concomitants of it from him for ever he imprisoneth him during life banisheth him from his Country never to return confiscates his estate for ever Yet who quarrels with him as if he did unjustly Object But will some say God doth not only adjudge a sinner to an eternal loss of his life estate liberty this indeed man doth but God adjudgeth him also to eternal torments to a never-dying worm a fire that never shall be quenched Sol. I answer Had man the same power he would also do the same thing and yet hope to be acounted guiltless where eminent injuries are done to persons of great place and power How many are angry and will not be reconciled though they be under a Divine Law obliging them to the contrary How doth man sometimes divide a Malefactors last punishment and suffers him not to dye at once but by piece-meal to make his punishment as long-lived as he can What will you say of those condemned to be starved to death Yet in some great crimes who calleth this cruelty or injustice The greatness of the offence is in this case judged to justifie the extraordinariness of the punishment 2. What injustice can it be in God to be ever exacting satisfaction to a debt which is never paid especially when the debtor hath also refused his pardon for it Suppose one of us hath a debtor who oweth us a great sum of Money we offer him that if he will come to us and upon his knees but ask pardon we will forgive him the debt he refuseth we lay him up in Prison still he payeth us nothing Which of us counteth it unjust to keep this wretch in Prison as long as we can The reason why we do not for ever keep him in Prison is because that neither we nor he are of eternal duration If indeed the suffering of the sinner a Thousand Ten thousand years did give any satisfaction to God this were unjust But who counteth a debtors lying in a Gaol any payment of or satisfaction for his debt There are two things may be said of every sin which should make the thoughts of sin very dreadful to every understanding Christian 1. That all the holy actions of all the men in the world cannot make God amends for one sin It is a true saying of Drexellius Omnium bonorum sanctae actiones unius lethalis noxae pondere superantur 2. That the severest punishment which any poor wretch can suffer for sin cannot give God satisfaction for the least sin 3. What pretence can there be of charging God with unjustice for continuing a punishment upon that sinner that continueth his impenitency If a sinner in everlasting torments indeed either ever could or did repent there might possibly be some pretence for this imputation of injustice to God or at least something might be colourably said to derogate from the goodness and mercy of God in not delivering him from those torments Though that Text Rev. 16.9 11 possibly be not to be understood of Hell yet you have in it a true picture of such as are under the condemnation of it When the fourth and fifth Angels poured out their vials and had power to scorch men with fire it is said vers 9 That they were scorched with great heat and blasphemed the name of God which had power over those plagues and repented not to give him glory And again vers 11 They blasphemed the God of Heaven because of their pains and their sores and repented not of their deeds I say these two verses give you as to this thing a true picture of Hell Sinners are there plagued and scorched with heat but they repent not to give glory to God Had they in this life repented they had never come into those flames In that state indeed there is no place no means for repentance nor hath any sufferer there any heart for it Non decebat justitiam dei poenitere non poenitentium injustitiae humanae It did not become the justice of God to repent as to their punishment who never repent of their own injustice and unrighteousness What man pitieth a person laid in Gaol for contriving Treason against his Prince or Country Because he continueth there whiles even in Prison he goes on to revile and threaten and act what mischief is in his power under his circumstances And will not so much as say that he hath done amiss nor beg his Princes pardon This is the case of the damned soul in this life he sinned but refused to repent though he was often called to and admonished to repent God throws him for his sin continued in impenitently into Hell there he repenteth not he saith not so much as I have sinned Lord have mercy upon me Is God think you unjust in keeping this hardened stubborn and impenitent sinner in an eternal Prison In this the sinner is like to the Devil and to his evil Angels as the Saints in the resurection are made like to the good Angels so sinners are like to the evil Angels The Devils never repent they never say what have we done they never ask God pardon no more do sinners that are once condemned to a fellowship and society with them for ever 4. What injustice can there be in God never to cease from punishing that sinner who never ceaseth from his acts of sin I shall not here concern my self in that question whether the blasphemies of the damned be sins yea or no For my own part I see no reason why they should not be called sins they are the acts of rational creatures contrary to the Law of God If the sinner had in this life ceased to do evil he had never come in those torments if he ceased not to sin in this life I ask when he ceased or by what other name we can call the blasphemies of damned souls because of their torments than that of sins against God If they be sins I say damned souls never cease to sin Are not the blasphemies of the Devils sins And are not the blasphemies of damned souls of the same nature But I will not enlarge upon this for it hath a great cognation to the former 5. If it were not unjust with God to annex the penalty of eternal destruction to his threatning against sin it cannot be unjust with him having enacted a Law under such a penalty to execute it The truth of this dependeth upon this principle That it can be no injustice to put a just Law in execution which is so plain as that it demonstrateth it self to every mans reason For what is Justice in the execution or practice of it but the putting of just laws in execution Besides what is necessary cannot be unjust Hath the Lord spoken it and shall he not do it saith the Prophet God having enacted such a Law and affixed such a threatning to it is concerned in truth to give being to the execution of it So that all I have to do is to evince
confess to be the supream and most free agent the liberty which we will yet claim and challenge for our selves Nor is this more unreasonable pride and arrogance than it is folly and Vanity It is searching for a bottom in an Abyss searching for a cause Antecedent to the first cause God they say from all Eternity foresaw that such and such would believe would obey would incline their hearts to his Testimonies it must be then certain that that they would do so God could have no certain knowledg of that of which there was no certainty Now I would fain understand whence this certainty should be otherwise than from the will of God determining their wills to these certain good inclinations more than the wills of others all others have Souls reasonable Souls as well as they whence is it that their Souls incline to that which is good and the wills of others to that which is evil Surely to will and to do are both from God Thus vain Man would be wise when as he indeed is but like a wild Asses Colt Proud men torture themselves in vain to find out a principle of good and of life in themselves And how unreasonable a thing is it to charge God with unrighteousness upon this hypothesis Shall a man be master of his own favours who is yet a debtor to the Law of God and under an obligation to do good to all because God hath so commanded him and shall not God who cannot in any wise become a debtor to his Creature farther than he is so made by his own Covenant and promise Shall it be a reasonable thing for a Man to say I will be kind to such a one because I will and doth he think he is not further to be accountable to his fellow Creature And shall not the Soveraign Lord of Heaven and Earth say I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy and because I will have mercy but Man shall for it call him before the Tribunal of his own Reason Vse 2. In the second place what reason have we who are made partakers of this mercy of God which bringeth salvation to adore admire and be thankful to him for it Now this concerneth either all of us in general or else some particular Souls 1. Let us first consider this so far as it respecteth all of us whosoever liveth within the pale of the Church under the preaching of the Gospel may see reason 1. To adore and admire the goodness of God towards them 2. To tremble and fear lest we be found unprofitable under the means of grace The Apostle propoundeth the question concerning the Jews Rom. 3.1 2. What advantage then hath the Jew above the Gentiles Or what profit is there of Circumcision He answereth Much every way because unto them are commited the Oracles of God Whether the Gospel in the preaching of it be a sufficient means of Salvation having such a constant operation of the Spirit attending it that if men will they may believe and be saved and the ministration of the Spirit be little differing from the ministration of the Gospel and inseparable or at least never separated from it though affirmed by some may be justly doubted But that it is a great and high means of Salvation and there is no man living under the faithful and powerful preaching of it but if he misseth of Life and eternal happiness it will be his own fault and the proximate cause of damnation will be in himself I do not doubt Now God hath not dealt thus with every Nation O consider how many Nations and People there are in the World who never heard of Christ amongst whom the joyful sound of the Gospel did never come People that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death whom the day-star from on high did never yet rise upon Doth any say But what good doth the Gospel or how is the preaching of the Gospel such a mercy if God doth not give unto them that are under the sound of it effectual Grace so as their hearts are changed upon the preaching of it and they converted and eternally saved I answer The Apostle thought it a mercy and no small mercy that the Jews had the Oraeles of God committed to them to them and not to other People yet for all this it is most certain That there were many amongst the Jews who kept not the Laws Statutes and Ordinances of God the Jews might have said the same thing yet Moses crieth out Deut. 4.8 What Nation is there so great who hath God so nigh unto them as the Lord your God is to you in all things That hath Statutes and Judgments so righteous Again as I have oft told you though I dare not say with some That all men sitting under the sound of the Gospel have a sufficiency of grace given them that if they will they may turn unto God and live yet I do think that there is such a sufficiency of Light and means that if men will do what in them lies God will not be wanting to them in his effectual Grace Men shall never have this to say Lord I did what was in my power to do I would have repented believed but thou deniedst me that Grace which was necessary to it Now herein appeareth the greatness of the Grace of the Gospel The Heathen walk in darkness and in the shadow of Death they have not a sufficient Light to guide their feet into the way of Peace But where the Gospel is Preached there a great Light shineth a Light sufficient to direct men into the way of Life But 2. This looketh dreadfully upon all those who wilfully shut their eyes against Gospel-light and stop their Ears against this joyful sound This saith our Saviour is the condemnation that when Light is come into the World men love Darkness more than Light because their deeds are evil Matth. 11. Our Saviour upbraideth the Cities where his mighty works had been done and his Gospel preached Capernaum and Bethsaida he saith they had been lifted up to Heaven but they should be thrown down into Hell that it should be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah yea for Tyre and Sydon in the day of judgment than for them when the Gospel hath been long in a place faithfully preached it is much to be feared that God hath had mercy in that place upon as many Souls of that Age as he will have mercy But this is but a Digression we have reason to adore God for his free mercy to us in giving us the Gospel the faithful and powerful preaching under the Gospel many may and do perish but where the Gospel comes not there is no hope Now whence is it that the rain of the Gospel falleth upon one City not upon another Upon one Country not upon another That some Nations have not so much as the sound of it the feet of them which bring the glad tidings of Peace come not amongst them
a credit to his word if his faith be weak and languid the exemplifying of the thing revealed in the Word of God by the issues of Providence tendeth much to the confirmation of the souls faith and assent and therefore it is laid to the charge of the Israelites as a great aggravation of their sins That they believed not for all his wondrous works And this was the great aggravation of the sin of the Pharisees and the Jews that lived in the time when our Saviour was upon the Earth that although the Providence of God had declared Christ to be the Son of God by his doing such works as no man ever did and by such evident signs and tokens as never before were declared as to any man yet they believed him not to be the Son of God 2. As Faith is one great principle of all our spiritual actions so Fear is another Now the observing of Divine Providences much conduceth to this It is particularly remark't by the Holy Ghost upon the sudden death of Ananias and Saphira That a great fear came upon all the Church and upon as many as heard of those things And in the Law of Moses you shall find God commanding exemplary Justice to be done upon some remarkable offenders for this very end That all Israel might hear and fear It is particularly said Jonah 1.16 When Jonah had told them the cause of the storm and they had thrown him over-board Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly and offered sacrifices and made vows Severe Providences without the word make men startle and put them into a passion of fear but when they follow a word of threatning and they do but see God doing what in his word he hath said he will do this must needs have a great power and influence upon the heart especially upon the hearts of such as before had an habit of Divine Fear wrought in them though it were smothered with the ashes of too much carnal security 3. Love to God is a third principle of spiritual action an habit wrought in the soul of every Child of God but not at all times so lively and quick and working as it ought to be Now the observation of Gods good and gracious Providences serves hugely to excite it and to blow up the Coals of it in the soul Psal 37.23 O love you the Lord all his Saints for the Lord preserveth the faithful and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer But this will be further enlarged upon in my discourse upon the second branch of the Proposition which I now come to discourse upon Mem. 2. Whoso observeth the Providences of God he shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord. I take the word understand here to signifie three things 1. Knowledg 2. A more clear and distinct knowledg 3. A more demonstrative and experimental knowledg 1. He shall know the loving-kindness of the Lord understand it with reference to the Church and People of God for Gods Providence is like the Cloud which conducted the Israelites out of Egypt and through the Red-sea it hath a light-side which hath an aspect upon Gods Israel and it hath a black and dark-side towards his enemies Now he who observeth Divine Providence will know this That all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth to those that fear God Psal 25.10 A slight and transient view of Divine Providence will not bring a man to the knowledg of this but a wist view and observation of Divine Providence in the course and series of it will do it The word of God speaketh much of the Love and Favour of God to his People Providence to the strict and constant observer of it will confirm all these words God himself speaking after the manner of men to Abraham speaks as if he had not known his love and obedience to him till he had made an experiment of it and saw that he would not have withheld from him his Son even his only Son We know nothing of the loving-kindness of God before we see it experimented and brought into demonstration in comparison with what we know upon such an evidence and this we gain by our considerate observation of the motions of Divine Providence 2. He who observeth the motions of Providence shall have a more distinct knowledg of the loving-kindness of God He shall not only know that God is good to Israel and to all that are of a clean heart but he shall also see something of the Methods of God in the exercise of his loving-kindness When we speak of the Love and Favour of God to his People we are prone to understand by it nothing but pleasing Providences grateful to our senses now the loving-kindness of God is not only seen in pleasing dispensations but in adverse Providences also Whom he loveth he chasteneth and scourgeth every child whom he receiveth All things are yours saith the Apostle This knowledg must be gained by observation Sense looks upon cross dispensations of Providence and it may be Reason judging of them from present appearances and effects cryeth out All these things are against me Here is nothing of promised loving-kindness in all this Is his mercy clean gone doth his promise fail for evermore But whoso observeth Divine Providence will in these things also understand the loving-kindness of the Lord and know that it is the method of Divine Providence to deal out the loving-kindness of God to the Souls of his People through crosses and tryals and afflictions in a way which at present they do not understand and know but shall know hereafter No affliction saith the Apostle is joyous at present but grievous but it bringeth forth afterward the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby Heb. 12.11 3. Vnderstanding thirdly may signifie experience and indeed there is no such understanding as experience gives Every Child of God that observeth Divine Providence shall find it let the wind of it blow which way it will giving him an experiment and demonstration of the Love of God to his Soul But thus much shall serve to have spoken to the Explication of this Proposition in both branches I come to the proof of it to shew you how it appeareth That he who observeth the motions of Divine Providence and he alone shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord. It will appear to you if you but consider 1. That however things go in the course of Providence yet it is most certain that they are mercy and truth to them who fear God For this we have a certain word Psalm 25.10 All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his Covenant and his Testimonies And again Psalm 73.1 Truly God is good to Israel In my former Discourse I shewed you three Objects of special Providence 1. Rational creatures are a more special object of Providence than either inanimate or brute creatures 2. Amongst rational Creatures those men and women in the World which make
