Faith is the ground of things hoped for and the Word and Promise are the warrant of Faith Faith and Hope look both on this the free promise of God so it is said of Abraham that be beleeved above hope because be knew that be that promised was able to do it There is the first thing then Faith is the ground there is none but a true beleever that can indeed aright wait for and desire the coming of Christ But this will appeare more in the second thing and that is by the companion
and that this is it that makes him careful to mortifie his secret lusts that this is it that makes him careful to purge himself from worldly affections that this is it that makes him industrious to avoid evil courses that this is it that makes him diligent in good actions that this is it that makes him constant and to persevere to the end in all holy wayes and in avoiding of all evil because he looks for and waites for the coming of Christ Now then take this for a main tryal of your selves concerning the former point Whether you can with comfort looke for the coming of Christ or no There shall be abundance at that day that shall hang down their heads I saw saith Saint John the Divine the Kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief Captaines and the mighty men and every bond-man and every free-man men of all sorts hide themselves in the dens and in the rock of the mountians and said to the mountains and rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb for the great day of his wrath is come and who shall be able to stand Would you therefore hold up your heads with comfort and with joy that when you hear a Funeral Sermon it might comfort you to think It will not be long before my time shall come before my time shall be would you in truth have freedome from the fear of death which Christ hath purchased for he tooke upon him the same nature because the children were partakers of flesh and blood that he might free them who for fear of death were hold in bondage all their life Would you have comfort in Christs coming to Judgment See how effectually this works in you Is it thus effectual that because you look for Christs coming therefore you prepare your selves therefore you purge out your lusts and corruptions because there shall be nothing then when the secrets of all bearts shall be manifest that shall be displeasing to him when he shall come Are you careful to let fall worldly affections because you have a comfortable apprenension of heavenly joyes Are you careful to turn your course from sin because you would not lie open to the judgement of condemnation Are you careful to do good to persevere in the practise of godliness because he that shall come will come and will not tarry If it be thus with you then you may with comfort think of that day then you may with chearfulness look upon the day of death the day of death then is better then the day in which thou wert borne It is better to thee then the day of thy marriage it is the day of that great Marriage that shall be made between Christ and thy soul to all eternity It is better then the day that thou obtainest thy freed one then the day that thou comest out of thy Apprentiship it is the day wherein thou art set free and brought unto the glorious liberty of the sons of God It is a day that is better then the day of the enjoyment of the greatest comforts of this life because it sets thee in the possession of pleasures that are at Gods right hand for evermore Take this consideration therefore to heart and that you may walk in a holy course the better and with more constancy keep the object alwayes close to your eye Think with your selves and say If we would walk as Saints in heaven we must live as Saints on earth But how shall we do this Be often thinking of the coming of Christ often put this question to your souls What if Christ should now come If he should come now I am in the Church am I hearing the Word with that affection that I ought to here it with If he should come now I am in my calling in my world business do I follow it with a heavenly disposition as I ought to do What if he should come now while I am feasting should he take me as one feasting with fear lest I should sin against God in my mirth What if he should come and take me asleep have I made my peace with God before I went to rest Work these considerations upon thy soul When the morning cometh think it may be Christ will come and take me away before evening how shall I walk this day that I may have comfort in the coming of Christ When the Evening is come think it may be I shall never see morning before the great day of the Resurrection what now shall I do that if I die in my sleep I may rest in the Lord and so may have comfort in his appearance Either this moment either this minute settle thy comfort and peace with Christ or it may be the next hour it will be too late And remember that if ever you will live a holy life if ever you will have a heavenly conversation on earth you must be much and seriously settled in this meditation slight it not pass it not in your thoughts as a matter of discourse but let it be a working meditation let it be effectual to produce somewhat in you that may warm and heat your hearts and to set on fire the whole soul and to purge out the dross of corruption that remains in you Thus you see what it is that the Apostle here undertakes for himself and for as many as walked as he did they had a heavenly Conversation and that which made them have a heavenly conversation was the looking for the coming of Christ This was the fruit of their looking for the coming of Christ it made them walk in a heavenly conversation on earth There is another fruit of this by their looking for Christ they shall find him to be a Lord and Jesus We look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Which word sheweth that all that Christ did for the purchase of our redemption he did it by price and by power He did it by price he satisfied his Fathers Justice and so he is a Saviour We wait saith the Apostle 1 Thes 1.10 for his Son from heaven whom he raised from the dead even Jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come And by power to over Sathan so he is a Lord the Lord of might Thou shalt find at the day of Christs that he will both be Saviour and Lord to thee A Saviour to free thee from sin and condemnation A Lord to bestow upon the heaven and glory with the Saints This is another benefit of our looking for Christs coming in the manner before spoken of we shall find him then to be a Lord and Jesus one that will save us from our sins and one that hath power to bestow heaven upon us Wouldest thou then have this comfort at that day Let him be so here to thee in this life let him be thy Lord and commander of all thy
affections of the whole man yeeld obedience now to his will and thou shalt find him a Jesus then He is not a Jesus a Saviour except he be a Lord and Commander also But you see I cannot stand to insist upon this The occasion of our meeting at this time is to commit to the Earth the body of our Sister departed She hath now the termination and conclusion of all her waiting and expectation And after so long a waiting there remaineth a sleeping in the Grave awhile when the soul resteth in the hands of Christ and waiteth for that great day when body and soul shall be joyned together I perswade my self well of her that She was one of the number of those waiters that shall have joy at the coming of Christ I had not much knowledg af her only I observed in her sickness a good purpose and desire of new and better obedience and performing better service to Christ then she had done if God should have spared her longer And she expressed also a great desire of Christs second coming a desire that he would receive her to himself and that these dayes of sin might be finished Much she was in these desires and she had good warrant for it for she was careful as I am informed to set up the kingdome of Christ in her Family It is the duty of a good Wife to be a help to her Husband especially in matters of piety and the worship of God and therein her example should teach wives to strive herein She was alwayes stirring him up to prayer in his Family to a more careful sanctifying of the Lords day herein She was frequent She was much mortified to the world for some late years as it was observed in her daily course by those that knew her Thus she laboured to fit her self and her Family that she might have comfort in the great Day of the appearing of the Lord Jesus I speak upon information for your edification to stir you up to labour to fit your selves for Christ by purging out of sin in your hearts and lives Labour to fit your Families for Christ that when you and your servants and children shall appear before him you may look on them and look on Christ with comfort as men that before have prepared themselves for the coming of Christ and as those that then shall lift up their heads because the day of their redemption draweth nigh CHRISTS PRECEPT AND PROMISE OR SECURITY AGAINST DEATH SERMON XVII JOHN 8.51 Verily verily I say unto you if a man keep my saying he shall never see Death IT is not long men and brethren since Death rode in triumph thorow this City and did bear down all before him he locked up your houses pulled down your windows and made the wealthiest among you put upon them the semblance of Banckroutness by locking up their doors and turning their backs to their houses and running away so it plaid the Tyrant then there died thousands a week and the Grave that alwaies cryeth Give give was almost cloyed with carkasses Death served himself so fast that the Prison could scarse hold the Prisoners It might almost have been said then of this City as once it was of AEgypt There was scarse a house wherein some were not dead at least where there was not the fear of Death Now it hath pleased God to shew you more favour and men now die but by scores Death goeth his old pace and takes away a few secretly without observation But Death is amongst you still and still will be so long as sin is among you and therefore it will not be unseasonable upon this occasion for me to speak and you to hear somewhat that may arme you against this last and worst Enemy Death which though he make not such a stir in these times of less Mortality yet he will certainly take us all away one by one And who can tell but he may be amongst the number of the hundred or fewer hundreds that die now as no man could tell wether he should be amongst the number of the thousands then Since Death therefore is alwayes an enemy and alwayes fighteth against us though not alwayes with like fury and violence it is a part of wisdome in us alwayes to hear and to practise that which may secure us against the danger of death And that is taught in this Text. Verily verily I say unto you If a man keep my saying he shall never see death Wherein not to speak any thing of the Context I pray take notice who speaks the words The Author of truth the Death of Death he that can best tell by what means a man may shun the hurt of it he that hath vanquished it and overcome the uttermost of his assaults Our Lord Jesus Christ that hath slain death and brought life and immortality to light He giveth us this direction for the avoyding of the hurt of Death Then observe the manner of his speaking Verily verily I say unto you with an affirmation earnest and redoubled He never affirmed any thing unture therefore that which he speaks is an undoubted verity He never spake any thing rashly therefore that which he affirmed so earnestly is a weighty thing and of great consequence And lastly observe that which I only shall insist upon the matter of his direction here comprehended in a hypothetical proposition which hath as all such have two parts An Antecedent and a Consequent In the one he sheweth the Duty to be done as a necessary condition for the obtaining of that which is specified in the other The first hath the Duty The second the benefit that floweth from the Duty These two are knit together in a most necessary consequence If a man keep my word he shall never see death You see now the only and perfect remedy against the evil of Death that is to keep the saying and word of Christ If any would know by what means he may be secured against the terrible of all terrible things as one calleth Death here is a sure and certain rule for him and he need not doubt of it it cometh from the mouth of Christ let him keep his saying and then Death shall never do him harm I will first interpret these words unto you and then make them good by Scripture and Reason and then apply them and commit my self and you and all at last to the blessing of God First then when our Saviour Christ saith If a man we must conceive him to mean generally at least indefinitely If any man whatsoever for so it pleaseth him to in large his promise in the redoubling of the word that no man may have cause to say he is excluded except he exclude himself Keep my sayings Here first I must shew you what is meant by sayings and then what it is to keep those sayings The Saying or words of Christ is the doctrine of the Gospel the Covenant of Grace which by an excellency
still a generation to praise God their Creator and so being a temporal thing ordained for the office of this life it ceasoth when Death cometh there is nothing but Death and that which Christ speaks of in the Gospel can make a separation when death cometh all relations cease and a wife is no wife and a husband is no husband Behold out of this the infinite love of God in Christ that hath made all things all unions and contracts hath made all to be void but his own for our Lord Jesus in life and death is our Husband our Lord our Master our Father as well in the one as in the other whereas by the intercourse of death all things are dissolved two of the best friends that are may part upon discontent and body and soul must part at Death and Husband and wife the Symbol of Christ and his Church must part one from another yet when all societies and contracts part Christ doth not part from us but he is in the Grave as well as in the highest heavens our Husband and Lord and Spouse and we are his Church still we keep the same relation and as strong bonds in death as in life My Dead Yet not withstanding though she was not Abrahams Wife yet she was Abrahams dead This must teach a man after he is freed by Death to the combination and contract yet that there is a care remaining from the Dead a love to that though not as to a Wife the respects of Man and Wife are carnal and fleshly Death cometh and cutteth down the flesh therefore cutteth off that respect too but because she was dead and there was such bonds hetween them formerly therefore a man is bound to lament and sorrow for his dead as Abraham did here to love the memory of the dead to speak well of the dead when occasion serveth to commend them for their vertues to use the friends of the dead as far as is in their power with all courtisie to be good to the children of the Dead those that the mother hath left and not to cast them into the hands of a furious woman a new Wife that neither careth for dead nor living but to have a special regard to the bonds and familiarity and that spiritual acquaintance that God made in this life and so to be good to all that come of that issue for their sakes Let me bury my dead Lastly it followeth why he would bury his dead Out of my sight A strange thing Out of my sight Was his grief so aggravated as he could not still behold her face or was it necessary that the carkasse it self must be conveyed away must it needs be that the body being now no way amiable but noisome must be conveyed out of a mans sight The best friend in the world cannot endure the sight of a dead body it is a gastly sight especially when it cometh to that dissolution that the parts begin to have an evil savour and smell as all have when they are dead then to keep themselves in life and health it is necessary to avoid them to bury their dead out of their sight And what so sweet a sight once to blessed Abraham as Sarah What so sweet a spectacle to the world as Sarah The great Kings of the world set her as a Parragon and she came no where but her beauty enamoured them she was a sweet prospect in all eyes every man gazed on her with great content to see the beauty of God as in so many lines marked out in the face of Sarah Yet now she is odious every eye that looked upon her before now winks and cannot endure to look upon her she must be taken out of sight Oh bethink your selves of this you that take pride in this frail flesh that prank up your selves to make you graceful in every eye you that study to please the beholders you that are the great Minions of the world you that when age beginneth to purle your faces begin to redeem your selves with paintings think of this Mother Sarah the beautifullest woman in the world is loathsome to her husband her sweetest friend therefore I heseech you in the fear of God leave these fooleries and vain fancies remember what danger Sarahs beauty cast her into though it were a great gift of God yet she had better have been without it then to have that hazard of soul and body that she was brought to by Abrahams travels and necessity and know it that your best beauty is to please the eye of God to look beautiful in his sight for the sight of God is never weary the sight of men will be weary of you the best friends you have will loath to see you dead you will then be grisly in the eyes of men but the eye of God it is all one even in the dust and nothing can make you so ill-favoured but God will like you therefore labour to please Gods eye that never ceaseth nothing will make him after his affection whereas the eyes of men this life is so full of foul alterations as the least sickness bringeth an abomination unto them I see the time prevents me I will speak a little to the present occasion We have here a depositum a gage a pawn of a dear Sister of ours a woman known to you all to be of a holy Christian conversation a neighbour full of peace and quiet and of good works according to her calling She was also in the spiritual part a woman of a very good inclination loving the Word of God curious and attentive in the hearing of it She was much delighted in it and desired to communicate the knowledg she had in the Scriptures to others and to speak of it as often as occasion permitted By this study it pleased the Lord to work a constant and lively faith in her to put all her trust and considence in him She was now taken upon the sudden therefore the Lord hath left her as a pattern for us to look upon to take heed to our selves that we may make our peace with God and look for death every moment because we know not how soon we may be arrested She was indeed a woman of great trust and faith in God and one whose mouth was full of his praise still admiring and recounting the wondrous grace of God to her in all the course of her life in sparing her in giving her comfort in her conscience concerning the pardon and forgiveness of her sins and providing for her worldly helps which she thought never to attain to and in many other particulars She did open the grace of God according to her best understanding still giving the praise to his holy Name and no doubt if the stroke upon her had not been so fatal and as deadly as now it was we should have had the like fruit more abundantly at this time Howbeit she was not as one altogether destitnte but she called for and craved
Lo this is the man that took not God for his strength but trusted in the multitude of his riches and strengthened himself c. Secondly having lost his supposed good he loseth the fruition of God the chief good the countenance of the beatifical presence the fellowship and melodious harmony of the glorious Angels his place and portion with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in the kingdome of heaven And all proportionable to his own deservings In his life-time he refused God being dead God refuseth him he turned his face from the poor and needy God in his affliction eternally turns his face from him A loss so exceeding great that whosoever descends deepest in the meditation of it yet he shall be at a loss and to seek for a full definition of it For as Chrysostome truly affirms though a man tell thee of ten thousand hells all is one in comparison of this misery to be discarded of blessedness and glory and to be hated of Christ But if this be so what shall we say to further misery having lost the chief good he receives his punishment with hypocrites and unbeleevers in the dungeon of extream ill A place where there is nothing but horrour of conscience and desperation a company of affrighting divels and with all this weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth Instead of merriment and jovial laughter and scurrulous lascivious songs and wasting and abusing the creatures of God nothing but weeping and gnashing of teeth So that having come into the chambers of death and closed in the straits of the grave the man like the hedg-hogg leaves the apples behind him and only reserves the prickles of a wounded spirit in that sentence of Babilon As much as she bath gloryed her self and lived delitiously so much terment give her Lastly that that is the hell of hells that nothing may be wanting to his diserved wo he is out of hope of all gracious means of deliverance he must never look for the revokation of Gods sentence though with Esau he seek it with tears he must never look for mittigation of his horrour though he heg with the unmerciful glutton for one drop of water The date of repentance is out the day of grace will never dawn again the justice is implacable the fire unquenchable the worm unsatiable and all continual without intermission for ever-more O! bottomless depth of horrour oh unexpressible torment of a forsaken soul what greater misery saith devout St. Bernard then alway to be wishing for that which shall never be and for the removing of that that shall never cease to be Therefore the sum is this Hath the covetous exchanged his soul for riches the ambitious for honours hath he lost it for the riches of Cressus the power of Alexander the Empireof Augustus the glory of the whole world yet in consideration of The end of his life The loss of his God The extremity of his pain The eternity of all What is a man profited Now then for some application and to draw toward a conclusion suffer the word of exhortation brethren and captivate your thoughts to the obedience of Jesus Christ You especially whom God hath blessed above others concerning the enjoyment of outward temporal things If ever you be desirous to escape the direful slaughter-house of Hell to escape those burnings and those everlasting yellings while you have time bethink your selves of some saving course to flie from the wrath to come And now in time cast up your accounts take heed lest for the love of this present world you lose your God the life of your souls There is a way that seems right to a man saith Solomon but the end of it is the manifold wayes of death Some Babilonish garment some Naboths Vineyard some sweet preferment but if the means be unlawful if it disturb conscience and prejudice the glory of God and occasion the destruction of thy soul then say What shall I doe when God shall rise up and when he shall visit what shall I answer This will be the reckoning of fools at the last What hath pride profited us and what hath riches brought us Surely the gain will be no other then what Promethius is fabled to have had by Pandora's box a place to be tormented Or what Hercules got by Dianira's garment Such will be the final issue of all Mammonists that live amongst Christians and under means of better reformation and more sanctification in their wayes I say this will be the final issue The worm of despair alway gnawing and never dying and the flames of eternal Tophet never to be extinguished Therefore in such a case if thou tell me thou knowest what thou dost and what thou gainest Let me tell thee thou little knowest thy dammage and what thou hast lost Alas what are the goods of this life when they are compared with eternal damnation and the sweetness of imaginary gain what proportion hath it with the bitterness of so great a loss Riches have wings they take their leave honour is transitory pleasures flie away whereas the soul of man is the subject of immortality And thy poor neglected soul must bide by it for an everlasting pledge and pay the debt O! then contemn this glory that is nothing First seek Gods kingdom and the glory of it suffer not heaven to stand at so great a distance to thy soul taste and see how gracious the Lord is by one drop of water from that celestial fountain by one crum from that heavenly table and then as concerning the things below thou wilt account them as dross and dung in comparison of that joy and peace of conscience Resolve as Themistocles when he saw a goodly booty he would not stoup to take it up leave these things for the Children of this world But let your care be to please the Lord and to gain the peace of a good conscience First seek the kingdom of God which consists not in meat and drink but in righteousness and peace and joy in the holy Ghost Remember the vanity of the things of the world remember how unable the soul is to enjoy hell and to lose heaven without eternal horrour and in consideration hereof Use the World as though you used is not and use this as a proof hide it in a sanctified memory and write it in the table of a sanctified conscience if it were possible with a pen of Iron and the point of a Diamond What is a man profited if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul CHRIST HIS SECOND ADVENT OR THE APPROACH OF The God of Recompences SERMON XXIII REVEL 22.12 Behold I come shortly and my reward is with me to give every man according to his works THe Angel having described to Saint John in the Chapter immediately before and in the former part of this Chapter the exceeding great joy and glory and felicity that all the godly shall have in the kingdome of heaven by
and remediless torment upon body and soul for ever Thirdly the Saints have here consolation against the mortality and corruption whereto they are subject here in this world wherein their condition is common with the condition of all for that that befalleth one may befall every one in regard of the outward estate and condition All must die Nay further here is consolation against the distresses and afflictions and pressures whereto the Saints are subject above others for their profession sake in this very respect they are hated they are persecuted all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution and through many afflictions we must enter into the kingdom of heaven Where is now there comfort surely this that is set before us you heard that natural men are dead while they live but those that are in Christ do live while they may seem to be dead Jonah lived when he was cast into the Sea swallowed up by a Whale and was even as it were in hell so the Saints though swallowed up as we may say in the tempestuous sea of this world by cruel Whales yet notwithstanding they stil live that life that is begun here in the world whereof you heard before And to this purpose the Apostle Saint Paul in 2 Cor. 4.9 10 11 12. sheweth plainly that though they are given up unto death daily for Jesus sake yet they are not destroyed not clean swallowed up but that they live in Christ and that Christ liveth in them We are perplexed but not in despair perseouted but not forsaken c. And this is it that doth comfort them both the fruition of that life that they have here and their expectation of the accomplishment and fulness thereof in the kingdom of heaven Now my brethren this is the rather to be observed of us because of all others the Saints seem to be most subject to death And the truth is here is matter of admiration in regard of their happiness that notwithstanding that condition whereto they are subject there is a life they enjoy in this world there is a better life prepared for them hereafter And what can be more desired Life of all things else is most esteemed Men are ready in sickness and in other distresses to spend all that they have as the Woman that was troubled with the bloudy issue spent all that she had upon the Physitians to preserve life to recover health Solomon speaking according to the conceit of men saith that a living Dog is better then a dead Lyon any life better then a death thus they imagine and Satan well knew mens account of life when he could say Skin for skin yea all that a man hath will be give for his life Now if so be that this temporal life here that is but a flower but a bubble but a blast but a breath yea that life that in the shortness thereof is subject to so much perplexity as it is be notwithstanding so highly esteemed what is the life here promised that while here in the enjoying in regard of the first fruits thereof is accompanied with such a peace as passeth understanding accompanied with the very joy of the Holy Ghost and in the consummation thereof such contentment such glory as the tongue of man cannot express the mind of man cannot conceive It is noted of the Apostle Saint Paul when he was caught up to the third heaven and saw but a glimps of this life he did there see they are his own words unutterable matter things that cannot be exprest And therefore in this respect he saith and that which he saith may be most fitly applied to this the things which eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither hath entred into the heart of man are such as God hath prepared for them that love him This is that Life which we are so to consider of as it may make us say with the Apostle I account that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be campared with the glory which shall be revealed in us for our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory It will be here said whence cometh this or what may be the ground thereof My Text telleth you It is stiled here Grace of Life Neither will I here insist upon the divers acceptations of grace as it is in man as it is Gratis data or as it is in God as it is Gratis faciens making us accepted with himself It is more clear then need to be proved that eternal life it cometh from divine grace Grace is the ground of it Being justified by grace saith the Apostle and again by Grace you are saved And indeed all things that bring us thereto are in Scriptures attributed to Grace And needs must it be so For First out of God there can be nothing done to move him to do this or that as if it should be done for our sakes either meriting or procuring of it He is independant and we are depending upon him and whatsoever we have is out of our selves and cometh from him Again in Man there can be nothing What is there in man but misery whatsoever man had or hath if there be any good thing he hath it from this fountaine of goodness all our sufficiency is of God And this is briefly to be noted against that proud and arrogant position of our Adversaries concerning the merit of mans works as if man by any thing in him could merit or deserve this life it is not the merit of life but the grace of life Surely they know not God they know not his infiniteness his all-sufficiency they know not man his emptiness his impotency his vileness his cursedness they know not this life they know not the reward the excellency of it the disproportion between any thing that man can do and this life that is thus graciously bestowed that have such a conceit Let them therefore pass with their foolish opinion For our own parts it affordeth to us another ground of comfort and that in regard of our unworthiness for as we are creatures we are less than the least of Gods mercies but as we are mortal creatures dust and ashes much more unworthy of any favour but as we are sinful creatures having provoked the Justice of God most most unworthy of any grace of any life most worthy of all judgements and vengeance of eternal death and damnation Where is now our hope what ground shall we have that have nothing in our selves surely this the ground of this life the grace of God What God doth he doth for himself for his own names sake Grace is free And these two joyned together give evident demonstration of God to be a God in the thing that he doth confer upon thee and in his dealing of it the greatness of the
