both as to God and as to his Son but of none as to him I thank God all is in a good way of cure now through Jesus Christ Donatum ob causam non est donatum sed potius permutatio A gift given for some cause is not a gift but rather an exchange of one thing for another but when very costly in it self and yet of no cost to us then it sparkles in the eyes of the receiver such a gift is Christ in this great work of the cure of our carnal state And doth the freeness of this love sparkle in your eyes and lay bonds upon you and make you go bound with holy affection and admiration No man that was ever cured of a desperate disease wherein he gave himself up for death but it was much obliging to him as to the instruments used for his Cure Naaman the Syrian thought himself bound to choose the God of Israel for his God that had cured him of his Leprosie If you be cured of your filthy Leprosie which is Christ's Priestly work and Kingly work too your Cure is between them both Do you choose him and own him for your Jesus and Lord as the Apostle here doth I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Christ by kindness conquers as Jeptha did If I do thus and thus for you slay your Enemies deliver you from slavery Shall I be your King And will ye chuse me to rule over you and they consented willingly If Christ hath cured your Soul diseases then are you under the Law of this great kindness and willing that he should be your Lord and to Rule you in all things according to his Word Secondly The Apostle was taken as with the love of Christ so with the love of the Father in this matter I thank God he hath found out a way to do me good a new and living way through his Son So the Apostle Peter Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Christ from the dead to an Inheritance incorruptible 1 Pet. 1.3 He saw an abundant mercy in the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ as well as in the Son our Lord Jesus Christ That having no more Sons should part with him out of his Bosom in Heaven to lodge Him in a Manger yea worse to lodg Him in Hell nay in a Place worse than that the filthy heart of the fallen Sons of Adam So the Apostle Paul again writing to the Ephesians saith But God who is rich in mercy for the great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sin and trespasses hath he quickned us together with Christ that in the Ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus Ephes 2.4 5 6. He saw rich mercy and great love exceeding riches of grace in God that by his own Son and not by any lower hand he should quicken Men dead in trespasses and sins And surely some thing of this is where this great Work is wrought a confessing that Jesus is the Lord To the glory of God the Father Vse 3 The last Use is for Exhortation seeing Christ is the proper remedy of our fallen state let this draw us to him to attend his Word and Ordinances and to attend the Angels stirring of these Waters Christ doth open Prison doors and deliver Captives but he doth it according to his Commission Now well observe the termes of his Commission Is 61 The Lord God hath anointed me to preach good tidings to the meek To which agrees 1 Pet. 3.19 By the which also he went to preach to the Spirits in Prison which were disobedient in the Days of Noah Preaching how lightly soever esteemed and how much soever opposed and suppressed is the great Ordinance by which Christ frees Captives and Prisoners and therefore this Ordinance which is the most general Ordinance to convince and convert should carefully and tremblingly be attended upon They that make light of preaching make light of their own depraved state of their Captivity to sin and Satan these groan not with this Apostle under the body of death Christ did create every day orderly by his Word he could have done it without but he did all as his Father appointed him and did not Movere per saltum make hast and pursue his own will or his own infinite and absolute Power so he doth in the new Creation and therefore wait upon wisdomes Posts Whoso is simple let him turn in hither where he will have Line upon Line now a little and then a little to touch and turn his heart Presently after the Creation was finished the Creator takes to himself the Title of Jehova Gen. 2.4 These are the Generations of the Heaven and of the Earth when they were created in the Day that Jehova Eloim made the Heaven and the Earth When you do approach to the Preaching of the Word Remember this Name of Christ that he is Jehova and able to give Being to his Word That what he bids you to be that he makes you to be Be exhorted when you attend Ordinances to pant for this thing that Christ as Jehova would Preach to you as one giving Being in your heart to every Word which he speaketh in your Ear That Christ would so speak that you might hear and believe all that he saâ—th as they at Iconium Act. 14.1 Take