wheel we see nothing in it that resembleth God the great workman we see in it nothing of the Divine Wisdom possibly nothing of the divine goodness and loving-kindness but could we have patience till the Lords work came off the wheel we should easily see it in quite another representation we often see in Gods works of Providence nothing but confusion and blood and trouble and multiplied troubles and disturbances to those who most fear him and desire to walk most closely with him But in the evening of that day saith the Prophet Zech. 14.6 it shall be light The day neither light nor dark but in the Evening it shall be light Gods peoples days sometimes are plainly darkness thick darkness but would we have patience to the evening of them we should see light The Evening is the close and making up of the day When God cometh to close up his days work did we but observe Divine Providence we should easily understand that it would be light Sorrow may be for a night but joy shall be in the morning So as I say again This is one great reason why at all times we cannot understand the loving-kindness of the Lord to his Church and his people because we do not observe the motions of Divine Providence but take only a slight and superficial view of them I shall conclude this Discourse with an Exhortation to the duty of the Text The observation of the motions of Divine Providence Vse 2 In my last discourse I discovered to you some unsearchable things in Divine Providence and cautioned you against too curious an Enquiry into them My business now is to call upon you non caecutire in revelatis not to be blind as to those things which God hath revealed This also is your duty as well as the other by the former you acquit your selves from an unwarrantable curiosity by this from a wretched unthankfulness The Providence of God is daily working in order to the fulfilling of Gods great end the glorifying of his great and holy Name the establishing of his people c. 1. Do not rest in a meer view of what is done in the World but fix your eyes upon it Lay up the things in your heart let your thoughts dwell upon them the remarkable passages of them especially You see and hear of Wars and rumours of Wars inundations fires changes and over-turning in Nations of powers and Dominions you at present understand not the tendencies and indications of them you cannot make up a judgment of them and prophecy what will and shall be from them but yet observe them lay up these things in your minds yea and let them not pass out of your minds as we are to hear for the time to come so we are to behold and observe the motions of Providence with a respect unto a time to come too Do not think you can expound every Providence presently the vision oft-times is for an appointed time and is to be expounded by time in the mean time only to be diligently marked and observed taken notice of as a great work of God the meaning of which we shall understand hereafter Divines say That the meaning of many Providences and our clear understanding of them is one of those things wherein our knowledg shall be bettered and perfected in the day of Judgment and till that time when the hidden things of God as well as of men shall be made manifest we must be content to know but in part 2. Do not secondly observe meer single acts of Divine Providence but let your Eye follow it in its motions God sometimes hath his works a long time upon the wheel especially those relating to his Church I will give you two famous instances 1. The establishing of his ancient Church of the Jews in Canaan The promise was out for it Gen. 12 to Abraham it was more than five hundred years before this work was off the wheel of Providence four hundred years before they went out of Egypt where they were in bondage forty years they travelled in the wilderness then during all the time of the Judges yea and in Sauls time too they were but in a very unquiet condition In David and Solomon's time they came to a setled estate in the promised Land There was a Promise given out unto Christ for having the ends of the earth for his possession David mentioneth it Isaiah prophesieth much of it After this Christ comes was crucified c. And it was three hundred years after this before these Promises had any considerable accomplishment Indeed as to particular persons their beings are of shorter duration and the Providence of God brings about the promises to them in much shorter periods or they could see nothing of Gods loving-kindnesses in the issues or contextures of them but take heed there of resting your Eye upon the observations of some single acts of providence relating to them those who should thus have observed the motions of Providence with reference to Abraham Jacob Joseph David Daniel Job would have seen little of that loving-kindness of the Lord to them which yet is evident enough to all that keep their Eye upon their story to the winding up of their bottoms Now to this observation of Providence you have two great Arguments in the Text 1. It is an Indication of spiritual Wisdom A wise man looketh not only at present things but at things past and yet to come Now Wisdom is a lovely thing It is justified of her children saith our Saviour Every man desireth the reputation of a wise man and studiously avoideth the reproach of a fool Two things speak a fool 1. To observe and mind nothing Or 2dly Meerly to take notice of things present and gather conclusions from them 2. Thus you shall understand the loving-kindness of God Then you will see that all the paths of God towards his Church are mercy and truth Truth not a word failing of the promise and mercy working for the good of them that love God yea thus you that fear the Lord shall understand the loving-kindness and truth of God to your particular souls A thing the evidence of which is and ought to be of more value to you than the whole World I will conclude my Discourse by giving you three Cautions to direct your observation 1. Observe the Providence of God when it seemeth to move contrary to his Word but never determine the Indication of it without the Word Indeed the Providence of God never moveth contrary to the Word it is always a servant to some Declaration of the will of God in some promise or threatning but it often seemeth to us to move contrary which made the Psalmist cry out Doth the promise fail for evermore The reason of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that deceiveth us is our imperfect knowledg or understanding of the Word of God and non-acquaintance with the Counsels of God and contrivances of his Wisdom and the variety of those
1. Sometimes some of his people shall be blessed with outward blessings Abraham shall be a rich man and have many flocks and herds Joseph shall be the second man in Egypt David and Solomon shall be great Princes Mordecay shall be the man whom the King of Persia shall delight to honour Daniel shall be the first president This is necessary that God may justifie his Promises of this nature you have such Psal 128.1 2 3. and in many other Texts of holy Writ They may be necessary to uphold the interest of God in the world The world must sometimes say Verily there is a reward for the righteous Gods own people shall sometimes have healthy bodies numerous families plentiful comfort in their relations many left hand-hand-mercies added to those spiritual blessings with which God hath blessed them all in Jesus Christ 2. Others now God doth not reward this way but he rewardeth them in their souls and inward man and indeed this is the constant reward of them that fear the Lord and there is a variety in these too God doth not measure out the same kinds nor the same proportions unto all Some are blessed with a quiet conscience possibly they have not extasies of joy as others but their hearts do not condemn them and this is indeed the usual reward of the man that worketh righteousness The work of righteousness shall be peace saith the Prophet Isa 32.17 If God brings them to a sick-bed or into any other strait they can say with Hezekiah 2 King 20.3 I beseech thee O Lord remember me now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart that is an upright sincere heart or with Nehemiah 13 14. Remember me O Lord concerning this and wipe not out my good deeds which I have done for the house of my God And give me leave to tell you this is a great reward but to be delivered from the sowre reflexions of a condemning conscience for as there is nothing more nauseous and troublesom to us than the sower recoilings of our stomack so there is no greater torment to a mans life than the recoilings of a guilty conscience Nothing is oft-times so great a torture to a sinner as this when he saith unto his conscience Is it peace and his conscience tells him What peace so long as thy drunkenness thy whoredoms thy lyes and oaths and blasphemies thy cheating and cozening thy oppression and violence remain There is no peace to the wicked saith my God On the other side there is nothing so refreshing unto a spirit tired with the crosness of the world than to find a peace within himself Now this is the general reward of the righteous man if he misseth raptures and extasies of joy yet he cometh not short ordinarily of a quiet and serenity of a waky and awakened conscience I know there are hours of melancholy and darkness and desertion to which the best of Gods People are exposed but these are but rare examples in comparison of those multitudes of godly ones that walk in some blessed view of their own sincerity and uprightness Some he rewardeth in their inward man with raptures and extasies of God They know and are perswaded that nothing shall separate them from the love of God in Jesus Christ they defie death and hell and challenge the fatal strokes which others tremble at the thoughts of They complain of time and were it not for the Law of God in the case would dismiss their souls of their prison and lye like men waiting for a wind longing for that happy gale that should carry their souls into the wide Sea of Eternity But this is but the portion of a few and scarce the abiding temper of them neither but such hours the People of God have had Some again he rewardeth inwardly with strength confirmed habits of grace and contentment with their portion c. Their outward man decreaseth but their inward man increaseth day by day they are poor in purse but rich in grace they have but little but they are content with what they have and tell all the world they have enough And let me tell you that as punishments in the inward man are the greatest punishments so these spiritual rewards are of all other the greatest rewards which is matter of easie demonstration if we will but allow our souls to be our nobler parts and the Jewel to be better than the Cabinet Whatsoever tends to the debasing and ruining the soul must be the greatest evil and whatsoever conduceth to its ennobling or felicity must be the greatest reward and good Besides this spiritual judgments are the continual forerunners of such as are temporal and spiritual mercies draw after them at least a proportion and sufficiency of the good things of this life All these things shall be added unto you saith our Saviour 2 Chron. 25.16 God sent a Prophet unto Amaziah the King would not hear him see what the Prophet saith I know saith the Prophet that God hath determined to destroy thee why because thou hast done this and hast not hearkned unto my counsel Spiritual judgments forerun temporal you have it Isa 6.10 When the Prophet asked how long how long in seeing they should see and not perceive and hearing they should hear and not understand God answereth Vntil the cities be wasted without an inhabitant and the houses should be left without men and the land should be utterly desolate In like manner spiritual rewards and mercies never go without something of this life if not a plenty yet a sufficiency food convenient for Gods People Finally as spiritual judgments are the forerunners of eternal ruin so spiritual rewards are the more certain forerunners of eternal salvation they are the things which as the Apostle speaks accompany salvation and make men meet for the Kingdom of God 3. But God sometimes rewards his people with sufferings This you may think a strange reward But yet a reward it is Christ promiseth to the losers for him that they should receive children houses lands with persecutions and the Apostles Act. 5.41 rejoyced they were thought worthy to suffer shame for his name-sake God honoureth that man whom he calleth out to be a witness for him and to carry his cross after him Job speaketh of other afflictions and cryeth out Job 7.17 Lord what is man that thou shouldst magnifie him that thou shouldst set thine heart upon him that thou shouldst visit him every morning and try him every moment What need we more than what the Apostle assureth us Heb. 12. That whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth and scourgeth every child whom he receiveth Our light and momentany afflictions saith the Apostle shall work for us a far more eternal and exceeding weight of glory and if we suffer with him we shall also be glorified together with him Rom. 1.17 This variety of rewards our heavenly Father hath The rewards of the righteous from God are not uniform but always certain
grace which bring glory to God if God should not sometimes suffer his own people to fall all the revenue of his glory from these exercises would be lost 5. Again hath God any glory from any more external Acts of Worship and Homage which we perform unto him from our Prayers Praises from our hearing his word receiving the Sacrament Prayer is made up of Confession of Sin and Supplications for pardon of Sin and strength against Sin Confession of Sin gives glory to God my Son saith Joshuah to Achan confess and give glory to God Supplication for good things gives God glory as it owns him to be the Fountain of all good and our whole dependance to be upon him It is true had Sin never entred into the World our daily dependence upon God would have evinced Prayer to have been our daily and a natural homage which derived inferiour beings do owe unto the first being But there would have been no need of Prayer either for the pardon of Sin or for strength against Sin For Praise that also is a piece of Homage which Adam would have owed unto God if he had stood in his first integrity and state of Innocency and the Angels of God who never fell are continually occupied in singing the praises of God But the praises of God both by his Saints upon the Earth and by his glorified Saints are highly advantaged by the forgiveness of their Sins and their having their garments washed in the blood of the Lamb. Now if no sin were committed in the World none would be remitted and forgiven and all the glory which the God of Heaven hath from his Saints on Earth or in Heaven for the free forgiveness of their Sins would have been lost Certainly the fall of the evil Angels advantages the praises of the elect Angel it being doubtless a piece of their song to bless God who suffered not them to fall as the infernal Spirits did and indeed this needeth no further evidence than what it hath from every gracious Soul that hath tasted any thing of the love of God in pardoning mercies I appeal to any such Soul to what a pitch it raiseth his Soul in the thoughts of God and the admirings of his Divine love and grace Psal 103.1 2 3. Bless the Lord O my Soul saith David and all that is within me bless his holy name Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his benefits who forgiveth all thine iniquities and healeth all thy diseases Thus I have shewed you a second way by which God gets himself glory from Sin the permission of Sin in the World 3. Holiness and Piety are advantaged by Sin Sin is a foil to holiness Pulchriora apparent bona ex malorum deformitate As the dark shadows are advantages to the Picture and the wanton thinks at least that her black Patches are advantages to her beauty so are the Sins and Debaucheries which God permitteth in the world advantages to holiness The beautiful and well-proportioned works of Nature are the more beautiful for the Monsters that it erreth in Sin is but monstrum morum a monster in mens manners I am perswaded that in the very times wherein we live God hath made use of the prodigious intemperance lust and luxury Atheisme and foolish superstitious vanities of some to make true Religion Godliness and Vertue appear more lovely unto thousands than before they did Lastly From what is said abundantly appears that it is not without infinite wisdom that the Lord though he be pleased to manifest the riches of grace upon some to change their hearts and to turn them from the wickedness of their ways plucking them as brands out of the fire yet suffers multitudes to walk in their own ways till they drop into that Pit from which there is no Redemption for ever We may all of us be assured that the wise God consulteth his own glory in this In the same Text Pro. 16.4 Where he tells us that he hath made the wicked for the day of evil he saith in the former part that he hath made all things for himself Though we be not able to see the particular reason of many dispensations of God yet we ought to presume they are not done without excellent Counsel admirable reason incomprehensible wisdom yea and infinite love toward those that shall be saved I shall close this discourse with an excellent saying of one of the Ancients If saith he an ignorant person goeth into a Smiths shop what matters it if he doth not knowof what particular use the Sleth the Anvil and other utensils are yet it is enough if the workman knoweth and can make use of every utensil in it's season what if we do not know if we cannot comprehend of what use some particular sinful actions of men should be for the glory of God it is enough for us that God knoweth the vilest action that was ever done in the World the crucifying of the Lord Jesus Christ was of the greatest use for the manifestation of the glory of God Now after this discourse of the reasonableness of Divine Providence in permitting Sin for the further manifestation of the glory of God and the acquisition of glory to his sacred name c. It may seem an idle question why the Lord suffereth so many sinners so as his own number is but a little flock in comparison of those Herds for sin being a quality must inhere in some Subject and if there were no sinners tolerated there could be no sin but yet let me a little further enlarge upon this Argument 1. God suffereth so many sinners that some of them might be made Saints by Nature there is none righteous no not one all are Children of wrath one as well as another all that are implanted into Christ were natural branches of the wild Olive they are made otherwise by an engraffing and implantation into the Lord Jesus Christ It is the Metaphor which the Apostle useth Rom. 11. v. 17 19. Those all those whom the Lord quickeneth were at first dead in trespasses and sins It is the saying of a very ingenious Author Non est sterilis Deo patientia sua ut saltem fatigatione taedeat peccatores voluptatum Gods patience saith he with sinners is not barren if it were only for this that God by suffering sinners many sinners doth at last tire and weary some out of their delight and pleasure in their lusts thou that sayest why doth a pure and holy God endure so many vessels of wrath fitted for destruction do but remember that thou thy self wert once a Child of wrath thou wert once a person fitted both by Original sin and by many actual sins for destruction God suffered thee to go on a long time in thy own ways that he might weary thee of thine own ways and bring thee home unto himself why may not God do so by many others They are yet as wild Asses but why may not they also have a
Application recapitulate a little 1. For the sins of others which we see permitted in the World 1. Let us be quickened upon the view of them to adore the patience and long-suffering of God Dost thou hear a wretch curse and blaspheme and profane the great and dreadful name of God and defie the God of Heaven challenging his own damnation and doest thou see God suffering him to live from year to year and to go on in this course Doest thou see another in the heighth of rage against the people of God endeavouring if it were possible to root out all Religion and dayly devouring those that are more righteous than himself Let it help thee to recognize the patience of God do thou upon occasion of others profaneness and blasphemy give God the glory of his patience Let it make thee many a time reflect and say O what a patient God is the God in whom I trust he seeth these vile wretches he could as easily crush them as I with my foot can crush a worm yet he spareth them and with much long suffering endures the vessels of wrath fitted for Hell 2. Let the view of the sins of others which thou seest God permitting for his own wise ends make thee adore the wisdom of God Thou art posed to think what glory God can procure to himself from the profaneness and blasphemy of wicked men but God will certainly do it and would never suffer their profaneness if he did not know how to do it O! the infinite wisdom of God that can make the wrath of man to praise him Let thy heart be affected with that meditation 3. Again Doest thou see the world of sin that abounds doest thou hear of prodigious lusts blasphemies cruelties c. which make thy soul tremble Let God upon this occasion have the glory of his free-free-mercy and grace towards thy soul Bless God that he hath given thee another spirit Say Lord why was not I as one of these I had the same seed of sin in me my heart was as full of original lust and corruption as theirs Oh! what reason have I to adore the free grace of God that I am not as this beastly drunkard as this unclean wretch as this monstrous blasphemer If it had not been for free and rich grace I had been as bad as they It is that which made me to differ 2. But let God have glory from us upon the occasion of his so long suffering us to walk in our own ways Now that may be many ways let me a little particularly direct here also 1. Let it make thee live in a dayly admiration of free-grace both in pardoning thy former guilt and in renewing and changing thy heart This this is a work not for a rapture not for an hour or a day but for eternity It will doubtless be a great piece of our work when we come to Heaven to cry salvation to our God and to the Lamb. Blessing and glory and honour and wisdom and thanksgiving be to the Lord for ever and ever It should be much of our work upon the earth if we have either obtained the sense of the pardon of our sins or a good hope through grace you shall find St. Paul beginning most of his Epistles with such a blessing of God O you redeemed of the Lord you that are come out of a state of deep guilt you can never think nor speak enough what God hath done for your souls It is a great work of God and he doth his great works that they may be had in remembrance Let God have some glory from thee for pardoning those sins by which he hath been much dishonoured by thee and as for his pardoning so for his sanctifying grace Admire God bless God upon the view of thy former hard heart profane and unclean spirit say Ah Lord that ever such an Ethiopian as I was should through grace change my skin that ever such a rebellious spirit should be made obedient such a profane wretch should ever have an heart toward Heaven that ever one that loved his lusts so well as I have done should be taught of God to love him and fear him and delight in him that a Saul should be amongst the Prophets a Paul a persecutor a blasphemer should be amongst the Apostles a Mary Magdalen should wash her Lords feet and be so humbled as to wipe them with the hairs of her head the offering up of these praises glorifieth God 2. Let thy former sins make thee more abundant in penitential tears and in confessions of thy sin unto God God delighteth to hear a soul acknowledg its iniquities and take shame to it self Let thy reflection upon thy former ways make thee with Peter to weep bitterly make thee go alone and confess thy sins unto him that hath forgiven them the more vile thou makest and ownest thy self the more thou glorifiest God as a God of free grace and infinite mercy 3. Let thy former sins ingage thee to love God more Hath much been forgiven thee O love much Say with thy self O I can never love God enough I can never do enough for him I that have done so much against him I that have been so profane so vile that have spent my youth and strength in the service of my base lusts and pleasures and am yet received to mercy at last What shall I render unto the Lord Let my burning love to God and whatsoever beareth his image and superscription make some amends for my burning lusts which had consumed my poor soul if God had not mercifully quenched them 4. Let thy former sins and thy reflections upon them make thee to walk softly and humbly with God all the days of thy life Doest thou find thy heart at any time begin to swell in an high opinion of thy self Say my soul What hath a sinner to be proud on what hast thou that hast been so filthy so polluted to glory in High thoughts become not one that hath been so dirty so polluted and unclean as thou hast been 5. Let your reflections upon your sins bring forth that brood of graces which the Apostle mentioneth 2 Cor. 7.11 Indignation carefulness fear vehement desires revenge Indignation at your selves for your former errors Anger never hath a truer object than when it is exercised upon our selves for our miscarriages Revenge a revenge upon our selves this doubtless lieth much in acts of mortification and self denial mens denying themselves in the lawful use of the liberty of those things which they had before smfully abused Fear a fear of again salling into such remptations as they had before been overcome with A Care in looking to your ways and vehement desires in all things to please God and to walk more perfectly before him 6. Finally You shall make an improvement of your sins if your reflexions upon your former sins both of omission and commission shall engage you to more frequent acts of homage to him to be