others with whom she had long and private intimacy of many years acquaintance I must and will speak That which I told you was recorded of Rachel that she was fruitful in procreation of Children may in a great measure be spoken of her for if the Scripture account bearing but of two children fruit certainly it will make an extraordinary fruit in bearing of twelve which she did It is a certaine token of a true and faithful servant of God to frequent his house to pray unto him to praise him in his Church earnestly to labour to be instructed in his will out of his Word then and there read and preached to them all which evidences of a good Christian were found in this our Sister For her constant coming to Church I my self can now speak upon my own knowledge I have seriously and strictly examined my self and I profess ingeniously before God that knows my heart and you that here me speak that I cannot call to mind that ever she mist coming to Church twice a Sabbath day since I came which I would be heartily glad I could speak as well of others of this Parish as of her For some of them have got such a fisking trick up and down to go to other Churches as if there were no rellishable food at their own that I fear at the last they will come to none at all I pray God they amend this fault It was a vertue in her that deserved commendation and it is a vice in them that deserves reprehension When she was in Gods house she did not as too too many do imploy her time in sleeping or some such ill course but I ever observed her to listen very diligently and attentively to what was delivered for the nourishing of her soul I confess I do not remember that ever I saw her take any notes in the Church of Sermons that were preached for it seems she did it when she came home for since her death going to her house accidentally I met with a book of hers wherein she had written many texts of Scripture with notes the day when they were preached and the persons by whom most of those which I have preached I saw and perused and others of strangers that I my self have heard these qualities are not to be past over in silence but are worthy of your serious imitation Neither did she think it fit barely to set them down for her own instruction only but what she heard upon the Sabbath day that she constantly practised upon the week dayes She catechised her children in those points spending some time in training them up in the knowledge of God and putting them in mind of their duty to him in whom we live and move and have our being by repeating Gods word delivered by hearing them read Gods word printed and by singing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs That she was a most provident and careful Wife and a most indulgent and loving Mother all that knew her can best testifie and some of them have informed me And this let me speak and I have it from the mouth of some that prehaps did not think I would have mentioned it at this time and would have had it concealed but for reasons best known to my self I hold it very fit to relate she was ever held to be of a most sweet nature and of a very loving disposition that she was very charitable and inclined to relieve the poor It is likewise testified of her she was liberal alway but more liberal now then usually having had a consideration of the hard and needy times to which end as if she had prognosticated her own death she laid some money according to that ability that God had blessed her with for the relief of the poor Let no man censure me for speaking these things I do for if I should not have given her her just and deserved praises some that now hear me and knew her from her cradle might justly have censured me for too much remisness Thus for her life As for her death I can say little touching it It pleased God not to give her any long time of sickness but to take her away though not unprepared yet on a sudden with a short warning When her bitter pangs first came upon her she called to her Husband and desired him to joyn with her in hearty prayer to Almighty God that he would be graciously pleased to extend his mercy towards her that he would be pleased to let her live longer that she might repent of her sins and beg mercy at his hands for them that she might amend her life And if he would not grant this for her yet for those many poor Children that were young that she was to leave behind her she desired him to be a careful Father over them all she prayed to God devoutly to send a blessing both upon him and them Much she could not then speak because of her pains that now began still to increase upon her When she was in the extremity of her labour he being absent as it was fitting she sent down to him to desire him to pray to God on her behalf that he would ease her of those grievons pains and preserve her in the great pain and peril of Child birth The propitious God it seemed heard him and granted his request for presently to the thinking of the standers by she was well delivered Not satisfied with this having received so great a blessing from God she sent down again to desire him to give God thanks for her safe delivery But God that had determined to take out of this miserable life quickly turned that hope of the standers by into a fear and suddenly she changed which perceiving as long as she was able to speak she cried Lord Jesus have mercy on my soul Lord have mercy on me Lord pitty me poor miserable wretch and when she could not speak she held up her hands to heaven as desirous to make her peace with that God whom she knew she had highly offended I make no question but God hath translated her from the valley of tears to the Mount Sion of blessedness whither God of his infinite mercy bring us all THE DEATH OF SINNE AND LIFE of GRACE SERMON XXXVII ROM 6.11 Likewise reckon ye also your selves to be dead unto sin but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. THe intent of this Chapter is to take off an abuse of the Doctrine of the Gospel which publisheth the free Grace of God to great sinners The Apostle had said in the latter end of the 20. Verse of the former Chapter where sin abounded Grace did much more abound From hence some did infer that therefore under the Gospel they might take liberty to sin the more their sins were and the greater they were the more they should occasion God to manifest his abundant Grace upon them This the Apostle answers in this Chapter and he answers it two wayes
So the Church of God is called the house of God and sometime it is understood of the Church militant and sometime of the Church triumphant Of the Church triumphant In my Fathers house are many mansions There it is heaven the place of the blessed Then for the Church militant Moses was faithful in all his house faith the Text. And Paul exhorts Timothy how he should carry himself in the house of God that is in the Church militant As for those that live above us they need not our good works and actions therefore it is intended of those that are here in the Church militant that is called Gods houshold because there is such a communion amongst beleevers as amongst those that live in the same house that abide under the same roof that live under the same government that eat at the same Table c. So then you have the meaning of all which is no more but this Take those advantages of times which you can obtain or else many will slip unprofitably to be conversant in such actions of mercy which tend to the relief of those that want them If there be extream necessity do good to all but if you may make choyce of persons to whom you may do good choose the houshold of faith Thus you have the substance and the meaning of the words In them you may observe briefly these three parts The first is a determination or limitation of time to which the Saints are tied in the performance of the duties that are in joyned them as you have opportunity and while you have time Secondly there is a declaration of duty do good Thirdly there is a description of the persons to whom this good must be done first more generally Do good to all and then more particularly and with an especial note Especially to those of the houshold of Faith Of these in order First for the determination of time to take the words as they lie while you have time therefore or as you have opportunity the words themselves do render the main point It is the duty of Christians to take their advantages of times to take the best opportunities of their life to do good I will speak somewhat by way of Explication of the point and something by way of Application and so proceed to what follows First for the Explication what is intended or meant in it when we incite you to embrace times and opportunities Briefly these two things are meant in it First that you should be sure not to lose the time of life And Secondly that you should not forego the advantages and opportunities of estates You shall not alwayes have life to do good and it may be if you have life you shall not alwayes enjoy means and ability to do good While you have life therefore and time do good or while you enjoy means and so power to do good embrace these opportunites That is the meaning of the Apostle in this place First then there must be a doing good while you have life let your good works go before you do things while you live and defer not the performance of them till your death Make you friends of the unrighteous Mammon that when you want they may receive you into everlasting habitations He calls that unrighteous Mammon not that it is unrighteously gotten only though that may be meant but that which is unrighteously kept is unrighteous Mammon to you if you procured it never so justly unless you do rightly dispose of it and if you be desirous to do right in disposing of your Mammon of your wealth do it now That when you want that power and those times you may enjoy the comfortable fruit of the well-redeeming of the time of your life to receive you into everlasting habitations In the 25. verse of the 16. Luke it is the challenge of Abraham to Dives Son remember that thou in thy life-time haddest thy goods for so the word signifieth thou haddest thy opportunities of life and of goods too but now thou hast neither life nor goods left thee to do good with and therefore he is blessed and thou art tormented It was the folly of those five Virgins they took not the opportunity of life for that is the thing meant there but they posted over all to the last and hoped that all might be effected in a trice or miniute of their life which would have held them employment enough all the dayes of their lives And therefore they came short of heaven the gates were shut against them as you see when the Bridegroom came If any man imagine because it is said Blessed are they that die in the Lord for they rest from their labours and their works follow them That therefore it matters not so long as a man doth good at his death though he have neglected the wayes of goodness all his life Let them know that by works there is not meant the actions of men but the fruits of their actions Their works follow them not the works they have deferred untill death but the fruits of those works they did while they were living and received not the benefit of them untill death Their works follow them that is the fruits of their works It is more good and pleasant by far to have the actions go before and the fruits and comfortable effects to succeed and follow after But if any man yet suppose that he may make that up in his Will which he hath neglected all his life long and though he have lived miserably covetously and unprofitably all the dayes of his life yet his thoughts may tell him that by the Charitable Requests of his last Testament as bequeathing largely to the Church and Common-wealth and to all sorts of people be may at the last make fit compensation and satisfaction for neglect of former duties Let no man deceive himself with such a bad resolution for first it argues a sign of infidelity that a man will not trust God for fear he should want in his life-time what is the reason else that he defers the doing good in health unless it be for fear of wanting himself such distrust he hath in the providence of God Besides the same God which bids thee do good when thou hast opportunity and while thou enjoyest the advantage of life he expects it now And it may be truly said of many that neglect those times of doing good while they lived and have now supplyed that defect in their death by the large benevolence of their Wills Their will is good but their deed is naught So much for the first point I proceed unto the second that is thou must not only take the time of thy life but also the opportunity of thy means and thy estate while there is yet a price in thine hand while thou hast opportunity and enjoyest wealth to do good with redeem the advantages and opportunities by employing them in
their patience to endure for Gods cause whatsoever man or divel can inflict upon them to part with any limb for their head Christ Jesus gladly to forfeit their estates on earth for a crown in heaven chearfully to lose their lives in this vail of tears that they may find them in the rivers of pleasures that spring at Gods right hand for evermore Here is work for their faith also to see heaven as it were through hell eternal life in present death to beleeve that God numbreth every hair of their head and that every tear they shed for his sake shall be turned into a pearl every drop of blood into a Ruby to be set in their crown of glory To confirme both their faith and patience Christ proclaimeth from heaven that howsoever in their life they seemed miserable yet in their death they shall be most blessed and that the worst their enemies can do is to put them in present possession of their happiness Blessed are the dead c. So saith the spirit whatsoever the flesh saith to the contrary Here we have 1. A proposition De fide of faith 2. A Deposition or testimony of the spirit A Proposition of the happy estate of the dead A deposition of the holy Ghost to confirm our faith therein 1. Saint John sets down his relation 2. A most comfortable assertion 3. A most strong confirmation The relation strange The assertion as strange of a possession without an owner a blessed estate of them who according to the Scripture phrase are said not to be The Confirmation as strange as either by an audible testimony of an invisible witness So saith the spirit Or because this asseveration concerning the condition of the Saints departed is propositio necessaria as the Schools speak we will cloath the members of the division with terms apodictical and in this verse observe 1. A conclusion sientifical whereof the parts are 1. The subject indefinite mortui the dead 2. The attribute absolute beati blessed 3. The cause propter quam the Lord or dying in the Lord. 2. The proof demonstrative and that two-fold 1. A priori 1. By a heavenly oracle I heard a voyce c. 2. A divine testimony So saith the spirit 2. A Posteriori by arguments drawn 1. From their cessation from their work They rest from their labours 2. Their remuneration for their works Their works follow them Where the matter is pretious a decision of the least quantity is a great loss and therefore as the spie of nature observeth the Jewellers will not rub out a small clowd or speck in an orient Ruby because the lessening the substance will more disadvantage them then the fetching out of the spot advance them in the sale Neither will the Alcumists lose a drop of quintessence nor the Apothecaries a grain of Bezar nor an exact Commentatour upon holy Scriptures any syllables of a voyce from heaven the eccho whereof is more melodious to the soul then any consort of most tuneable voyces upon earth can be In which regard I hold it fit to relinquish my former divisions and insist upon each word of this verse as a Bee sitteth upon each particular flower that we may not lose any drop of doctrins sweeter then the honey and the honey comb any lease of the tree of life any dust of the gold of Ophir 1. J there were three men in holy Scripture termed Jedidiah that is Beloved of God Solomon Daniel and Saint John the Evangelist and to all these God made known the secrets of his Kingdome by special revelation and their prophecies are for the most part of a mystical interpretation This Revelation was given to John when he was in the spirit upon the Lords day and if we religiously observe the Lords day and then be in the spirit as he was giving our selves wholly to the contemplation of Divine mysteries we shall also hear voyces from heaven in our souls and consciences Heard with what ears could Saint John hear this voyce sith he was in a spiritual rapture which usually shutteth up all the doors of the sences I answer that as spirits have tongues to speak withall whereof we read 1 Cor. 13.1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and Angels so they have ears to hear one another that is a spiritual faculty answerable to our bodily sense of hearing The Apostle saith of himself that he was in the spirit and as he was in the spirit so he saw in the spirit and heard in the spirit and spake in the spirit and moved in the spirit and did all those things which are recorded in this Book When Saint Paul was wrap'd up into the third Heaven and heard there words that cannot be uttered and saw things which cannot be represented with the eye he truly and really apprehended those objects yet not with carnal but spiritual sences wherewith Saint John heard this voyce A voyce from Heaven The Pythagoreans taught that the Coelestial sphears by the regular motions produced harmonious sounds and the Psalmist teacheth us that the Heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament sheweth his handy work and that there is no speech nor language where their voyce is not heard but that was the voyce of Heaven it self demonstrately proving and after a sort proclaiming the Majesty of the Creatour But this is vox de coelo a voyce from Heaven pronounced by God himself or formed by an Angel so Gasper Melo expresly teacheth us Saint John heard a voyce not sounding out wardly but inwardly framed by that Angel who revealed unto him the whole Apocalypse Saint John here heard a voyce from Heaven commanding him to Write and Saint Austin heard a voyce from Heaven commanding him to Read Tolle lege and most requisite it is that where Heaven speaks the earth should hear and where God writes that man should read There never yet came any voyce from Heaven 〈◊〉 did not much import and concern the earth to hear The first voyce that came from Heaven was heard on Mount Sinai and it was to confirm the Law to be of divine authority and establish our faith in God the Creator A second voyce from Heaven we hear of in Saint Peter on the holy Mount when the Apostles were there with Christ and it was to confirm the Gospel and to establish our faith in Christ the Redeemer A third voyce or sound was heard from Heaven in the upper room where Christs Apostles were assembled in the day of Pentecost and it was to confirme our faith in the holy Ghost the Comforter A fourth voyce that came from Heaven was heard by Saint Peter in a vision and it was to confirme our faith in the Catholike Church and the Communion of Saints and the incorporating both Jewes and Gentiles in one mystical body Lastly a voyce was heard from Heaven by Saint John in this place to establish our faith in the last Article
this was in their eye this bore them out against all the threatenings and sufferings of the World this was that that did give them encouragement and comfort above all discouragements And to conclude above all let us encourage our selves by the fruit and recompence of all this expectation what is that the Apostle Saint John saith that when this hope shall come into our hand when our faith shall meet with fruition then we shall see Christ so as to be like him here is such a sight of Christ as never the eye of flesh saw nor can see to see Christ and to be like him to see him as he is here is such a sight as would ravish us if we knew what it was and we cannot know while we are on earth eye hath not seen that which we shall see in Christ but when we shall enjoy this expectation we shall see him as he is and see him so as to be like him Father saith he John 17.24 I will that where I am they may be that they may see my glory Wicked men see his glory what priviledge then between them and the godly It is true indeed wicked men see the glory of Christs person and they shall see and feel the glory of his justice but the godly see the glory not onely of his person not onely of his justice but the glory that no wicked man ever shall see the glory of his Mercy and goodness and grace here is the difference God getteth himself glory upon Pharaoh in drowning of him but God getteth himself the glory of his Mercy in Israel in saving them in the bottome of the Sea so the godly they see the glory not onely of the person of Christ and that is infinite and surpasseth apprehension but they see the glory of his Mercy of his eternal goodness and they see it so as to be like him to be translated into that glory to get a part and share of it as much as they are capable of they make themselves all glorious with his glory and shine with his brightness and beauty Alas brethren all the sight we can get of Christ in this world it is like the sight of the blind man that Christ cured he bad him look up and lift up his eyes and he saw men walking as trees an imperfect sight so we have here but an imperfect glimpse of Christ we see him through a glass through the Word and Sacraments and these means that he hath appointed an imperfect sight till Christ give us a clear sight and makes us see perfectly and this is in the day of his return All the sight and vision of Christ in this life it is but to see him in a glass faith the Apostle as in a looking glass but then we shall see him face to face we shall see him as he is What difference there is between the shadow in a glass and the face it self so much difference there is between the sight of Christ here and hereafter when we shall see him as he is when we shall see him with open face and not in a mirrour Therefore let this incourage us and stir up our hearts to expect and wait for the coming of Christ with vehement and daily prayers with fervency of spirit with the Church and the Bride and the Spirit to say Even so Amen Come Lord Jesus FINIS DEATHS PREROGATIVE SERMON XXXXVIII GEN. 3.19 For dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return AS the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel Pro. 12 10. or the seeming cruelties at the highest but severities of the God of Heaven have much of mercy in them Witness this carriage in this Chapter towards our first Parents not to speak of his mercy of mercies obvious to every eye Christ the Second Adam promised before the first Adam was punished the woman is sentenced in sorrow to bring forth Children It might have been better and better whereas it is Bitter-sweet though sorrow yet she shall bring forth Chrildren Travellers will assure us that there is a small Island nigh Nombre de dios in America where no woman as yet could be delivered of a child and therefore when neer their time are conveyed over to the neighbouring continent whether this proceedeth from the Astringency in the Aire Earth or Water or any other occult Quality let the privie Counsellors of Nature discuss and deside God might have extended the Malignity of this Island all over the World Caine might have been the Ben-nony to Eve but his goodness was so merciful that her comfortable pain was for the time abated with the hope for future forgotten with the fruition John 16.21 That a man was born into the Word Secondly for Adam he is censured vers 17. In sorrow to eate of the ground all the dayes of his life In sorrow there is Justice shall eat there is mercy God might have made the Earth Deaf and Dumb to the desires of the Husbandman ut non parerent arva colono Man might have Fallowed and Stirred and Plowed and Sown and Harrowed and Rouled and Weeded and Mown and yet not have brought home to the Barn or not have eat of what he brought home How easily can God make an ill conditioned and unseasonable autumn defeat the promises of the most pragnant Spring and Summer How may a Snowy January Frosty February Dusty March Showry Aprill Windy May Warm June Hott July all very kindly in their kinds be married with a constant and continued raign in August even to the famishing of all man-kind had not God gratiously promised that man should though in sorrow vers 17. and in the sweat of his face vers 19. eat bread from the ground A Second favour is herein conferred on Adam that God in his due time would put a period to his painful life his toil trouble and turmoil occasioned by his tilling the earth and other interveining afflictions should not last alwayes but end and expire with his life for dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return This text I may tearm the GRAND LEVELLER as which equalleth Showels and Scepters Penknives and Swords Scholars and Souldiers Captains and Captives Princes and Peasants high and low rich and poor one with another Saint Paul 2 Tim. 4. compareth mans life to a race I have finished my course and Heb. 12.1 Let us run with patience the race that is set before us let us improve his Metaphor into an Alegory and it will serve us very conveniently for the deviding of our text wherein we may observe 1. Carcer the Bar from whence we do start for dust thou art 2. Meta the mark to which we run and unto dust thou shalt return Be it here remembred that this Metaphor is confined to the Terrestial and earthly part of man without the least reference to his best moity I mean his Soul man consisteth of two parts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Soul and dust the former not
my son would God I had died for thee my son All conditions that live find tears in mens eyes and consideration of their departure only the godly and the righteous man findeth none Here is their stupidity Can there be a greater stupidity then to make a man die twice as they die the death of their bodies so to make them suffer a death in our memories as they perish to the world so to perish also in our thoughts and meditations We owe God so much we owe piety so much we owe the memorial of many so much we owe our selves so much as to take it into consideration And yet no man considereth This is the fault which we may examine our selves of For if we now make reflection of all this upon our selves we must find a conformity with our times There is never a word of this Scripture but it is true now I will now take the parts in order First we cannot deny that evil is to come upon this place Nay it were well if it were to come it is come already it hath overtaken us If we load the earth with the evil of sin it is impossible that God should forbear long The evil of sin that surchargeth the earth must be unloaden again by this burthen by the burthen of punishment one burthen must justle out another Evils there have been impendant that we have seen Evils there are now present that we begin to groane under and no man can tell where that evil will stay There is evil present and evils to come because our evils are still multiplying the beginnings of sorrows and sufferings and fears God grant it may stay But our state and condition is like them in this that they are yet impendant We see the heavens grown black judgments are a ripening When ye see the sky red when ye see the skie black judgment is beginning not only beginning to bud but it beginneth to spread and inlarge it selfe Thus farr there is a correspondency There is evil that we have cause to fear and suspect yet further to come on this place Secondly there is a conformity with the other too in our negligence The world sendeth forth men now void of natural affection It was never so before For if before they neglected others yet they were careful of themselves But men now desperately neglect their own salvations There is no respect to God no pitty of others no not of themselves I do not wonder that men heretofore considered not when they loved their lives better then their sins because they had some sensible taste of that that was temporal when they loved their lives better then heaven But now men love not their lives best but their sins better for though their lives be in danger yet their sins are kept It is an admirable thing to consider how every way we are given to plenty to ryot to security notwithstanding God cometh neer and bringeth his judgment even to the door and makes it swell He forbeareth a long time to trie us with mercies and then he takes a severe course Where shall men see the face of an alteration our lives are the same our delights the same our vanities and follies the same we keep the same sins still as if we were bent to provoke God further to see what he will do That is an evident sign we consider not for what purpose God sendeth his plagues we consider not what he doth when he takes away others for our example none lay it to heart and take it into consideration it swimmeth not in his brain We begin to tremble and we think our selves well if we provide a countrey house but God hath beset us in the Countrey and in the City There will be no flight but to repentance there is the City of refuge and there is no way to repent but by consideration these must be took to heart before there can be amendment and till there be amendment there will he no removing of judgment It is plain then that we are conform able in that part of the Text. And in the first too That merciful men are taken away experience sheweth it daily they are taken so frequently that there is hardly any left they are not only taken away but swept away And if there were no other proof this representation this sad spectacle before our eyes that is an argument to make the proof of the conformity of the first part of the text with us In the text there is mention made of a righteous man of a merciful man The Spirit of God bringeth in all the parts by pairs It is fulfiled in the solemnity and occasion of this day by pairs God calleth us to piety by pairs he giveth us spectacles of mortality I thought I had come to do the duty for one to performe the solemnity of one Funeral but after I perceived I was called to do the office for two It was not so from the beginning it falleth not out so every day Here is the true proof that these are the times of mortality set the pairs any way and we shall see that there is one free none can secure himself from the stroke of death One a vertuous ancient Gentlewoman the other a grave learned minister but of younger condition here are both ages took away and both presented not only so but here are both conditions of life and both presented together and here are both sexes and both presented together to teach us that no sex no condition no age can secure themselves I will smite the Shepheard saith Christ foretelling the Disciples what should befal them Here is the smiting of the Shepheard and the sheep too But both together and I beleeve this place cannot send such another pair For the one He was the most eminent for his place For the other she was the most eminent for her piety I was not acquainted with the conversation of either and therefore I shall not speak much and the information I had it was not much for it was needless I may save a labour for both for if I speak any thing false ye are able to refute me if I speak any thing true as all must be true that is spoken here yet ye are able to prevent me and I can say nothing that ye know not For the one I here that he had the report of a man that was conscionable in the discharge of his place And all that I shall say of him shall be only this there is cause that ye should take to heart his death For what is the reason that in this little Parish that is as healthful as another But God is wounderful in his wayes and we must not search into the judgments of God that it is not full eight years but there have three succeeded that have been commended to this place and have died one after another Is it so that ye kill them with unkindness the world saith so I tell ye I know
