her and speak every way to her heart And then in the 19th Verse I 'll betroth thee unto me for ever Yea I 'll betroth thee unto me in Righteousness and in Judgment and in loving kindness and in mercies All this indeed hath a peculiar Relation to the Church of Israel But it is true of every Soul and of every Spirit that Christ speaks to and draws to love him as its Husband and Spouse He doth allure and speak to their Hearts He doth hedge up their way If God see that any of His love the World or Relations or any Thing better than himself He 'll hedge up their way They shall not find their way Thus you see there is a Time of Preparation wherein Christ is fitting and preparing and drawing the Soul to Himself 2. In the Second Particular I will enlarge a little further upon this Point of our Espousals and draw to a conclusion and therein shew you That we may all discern wherein and whereby the Soul is thus drawn to an Union with Jesus Christ to this Spiritual Union with him 1. In the first place It is by the Souls seeing and finding that it is in a miserable and a Lost and a Captivated condition without him When it comes to find it self in the Hands of Justice In the Hands of Divine Wrath and Indignation When it finds it self in all its Impurity and in all its Unholiness without Him it comes then to desire him to receive his offer to unite with him Now this is not onely by way as some it may be have insisted upon it by way of preparation but it runs throughout all the present State A true Christian is continually looking upon himself as a Captive It is not a thing of preparation onely But it flows out from the Efficacious Grace and Spirit of the Lord Jesus That every Soul that is thus united to Christ it finds it does not know what to do with it self without him Nor that it is onely drawn by fear but as I shall presently tell you tho very Briefly it is drawn by Love to him But I say because we are Captives because we are brought out of another Land a Land of Darkness a Land of Impurity a Land not suitable to the Land of Promise because we are brought out of that Therefore there must be a continual consideration of the necessity that lies upon us And it is not Derogatory to our Love of Christ or to the Grace of Christ that our first State being a Captivated State is known to us to be such a Captive State And therefore to be made Free by such Rich Grace as that the Great Prince and Lord of Life should have a desire to us that he should look upon that of his own Grace which is all the Beauty that is in any that God hath Loved them with an Everlasting Love the Beautiful Person is onely he that God hath from an Eternal free Love and Grace when we were all together lost and undone in our selves look'd upon and made his Time in the proper season of being brought home to him tho we are found in all our Impurities To be the Time of Love How great is it Now when any one of us is under this Grace of God Jesus Christ looks upon us He beholds the choice of God he beholds the Love of God upon us And such a one is as a Beautiful Person in his Eye And so he takes care to Shave the Head and to Pare the Nails and to change the Garments of Captivity and to bring him home to himself This I say it is not preparation Hammered out and Anvil'd by our own strength Povver or Consideration but it is a first Davvn of the Grace of Christ of the Love of Christ through the Election and Choice of God upon us Here is the very Beginning of the thing For as I read to you out of Ephes 5. Christ Loves the Church first of all and then he Sanctifies it and Washes it with the Water and with the Regeneration of his â—ord and of his Spirit He first of all Loves it Who Loved the Church and gave himself for it His Love is like the first Love of Espousals of drawing the Soul into a Condition and State of Espousals to himself And so he Sanctifies and Washes it with Water and Regenerates and Renews it and takes away the Prison-Garments the Captive-Garments Which it may be look Beautiful to those that are yet Ensnared They look upon all the Enjoyments and Pleasures of the World to be the greatest Bravery But now when Christ comes to shew them what their State is then they come to cry out at the first and so ever after as the Apostle Rom. 7. 24. O wretched Man that I am Who shalt deliver me from this Body of Death And you see he speaks of it in the very same Language ver 23. I see another Law in my Members warring against the Law of my mind and bringing me into Captivity to the Law of Sin which is in any Members It is a continuing sense on every Soul in Christ 2. The second thing wherein this is shewed It is in drawing the sincerest and Purest and Chastest Love of the Soul unto Jesus Christ When Christ by his Spirit in his word and by the Friend of the Bridegroom that is by the Preaching of the Word of Christ when he draws the entirest affections of Souls to himself Shewing his Love to them in the Pardon and Forgiveness of Sins he draws their hearts entirely and unitedly to himself He does therefore first of all as it were send the Soul the Wedding Garment of his own Righteousness He sends it a Robe a Vest from himself of his own Righteousness and of the sanctification of his own Spirit And this enkindles and enflames the Love of the Soul unto Jesus Christ The Apostle speaks in this Language in the 2 Cor. 11. 