and in the same Nation where the Gospel is preached some have a sound and little more Preachers in some places in stead of preaching the Gospel Preach human Philosophy or the lusts of their own hearts In other places the Word of God is preached faithfully and powerfully so that the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence and the violent take it by force Men are compelled to come in This difference in the external ministration which let me tell you hath no small influence upon the eternal concern and interest of men for God doth not ordinarily work by way of miracle and heal the eyes of the blind with Clay and Spittle is fountain'd only in the free-will and Grace of God Vse 2. But I trust I speak to some who have tasted further of the mercy and Grace of God than receiving the general Dispensation of the Gospel with their outward ears God hath by his holy Spirit upon the preaching of the Gospel effectually moved their hearts and conquered their Souls into a subjection to Christ They have embraced the Lord Jesus Christ by a Gospel-faith they are brought by a mighty hand out of darkness into marvelous Light and translated out of this Kingdom of Sin and Satan into the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus I have this day been discovering to you the Fountain of this Grace of which God hath made you partakers you have heard that it is the will of God only which hath distinguished betwixt you and others It is not because you were more nobly born than others nor because you were more rich more honourable or by nature better complexioned than others God saw no more goodness in your natures than in the natures of others you were all the same flesh he infused into all Souls of the same nature and species only he hath willed rather to shew mercy unto your Souls than to the Souls of others because he hath set his love upon you There are three duties that hence lie very obvious 1. The First is Praise Thankfulness and Admiration Certainly every such Soul stands highly obliged with the Psalmist to cry out Bless the Lord O my Soul and all that is within me bless his Holy Name Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his benefits If free Grace will not affect our hearts and fill our mouths with a new Song nothing will It must certainly be an amazing consideration for a Soul to sit down and think I was in the same mass and lump of lost man-kind that others are I was by Nature a Child of wrath as much as any my Childhood and Youth were Vanity as much as any others I was grinding at the same Mill it may be in actual sins I outstripped many others Now that the Lord should look upon me and pluck me as a brand out of the Fire that God should open my eyes and change my heart What did God see in me Possibly my more external circumstances were far less and more unvaluable than those of thousands of others my House was of small account and little esteem there are many more great and noble more wise and prudent than I am many who in all appearance so far as man can judg might have been more serviceable to God than I am or am ever like to be now that the Lord should pass them over and shew mercy to me certainly no Soul can seriously think of these things but must be ravished with the apprehensions of the inaccountable love of God in these things and say What shall I render unto thee O Lard what shall I render unto thee 2. This notion of Gods Soveraignty freedom and inaccountbleness in the dispensations of his Grace should teach every Soul that hath been or shall be made a partaker of it the great lesson of humility The Apostle Rom. 3.27 giveth this as the reason why God hath setled the justification of a Sinner upon a bottom of free Grace and hath excluded works that he might also exclude boasting and teach those who glory to glory in the Lord upon this Argument the Apostle exhorteth the Gentiles not to boast against the Jews Rom. 11.22 Behold the goodness and the severity of God saith he to those who abide in their unbelief severity to thee goodness Pride is a sinful habit disposing the Soul to swell in the opinion of some excellency in it self and a little thing will swell our corrupt hearts The Apostle propoundeth this very consideration as a cure for that tumour in the Souls of Christians 1 Cor. 4.7 For who maketh thee to differ from another And what hast thou which thou didst not receive Now if thou didst receive it why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it It is nothing but the will of God that hath made a difference betwixt thee and the vilest Sinner breathing betwixt thee and the most filthy Drunkard the most furious Persecutor c. It was not for any worth any goodness or holiness which the Lord saw in thee but of his meer free will and Grace God hath shewed mercy to thy Soul what hast thou now of thy own to boast or glory in Thou hast indeed reason to glory and to make thy boast in the Lord and to bless God for what he hath done for thy Soul more than for a thousand others but there is no thanks to thee his will his own will was the fountain of his Grace extended to thee God hath had mercy upon thy Soul only because he would have mercy O therefore be not high-minded but fear and walk humbly before God 3. Lastly this calleth upon all of you who have tasted of this free and unaccountable Grace to live a distinguishing life and conversation There is a Generation that fancyeth that the Doctrine of Free-Grace opens a door to Liberty It is but the old Cavil in Saint Pauls time there were those that thus accused the Doctrine of Free-Grace as if it gave men a liberty to go on in sin as appeareth by the Apostles anticipation of that Cavil Rom. 6.1 What saith he shall we then continue in sin that Grace may abound God forbid and so he goeth on shewing that any such conclusion from his principles was unreasonable How shall we saith the Apostle who are dead unto sin live any longer therein Special distinguishing Free-Grace both deadneth the Soul to Sin and inflameth the Soul with a love to God who hath made the Soul to differ so as that Soul cannot live as other men the love of God constraineth him he must apprehend himself obliged to do more for God than others because God hath shewen more mercy to him than unto others and that meerly because he would shew mercy What can possibly be imagined to have a greater and lay an higher obligation upon the Soul to all manner of holiness in conversation to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord as the Apostle speaketh SERMON L. Hosea XIII 9. O Israel thou hast destroyed thy self but
some means The very Heathens have something of God manifested to them and manifested in them For the invisible things of God saith the Apostle are manifested by the things that are made even his eternal power and Godhead they have natural light and a natural reason and something of a natural conscience too The works of Creation they have and the works of Providence shewing them a great deal of the eternal power and God-head of God sufficient to convince them that there is a God a Great Infinite Powerful God for he leaveth not men without witness giving the very Heathens fruitful times and seasons But I am not speaking unto Heathens you that are Christians have yet further means though in different degrees too All have the Scriptures Protestants have them in their own Language so as they may read and in a great measure understand what they read all have the Ministry of the Word they have the Gospel preached to them though it is true that also is in very different degrees yet all have something of what they call a moral Season and are perswaded and intreated to turn unto God This we say is not a sufficient means to bring a Soul unto Heaven if God doth not more for Souls than let them have the benefit of the works of Creation shewing them his glory and the benefit of the light of Nature and Reason and the works of his common Providence yea and of the Scriptures and the preaching of them and that not only in a cold flat and dead and dull manner but in the most lively powerful manner they will never repent never believe and turn unto God Paul may plant and Apollo may water long enough if God doth not give the increase It is not in him that Preacheth and perswadeth nor in him that Prayeth and heareth but in God that sheweth mercy he must give both to will and to do he must give repentance unto life and be both the Author and the finisher of our Faith But yet I say all these are means some of them very great and excellent means and the highest in the order of external means And though they be not sufficient though used with the best natural improvements of our own will and power to bring us to Heaven yet sufficient to render us without excuse unto God if we do not make a due and just improvement of them Let me therefore plead with you that you would live up to the means of grace which God giveth you That sort of people amongst us whom we call Quakers call to men to Hearken to the light within them I do not well understand what they mean by the light within us but thus much is certain that all men have a light within them and they have a light without them The light without them is the light of the works of God in Nature and of his works of Providence The Scriptures and the Ministry of the Word all men have some or other or all of these All men have also a light within them the light of Nature and of Reason This light as I have shewed you is not sufficient to shew a man the way to Heaven but it is enough to shew a man much of God and much of his duty and the way to obtain a full and sufficient light to bring him to glory is for him to walk up to the light which he hath This will be the condemnation that when light is come into the world men love darkness more than light because their hearts because their deeds are evil But to shut up this Discourse 3. Vse In the last place What an obligation doth this lay upon the children of God to cry out with holy David Bless the Lord O my soul and all that is within me bless his holy name Bless the Lord O my soul and sing of all his benefits who forgiveth all thine iniquity and healeth all thy diseases Who redeemeth thy life from destruction and crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercy To heighten your souls apprehensions of the Divine goodness extended to you and raise up your hearts in the high praises of God I shall but offer Two things to your Meditation with which I shall shut up this Discourse 1. Consider What is done unto you God hath undoubtedly given unto you a sufficient grace The sufficiency lost in Adam is restored to you by the Lords giving Christ to you I can do all things saith the Apostle through Christ that strengtheneth me So that God may say to you as to his Vineyard Isa 5. What could I have done more for my Vineyard than I have done What could I have done more for such a soul than I have done God hath display'd the riches of his grace upon your souls God could do no more for you than he hath done God hath nothing more to give than grace and glory he hath given you grace special distinguishing grace Glory is hereafter to be revealed in the mean time special effectual grace is glory begun 2. Consider Secondly Why to you to you rather than unto others others may easily understand Why not to them because they despised the riches of his Grace they sinned against their natural light they lived not up to their light of Revelation But Why to you Did not you also sin against your light Did you make that improvement of the works of God the light of your natural Reason or Conscience that you ought to have done If not Why hath God done more for you than for them discovered more of Christ unto you than unto them Here you will be lost and at last be forced to resolve it into this God hath shewed me mercy because he would shew me mercy and hath extended compassion to me only because he would extend compassion Oh sit down alone sometimes and say My soul Why should the God of grace shew mercy unto thee Hast thou not sinned often against the very light of Nature and Reason Hast thou not despised the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and trampled under foot the blood of the Son of God What high praises of God are high enough for every true believers heart How precious should Christ be unto his soul How can he ever have thoughts of God high enough or with his tongue sing the praises of God loud enough How doth he stand concerned to cry out with David Awake my glory Oh! What manner of person should a believer be in all boliness of conversation He can certainly never do enough for that God who hath done so much for him and hath made such a difference betwixt him and others This is praising of God not in word and in tongue only but indeed and in truth Oh this is to perfect holiness It is for that God who hath from eternity chosen you to obtain everlasting life and hath left others to perish in their iniquity for that God who in the dispensations of his gracious Providence in the
Providence calleth to us for and sheweth us the reasonableness of is Prayer We have reason in our distresses to seek unto God by Prayer because the Lord reigneth and it is an encouragement to us to seek him because he reigneth Whither should we go but unto him who hath power to help save and deliver Prayer therefore hath in all times of distress been the Refuge of Gods people It was a sad time with David Psalm 109.4 The mouth of the wicked and of the deceitful saith he v. 2 3. are opened against me they have spoken against me with a lying tongue They compass me about also with words of hatred and fought against me without a cause for my love they are my adversaries but I give my self unto Prayer v. 4. Luther when he was in any strait was wont to say I will go and tell my God of it Prayer hath been the constant mean which the people of God have used for rescue out of any troubles You see it is upon a good foundation viz. The Dominion which God hath over all and his daily exercise of it 3. It calleth to you for praise and thanksgiving Prayer solliciteth for a mercy when we want it Praise acknowledgeth the gift when received and giveth unto God the glory of it Nor can it without robbery be paid at any other than Gods Altar Is there any good done by thee Let God have the glory of that thou hast done it by vertue of a power or gift which is given to thee from above yea and it is from his Governing-Power of Providence ruling directing and influencing thy heart to it His Kingdom is over our hearts our hands our tongues inclining them to every good thought word action without him we can do nothing Doth any good come unto thee Let God also have the glory of that The earthly Prince looketh that you should acknowledg your peace your trade to his Government but he is but the instrument of God in bringing these things It is the Kingdom of the Lord that ruleth over all he gives thee power to get riches saith Moses I am sure the people of God have more special reason to acknowledg God in all their peace and prosperity They are men of peace their hands are against none but the world hates them they are as sheep amongst wolves if they have any months or years of peace they are beholden to the power and ruling of God for it Is any evil kept from you It is God that doth it he that ruleth the raging of the Sea he stilleth the tumults of the people he hath the hearts of Kings in his hand and turneth them as the Waters of the South It is because the Mountain of the Lord is full of Chariots and Horses that they are not swallowed up by their Enemies every moment O see and praise the Lord for the Governance of his Providence 4. This Doctrine calleth to you for patience in adversity The people of God are subjected to trials of adversity yea â—o fiery trials as well as other men yea in greater degrees than others hence the Apostle calleth to them to let patience have its perfect work Patience is nothing else but a quiet submission to the will of God under any adverse dispensation of his Providence in obedience to his command and because it is his will and he layeth it upon us we have need of patience and the exercise of it is our duty and this Doctrine will shew you that it is but a reasonable duty Let me shew it you in two or three particulars 1. As it showeth you that all your afflictions be they of what sort and kind they will are from the Lord Job 5.6 Afflictions cometh not out of the dust nor doth trouble spring out of the ground Is there saith God by the Prophet any evil in the City and I have not done it Affliction comes not by chance or fate it comes from God and is the wise issue of his Providence in the Government of the World we have therefore no reason to fret and vex our selves against instruments They are but instruments Perhaps said David of Shimei God hath bidden him curse They possibly do ill and at last will know it but God is righteous in their unrighteousness I held my peace saith David I knew it was thy doing It is the Lord saith that good man let him do what seemeth him good 2. As it assureth us that all things shall work together for good to them that love God If God ruleth and governeth the world he certainly doth it for himself and for his own glory which glory of his being the highest design of his people all things must necessarily tend to their good to that which they above all things desire and seek after This God who ruleth the World is his peoples father and doth what-ever he doth as a father for the good and advantage of his children 3. Lastly It is a good Argument of patience As it letteth them know that their afflictions are ordered and governed by God The Afflictions Oppressions Persecutions of the people of God are not things excepted out of the Dominion of God It was you know the Centurions faith That diseases were to Christ as his servants were to him He said to one go and he went to another come and he came and to another do this and he did it So God speaketh to diseases and not to diseases only but to all sorts of afflictions Isa 27.8 In measure when it shooteth forth thou wilt debate with it God first causeth then ruleth and governeth all our troubles afflictions and trials Fifthly This Doctrine calleth to all the people of God for love to him This is the Psalmists Exhortation and upon this very Argument Psal 31.23 O Love you the Lord all you his Saints for he preserveth his Saints and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer All the earth is bound to love the Lord for the exercise of his Governing-power If the Lord did not reign the worst of men would quickly find the ill effects of it they need no worse enemies than their own brethren and companions in wickedness did the Lord lay the reins upon the necks of their lusts and suffer them as they would to devour one another For as we see the ravenous Birds Fishes and Beasts do not only prey upon other but their own species so were it not for the Restraining-Providence of God in governing the world the wicked of it would see their brethren in iniquity not only preying upon the Saints and people of God but also upon those like unto themselves if lesser than themselves But I say above all the people of God as being the least flock are more especially bound to love the Lord for the Government of his Providence but this will more eminently appear when I come to discourse concerning the Specialties of his Providence with reference to them 6. Lastly This Doctrine calleth unto all for a willing
