Slaughter THis Truth lieth as plainly in the Words as may be and for the prosecution of it I shall propound this plain method First To shew you that in days of slaughter all the Israel of God may not escape Some of them may but others may fall Secondly That the result of the slaughter whoever stands or falls shall be for the raising up Christ and his glory for the getting him a Name Thirdly I shall endeavour to shew you what glory shall be brought to Christ in the end and issue of the slaughters that shall be made in the World And Fourthly That all the glory that shall be put upon the head of Christ shall be in mercy unto those of Israel that out-live and escape the Distresses that shall break in upon the World And then Fifthly The Application will follow First To begin then with the first viz. That in days of slaughter all the Israel of God possibly may not escape some of them may fall to the ground That is clearly intimated in the Text The Branch of the Lord shall be glorious to THEM that ARE escaped of Israel strongly holding out to us that some among Israel may fall I need say nothing to confirm this Truth but onely refer you to our sad experience this day I might bid you go round unto all the Churches of Christ in and about the great City and ask them how it hath fared with the Saints of God this day doubtless you will find every of them reckoning up their Slain and those that have fallen by the Sword of the Angel I might bid you go unto every Soul that knows God in truth in and about this City and see what account they will give you I am perswaded you would find almost every of them making some or other sad complaint for the loss of such and such a Christian Friend and such a one that feared the Lord with whom they had much intimacy and acquaintance this is the general cry among the Saints this day But a little that these proceedings of God may not startle you you shall finde some footsteps of like dealings in the days of old that God hath not walked in an untrodden path but a course he hath sometimes taken in days and times past Sometimes in Scripture you find the Lord threatning of and cutting down onely the Uncircumcised Ones the profane Nations and People of the earth thus Ezek. 32. you have a long Catalogue of the dreadful Judgements of God upon men uncircumcised from ver 20. to vers 30. where he tells you that many of the barbarous Nations that knew not God are gone down to the pit being slain with the sword and he concludes vers 30. There be the Princes of the North all of them and the Zidonians which are gone down with the slain with their terrour they are ashamed of their might and they lie uncircumcised with them that be slain by the sword and bear their shame with them that go down to the pit c. At other times you find the Lord dealing with his own People as with the uncircumcised and laying them together under the same Calamity and Distress Jer. 9. is a famous instance vers 25. Behold the days come saith the Lord that I will punish all them which are circumcised with the uncircumcised God tells us plainly there are such times in which his own People and others may fare alike Calamities and Distresses may make no distinction it may be in some measure unto the Saints as it is to the Sinners You shall find the Lord in Scripture sometimes threatens as heavy things against his Israel as against any Jer. 14. the Prophet begins to beg mercy for Israel O the Hope of Israel ver 8. the Saviour thereof in the time of trouble why shouldst thou be as a Stranger in the Land and as a way-faring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night in which words he seems to intimate that it would be a strange thing a strange way of proceeding if God should turn against his People if thou art the Saviour of thy People wilt thou yet turn thy hand against Israel to whom thou hast been known as a Saviour but God stopt the mouth of the Prophet vers 11 12. Then said the Lord unto me Pray not for this People for their good when they fast I will not hear their cry and when they offer burnt-Offerings and an Oblation I will not accept them but I will consume them by the Sword by the Famine and by the Pestilence This very Israel unto whom God was sometimes known as a Saviour yet at this time he took up a resolution concerning them that he would come out against them and consume them by his sore Judgements So Ezek. 33. God threatens some that out-lived and escaped some Distresses vers 27. Thus saith the Lord God As I live surely they that are in the Wastes shall fall by the Sword and him that is in the open Field will I give unto the Beasts to be devoured and they that be in the Forts and in the Caves shall die of the Pestilence This is spoken of Israel And those of Israel that as yet were not carried away captive God comes out against them with this purpose and determination that though they did remain and were preserved they should at length fall So Jer. 44.13 some there were that in the time of Israel's Captivity fled into Egypt for refuge and what says he I will punish them that dwell in the Land of Egypt