be greater then I can give warrant for they that die thus die eternally And we had need beseech God with all earnestness of spirit to keep us from such a fearful temptation as this for they that die thus die not in the Lord and therefore cannot be blessed for my Text saith it of no other but of those Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord. This is the first point I come to the Restriction Die in the Lord. It may be construed two wayes the preposition is Ambiguous for the preposition many times in Scripture signifies In Domino or propter Dominum As Rom. 16.1 I commend unto you Phebe our sister that you would receive her in Domino in the Lord that is for the Lords sake as becometh Saints And in the twelfth verse of the same Chapter Salute the beloved Persis which laboured much in the Lord that is laboured much in Gods cause for the Lord. So again Say to Archippus look to the ministery that thou hast received In Domino that is for the Lord for the Lords service for his work I might give you many more instances There is one place most pregnant Eph. 4.1 I Paul a prisoner in Domino so saith the vulgar Latine and so is the Greek interpretation In the Lord. What meaneth Saint Paul A prisoner in the Lord what is that A prisoner for the Lord a prisoner for the Lords cause And thus you may take the word here in the Text Blessed are they that die in Domino that is such as die in causa Domini and thus Judicious Beza to whose judgment I attribute much in translations he readeth it so Blessed are the dead qui moriuutur causa Domini and then in his Annotations propter Dominum And if you take it thus then the Martyrs only are blessed That Martyrs are blessed the Church of God is so far from making a question that they set it down as a Rule Injuriam facit Martyri qui orat pro Martyre A man doth wrong to a Martyr that prayes for a Martyr their blessedness is so sure for He that loseth his life for my sake and the Gospels shall find it saith Christ If he loseth a temporal life he shall find an eternal If he lose a life accompanied with sorrow he shall find another life that is with joy such joy as cannot be conceived such joy as shall never be ended Precious in the eyes of the Lord is the death of his Saints There are two things saith S. Bernard that makes the death of a Saint precious the one is a good life before the other is a good cause for which he dieth A good life will make it a precious death but a good cause will make it a more precious death But that is the most pretious death that hath both a good life before it and a good cause coming next The Matyrs are blessed but they must be such Martyrs as suffer for the Lord be sure of that or else they are not blessed There be some that would be accounted Martyrs a great company of such we have had of late that have died for broaching of reason and some for sowing of sedition some for absolving subjects from the oath of Alleageance some for attempting to blow up Parliament houses Such as these are not Martyrs It is not the punishment it is the cause that makes the Martyr Our blessed Lord himselfe that never did evil was crucified between two evil-doers there was an equal punishment there was not an equal cause It must be the cause that we must look to if we look to be blessed But I cantot stand upon that Here is the first interpretation To die in the Lord is for the Lord. But there is a second and that is more large die in the Lord that is die in the faith of the Lord. Salute Andronicus and Junius my fellow prisoners which were in the Lord before me Saith S. Paul that is that were Beleevers that were in the faith before me And to let pass many other places if there be no resurrection of the dead saith the Apostle then we that are asleep in Christ c. If we beleeve that Jesus died then those that sleep in Jesus shall he bring with him c. and Again He shall descend from heaven with a shout and they that are dead in Christ shall rise first Now what is it to die in Christ in a large sense I will tell you He that would die in Christ first he must die in obedience There are many works of obedience that we are to doe Our last and greatest act of obedience is to resign up this same spirit of ours willingly chearfully into the hands of God that gave it If we have not attained to that strength that some have done that is to live patiently and die willingly yet we should labour to attain to thus much strength to live willingly and to die patiently So as Christ may be magnified in my body saith the Apostle I pass not it makes no matter let it either be by life or by death When we have done the work that God hath set us to do we must be gone and thus must every one say with himself Lord if I have done all the work thou hast appointed me to do call me away at thy pleasure Here is the first In obedience Secondly Die in repentance I remember what Possidonius said of Saint Augustine a little before his death that it was necessary that men when they died they should not go out of the world absque digna competenti resipiscentiâ without a fit competent repentance He himselfe did so for he caused the penitential Plalmes to be written and they were before him as he lay upon his bed and he was continually reading those penitential Psalmes and meditating upon them with many tears he died even in the very act of contrition I do love to see a man chearful upon his death-bed but I do more love to see a man penitent There is a day indeed when God will wipe away all tears from our eyes When that cometh then he will wipe away these tears of repentance too these tears of godly sorrow But the Lord grant he may find me with tears in mine eyes Thirdly Die in faith Indeed if ever Faith had a work to doe it bath then a work to do when all other comforts in the world fail us and freinds go from us then faith to lay hold on the promises I know that my Redeemer liveth and that I shall rise again at the last day and be covered with my skin and shall see God with these same eyes Thus faith And then fourthly Die with Invocation calling upon the name of God Thus have all the Saints of God done continually commending of their souls to God in prayers Saint Paul would have us commend our souls to God in well-doing And it is a necesary thing every morning
Zacheus his offer was but half of his goods Lord half of my goods I give to the poor For ought I can perceive and understand above half of her estate she hath given to charitable uses I say no more of her These works of her will praise her in the gates She died in the Country And I am sorry that I had not information as I did desire of her behaviour in her sickness I have it not I can say nothing of it but thus much It was not possible that such a creature that lived thus as we know she did in obedience to God in repentance in faith with invocation of Gods mercy in Charity in Peace but that her death was blessed She that lived in the Lord no question but she died in the Lord and she is blessed for Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord. Good Lord teach us to number our dayes that we may apply our hearts to wisdom and grant that as we grow in years we may grow in knowledge of thy truth in obedience to thy will in faith in thy promises in love toward thee and toward our neighbours for thy sake that when we come to the end of our dayes we may come to the end of our hope the salvation of our souls through Jesus Christ to whom with thee oh Father and thee oh holy Spirit three Persons but one true and immortal and only wise God be given both from us and all thy creatures in heaven and in earth continual praise honour glory dominion and power now and for evermore Let all those that hear the word of God depart from iniquity Now the God of Peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus the great Shepheard of the sheep through the bloud of the everlasting Covenant make you perfect to do his will working in you that which is pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ Amen THE CHRISTIANS CENTER OR HOW TO LIVE TO GOD. SERMON X. ROM 14.7 For none of us liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself for whether we live we live to the Lord and whether we die we die unto the Lord whether we live therefore or die we are the Lords THese words contain an Argument or reason which the Apostle useth to prove that the weak Christian should be born withal and that men should not judge because of the difference of meat amongst them He sheweth that they did not with the neglect of the knowledge of any truth keep themselves ignorant in this particular but it was their weakness The strong should bear with the weak and the weak should not censure the strong the reason is because they agree in one end they propound one general end to themselves that guides them in all their actions they walk in one way and in one path and therefore they should in these things agree together The general end at which they all aymed in their doings is the Lord He that eateth faith he eateth to the Lord he that eateth not to the Lord he eateth not that is still he propoundeth God as his end and the pleasing of God in his actions as the rule of them That he may prove this unto us that they stand thus affected both of them notwithstanding this difference he bringeth in this as the general reason where to every particular of their lives may be reduced All their life is ordered by the Lord they live to the Lord they die to the Lord so that whet her they live or die they are the Lords Therefore all their particular actions are to the Lord. Whether we live we live to the Lord and whether we die we die to the Lord. Now this general reason he propoundeth two wayes First Negatively None of us living to himself and no man dieth to himself Secondly Affirmatively which consisteth of two parts Their duty to God Gods acceptance of them and protection over them Their duty to God if we live we live to the Lord and if we die we die to the Lord. Gods acceptance of them Whether we live or die we are the Lords That which we shall now insist upon is the former part the negative expression and proposal of this general reason none of us liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself Now when the A postle affirmeth this of the beleevers of those times he therein intimateth thus much that it is the course of beleevers in all times It is a duty belonging to all others of which they must make account not to live to themselves but to the Lord. Therefore though he speaks generally here yet there is in his speech a kind of particular universality a generality with a restraint He saith none of us he saith not none in the world live to themselves for there are many in the world live to themselves and not to the Lord but none of us none of those that we rank our selves with that are in the condition of beleevers none of those concerning whom we speak in this question none of us live to our selves Life in general is nothing else but that power whereby we act or move As we read Gen. 2. God breathed into man the breath of life and he became a living soul he gave him the power whereby he acted The acting of this power is the exercise of that life whether the action be of the mind or of the body And so as there is a donble life there are two sorts of actions of life there are natural actions of a natural life and there are spiritual actions of a spiritual life When the Apostle speaks of living he intends both these We live not that is we do not the actions of life whether natural or spiritual to our selves but to the Lord. No man liveth to himselfe By himself he meaneth not only a mans person either soul or body but all those advantages that conduce to the well-being of a man No man of us so ordereth the actions of his life with reference and respect to our selves as the uttermost end we do not make our own well-being or well-fare the uttermost end of our actions none of us live to our selves You have the sense and meaning of the words which being a patterne to other Christians a thing which the Apostle supposeth is or should be in every beleever it giveth us this point of instruction whereupon we shall insist at this time That is No Beleever none that are in Christ should make themselves the end in their actions None should live that is spend their time and strength and endeavour ayming at no higher end then themselves No Christian should so spend his time as to seek himself only in the actions that he doth None of us liveth to himselfe But here it may be objected for the clearing of the point May not a Christian seek himself in the things that he doth When they do good things that which God commandeth that
be straitned and because the Apostle intends it not as the main thing I do but only name it The second thing and that which Saint Paul mainly intends is that because we have but a little time we are even ready to strike sayle and to go to the Harbour presently therefore he that had a wife should be as if he had none and he that used the world as if he used it not c. And there the Lesson that I noâ—e is this That the serious meditation of the little and short time that we have to remain in here below should be a great means to cut us off from the world and to put us upon thoughts and actions concerning heaven I shall not need to give you a better ground of the point then is in the Text. The time is short saith he the time is contracted you are ready to strike sayle therefore do this I might give you a world of Scripture to prove this But I will satisfie my self in laying you down two or three grounds of it First we know that all things that ever a man can enjoy in this world they all die assoon as ever this time is gone Mark it All things here below let a man dote never so much upon them let him have wife and children and beauty and credit and pleasures and learning or whatsoever it is if his glass be out if his time be gone ther 's is an end of all those to him Now the soul of man careth not for that happiness that hath no continuance at all in it Yea the rarest thing that mortal men seek if they should know before hand that they should enjoy them but a little time the soul careth not for pitching upon it If a man were offered the goodliest woman for his wife that ever lived in this world if God should send him this message there take her I bestow her freely upon thee but to morrow thou shalt die who would care for marrying To be a King we know is simply the greatest thing that men seek after in this world yet among the Grecian Cities as that of Sparta because one was but to have the Kingdome but for a year and then to lay down his Crown and become a private man all the wisest men of the City strove as much not to the King as we to get great places Why because they knew that that honour was but for a year and that would be gone presently therefore they cared not for it So the Apostle teacheth in this place Though thou shouldest have a wife that thou shouldest love mightily though thou shouldest have pleasures that thou takest full content in Why doest thou so We are ready to strike sayle we have but a little time to continue So that because all the blessedness of this life let them be never so many never so great yet they all die with us when our time is ended he that could but seriously think that he hath but a little time to continue below he will never let his heart be set violently upon them that is the first Argument The second and principle Reason why the meditation of the shortness of our time should be such a marvellous means to take us off from all the things of the world is this Because we shall find work enough in this short time for things that more concern us Now the very nature of our soul that God hath put into us is this that a man cannot intend earnestly and violently two things at the same time Let a man for a certain hour wholly be took up with some business though there were a great many other things that be could find in his heart to think upon yet the soul intends that one mainly and can find no time for the other This is our case We have but a little time but in that little time admirable is the work we have to do before this time be spent if we would give a comfortable account What have we to do I tell you in a word The main and needfull thing of all that we have to do in this little time here allotted us is How to shoot the gulph of hell how to make our peace with God how to get his favour in Christ how to have the corruptions of our soul cured and healed how to grow up in grace and to get sure evidence against that day when all shall stand naked before him that then we may be found in Christ Have I ever heard that I have a great work to do and that I have but a little time to do it in Surely then if I seriously think of it I cannot find in my heart to let my soul pitch earnestly upon the things below Beloved our time here is the only time we have to make heaven sure It is the most precious thing that ever we have in the world Now if a man have such a precious thing and but a little of it will he go and spend it for toyes and baubles It is a thing that the Emperour Caligula is laughed at for in all Stories There was a mighty Navy provided admirable and strange and all trimmed and every one expected that with it the whole countrey of Greece should be conquered and so it might have been But he imploped his souldiers to gather a company of Cockleshells and Pibbles and so sayled home Had not every one cause to laugh at the folly of this Emperour Verely such a fool is every man and so we would acknowledge if we would but weigh this God hath given thee but thus much time it may be twenty years it may be but a day or two more in this time he hath furnished thee with that which may be a means to conquer heaven it self now if â—…hou lay out this little about wife or children or to purchase a little wealth or chese things here below is it not the greatest folly that may be Suppose that a servant hath a great deal of work to do and knows that he must give an account to his Master thereof and that if all be not done that should be done he can never appear with comfort before his Master and he sees also that the Sun draws low and the day hastneth to an end do you think that this servant can find time to play If a man have much to write and but a little paper to write in he must write small and thick and close as ever he can So it is with every one of us â—… warrant you there is not any soul of us but we shall find so many thousand things to repent of so many graces to obtain that we stand in need of so many evidences or heaven to get that yet we have not got sealed so many particulars concerning better life that a man may wonder that ever any one should find one half day to 〈◊〉 any thing else Thus you see the reasons why the serious meditation of
shall he no more As there shall be no more sorrow and pain so there shall be no more death and sin All tears shall be wiped from our eyes I will ransom them from the power of the grave and redeem them from death More then this This yet addeth to our comfort Christ will so destroy Death as be will not only subdue him for us but also reconcile him to us not only foil him as an Enemy but propitiate and make him our friend We have all our enemies subdued to us but some are so subdued that they are reconciled Death is one of them it is a reconciled as well as a subdued enemy Instead of bringing forth children for bondage it becometh a purchaser of our freedom it is so far from plucking us from Christ as rather it letteth us into Christ so far from being a loss as it bringeth gain so far from being a dammage that it is part of our Dowry therefore the Apostle reckoneth it as a prerogative as he saith that the world and life and Christ is ours so Death is ours Indeed if Death were not ours life were not ours for our only way to life now is by Death Such a friend is this Enemy become that it is a Bridge to pass to heaven the Chariot that we are took up to heaven in What we get of life toward life we lose in death but what we get in death toward life we never lose Now for the Application and conclusion of all Something I have to say by way of comfort and something by way of counsel First by way of comfort Against the fear of Death or against over-much sorrow for those that Death takes away It is true Death is an Enemy But to whom only to the wicked that are out of Christ to those that have no benefit at all by his Death and Resurrection and Ascension When Death cometh and findeth out these they may say as Ahab did to Eliah and more truly a great deal hast thou found me oh mine Enemy It is the worst Enemy they have in the world It is a cruel Sergeant that catcheth them by the throat and arresteth them for a debt that they are never able to pay It draggs them to the Jayl casteth them into the Dungeon to the chains of Darkness I have not a word of comfort to say to them They have no more comfort in Death then they have in Hell where though they shall lie in torments and pain they shall not have a drop of water to cool their tongue But to the saithful in Christ there is comfort upon comfort For though Death be an Enemy yet remember first it is a subdued Enemy Secondly a reconciled Enemy Thirdly and lastly an Enemy that one day shall not be at all It is a subdued Enemy that is one comfort The strength and sting of it is gone When a Bee hath lost his sting and is a Droan it can hurt no more So Death is a Droan to a Christian it hums and buzzeth it doth no hurt it cannot sting the sting is gone Against all those Enemies that I formerly told ye of that are attendants on Death here is comfort First it is true Death cometh with ill Harbingers it bringeth sicknesses and aches and pain but there is comfort against this For when God sendeth pain remember he promiseth to send patience too that he will put his hand under to help His left hand shall be under us and his right hand over us to catch us he hath promised comfort upon our sick beds to make our bed in our sickness We need not make such an Allegory as Ambrose doth this sweet flesh of ours the Bed of our soul it is under infirmities and weaknesses God helpeth us he makes our bed he saith to the sick of the Palsey Take up thy bed he turneth our bed in our sickness either he sends us health so some exponds it he turns the bed of sickness into a bed of health or God turneth our bed for us in our sickness that is he refresheth us giveth us ease when we lie upon our sick beds It is a Metaphor borrowed from those that attend sick persons that help to make their Beds easie and soft and turn them that they may lie at ease So God hath promised his children in the painfull time of sickness to make their Beds easie and soft to cause them to lie at ease by the Patience that he will give them Secondly it is true Death bringeth dissolution and dissolveth the frame of nature it separateth and divorceth those two loving companions the Soul and the Body But there is comfort in this For though it divorce the Soul and the Body yet it cannot destroy the soul and the body even the body is in the hand of god when it is rotting in the earth as the Soul is translated to heaven Again though they be separated yet it is but for a time one day they shall meet more joyful and glorious then ever before and after that they shall never be separated again Lastly though he separate the soul from the body and the body from the soul yet neither from Christ nor Christ from them Nay it is so far from separating that it helpeth to unite us to Christ as I said before the dssolution of those shall be the conjunction with him I desire to be dessolved and to be with Christ Thirdly it is true the horrour of the Grave attendeth Death and the putrifaction of this flesh of ours that must turn to corruptness it makes it terrible and fearful But there is comfort against this For after that time of putrifaction there shall be a time of restitution and though the worms devour this flesh of ours yet in thâ—… very flesh of ours we shall see God another day These eyes shall see him There is comfort in that that when God shall come to restore us with himself what the Grave hath cloathed with corruption he will cloath with glory these vile bodies he will make them like the glorious body of Christ without all corruption Fourthly it is true Death depriveth us of worldly friends of worldly imployments this makes it terrible Yet there is comfort against this Though we be deprived of worldly friends it carries us to heaven to better company to Angels to the spirits of just and perfect men to God the Judge of all to Jesus the Mediatour of the New Testament Nay besides one day he will restore again those very friends of which here we are deprived though we lose them for a time in heaven we shall meet again and there renew a perpetual league of society and love So though it deprive us of worldly benefits it cannot of heaven and those are better they are not pleasures of sin that last for a season but at the right hand of God that endure for ever So though it deprive us of worldly
give attestation to the sentence that he pronounceth and say Amen to the condemnation of the wicked So that the difference is easily reconciled and we see how God and Christ and the Saints are said to judg The Authority is Gods The Execution Christs The approbation the Saints The Apostle in Rom. 2.16 makes the point plain he telleth us that God shall judg by Christ In that day God shall judg the secrets of all hearts by Jesus Christ So Christ himself Joh. 5. The Father Judgeth no man but hath committed all power to the Son He hath given him power to execute judgment as he is the Son of man Why to him For this Reason That his second coming may be in glory to make amends for his first coming in humility Christ at his first coming into the world he came meanly and homely at his second coming he shall come triumphantly and gloriously Before he came like a Lamb then he shall come like a Lyon Before in the forme of a servant then in the form of a Lord. Before Pilate sate upon the Bench and Christ stood as a malefactour but then Pilate shall stand at the Barr as a Malefactour and Christ shall sit on the Bench as Judg. He shall then openly come to shew himself a just Judg amongst men as before he came to be Judged when he came privately he was Judged of them that were unjust It was once a scorn that he the Son of man should be Judg of the world therefore God will have him come and appear in that very form he was scorned in that now they may behold him in his Majesty that before would not take notice of him when he appeared in humility that they who the more contemptuously before esteemed him in his baseness may now more severely taste of his justice God then is Judg. Not men Not Angels but God himself Had men been our Judges we might not fear the face of men because they are vessels of the same earth as we took out of the same pit hewen out of the same rock If Angels had been our Judges we should not have stood in so much fear because though they be Spirits more glorious then we yet by their own confession they are our fellow creatures and our fellow servants therefore we after a sort participate with them in some degree of nature But neither men nor Angels shall be Judges then but Almighty God that as much excelleth men and Angels as the heavens do the earth And look what is necessarily required to the office of a Judg it is incomparably found in him To the office of a Judg there are three properties specially required Knowledg to discern Power to determine Justice to execute In God these are all of them transcendent and eminent For Knowledg he is the most wise For Power most absolute For Execution most just Knowledg to discern that is the first He that assumeth the person of a Judg must needs be one of wisdom and understanding Though he have the Scepter of authority in his hand if he have not the eye of wisdom in his head if he be not able when men plead their case before him as the two Harlots before Solomon to decide to whom the right of the case belongeth as he to whom the living child pertained he is as unfit to be a Judg as an illiterate Ignaroe is to be a Priest The Judges ignorance is the honest mans overthrow We commonly paint Justice blind not because he should be so that sits in Gods seat of justice to decide Cases but only in respect of persons Blind Isaac was fain to put forth his hands to feel whether it were Esau or no that came to ask the blessing it is a hard case when Judges have sore eyes that they cannot discern the right Case but only by feeling But it shall not be so here God is the Judg that is of infinite wisdome and understanding that is able to discern right and wrong Of necessity it must be so because he is Omniscient he knoweth all things he hath the true understanding of them it is impossible to deceive him Earthly Judges they somtime are blinded in the hearing of Cases that are brought before them for what their eyes see not they are not able to discern there are no glass windows into the bosoms and breasts of men by which they are able to come into their hearts all the information they have is from Evidences and Witnesses the hear-sayes and reports of others where if any thing be concealed or mistold how easily may they miscarry But Gods knowledg is not so unsound or uncertain because he himself is an eare and an eye-witness of all things that are he knoweth whatsoever is done he beholdeth not the actions only but the very intentions he is able to judg of the thoughts and intentions of the heart It is but folly to think to hide any thing from him heaven is not so high but he can reach it hell is not so deep but he can search it the earth is not so wide but he can spanit the night is not so dark but he can see it the chamber the bed the closet is not so close but he can pierce it He that sitteth upon the circle of the heavens and whose eyes are as flames of fire seeth every thing Heb. 4. There is no creature that is not manifest in his sight but all things are naked and open like an Anatomized body for thence the Metaphor is drawn where the bowels are laid open and every nerve and muscle and ligament every Atome discovered so that we may take a full view of it In a word if it were Davids commendation that he was wise as an Angel of God how wise must God be that infuseth wisdome into the Angels and in whose sight the Angels are foolish That is the first thing requisit in a Judg he must have knowledg to discern In the second place He must have power to execute he must have authority to command and not be as an Image set against a wall for if he be so Abjects will insult over him though peradventure some may regard him because he hath eyes to see yet others will contemn him because he hath no hands to punish so innocency shall be hopeless of recompence and the wicked of their desert Again if he have not power if he have power only to hear and not to determine or if his power be restrained to some petty Cases and not also extended to matters of greater consequence and moment Appeals will be made as commonly they are from inferiour Courts to the higher But it is not so here God is the Judg who as he is infinite in knowledg so he is in power and authority We stile the King Supream head over all persons and in all causes in his Dominions but God is over all the Dominions of the earth supream over all not only