subjection and obedience unto God This is that which we call holiness There are two Arguments arising out of the former discourse which ought to have a force here 1. Let us do what we will God will be our Governour Let Assyria mean or not mean so he shall be the Lords Servant and execute his pleasure and no more Pharaoh may huff a little and ask Who is the Lord that he should serve or obey him but God will at last be glorified on Pharaoh and make him know his Kingdom is over all God will disappoint the devices of the crafty so as their hands shall not find their enterprises God will at last be glorified and make all the wrath of man at last to praise him 2. None shall be rewarded by God or be his favourites but only such as yield him free willing and chearful obedience Let us do what we can we cannot resist his will but unless our obedience be free voluntary and chearful it shall never be rewarded by a just and righteous God There is nothing more ordinary in the Prophets than to read the denunciation of Gods judgments against Assyria and Babylon which were yet Gods servants in executing vengeance upon the hypocritical and rebellious Jews Let this therefore mind us to be obedient to to the will of God freely and willingly and sincerely that so we may hear that joyful voice Well done thou good and faithful Servant Enter thou into thy masters joy A DISCOURSE Concerning ACTUAL PROVIDENCE PART II. Concerning the Specialties of Providence 1 Cor. IX 9. Doth God take care for Oxen I Have been for some time discoursing concerning Providence that is Actual Providence which is nothing else but Gods taking care for his creatures made as you heard by the word of his power I have discoursed this care of God more generally opening to you those two more general Acts of God by which this care is expressed 1. In preserving of them 2. In the rule and governance of them I have shewed you the workings of Divine Providence in the preserving of his creatures in general in their Beings and use of their several faculties with which he created them of man in particular considered singly as an individual or in his Political capacity or 3. In his Spiritual capacity as the subject of Divine Grace I have also discoursed generally concerning the Government of Divine Providence and by what particular acts God exerciseth this Government and declareth his Dominion over all the Creatures which he hath made but besides the general care of God concerning all his Creatures there is also a special Providence For the beginning of a discourse concerning that I have made choice of this Text Doth God take care for Oxen saith the Apostle Non est vox dubitantis saith Pareus It is not the language of one that doubteth The Apostle knew well enough that our Saviour had said That God cloatheth the Lillies the grass of the field and that a sparrow though two of them are sold for a farthing falleth not to the ground without the will of our heavenly father The words therefore only signifie an inequal care viz. That God taketh a greater and more special care for some of his Creatures than he doth for others and so it layeth a foundation for this Proposition Prop. That God exerciseth a special Providence for and concerning some of his creatures He taketh a general care concerning them all but a more special care concerning some of them That is the Proposition which I shall handle in this method 1. I shall shew you that there is such a special Providence i.e. though the Lord taketh a general care of all his Creatures according to their natures yet he taketh a more particular and special care concerning some more than others 2. I will enquire Which of his Creatures they are as to which he exerciseth a special Providence and concerning which he taketh such a more especial care 3. We will enquire by what acts God exerteth putteth forth and declareth this his especial care 4. Lastly I will make some Application of the whole 1. That God doth exercise a more particular care in the Preservation and Government of some of his Creatures than he doth of others will appear 1. By express Scriptures which assert it 2. By promises made to some in which others are not concerned 3. By experience and matter of fact 1. By express Scriptures thus Deut. 11.12 Canaan is called a Land which the Lord careth for so Matth. 6.30 If God so cloath the grass of the field which to day is and to morrow is cast into the Oven Shall he not much more cloath you O you of little faith Matt. 10.31 Fear you not therefore you are of more value than many sparrows ver 29. Christ had let them know that the Providence of God extended to the sparrows two of them were sold for a farthing but not one of them fell to the ground without God but saith he you are better than many sparrows God will more regard you and take more care of you 1 Tim. 4.10 He is the Saviour of all men but especially of them who believe Psal 33. v. 13 He beholdeth all the sons of men but Verse 18 The eye of the Lord is upon them that fear him upon them that hope in his mercy to deliver their soul from death and to keep them alive from famine so this Text Doth God saith the Apostle take care for Oxen or doth he say it altogether for our sakes for our sakes no doubt It is true there are degrees and differences as to this special Providence as I shall shew you hereafter I am only as yet evincing the thing in general 2. All the promises of God made to some men not to others are a proof of this for what is a promise but the Revelation of Gods Will to bestow some good things in the way of his Providence so as if there be any special promises there must be a special Providence Now there is none so meanly versed in the holy Scripture that he is not aware of a multitude of promises in them made to the people of God promises that concern this life and that also which is to come the 91 Psalm is made up of such promises 3. Lastly The experience of all times proves it that some have been preserved upheld directed and governed by a Providence in a more special manner than others have been So that none can modestly deny or doubt a special Providence The next Question is Quest 2. Who are the objects of it It is generally answered by Divines that reasonable creatures are the objects only of special Providence These are only Angels and Men for the Specialty of Divine Providence so far as they relate to Angels as we know little of it so neither doth the knowledg of it much concern us of that therefore I shall say nothing being not desirous to intrude into those things which man hath
abideth for ever If two be walking together they had never more need to take heed that they lose not one anothers company than in a dark and blustring night when the darkness keeps them that they cannot see one another and the wind hindereth that they cannot hear the sound each of others feet The Believer and the Promise are Relates companions each to other there is never more danger of their being parted each from other than in a night of dark and blustring Providence Now a Christian stands concerned to be often applying his Soul to the Promise often calling upon his Soul as David in Psalm 42 Trust thou in God for I shall yet praise him Nor is there any thing more conducive to make a Christian at such a time hang upon the Promise than to hear that it is the usual method of Divine Providence then to remember Gods people when they are in the lowest condition Fourthly As this calleth to the people of God for faith in the Promise so it calls to them for hope Faith and Hope are so near of kin that they are oft put one for another Indeed Hope is nothing else but Faith looking out at the windows of the soul in expectation of the coming of the thing believed There is an hope that worketh upon the encouragements of sense when the mercy hoped for is seen coming in a way of probable means but there is an Hope that proceedeth meerly upon the Evidence of Faith when the Soul hopeth for some good thing but seeth no encouragement from any sensible thing the former is but a natural affection working upon an absent probable good This latter is a supernatural habit and an exercise of grace The Apostle calls it an hoping against hope or a believing in hope against hope This is that which I am calling to you for This is that which keepeth the heart alive in the deadest time We use to say If it were not for hope under evils the heart would break Faith is the acquiescence of the Soul in the World Hope is the motion of the Soul consequent to this acquiescence Faith saith the thing is sure Hope seeth it coming and relieveth the Soul with that Hope is the Souls watchman The Soul cryes out Watchman what of the night Watchman what of the night Hope saith The morning is coming Now this Observation advantageth Hope It assures you that God is coming at Midnight When you see these things come to pass saith our Saviour Luke 21.28 lift up your heads for the day of your redemption draweth nigh It hath reference to all that went before where our Saviour had been telling them of the great Evils that were to precede his coming Now saith our Saviour when you see things at this miserable despicable pass then lift up your heads Fifthly This Notion calleth to the people of God for fervent and constant prayer for the Church and people of God when they are at the lowest ebb Never give over the case of the Church and people of God for desperate it is never less so than when it most appeareth to you to be so I remember it is particularly remarked concerning Daniel in the 9th Chapter of his Prophesie That when he understood by books that the time was come for the fulfilling of the Jewish captivity then he made that excellent Prayer which you have upon record in that Chapter with a great deal of fervor and zeal for the people of which you will find it full Daniels certain knowledg that that was the time for their deliverance did not supersede his duty of Prayer but more abundantly quicken him to it In such a state of the Church and people of God as I have been describing to you a Christian hath two great arguments to perswade him to a more constant diligent and fervent application of himself to the throne of Grace 1. The Churches misery and low condition calling to him for pity and what help he can give it 2. The knowledg he hath or may have that it is now about the time when God useth to arise and help Lastly This Observation calleth upon all that fear the Lord especially at such a time when they or the Church of God is lowest to watch unto holiness to wait upon the Lord and keep his way and to be wary of sin To deter all that fear God from sinning especially at such a time I might mind you of that precept of God to the Jews When the Host goeth forth to battel then take heed of every wicked thing But I shall conclude with that known story of the Israelites You know they had an old Promise made four hundred years before that they should inherit the land of Canaan they had served in Egypt many years they were now come over the Red-sea and had encountred and overcome the long and many difficulties of the Wilderness they were brought within a prospect of the promised Land nothing wanted but a taking possession they murmur against God retard their entrance forty years until all that generation was destroyed except Caleb and Joshuah I shall conclude Hath the Church been a long time under great pressures things still as to its interest growing worse and worse that they seem to be brought to as low a pass as they can be Now begins her hope to dawn according to that Method of Providence which I have observed to you Only now let the people of God look to themselves that by some defection they do not set back their own mercies You may take the Exhortation in the words of the Apostle 1 Cor. 10.6 Now these things happened unto them for our ensamples to the end that we should not lust after evil things as they lusted neither be ye Idolaters as were some of them c. But I shall add no more to this Second Observation SERMON XVII Psal CVII 43. Whoso is wise and will observe these things even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord. I Have both shewed you the duty of the people of God to make Observations upon the motions of Divine Providence and the advantage accrewing to them that perform it 1. It is an indication of spiritual Wisdom 2. Those that do it shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord. My work at present is to give you some observations upon the motions of Actual Providence which is the work of God in the World fulfilling his purpose and fulfilling his Word both of Promise and of Threatning Two of those Observations I have given you discoursed upon them and made some futable Applications I proceed to a third 3d Observ Providence ordinarily doth its greatest works in the day of mans smallest things It is truly observed that the greatness of Divine Power and Wisdom is most seen in the Creation and Preservation of the least creatures As a Workman is most magnified that can bring most art into the least room and it is as true that the greatness of Divine Providence
which then hindered his being revealed and would let until he should be taken away The Roman Empire hindered nor is that hinderance yet taken away 'T is true there is but a stump of that Empire remaining in Germany Spain France England many other great boughs are lop'd off it but most of them kept their Antichristian favour though they changed their temporal Lords and set up for and by themselves as to temporal subjection and dominion You see and hear how fierce the French the Spaniards the Portugals c. the house of Austria are for the Romish Religion 'T is true England hath broke that yoke off its neck so hath Holland the Gospel hath got a great foot in Germany France Denmark Poland Sweden Hungary but yet the Devil hath a large Chappel in most of those places It is the National Religion of France Spain Portugal Italy the Imperial Proper-territories God is fitting the circumstances of the World much to his promised Work of destroying this Antichrist with the spirit of his mouth with the brightness of his coming England is fallen off Holland is fallen off a great part of Switzerland many Cities and Territories in Germany Sweden and Denmark great numbers in France God is by degrees doing his work and a great deal is done within the space of a hundred and fifty years last past for it is no longer since Luther began to shake his Throne but yet the circumstances of the World do not look as if it were like to be a work we should see in our age nor it may be our childrens children Methinks the Scripture looks as if that man of sin should die a natural death not a violent one I mean that that Religion should be loathed out of the World not fought out of it God will consume it with the Spirit of his mouth and with the brightness of his coming Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit saith the Lord I tell you but my judgment that before the fall of Antichrist you must yet see a greater falling off from Popery by the Princes of other Nations and their people The Worlds circumstances do not yet seem fitted to that great Work God may work Miracles in the case but I know no ground we have to expect them I am very confident that Antichrist is in his wane much past his full declining every day and therefore the fears of some that that ridiculous Religion should again over-spread England or Holland or any other reformed Church do not much afflict me I take that for granted that Babylon is falling but when we shall hear that joyful sound Babylon is fallen Babylon is fallen that I cannot tell you but in the general I think we must first see the World otherwise circumstanced than it is 2. By this observation of the motions of Providence you shall also understand much of Gods set time as to shewing mercy to your own particular soul viz. when your bodily or spiritual circumstances are fitted for the desired mercy 1. I say first when your bodily circumstances are fitted to it There is nothing more evident than the dependance of our minds upon our bodies and the influence that some bodily distempers especially have upon our souls and minds now although it be true that God can work miraculously and by light can break through a darkness be it never so thick and ravish a Soul with unspeakable joy and peace though at that time it be yoked to a dark cloudy melancholick disturbed body yet God useth not to work Miracles ordinarily but to move in a more ordinary course of Providence by the use and application of means that are proper so that as it is seldom but God useth the disorders and disturbances of the body to influence and afflict the mind and to be at least an adjuvant cause when he will trouble a Soul so he usually restoreth health and a better constitution of body when he intends to restore peace and quiet and a composure of spirit I say ordinarily he doth so And hence again in the next place 3. We by giving attendance to this Observation may learn our duty in reference to the use of Means so as to use what is proper to its season for there is great wisdom to be used in apportioning means For Example as to the bringing down of Antichrist if Gods time be not come the means are not girding our swords upon our thighs c. I question whether that will ever be a Mean proper to be used in that case but endeavouring by all means possible to loath the World of Popish superstitions and ceremonies and all the idolatry of that Synagogue and of all the cheats they put upon the World and alienate the hearts of people from them So for calling the Jews the means to be used is not inciting them to get into a body and heading them c. but to convince them of their errours to endeavour the sweetning of their spirits the enlightning their minds with the knowledg of the truth of the Gospel and reconciling them to the Christian Religion and shewing them the Examples of an holy life and conversation So in case of particular Souls where the discomposure of the mind is originated in or further advantaged by bodily distempers which is a thing very frequently happening I do not take it to be the duty of a Christian meerly to pray and hear but also to use natural means proper for the abating of these distempers yet not this without Prayer and use of Ordinances both for the blessing of God upon such means and for the further influences of his supernatural grace for God fitteth the circumstances of the person that is to receive the mercy to the desired mercy when he intendeth the bestowing of it as well as the circumstances of the World to the mercy which in his set-time he intendeth for his Church so as I say this observing of this method of Providence duly attended to addeth spiritual Wisdom to a Christian as in discerning of Gods time for mercy so also in directing him to his duty as to proper means to be used by him in the way of his duty in order to the obtaining of the mercy teaching him to know what Israel ought to do what a good Christian ought to do under the circumstances under which God hath brought him 2. By an attendance to this working of Providence you shall understand much of the loving-kindness of the Lord very much of the goodness and love of God to Nations and Churches is seen in this his fitting of the worlds circumstances to his designs before he produceth them as his designs are effected without tumult and bloodshed which otherwise through mens opposition to it would not be avoided With how much bloodshed in all humane probability must the Children of Israel have first came out of Egypt then out of Babylon had not God fitted the circumstances of the world to those designs of his Providence