as I have punished Jerusalem by the Sword by the Famine and by the Pestilence observe God sometimes punisheth Jerusalem the Seat of his own People with these great and sore Judgements Sometimes if his own People shall think to take Sanctuary and refuge themselves here and there it shall not avail but the hand of the Lord shall overtake them Let me tell you not onely some of Gods Israel may fall by slaughter but some of the principal of his People some of the choice ones of the flock Jer. 25.34 35. Howl ye Shepherds and cry and wallow your selves in the Ashes ye principal of the Flock for the dayes of your Slaughter and of your Dispersion are accomplished and ye shall fall like a pleasant vessel and the Shepherds shall have no way to flee nor the Principal of the Flock to escape We are apt to say when we see God terrible in his doings to the children of men and terrible in his dealings to his own People What do these things mean We are ready to look upon such Providences as things uncouth strange and unheard-of but we finde it is not out of the course and method that God hath observed heretofore So that I may conclude in respect of common calamity it sometimes falls according to that Eccl. 9.2 All things come alike unto all there is one event to the Righteous and to the Wicked to the Good to the Clean and to the Unclean to
sojourn in Mesech and dwell in the tents of Kedar that is among a people where God is dishonoured When thou lookest abroad in the World and seest how little sin is born down and how little the Interest of Christ is advanced among any that are escaped if thy Escape hath furthered Christ's Interest in thee this will grieve thy heart be careful and watchfull in the making a right use of this matter But to come to a second Use VSE II. Should the escaping dreadful Calamity work the heart to a prizing this Branch of the Lord then if any of you have a witness coming in against you that it hath not had this effect I must say the Lord will say unto you as unto them Deut. 32.6 Do you thus requite the Lord O foolish and unwise I would a little set before you the evil of this and the misery that may follow upon it 1. There is much sin in it your sin lyeth in this that you have hitherto crossed the design of God by what means you can the Designs of the Lord are very much for the advancement of Christ God saith his Son shall be exalted and extolled and made high and he works to this end by all means Word and Rod are both intended to this end he giveth you the Word to make way for Christ into the heart he comes with the Rod and why with that Rev. 3.20 Behold I stand at the door and knock if any man hear my voice and open the door I will come in to him and will sup with him and he with me He knocks by the Word and he knocks by the Rod and it is all that the Door may be opened for the exalting of Christ If he do deliver and save you in times of trouble it is that he may be exalted Is he not made glorious If not you cross God's design Hos 11.4 I drew them with the cords of a man with the lands of love and I was as one that took off the yoke from their jaws and layed meat before them All this was that they might exalt the Lord. Now if it have not this issue upon you you are guilty of the great sin of thwarting Gods designs Further there is sin in this respect you pretend that you are for the exaltation of Christ this is that you pray for how oft have you prayed Thy Kingdom come how oft have you begged that Christ might become amiable and lovely to you and is not Christ yet made glorious not yet exalted If not your sin is this it is doubtful your Profession is much of it Hypocrisy and your praying mocking of God sins enow you need not be guilty of greater evils 2. It will endanger the intailing of punishment upon you if Christ be not become glorious to you To speak of two or three things briefly 1. It will be doubtful it will lay thee under the plague of an hard heart which is the forest of all plagues if the Lord's dealings do not soften thee and promote Christ's Interest in thee it is to be doubted it will set thee further from Christ and will leave thee under very great rockiness and stoniness of heart Not onely Pharoah's heart was hardned when the dealings of God in removing the Plague did not work kindly upon him but Israel had their hearts hardned also as you may see Heb. 3.8 9. Harden not your hearts as in the provocation in the day of temptation in the Wilderness when your Fathers tempted me proved me and saw my works forty years c. This was the sin of Israel of old and possibly the like evil may befall thy soul And 2dly if thy Escape have not produced this effect to render Christ more glorious possibly thou shalt not yet escape for all this thou settest up thy Eben-ezer and sayest Hitherto the Lord hath preserved but it is but hitherto thou knowest not what a day may bring forth God can return this very Judgement and cause it to cut off thee and many more the face of things look something sad for the present * The Plague increasing at this time God is coming back some degrees in his displeasure and whose turn among us it may be to fall we know not it may be any of our conditions if God find us under hardness of heart do not say the bitterness of death is past remember that when the Caldeans had besieged Jerusalem and by the coming of Pharoah's Army the Siege was broken up presently the people were confident the Caldeans should come no more but see a little what God saith and also what he doth Jer. 37.7 8 9. Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel thus shall ye say unto the King of Judah that sent you unto me to enquire of me Behold Pharoahs Army which is come forth to help you shall return to Egypt into their own Land and the Caldeans shall come again and fight against this City and take it and burn it with fire Thus saith the Lord Deceive not your selves saying The Caldeans shall surely depart from us for they shall not depart And so it came to passe for in the 39th of Jeremy first verse it is said that Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon came and all his Army against Jerusalem and besieged it and in the next verse it is said the City was broken up These poor people were confident because the Caldeans were withdrawn and the Siege raised they should be in danger no more It may be we say the storm is over the Bill is much decreased but alas it may increase again and be yet more sore than it hath been Thus I say if Christ be not advanced in thee possibly thou mayest not yet escape this Judgment Or 3dly if not by this Judgment God can meet with thee by others he hath reserves of Judgments of divers kinds and can easily and quickly meet with them that are not in the frames they should be as God saith of Moab Isa 15.8 For the cry is gone round about the borders of Moab the howling thereof unto Eglaim and the howling thereof unto Beer-Elim For the waters of Dimon shall be full of blood for I will bring more upon Dimon lyons upon him that escapeth of Moab and upon the remnant of the Land God had been dealing with the Moabites in some way of Judgement and there was some of them remaining but though they had been emptyed from vessel to vessel their scent still remained and now God saith he will come forth with another stroke God hath every thing at his command and he can commission another Dispensation but let me tell you it is sad if after thus long being under the hand of God Christ be not advanced more in your hearts And this leads me to the third Use of the Point VSE III. If it be a blessed effect of Slaughtering-Judgements upon them that have escaped to have Christ become more glorious what shall we think of those who though they
for a time they shall be dealt withall according to the violence done to the Saints of God The violence done to me and to my Flesh be upon Babylon shall the Inhabitants of Zion say Isa 51.22 23. I have taken the cup of trembling out of thy hand that is out of Zions hand even the dregs of the cup of my fury thou shalt no more drink it again but I will put it into the hand of them that afflict thee which have said to thy Soul Bow down that we may go over and thou hast laid thy Body as the ground and as the street to them that went over They shall suffer too according to the contempt of the Gospel and the dishonour done to Christ that way for he shall come to deal with all them that do not know him and obey not the Gospel and also according to the sin of despising the forbearance of Christ Indeed this day you are escaped and the patience of Christ is exercised towards you but let me tell you if you stand and abide in your sinful state you shall find that the abusing of the patience of Christ is but treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath 5. Those that have escaped and not Israel they shall be compassed about with eternal Sorrows and shall never rise out of them Says the Church Though I fall I shall arise again and though I sit in darkness yet the Lord shall be a light to me Then shall she be confounded that is the Enemies of the Church shame shall cover her That will be the portion of every sinner though he may escape for a season shame shall cover him misery and distress shall abide him for ever VSE III. HAving dispatch'd the Second I come now to a Third Use which the former Uses necessarily lead unto It is a little to encourage the hearts of poor Sinners that possibly may be full of thoughts and desires that they might yet be brought into the number of Israel Methinks I do even hear some poor heart say If it be so well with them that are Gods Israel and so ill with them that are not Gods Israel What is there no hope for me though I am yet none of that number Must I for ever stay in that state of misery in which I am Must an eternal doom of Misery be entaild upon me I acknowledge my state is exceeding desperate and sad but is there no hope in Israel concerning this matter To that I answer If there be any poor sinner sensible of the misery of his condition that would gladly make an escape out of it Soul be not discouraged thy condition is not hopeless but be encouraged for there is a possibility that as thou hast escaped the