1. VVould to God you could bear with me a little c. For I am Jealous over you with a Godly Jealousie For I have Espoused you to one Husband that I may present you a chast Virgin to Christ The Preaching of the Gospel and the drawing of Souls it is the Espousal of them to one Husband and presenting them a Chast Virgin That is with undefiled and Inviolable affections to Jesus Christ When the Love of the Soul is thus drawn to him united to him The upright as I said to you before Love him And when once this Love of the Soul to Jesus Christ is indeed kindled where it is sincere and indeed kindled to him O how strong and how vehement is it It is true it is from the Love of Jesus Christ made known to it Even as you know Love draws and wins Love back again upon it self This is admirably set out to us in the eighth Chapter of the Song of Solomon Set me saith she as a Seal upon thine Heart as a Seal upon thine Arm. Let the Love
of Christ be to me so as if be set me as a Seal upon his Heart as a Seal upon his Arm. This is the greatest Indenture the strongest obligation and uniting of the Lord Jesus Christ to the Soul and of the Soul thereby to him again for then Love is as strong as Death and it is cruel as the Grave The coals thereof are coals of Fire which hath a most vehement Flame Many Waters cannot quench Love neither can the flouds drown it If a Man would give all the substance of his House for Love That is to buy that Love off from Christ That 's the meaning of it If a Man would give all the Substance of his House where Love is once fixed to draw it off It would utterly be contemned Now this we should look to whether we have such a chast and Inviolable Love to Jesus Christ That all the substance of the VVorld would be utterly contemned whether Christ hath Set us as a Seal upon his Heart and Arm It is impossible then it should ever be taken off 3. The third is this when once we come to be thus united to Christ in the Chastness and Purity of our Affections in the sense of his Love to us and our Love to him Immediately there follows and all along there follows a Self-Resignation and Obedience And it cannot be otherwise For Love from a worthy Person hath a great command over those that are Loved It hath a mighty command on the Persons Loved to engage to Love again So that they are willing to do any thing to give up themselves to the will of the Person that Loves and is Loved upon his Love first And this is most due indeed to our Lord Jesus Christ Because he is the most excellent of all that can be proposed to us And he Hath Loved us and Washed us in his Blood And he thus wins us to his own Holiness Eph. 5. Saith the Apostle the Church is Subject unto Christ as unto the Head the Saviour of the Body It is in a perfect complyance with the Holy will of God Object If you ll say But how can we say this We find many Imperfections in our Obedience many Motions in our Hearts that are disloyal to Jesus Christ and are not at all according to the Obligations that lie upon us Answ Because we are going on to perfection in this state and because we find that we are under a Degree of Captivity and not perfectly freed Therefore the Soul cries out earnestly for the coming of the Great Bridegroom I shall but make Two or Three Expressions of Application and so conclude this Point 1. In the First Place I beseech you that you would consider what your Christianity is If it be not so strict an Adherence of your Souls and Affections to Christ as every wise and prudent and good Husband requires and expects from his Wife I say if it be not so how is it possible that you can say That Christ is mine and I am his And therefore look well to it and have a Jealous Eye as the Apostle said I am Jealous over you with a Godly Jealousie So we should be All Jealous over our own Hearts and the Motions of our Eyes to see whether there be such a Faithfullness to Jesus Christ as ought to be VVhen the Church is Subject to Christ as the most Excellent and Virtuous VVoman and VVife is to the most Honourable and Worthy Husband There is not any thing then that can or ought or is possible to come between our Souls and Jesus Christ And If we cry out Alas We are not able hereunto we do not find this I shall after by the Grace and Assistance of God press upon you Every such Discovery of the remaining defection and falseness of our hearts It should make us cry out earnestly Come thou Beloved of my Soul That there may be an entire and a perfect Union between me and thee Betwixt thy self and my heart This it should make us weary of the World and weary of Life and weary of the present State We cannot find our hearts come up as we desire they should But in the mean time there is a True and a Real and a Substantial Faithfulness and Purity and Chastity of Affections towards Christ in every Soul that is