he that sheweth no mercy when he comes to need it shall have judgment without mercy for his portion Take heed of persecuting good people for their conscience-sake towards God it may be you may take the advantage of a furious time and plunder them a little or get them imprisoned or oppressed directly contrary to what is law and justice or directly contrary to the highest law which is the Law of God but if you do it is ten to one but as your hands sent many to bed without bread for themselves and their children to eat to sleep without a bed to lye upon to work without a tool to work with so God will find hands shall requite it into your bosom Or if you should contribute to make the wives of your brethren widows and their children fatherless and vagabonds in a good sense to seek bread out of desolate places God ere long will stand over your houses and say Let these mens children be fatherless and their wives widows let their children be continual vagabonds in the earth and beg and let them seek their bread out of their desolate places Let the extortioners catch all they have and let the strangers spoil their labour let there be none to extend mercy unto them neither let there be any to favour their fatherless children Let the iniquity of their fathers be remembred with the Lord. It was the curse Psal 109.9 And for what cause they were adversaries without a cause to David while he gave himself unto prayer ver 4. They rewarded him evil for good and hatred for his love Oh! my heart akes to think what judgments many in these days have laid up for themselves and their wives and children they have shewed no mercy they or some of theirs will find judgment without mercy God hateth cruelty and the sons of violence his foul abhorreth Vse 2. This observation calleth aloud to you for the exercises of charity and mercy They are virtues or graces the exercises of which God will not only certainly reward but he maketh haste to their reward he ordinarily lets not their reward sleep As it is said of some sinners Their damnation sleepeth not so as to some exercise of grace and vertue it is such a sweet savour in the nostrils of God that their recompence shall not sleep till the resurrection Let me not hear a mouth opened amongst my brethren nor see a purse-string tyed against an act of charity and mercy it grateth upon my ears Sirs give me leave to tell you that God never came more on borrowing than he doth in this age Troops of Robbers have robbed God they have robbed his Servants and God accounteth what is done to them as done to himself Anon it may be before these are gone another comes and tells you that such a Town is burnt down to the ground many hundred Families undone God sends to you for some help for them Anon another comes to tell you God hath sent to borrow a little of you for such a poor servant of his who hath not spent his estate in Luxury but God hath blasted him Possibly God sends another to you to lend him a little for another that is under the Physitians hand or under the Surgeons hand and hath spent all his or her estate O lend it He that gives to the poor lends to the Lord and he will repay Say not as many of you do when such come to borrow of you as you have no mind to lend any too Truly I have no money I can spare from my necessary occasions When the truth is thou hast no money thou art willing to lend such a person God sends on borrowing to thee He that hath given thee all that thou hast hath sent to thee to lend him a few shillings a few pence he hath sent us his Ministers upon his errand or some poor servant of his but he hath sent us with a ticket under his hand which thou knowest thou ownest his written word his holy Scriptures Say not thou hast no money if it be true indeed it is a good excuse or none that thou canst spare from thy necessary occasions if that be true too it is a good excuse but take heed it be true remember the case of Ananias and Saphira What mean the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the oxen What mean thy garments of silk thy costly laces thy feasting thy faring deliciously every day I do not blame these things where there are estates to bear them out soft rayment may be worn in Princes houses but then say not thou hast no money no money for to buy a cap to keep thy brother from the cold and yet money to buy a costly periwig no money to help thy brother to buy so much bread as to keep him from starving and yet hast thou money to furnish thy table with varieties and dainties hast thou no money to help a poor Christian to buy cloathes to cover his nakedness and yet hast thou money to lavish out to cloath thy self and family with silks and fine linnen hast thou no money to lend to thy Lord to relieve one of his prisoners to buy them a bed to lye on to recover them a seat to sit down upon and yet canst thou find enough to buy thy self a cupboard of plate or the most costly houshold-stuff O take heed that God judgeth not that thou hast no heart thou canst not trust that God thou so much talkest of and art no more than a prating Christian But my brethren remember that acts of mercy and charity are such as God ordinarily retaliateth in this life it is seldom that God putteth men to trust him to another world for rewards in these things It is a time to speak and I must speak in this case It is reported of holy Mr. Bradford that in an hard time he sold his Chains Rings and Jewels to relieve those in want It is reported of Basil that in a famine once he sold all the lands and goods he had to relieve the poor I shall add no more but conclude my discourse as that of our Saviour He that hath ears to hear let him hear He that believeth what he hath heard this day and searching the Scripture finds it true let him be up and doing accordingly But if any man believeth not the word of God nor us his servants but hath a mind to make an experiment whether Solomon had any warrant from God to tell the world That he that stoppeth his ear to the cry of the poor he also shall cry and not be heard Let him at his peril try whether Solomon or he was the wiser man I know I have spoke to many obedient ears if there be any other I so far my self am assured of what I have said That in these things Let them do what they please I and my house shall desire both to obey and fear the Lord. SERMON XXIV Psalm CVII 43. Whoso is wise and
man whose sins are covered by God! O let no man despise the riches of Gods goodness forbearance and long-suffering but let him know that the goodness of God leadeth him to repentance Rom. 2.4 5. If he continueth in the hardness and impenitency of his heart he doth but treasure up wrath against the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgement of God Wrath against thee for thy sins lyeth hid at present possibly thy Conscience keepeth silence and doth not arrest and disturb thee the providence of God as to thee keepeth silence judgement is not executed speedily but there will be a revelation of divine wrath either in this life or that which is to come oh therefore break off your sins by a true repentance He that hideth his sins shall not prosper Prov. 28.13 Our sins cannot be hidden from God they are all in the light of his Countenance a man then covereth and hideth his sins from God when he doth not confess and bewail them So long as a man covereth his sins God will not cover them See that experience of David which you have recorded Psal 32.2 3 4. When I kept silence my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day-long for day and night thy hand was heavy upon me my moisture was turned into the drought of summer Selah vers 3. I acknowledge my sin unto thee and mine iniquity have I not hid I said I will confess my transgression unto the Lord and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin Selah Vse 3. In the last place this observation calleth upon all such as fear the Lord and walk before him for a progress in the wayes of God and a patient waiting for the promise The Apostle tells us Heb. 10.36 That we have need of patience that after we have done the will of God we might receive the promise It is our duty as to do well so not to be weary of well doing it is pressed upon us Gal. 6.9 And let us not be weary in well-doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not And again 2 Thess 3.13 but you brethren be not weary in well-doing There is nothing so far conduceth to make us faint and weary in our duty as when we see nothing comes of it we have hopes and promises but no issue no performance you know Solomon tells you hope deferred makes the heart sick Now this is a great cordial in such a case for us to hear that when providence moveth slowly in bringing rewards to the righteous it recompenceth our patience at last with the riches and liberality of the reward Indeed here are three or four arguments which together with this observation the Apostle hinteth me in the afore-mentioned Text out of the Epistle to the Galathians we shall reap we shall reap in due season Our fainting will spoil our reaping The longer it is before we reap the greater the crop of mercy and blessing shall be which we shall reap 1. We shall reap He that ploweth up the fallow-ground of his heart and soweth to the glory of God and to the good of his own soul in righteousness he shall reap The Husbandman that sowes his Wheat and Barly cannot promise himself that he shall reap the souldier the plunderer may reap what he hath sown a tempest an east-wind lightning many other things may hinder his reaping but he who sowes righteousness he shall reap nothing shall hinder his reaping 2. He shall reap in due season It may be he shall not reap in his season the season which he expected but he shall reap in due season in such a time as the wise God judgeth most seasonable and when he cometh to reap he shall also acknowledge the seasonableness of it that it is in due season we do not know the fittest time for our own mercies God knowes the fittest season we shall reap in due season 3. Consider that our reaping dependeth upon our not fainting we shall reap saith the Apostle if we faint not If any soul draweth back Gods soul will have no pleasure in him he who draweth back draweth back to his own perdition 4. and Lastly our reward will be so much the greater by how much it is slower the rewards of Gods people are ordinarily proportioned to their patient waiting The Apostle Rom. 2.6 having spoken of Christs coming to render to every man according to his work addeth v. 7. To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality eternal life Yea and certainly degrees of glory will be proportioned to our patience those that have had least sensible rewards in this life if there be such a thing as degrees of glory may expect some of the highest seats and mansions of glory in that life which is to come But I shall add no more to this Observation SERMON XXX Psal CVII 43. Whoso is wise and will observe these things even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord. I Go on yet in my observations concerning the Actual Providence of God and that more especially in dealing out distributive justice recompensing the righteous and the unrighteous I observed the last time that it is a thing very ordinary with Divine Providence to proceed slowly in these distributions But by how much slower the punishment of a sinner or the reward of a good man cometh from the Lord by so much the greater both the one and the other is I now proceed to another Observation Observat 17. That the Providence of God is very quick in the distribution both of punishments and rewards unto some I shall discourse it first with relation to punishments and then with reference to the rewards of Providence First As to punishments The Apostle Paul to Timothy 1 Tim. 5.24 hath this expression Some mens sins are open before-hand unto judgement and some mens they follow after likewise also the good works of some are manifest before-hand and they that are otherwise cannot be hid I know it is a Text of which Interpreters give various senses as they understand it of the judgment of God some of them others of the judgement of men and amongst those who understand it of the later some understand it of the judgment of the Magistrate others of the judgment of the Church some of both these some of the judgment of God and the Ecclesiastical judgment also I shall not pretend to give the just sense of it I shall only allude to it in my discourse As there are some sins that are open and manifest with respect to the filth and guilt of them they do not hide their sin but proclaim it as Sodom they go to the Devil with a trumpet before them all the world takes notice of them others sin more secretly and slily and in corners So God as to some sinners sits in judgement presently Some indeed he is more slow with they are kept to the great Assize or for many years but he is
more in prayer in praise in hearing c. Thus it was with St. Paul he reflected upon himself as not meet to be called an Apostle because he had persecuted the Church of Christ But saith he by the grace of God I am that I am and his grace bestowed on me was not in vain but I laboured more abundantly 1 Cor. 15.9 10. SERMON XXXVIII Job V. 6 7. Although affliction cometh not out of the dust neither doth trouble spring out of the ground yet man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward THe words which I have read to you are the words of Eliphaz the Temanite unto his friend Job who Chap. 3. had made so bitter a complaint of his afflictions whether he had this title from his Ancestors as some think Gen. 36.11 where we read of one Eliphaz a descendent from Esau who begat Teman or from his Countrey which I take to be most probable for we read Jer. 49.7 concerning Edom thus saith the Lord of Hosts Is wisdom no more in Teman Teman was certainly a City in the dominion of Edom famous both for wise and valiant men as you may learn from vers 8. of the Prophecy of Obadiah Shall I not in that day saith the Lord even destroy the wise-men out of Edom and understanding out of the Mount of Esau and thy mighty men O Teman shall be dismayed It is not much material This Eliphaz in probability was an Edomite an inhabitant of Teman a friend of Job who by appointment was come with the two others to visit Job upon the report of his great affliction he began his discourse in the former Chapter and continueth it in this I shall not concern my self in the other part of Eliphaz his discourse in the Verses which I have read to you he seemeth to comfort Job from a twofold Consideration 1. That the hand of God was in his affliction for that is implied when he saith Affliction cometh not out of the dust neither doth trouble spring out of the ground 2. From the consideration of the fate of man Man saith he is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward The Proposition of these two Verses is plainly this Prop. That God hath a great hand in all the evils that come upon us Man is born unto trouble and it is as natural to him as for the sparks to move upward and his afflictions come not out of the dust It is the observation of an Eminent Divine of our own in his excellent commentary upon this Verse that this is a Proverbial speech and the sense of it That affliction cometh not by chance or fortune and so the dust and the ground in my Text stands opposed 1. To God and 2. To our selves What if I should offer my thoughts that it is an Eliptical speech and much parallel to that Psal 75.6 7. For promotion cometh neither from the East nor from the West nor from the South But God is the Judg he putteth down one and setteth up another So here affliction springeth not out of the dust nor trouble out of the ground but God hath an hand in all only this latter part is left to us to be understood My present design will not lead me to consider how far man is felo de se and the author of his own evils having the meritorious cause in his own soul but I shall only discourse of God as the efficient cause the other will fall in as that which moveth God to such an execution of Providence Here are two branches in the Proposition 1. That man is born unto affliction and trouble as the sparks fly upward it may be understood that he hath a right to it as the sparks have by the Law of Creation disposing and ordaining them to such a motion so man hath a legal right to trouble by vertue of the first Covenant In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye Now this man hath as a sinner depraved and fallen from that Original rectitude in which God created him 2. He hath a natural fitness and disposition to it and is by his nature subjected to a variety of afflictions and troubles As the sparks by reason of their levity have an aptness to move upward so hath man through his natural constitution ever since the crasis of his humours was impaired and spoiled upon the fall a native fitness and disposition to receive impressions of affliction and trouble 2. That this trouble these afflictions come not upon us by chance but by the hand of God It was the saying of a good Prophet 2 Kings 6.33 This evil is of the Lord. The Prophet speaks of evils more generally Amos 3.6 Shall there be any evil in the City and the Lord hath not done it and vers 5. Can a bird fall in a snare on the earth where no gin is for him And this is true of all species of penal evils which we call troubles and afflictions whether they fall upon our bodies or spirits or in our estates or from our relations c. The Question is Quest How this is consistent with the goodness and mercy of God Can God be the Author of evil Lam. 3.33 34. He doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men to crush under his feet all the prisoners of the Earth Sol. The answer is very easie there is an evil of sin of this God cannot be the Author he can neither be tempted with evil nor tempt any man but there is an evil of punishment indeed in it self not evil as I shall shew more by and by Of this none doubteth but God may be the Author yea there is no evil of this nature in the City which he hath not done 2. Nor is this at all inconsistent either with the purity and holiness or the mercy and goodness of God for as I said before these kind of evils are only nuncupatively so and have no more evil in them than as they are ingrateful to our pallats and but nick-named evils by us following the fallible judgment of our senses Quae vulgus infamat malorum titulo arcanis suae benignitatis decrevit God in his eternal thoughts of love hath decreed the effecting those things which we scandalize with the name of Evils Evils of punishment are good under a disguise and we should not call them Evils if sense did not cast a mist before our eyes 'T is sense deceivable sense that both makes us call the real evils of sin good and the real good things of afflictions and troubles evil When God once dispelleth this mist and opens the eyes of the spiritual understanding it sees after another manner and it then crys out with David Psal 119.67 Before I was afflicted I went astray but now I have kept thy word Vers 71. It is good for me that I have been afflicted that I might learn thy statutes Thus the child when it comes to understanding blesseth the rods and ferula's with which he
God to punish wicked men though he knoweth afflictions will do them no good but make them worse hardening their hearts and giving them occasion to blaspheme because of their plagues But we do not only see adult and grown persons smitten of God and afflicted and those as well such as fear God as those who have no fear of God before their eyes but we also see children smitten of God such of whom we say They have neither done good nor evil The Question is Quest How this dispensation of Actual Providence is reconcileable to the justice and goodness of God That which blindeth our eyes and maketh this motion of Providence appear more hard and difficult to be understood by us is the supposed innocency of children they perish oft-times before they come to exercise any acts of reason Concerning the eternal state of children dying in their infancy I shall determine nothing because indeed the Scripture that I know of no-where determines all so dying within the election of grace nor that Christ as to all such hath expiated the guilt of Adams sin or original corruption nor that effectual saving grace doth always attend the Ordinance of Baptism though they be brought under it which yet many are not This is a great secret what God doth with the souls of children dying in infancy But this is not what I have to do with what God doth with the souls of such we see not we have no sufficient means to understand and therefore freely leave them to the good pleasure of God But we see they are afflicted as well as others they dye as much as others if not in greater numbers Shall we say the hand of God is not in this thing Or that their sicknesses and deaths are no effects of punitive Providence or vindicative justice but the meer product of a disordered nature and temper this were certainly to contradict the holy Scriptures where we find the afflictions of children made the matter of threatnings the executions of punishments upon them ascribed to God God by his Prophet threatned the death of Davids child by Bathsheba and of Jeroboams child in this Text see vers 12. The afflictions and troubles of children rise no more out of the dust nor more spring out of the ground than others their afflictions come at his command work at his command bring forth the issues which he willeth them and are punishments as well as the afflictions of more adult and grown persons My business must be to reconcile this motion of Divine Providence to Divine justice and goodness In order to which I shall offer you several considerations 1. Could I assure you that all children dying in their infancy are undoubtedly saved either as being within the decree of election and all of them chosen in Christ to eternal life before the foundation of the world or as having their share in the guilt of Adams sin expiated by Christ and their original pollution washed away in his blood this question were determined and the objection of no value It is a priviledged soul that first gets out of the prison of the flesh into the liberty the glorious liberty of the sons of God Supposing this it would be no act of justice and severity but mercy and goodness of God to cut off our children from the womb and from the breasts to deliver them from the bodily pains and aches from all other vexations crosses and disturbances which they shall be sure to meet with in the world happy thrice happy is that soul certainly that makes but one leap from the womb into Abrahams bosom that takes but one step into the world and the next into Paradise and certainly this is the case of very many Christ hath told us that of such is the kingdom of God if all such be not there as to which the Scripture is silent yet many such are there all chosen in Christ are there There is good hopes of the seed of those that fear God the Covenant of God is with his people and with their seed and how happy are they that can get to Heaven with a groan or two with such a degree of pain and aches as those little bodies can only bear and that before their reason is improved by its reflections to make their pains and miseries more bitter So that as to all such as are ordained unto life the case is plain Divine goodness is eminently seen in giving them so short a passage through the vale of misery and shewing them a far shorter and nearer way to Heaven than what more grown persons must go through much tribulation Now though I cannot assure you this concerning all yet I can concerning many which makes the day of their afflictions and death to be much better than the day wherein it was said of them There is a child born into the world and surely if the Thracians who were heathens upon the prospect of no more than the miseries to which humane life is subjected could alter the common custom of rejoycing at Nativities and mourning at Burials into a mourning at the birth of their children and a rejoycing and triumphing at the death of their friends we to whom a life and immortality is brought to light by the Gospel and to whom the immediate transition of elect souls out of a state of mortality and misery into a state of happiness and eternal blessedness is matter of faith have much more reason to adore the goodness of God in the present determination of our childrens lives than to quarrel at Divine Providence for bringing such things to pass while it doth us nor ours any further harm than depriving us of the little pleasure we take in beholding those pictures of our selves dandling them in our laps hugging them in our bosoms while also this pleasure is embittered to us by a thousand fears and cares and sollicitudes and troubles for with and concerning them But because I cannot assure you this concerning all something further must yet be said to vindicate the justice of God in this dispensation 2. Therefore I say the original sin of children is enough to justifie God in all his afflictions of Children nor is this that I know denied by any valuable or considerable party It was indeed the opinion of Arminius That no person was damned meerly for original sin but upon what grounds none of his disciples have been able ever to tell the world to any satisfaction and it were strange if they should when the Scripture saith expresly Ephes 2.3 That we are by nature the children of wrath that is certainly heirs of wrath and exposed to the wrath of God and the Apostle tells us Rom. 5.18 That by the offence of one man judgement came upon all to condemnation Now when-as all men were by Adams sin subjected to wrath and condemnation and by their original sin children of wrath what ground hath any to assert that none shall be eternally condemned meerly for original sin