avenge our blood on those that dwell upon the earth All the Saints departed their souls cry to God to finish these dayes of sin and hasten the coming of Christ And besides this this further benesit we have that we are all members of the same body there is a gathering under one Head as the Apostle calleth it under Christ they are the superiour members we the inferiour all joyned under one common Head Lastly the Saints on earth have interest one in another by vertue of this communion they have interest in the prayers in the gifts in the wealth one of another sofar as necessity and love requireth Fifthly and lastly as in earthly Cities and Corporations there is trading and traff quing buying and selling c. So here this heavenly conversation consisteth in a kind of heavenly traffique as the word importeth We either are all or should be all heavenly merchants even here upon earth The kingdome of heaven is compared to a treasure hid in a field which when a man findeth he hideth it and for joy departeth and selleth all that he hath and buyeth that field It is compared to a Pearl which when a man descrieth the excellency of it he giveth all that he hath to possess that Pearl There is a heavenly thing that is worth all that we can give and it must be bought too It is our Saviours counsel come buy of me yea come buy wine and milk without money without price It must be bought but bought without money there is nothing that is subject to corruption that can buy heavenly things Buy of me eye-salve that you may see and gold that you may be made rich and garments that your nakedness may not appear This must be bought but what must we give for it Christ tels us he saith that he himself is the Pearl the treasure and that which we must give for him is no more but this Let a man deny himself and take up his cross and then follow him He must deny his worldly pleasures his carnal affections the love of his lusts he must renounce his sins If thy right hand offend thee cut it off and cast it from thee if thy right eye offend thee pluck it out and cast it from thee What is that that a man should dismember himself No such matter What then To do that which a man accounteth as harsh a peece of work as to pluck out his eye or cut off his hand that is to mortifie his carnal affections to part with his sweetest lusts which a man holdeth as dear and sets as high a rate upon as on his right hand or his right eye there should he no sin so precious no gain so sweet no pleasure so delightful but a man should be willing to let it for Christ there should be no worldly thing whasoever that a man should so set his heart upon but if persecution for the Gospel should come he should be contented to leave it for Christ and in the mean space to let his affections hang loose to it that whensoever Christ shall call him to part with his estate with his contentments with himself he may let all fall for his sake and the Gospels This is the heavenly traffique of a Christian I might here lay down some tryals by which men may be able to judg of themselves in this particular whether their conversation be in heaven I will instance but in some generals because I hasten to that I principally intend See how thy affections stand such as is a mans mind such is the man such as is a mans affection such is his conversation a heavenly affection argueth a heavenly conver sation a heavenly conversation presupposeth a heavenly affection for it is impossible for any man to walk in a heavenly course but he that is of a heavenly mind It sheweth the errour of those men that think that that pitch of holiness and careful walking with God in newness of life is too strict a point to be pressed what say they will you have us to be Saints are we not men shall we not have infirmities still Yes that thou wilt when thou hast done what thou canst But here is the thing What is the bent of thy heart what is the strength of thy mind what is the endeavour of thy whole man which way are thy affections carried What dost thou mourn for most what dost thou rejoyce in most what dost thou hope for most According to thy affections so will thy labour and endeavour be A heavenly heart sorroweth most for sin a heavenly affection rejoyceth most in Christ Many say who will shew us any good but Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us thou hast given me more joy of heart then they had when their corn and wine and oyle abounded A heavenly affection hopeth most for heaven and that not so much that thereby he way be released from worldly troubles as that he may be possessed of those heavenly joyes that are to be had in the presence of God and in a perfect communion with him that he may be freed from sin and fully brought into the glorious liberty of the sons of God And this is that which stirreth him up with all industry and endeavour and carrieth him along mainly and chiefly to seek after not the wealth and honour and pleasure of the world but how he may get into the Covenant of grace and an interest in Christ how he may attain evidences of heaven and testimonies of the love of God He speakes of heaven as the worldly man speaks of the world A worldly man speaks of the world and the world heareth him faith Christ every table ringeth of his worldly talke every company soundeth of his worldly affections in every meeting he sheweth his worldly disposition So a heavenly-minded man is alwayes talking of heavenly things alwayes labouring to draw heavenly uses out of earthly things let crosses come he can draw comforts from thence he makes them means to take off his heart from the world to set it more toward heaven as Noahs Arke the more the waters increased the neerer it was raised to heaven so a heavenly man the more worldly crosses come the higher his soul riseth toward heaven the worldly man sinketh under afflictions but he is lifted up neerer to Christ This is a heavenly conversation But I will not stand on this The second thing which I told you was observable from the first part of the Text was this That in this very life the children of God are stated in a heavenly condition Our conversation is now in heaven faith the Apostle When a man is brought by repentance and faith unto Christ he is brought into a heavenly state actually possessed of heaven And that in two respects In respect of right and title In respect of possession First in respect of right and title and that also first in respect of
avoids the corruptions that are in the world through lusts But this looking for the second coming of Christ This Argument John the Baptist used to press upon his hearers the Doctrin of repentance because the king dome of God was at hand This is that upon which Saint Peter groundeth his exhortatoin unto the people Acts 3.18 Repent saith he and be converted that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord Therefore repent and return unto God do away your sins because there will a time of refreshing come and you had need then to be found in another hue in another state then in your old rotten withered condition and sinful lusts This is the Argument that the Aposte used to the Athenians to bring them from Idolatry to serve the living God because God hath appointed a time to judg the world in righteousness by that man whom ho hath ordained Even for that reason because God hath appointed a time to judg the world in righteousness therefore they should turne from their Idols to serve the living God There is nothing that doth so unbottome the heart nothing so shakes and looseneth a mans hold of sin and unrighteousness as the consideration of Christs coming to Judgment What will it boot me will the soul reason to keep my sins when Christ will come to judg me for my sins What shall I get by going on in a course of sin when I can look for nothing then but a sentence of wrath to be denounced against me This then is that that doth settle a man in a holy conversation in that respect Nay fourthly this is that also which quickneth a man to the practise of all holy duties in his place both in his general and particular Calling It is the very argument which the Apostle Saint Peter useth to stir us up to holiness of conversation Seeing saith he that all these things shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for the coming of the day of God wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat As if he should have said Look now about the whole world and see what it is that now can comfort you if you be such as go on in a course of sin It may be you will say I fear not much for I have many friends Yea but all these shall die It may be thou hast store of lands but all that shall be burnt with fire It may be thou hast many pleasures but then there shall be nothing but Judgment The coming of the Lord that shall then put an end to all these and turn the course of things the expectation thereof is a special means to take us off from a course of sin and put us on to a course of obedience to make us walk in another kind of fashion while we are in the world Therefore the Apostle Saint Paul when he would â—…ir up Timothy to the work of the Ministry what is the Argument that he useth I charge thee before Christ who shall judg the quick and the dead As if he should say there shall be an appearing before the Lord and therefore if thou wilt give thy account up with joy at that day I charge thee to look to thy Ministry So may I say to every man in his place I charge thee that art a Master of a Family look to the business of thy family to the salvation of the souls of thy people I charge thee that art a father or a mother to look to the salvation of the souls of thy children I charge thee that art a Christian to look to the salvation of thy own soul And how is the charge I charge thee before the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judg the quick and the dead Because there shall come a time when both thou and they shall be present before Christ at his appearing therefore if thou wilt have comfort in them and in thy self and in Christ be careful to do the duty that concerns thy place Looking for the coming of the Lord Jesus So then you see in this respect also there is nothing so forcible an Argument to settle a man in a holy conversation in a heavenly course as this for a man alwayes to look for the second coming of Christ Lastly there is nothing fixeth a man so constantly in a holy course as this Our conversation faith the Apostle is alwayes in heaven We alwayes walk on earth as those that aspire to heaven because we alwayes look for the coming of Christ Wert thou carefnl to serve God yesterday do it to day also it may be Christ may come now and take thee away by death to day and there is no preparation for judgment afterward Little children saith Saint John now abide in him that when he shall appear we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him at his coming What is it that giveth a man boldness and takes away shame from him at the coming of Christ What is the reason that a man hath not that spirit of fear and trembling upon him that shall be upon the hearts of all those that go on in sin when they shall cry to the mountains to fall upon them but this that he hath continued in a holy conversation and constantly walked before the Lord with an upright heart I have finished my course saith the Apostle I have fought a good fight I have kept the faith hence-forth is layd up for me a crown of righteousness which Christ the righteous Judg shall give to me and to all them that love his appearing Still the servants of God have incouraged themselves to persevere in a holy course from the expectation of the coming of Christ that will give them a reward for their constancy in his service It is the Argument that the holy Ghost useth to the Church of Philadelphia Rev. 3.11 Hold fast that thou hast and let no man take thy crown As if he should say There is a time coming when Crowns shall be given but to whome to those that hold out that persevere in a godly course Be thou faithful to the death and thou shalt receive a crown of glory This is that I say that will make a man go on will make him that is good in youth be good in age also because whensoever he dieth he shall receive his Crown This will make a man that he shall not begin in the spirit and end in the flesh this will make him that having put his hand to the plough he will not look back because he no further looks for comfort in the appearance of Christ then he hath had care to walk on constantly in a good course Thus you see the point proved to you that a Christian soul hath a main benefit by his looking for the second coming of Christ
mad merrimemt he is a mad man that rejoyceth in that for which except he betake himself to serious and bitter mourning he cannot be saved Thirdly the inordinateness of the joy of young men may appear in this because they rejoyce excessively in lawful things for any joy when it is inordinate and excessive it is carnal It is lawful to rejoyce in recreations a whetting is no letting as the Proverb goeth But for a man to let out himself to the hinderance of the service of God to the disturbance of his duty to men it is unlawful It is lawfull to delight in the blessings and comforts of God that he affordeth us we read of the Joy of harvest in Isa 9. But for a man to delight in the gifts of God more then in the giver it is unlawfull Now if young men examine themselves they shall find their hearts mount not up to God in their joy and jollity and that they are excessive in the joy of the creature but altogether cold without joy of the Creatour Fourthly the carnalness of the Joy of young men may well appear in this because they terminate and conclude not their joy in God This followeth on the former for it is impossible that what beginneth not in God should end in God Now when Joy beginneth in sin it cannot end in God but in the Divel Secondly let young men take notice of themselves how they walk after their own hearts The heart that saies Come put away pensive thoughts trouble not your self about the day of reckoning and Judgement enjoy the time present what need this strictness of conversation zeal is but rashness there is no need of it take thy sill of pleasures thou hast goods laid up for many years Thus they Judge and thus they walk after their carnal heart This heart is as no heart as we read of Ephraim in Hosea 7. He was a silly dove that had no heart Certainly the heart that doth not guide men in the right way and direct men to the fear of God it is no heart For as the eye that will not lead us in the right way that performs not its office is no eye so the heart that leadeth not men to God and to goodness it is like the heart of Ephraim it is as no heart Again in the third place Let young men take notice of themselves how they walk after the sight of their eyes That is they stand gazing on things temporal and neglect things eternal they see a beauty and lustre in these outward things and perceive no glory and brightness in Christ Jesus and in his precious Ordinances Beloved if we follow our own heart and our own eyes it will be thus We should rather labour with Job to make a covenant with our eyes Oh how few young men are there that make a bargaine and agreement with their eyes that they Oh how few young men are shall not be as open Casements to let sin into the soul there that like Jeremy have their eyes as fountains of water to weep day and night for the afflictions of the people of God Oh how few yonng men are there that with Moses have an eye to the recompence of reward that they may suffer affliction with the people of God rather then to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season Now I beseech you take a survey of your selves in these things These are the vices and sins and deformities of young men to be seen and lamented by all those that hope to dwell in Gods holy Hill The second use of this point is for exhortation to young men they should labour to be reformed in their affections and hearts And away away with this carnall joy we ought to cast it out of us Carnal Joy will you know what the event of it will be It will end in carnal sorrow and without repentance in hell it self Wo unto you faith our Saviour Christ that laugh now you shall weep and mourn The triumphing of the wicked saith Zophar in Job is short and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment though his excellency mount up to the heavens and his head reach unto the clouds yet he shall perish as his own dung they which have seen him shall say where is be He shall fall away as a dream and shall not be found yea he shall be chased away as a vision of the night But not to give you this only in Precept but also to shew you how to reform your selves in these vices that Solomon speciâ—…eth bo bear sway in young men let me lay you down these few directions First you must betake your selves to mourning for you sins as Saint James saith Be afflctied and weep and mourn let your laughter be turned into heaviuess If we be not reconciled to God if we have not assurance that we are interested in Christ there is no time for us to rejoyce we should rather betake our selves to bitter mourning for the wrath of God is due unto us and we know not how soon it may fall upon us In the second place Consider how vain all things are in which youthfull persons rejoyce If young men rejoyce in human wisdome and understanding this is a vain thing For first it is gotten with a great deal of trouble and vexation of spirit so faith Solomon Eccles 1.13 I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven this sore travel hath God given to the sons of men to be exercised therewith And verse 18. in much wisdome is much grief and he that increaseth knowledg increaseth sorrow God doth so punish the pride and boldness of the wit of men even from the fall of our first Parents Secondly this human wisdome it must needs be a vain thing for Eccles 1.15 that which is crooked cannot be made straight and that which is wanting cannot be numbred by human wisdome The meaning is this that the natural wisdome of man cannot supply the defects of nature which are innumerable much lesse can it furnish the soul with grace or salvation Thirdly it is but vexation of spirit Solomon though he had gotten wisdome and understanding and had experience more then all the Kings of Jerusalem that were before him yet faith he Behold this is vexation of spirit Again God will abolish this human wisdome 1 Cor. 1.19 I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent Where is the wise where is the Scribe where is the disputer of this world Hath not God made foolish the wisdome of this world Besides all your human wisdom it shall not go down to to the Grave it shall leave you when you die There is no work nor device nor knowledg nor wisdome in the grave whether thou goest Eccles 9.10 This is the first thing in which young
those that were without God in the present world as the Apostle saith Now for this there is no distinction in our time for Christ being made the Corner stone hath made both walls one the Jewes and Gentiles being built upon himself all this difference is taken away But at that time it was fit to maintain a distinction to keep a note of difference As God set a mark upon the flesh of Abraham and upon the houses of the Israelites in Egypt so they kept this in all points even in their very Graves that a difference might be maintained between the seed of the Woman and the seed of the Serpent to the uttermost Give me a possession a burying place Here is the end why he would have this Pessession A strange kind of Possession a thing that every one is born to no man will deny this we say the land in the Church-yard is every mans every man is born to that land Behold such a land such an inheritance this Father cometh to begg He hath not a foot of ground in all the whole land no place to dwell in but by their leeves no place to feed on but with there consent he is content thus to possesse to have it upon their hand to have his house upon their liking and his field and grass upon their affection and content to be gone and depart upon their bidding but when it cometh that his dead must be buryed there is no dislodging then no removing then that is a Possession he makes not other things his Possession but useth them in a transitory manner So that the holy Ghost would teach us this that a mans Grave is his strong hold his Possession And indeed there is no Possession so durable and certain as the Grave all the lands and all the means that a man hath in this world it may in the course of time either by the misguidence of the party or the succession of prodigals be made away that he that hath had full possessions may not have a foot of land to call his own so Possession are alterable sometime one mans sometimes anothers and again anothers no man knoweth whose because they are still removing But when a man is possest of his Grave that is a long Possession that Lease is time out of mind and it holdeth to the coming of Christ to Jndgement Though there be a sort of covetous men in the world that care not for lucre and gain to remove dead bodies to make men pay dear and yet presently when the memory of that payment is gone in this base respect to remove them from their natural rest and to put new bodies in their room Though this I say be practised by some yet notwithstanding the Lord hath ordered this that a man should have his Grave for ever and that all Christian men should know that they have no such true inherent Possession sticking to them and they to it as the Grave Thus the great God bringeth us to life by death making us possesse the Grave here for a time and after possesseth us with life and glory and joy in the highest heavens Behold Abraham see how he beginneth to possesse the world by no land pasture or earable Lordship the first thing is a Grave So every Christian must make his resolution The first houshold-stuff that ever Seleucus bought in Babylon was a Sepulchre stone a stone to lay upon him when he was dead that he kept in his garden So we should begin to make that our chief utensill it should teach every Christian much more to be mortified so to the world as to be settled upon nothing for a Possession so as the ground where his flesh shall rest in hope till the Lord receive him and give him his Spirit again A strong kind of entrance this holy man made into the holy Land that the first thing he takes possession of should be a place of burial for the dead Even so wondrously God useth to work the promised seed it came of the dead womb of Sarah and accordingly it is in this great and famous History that out of these dead ones the Lord takes such a firme possesson of this Land that when four hundred years were come about there was such a quick issue that it drove all the Inhabitants out of the Land for out of Sarah that was now dead and Abraham and the Partiarchs that were interred in his Cave out of their dead loynes the Lord raised a living issue of six hundred thousand foot-men besides women and children that came under the conduct of Joshua and discomfited the Captains of the Land and took possession The gracious God out of dead and poor things in the world raiseth strength and Majesty that those that they trampled upon and accounted as dead men the Lord made out of them such a living stock that all the poor of Canaun was not able to hold up and make head against them they were such a powerful Army but hid themselves in Caves and became as dead men to give place to these dead men Here is the wonderful great glory of the Almighty out of meer nothing to work all things and as he made all things that are seen out of nothing for by faith we learn that things that are seen were made of things that are not seen so he still continueth to lay his foundation in baseness and humility in a ridiculous manner to flesh and bloud yet out of that he bringeth large and infinitie majesty and glory such as no man can aspire in his thoughts to think sufficiently of Give me a burying place to bury my dead Behold he calleth her Sarah his dead he calleth her not Wife though it is said after in the Text that Abraham buried Sarah his wife yet that is in respect of the time of her life when they lived together and in respect of the former society and converse they had but now he speaks to the point she is no more his Wise but his dead It is translated by all in the Neuter Gender not my dead she but my dead simply in the Neuter gender as a thing which now had not so much relation So it is true when men and women are severed by Death they are no more man and wife but one anothers dead For as the Apostle saith Do you not know that as long as a man liveth his wife is subject to him and she must not couverse with another So likewise for men again but when God dissolveth the contract by Death then as she is free for another man so she is no more his Wife so long as she was alive upon the ground she was his Wife but now when she is to go into the ground he calleth her his dead but not his Wife The substance and sum is this That Matrimony is Gods blessing for present use of mankind for the propagating of the Species to continue the seed of man to the worlds end that there may be