dread and misery of this present day so thou mayst be delivered from that Christless state wherein thou art There are two Scriptures I would commend to you for this purpose the first is in Isa 44.5 One shall say I am the Lords and another shall call himself by the Name of Jacob and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord and sirname himself by the Name of Israel The words are both a Prophecy and a Promise and they do respect the Gentile-World that were at that time and long after in their sins in their state of estrangement from God here it is prophesied that yet there should be a flocking into Israel the number of Gods Israel should be greatly augmented and encreased It is promised that God would so prevail upon the hearts of some poor Sinners that they shall come and say I am the Lords and shall come and subscribe their hands to the Lord and shall sirname themselves by the Name of Israel that God would conquer them so far that they should see the need they had to be of that number that they shall resign and give up themselves to be of the Israel of God This is an encouraging word to the Sinner there is a possibility for them that were strangers to come and to name themselves by the Name of Jacob and subscribing to the Lord to take up that Name and so partake of the Priviledges of the Israel of God Take another Scripture Isa 19.24 25. In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria even a Blessing in the midst of the Land whom the Lord of Hosts shall bless saying Blessed be Egypt my People and Assyria the Work of my hands and Israel my Inheritance The import of the words is this Egypt and Assyria were some of the Enemies of God and his People at a very great distance from him but here is a Promise that they should come to be conquered and brought into subjection to the Lord and to be baptized into the Spirit of Israel to be blessed with the Blessing of Israel they shall speak the Language of Canaan they shall be of one Heart and one Lip with the Lords People Souls were you as Egypt and were you as the Assyrians Enemies to God and his People were you at the greatest distance from God that could be supposed Egypt had neither Ordinances nor Priviledges nor ought else that good was more then the creatures of the Earth and such-like things yet the Lord intimates here to us that they shall come to share in and divide a Blessing with Israel If thy estate were as one of them yet mayest thou as and according to the promise made to them be brought into the number that shall share in the Blessing of the Israel of God Therefore Soul though now thou art not of Israel yet it may be said to thee They have obtained Mercy which had not obtained This is the kindness of God that he is pleased to make blessed overtures of Mercy unto poor vile and unworthy Sinners But more then this for the encouragement of any Soul that may yet be in his Sins I would speak four or five things Thy condition is not desperate but thou mayst be brought into the number of the Israel of God and so partake of the same Mercy with them in thy escaping this day if thou dost consider 1. That Gods Israel came to be the People of God by choice and through the Grace and Goodness of God Israel were not born the People of God He chose Abraham and his Seed from the rest of the World to be a peculiar People to himself Hence it is that Israel often-times are called in Scripture Israel my CHOSEN so Psal 105.4 The Lord hath CHOSEN Jacob for himself and Israel to be his peculiar Treasure and in Isa 44.1 Israel is called there the Chosen of the Lord Yet now hear O Jacob my Servant and Israel whom I have CHOSEN They were chosen meerly from the good pleasure of God Choice it is a free Act in which there is no necessity and constraint so it was in God a free Act to pitch upon Israel to make them his People This account the Lord gives of it Deut.
and thus to do will be a proof of your love to and esteem of this Branch of the Lord as more excellent to you then he was wont to be Saith David Psal 116. I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplications that is I will love him better then ever I did if he had but a little he shall now have more and what proof doth he give of it vers 14. I will pay my Vows unto the Lord now in the presence of all his People here was a proof it The Lord help us that have the Vows of God upon us to evidence that Christ is become glorious unto us by performing our Covenant God is known to be a Covenant-keeping-God and his People should be like their heavenly Father But again 3. A third thing required from them that escape a day of Calamity is this That Christ be owned in the Escape that he have the glory of it put it not upon your natural Fortitude and Courage your natural hardiness and boldness as some vaunting spirits are apt to do and to conclude thence was their preservation God doth not fear to strike the most fearless and sometimes the most fearless are in the greatest danger Put not thy escape upon the score of thy own Wisdom that thou hast acted thus and thus prudently for thy preservation if the