an Harp go about the City thou Harlot that hast been forgotten make sweet melody sing many Songs that thou mayest be remembred Isa 23.16 This spake the Lord to Tyrus a filthy sinful City and their punishment fore-told and the time for Seventy Years and then counselled to bemoan her self that she might be remembred and it is observable how holy bemoaning our selves is called and holy panting for deliverance from the slavery of sin and wrath it is called sweet melody and singing many Songs So indeed is such panting under the body of death and to be delivered from it as here the Apostle doth The mourning Doves note under the sense of our wretched state with a panting after Christ to cure it no Musick is such melody in the Ears of God to make him to remember us Thus crie and be ye all pained to be delivered Thirdly Take to you words and tell your great Physician how it is with you And if you want words help your selves with those Ephes 4.18 This I say and testifie in the Lord that ye walk not as other Gentiles in the vanity of your minds having your understandings darkned being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in you because of the blindness of their heart being past feeling c. Take up these words and apply them to your own depraved condition saying O wretched man that I am what a vain mind I have and how I walk in the vanity
all good to the great good Christ and to the embracing of him Some are well and yet still offering their hand to the Physician saith Seneca their hearts being like a Pond after a storm a long while trembling Some are not Soul well the Plague of a hard heart being on them and their sores and swellings daily to be seen without searching for and yet never offer their Pulse to any to feel them but judge themselves well and their state good which confidence is carnal and an evident token of an impenitent and insensible heart If ye say that ye have no calamity in your Families nor Death in your Houses yet Death is much in the dwellings of many others How do ye lay this to heart God doth whip some upon others backs and this is tender mercy and should be the more melting and abasing and drawing to Christ as Cords of great love Is it thus with you How the Prophet Jeremiah was affected with the calamity of others especially as he saw it did no good upon their Souls which was an evident token how well it wrought upon his Soul though others smarted yet he laid to heart and profited My bowels my bowels I am pained at my very heart my heart maketh a noise in me I cannot hold my peace because thou hast heard O my Soul the sound of the trumpet and the alarum of War Destruction upon destruction is cryed for the whole Land is spoiled suddenly are my Tents spoiled and my Curtains in a moment How long shall I see the Standard and hear the sound of the Trumpet for my People is foolish they have not known me they are sottish Children they have no understanding they are wise to do evil but to do good they have no knowledge Jer. 4.19 20. Let us apply these words to our selves do not we lie in such an ill frame of Spirit Are not our hearts though God's hand be so heavy still sottish and sensless of all that whereby we have provoked God to do all this against us Very wise and quick to see the Moat in others Eyes and to lay the blame at others doors You will say so did Jeremiah in this Scripture which you have quoted I answer That the Prophet did see provocations abroad it is true but that it was not without looking well to his own heart see Jer. 12.1 2 3. Righteous art thou O Lord when I plead with thee yet let me talk with thee of thy judgments Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper Wherefore are all they happy which deal very treacherously Thou hast planted them yea they have taken root they grow yea they bring forth fruit thou art neer in their mouths and far from their Reins but thou O Lord knowest me and seen me and tryed my heart towards thee pull them out like Sheep for the slaughter and prepare them for the Day of slaughter As if he had said thou knowest right well that I have frailties and infirmities many yet thou also knowest that I bewail them and in all things I endeavour to approve my self to thee by thy help and would do nothing to provoke thee in this Day Can we thus approve our selves to GOD now Vse 4 Let the last Use of this Doctrine be for Exhortation Be sensible and lay to heart this mortal time and this dying day the many thousands of all sorts good and bad which now are swept away Let it not be said that the Graves are wide open Hell is wide open but our hearts are still fast shut Righteous and merciful Men as well as profane drunken covetous Nabals are taken away but none lay to heart one or the other If the Prophets charge in my Text should be found a true charge against us alass for us we are all dead Men and Women and no escaping Wherefore