fruit of the womb as a blessing and blesseth him that hath his quiver full of these shafts but now the poor man knoweth not how to understand this and it is hard for him not to repine at the multiplying of it a great error doubtless but such as for ought I know good people may fall into we cannot trust God to provide for those which he giveth us if this hath been thy error God but pays thee in thy own kind by shortning thy number and maketh thy own secret sinful wish now to be thy Plague and Torment but this ordinarily is the sin of the poorer and meaner sort of Christians 2. Didst thou not let thy heart run out too much upon thy Children God is jealous and it is the nature of jealousy not to suffer a rival in the object beloved be it a person or a thing God is the object and he will be the prime object of his peoples love desire and delight It is his Law Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy Soul and with all thy strength it may be thy Child had more of thy heart more of thy love and and delight than God had no wonder if he hath taken it from thee this is now usually the sin of those whose circumstances in the world are better they have a fair estate in the world and Children few enough to leave it to and in such cases it is a very hard thing to keep our hearts within due bounds but our affections are ready to overflow especially if there be nothing in the temper or behaviour of the Child that takes off the edge of our affections to it 3. Doth not thy heart smite thee for the neglect of thy duty to thy Child especially if it were of any years Thy duty in instructing it or thy duty in reproving and admonishing it Elie's Sons were indeed men grown but God cut off his Children though their personal guilt justified God in his severity against them yet Eli smarted in their punishments for honouring his Sons more than God for dealing too gently with them for their most enormous wickednesses Thou mayest also neglect thy duty towards them in instructing them in making them acquainted with the holy Scriptures in admonishing them to keep the Lords Sabbaths and seeing to their external Sanctification of them This is undoubtedly a second piece of thy duty upon such a dispensation and to be humbled before God for those sins which thy conscience smiteth thee for and suggesteth to thee as probable causes of this rod of God upon thee 3. It is doubtless thy duty whatsoever thou findest to be satisfied with Gods good pleasure Rachel mourned sinfully while she so mourned as that she refused to be comforted If thou findest that probably God hath punished thy sin in the sickness pain and death of thy Child it is indeed matter of humiliation to thee it offers thee a just opportunity to resolve for the time to come to amend thy errors as to any survivors which God shall lend thee but yesterday cannot be called back again God hath done what pleased him It may be in mercy to thy Child though it be in judgment unto thee thou hast no reason to quarrel or murmure at God for any of his dispensations If it be for thy Child 's Original sin still thou hast no reason to blame God he is just and righteous in what he hath done But if God hath done it to give thy Child a quicker passage to Heaven to bring it sooner to a state of perfection to deliver it from an evil to come here thou hast reason to admire and adore the Divine goodness rather than to quarrel at Divine Justice There are a great many things that may conduce to the relief of a godly man or woman disturbed at this dispensation of Divine Providence It is a very ordinary dispensation of God though therefore it may look like a digression from the principal argument of my discourse yet it may possibly be not so judged by some of you whose case it either at present is or may be to instance in some heads of arguments which occasionally you may make use of for the quieting of your Spirits 1. Consider what-ever was the moving cause on Gods part yet the will of God is revealed The will of God is such a thing to satisfy a Christian with as nothing can be more nothing greater We have our Heaven by the will of God fear not little flock it is your Fathers will to give you a Kingdom We have all our grace all our glory from the will of God and shall we not thankfully accept a cross when it is the will of our Father to lay it upon our necks We pray thy will be done and shall we murmure against it when we see it done This silenced Aaron David Heli Hezekiah it leaves no room for a good Christians reply to it it is our Fathers will that is enough It is our Fathers will revealed by an Act of his Providence The Lord hath given saith Job and the Lord hath taken blessed be the name of the Lord. 2. Consider how many sadder cases than thine there have been Thou hast lost a Child an infant Job lost all his Children when they were grown up feasting at their elder Brothers house Aarons was a sad cause he lost his two Sons grown up in an act of sinning yet he held his peace Helies case was sad to lose two such wicked Sons in a Battel Davids case was sad God had expresly told him the Child should dye because of his sin and that by it he had made the enemies of God to blaspheme What doth David do He fasteth he prayeth he humbleth himself before God so long as the Child lived and while he had any hope but when the will of God was revealed when the Child was dead he ariseth and eateth bread as he was wont to do he saith that he should go to it it should not return to him 3. Consider Let the case be as sad as it will yet if thou lookest round about it there is mercy in it either mercy to thy Child or mercy to thee or mercy to both if thy Child be gone to Heaven there is mercy in that if it be delivered from evil to come upon the World or that part of the world where it should have had its portion there is mercy in that David's case was as sad as one can well think of any of this nature yet there was this mercy in it the living monument and remembrance of David's sin and shame was taken away 4. Suppose that God hath for thy sin taken it away and thou canst not satisfie thy self but it is so yet consider God eternally punisheth none for the sins of their correlates God may punish persons with bodily and temporal punishments for the sins of their Parents but not eternally as to those punishments every soul shall bear no
more than its own iniquity Arminius I remember telleth us that he can see no reason but that Children may be equally punished eternally for the sins of their Parents as well as the whole posterity of Adam for his sin but certainly there is a vast difference the first Adam was a publick person with whom God made a Covenant for life or death for himself and for his posterity and he had a power as well to have conveyed life as death to all his posterity but surely none will assert this as to any Parent since his time 5. Consider how much comfort there is laid for parents mourning in that speech of our Saviour for of such is the kingdom of God Men that have large Gardens and Orchards have places for slips and Inlays as well as for old Stocks Nurseries for Plants as well as places for full-grown fruit-trees God hath his garden of Grace that is his Church and he hath his garden of Glory to both belong Nurseries The Children of believers are though imperfect members yet members of his Church and they may be heirs of Glory though they go out of this world under age as to any earthly inheritance Yet they may be of full age for the inheritance that is immortal incorruptible and which fadeth not away they will be of age in that Country where is no infant of days nor old man of years The possibility of little Childrens entering into the Kingdom of God yea the probability that the seed of such as fear God dying in infancy are so entred ought to be a wonderful relief to Godly parents mourning upon this account Some Mothers only people the earth with sinners God puts an honour upon thee if thou stockest Heaven with Saints and bringest forth to the kingdom of Glory 6. Consider Thou canst never lose a Child with more hope than in its infancy Some have thought that the death of Christ hath as to all expiated the guilt of Adams sin both the Socinians and Arminians seem so to judge Others think that by vertue of the New Covenant the water of Baptism washeth away original sin Augustine was called Durus pater infantum an hard Father to Infants because he thought all unbaptized Infants were damned by which it seems he deferred much to Baptism but I do not remember that I ever read in him or heard from him that he held that all baptized Infants should be saved if dying in infancy I durst not fix the comfort of mourning Parents upon these foundations But yet this is certain the Infant within the pale of the Church the Child of the believing the true believing Parent especially is in Covenant with God It hath not yet been defiled with wilfull presumptuous sinning we cannot say so of our Children when they are grown up to years A godly Parent can never lose a Child with more hopes of its eternal Salvation than in its infancy 7. Again Possibly what God hath done he hath done in mercy to thee to thy soul that thy affections may be more entirely upon him God knew thy heart better than thy self it may be by such a stroke he hath secured thy heart more unto himself it may be in mercy as to the comforts of thy life Zedekiah could better have followed his Children in their infancy to their grave than have seen them slain by a barbarous enemy before his face Thou knowest not what evil is coming upon the world 8. Lastly consider That for those that keep the Lords Sabbaths and chuse the things that please him and take hold of the Lords Covenant God hath Isa 56.45 promised a better name than that of sons and daughters even an everlasting name which shall never be cut off But I shall digress no further on this Argument 4. Lastly Having stilled thy impatience what hast thou to do but to fulfil the Lords will and ends under such a dispensation Let those do it that are patients under such providences Let us all do it who are spectators of them Are any of us patients under such Providences let us fulfil the Lords ends in them You will say what are they I Answer 1. Submission to his good will is doubtless one thing God by all afflictions of his people designeth to humble and to prove his people that he may do them good in the latter end Such dispensations are the rod of God upon us and his rod hath a voice and we are bound to hear his rod. God is now trying thy obedience Abraham's trial was a greater trial he had but one Child him a Son the Child of the promise God required him to kill him with his own hand he submitted and the Lord accepted his will for the deed Thy hearing the voice of one rod may prevent the Lords taking of another to scourge thee with 2. Humiliation for those sins which thou suspectest to have been the provoking cause of such a dispensation that 's another end which thou maist probably think that God aimeth at Afflictions are to humble us and to prove us 3. God calleth aloud to thee to take thy heart off thy creature-comforts Thou seest what gourds what blossoms they are what shadows they are which thou huggest what lyes thou hast in thy right hand he calls now to thee to fix thy heart and thine eyes upon him alone and to make him alone thy portion to fix all thy delight upon him For us that are spectators of such Providences let us also by them learn wisdom 1. By taking heed of such sins as may provoke God to such dispensations we stand concerned if we love our children to love God and to fear him to walk closely with him the wicked life of a Parent may shorten the life of a Child for that God in judgment may write him childless a man who shall not prosper nor his name out-live a present generation Take heed of those particular sins which may provoke God to such a stroke Take heed of murmuring at the blessing of a numerous off spring and distrusting the Providence of God as to a providing for them Take heed if Children be given you that you do not set your heart upon them Look upon them as fading flowers and such flowers as never fade sooner than while they are worn too near your heart Take heed of sins by which the enemies of God shall be made to blaspheme David for such sins lost his new born Child from his beloved Bathsheba 2. More especially take heed of neglecting your children Neglect not the ordinance of Baptism as to them I do not think that is damnable but I do think it is provocative of God I remember God met Moses in the Inn and was about to kill him for his omission of Circumcision Circumcision was in it self a pitiful thing but it was Gods ordinance it was his Covenant in the flesh with the seed of Abraham We are not upon a Divine institution to say To what purpose is it or what good
from Heaven with his mighty Angels in flaming fire taking Vengeance on them who know not God and obey not the Gospel of Christ who saith he in my Text shall be punished with everlasting destruction The Text will afford us two Propositions 1. Prop. That those persons who in this life have not known God or have not obeyed the Gospel of Christ when Christ shall come to judgment shall be punished with everlasting Destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power 2. Prop. That amongst sinners the persecutors of others unjustly for their conscience toward God and for the Gospel of Christ shall least escape this righteous Judgment These above others shall be punished with everlasting destruction The Emphasis of the proposition so far as I desire to handle it lies in the word everlasting they shall saith the Text be punished with everlasting destruction which is no more than our Saviour had said Math. 25.46 And those shall go into everlasting punishment but the righteous into life eternal and Math. 9.44 46 48. Where you read of a worm that never dieth and a fire that is not quenched The Revelation of Scripture in the case is plain enough only here is the Question Quest How it can stand with the Justice or goodness of God to punish momentary Sins with everlasting destruction The grounds of this Question or doubt are 1. The proportion which Justice seemeth to require betwixt the offence and the punishment Justice amongst men requireth a proportion as well as punishment it self and it is with us accounted injustice not to keep a measure in punishment Every one condemneth the Roman taking away the life of his Servant in compensation of a cup-board of glasses he had broken and we count it hardly just to do the like for little things stollen from us now there seemeth to be no proportion betwixt momentany singings and eternal punishments Tertullian rightly calls sins vaporata libidinum momenta And the holy ghost calls them the pleasures of sin for a season It is the same case as to the profits of sin man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live and no longer time to sin in then he hath to live 2. Eternal torments seem to bear no proportion to that infinite goodness and mercy of God which we have read of to be in God They say indeed of Nero that having condemned a malefactor to long torments and pleasing himself to see him so tormented when the poor wretch called to him for mercy he gave him no other answer then Nondum tecum in gratiam redii stay Sir you and I are not friends yet but is it possible without blasphemy to imagin any such thing of God of whose nature it is to forgive and to shew mercy Can he please himself with the eternal torments of a creature which he hath made No no saith the Atheist Hell is but a bugbear there can be no such thing consistent with the Justice and goodness of God as Eternal Destruction But the Scripture affirms it suffer me therefore in general to cry out O you Sons of men are not the Lords ways equal Are not your ways inequal who art thou O man who reasonest with God Shall the clay say to the Potter why hast thou made me thus Is not our Reason debauched think we when it can agree no better with the Reason and wisdom of God whence it deriveth and that in a lefs proportion than a drop of water beareth to the Ocean or the Fountain from which it deriveth Know therefore that all these vain and Atheistical reasonings of our hearts proceed upon one or more of these mistaken principles 1. That Gods compassion goodness or mercy must be Eternally extended to and exercised upon the most notorious desperate despisers and contemners of it Now this is indeed to fancy an idol to our selves instead of God we have no reason so to conceive of God partly because we find no humane nature so tame though we be under a Law of shewing pity and compassion partly because the Scripture no-where teacheth us such a notion of God Besides that such a notion of God as this is would disarm the most excellent and perfect being of all power to protect it self from the greatest injuries which the most debauched persons should offer to it I would gladly know what reason or what part of Scripture can induce any to dream of a goodness and mercy of God towards finners beyond this life 2. That the goodness and mercy of God must be estimated and measured by his dispensations to individuals Amongst men mercy to some particular persons that are eminent disturbers of humane Society is cruelty to thousands possibly Gods mercy may be exercised and he may be a God in whom all that the Scripture saith of that goodness that is in the Divine being may be verified and yet hundreds yea thousands of impenitent sinners may eternally perish 3. That the proportion which the Divine Justice observeth in punishing sinners must be measured by the proportion of time which the sinner hath to sin in Than which there nothing more false nor as I shall anon shew you is there any such rule kept to in the justice of men 4. That the Justice of God is to be measured by the same measures as the Justice of men and nothing which amongst men is injust can be just with God where-as among men we see the same rewards and punishments are not judged just as to all men all Nations though the fact be the same otherwise punish injuries done to superiours than to inferiours and it is thought but just to proportion the punishment to the quality and greatness of the person to whom the injury is done 5. That the condemned sinner satisfies by his suffering than which there is nothing more false No creditor takes his debtors lying in prison whatever misery he feeleth there to be any part of payment of his debt These are some of the mistaken Principles from which vain man quarrelleth at the Divine Justice in the eternal destruction of sinners Now these things premised I shall easily shew you that eternal punishment is not inconsistent with the Justice of God nor doth any way derogate from that infinite goodness and mercy which is inseparable from the Divine Being 1. Why should we not in the first place allow that to be just with God which we allow to be just and righteous in man What doth man less than this according to the extent of his power Doth not the Magistrate for his offence deprive the Traytor the Murtherer or other Malefactor of his life and all the comforts of it for ever Divines say that in Hell there is a pain of loss and a pain of sense and the Schoolmen argue the former to be greater than the latter you see man inflicteth an eternal pain of loss and counts it just he taketh away the malefactors life and all the sweet