His That tho there are things that do not look so Resigning to Christ as they should do and so perfectly complyant Yet the Spirit is United to him As the Apostle speaks by way of Allusion to this very thing in the 1 Cor. 6. latter end But he that is Joyned to the Lord is one Spirit That is in regard of the present State of Flesh and Blood there will be some Wandrings of Heart But the Spirit is Stedfast and Jealous over those Unholy and Impure motions towards Sin Flesh and the World and it gathers it self back and it humbles it self And it bewails it self in regard of the Trayterousness of the Flesh and corrupt part wherein it does any way behave it self unworthily towards Jesus Christ that Saviour of it self He is the Saviour of the Body and therefore the Church is Subject to him And then 2. In the Second Place It should teach us very vehemently to look and cry out for that Time of free and full Enjoyments of Christ I wonder we should not be earnestly desirous when I consider the Reason the necessity and the great obligation which lies upon us I wonder we are not more earnest to dye and to be with Christ we are apt to think there is a State of the World ordained wherein we should have such and such Enjoyments and bear up our selves for a Time While in the mean time we forget Jesus Christ But hereafter it will be endeavoured to be made plain in this Discourse that either to go out of the Body and to be with Jesus Christ in Spirit Or to have the whole frame of this VVorld unpinn'd and dis-joynted one part from another That there may come that Glorious Kingdom of Jesus Christ and that Marriage of the Lamb and coming down of that New-Jerusalem And our selves as a part of it as a Bride adorned for her Husband is the Inward Groan of every Saint These things should be sweet to us And we should not be Gulp'd down by the present Temptations of the World which have so much force because our hearts are not steady to Christ O Let us look earnestly for that Love which many Waters cannot quench nor the Flouds drown And If we find that we cannot be as we would be We should therefore cry out Make haste O Beloved And appear upon the Mountain of Spices That we may be for ever quiet and Pure and Un-interrupted in our Love unto thee and receiving thine upon us SERMON III. On Matth. XXV Ver. 1. and so on to Ver. 13. Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened unto Ten Virgins which took their Lamps and went forth to meet the Bridegroom
with this Who does not that is seriously a Christian long That might be fulfilled From the Rising of the Sun to the going down of the same Thy Name O Lord shall be Great That Christ should have his Portion given Him with the Great and with the Strong That the Ends of the Earth should be His That Knowledge should cover the Earth as the Waters do the Sea If any Love God and Love Christ I appeal to you whether we could be content Things should be as they are and not as they are thus foretold Let me make a plain and a Familiar Comparison and bring it to our selves I would suppose now as I know there are many that are Zealous in this Nation for King James They know he is out of the Nation and as it were an Exile from them And tho they may have a Great Plentiful Competent Estates and Great Riches Yet they think things are not well and as they should be Because they say things are not as they should be to exclude a Just and Lawful Prince as they think I make onely this Allusion My Judgment is enough known Suppose any Profess to Love Jesus Christ Then think with your selves whether it can consist with your Loyalty to Christ with your desire of his Glory and his Kingdom that it should be at so low an Ebb as it is Now I am sure if you weighed these and much more that might be said and all of them together You would plainly say that there can be no Truth nor no Loyalty of Christianity without an Earnest Desire and Preparation in your selves continually for the Bridegrooms coming Surely to be Rich onely as to this world and after the rate and pass of it and to our selves can no way satisfy a Wise Virgin in Christianity But now Alas We may see it very much otherwise who can but observe it every where and with all manner of Persons that we may converse with of the Higher and Lower Degree even of the First Three as I may speak in Christianity As it was said of David's Worthies I say if you take even those of the First Three We cannot but say there 's too Great a Byass too Great a Propension too Great an Inclination and Poize of Men towards this VVorld They are for every thing Pleasing and Desirable and Pleasurably affecting in it And they hold off as much as they can from a belief of the nearness of the coming of Jesus Christ Now how comes this to pass in the VVorld Give me leave very briefly to Represent the reasons of this to you and the way or method how these things have come into the VVorld I am sure I may without any uncharitableness or untenderness say that the Religion and Christianity of not one of a Hundred but is onely Calculated for the present State And they would that all