stir up your selves weep not for the dead but weep for your selves saying alass alass what have I done How do I live that so many die where I dwell Do not I infect the Parish my Family this City And be close home in these Queries and in these Heart-smitings for surely if we did judge our selves as we should every one in truth we should not thus continually be judged of the Lord. The Bells tole and ring in your ears every Morning and Evening but is there nothing else sounds in your Ears No Achan no accursed thing that yet your hearts hide and cleave so fast to And will not yet though thus affrighted part with A dreadful sound is in his ears Job 15.21 in prosperity the Destroyer shall come upon him said Eliphaz to Job he speaks to Job as to a worldly Man catcht in his worldly ways You have had worldly ways and tumblings all over the World you Citizens and now you are at leisure and quiet Do you not hear some dreadful sound in your ears of sin in this and in that you have complained for want of leisure now you have leisure pray lissen well now to your consciences what dreadful reports they are ready to make at the great Bat above against you O lay these to heart well for these have slain you and us now in all that is dear and will slay yet all the remnant unless we all repent The Prophet Elija by killing two Captains and their Fifties brought the third Captain upon his knees and to humble himself whether in truth I know not but he saved his life by it and the lives of his Fifty men O that Christ by killing so many Thousands so many Eight Thousands and so many Five Thousands might bring the rest upon their knees indeed to him he got his life and we should get our lives and our Souls and so would the Plague as a Plague not come nigh our dwelling Secondly Let me exhort you to lay to heart the import of these general strokes that one and all are so cut off wicked and righteous These kind of general strokes do import that we all have sinn'd and have much provoked God one as well as another Righteous Men and merciful Men have not been so holy and righteous and so merciful as we should Behold the Days come saith the Lord That I will punish the circumcised with the uncircumcised Aegypt and Juda and so puts them together and then Edom and Ammon and Moab and Israel with them which are in the uttermost parts of the Earth For all these Nations are uncircumcised in Flesh and all the House of Israel are uncircumcised in heart Jer. 9.25.26 Some Men are outwardly and openly stark naught and the best of us it seems are not so good at heart as we should be this let us lay to heart all of us Or else the import of this general mortality is that God means to harden the hearts of some much by slaying the good as well as the bad that they who have no mind to repent and change their courses may be confirmed and encouraged in them in as much as
only to roar and cry out when we are beaten and over-burden'd he teacheth us to believe and to expect Songs to be given in the darkest Night Job 35.9 The true state and life of man is not to be shaken with tumults and distresses nor be lifted up with prosperity and ease said the Heathen and what can poise and even the Soul thus in all conditions but faith by which we know how to abound and how to want how to be high when low and how to be low when high if faith have its perfect work so will patience and then the Soul is entire and wanteth nothing no though all the things of this World he wanting Likewise we may learn from hence that we are never gone and quite undone till faith be gone For loe they lie in wait for my Soul the mighty are gathered against me they return at Evening they make a noise like a Dog and go round about the City behold they belch out with their mouth Swords are in their Lips for who saith he doth hear But thou O Lord shalt laugh at them thou shalt have all the Heathen in derision because of his strength will I wait upon thee for God is my defence Psal 59.9 The God of my mercy shall prevent me he shall let me see my desire upon mine enemies Things were very bad indeed when the wicked were at this height that they could belch out any thing and run every where as Dogs and tear God and Man and yet David was not quite ruined Because of thy strength I will wait upon thee A believer is strong enough as long as God is strong and wise enough as long as God is wise and rich enough as long as God is rich and lively enough as long as God lives Hanibal offered himself to make War with the Romans without an Army saith Seneca And truly a believer will himself make War with all enemies in the World and without any Army only by the strength of God and is never at a loss for an Army nor Counsel nor Provisions but saith as that Father of believers God will provide God will fight for you and ye shall hold your peace said Moses in a great strait Cain was not utterly lost when he