Lord would he could easily have out-witted thee and if he had not been with thee in the acting the best of thy Wisdom would not have been useful take heed of boasting in Means if Means have been successful look up to that God that hath been pleased to bless them unto that end Psal 116.8 David puts the matter upon its proper Basis Thou hast delivered my Soul from death mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling Gracious hearts desire to cry as Moses and the Children of Israel did when they saw Pharoah and his Host sunk as Lead in the Sea and themselves preserved to their great amazement Exod. 15.2 The Lord is my Strength and my Song and He is become my Salvation He is my God and I will prepare him a Habitation my Fathers God and I will exalt him According to this time it shall be said said Balaam in his Prophecy What hath the Lord wrought This must you and I say What hath the Lord wrought The truth is Christ suffers much in the World and suffers much from his own People they rob him of his glory we are apt to give that honour that is due to him unto some one else but it should be our care to be found in the frame with them Jer. 50.28 The voice of them that flee and escape out of Babylon to declare in Sion the vengeance of the Lord our God the vengeance of his temple it is the work of escaping Ones to praise the Lord and declare his works Would you all have some token for good that the interest of Christ is promoted in you see whether it be your care to give Christ the glory of this Salvation of which you have been partakers 4. This is the requirement of Christ from them that are escaped That the sence of this Mercy should long rest upon our Spirits our goodness in every respect is apt to be like the morning-cloud and the early dew that soon passeth away and in this respect more then in many other things the sence of our deliverance is very apt to wear off the Soul but it is a frame that Christ much mislikes where he findes it an instance or two may serve to convince us of it Psal 78.10 11. They kept not the Covenant of God possibly by this may be intended the Covenants they made with God in distress they did not keep them why not it was because they forgot his Works and Wonders that he had shewed them and one sin draws many more after it oft times they forgot the Works of God and so their Covenant with God both are taken ill and the latter as ill as any that God should shew abundance of kindness to a People whilst they slight and dis-esteem and let the sence of that kindness slip out of their minds and therefore he complains of the same thing Psal 106.13 They soon forgat his Works they waited not for his Counsel They were the delivering-Works of God and all the wonders he had shewed them they soon forgot the sence thereof was crept out of their hearts in a little time All of us alive may say we have seen much of the goodness of God to us but if we should be of the number of them that soon forget his goodness we do very evilly requite the Lord. 5. This is the requirement of Christ from them that are escaped in the day of Calamity That we should be dedicated consecrated and given up to his Use and Service in our whole Course This is the obligation that Christ hath laid on our Souls by carrying us through the distresses of this day That the rest of the time we spend in the flesh should not be spent according to the will of the flesh but according to the will of God that the rest of the time of our sojourning here might be spent in fear It is a kind of a new life that every one of us have received and this new Life should have Newness of Life going along with it saith the Apostle I beseech you by the mercies of God that you give up your selves Body and Soul as a Sacrifice to God which is but your reasonable service and such a mercy as this doth call for it that your Souls should be for God and your Bodies for God the Body hath received a great deal of mercy at this time that is preserved and kept the Clay-Cottage kept from tumbling to dust and ashes now all the members of the Body as well as the powers of the Soul ought to be for the Lord this the Lord expects and it is but your reasonable service which in common Justice should be given unto Christ Psal 116.8 9. For thou hast delivered my Soul from death mine Eyes from tears and my Feet from falling I will walk before the Lord in the land of the Living that is I will walk as in his sight and presence I will look to maintain a good frame of Life and Conversation in the rest of the time I have to spend in the World And thus may you testifie unto your selves and others that Christ gains on you by your Escape this day if you be found in the discharge of those Duties which are expected from you And thus I have dispatched the Doctrinal part VSE I. If this be a proper effect of your Escaping in a day of slaughter to have the Branch of the Lord become lovely know this kindness hath been shewed us therefore it concerns us narrowly to see how this effect is wrought out Every Soul should turn his Eyes inward I would hope your Souls have been a little thus