honour successes c. David himself never had a slip like that he had when he came into the highest state Even the best of Gods people have great reason to rejoice with trembling in the midst of full cups but sinners have far more reason when they are not plagued as other men when there are no bands in their death when their eyes stand out with fatness and they have more than heart could wish that is the time when their mouths are set against Heaven then their day of destruction is not far of and indeed those are the two dreadful considerations and therefore they have reason to fear and tremble 1. Lest their prosperity should slay their souls There is a latent poyson in sinners hearts at all times but poverty and adversity keeps it in The poor man useth intreaties saith Solomon but the rich man speaketh proudly honour and power are great temptations to oppression Riches and abundance to all sorts of Luxury So as if a man be a fool and hath no spiritual wisdom to rule and to govern himself in a prosperous state his prosperity slayeth him giving advantages to those lusts that are in his heart to discover themselves It is the prosperous sinner that oppresseth his neighbour that does acts of injustice and thinks by his power to defend himself 2. Again Prosperity bodes ill The sinner is never so near a fall as when he is upon a pinacle of honour and power When the worldling saith Soul take thine ease thou hast goods laid up for many years then comes the voice Thou fool this night shall thy soul be taken from thee and one reason of this is because that is the time when his sin ripeneth when he lifteth up his heart highest and openeth his mouth widest and lifteth up his hands most fiercely against the God of Heaven O then let the prosperous sinner fear and tremble 3. Lastly You have heard that it is but a righteous thing with God to give unto the worst of men the good things of this life because they have something in them of the nature of means to convince sinners both of their sins against God and also of their duty to God Indeed they ordinarily prove the quite contrary but this is not of themselves or from their own nature but from the lust and corruption of sinners hearts O then let the goodness of God lead you to repentance Rom. 2.4 The Apostle lets us know that the patience long-sufferance and goodness of God leads us to repentance The long-suffering and patience of God if there were no more ought to do it And certainly were there any ingenuity in the heart of a sinner it would do it For him to sit down and think I have been a drunkard a lyar a swearer a Sabbath-breaker these Twenty Thirty Forty years God hath seen and known me all this time there hath not been a thought of my heart but hath been naked before him I have not told a lye nor sworn an oath but as soon as the word hath been out of my mouth the news of it hath been in Heaven and it hath been written in Gods Book of remembrance God hath all this while been an Almighty God and hath had it in his power every moment of this time to throw me to Hell He could have struck me dead with my lye in my mouth as he did Ananias and Saphira Acts 5 or with my oath my curse my blasphemy in my mouth but God hath been long-suffering and patient with me willing that I should at last be saved Shall I yet go on in my sinful courses Shall all this patience of God be lost upon my desperate soul Surely I am bound humbly to acknowledg thus many years of patience and to sin no more lest I turn Divine patience into fury But then the riches of Gods goodness though it be but in the things of this life adds great weight to the argument for a poor creature to sit down and think that he hath not been plagued as other men he hath not had such a sickly body nor such a scant estate but God hath made his cup to overflow he hath had success in his trading whiles others have been blasted O shall not this goodness of God lead thee to an acknowledgment of God Shall it not lead thee to a repentance for thy sin wilt thou treasure up wrath against the day of wrath and the Revelation of the most righteous Judgment of God Consider that the good things thou hast enjoyed have a natural tendency to change thee if thou hadst not banished that common ingenuity which teacheth all to love those that love them and most certainly it will make thee worse if not better if it doth not soften thy heart it will harden thy heart if these things tend not to make thee more holy they will certainly make thee more leud and profane And think with thy self what an aggravation of thy eternal misery it will be to fall into it out of as high a state of content and external felicity as thou wert capable of I would have every prosperous sinner say with himself What hath God done to me that I should be thus vile and so presumptuously sin against him There are very many that if they would listen a little to their own consciences might hear God by them speaking to them and saying What could God have done more for you than he hath done Would you have strong and healthy bodies God hath given you them Would you have large possessions great and plentiful estates God hath given you such Would you have desired a loving Wife hopeful Children You have had them God aggravateth the sin of David from the outward blessings he had blessed him with he had raised him to be King over Israel from following the sheep he had given him his Masters Houses and his Masters Wives into his bosom 1 Sam. 11. Will not God think you from hence aggravate your sins another day Will not this make Hell twice more Hell to you will it not add more heat to the fire that never shall go out and pain to the gnawings of that worm that shall never dye Oh harden not your hearts to day while it is called to day hearken to God speaking to you not only by the voice of his Word but by the voice of his Mercies O let not that riches of Divine goodness make you worse which in reason ought to make you better Let not your honours your riches damn you Take heed that there be not cause to say of you that if God had not been so good to you you had not been so leud and profane so wicked and abominable in his sight Thus far I have applied this discourse as to wicked men it remaineth yet that I should apply it as to the people of God shewing them their duty under such dispensations of providence but it is a point fit in our times to be further enlarged upon
dispensations all discontentment at their own low estate all displeasure at Gods dealings with others all accusations of God of injustice or hard dealings with his people whatsoever as a fruit or indication of any of those passions is certainly here forbidden us under the notions of fretting being angry or envious Let me now press this negative or prohibitive part of your duty upon you by some few arguments 1. I beseech you to consider the exceeding sinfulness of it when God said to the Prophet Jonah Dost thou well to be angry it is certainly implyed that he did not well It is in this Psalm twice forbidden us twice in the Book of Proverbs at least Envy is by the Apostle reckoned up as one of the fruits of the flesh now certainly if no more could be said than this It is the will of God that if thou seest the wicked prosper grow rich and great thou shouldst not be displeased at God nor envy them c. This should be enough to engage the people of God to take heed to their Spirits in this thing and indeed we had need watch for we shall find our Souls under very great temptations in the case and that it is a very hard thing for a good man to look with a good Eye upon the prosperity of wicked men 2. But I shall shew you that it is a sin which receiveth more than ordinary aggravations 1. As first it is against the express letter of the Divine Law 1 Kings 11.9 10. It is said that the Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart was turned from the Lord God of Israel who had appeared to him twice and had commanded him concerning this thing that he should not go after other Gods God hath commanded us concerning this thing this particular thing and hath been pleased to make it the matter of a precept many times repeated If God had commanded us some great thing should we not have obeyed him in it How much more in the forbearing of a little Iust or passion It is not concluded a sin meerly from consequence of Scripture or to be concluded from some precepts that are laid down there it is the express letter of Scripture he that runs may read the will of God concerning this 2. Again by how much the more precepts are violated by any sinful action by so much the sin is greater you have heard this is a Sin against both Tables a sin against the duty which we owe unto God and the duty which we owe to our Neighbour that which we are forbidden in many Scriptures those so plain that he who runs may read them 3. Again Some sins are in their own nature more heinous than others amongst others the sin of Murther is a very great transgression Solomon saith Prov. 6.32 Men do not despise a thief if he stealeth to satisfy his Soul when he is hungry but v. 32. whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding he doth injury to his neighbour of an higher nature But now Murther that is an higher transgression St. John tells us no Murtherer hath eternal life Our Saviour reduceth Anger and Envy under the commandment Thou shalt not kill and makes him that is angry with his Brother without a cause no less than a Murtherer 4. Further yet a sin that breaketh out at the lips in sinful words or in the conversation by irregular actions is greater than that which is only in the heart defiling that Now it is a very hard thing for men to keep the fire of anger and envy within the chimney of their corrupt hearts Even the best men have not been able to keep it in 5. Finally by how much any sin is more the mother of Sin and brings forth more sins by so much the greater it is This fretting and envying at the prosperity of sinners besides the discontent and impatience of the Spirit which constantly attendeth it bringeth forth a world of sin at our lips and in our conversation reviling speeches detracting words spightful thoughts words and actions c. 2. Again this sin receiveth an aggravation from the persons offending In that Text 1 Kings 11.4 9. I observe two aggravations of Solomons sin of Apostacy The first that he did it when he was old so had he great experiences of God v. 9. there 's another expression it was after God had appeared to him twice for men that know not God nor have had any experience of his ways to fret and vex that others have more of the world than they have is not such a guilt as for the people of God to do it They are called the Children of Light and that not only in respect of grace and mercy which may be compared to light of which they are Children but with respect to knowledg they are a people who know better things than others and should know the riches the honours all the good things of the world are not worth valuing now for you after that you have been thus far enlightened still to be so enamoured upon them as to fret vex and be envious because others have more of them than you have must be a great transgression Especially to consider that you are the Children of God hears of grace yea and of glory too Thus I remember the Father of the Prodigal rebuked his Son fretting for the fatted Calf slain for his Brother Son saith he remember thou art always with me and all that I have is thine for those whom God hath made the heirs of grace and glory the heirs of the Kingdom to whom God hath said All that I have is thine I say for these to fret vex and repine that wicked men prosper in this world and have a little of this worlds goods must be a great provocation And to this there are not many of Gods people but in one degree or other have had an experience of the incertainty and vanity of all these things enough to depretiate them and render them invaluable to any good and gracious heart Further yet what doth any man get by fretting vexing or being envious at the prosperity of sinners as our Saviour said of thought-fulness none can by thinking add one cubit to his stature So I may say none by fretting vexing or envy can either detract a cubit from the stature of a sinner in prosperity nor add a cubit to his own it is a sin that can end in nothing but murmurings and repinings against God in tormenting and macerating of our selves and in the discomposure of our Spirits To shut up this discourse by how much any sin is more causeless by so much the greater it is there is neither so much good in the highest prosperity a sinner is capable of nor so much evil in the lowest and most afflicted estate of the people of God as to give a reasonable ground or occasion for a Child of God to give himself the disturbance so much as of one hour or to wile his
ne cede malis sed contra audentior ito These men may live at Sea in the midst of troubles and never think of God and Christ nor upon the power goodness and truth of God but upon an O socii neque enim ignâ—ri sumus ante malorum O passi graviora c. or some such thing but this is not to live upon faith if thy soul liveth the life of faith thy heart is alive in an evil time and the life and courage of it is maintained from God thy heart is maintained from the Truth Power and Goodness of God 2. This life of Faith is a quiet life It is a quiet life as to passions Faith hath a wonderful power to keep the mind in a calm serene temper It is the unbelieving soul that fretteth and sumeth and vexeth all turbulent passions upon Gods providence are the products of unbelief The Prophet telleth us He that believeth maketh not haste Faith dryeth up immoderate tears scatters the storms of fears maketh the soul to cease from anger and forsake wrath It quieteth the tongue so as it doth not charge God foolishly it keeps a man from all murmuring and flyings out against God from all indecent and extravagant flying out against men who are Gods instruments I held my peace because I knew it was thy doing David believed that God had done what was done he dust not mutter or repine because the Lord had done it And so as to action I mean irregular actions Take an unbeliever and let him be in any streight or distress he is unquiet and turbulent and makes no conscience what means he useth to set himself at liberty but he that believeth maketh not haste he who by faith eveth the promise gives credit to it and hath committed himself to the Power Goodness and Truth of God for the accomplishment of it as he is not hasty with his spirit to murmur fret and vex because it is not presently made good to him so he is not hasty with his tongue to charge God foolishly nor in his action He dareth not use any sinister or unlawful means to quit himself of any difficulty in which he is entangled he believeth that God will preserve uphold deliver him and in his own time find out some lawful way and means and the belief of this restraineth him from impatience or any thing which should be a fruit and indication of it 3. Again The life of Faith is an expectant life The Apostle telleth us that Faith is the evidence of things not seen Hence Faith hath always two daughters which are its genuine off spring 1. Hope which is the souls looking up or looking out for those things of which Faith giveth an evidence or assurance Faith assureth hope expecteth and this is so inseparable from Faith that it is often in Scripture put for Faith and only differeth in this that Hope is an expectancy upon faith's evidence and the certainty which it giveth the soul of the thing promised in the word Every hope indeed doth not speak faith but every grounded hope doth there is an hope of an hypocrite which groweth up like the rush without mire and the flag without water Patience is another daughter of Faith I shall have occasion to speak to that more fully hereafter Faith assureth the thing to the soul Hope looketh out for it and expects it Patience keeps the soul still and waiting for it If you ask me what the soul expecteth what it waiteth for it must needs be that of which Faith hath given the soul an evidence that is the Promise The Promises are of various natures for outward mercies such as Protection Deliverance c. Spiritual mercies such as inward Support Strength Consolations Eternal happiness 4 Again The life of Faith is an active life The operation of Faith doth not terminate in a meer speculation The activity of Faith lieth 1. In the diligent use of all natural and rational means which God hath appointed in order to the obtaining of the mercy of which faith hath given the soul an evidence and assurance As Faith doth quiet the soul and restrain it from the use of all unlawful means so it doth quicken and engage the soul in the use of all lawful and proper means The reason of which is because Faith can assure the soul of no mercy but in that manner and order and under those circumstances in and under which God hath promised to bestow it Now God hath promised mercies in the use of means so it quickeneth and engageth the soul to the use of means as a piece of the Will of God in order to the obtaining of our desired mercy 2. It lyeth in the use of all spiritual means and here Prayer in a special manner Prayer being the general spiritual means to be used for the obtaining of any mercy Daniel chap. 9 understood by Books that the time was come for the fulfilling of the 70 years captivity and this faith of his as to what he read in the Books quickned him up to pour out that fervent prayer unto God Dan. 9. 5. The life of Faith is a cheerful and joyous life you read in Scripture of a joy and peace which attendeth believing Rom. 15. Believing the glory of God is a great means to make the soul to rejoyce in the hopes of it Now the reason of this joy is the strength of that evidence which faith doth give the soul for joy is nothing else but the complacency of the soul or rather the expression of this complacency upon the souls union to its desired object Now according to the nearness and fulness of this union so is the joy Faith giving the soul a great and unquestionable evidence of the thing doth also give unto the soul a proportionable joy 6. The life of Faith is a crucifying dying life to the world This is the victory saith the Apostle by which we overcome the world even our faith Faith looketh up to the Cross of Christ and by it the heart of a Christian is crucified to the world and the world is crucified to his heart The proper operation of Faith is to work against hope for indeed if once the mercy cometh in sight so as sense cometh in play faith ceaseth as well as hope Hence the operation and exercise of Faith must needs crucifie the heart of a Christian to the world to sense and to all sensible objects Faith made Abraham overlook his own body which was now dead and Sarahs dead womb it made him to overlook the Knife and the Altar and the loss of Isaac's natural life and only to consider that God was able to raise him up from the dead it maketh a Christian overlook all seeming difficulties in regard of sense and all contrarieties whatsoever indeed seemeth to be in his way Now by these things you may try your selves whether you live the life of Faith under sad and dark Providences yea or no. By this time methinks
second place get an acquaintance with the promises of God Two Sorts of promises you must be acquainted with if you would bring your hearts into this frame of silent waiting for God 1. All those promises that are made to the Church and people of God for support and comfort in and under troubles and deliverance out of them of which the Scripture is full such as these Psal 94.14 The Lord will not cast off his people nor forsake his inheritance Read at your leisure Psal 128.6 Jer. 29.10 Mic. 4.4 11 12. Isa 27.5 7 8. Isa 33.20 Jer. 33.6 A second sort of promises are those that are specially made to this waiting upon God Psal 37.9 Psal 27.14 Isa 40.13 Wait upon the Lord and he shall strengthen your heart They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength like the Eagle they shall run and not be weary they shall walk and not faint The promises in Scripture of this nature are very many These are but a specimen of them 3. Lastly Labour to be acquainted with the ways and methods of Divine Providence which is to deal out dispensations of mercy to his people not presently but after their waiting upon him some time Habakkuk 2.3 The vision is yet for an appointed time but at the end it shall speak it shall not lie though it tarry wait for it because it will surely come it will not tarry The Church in her Song saith Lo this is our God we have waited for him to this is our God we have waited for him we will rejoyce and be glad in his Salvation 2. Secondly Beg of God a waiting frame of Spirit As there is nothing more sinful in it self nor more tormenting to our selves in an evil day than an impatient hasty Spirit so there is nothing more conducive to our glorifying of God nor to the quiet of our own Spirits than a silent waiting Spirit This the God of Heaven must give and he giveth it to them that ask him beg of God those graces which may dispose thee to this patient waiting I might instance in many habits of grace necessary to bring the soul into this waiting temper I will touch only upon 4 or 5. 1. Beg Faith of God Faith in his Word and Promise He that believeth maketh not haste The hastiness and impatience of the Soul floweth from its distrust in God for the fulfilling of his Word 2. Hope is another gracious habit which disposeth the Soul to waiting we hope for what we see not for what we see why do we any longer wait for 3. Humility is a third the proud soul thinks much to wait he looketh upon mercy as his due and thinketh that God wrongeth him whiles he withholds it from him the humble soul believeth that it deserveth nothing and is therefore willing upon the least crevis of hope to wait upon God 4. Pray for patience a passive patience this is necessary in order to the bearing of evils Lastly Pray for meekness a froward Spirit is always an hasty Spirit and knows not how to wait Now to press this duty upon you I shall but name to you several Considerations leaving them to be digested and inlarged upon in your private thoughts 1. Consider first It is the work of thy day The question is what God would have a child of his do when the enemies of Religion and godliness are very high and rampant and the people of God are low poor and afflicted and God suffereth wicked men to devour those who are more righteous than themselves as if men were under the same providence as the Fish of the Sea and the Beasts of the Earth where without any regard to right or wrong the greater devoureth the less at such a time as this what should a good and righteous man do Let Solomon answer Prov. 20.22 Say not I will recompence evil but wait on the Lord and he shall save you Hence you shall every-where in Scripture find the Church and people of God resolving upon it and the Lord when he instructs his people what to do in an evil day this is that which he directeth Isa 60.9 Zech. 3.8 Hab. 4.5 Isa 8.17 2. It is that which God hath alone left for you to do in such a day Our Eyes of sense in such a time are quite put out we have nothing to do at such a time but to stand still and see the Salvation of God Jer. 14.22 Are there any amongst the Gentiles that can give rain therefore we will wait upon thee we have nothing else to do we have none else we can wait upon therefore we will wait upon thee 3. It is that which hath been the practice of all the people of God and what they have called their souls to in evil times Psal 52.9 Psal 62.5 Indeed it is the whole business and life of a child of God It was the practice of the Church Mic. 7.7 And of Job The Saint hath the promise of heaven but he must wait for it 4. Thou hast ground enough to do it the Power of God the Goodness and Truth of God are certainly a sufficient ground of encouragement to any soul to wait upon God who hath promised help and is so true that he cannot lie who is able to help and to do more abundantly than we stand in need of and who is Infinite in Goodness and wanteth no love to prompt him to come in to the relief and succour of his people 5. Waiting upon God gives God the honour of many Attributes It giveth Him the glory of his Soveraignty His Wisdom His Power His Truth and His Goodness 6. It is a great evidence of your Faith He that believeth maketh not hast 7. It is that which in a day of evil will distinguish you from wicked and ungodly men they cannot wait upon God but break out into fits of impatience c. 8. There is nothing so effectual in an evil day to help thee to keep down thy corruptions to silence thy temptations You have heard it in that to which many promises are made That your waiting upon God is pleadable as an argument for the mercy which you desire In short there are very many Arguments might be used to perswade this silent waiting upon God but I have before spake to many of them and shall therefore add no more to this Discourse SERMON XLIX Rom. IX 15. For he saith unto Moses I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion upon whom I will have compassion I Am as you know attempting to expound the hard Chapters of Divine providence giving you some account of those Motions of it which to us appear most difficult I have brought these under some heads propounding to speak 1. First To such as concerned the exhibition of the Covenant of works after the establishment of the Eternal Covenant of Redemption and Grace And 2. The Exhibition or tender of grace to all indefinitely after the Decree of