had committed murder for so had David done But when he rejected the offer of grace and desired death as a despairing Creature He had a most glorious offer of grace Gen. 4.7 And if thou dâ—st well shalt thou not be accepted or certainly accepted and though thou dost not well yet a sin-offering lieth at the door so it should be read saith a great Scholar in the Languages of the Scripture Dr. Lightfoot And this great offer of grace he despised and so forsook his own Mercy and desired Death through a proud dogged spirit having lost the honour which was given to Abel Now therefore let it be that any one that fudeth me may kill me So should these words be read saith the same Author And now and not till now was Cain quite undone Use 2 This Doctrine in the next place may be for reproof and it may be for reproof of unbelief upon any account whatsoever seeing faith looks through all matters whatever As for the Jebusite the Inhabitants of Jerusalem the Children of Israel could not drive them out but they dwell there to this day Judg. 15.63 David along while after drove them out And why could not these lame and blind be driven out It was their unbelief The enemy had gotten a strong Fort and the advantage of that City Jerusalem and yet had they had faith they might have lookt thorow these Forts and Rocks of Jerusalem and have conquer'd it as they did Jerico and other places as strong by faith Their sin was the same with Rubens Dan and Asher Sisaâ—'s Host was great and therefore they could not see through them and over them For the divisions of Ruben there were great thoughts of heart Gilead abode beyond Jordan and why did Dan abide in Ships Ashar continued on the Sea shore and abode in his breaches Judg. 5.16 17. Distresses are of several magnitudes but yet how great soever they be faith should be such as to master them and look thorow them but when it is not so then men betake them to their self ish shifts and every one is but for one Why did Ashar abide in his breacher 'T is a grand evil of this time every Man seeks his own and stands with all he hath to make up his own breaches but as to the publick and the common calamity of others Who hath a Heart or a Purse or a Hand which speaks plainly our unbelief and that we do not see through the dark Clouds which are come upon us but say in our hearts as David I shall one time or other surely perish by this and that great tryal and these Sons of Anack are walled up to Heaven and no dealing with them Necessity saith one of the Heathen maketh us more violent than valorous There are amongst us through many necessities many violencies both inward and outward spiritual and corporal unto great hurt every way but little true valour that which flows from faith which is that that doth business as we have seen Secondly This Scripture reproveth giving way to unbelief We flatter our selves in our unbelief as Jona in his passion and in many cases very desperately we think we do well to be unbelievers whereas the greater the difficulties be the more our duty is to believe Curse ye Meros curse ye bitterly that they came not out in a plunge to help the Lord against the mighty Judg. 5.23 If thou think some great tryal shall encounter thee â—aith Seneca do not flinch but comfort thy self with this that surely thy death and suffering is of some great importance Great distress is no warrant for us to make great consult with flesh and blood but great consults with the promises and with our own experiâ—nces and to call much upon a cowardly and deceitful heart Why art thou cast down O my Soul hope in God for I shall yet see better things than these If unbelief were as profitable as it is self-pleasing and that it would further escapes out of distresses one might through self-love give way to it as Men do to many gainful sins but it doth not this but rather obstrucâ—e caâ—â—s as our Fathers unbelief in the Wilderness upon every occasion it caused God to swear against them that they should dye in the Wilderness It is not the giving way to unbelief but the exciting faith what ever the difficulty be that is the likely way to make escape As Caleb and Joshua said We be well able to deal with them for God is departed from them and they are bread for us and this is called following of God fully which God took well and honoured them with escapes from all dangers and they enjoyed the good Land To this agrees that Psal 37.40 And