up in Armes against this materiall world and to rend himself from this faecaelent matter and out of the greatness of his Spirit and nobleness of his disposition to be altogether ambitious of the presence of God and of these constant and unchangeable good things This is the duty of Christians and are not they Strangers Are not they strangers that have double Impost and double customes and the greatest taxations laid upon them is not this peculiar unto the Saints in this life have they not afflictions laid upon them in the greatest measure must they not through many afflictions enter into the kingdome of heaven Have they not tears and that in abundance for their meat and for their drink Have they not enemies from within and enemies from without Must they not be conformable to their head Christ their elder brother as he had his double portion in this life of afflictions and punishments so must they have as he was sanctified by afflictions so must they also The gold is not pure unless it be tryed nor the water sweet if it have not a currant nor the vessel bright unless it be scoured nor the Saints fit for heaven unless they be prepared by afflictions what man was there that ever set himself seriously either to reform himself or others that found not great opposition from himself and from others and are not these strangers Are not they strangers that are ad placitum Principis to stay in the Land or to be gone according as he shall manifest his royall pleasure by his Proclamation and are not we here in the world upon these termes how soon all of us or any of us shall be dismissed who knows who dares promise to himself the late evening or secure himself of the least atome or moment of time he that dreamed waking of long continuance had scarce liberty to dream sleeping for that night they took away his soul and he himself was branded to succeeding generations with the name of a fool and are not we strangers Did not the Saints of God whose judgements were most refined those that had the honour to approach most near unto God himself alwayes so repute themselves Doth not the holy Patriarch that wrestled with God and hath principality over him Did not he acknowledge that few and evil were the dayes of his pilgrimage Did not he that was a man after Gods own heart that had a special promise that his house should continue for ever Yet did not he acknowledg that he was a stranger as well as his fathers were is it not his earnest prayer unto God I am a stranger upon earth hide not thy Commandements from me as if he had said I am a Traveller upon earth I am speeding to Jerusalem which is above I am to passe through this dark calignous world thy Word is a light to my feet a lanthorn to my steps the rule the square the cannon of all rectitude hide not this light from me lest I run out of the way or linger in the way or stumble or fall in the way I am a stranger upon earth c. What should I instance in particulars are they not summed up to my hand by the Apostle Heb. 11.13 All these Patriarks Prophets Saints all of them did acknowledg themselves to be strangers Examples have in them an universality of Doctrine and instruction especially the examples of the Saints because Praxis Sanctorum is Interpres pracceptorum the practice of the Saints is the best interpretation of the precept Examples have in them a directive force because those that are best disposed in mind and body are a rule for the rest Examples have an incentive force to give life spirits vigour transmitting by a kind of Metem Psychosis the soul the spirits the resolutions the affections of the pattern to him that reads it extorting deep sighs and tears and groans and other alterations at their pleasure And if any Examples have this force have not these much more Other examples have the testimony of men these have the testimony of God himself he is not ashamed a wonderful condiscention of the one and the supream elevation of the other to be called their God the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob the Father of the faithful and the God of the beleevers There are examples whereof men boast but God is ashamed of them corrupt examples of wicked the imperfect examples of heathen men of these God is ashamed but of these God is not shamed and shall we be ashamed of them We are then strangers Let me instill into your ears the voyce of that was heard in the Temple before the ruin of it Migremus hinc Let us go from hence Let me say unto you with our Saviour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us go from hence let us truss up our fardels and on with our sandals and promote our way to heaven Let us depose and lay down all burthens and impediments and make our selves expedite and fit for our journey we are in an Inne let us look about us and leave nothing behind but carry all with us or send it before us we have but an instant of our abode here let us imploy it to the best advantage It is the greatest loss it is the most shameful loss it is the most irrecoverable loss that may be to lose this instant upon which eternity depends eternity of misery or eternity of felicity let us follow our Saviour let us seek his face let us ascend with him let us not rest here Sleep may overtake us a false Prophet may deceive us the snare may intangle us the Armie of the enemy may fall upon us let us be above all these Let us seek those things that are above What where Sun and Moon are nothing less Where then where God is where Christ who is our house our temple our habitation that we may be cloathed with him this is the desire of all the Saints and this leads me to the second point That the Saints desire a true and proper house In this we groan earnestly c. What is meant by this house whether the Joyes of heaven or a Glorisied body is hard to determine by the context I incline to Calvins opinion that both are meant as making up that compleat house which the Saints desire the one as the introition the other as the consummation of their bliss and into both these houses I shall labour to introduce your spirits and affections The first house is the Joyes of heaven a kingdome else-where for the amplitude for the abundant sufficiency for the honour royalty of them yet because many in kingdomes see not the face of the King and of those that see his face few are of his house and family and of those that are of his Court few are familiar with him or converse with him and of those that converse with him few are his sons his heirs Therefore this kingdome is an house wherein all
equality with the Angels the glory of a Kingdome worthy a tear a groan a sigh a fast are they now so contemptible or mean that no violence is requisite with what face shall we appear before our Saviour at his Tribunal when he shall demand of us his tears his watchings and fastings when he shall say unto us were are my tears are they water spilt upon the ground not to be gathered up Where are my sighs and groans have they vanished in the ayr where are my watchings what not a tear for so many tears not a fast for so many fasts not a groan for so many miseries which I indured Had I shed but one tear should it not have broken up a fountain of tears in thee Had I setched but one sigh should it not have made thy life a perpetual sigh But when I have done so much for thy sake shall it be lost wilt thou do nothing for thy own self shall I cast so much seed into the ground and reap nothing again Oh my beloved what are all our afflictions what are all the afflictions of our selves to the least drop of gall that he tasted to the least scourge which he suffered how can we say that either we loved God or our selves if we do not these things in testimony of this If ye shall not perform these duties it is a small comfort for us that we have freed our souls it is your salvation we thirst after and say in a better sense then the King of Sodome Da nohis animas Give us your souls and without this we have no comfort we may be acquitted at the bar of God but we shall not be crowned in his Throne for what is our crown but you that hear us but if you shall thus groan as I doubt not but you do in secret it is not I but God himself hath promised that they that sow in tears shall reap in joy that they which mourn here shall be comforted hereafter that they which groan here shall be refreshed in their proper house In this we groan earnestly desiring to be cloathed upon with our house which is from heaven Which God of his infinite mercy grant c. THE CARELESSE MERCHANT OR THE WOFUL LOSSE OF THE PRECIOUS SOUL SERMON XXII MATT. 16.26 What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his soul THe Patriarch Jacob in his vision at Bethel saw the Angels of God ascending and descending Gen. 28. So from the thirteenth verse of this Chapter we have the Disciples of Christ ascending and descending For first their general speaker Simon Peter had made a notable confession of our Saviours Divinity and had received for the further incouragement of himself and his brethren such an excellent testimony from our Saviour that the Angels of heaven might behold observe and imbrace Blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jona for flesh and blood hath not revealed this to thee but my father which is in heaven and I say thou art Peter and on this rock will I build my Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it Which words were not only appropriate to him they were spoken to him but they were common to all the Apostles For as Origen argues shall we think that the gates of hell prevailed not against Peter but did a gainst the rest Therefore that which was said to him was said to all and being such a glorious commendation behold the Angels ascend But secondly what if the earthly mind of man dream of a Messias temporal and that they must be promoted to places of eminency and stiled gracious Lords the case is too palpable for if Christ warn his Disciples and tell them of his approaching death at Jerusalem he shall be sure to meet with a check no such matter it shall not be so to thee Oh! here is a strange metamorphise a sudden alteration before a Confessor and now a controller there is no wisdome of the spirit in this and therefore no commendation for this but because he was somewhat too forward get the behind me for thou art an offence to me behold the Angels descend And surely this carnal wisdome had been able to weigh them down to the nethermost hell had not the wisdomâ—… of the wisest curbed and subdued and restrained it What not suffer Yes Peter also must suffer and all that will follow Christ must renounce all the inticements of the world and mortifie all the corrupt exorbitancies of the flesh and resist all the temptations of the Divel For what is a man profited if he gain the whole world and lose his soul Which words are an exaggeration of the woful estate of a temporizing Professor of a carnal Gospeller and they reach to our consideration these four generals First the excellency and worth of mans soul which is of greater value then the whole world Secondly the possiblity of the loss a man may lose his own soul Thirdly the compossibility of outward prosperity he may lose his soul in gaining the whole world And then lastly the woful bargain in such an exchange What is a man profited Of these in order First of the surpassing excellency and dignity of mans soul it is valued and prized here above the whole world It was the plausible conceit of certain Ehilosophers that the world was a great man and that man was a little world a little world indeed but as Saint 〈◊〉 rearms him a great wonder for within this little world there is a reasonable soul worth all the world To render an exact definition of the soul it requires the tongue of an Angel rather then of a man it passes the comprehension of travellers to apprehend the nature of the soul for these three God Angels and mans Soul they are unknown to us we may sooner admire their excellency then conceive their nature and argue of their opperations then attain their knowledge of such sublimity is the soul of man so Angelical and Divine the excellency whereof is commended to us by three distinct voyces of Nature Grace Glory For first in the order of nature it is the greatest thing saith Plato that we may conceive in a narrow room the most noble thing that all the frame of nature affords and that In respect of the Orignal In respect of the Image In respect of the Original the soul of man hath no beginning here 〈◊〉 there was no voyce directed to the earth or to the water for the production of 〈◊〉 soul but a serious confultation of the sacred Trinity and a breathing into his 〈…〉 the breath of life Saith Saint Austin he created it by infusion and 〈…〉 creation And the Philosopher well concludes that the soul as it is not from without it is only divine Therefore the Manichees extolled it too high when they deemed it a portion of Gods substance let not others abase and depresse it too low to think it is derived
from Parents it comes not of their substance it is enough for them to be the fathers of the flesh God alone is the Father of spirits as the Apostle makes the antithesis Heb. 12.9 Secondly for the Image the soul is most like God saith Plato saith Aristotle it is of the nearest kin of the greatest consanguinity as I may say and the Lord himself signifies so much After our Image let us make man Then the soul of man is not stamped with a Roman Caesar but with Gods own Image and superscription and that First in respect of the substance being not only a spiritual intellectual incorporeal invisible essence but explaining by the plurality of Powers in the unity of Essence the plurality of Persons in the unity of the Deity Secondly being furnished with singular indowments as in the state of innocency with perfect wisdome and holiness and righteousness Yea still in the state of sin some generals are lest some broken fragments of the creation moral qualifications that may lead us by the hand to the knowledge of our Master Lastly in regard of the comanding power it hath over the body It is to the body as Moses was to Pharoah a God to the body it actuates it and moves and commands and restrains it whereby next and immediately under God we live and move and have our being Seeing then the soul is the immediate work and character of God himself so excellent for the Original and for the Image let nature conclude that the soul in-these regards is of greater value then the whole world Secondly in the Kingdome of grace the price of the soul is far above the dignity of the world and that in the grace of Redemption and the grace of renovation For first in the souls redemption the soul amounts so high as that the whole Creation is not able to discharge it It is not gotten for gold nor silver is not weighed for the price of it it is not valued with the gold of Ophir or the precious Onix It cost more to redeem the soul of sinful man the precious bloud of the eternal Son of God he could only redeem it that at the first created it Ye are bought with a price the precious blood of Christ Secondly in the grace of renovation nothing is able to cleanse it from sin but the Spirit of God The spirit alone must enlighten the understanding and rectisie the affections and purisie the will and sanctifie the conscience and seal up the Image of God in righteousness and true holiness And the soul thus renewed is as a Garden inclosed a spiritual Paradise where the God of heaven delights to dwell the Spouse of the Beloved and in the phrase of the Church As the Lilly among the thorns so is my love among the daughters Seeing it appears that the universal World is not able to redeem or being redeemed to renew or renewed to parallel the soul let grace subscribe to that which nature concludes that the soul is of greater value then the whole world Lastly for the passage of glory the contents of the whole Universe are not able to come neer the soul Saith S. Bernard well well it may be busie and took up with other things but it cannot be satiate and replenished with them And Democrates imagined that if there were millions of worlds it were all one in comparison of the soul for blessedness The world is transitory like the dew of the morning it fades as the grass and as the flower of the field whereas on the contrary the soul of man is the subject of immortality capable of an exceeding surpassing eternal weight of glory For if in the time of grace we behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord and are changed into the same Image from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord. How resplendant shall the soul of the righteous be in the beatifical vision of Gods excellencies How wonderful shall that divine capacity be that shall be capable of God himself for a perpetual residence Insomuch that the most ancient of dayes shall give fulness to the Soul of knowledg and wisdom and his sacred Spirit that shall fill it with the fulness of God with contentation and the sacred Trinity shall be all in all to it Seeing then the Soul is capable and is the subject of the happiness and joyes of heaven and partner with the glorious Angels in the fruition of the chief good let the sentence of glory joyn to Grace and nature that the Soul is of greater value then the whole world Behold then O man out of the mouth of three witnesses for I may say in this case as Saint John saith in another There are three that bear record in heaven the Father the Word and the holy Ghost Behold out of the mouth of three Witnesses the surpassing excellency and dignity of thy soul it is the breathing of God the Image of God he created it with his Word redeemed it with his Son and in whomsoever his grace abides he will crown it hereafter with his glorious presence What then remains but that we esteem our souls accordingly as God values them Let us not with the unhallowed voluptuous in these times make Lords of our bodies and slaves of our souls Let us not spend our dayes in providing for the lusts of the flesh Let us not in affectation of fair possessions of able servants of hopeful sons and good friends content our selves with bad souls A mans soul is himself saith Plato And O wretched wight saith Saint Austin how hast thou deserved so much ill of thy self as among all thy goods to be only thy self bad O remember the sublimity of thy precious soul thou knowest not what a precious pearle thou hast in thy body like the hidden treasure in the Gospel it is of greater worth than the whole field I say not as he did know that thou hast a God in thee yet know that in that better part of thy nature thou art like to God for he hath given thee a soul of his own breathing and stamped it with the impress of his own Image and created it capable of the fruition of his own presence in endless glory In the consideration whereof walk worthily of this precious divine inspiration Thy Soul is a spirit let thy thoughts be spiritual Thy soul is immortal let thy meditations be of immortality and renounce thy body and good name and gifts of the world for the gainig of thy soul for what shall it profit a man to gain the whole world and to lose his own soul So much shall serve to be spoken of the first point the surpassing excellency and dignity of the soul it is vallued and prized here above the whole world Now the next is the possibility that a man may lose his own soul The mention whereof causeth me to remember that passage between Christ and his
not so to be accounted slack but saith the Apostle He is patient toward us and would have none perish but come to repentance Then the slackness of Christs coming is his patience because he would give us time to repent and have us prepared before he come O! then beloved let us not make a mock as others do of this patience but while we have time let us take time that when he comes we may be worthy of him Thus you have the first heresie confuted The second was quite contrary to this set abroach by certain false teachers who taught the Thessalonians that the day of Judgement was so neer that it should happen in their age Where by the way you may take notice of the exceeding great subtilty of the Divel that labours by all means possible to bring men to one of these extreams Either that the day of Judgement shall never come or it shall come in such a limited time and age And indeed it is ranked among the opinions of some that held that the day of Judgement should be just 6000 years after the Creation 2000. before the Law 2000. under the Law and 2000. under the Gospel But Saint Paul answers these false teachers among the Thessalonians and all of the like opinion therefore to arm them against their assaults he bids them for a certainty beleeve it 2 Thessal 2. that the day of judgement was not at hand And he gives the reason vers 3. For saith he that day shall not come except there he a departing first and that man of sin the son of perdititon be revealed But how is it that the Apostle tells the Thessalonians that the day of Judgement was not at hand seeing it is plain in the places before recited that the end of the world was at hand and that now was the last times and Heb. 9.26 Christ appeared in the end of the world It was in the end of the world that Christ appeared to sacrifice himself for our sins how is it then that he tells the Thessalonians here that the day of the Lord is not at hand Master Calvin saith the answer is easie for saith he in respect of God it was at hand but as for us we must be continually waiting for it But Master Beza and Rollock give another Exposition which I take to be more natural to the place for say they in all those places where it seems to be avouched that the day of the Lord is at band they understand the word in the Original to signifie generally a time drawing neer As to say the day of judgement may be this day as well as to morrow and to morrow as well as this day and many dayes hence as well as now But in that place where he saith it is not at hand they understand the word precisely to be meant of a precise time so the Apostle speaks truly the day of judgement is not at hand so as that any man can say it shall be this hour or this day or this month or this year or this age This is no more but the doctrine of Christ Of that day and hour no man knoweth no not the Angels in heaven no not Christ himself as man but the Father only So you see it is plain and evident that the day of Judgement is at hand but in what precise limits of time or age it shall happen it is uncertain Our Saviour Christ tells his Apostles Act. 1.7 It is not for you to know the times and seasons that the Father hath put into his own hands It is not for you to know these times Then beloved why should we have an ear to hear where God hath not a tongue to speak Let it suffice us to know that it is at hand which if we make good use of it will make us wary and watchful and Vigilant over all our wayes that we say not with the evil servant Our Master defers his coming let us eat and drink and beat our fellow servants but betake our selves to the good servants duty to watch Watch we therefore we know not the day and hour when the Son of man cometh But when he cometh and finds us doing well dealing faithfully and living holily happy nay thrice happy shall we be we shall be sure to partake of the blessing of those upon mount Gerrazim we need not fear the curse of those upon Mount Ebal We need not be afraid of the Thundering and lightning on Sinai nor the fire and tempest nor smoak of the furnace nor of the sound of the Trumpet for all our joy shall be in Sion But when he comes if he find us living wickedly dealing unfaithfully cursed nay thrice cursed we be we are sure to partake of mourning for joy of ashes for beauty of a rent for a girdle whatsoever becomes of our garments assuredly our hearts shall be rent in sunder Watch we therefore we know not the day and hour when the Son of man will come In the second place that the children of God may be armed and prepared for his coming he hath set down in his Word certain signs which being effected and come to pass they may easily judge that then the day of redemption draweth nigh Now these signs are of three sorts Some are in respect of us a long time before he comes to judgement A second sort are imediately before his coming The third in his coming The signs that prognosticate his coming long before are these First of all the preaching of the Gospel to the whole world which is set down by Christ Mat. 24.14 The Gospel of the kingdome shall be preached to the whole world for a testimony to all Nations then shall the end be Which words of our Saviour Christ we are not so to understand as that the Gospel should be preached to the whole world at any one time for that never was nor I think never will be but if we so understand it that the Gospel shall be preached to all Nations successively and at several times then if we consider the times since the Apostles we shall find that the sound of the Gospel hath gone out to all the Nations of the world as it was spoken by the Prophet so that this first sign is already past the end cannot be far The second sign is the revealing of Antichrift saith the Apostle 2. Thessal 2.3 That day shall not come except there be a departing and that man of sin the son of perdition which is Antichrist be revealed Concerning this sign in the year of our Lord 602. after Christ S. Gregory seemeth to avouch that whosoever taketh the name of universal Bishop and Pastor of the Church that was Antichrist Five years after Boniface succeeding him by Phocas the Emperour had the title of Universal Bishop of the Church and ever since all their successours have taken that name so that it is evident that at Rome hath been and now
else that speech could not stand what ye lease on earth shall be loosed in heaven and what ye bind on earth shall be bound in heaven We bind when by declaring of mens sins we denounce the judgment of God against such sins and so pronounce men to stand under the wrath of God that remain in those sins saith Christ what you thus bind on earth shall be bound in heaven that is Gods act shall ratifie and confirm the same sentence in heaven which we denounce here upon earth by vertue of this word So when we come to distressed souls and declare to them that they stand acquitted and that by the Word of God and so as Ministers of the Gospel by vertue of the truth revealed to us declare that they are freed from the bond and guilt of their sins upon those evidences of repentance that they manifest I say it is ratified in heaven Therefore you see there is no other way of proceeding but look as Christs own words when he was upon the earth so the same that are as his own words that is those truths that are drawn from Christs truths have the same power upon the hearts and consciences of men now to cammand them and shall have after to judge them as ever they had But here it may be objected it should seem that all men shall not be judged by the Law because there are some men to whom the Law hath never been published for what shall we say to a great part of the world that have not yet received the Scriptures we know that the Scriptures have not been published to a great part of the world at this day there are many Heathens many Pagans that never had the Scriptures therefore how shall they be jndged by the Law except you say that only those shall be judged by it that have been under the preaching of the Gospel and have had the help of the Scriptures We answer that all man-kind and every particular man is under the Law only the Law is not alike expressed to them it is not revealed alike to all sorts All have the Law and the Law written too but either it is written in the hearts of men and so it is naturally in the hearts of all the Sons of men Or else in the Scrptures and so it is more clearly and evidently manifested in the Churches but yet nevertheless in the hearts of men is the Law written as much as shall be sufficient to condemn them as we see Rom. 2.14 saith the Apostle If the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature the things contained in the Law they having not the Law are a Law to themselves and shew the effect of the Law written in their hearts their consciences accusing or excusing them before God The Gentiles that had not the Law that is not the Law written in the Scriptures yet nevertheless they are a Law to themselves that is they have certain principles certain rules which remain in their natural consciences whereby they either accuse or excuse as they do good or evil And even these do shew that they have a Law that doth bind them and shall condemn them because that when they would not obey even that Law that is even those principles whereupon their consciences wrought to accuse or excuse they were sinners against the Law So that we see no man shall be condemned at the day of judgement but by vertue of the Law and however all have not the Scripture yet they have a natural conscience and the Law written there whereby it accuseth or excuseth Howsoever it be true that things are not alike expresly manifested to other people and to us that have the Scriptures yet they have so much manifested to them as shall condemn them And the reasons of it are these why it must be so First because the Law of God is Gods Scepter whereby he governs and rules the Church Psal 110.2 he shall bring the rod of thy power out of Sion The rod of thy power that is the Scepter of thy power that Scepter whereby thou dost authoritatively and by power rule over the Churches and what is this Scepter It is the Word as we shall see Isa 2.3 4. The Law shall come out of Sion So then the Scepter the rod of the word that is brought out of Sion is the Law that comes out of Sion the word of God the Law of works and the Law of faith for both these come out of Sion the Law of works as far as it is the rule of life and then the Law of Faith both come in to rule the Church of God Yea this is the rod of Christs power therefore he will manifest his power and make all men subject to it What power There is a power of Christ such a power whereby he manifests his own greatness and soveraignty over all his creatures over those creatures that have not sence that have not reason that is not this Law But this power here the Scepter of his power is that whereby he manifests his soveraignty over reasonable creatures Angels and men therefore if they will not obey him yet it shall be a Scepter of Iron to crush them in peeces Therefore we see the very Angels themselves that would not obey the directing commandement of God the rule of life in that particular place wherein they were they found it a Scepter to crush them down and they were cast out of their place for their sin So likewise men you see what the Apostle Peter speaks of those that perished in the time of Noah because they would not receive the Word preached to them but they would be lawless and disobedient or like men that would be under no Law therefore they felt the force of it in the effect of the Law in the fruit and penalty of the Law upon them So I say Christ still rules by power in the Law in so much as that when the Law and command prevails not then the punishment prevails and they that will not subject themselves to the Law they shall be subdued under the punishment of the Law that is the first thing Again secondly it must be that Christ must proceed in judgement according to the Law because the Law is the rule Now you know a rule is a note of distinction it is that that being straight right in it self which doth distinguish and discover things that are crooked So the Law of Christ it is a straight rule in it self therefore whatsoever is contrary to it is crooked and perverse And he will declare a righteous proceeding contrary to the unrighteousness of men How by that rule that discovers unrighteousness How shal Christ appear to be righteous in his Law except he have a rule whereby unrighteousness shall be discovered Now that is discovered by the Law the right rule as it is Psa 19. The statutes of the Lord are right Now rectum is index sua oblique