the State and Trade and Government and the VVealth and Peace and Plenty and Prosperity of it should go on still Than that there should be an approach of the Bridegroom and Kingdom of Christ The Reasons of these things I 'll give you in these three Particulars 1. The first is It comes to pass by the Bridegrooms Delaying his coming that hath given the Advantage and Opportunity to this State of Things if Christ had come as soon as he Rose as soon as ever he sent forth the Apostolick Preachers Things would have been found in a far other temper than now For when I come saith Christ Shall I find Faith on the Earth But now it was so necessary for Him in the Wisdom of the Father and in his own wisdom to delay his coming that he Swore It was a thing of so great concernment Dan. 12. That there should be Time Times and Half a Time before his coming should be So he did Chronize he drew out Time till his coming And that hath given Advantage to all that Deadness of Christianity to all that low posture of things So the Apostle saith 2 Thes 2. That day cannot come except there be a falling away first Thus the day was Post-pon'd it could not come And so observe Mat. 25. Where the Bridegroom Delayed his coming they all slumbred and slept Ver. 5. While the Bridegroom tarryed they all slumbred and slept And in Match 24. Pray observe how the Spirit of God Insists upon this that there was a delay of the coming of Christ ver 48. But and if that Evil Servant shall say in his heart my Lord delayeth his coming c. So here 's the sleep and space given for the possibility of such sleep such a low State in Christianity as there is by Christ delaying his coming Some are ready to say he 'll never come there will never be any such thing Why is it not sooner Why has it been so long Men have time to do something else We must find somewhat or other to pass away the Time till our Bridegroom comes And so they fall into a slumber As many in Morality have discoursed the great degeneracy of humane nature say they the Intellectual Life is Slumbred by the Animal Life And as some have desired to Allegorize the History of Adam and Eve Adam when Eve was taken out of him fell into a sleep you know God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam And so say they that lower Soul came to have the Predominancy and to get above because the Life of Adam was in a slumber it was in a sleep Give me leave by this to express to you my sense in what I am now upon as soon as ever the Professors of Christianity did perceive that the Bridegroom did not come The lower Life began to get above and the Christians even of the first Times began to slumber and sleep We have many instances of it Demas hath left us having Loved the present World Demas was not onely a single Example But he was a Peculiar Pattern of the State of Christianity Having Loved this present World So says the Apostle there is no Man like minded to Epaphroditus that naturally cares for your State For all Men seek their own not the things which are Jesus Christ's Phil. 2. So I say here was presently a Slumbring of the Power of Christianity And then there 's a Great Example of this Worldly Grandeur rising in that of Diotrephes in the third Epistle of John ver 9. He Loved to have the pre-Eminence Now as I said of Demas so I say of Diotrephes It was not onely a single Example But the Bishops of the Churches of Christ began to Love Preeminency to Love Grandeur To Love Prelation and to set up one above another And thus the Apostacy began to creep in And so Christianity degenerated into a Worldly Interest a Worldly Gain a Worldly Greatness a VVorldly State And here the Life and Power of Christianity fell asleep It was in a Slumber And this Spirit went from one to another and from hand to hand And tho the Reformation
4. In the fourth Place I beseech you consider the great difference between the City of the Servants of Christ of those that are of the true Wise Virgins in Christianity And between the City of those that are not or are Foolish Virgins I would but very briefly represent that to you in Scripture-Expression and so I will conclude If you consider the City of the Servants of Jesus Christ consider it in that of the last Chapter of Ezekiel and the very last Verse the End of that Prophesie And the Name of the City in that day shall be The Lord is there There shall be the Bridegroom There shall be the Glory of the Prince himself That 's the City wherein Christ will entertain those that have the Bride-like Affection And Rev. 21. 2. I John saw the Holy City New Jerusalem coming down from God out of Heaven Prepared as a Bride adorned for her Bridegroom Here 's the City of those that are Virgins in Spirit to Christ in the sincere Love of him that shall be presented at that day as Chast Virgins to him But now consider on the other side You have the Name of another City And it is very admirable And I cannot but propose my Observation to you that God hath been pleased very lately to cause me to consider and to observe There is the Name of another City I say And it is the Name of the City of the Multitude Ezek. 39. 