in me is thy help I Am now come to the second general Proposition which I promised you to discourse upon a little In my last exercise I discoursed to you of the Fountain of Life and Grace which we found to be the free-will of God There is no other account to be given of Gods shewing mercy but because he will shew mercy which is most certainly true as of Gods eternal acts of Grace so of his Acts of Providence as to the dispensation of his first Grace The next Proposition I mentioned was this 2. Prop. That God in his providential Dispensations of punishment never acteth by meer Prerogative but according to the demerit of his Creatures In his Dispensations of Grace and the means of it he acteth meerly from his own Will he will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy and there is no other account to be given of those Dispensations he sendeth the Gospel to this place rather than another because he will send it he changeth this Man or Womans heart and turneth it to himself because he will shew mercy But the case is otherwise in his penal Dispensations there God acteth not upon Prerogative God there hath a Prerogative for may not the Potter do what he will with his Clay But it is one thing to have Jus absolutum an absolute right and power which we must claim for God so long as we know him to have an absolute right and Soveraignty over the works of his hands 't is another thing for God agere secundum jus absolutum to act according to his Soveraignty and absolute power this we say God doth not I pray observe I restrain my Discourse to Gods Dispensations of actual Providence I shall not meddle with the eternal Councils of God in this case that is quite beyond my Subject propounded It is unquestionable that the punishments of Sinners both in this Life and that which is to come as well as the other great issues of his Providence concerning the rewards of righteous men were set in order by an Eternal deliberation but whether by a meer negative or positive Decree whether upon consideration of sin or no are points I am not at all concerned to interest my self in having all along restrained my discourse to the motions of Actual Providence and certain it is that God in those Dispensations doth punish none either here or hereafter meerly because he will but upon consideration of Sinners demerits Shewing mercy is an Act of Grace punishments are Acts of Justice The gift of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Eternal Life that is a guift and what is freer than gift But the Wages of Sin is Death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Man must earn Death before he hath it from the hand of a merciful God but Eternal Life must be given him if ever it be his Portion so saith my Text. O Israel thou hast destroyed thy self I will open this in two or three conclusions 1. I understand it of all kind of destructions possibly the Text may chiefly relate to temporal destructions 't is Ephraim to whom the Prophet is speaking and it is about a bodily destruction but the Conclusion is general and the Text is well enough applyed by Divines to Eternal destruction all destructions whether of Body or Soul are of our selves yea I take the Aphonimy of the Text to be more eminently true of the destruction of the Soul than of the destruction of the Body A Child may dye for the sins of the Parents Subjects may dye for the sin of their Prince as in the case of Saul's Children that were hanged in David's time and in the case of those many thousands which in David's time were cut off for his sin in numbring of the People The Children of God may be involved in a common destruction and suffer as they are a part of a sinful Nation God may take them off to deliver them from an evil to come as in the case of Abijam the Son of Jeroboam God may punish his people with afflictions of this Life for the trial and exercise of their graces but in Eternal destructions God can have no other end than the punishment of the person and all such destruction is for a mans sin his personal sin 3. When we say that Mens destruction is of themselves you must understand of themselves as the meritorious cause not of themselves as the principal efficient cause God is rightly enough entituled to all the Evil of punishment in the City It is no dishonour to his Majesty to be the Author of his own Judgments which is all that Mr. Calvin or any of the same mind with him have said which hath made some so clamour against them as having asserted God to be the Author of Sin For God to be the Author of punishments is no stain to his Glory but a Declaration of his Justice and of his Righteousness Christ himself shall come as the Apostle telleth us in flaming fire to take Vengeance upon them who know not God and obey not his glorious Gospel God shall say to those on his left hand depart from me you cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels But our destruction is from our selves as the proximate and meritorious cause though from God as the efficient cause It is not from the Soveraign will of God meerly but from the stubborn and rebellious will of Man that any Soul perisheth Divines do say that though God cannot will the doing of any Sin yet he may will that it should be done The Holy Ghost telleth us that Herod and Pilate and the Jews employed in accusing condemning crucifying of Christ did no more than what the Council of God had determined should be done But I say notwithstanding this the proximate cause of mans Damnation is not because God hath willed their Damnation it is the guilt of their own Sins the demerit of their own Transgressions which bringeth them to the Pit of Destruction The Gracious God sheweth mercy and saveth all who are saved by Prerogative by Grace you are saved saith the Apostle he hath the same Prerogative in matters of Death that he hath in matters of Life but he useth it not but there acteth according to his Statute-Law The Soul that sinneth shall dye He who saveth men without themselves damneth none without themselves Men are saved by Grace but they are damned by Sin The wages of Sin is Death Omne peccatum est voluntarium all Sin is of ourselves it must have something of our own will and consent to and in it 3. Thirdly Although this be certain that all destruction all punishment is for Sin yet the particular proximate cause of some punishments is unknown to us I will instance in one particular a punishment undoubtedly a most severe punishment The withholding the Gospel and so the ordinary means of Grace and Salvation from the far greatest part of the world They hear nothing of the Lord Jesus
they have not the Oracles of God the ordinary means of Grace are hidden from them There is no doubt but their own wilful sinning is the cause of it But whether the Sin of their Progenitors who had the Gospel and sinned it away which to me seemeth a little hard for I can hardly be brought to agree that God for the sins of Relations punisheth their Correlates in Spiritual things Or that prodigious sinning which they are guilty of not living up to what may by them by their natural Light be seen of God for the Apostle Rom. 1. gives you a true Copy of the lives of all Heathens is not so easie to determine I should incline much to fix the cause here they have though not the Book of Scripture yet the Book of Gods Works and Nature though not Men Ministers of the Gospel to them yet the Heavens declaring the Glory of God and the Earth shewing his handy-work those standing Preachers of the Power Glory and Greatness of God whose sound is gone out and going dayly out over all the world they have the Sun and Moon they see much of God in and by them and may learn much of God from them but knowing God and not glorifying him as God but becoming vain in their imaginations they worship Devils and Stocks and Stones the work of their own hands and shutting their eyes against the Light of those common notions which are engraven in all reasonable Natures they give up themselves to commit all filthiness and unrighteousness So not using the Light of Nature and Reason which God hath given them God justly with-holdeth from them the Talent of the Gospel If God doth grant it to others which yet it may be are guilty of the same sottish abuse of their natural Light and Reason therein he is good and gracious but if he denieth it unto them therein he is not unjust or unrighteous But I say there may be some particular instances as to which it may be hard for us to assign what particular sins God so securely proceedeth against the Nations Families or Persons for but this is certain Sin is certainly the next cause of all severe dispensations of punishment Now this will appear to us 1. From the evidence of Scripture 2. From the evidence of Reason concluding from Scripture-Principles 1. First from the plain evidence of Scripture In the case of the Heathen amongst whom the Devil hath the greatest harvest of perishing Souls of these the Apostle speaketh Rom. 1.18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men Observe the words God doth not reveal his wrath against the Heathen meerly upon the account of his Soveraign Power because he will do it but against the ungodliness and unrighterusness of men he goeth on declaring their ungodliness and their unrighteousness Vers 21. Because when they knew God they glorified him not as God They had light enough from the Works of God in Nature to shew them other kind of Ideas of the Divine Being than it was possible for them to find amongst created beings but they turned the Incorruptible God into the image of a corruptible man yea of creeping things and four-footed beasts The Apostle telleth them also of their unrighteousness Vers 29. Fornication wickedness covetousness malitiousness they were full of envy murders debates deceits c. Now for these things the wrath of God was revealed against them The Apostle telleth us Rom. 2.14 That when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature the things which are contained in the Law they are a Law to themselves And Vers 26. If the uncircumcision keep the Law their uncircumcision shall be accounted to them for circumcision I am not of their mind who think that the Heathen have light enough to shew them the way to Heaven I know not Isa 9.2 Mat. 4.16 Luk. 1.7 9. if that were true why the Scripture should set them out under the notion of persons or people that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death until Christ as the day-spring from on high hath visited them But I am sure they have sin enough to justifie God in damning them and permitting them to walk in their own ways until they have filled up the measure of their iniquities and brought judgment upon themselves I also believe that if there be found a Job in the Land of Vz If there be one found amongst the Heathen who feareth God and escheweth evil who walketh up to his natural light God hath his secret way to reveal and apply Christ to them so as he shall not perish But yet I cannot believe that his natural light shall save him because the Scripture telleth us That there is no other name under heaven than the name of Jesus Christ by which any can be saved neither is there Salvation in any other There are several things in nature that we know are so but we do not know the way of them In the matters of grace there are several things also which we understand not the way of God in Three come into my mind at present The way of God with an infant we are not sure that all infants no not that all Baptized infants shall be saved but we doubt not but of many such is the Kingdom of God but for the way of God with the Soul of one that liveth not up to the exercises of reason and the intelligentness of the ordinary means of Faith and Regeneration this we do not understand 2. The way of God with a thief upon the Cross I mean with a sinner forgetting or neglecting to turn unto God until his last hour we do believe that God hath mercy upon some such Souls but how God worketh in them these habits of grace which are necessary according to the ordinary rule how they are born again of the Spirit and Baptized not with water only but with the Holy Ghost and with fire this we do not understand And so Thirdly The way of God with an Heathen that never cometh to the light of the Gospel nor hath any external Revelation of Christ I say how the Spirit of God moveth and which way it cometh into such a Soul this we do not understand but leave it amongst the unsearchable things of Divine Providence which we believe and revere If there be as I said before a Job in the Land of Vz he shall know that his Redeemer lives and that he shall stand at the last day upon the earth and he shall see him with his eyes But which way God revealeth this to him we understand not In the mean time these hidden things being left to God revealed things belong to us and to our children and this is revealed That the wrath of God as to the Heathen is revealed against the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men 2. But this is much more evident concerning such as live under the means of grace and offers of salvation Oh
day of believing Souls if we can make any Judgment of Believers do sufficiently evince this to our Souls my business is to inquire the Justice and the reasonableness of the motions of Divine Providence in the inequality of this distribution This will easily appear to you upon three hypotheses which I take to be all very true 1. That God doth ordinarily dispense out these influences of grace to souls which by his Providence he hath prepared for them This which I call Gods Providential preparation of souls for the reception of these influences I conceive lies chiefly in Two things 1. The freedom of it from those bodily incumbrances which in a natural working make the soul sad heavy and dejected such distempers we know there are as in a natural working sadden the spirit and fill it full of fear sorrow dejection and despondency which are all contrary to the comforts and serenity of a soul and as I have once and again told you it must be a miraculous operation contrary to the bias tendency and natural operations of a man for a soul to be filled with consolations while it is influenced with a body lying under these disadvantages God therefore when he intendeth any of these consolatory influences doth ordinarily prepare the soul for it by delivering it from those influences of an ill affected body which dispose it quite another way 2. A second way by which God prepareth the soul for it is by filling it with knowledg proportionable to it for the comforts of a gracious soul are not irrational and unaccountable things but the results of Scriptural conclusions which the soul is by the Comforter inabled to make God hath in his Word sown the seed of light and joy for them the Ministers of the Gospel who are the Interpreters of Scripture have an Office and Ministery in the Interpretation of this Word and working the souls of Gods people to understand the sense of them The soul it self hath an action in it using its reason and natural powers to conclude from the Scripture The Holy Spirit giveth unto the soul to see the things which are freely given it of God 1 Cor. 2. and further possibly setteth to its Seal and giveth it a further and more undoubted confirmation so as in an ordinary working the comforted soul must be a knowing and understanding soul It is true we sometimes find some honest souls full of joy and peace whose knowledg doth not appear proportionable God so relieving some particular souls after their lying under the discouragements of the spirit of bondage But commonly such comforts are not of long continuance rather present reliefs to the soul from an extraordinary working of the blessed Comforter than any settled consolation and the abidings of the Comforter with them Seldom any but knowing and judicious Christians have a settled and continued joy and peace upon their believing 2. Secondly That God doth ordinarily give out these dispensations more or less or nothing of them though not according to the merits of those souls that have them yet according to their behaviour and misbehaviour towards him That famous promise John 14.21 We will manifest our selves unto him is made to those that love Christ and who keep his Commandments And when Judas asks him Lord How is it that thou wilt manifest thy self to us and not unto the world Christ answereth him saying ver 23. If any man love me and keepeth my sayings my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings as much as to say The reason why I manifest my self more to you is because you love me and demonstrate that love to me by keeping my Commandments For the world they love me not and proclaim that they love me not by their disobedience to my Commandments and therefore it is that I do not manifest my self to the world as I do unto you In the receiving of the first grace man is meerly passive and the subject of preventing and operating grace but as to the receptions of further grace the child of God is active and the subject of cooperative adjuvant and assisting grace and God gives out his assistances according to their motions 3. Lastly The reasonableness of this different dispensation may appear in this That in the dispensations of this grace God acteth often by Prerogative shewing mercy where he will shew mercy Indeed he doth so as to the first grace as I have before at large shewed you But now he doth not so as to these influences of grace which are necessary to the upholding of the mystical union between Christ and the Soul and the upholding of a Christians spiritual life if he did it were possible that a child of God might fall away from his state of grace and there might be an intercision of the state of Justification But Christ hath told us That if any man drink of the water which he shall give him he shall never thirst but it shall be in him a well-spring of living water springing up in his soul to eternal life c. so that in the dispensation of that God acteth upon a Covenant and as a debtor to his promise If any one saith God hath also promised to manifest himself unto his people I answer those promises are made to those that love him and keep his Commandments but for the upholding of the spiritual life he hath made a Covenant with his people as that he will never depart from them to do them good so that he will put his fear into their hearts that they shall never depart from him which promise although it be not to be extended to a being kept from all sin yet it is to be extended to the preservation of souls from such degrees of sinning as shall extend to the alteration of the state of the soul and the extinguishing the spiritual life and killing the seed of God in the soul But for those manifestations of grace which are not necessary to a souls Salvation and the upholding of spiritual life in it God acteth more freely according to the counsel of his own Will derected by his own infinite Wisdom Now upon these Hypotheses supposing that all Christians are not of equal degrees of knowledg nor are equal as to their bodily circumstances that every soul that belongeth to God doth not walk up to an equal degree of duty but some may be and are guilty of more and more eminent failings than others Or that God may be by his infinite Wisdom directed to try one soul more than another to prove their patience or their faith which is most tryed when his people have least sensible consolations the motions of Divine Providence in distributing to several Christians nay to the same Christians several degrees of consolatory influences of grace cannot seem either unjust or unreasonable to any sober and intelligent Christians This is all I shall speak to this