man that gives a thing upon merit he gives it not freely I answer it is free in respect of us whatsoever Christ hath done we did not merit it If it be replyed Christs merits are made ours and we merit in him and so it cannot be free I answer this reason were of force if we our selves could procure the merits of Christ for us but that we could not do but that also was of free gift Ioh. 3. God so loved the world that he gave his onely begotten Son that he that beleeves in him should not perish he gave him freely of free gift so that though eternal life be due to us by the merits of Christ yet it is the free gift of God I will stand no longer in proving the truth of the Doctrine I come to the application and use to conclude with the time First it serves to confute our adversaries of the Church of Rome in the point of merit They look for heaven and eternal life as wages we see the Apostle teacheth us otherwise that eternal life is not given in that manner but another manner of way It is not given as wages it is the free gift of God And in Rom. 8. he saith that the sufferings of this life is not worthy of the glory that shall be revealed all our sufferings all our works they are not worthy of the glory of God we connot properly merit them This was the constant Doctrine of the primitive Church that a good life when we are justified and an eternal life when we are glorified they all grant that all that is good in us is the gift of God that eternal life is not a retribution to our works but the free gift of God When God crowns our merits he crowns nothing else but his own free gift these and many other sentences we find among the ancient Fathers plainly convincing our adversaries that in this point they swerve not only from Scripture but from all sound antiquity Secondly then to come to our selves this should humble us in respect of our own deservings do all the good thou canst take heed it do not puff thee up think not to merit heaven alas thou canst not do it for what is it to the Almighty as it is said in Job that thou art righteous Thy well doing extends not to him thou canst do him no good therefore thou canst look for nothing at his hands since thou canst do him no good but all that thou dost in his service it is not for his but for thy good yet he commands thee and thou art bound to do it but all thou canst do is no more then thou art bound to do Therefore when thou hast done all that thou canst acknowledge thy self to bean unprofitable servant and thou hast done no more then thy duty If thou hast many good works yet thou hast more sin and the least sin of thine in the rigour of justice will deprive thee of thy interest in God Therefore thy appeal must be to the throne of grace and thy only plea must be that of the Publican every one of us God be merciful to me a sinner when we have done all we can it must be mercy and not any merit of ours that must bring us to heaven Thirdly here is comfort for the children of God in that this inestimable treasure of eternal life is not committed to our keeping but God hath it in his keeping It is his gist it is not committed to the rotten box of our merits then we could have no certainty of it the devil would easily pick the Lock yea without picking he would shake in pieces the crazy joynts of the best work we do he would steal it from us and take it away and deprive us of this excellent benefit but the Lord hath dealt better for us he hath kept it in his own hands he hath laid it up in the Cabinet of his own mercy and love that never fails for with everlasting mercy he hath compassion on us Isa 54. he loves us with an everlasting love It is his mercy that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not and whom he loves he loves to the end It is laid up in the mercy of God he will have it his gift lest we should keep it and it should be lost he hath reserved it in his own hands Therefore in temptations when they drive us to doubt of our attaining of eternal life let us cast our eye upon the keeper of it it is the Lord he is wary to discern and faithful to bestow it therefore let us comfort our selves and say every one of us as Saint Paul 2 Tim. 1.12 I know whom I have trusted and I am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day Lastly seeing eternal life is the free gift of God it must make us thankful to him for it which we should never do if we deserved it doth a master thank his servant for doing his duty So if we did think heaven were our due we should never be thankful for it Pride is a great enemy to thankfulness therefore the way is to humble our selves and to consider that we deserve no good thing at Gods hands then we will take this great benefit at Gods hands most thankfully Especially when we consider it is all that God requires of us as he saith Psal 50. Call upon me in the day of trouble I will hear thee and deliver thee and what shalt thou do Thou shalt glorifie me Glorifying God and being thankful to him is all the tribute we are to pay to this our royal Lord and shall we deny him this It is a small benefit that is not worth thanks We set eternal life at too low a rate if we forget to be thankful There was never a precious Jewel afforded so cheap as eternal life for our thankfulness If we did know what it were to want it we would give ten thousand worlds rather then be without it Therefore as Naamans servants said to him concerning his washing in Jordan if the Prophet had commanded thee a greater thing wouldest thou not have done it So if God had commanded us a great matter for eternal life we should have done it how much more when he saith take it and be thankful be but thankful Thus I have described to you this twofold service the wages of sin that is death temporal eternal The service of righteousness the wages and reward of that eternal life which is not wages but the gift of God So that I may now say to you as Moses did to Israel Deut. 30.19 Behold I have set before you life and death cursing and blessing Therefore choose not cursing chuse not sin nor the wages thereof it is death but choose life that you and your seed may live If we follow sin the wages will be death if we apply our selves to righteousness in the
soul is heavy unto death yet be not troubled was he so careful when he was in his own troubles on earth to comfort them and will he not now be so in heaven when he is in blessedness certainly the soul that hath recours to Christ shall not return empty therefore see how Christ is exprest in heaven Matth. 25. Come ye blessed c. For what you have done to these you have done to me he is in heaven and so Saul why dost thou persecute me he is in heaven yet in respect of his Church he is below therefore be assured that Christ hath not put off the bowels of love to his people he will be the same if thou receive him as a Lord and Saviour as ever he was to his Disciples But it may be objected we are exposed to many uncertainties though we beleeve in Christ and we find not the comfort of it here Therefore Christ saith rest not upon things present here you are in Tents but you shall come to your fathers house there is a place provided for you between which and this there is as much difference as is between a house and a Tent between a mans own mansion and an Inn. And though you have hard entertainment in the world yet you shall have an abiding place after But you will say indeed there are mansions but there are abundance to receive them what shall we do There are many masions therefore look as there are many children to be brought to glory so there are many places to receive them in glory and to settle them there we see what a vast body the Sun is and the Stars are yet they seem but little sparks in comparison of the heavens above us but what is the heaven of heavens that contain all these infinitely beyond in its own compass there are many mansions But how shall we come to heaven Saith Christ I go to prepare a place for you as if he should say all that I have done is for your sakes I die and ascend and sit at the right hand of God for your sakes I will come at the day of judgment to bring you to glory all that Christ doth now as God-man as Mediator between God and us all is for our sake But when Christ is taken from us how shall we get thither Saith he I will come and bring you with me I will come in glory at the day of Judgment in the clouds and inable you to meet me and thence bring you to those heavenly mansions in my fathers house never doubt how these things shall be done I will do them all Thus Christ would confirm their faith there is the greatest happiness and comfort in this wherein he would have them setled this should stir us up to settle our hearts this way But the time is past this shall be sufficient for this time FAITHS TRIUMPH OVER THE GREATEST TRYALS SERMON XXXII HEB. 11.17 By faith Abraham when he was tried offered up his son Isaac and he that had received the promise offered up his onely begotten son THis Chapter doth speak in the commendation of the Faith of many of the Patriarchs and Abraham among the rest is brought in with a manifest testimony of his Faith there be two things observable which Abrahams Faith strengthened him to act one was to give up his Country the other was to give up his Son to give up his Country in verse 8. By Faith Abraham when he was called of God to go out in a place which he should after receive for an inheritance obeyed and he went out not knowing whether he went To leave our friends our parents to take our journey we know not whither to live among we know not whom and all this upon a bare word this was not an easie thing to part with good Land for some good words this was a hard matter sence derides it and reason contemns it and will not hearken to it but Faith can see more in Gods promise than sence can find Abraham will leave his Country when God calls him to it but never shall lose his inheritance by beleeving and obeying no man did ever yet hazard his estate who could part with it upon obedient terms A second thing that he is to part with is with his Son his only son his first begotten son in this Act of faith Abraham sails against wind and tide where he breaks through the contentments of the world not only of sence and reason but of natural affection The story in a word is this God after many years patience at length gave Abraham a son in his old age he was the child of many prayers and of many teares the parents delight and to Abrahams thinking an heir of life because a child of the Promise he had not long spent his gray hairs in a strange land but God on a sudden calls upon Abraham to give back his son his very son Isaac as we may read in the 22 of Genesis Now what doth Abraham do how doth he behave himself doth he expostulate with God Any thing Lord but spare my son Isaac Nay the Text saith he offered up his son Doth he murmure and grumble against God in this manner Lord why dost thou single out this delight of mine why dost thou seem to envy this blessing of mine No he offered up his Isaac as if the Text had expressed Ahrahams language thus O Lord my God what is it that thou callest for whom is it that thou callest for is it for my only son Isaac the son of my love the son of thy promise the son of my age verily Lord thou shalt have him it is true I love him dearly well but I love thee better I got him by beleeving and I shall never lose him by obeying if Isaac were a thousand sons thou shouldest have them all though I am a father yet Lord thou art a God if I give him he is a sacrifice acceptable and though I kill him yet thou canst quicken him and raise him again I shall never lose my Isaac though I part with my son for thou hast said in Isaac shall thy seed be called Now the parts of these words are two First we have Abrahams great tryal Secondly we have Abrahams acquitment First his tryal Abraham was tried when he offered up his son Secondly his acquitment by Faith Abraham offered up his son In the former we may observe three particulars First the person that is tried Abraham Secondly the Person that tried him God Thirdly the thing wherein he was tried it was no ordinary thing it was to part with a part of himself to offer up his dear son Isaac In the latter part two things are observable First his quickening up himself in his obediential act he offered up Isaac saith the Text. Secondly the powerful cause which did inable Abraham to so difficult a work By faith Abraham when he was tried offered up his
all the Angels and Saints in Heaven the spirits of just men made perfect to Abrahams bosome to be with Christ Et quanta 〈◊〉 felicitas What greater happiness It was much that Moses obtained to see the back-parts of God but how much greater favour is it to see him face to face to have eternal fellowship with God the father with Christ the Redeemer with the Holy Ghost the sanctifier The knowledg of this benefit of Death makes the face of it comfortable to Gods servants and causes them to strive with their own natural weakness that so they may even long for their day of dissolution But now against this point divers Objections may be alledged For first the Apostle Paul sayes that Death is the wages of sin And else-where he stiles it Christs enemy the last enemy that he shall subdue is Death How should not death then be rather a day of misery to be trembled at then a day of happiness to be longed for To this I answer that we are to distinguish touching Death for it must be considered two wayes First as it is in its owe nature Secondly as it is altred by Christ in the first sence it is true that Death is the wages of sin and the very suburbs and the gates of hell But in the second taking of Death it ceases to be a plague and becomes a blessing inasmuch as it is even a door opening out of this world into Heaven Now the godly look not upon Death simply but upon Death whose sting and venome is plucked out by Jesus Christ and so it is exceeding comfortable But then secondly it is objected that we read of many that have prayed against death as namely first David Return O Lord faith he and deliver my soul oh spare me for thy mercies sake for in death there is no remembrance of thee Secondly Hezekiah when the message of death was brought to him Thirdly Christ himself Father if it be possible let this cup pass from me To all these I answer first touching David that when he composed that sixt Psalm he was not only grievously sick but also exceedingly tormented in mind for he wrastled and combated in his conscience with the wrath of God as appears by the first Verse of that Psalm therefore we must know that he prayed not simply against Death but against death at that time in asmuch as the coming of it was accompanied with extraordinary apprehensions of Gods wrath for at another time he tells us that he would not fear though he walked through the valley of the shaddow of Death And the like I say touching Hezekiah that his prayer proceeded not from any desperate fear of Death but first that he might do more service to God in his Kingdom And with such a kind of thought was Saint Pauls desire of dissolution mingled Secondly he prayed against Death then because he knew that his death then would be a great cause of rejoycing to evil men to whom his reformation in the State was unpleasing Thirdly because he wanted issue God had promised before to David that there should not fail a man of his seed to sit upon the throne of Israel so that his children did take heed to their wayes Now it was a great discomfort to him to die chidless for then he and others might have thought that he was but an Hypocrite in as much as God had promised issue to all those Kings that feared him and for this cause God heard his prayer and after two years gave him a son Manasseh by name And so I say the same touching our Saviour Christ that he prayed not against Death as it is the separation betwixt Body and Soul as appears by what the Apostle faith that he was heard in that he feared for he stood in our room and became a Curse for us it was the Curse of the Law which went with Death and the unspeakable wrath and indignation of God which he feared and from this according to his prayer he was delivered But thirdly we see in most good men a fear of Death and a desire of life and I my self may some godly man say do feel my self ready to tremble at the meditation thereof and yet I hope I belong unto God I answer that there are two things to be considered in every Christian Flesh and Spirit Corruption and Grace and the best have many inward perplexities at times and doubtings of Gods favour Now it is a truth which our Saviour delivers that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak And as in all other good purposes there is a combate betwixt the flesh and the spirit so is there in this betwixt the fear of Death and the desire of Death sometime the one prevails and sometimes the other but yet alwayes at last the desire of Death doth get the victory Carnal respects do often prevail far with the best care of wise children and the like These are their infirmities but as other infirmities die in them by degrees so these also at last are subdued and the servants of God seeing clearly the happiness into which their Death in Christ shall enter them do even sigh desiring to be clothed upon with their house which is from Heaven Here then is a good Mark by which we may know our selves to be Gods servants viz. by the state of our thoughts and meditations touching Death I will so deliver it as may be most for the comfort of those that truly fear God I demand therefore of thee Dost thou know that the confident and comfortable expectation of Death is the work of the Holy Ghost in Gods servants Dost thou desire unfeignedly that the same may be wrought in thy heart Dost thou labour to know what happiness comes by Death to those that feare the Lord Dost thou grieve at thine own weakness to whom the thought of Death is sometime troublesome and unsavory Dost thou pray the Lord so to assure thee of his favour in Christ that death may be desired before it comes and welcome when it is come Dost thou when thou hearest this speech of Simeon wish that thou wert able to use the like words with the like resolution Surely these things shew that thou art Gods servant and that by Death the Lord will draw thee to a place of rest If these thoughts which I have now named be strangers to thy heart and thou dost not love to trouble thy self to study about Death it is an evil sign The servants of God are not wont to be so secure in matters of this quality And thus much for the first particular in the first general part the desire in the godly of death the second is their care for it the point thence is that It is the care of Gods servants to be alwayes so prepared for death as at what instant soever the Lord shall send it they
may be comfortably ready to entertain it So much may easily be gathered out of Simeons words here Nunc dimittis Now let thy servant depart He did not as it were take a day over in which and against which to be provided as though he should have said Lord now will I settle my self to make provision for my last end but even now Lord at this very instant if thou wilt Death hath been my ordinary meditation and if thou wilt now call me home to thee I am ready to depart As in the former point I shewed you how Saint Pauls longing agreed with Simeons Oh let thy servant depart faith Simeon I desire to be dissolved faith Paul So here I will shew you that there was the same care in respect of Death in Saint Paul as in Simeon Now if thou wilt faith Simeon I am now ready to be offered faith Saint Paul And else-where I did daily I am ever thinking upon death and daily making provision for my end This was holy Jobs mind All the dayes of my appointed time will I wait till my change come there was a continual expectation So teach us to number our dayes prayeth Moses that we way apply our hearts to wisdome And what wisdome did he wish he might apply his heart unto but this a holy care to make provision for another world seeing in this there was no continuance The same in effect the Authour to the Hebrews professeth touching himself and those that were like to him that they had here no continuing City but did seek one to come We know faith he here is no abiding we dwell in tents which must remove in houses of clay which will be broken therefore we desire to be ever ready for that place which is of more perpetuity And so much may be gathered from that which is upon record concerning Joseph of Arimathca he did not only make ready his Tomb in his life-time but in his garden his place of solace and delight and how could so good a man so often think on death without labouring and caring to be ever provided for the same and therefore our Saviour Christ compares his faithful servants unto those which daily wait for their Masters coming Now the reason which so much prevails with the godly in this particular and which ought to be of sufficient force with every one is first the certainty and uncertainy of death Morte nihil certius As sure as Death is an ordinary Proverb What man is he that liveth and shall not see death faith the Psalmist That all must die it is Heavens decree and cannot be revoked The thing it self we see is most certain yet for some circumstances most uncertain for first Tempus est incertum No man knows when he shall die in the night or in the day in Winter or in Summer in youth or in his latter age Secondly Locus est incertus None know where they shall die whether at home or abroad in his bed or in the field who knows but that he may die in the Church of God even while he is asleep at the Word Thirdly Mortis genusest incertum No man can determine how he shall die whether suddenly or by a lingring sickness whether violently or by a natural course These things the servants of God know full well and seriously weigh the same and that makes them to make conscience of continual preparation that whensoever or wheresoever or howsoever they die they may with comfort commend their souls into the hands of God as into the hand of a faithful Creatour Secondly they know the misery of being taken by Death unprepared put case a man should die as Ishbosheth lying upon his bed at noon or as Jobs children while they are seasting or that a man like the rich man in the Gospel should have his breath taken from him at the very instant having made no provision for another world what hope can there be that such a one should be saved They know thirdly that the time of sickness is the most unfit time for this business of preparation the senses are then so taken up with the pain of sickness that a man cannot think seriously upon ought else and besides it is not in our own power to turn to God when he will ordinarily God forgets those in sickness that forget him in health And it is commonly seen that that preparation for Death that begins but in sickness is as languishing and faint as is the party from whom it comes And although Vera poenitentia be nunquam sera yet sera poenitentia est raro vera Though I say true repentance be never too late yet late repentance is seldome true when men leave their sins because they can continue to practise them no longer what thanks have they or what can that repentance be These things work with Gods servants to study to be ever ready for the Lord not to delay preparation but to seek continually to be provided My exhortation hence shall begin with that speech of Moses Oh that men would be wise to understand this and that they would consider their latter end I would there were a heart in us to entertain this doctrine in our best thoughts I remember the Complaint of old that men had made a Covenant with Death and were at agreement with Hell Death indeed will make truce with no man but here is the meaning Evil men perswade themselves that they are in no danger of hell or of the grave Death will not come yet thinketh the oldest man and when it comes I hope I shall do well enough thinketh the most godless man Thus men couzen themselves with their own fancies and so Death steals upon them at unawares and becomes Gods Sergeant to arrest them and to carry them away to eternal condemnation Who amongst us is able to say truly and upon good ground as Simeon Now Lord if thou wilt now command Death to seize upon me welcome shall it be unto me I am even now ready to receive it How many are there that are extraordinary ignorant in the means how to escape the sting of Death How many extreamly secure that never in their lives yet thought earnestly upon this how they may die with comfort and end their dayes in peace How many prophane ones that set light by Death being apt to say like those Epicures Edamus c. Let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall die How many that do put all to a desperate adventure God made us and he must save us and we shall do as well as please God and there is an end How many are there whose hearts albeit they be in the house of God and in his presence are notwithstanding fraughted with malice with envy with worldliness with disdain with secret scorning repining at the Word which they hear with wearisomeness with spiritual sleepiness and security You
that are such as I have now said think in your consciences what would you die if God should now stop your breath and ascite you by Death presently to appear before his Majesty being thus full of ignorance of security of presumption of unsanctified of vicious of malicious of covetous thoughts could you find in your hearts to say Lord now let us depart Sure we could not but Death must needs be to us as it is said to be to the wicked Rex terrorum the King of terrours if it should come upon us and find us in this case And yet what know we how soon how suddenly we may be overtaken some of us drop away daily some young some old some lie sick longer some lesser time and how soon it will be our turn we cannot tell Our hreath is in our nostrills we are all as grass If the breath of the Lord blow upon us we do suddenly wither as the slower of the field and return again to our first Earth Why will we not labour to be now ready sith it may be alwayes truly said We may now depart either while we are here or in our way home or in our beds or at our meat Who can truly say to himself I am sure I shall not die this hour It may be now thou wilt demand of me What shall I do that I may be ready To insist upon particulars would be too long onely therefore in a word The best preparation for death is a reformed life He that lives religiously cannot but die preparedly And it is a thousand to one if a wicked liver make a gracious end The Scripture makes mention of a double Death and so likewise of a twofold Resurrection the first Death is the death of the body which is the separation of it from the soul The second death is of the soul which is the separation of it from God The first Resurrection is the rising from the Death of sin to a new life the second is that which shall be of the body out of the Grave at the day of Judgment Now what faith the Scripture Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first Resurrection on such the second Death hath no power Wouldest thou then be freed from the second Death hell destruction when thou art dead Now that thou art yet alive labour to have a part in the first Resurrection Note what Saint Paul faith of the wanton widdow that she is dead whilst she lives So he that lives in the pleasures of sin and in the wayes of his own heart and after his own lust he is dead in soul though he be alive in body and if he seek not to come out of this grave eternal death shall be his portion Well then wouldest thou prepare for Death wouldest thou be able alwayes to say Lord now now I am ready labour to know God out of his Word that is eternal life Labour to feel Christ live and raign in thee by his Spirit labour to renounce every sin do not go on in any known sin against conscience renew thy repentance daily and still survey the state of thy soul that wickedness may not get dominion over thee Let Death come when it will though the Lord should so visit thee that thou shouldest drop down suddenly yet it shall not find thee unprepared thou hast a part in the first Resurrection there is no fear of the second Death But if thou wilt cherish thy heart in evil thou wilt go on in thy ignorance in thy careless worship of God in thy prophaning the Sabbath in thy whoredom oppression malice drunkenness excess voluptuousness thou makest ready for hell and it is not thy Lord save me or I cry God mercy c. that shall serve thy turn I will tell thee who thou art like unto even to a man appointed after a year or two to be burned and in the mean space must carry a stick daily to the heap so thou heapest up wrath against thy self and makest thy score so great that when Death comes thou shalt not know how to be prepared And thus have I finished the first general part of my Text touching the disposition of the godly in respect of Death I proceed now in a word to the second the ground rule or warrant of this desire and preparation for death according to the word as if Simeon had said this desire that I have now to end my dayes proceeds not from any carnal discontentment because I am now old and can take no great comfort in worldly things but the ground of it is thy word and Promise thou Lord hast revealed unto thy servant that I should not die before I had seen my Saviour This word is now fulfilled and the sweetness thereof hath given me that encouragement that I do even long to be dissolved and to be united unto thee Or again thus Oh Lord this care that I have had to provide thus for Death and to be alwayes in a readiness it hath not come from my self nature never taught it me but thy Word hath instructed me If I had not proceeded according to thy Word I should never have known how to have prepared my self to the time of dissolution This is the meaning of the words and so the Doctrine is plain viz. that Men ignorant in Gods word can never take comfort in death nor be truly prepared to undergo it This is plain if we consider the Exposition which I have already given of that part of Simeons speech It is a general Rule that of our Saviour Ye err not knowing the Scripture A man ignorant in the Scripture can never rightly perform any spiritual duty Hence was that of David Thy testimonies faith he are my delight and my counsellors If any matter came in hand that concerned his soul straight to the word of God went he to know thence how to do it as a man for his Lease or conveyance goeth to a Counsellor for direction So again he confesses that if Gods Law had not been his delight he should have perished in his afflictions And so no comfort no true quiet in any trouble much more at Death without the guidance and information of the Word The assurance that the sting of Death is plucked out that Gods wrath is appeased that sin is pardoned that Heaven gate is opened whence shall we fetch these but from the Scripture the directions for a holy life which is the best preparation for Death where shall we find them but in the Scripture Here then we see is a Caveat to all that have no will nor desire to be acquainted with the Scripture Divers think they should have done well enough though we had no such Book as we call the word of God To be a Scripture-man is a by-word a reproach a matter of disgrace and sooner will men listen to some idle Pamphlet then to a matter of Scripture Well beguile