17. The Name of that City shall be Hamonah And they shall cleanse the Land The Name of that City shall be Hamonah Or The Multitude thereof Or its Multitude That is The Dead Those that are slain with the Sword of Christ's Mouth The Gog-Magog Tho they are Dead That is as to the sense of Glory and Life and Happiness and Peace and Enjoyment yet they are in Being for they have a City It were but in vain that meer Dead should have a City But those Dead that is they that are not Partakers of the first Resurrection Their City the Name of it is Hamonah the Multitude of the World are of that City and belong to that City and are taken at last into that City Multitudes Multitudes as it is said in Joel 3. Multitudes Multitudes in the Valley of Decision and the Valley of Excision They are not onely Judged but cut off They are slain with the Sword of Christ's Mouth As it is said Rev. 29. 5. They lived not again till the End of the Thousand Years That is they lay in Chains under the Footstool of Christ At the End of the Thousand Years God gave them leave to move a little and they make a New Attempt And then Fire comes down upon them and casts them into the Lake And if you think all this is too Metaphorical or too Nice and Curious and that you cannot understand so well I 'll conclude all with that of Matth. 7. 13. Where you shall find the very Hamonah in plain Doctrinal Practical Discourse it self Enter ye in at the strait Gate for wide is the Gate and broad is the way that leadeth to Destruction And many there be which go in thereat As the New Jerusalem hath its Gates and an Angel before it So the City here is the City of Destruction as it is called Isa 19. It hath its Gate But it is a Wide Gate It lets in every one that is not taken up into the New Jerusalem There be many There is a Hamonah there is a Multitude that go in thereat Therefore let us seriously take heed Look diligently to this lest any of us fail of the Grace of God of the true Bride-like affection by which we may enter with him with the Bridegroom into the Wedding when he comes c. SERMON IV. On Matth. XXV Ver. 1. and so on to Ver. 13. Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened unto Ten Virgins which took their Lamps and went forth to meet the Bridegroom I Have you know made entrance into this Great Parable which I told you is in an admirable manner prepared and fitted to be a Representation of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ as I have shew'd you First Even from the Begining to the Complement and Perfection of it It is the Kingdom of Heaven I have shewn you that the very meaning of all Christianity is a Going forth to meet the Bridegroom And therefore the present State is a State of Espousals a State wherein we are Contracted and Affianced unto the Great Bridegroom For that the Eye of every Christian the great Aim and Design of those that are Wise Virgins is that they may have a much higher Enjoyment of Christ than they have now And because the Religion that is for the present World and the present State will not serve the great Interest and great purpose of our Immortal beings I shall now proceed to a fourth Doctrine or Proposition from these words They went forth to meet the Bridegroom And they that were ready they went in with him to the Wedding So the Observation that I shall lay down to you is this That all those that are Christ's they are to hold according to the Scripture Expression they are to hold a Great Feast unto Jehovah The great Intention and meaning of the Gospel is to assure us that after the Time of Preparation and the Time of the Espousals there shall be a Glorious Festival A Glorious Feast The Marriage Supper of the Lamb As you know it is called And I shall endeavour to open this to you according to the Scripture-Light concerning it And then I shall compare it with all the Feasts that we read of in Scripture under the Law And so I shall come to make the Application of it to our own State and Condition First therefore to make it evident to you that this is a great Notion of Scripture That there is a Feast to be held a Feast of Joy and Rejoycing and of Happiness to be held to Jehovah And it is this very Marriage-Supper as you shall see of the Lamb. That the Scripture delights in this Representation is very evident by sundry Great Expressions of it Isaiah 25. 6 7 8. And in this Mountain shall the Lord of Hosts make unto all People a Feast of Fat things a Feast of Wines on the lees of Fat things full of Marrow Of Wines on the lees well refined And he will destroy in this Mountain the Face of the covering cast over all People and the vail that is spread over all Nations He will swallow up Death in victory and the Lord God will wipe away Tears from off all Faces and the rebuke of his People shall he take away from off all the Earth For the Lord hath spoken it There is a great Feast that God will make to all People And it is set out by such Kind of Resemblances and Similitudes as express a Great and a Plentiful and a Rich and a most Delicious Entertainment among Men Fat things full