troublesome thoughts no perplexed motions shall we say that these were good men because they seem to go away in peace It is true indeed it is the common opinion Doth a man lye quietly hath he his memory to the end died he like a Lamb surely then he is gone to heaven but this is an absurd collection for First sometime this outward calmness is an ordinary consequent of some diseases as Consumptions and such like by which Nature being formerly weakned hath not power left to make resistance Secondly this outward calmness is no argument of a peaceable and quiet soul The Psalmist tells us of the wicked in whose death there are no bands Thirdly we must distinguish between security and peace betwixt carnal senssesness and true spiritual quietness Nabals death was quiet enough yet he were but a fool that would adventure his soul with Nabals I see many ignorant persons many of heathenish and brutish comversation very quiet in sickness without any fear of hell and judgment to come making no doubts casting no perils asking no questions complaining of no sins and so away they go without any more adoe What shall I say that these died in true peace God forbid No when I compare together their ignorant secure benummed hardned kind of life with their sensless and drowsie kind of death I must say that these are fearful signs these things argue that the Devil had quiet possession where he made so small a doe Thus then notwithstanding these Objections I will conclude that a peaceful death is the peculiar and individed priviledge of Gods servants However it be yet I know saith Solomon that it shall go well with those that fear the Lord but there is no peace to the wicked saith my God We may make Use of this first to be a trial betwixt our Religion and the Romish for from this Doctrine I avouch that Religion to be no true Religion because a Papist by the Rules of his own Religion can never die in peace This is a hard saying thou maist object or how can I make it good I answer by two reasons First every Papist is taught to beleeve under pain of Anathema and the great curse that whosoever dieth if he have not in this life attained to perfection and throughly purged himself from the remainders of sin by works of satisfaction his soul must after-death go into Purgatory and there continue untill he hath made a full satisfaction now the pain of Purgatory is held for the time to be as great as the pains of hell differing only in this that it is not perpetual Now I would fain know how can a man die comfortably and in peace and with a joyful heart when he thinks with himself that albeit perhaps after some years he shall go to heaven yet in the mean space his soul must go into such a place of unspeakable torment where if the matter be not well plyed by the prayers of them that are alive and by well seeing the Priests they may hap to lie for many years I say how can the Doctrine of Popery beget a peaceful death when it teacheth an expectation of such an hellish Purgatory Secondly every Papist as he is bound of a certain to beleeve a Purgatory so further must he beleeve that he cannot in this life be assured of salvation otherwise then by a kind of confused hope which may deceive him Now he which by the witness of his own conscience is sure that he hath deserved hell and cannot attain to any certainty of discharge what comfort can such an one have to die he knows that when he is dead he must come to his account before God but yet can have no assurance that the Lord will acquit him in Christ Jesus I wish that this may seriously be considered by us for the establishing of us in the truth of Religion I say again and testifie these reasons which I have alledged being weighed that a Rapist by his own doctrine can never expect that which Simeon did a departure hence in peace He knows he must to torment he is caught that he cannot know in this world that God will pardon him In the next place let us come neerer home to our selves that we must all die nothing more certaine Dust thou art and to dust thoushalt return God hath decreed it and it cannot be revoked if our end be not peaceable our estate after cannot be happy Let our care then be spent about this one point how one may attain to this to end our dayes in peace I doubt not but we will all be ready to say we hope so to do but this is nothing for when the wicked man dieth his expectation perisheth What becomes of the hope of the Hypocrite said Job when God takes away his soul But what course then shall we take that we may finish our course with joy I will tell thee in few words I touched it a little before the best means for a peaceable departure is a godly and religious life I have fought the good fight saith Saint Paul and he could comfortably from thence infer that therefore there was laid up for him a crown of righteousness It was Christs own inference I have glorified thee on earth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do and therefore now O Father glorifie thou me with thine own self The reason of it is first Gods promise blessed shall be the undefiled in the way Those that honour me I will honour said God Now this promise God will not break He that goeth this way though it be with much weakness with many falls with sundry imperfections with divers wandrings yet he cannot miss of the promised peace Secondly life eternal hath three degrees the first is in this life when a man repenteth and beleeveth and is purged from dead works to serve the living God The second is in death when the body goes to earth and the spirit returns to him that gave it The third is at the last judgment These three degrees hang together like three links the second followeth the first and the third the two former the last cannot be hoped for where the first is wanting for except ye repent ye shall all perish The first being obtained the last must needs ensue for he is faithful that hath promised So then wouldest thou have peace in death labour for grace in thy life wouldest thou end thy dayes happily make conscience to spend them holily A godlesse man that lives in sin may die senslesly or sullenly he cannot die peaceably Oh consider this all ye that forget God that spend your dayes in vanity and your years according to the lusts of your own heart that have hitherto hated to be reformed and will not be reclaimed from your former fashions but live yet still as you were wont to do Think a little with me of your last end which how neer
rise out of the grave of sin and to lead a new life a spiritual life the life of grace this is the resurrection of the soul Now that Christ is the Author of this Resurrection also of this spiritual Resurrection we may demonstrate this by a multitude of Divine testimonies but we will single out some few of the chiese we need go no further then this Evangelist which affords plentiful testimony for the confirmation of this truth As in Joh. 4.10 There Christ speaking to the woman of Samaria he said unto her If thou haddest known the gift of God and who it is that said unto thee give me drink thou shouldest have asked of him and he would have given thee living water Here the Spirit of Christ it is compared to living water by an allusion to the water that continually springeth out of a Fountain And the Spirit of grace is compared to living water from the effects of it because the Spirit of grace restoreth spiritual life to the soul and then preserveth this life therefore it is living Water and Christ is as the Fountain of this water that yeeldeth and giveth this living quickning water of the Spirit Again in Joh. 5.21 there Christ challengeth this power to himself As the Father raised up the dead and quickneth them so the Son quickneth whom he will As Christ when he was upon the earth he raised whom he would from the death of the body so now being in heaven he raiseth whom he will from the death of the soul Yea the voyce of Christ sounding in the ministry of the Word accompanied with his quickning Spirit is of power and efficacie to raise those that are dead in sins as we may see Joh. 5.25 Verily verily I say unto you faith Christ the hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voyce of the Son of God and they that hear it shall live Again in Joh. 6.35 there Christ stileth himself the Bread of life and the Living bread Jesus said unto them I am the bread of life and in verse 48. I am the bread of life and again verse 51. I am the living bread Christ is the living bread the bread of life who as he hath life in himself so he communicates spiritual life to all those that seed upon him And here is a broad difference between this Bread of life and ordinary bread ordinary food for though ordinary food can preserve natural life where it is yet it cannot restore life where it is not but Christ is such living Bread that he restores life to those that are dead in sins and preserves that life that he hath restored thus he is the living Bread Again Joh. 15.1 there Christ compares himself to a Vine and the faithful to so many branches I am the true Vine faith Christ and my Father is the husbandman And in verse 5. I am the Vine ye are the branches Now as the branch of the Vine sucks juyce and sap from the stock and root of the Vine so all the faithful receive spiritual juyce and life from Christ their head As Adam he is a common root of corruption and spiritual death to all that come from him so Christ is a common root of grace and spiritual life to all those that are his members And in this regard Christ is compared to a head and the faithful to his members Collos 1.18 Christ is the head of his body the Church Christ is the head and the faithful are his members therefore as in the natural body the head that is the principium the fountain of sence and motion it is the head that by certain nerves and sinews conveyes sence and motion to all the members of the body so in the mystical body the Church Christ is the head that conveyes spiritual life and motion to all that are his members to all the faithful Thus you see the second conclusion explained and proved also that as Christ is the Author of the resurrection of the body so he is of the resurrection of the soul too it is he that raiseth the soul to spiritual life Now in the third place we are to shew the reason why this double quickning power is here comprehended under one term I am the Resurrection Now that this double power of quickning is to be understood here under this one term we need not I hope spend time to prove for that Christ speaks here of the spiritual resurrection and the spiritual life this I take to be evident from Christs own exposition in the words following He that believeth in me though he were dead yet shall he live He that believeth in me though he were dead in sins and trespasses before yet he shall live the life of grace therefore I am the Resurrection Again that the resurrection of the body is not here excluded it may appear from the scope and intent of these words of Christ for the scope of these words here is to perswade Martha that he was able of himself by his own power to raise up her dead brother to restore him to life saith he I am the resurrection I have power to restore spiritual life to the soul that is dead in sin and this is the greater work therefore I am able to restore natural life to the dead body to restore the body that is dead in the Grave to life again Now the reasons why this double power is here comprehended under one term I am the resurrection the chiefe reasons I take to be these two First this double quickning power is here comprehended under one term in regard of the Analogie and proportion between these two between the restoring of the body to life and the restoring the soul to life Secondly in regard of the certain inseparable connexion between these two First I say in regard of the Analogie and proportion between these two the resurrection of the body and of the soul now the proportion and analogie consists especially in these four things First as in the resurrection of the body the living soul must first return to the dead body and quicken it before it can rise again so here in the Resurrection of the soul the Spirit of grace must return to the soul that is dead in sins and quicken it before it can rise again so that there is a similitude in regard of the first beginning and principle of this Resurrection Again secondly there is an analogie and proportion in regard of the point and term the state from which the Resurrection is for as in the resurrection of the body the body riseth from the state of corruption from the bondage of the Grave So here in this resurrection of the soul the soul and the whole man riseth from the state of spiritual corruption from the bondage of sin The third proportion is in regard of the estate to which a man riseth for as in the resurrection of the body a man shall rise again without those
hath not seen no faith Saint Austin eye hath not seen for it is no colour nor eare hath not heard for it is no sound nor never entred into the heart of man to conceive for the heart of man must enter into it where all shall be filled with abundance of peace so the Prophet they shall not only taste and see how good the Lord is but they shall be filled with abundance and they shall drink out of the River running over with infinite and transcendent pleasures where there gold shall be peace and their silver shall be peace and their land shall be peace and their life shall be peace and their joy shall be peace and their God shall be peace and the God of peace he shall fill them with the peace of God and that peace is it which passeth which is infinitely beyond all understanding Glorious things are spoken of thee thou City of God where the Kings is verity and the Law is charity and the State is felicity and the Life is eternity The comparing of these two things together of this lifes misery and that lifes felicity and eternity would make a man sing and to sigh too It would make him sing I singing is in the Temple and sighing is in the Tabernacle singing in the Temple Blesled are they that dwell in thy house they shall be alwayes praysing thee here is singing but sighings is in the Tabernacle for while we are in this Tabernacle therefore sigh we desiring to be dissolved and to be clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven for while we are here we cannot be happy for this life is misery This be spoken for our selves The second application of this plea is for others seeing this life is such a life of misery and that life is such a life of glory and immortality our present hap so base our future hope so excellent this should stay us and take us off from mourning for such as are departed as if we were without hope of them Hope is in the Text the principal thing and to lament and mourn for those that are departed we should be so far from it as to rejoyce in our spirits for the blessed translation of such into eternal rest from this vail of misery I say we should rejoyce in their very translation What dost thou mourn and lament and hang down the head and all for loss of such as are departed and gone to rest with God Oh but thou wilt say thou art not heavy for their gain but for thine own loss but seeing thy loss is the less and their gain the greater why dost thon not observe a mean and a proportion in these things I confesse it is very fitting both in Civility and Divinity and agreeable to the lawes both of Grace and Nature that there should be mourning especially in the house of mourning at times and occasions offered in this nature it cannot otherwise be But for Rachel to mourn for her Children so as that she would not be comforted not but that she could have been comforted but she would not that is not well But I say here is comfort in abundance and here is that which must stay us from being transported with impatient grief we must overcome all our grief with patience with a blessed expectation of our own dissolution for we must think we shall go to them they shall not return to us let us desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ which is best for them and for me I and for thee too Enough of the fist Point The last which I will but name that so I may run through this whole Scripture at this time is this that The righteous and the hopeful they are not miserable they are not most miserable not the most miserable of all nay they are not miserable at all How prove you that By the force of the argument here that the Apostle useth for this being a part of an Argument and an Hypothetical proposition he reasoneth thus If in this life only we have hope in Christ then are we miserable but now for this life onely we have not hope in Christ he doth not set our rest there therefore we are not of all men the most miserable How prove you that because the most wicked the most wretched so the less wicked the least wretched and the most righteous the best blest and the least miserable Not the most not at all Not at all No for as the outward prosperity of the wicked in this World is no true prosperity so the outward adversity of the godly is no true misery it is not such as doth destitute and dissolute a man utterly but you shall have the faithful come off with hope I and with rejoycing rather then grudging and repining at it yea they joy in their sufferings and at last are more then conquerours and all this sheweth then that that they are far enough from misery Well the knowledge of this lifes misery the knowledge of our not being at all miserable that are righteous should teach all of us to be righteous to be religious to strive to be godly if not for the love of vertue and piety and holiness and such kind of Graces as all good Christians and godly persons should be though there were no Hell to punish nor no Heaven to cherish a man in though there were no reward for the good nor revenge against the bad yet notwithstanding the love of vertue should constrain an ingenious Christian to strive after holiness and piety but if not for the love of religion let us do it for the fear of the misery that may befall us which we shall prevent if we remember now our duties that is to be godly and to be righteous for the righteous man is not cannot be miserable And then lastly this shall serve to shew to us how it ought to keep off the World from judging rashly there is a great obliquity and a perverse judgment in the World men censure those that are in any kind of misery to be of all men the most miserable whereas we know that this is no true misery on their part for it is but outward it is but temporal misery it is no true real misery And therefore this serveth to rectifie the obliquity of such mens judgments as do determine the godly to be in a miserable condition whereas the contrary is most true for we count them faith Saint James blessed that endure Do they endure to the very death Blessed are they that die in the Lord for they rest from their labours and who would not die here that he may dwell with God there in rest who that loveth who that hopeth would not be where his love where his hope is would not have what he hopeth for Doth not the Lord say to his servant Moses No man can see my face and live Oh saith a Father let me die then for I will
of poor people at Macedonia being so poor that the Apostle bears witness of them they gave above their ability We see a poor man and yet an heir of heaven lying full of sores and in want at the gate of Dives that was after thrown into hell An heir of heaven and yet on earth a Beggar You see then beloved the point is true now we will descend and see how it appears to be so and for what respect it comes to pass by Gods providence First it becomes so that there may be a conformity between the head and the members for Christ that was rich for our sakes became poor saith the Scripture even Christ that was rich and Lord over all became poor and in the form of a servant unto all for our sakes so poor that we see the foxes had holes and the fowles of the ayre had nests but our Redeemer had no shelter no not so much room as to rest his head Now there must be a conformity between Christ and his members if the head be poor necessity makes the other members partake of the same Cup. Again secondly if you observe and look on the condition of Gods Saints of the houshold of faith on earth here you shall find small occasion to marvel at their simple estates considering they are a company of travellers and Pilgrims in this world I beseech you as Pilgrims and strangers c. They are not only strangers which may have riches conveyed unto them after some certain stay in a place But they are Pilgrims and time will not permit their abode in one place upon any condition of advantage for their profession compels them from one place to another On whom our Proverbe may truly be verified that a rouling stone gathers nothing They are Pilgrims and Pilgrims desires extend no further in this life then a staffe and a scrip This is the brood of travellers saith David that seek thy face Thirdly there followes another reason and that proceeds from the opposition they find in the world against their course the world labours to make them poor and having prevailed like an imperious Jaylor to a distressed prisoner endeavours to keep them under And it comes so to pass in regard of the natural enmity and division that is in the world in opposition of the wayes of God You shall find that our Saviour intending to go to Jerusalem made his way through Samaria and dispatched some before to provide him lodging But the Samaritans understanding or suspecting that he was minded to go thither refused to entertain him They would not receive him saith the Text Why Because he was going unto Jerusalem Beloved thus deals the world with the members of Christ if they would rely on the world and make that their end as they do then riches should flow in in abundance and their estates might arive to be as eminent and mighty as others But if their minds be resolved for Jerusalem and their eyes reflect that way Let them seek their own entertainment for they shall receive no benefit nor enjoy any contentment by their permission Lastly God disposeth it to be so by his wondrous providence that his glory may be so much the more conspicuous and open in providing that they of the houshould of faith should endure the scourge of poverty on earth that so the work of his grace may appear the more in them by the means of their poverty for when doth grace make it self more manifest in the heart then in the middest of such extremities The stars make the brightest reflection in the obscurest night and grace appears most glorious chiefly in distress You have heard of the patience of Job had not Job endured much sorrow and been exercised in many afflictions the world had been ignorant of his vertues he was first deprived of his substance and suffered the torments of his body before he expressed his patience You have heard of the faith of those people which wandered in sheeps-skins and goats-skins But how could you have been acquainted with their faith if you had not heard of their clothing you see them in sheeps-skins and goats-skins enduring contempt of the world to preserve faith and a good conscience and so you became acquainted with their faith also Is it so then that Gods servants are thus then let the world wonder their fill at it and let not us account it a strange thing saith Saint James for it befalls others of the Saints So say I when we see of the houshold of faith in poverty account it no strange matter that God bestows not riches in this world to one that is rich in grace You see a multitude of believers stript of all they had and yet they were holy and religious Secondly condemn not their wayes for the entertainment they meet within the world Like not the worse of the wayes of God because he afflicts his servants you should then judge evil of the generation of the just You know Job was a man beloved of God from heaven he witnesseth his goodness He was an upright and a just man one that feared God and eschewed evil Notwithstanding you see how he was environed with troubles and made destitute of means and the society of his friends insomuch that his three familiar acquaintance did conclude that therefore he was an hypocrite and that God had found him out in some sin But the ensuing displeasure of God towards these men though it took no effect because of the righteous invocation of his servant Job will tell us there belongs a Judgment to those that censure the Children of God by their afflictions weighing their sins their sufferings both in one scale together But beware of incurring Gods displeasure by accusing the generation of the just in respect of their unprosperous events in this World Thou seest one man disgraced in much trouble it may be in extream necessity for want of these outward blestings presently thou concludest something is amiss in his life Thou perceivest another grows rich having riches and honour and applause in the World notwithstanding he goes on in a prophane course yet thou concludest certainly God loves this man these are dangerous conclusieâ—…s Cain and Esau were beloved of God if this be a sign of love now God himself said that He hated Esau Esau whom God hated had twelve Dukes to his Sons enjoying abundance and superfluity of all things and therefore forbear to reprove the just man or call his integrity into question because of his outward poverty Thirdly take heed you despise not the Houshold of Faith for outward poverty think not meanly of them nor the worse of Grace because of their simple outside for this is to have the Faith of God in respect of mens persons when a man comes in gay cloathing you say sit here in a goodly place but a man in meaner apparel stand thou there
in a holy course and then assuredly we shall live with joy and die with peace when we can get grace in our fouls sorrow for our sins new ness in our natures reformation in our lives uprightness in our wayes faith in Christ a discharge from God peace of conscience oh what a happy day the day of death will be to our Souls ITER NOVISSIMUM OR MAN HIS LAST PROGRESSE A SERMON Preached at the Funeral of the Right Worshipful Sir THOMAS THINNE Knight SERMON XLI ECCLES 12.5 Man goeth to his long home and the Mourners go about the Streets ALthough I might in the Kings King Solomon name command yet I will rather in the Preachers his other stile humbly entreat your religious attention to the last Scene and Catastrophe of mans life consisting of two Acts and those very short 1. The dead his pass he goeth c. 2. The Mourners march they go about c. Where as the whole Scripture is a Volumn of divine Sermons and the Author of every Book a Preacher and every Chapter a lesson and every verse and piece of a verse a Text. Gregory Nysscen reasonably demands why this Book which treateth throughout of the vanity of the world and misery of man is intituled The Book of the Preacher To pass by other answers rendred by him and others not so pertinent to our present purpose I conceive this title of the Preacher is in special set over this Book to intimate unto us that according to the Argument thereof there is no Doctrine so fit for all Preachers to teach and all hearers to learn as the vanity of the creature and the emptiness of all earthly delights and comforts And in very deed there is no meditation more serious then upon the vanity of the world no consideration more seasonable then of the brevity and uncertainty of time it self no knowledge more wholsome then of the diseases of the mind no contemplation more divine then of humane misery and frailty Which though we read in the inscription of every stone see in the fall of every leaf hear in the knel of every bell taste in the garnishing and sauce of every dish smell in the stench of every dead corpses feel in the beating of every pulse yet we are not sensible of it we will not take knowledge of it though we cannot be ignorant of it In which consideration the Wise man whose words are as goads and nails vers 11. pricks us deep with the remembrance hereof so deep that he draws blood sanguinem animâ—…e the blood of the soul as Saint Austin tearmeth our tears lachryme sanguis animâ—…e For who can read with dry eyes that those that look out of the windowes shall be darkned Who can hear without horrour that the keepers of the house shall tremble or consider without sorrow that the daughters of musick shall be brought low or comment without deep setched sighs upon mans going to his long home and the mourners going about the streets to wash them with tears and sweep them with Rosemary Origen after he had chosen rather facere periculosè quam perpeti turpitèr to burn Incense to the Heathen gods then to suffer his body to be defiled by a Blackamore and the flower of his chastity which he had so long time preserved to be some way blasted at a Church in Jerusalem goeth into the Pulpit openeth the Bible at all adventures intending to preach upon that Text which he should first light upon but falling upon that vers in Psal 50. But to the wicked saith God what hast thou to do to declare my statutes or that thou shouldest take my covenants in thy mouth which contained his suspension shutteth his book speaketh not a word more but comments upon it with his tears some thinks having read this Text in which I find all our capital dooms written I cannot do better then follow that Fathers president and shut up not only my book but my mouth also and seal up my lips and comment upon the coherence with distraction the parts with passion the notes with sighs the periods with groans and the words with tears for alas as soon as a man cometh into his short booth in this world which he saluteth with tears he goeth to his long home in the next And the mourners go about the streets It is lamentable to hear the poor infant which cannot speak yet to boad his own misery and to prophecy of his future condition and what are the contents of his Prophecy but lamentations mournings and woes Saint Cyprian accords with Saint Austin in his doleful note Vitâ—…e mortalis anxietates dolores procellas mundi quas ingreditur in exordio statim suo ploratu vel gemitu rudes animae testatur Little Children newly born take in their first breath with a sigh and come crying into the world assoon as they open their eyes they shed tears to help fill up the Vale of tears into which they were then brought and shall be after a short time carried out with a stream of them running from the eyes of all their friends And if the Prologue and Epilogue be no better what shall we judge of the Scenes and Acts of the life of man they yeeld so deep springs of tears and such store of arguments against our aboad in this world that many reading them in the books of Hegesias the Platonick presently brake the prison of their body and leaped out of the world into the grave others concluded with Silenus Optimum non nasci proximum quam primum mori That it was simply best never to be born the next to it to die out of hand and give the world our salve and take our vale at once How-be-it though this might pass for a sage Essay and a strong line amongst Philosophers yet we Christians who know that this present life to all that live godly in Christ Jesus how full of troubles cares and persecutions so ever it be is but a sad and short Preface to endless Volumnes of joy an Eves fast on earth to an everlasting feast in Heaven ought thus to correct the former Apophthegme Optimum renasci proximum quam primum mori That it is best to be new born and then if it so please God after our new birth to be translated with all speed into the new Heaven But soft we cannot take our degrees in Christs school per saltem we must keep our Terms and preform our exercises both of faith obedience and patience we must not look from the Font to be presently put into the rivers of pleasures springing at Gods right hand for evermore We must take a toylsome journey and in it often drink of the waters of Marah We must suffer with Christ before we reigne with him We must taste of the bitter cup of his Passion before we drink new Wine with him in his Kingdome we must sow in tears here that we may reap in joy
singular comfort if we take them as a commination and they afford us much or more if we take them as Saint Paul and S. Chrysostome do by an insultation As a man offering sacrifice for victory and full of mirth and jollity he leaps and tramples upon Death lying as it were at his mercy and sings an Io Poean a triumphant song wherewith Gerardus a great friend of Saint Bernards breathed out his last gasp of whom he thus writeth In the dead time of the night my brother Gerard strangely revived at midnight the day began to break I sent for to see this great miracle found a man in the very Jaws of death insulting upon death and exulting with joy saying O death where is thy sting Death is not now a sting but a song for now the faithful man dyeth singing and singeth dying And so having plucked away the prickles and opened the leaves by the Explication of the letter I come now to smell to them and draw from thence the savour of life unto life Ero pestes tuae ô mors As Saint Jerome writeth of Tertullian his Polemmical Treatises against hereticks Quot verba tot fulmina Every word is a thunderbolt so I may truly say of this verse quot verba tot fulmina So many words so many thunder-bolts striking Death dead by the light whereof we may discern three parts 1. The menaced or party threatned Death 2. The menacer or party threatning I. 3. The judgment menaced plagues 1. The menaced impotent mors Death 2. The menacer Omnipotent Ego I. 4. The judgment most dreadful pestes plagues 1. First of the party menaced Death Christ threatneth destruction to none but to his or his Churches enemies But here he threatneth Death Death therefore must needs be an enemy and so the Apostle termeth it the last enemy that shall be destroyed is Death For albeit Death by accident is an advantage as oftentimes an enemie doth a man a good turn which occasioned that excellent Treatise of Plutarch wherein he sheweth us how to make an Antidote of poyson and a good use of other mens malice yet is it in it self an enemy alwayes to Nature and to grace also it sets upon the elect and the reprobate the believer and the Infidel the penitent and the obstinate but with this difference it flyes at the one with a deadly sting but at the other without a sting the one it wounds to death the other it terrifieth and paineth but cannot hurt But there being divers kinds of death which of them is here meant Death is a privation and privations cannot be defined but by their habits that is such positive qualities as they bereave us of for instance sickness cannot be perfectly defined but by health which it impaireth nor blindness but by sight which it destroyeth nor darkness but by light which it excludeth nor death but by life which it depriveth us of Now if there be a four-sold life spoken of in Scripture viz. 1. Of nature 2. Of sin 3. Of grace 4. Of glory There must needs be a four-fold death answerable thereunto 1. The death of Nature is the privition of the life of nature by parting soul and body 2. The death of sin is the privation of the life of sin by mortifying grace 3. The death of Grace is the privation of the life of grace by reigning sin 4. The death of Glory is the privation of the life of Glory by a total and final exclusion from the glorious presence of God and the kingdome of heaven and a casting into the lake of fire and brimstone prepared for the devil and his angels Of Death in the first sense David demandeth who is he that liveth and shall not see death and shall he deliver his soul from the hand of hell of Death in the second sence Saint Paul enquireth how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein Of Death in the third sense Saint Paul must be meant where he rebuketh wanton Widdows Shee that liveth in pleasure is dead while shee liveth Of Death in the fourth sense Saint John is to be understood blessed is he that hath part in the first resurrection for on such the second death hath no power Saint Austin joyneth all these significations and maketh one sentence of divers senses he is dead to death that is Death cannot kill burt or affright him who is dead to sin And another of the Ancients makes a sweet cord of them like so many strings struck at once he that dyeth before he dies shall never die he that dyeth to sin before he dyeth to nature shall never die to God neither in this world by final deprivation of grace neither in the world to come of glory Of these four significations of Death the first and last sort with this Text for that the first is to be meant it is evident by the consequence here O grave I will be thy destruction And by the antecedents in Saint Paul When this corruptible shall put on incorruption c And that the second is included may be gathered both from the words of Saint John And Death and Hell were cast into the lake of fire and of our Saviour I was dead and I am alive and have the keyes of Hell and of Death And so I fall upon my second Observation viz. the person menacing J the second person in Trinity our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ The word here used Ehi is the same with that we read Exod. 3. Ehi Ashur Ehi I am that I am and if the observation of the Ancients be current that wheresoever God speaketh unto man in the old Testament in the shape of man of Angel we are to understand Christ for that all those apparitions were but a kind of preludia of his incarnation then the Person here threatning can be no other then he besides the word Egilam in the former part of this vers being derived from Gaal signifying propinquus fuit or redemit jure propinquitatis pointeth to our Saviour who by assuming our nature became our Alie by blood and performed this office of a kins-man by redeeming the inheritance which we had lost But we have stronger arguments then Grammatical observations that he who here promised life to the dead and threatneth plagues to Death was the Son of God the Lord of quick and dead for the same who promiseth to redeem from the Grave threatneth to plague Death but we all know that Redeemer is the peculiar stile of the Son as Creator is of the Father and Sanctifier of the Holy Ghost tu redemisti nos thou hast redeemed us to GOD by thy blood out of every kindred and tongue and people and Nation To the redemption of a slave that is not able to ransome himself three at least concur the Scrivener who writeth the Conditions and sealed the Bonds the party who soliciteth the business and mediateth for the captive and layeth down
are required at our hands we may be sure that we have spiritual life in us we may build upon it that Christ dwelleth in our hearts by faith and that we live in him by grace 3. Our benefit by them is manifold in this life and the life to come In this life peace of conscience their soul shall dwell at ease 2. Good success in all we undertake what soever we do it shall prosper 3. The service of the creatures for all things work for the best to them that love God Lastly a comfortable pass out of this world we are sure our end shall be peace In the life to come the benefits are such as never eye hath seen nor ear hath heard nor ever entred into the heart of man God grant therefore our heart may enter into them quia Aristoteles non capit Eurispum Eurispus capiat Arist otalum because we cannot comprehend the joyes of heaven let them comprehend us You expect something to be spoken of our dear Sister deceased and much might be said and should by me in her praise but that one of her chiefest commendations was that she could not endure praise Laudes quia merebatur contempsit quia contempsit mag is merebatur becanse she deserved praise she desp ised it and because she despised it she the more deserved it Silent modesty in her was her crown in her life and modest silence of her was the charge at her death Her life was well known to most of this place and her death was every way answerable to her life all that visited her in her sickness might behold with sorrow a pittiful anatomy of frail mortality and yet with joy a perfect pattern of Christian patience and a heavenly conversation and though she were full of divine conceptions and she had a spring by her of the waters of life in the devotion of her dearest helper especially in the best things yet when I came to her she desired she might be partaker of some of my meditations they were her own words and when I prayed with her and for her she joyned not so much with me with her tongue as her affections and answered more in sighs and tears then in words often she complained of her tuff heart that would not yeeld to her dissolution and long long she thought it till she should come to appear before the God of Gods in Sion Her last words were sweet Father help me and she had her request for presently he helped her both by the zealous and most feeling prayers of her Husband and by the holy spirit assisting her in her own prayers with sighs and groans that cannot be expressed and immediately her sweet Father released her of her pangs and received her to himself on his own day On the Lords day morning before the morning watch I say before the morning watch she entered into her rest and began to keep her everlasting Sabbath in heaven where she reapeth what she sowed and seeth what shebelieved and enjoyeth what she hoped for and is now entred into those joyes which never entred fully into the heart of any living on earth nor shall into ours till we with her be made perfect and all of us come to Mount Sion and the heavenly Jerusalem and innumerable company of Angels and to the Congregation of the first-born whose names are written in heaven and to the spirits of just men and women made perfect Whither the God of peace bring us in our appointed time who brought again from the dead the great shepheard through the blood of the everlasting Covenant To whom with the holy Spirit c. FAITHS ECCHO OR THE SOULES AMEN SERMON XLVI REVEL 22.20 Amen Even so come Lord Jesus THese words they afford to us a comfortable and sweet argument to be conversant in From the sixt verse of this Chapter is set down to us the confirmation of the whole Prophesie and Book of the Revelation partly by the affirmation of God as likewise of Jesus Christ and of John himself that heard and saw all these things and likewise of the Church of God in verse 17. It is likewise confirmed by the promise of Blessing and Happiness pronounced upon them that shall do all these things and shall faithfully expect the accomplishment of them This Verse a part of which I have read to you is the Repetition in few words of all that matter that goeth before from verse 6. to it and hath in it First an attestation of our Lord and Saviour Christ in the former part of the Verse Behold I come quickly Secondly an acclamation of the Church in the latter part these words I have read to ye Amen even so come Lord Jesus In the attestation of Christ he promiseth he will come to his Church he will come shortly both for the accomplishment of all his promises and likewise for their safety and deliverance from all enemies and all miseries and molestations whatsoever To this the Church makes an acclamation and saith Amen even so come Lord Jesus In this acclamation of the Church to which we must now come we are to consider First the person of the Speaker whose words they be Secondly what is the matter or substance contained in them Ye shall see whose words they be if ye look back but to the 17. verse of this Chapter there ye shall find that first it is said the Spirit saith Come By the Spirit is not meant the third Person in Trinity the holy Ghost because he is not subject to these passions to these desires but he resteth himself in the execution and present disposing and dispensing of things according to his own will and pleasure Neither by Spirit here is meant any wicked spirit or Angel for they do with fear and horrour expect the same coming of our Lord and Saviour Christ because his coming shall be the accomplishment of their misery and eternal infelicity But by Spirit here is meant the spirit in all the Elect and holy people of God in whomsoever the Spirit of God is that Spirit doth say come and doth wish the accomplishment of all these most gracious promises For this is not the desire of the flesh or of nature but an earnest and vehement desire of the Spirit of God in the Elect that saith come Again secondly the same verse telleth us that the Bride saith come That is the Church of God in general the Catholick Church the whole Church of God being now hand-fasted to Christ and entred into a spiritual contract with him She desireth the consumation of the Marriage the solemniation of the Marriage which is already begun in the contract of it and not only every particular member of the Church in whom the Spirit of God is saith come but the Church of God in general the Bride saith come the whole Church saith come wishing and desiring the accomplishment of the Marriage which is already begun In the third place the same verse
how to live and how to die while we live let us desire of God so to steer our course as that we may lead the lives of holy and devout Christians We desire to live and have we no desire to live well what 's this life without godliness what is it to live and to have our hearts all the dayes of our lives void of grace and piety Life without grace is like beauty in a woman without discretion Pro. 11.22 Non est vivere sed valere vita It is no life but a living death alwayes to live and to want health and strength which sweetens life and makes it comfortable So it is no life a Christian leads where there is a want of piety in the heart What is this to live unless we know how to live well and to make a right use of our time We must consider wherefore we live even to improve our time to the best advantage for the saving of our Souls otherwise we live like Beasts not like Men not like Christians These silly brutes live in time but know not the time in which they live so careless Christians run out their time but know not how to make use of their time they consume their time but they do not increase it Like Bankrupts that waste their stock but never seek to improve it We make a decoction of our time as water is boil'd away from a fourth part to a third and from a third to half so we waste and consume our time till we have no time left even till we come to the last minute of life why then while we have time let us pray to God to teach us to use it aright to give us grace to consider the time we spend that we may make the best improvment of it and as Esan did Jacob hold time by the heel and not suffer it to slip from us without giving a good account to God that we have imployed that time and space of life which is allotted us here for the advancement of Gods glory and the purchasing of our own Salvation We proceed to the third particular that we go to God by prayer to teach us the right use of our time in a right manner So teach us that is Teach us so efficaciously so powerfully so constantly as that we may attain to the true wisdome and knowledg of saving of our Souls We must pray to God to teach us effectually Psal 119.33 Teach me O Lord the way of thy statutes and I shall keep it unto the end We can know nothing of heaven unless the Spirit of God instruct us There is a great Light in us the Light of Nature and this light is enough to condemn us if we walk not according to this Light this Light of Knowledg imprinted by God in our hearts and by this Light all Heathens are condemn'd but this Light is not able to carry us half way to heaven The Light of Nature cannot save us but the light of Grace must bring us to the light of Glory Esther was fain to stand a loof off in the Court till the King reach'd forth his Golden Scepter to invite her nearer to him Nature only leads us to the outward Court of Heaven but Grace holds forth the Scepter to bring us into Heaven Nature like the faint heat of the Sun draws up the vapours but a little way it hath not strength enough to master our Corruptions but the heat and power of Gods grace is only able to dispel and vanquish them It is only the work of Gods Spirit to shew us the right way to Heaven and to guide us in that way All lies in the Grace of God and unless we are continually assisted and carryed on by his gracious Spirit we are never likely to come near the sight of Heaven We have indeed many helps and furtherances to carry us to heaven but none of these will avail us without God The word of God is constantly preach'd in our ears the Ministers of God are daily pressing us forward to heaven but what can the frail voice of man work upon the heart without the powerful influence of Gods holy Spirit We Ministers without God are but as Gehazi's staff laid upon the dead Child we are no wayes able to raise the Soul from the death of sin to the life of righteousness unless God first breath upon it and infuse the life of Grace into the dead heart of the sinner Let this teach us not to rest in our selves or any outward means for the purchasing of the joyes of heaven but place our whole trust and confidence in the living God What 's all the Light of Reason but darkness it self to bring us to the Light Everlasting All humane wisdome is but a false Light which will lead us in the end to the pit of destruction It is a good caution the Apostle gives us Col. 2.8 Beware lest any man spoil you through Philosophy and vain deceit If we follow the false Light of Reason it will deceive us and misguide us in our way to Heaven Natural Reason haply may see the heavenly Canaan afar off and have some stragling thoughts of the happiness of another world but it shal never be able to get possession of heaven The horns of this Altar shall never save any man that flies unto them As the light is hid under a bushel so nature is clouded and darkned with many mists of errour and cannot reach the sight of heaven In the second place let us fly to God by prayer that he would teach us effectually and shew us the right way to heaven Before we hear the Word of God let us fall upon our knees and beg of God to make it profitable and useful to our Souls What makes the word of God so ineffectual how come we to gain so little comfort by the preaching of the Word Is it not because we do not pray to God to open our hearts and make it useful to us that we may attend to the word of Truth and obtain Salvation by it The people before the Law was published to them were cleansed and sanctified by Moses to receive it Exod. 19.14 So ought we to Sanctifie our hearts by prayer and desire of God to purge our Souls of the many pollutions of our sins that we may gain a blessing by the Word of God and return with joy and comfort from the house of God It is prayer that makes the word of God profitable to our Souls it is like the Salt which Elisha threw into the waters to heal them So does prayer make the word of God beneficial to us and causeth us to relish the sweetness and comfort of it The heart is like that Book sealed with seven Seals which no man can open but God himself Therefore let us pray to God to open our hearts that we may receive instruction from the Word of God There is no man can teach us
effectually but God alone no man can shew us the right way to heaven but God Therefore let us pray So teach us c. We now come to the end wherefore Moses begs of God to teach us to number our dayes That we may apply c. In which we meet with three particulars 1. The kind and nature of this wisdome wherein it consists and it is in making the best provision we can for the eternal welfare of our Souls 2. The Subject of it our Hearts 3. The means of obtaining this wisdome and that is by the meditation of Death 1. Of the kind and nature of this wisdome wherein it chiefly consists that is in having an eye to heaven in looking after the eternal welfare of our Souls Our next Conclusion is this It is the only true wisdome of a Christian to provide for his Soul Then are we wise indeed when we are wise unto Salvation when we know how to provide for Eternity True wisdome consists not in gathering riches but in living in the fear of God and ordering our steps so as that we may make sure of heaven another day It is our obedience to Gods Commandments which cries us up for wise Christians in the repute of God and man Deut. 4.6 Keep therefore and do them for this is your wisdome and your understanding in the sight of the Nations which shall hear all these statutes and say Surely this great Nation is a wise and understanding people What is it for a man to be wise for the world and a fool for heaven what 's the wealth and honour of the world to the happiness of the Soul what 's a man the better for being rich and honourable in this world if in the end his Soul be lost Mat. 16.26 What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own Soul What the people said of David 2 Sam. 18.3 Thou art worth ten thousand of us the like I say of the Soul It is more worth than a thousand worlds and the Salvation of thy Soul is more to thee than the gaining of many worlds What the man pleaded to Joab for not slaying of Absolom 2 Sam. 18.12 Though I should receive a thousand shekles of Silver in my hand yet would I not put forth my hand against the Kings Son The like maist thou reason within thy own breast Though I might purchase the riches of a thousand worlds yet would I not seek the destruction of my Soul whatsoever thou dost still have an eye to thy Soul that that perish not in another world what if all other things go amiss with thee in this life â—…f thy Soul be in safety It is wisdome I confess to provide for the world for the body but the main wisdome is to provide for the Soul Be careful of the outward man but be sure thou dost not neglect the inward man Provide for both the body and Soul but let thy chief care be for the Soul which is thy better part It was the Symbol of Rodolphus the second Emperour of Rome who gave an Eagle with a double Head with the one he lookt upwards to the Sun and with the other downwards upon the Earth with this Motto Utrumque I have an eye to both Thus it is Lawful for a Christian to look downwards to the Earth and provide for the body but he must have one eye chiefly sixt upon the Soul and in the first place provide for it we must look directly to heaven obliquely upon the earth fix our eyes upon the one cast a glance upon the other It becomes a Christian to consider what may become of him hereafter and whither he is going Consider thy beginning from whence thou camest and consider thy end what will befal thee hereafter He cannot be a wiser man faith the Healthen wo does not know either from whence he came or whither he must go Sure enough he cannot be a wise Christian that knows not what will become of his Soul It is by way of just Reproof of such as are wise for the world but meer fools for heaven The wisdome of the flesh is meer folly in the sight of God Some men would be reputed wise in the world and yet know not which way to take for the gaining of heaven Such a man passeth in the world for a crafty subtile worldling that knows how to mannage his affairs with the best advantage to himself and yet he knows not a step of the way to heaven It is a Maxime amongst the Jesuites Uti scientia to live by their shifts so do many in the world who have only a little wit to carry them out in secular affairs and their brains serve them to gather a little wealth and muck but they are meer Idiots in all that concerns heaven and salvation and the purchasing of the true riches of the Soul And yet see the fondness of these men that though they know not which way to take to get heaven yet they make themselves sure of it as if Salvation and eternal life were within their reach and power to command it when they please Papyrius Massonus writes of the Jesuites that count themselves so wise ut se putant soelo vel ipsi quandoque imperaturos as that they think they shall one day have the command of heaven it self The like presumption is in many Christians at this day that they believe heaven is at their command and they shall easily obtain it though they do nothing for it Oh shake off this folly make what provision thou wilt for other things thou art but a fool if thou dost neglect thy Soul As provident as the rich man was in the Gospel God gave him the title of a Fool and Cajetan gives the reason of it because he did not provide for himself in such things as were needful for the Salvation of his Soul He is a fool that prefers and Apple before a piece of Gold who keeps those things that are to be cast away and neglects such things as are to be preserved who heeds not his house where he must abide for ever and beautifies that place where he is to lodg but for a night Such an one is he that forgets his Soul and is careful for all other things Give me leave to speak the truth and not alwayes to drop oyl into your ears and speak unto you smooth things Where shall we find the man that desires to save his soul that would willingly part with this world to gain a better We daily hear the word of God we talk much of Religion we boast of our interest in heaven but when the matter comes to decision when we are put to our choice whether Heaven or Earth whether we will forego the profits of this world for the love of heaven this is the fiery Chariot which divides between Elijah and Elisha which parts us and God and makes us to cast away our hope
fit for nothing but the common Dunghil In so low a state of abjection and in so vile an esteem were those very Ambassadors of Heaven among an Atheistical and crooked generation our very Apostle here professeth 1 Cor 15.32 That he fought with beasts at Ephesus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some would have meant Literally of his being dilaniated and rent in his body as many Primitive Christians were in the first Cruel times of raging persecution by wild Beasts to which Nero that Dedicator Damnationis as Tertullian slyles him being himself a Lyon was wont Tyrannically to cast the bodies of the Christians But others better in my poor understanding expound it of those Ethical or Moral Beasts who with Demetrius and the rabble that cryed up the great Diana of the Idolatours Ephesians so violently withstood and opposed Saint Paul who cryed down that their abhominable superstition at Ephesus Act. 19. in which place a great door and effectual was opened unto him but there were many Adversaries 1 Cor. 16.8 9. those Apostles indeed experimenting the proof of what their Lord and Master foretold them that they must be sent forth even as sheep among Wolves who would attempt to tear them in pieces and which of us in particular encounters not his discouragements Yea woe is me We seem to be fallen into those times wherein many men as if directly infatuated from Heaven out of a grosse misprision apprehend the Ministery it self the greatest inconvenience and that great cheat that grand Pantomime of Christendome the cunning Jesuit now almost bare-fac'd hath instilled as is feared so pernitious a principle into such as are for ought we can see willing to be deceived as to question the office it self and to dispute the Institution as if they would have men scorn the Physitian when sickest and shun the Chirurgion when forest And which must be forgotten there not wanting some who are apt to charge on that secret Calling the occasion if not the cause of all the Calamities of this latter Age Just as those of whom Suidas reports that they were wont to write with Ink or blood on a glass and so set it against the Moon making all those spots or blurres that were in the glass to be in the Moon and not at all in the glass upon which alone they were written mean while never at all anatomizing their own Ulcerous Corrupt insides or repenting for their loathsome self-abhominations and among them as principle for the contempt of Gods faithful Ministers Which sins becoming so Epidemical and National as they are call for Wrath and Indignation from the Lord who is here styled in my Text the Righteous Judge And yet though this be a Fight nevertheless it is for the quality a good Fight and that for these reasons First of all because it s undertaken for the Faith of Christ and for the Salvaof Souls whereof even one single one is more worth than a whole World O what comfort will it be in the day of retribution when a faithful Minister after all his sharp conflicts with the wayward oppositions of corrupt men shall say Loe me and the people which thou hast given me as the fruit of all my labour in thy Gospel being able thus to give up an account with joy and not with griefe Secondly Because it s undertaken for a good reward which is no less than a Crown of Kighscousness What Saint Gregory said of afflictions for a good Conscience will hold here alone Consideratio proemii minuit vim flagelli The consideration of the Reward abates of the Difficulty of the Fight even so it s noted of Moses that having respect unto the recompense of the reward he preferred the reproach of Christ to all the richest treasures in AEgypt Heb. 11.26 the same was it likewise that animated that noble Prophet under all his discouragements and fruitless endeavours among men Isa 49.4 I have laboured in vain and spent my time for nought yet surely my Judgment is with the Lord and my work that is the reward of my work is with the Lord who rewardeth his Ministers secundum laborem though not secundum proventum as Saint Bernard speaks according to their Labour and pious endeavours which themselves undergo in the Gospel though not according to the success of their Labours which is Gods alone to bestow And thus farr of the words in their first acception uttered by Saint Paul as an Apostle I might next consider them also as spoken in the name of all other Christians at large even of all such as who love the appearing of the Lord. Christ Jesus at his coming And under that notion of them we may observe That the Life of a Christian is a continual warfare upon the Earth so Chrysologus Christiano militars est id quod vivit in seculo suitable unto that of Job Chap. 7.1 Where the word rendered an appointed time is by many translated a Warfare which was hinted to us in the first enmity between the two seeds after again in Esau and Jacob strugling together in the same womb and to this effect is that speech of our Saviour I came not to send Peace on the Earth but War Division and variance namely between Grace and Corruption which was experimented mightily in the breast of this our Apostle when the Law in his Members rebelled against the Law of his Mind Rom. 7.23 it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a warring Law and elsewhere he faith The flesh lusteth against the spirit as the spirit lusteth against the flesh Gal. 5.17 and to the same purpose also Saint James Chap. 4.1 From whence come Warres and Fightings among you Come they not hence even of your Lusts that Warre in your Members Surely Contention comes from Corruption see likewise 1 Pet. 2.11 Now I might here take occasion to treat of the Doctrine of the spiritual Warfare and pursuing the Metaphor present you with those several things that concurre to make up a compleat Battaile as 1. A Bickering and encounter it self Nisi proecesserit pugna non potest esse Victoria as Saint Cyprian there cannot properly be said to be a Victory where never was a fighting delicata jactatio est vbi periculum non est it s but a fond or effeminate kind of boasting of a Conquest where never was danger 2. In a Warre there must be Enemies with whom to encounter quis enim oertat nisi inimicum habet saith Prosper there cannot be a Contention where there is not an Adversary Now in this Warfare the great and the grand Adversary is the Devil who with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Adversary 1 Pet. 5.8 Jam. 4.7 He is as the chief Champion the World also and the Flesh as under him Sunt tria quoe tent ant Hominem Mundus Caro Doemon And in relation to the several Temptations