A MEMORIAL OF GOD'S JUDGMENTS Spiritual and Temporal OR SERMONS To call to Remembrance First Preached and now Published for Publick Benefit By Nic. Lockier Minister of the Gospel A Psalm of David to bring to Remembrance Psal 38. 70. Title And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God hath led thee these forty Years in the wilderness to humble thee to prove thee to know what was in thine heart whether thou wouldst keep his Commandments or no. Deut. 8.2 Veteris incommodi reminisci Caes Tempus illud reminiscitur moerens Ovid. London Printed for Dorman Newman and are to be Sold at his Shop at the Kings Arms and Bible in the Poultry 1671. To the People of God and to the Readers of the following Tract Grace and Mercy by Jesus Christ Reader THese Sermons were preached when God's Judgments were destroying these Nations by Sword and Pestilence to second the works of God with the word of God for the saving edification of the punished Now because we are apt to forget the Rods of God and his words and our duty urged by them both I have thought it might be profitable at least to some to publish these Discourses such as they be and leave them to the blessing of God and the good and candid acceptation of such as shall please to peruse them The Sword and Pestilence were not strokes of God which only concern'd the City of London but the whole three Nations and therefore these Instructions are due and proper to all the People of God and to any that have a heart to make use of them Our Fathers went under five Miracles saith One through the Wilderness the Cloud the raining of daily Manna the following of the Waters from the Rock Horeb the continual newness of their Cloaths and the untiredness of their Feet The People of God in these Nations have gone under many wonderful Providences to that state of tranquility wherein now they are this among them all is a standing one that the Bush hath so long burned and yet is not quite consumed neither by Plague nor Sword nor any other hard things done unto them How the late Judgments were ushered in amongst us with signs in the Heavens in the Earth and in the Seas we cannot quite forget Several blazeing Stars in one Year's space the like scarce not known and other multiplyed Prodigies many ways and how they are all gone off with heightned security and multiplied prodigious wickedness may justly affect us much to consider and affright us more to think what worse things may quickly come upon us Our lives during the late Judgments did hang in doubt from God and man whether God would spare us from the Pestilence or Man spare us from the Sword The dread of the Sword was not small when the Seas did roar and the Rivers also at our Doors The dread of the Plague was many Plagues I am sure the best Christians that felt it will say that spiritual stroke not to have been small though their lives since I fear may more than say it to be so The destroying Angel passed over few Houses and some he swept clean and no Lord have mercy on us heard for so much as one Other Houses had some spared but with Hezekia's mark a Plague soar on their Bodies and a worse upon their hearts both which continue to this day Under all this dreadful Discipline what was done then and since to shew repentance reformation thankfulness for such great escapes may well cause great and deep thoughts of heart From Adam to Moses were Twenty-Six Generations and accordingly doth the Psalmist praise God six and twenty times according to the numeral letters of the word Jehova who did all the wonders for that People which are mentioned in that 136 Psalm And surely six and twenty times over hath the Lord merited praises and all worthy walking at all our hands high and low for the many great things he hath done for us at Sea and Land but I pray God we be not found six and twenty times worse than then we were Some remindings of God's great works amongst us by his word I think all will grant are therefore needful and pitty it is but the word of God should go freely forth over the Nations for such great ends to preach over the punishments of God afresh unto us If the punishments of God must repeat and preach themselves again for want of the word that will not be so pleasing nor it may be not so profitable for us Many thousands were killed by the Sword and Pestilence but few I fear made spiritually alive by either The word O the powerful preaching of the word of God This this kindly convinceth and converteth yea and diverteth Sword and Pestilence and Famine with all other judgments as all experience and divine History sheweth What prosperous times for health and wealth peace and plenty were in Juda when they were zealous to promote the word and true worship of God! when we fall out with these God he falls on upon us with one judgment or other If men do not believe this they may feel it seven times more Our nature is enmity to all good some thing is treated of this and its cure in this tract which indeed is the cure of all evils for whence come Wars and contentions Come they not from our unmortified lusts which war in our corrupt hearts Death whether by Sword or Pestilence or any how is no good friend to an ill life some thing also is said of this in this Tract to make us remember our later end to live and die well In miseries of all sorts we need friends mercy from Men as well as mercy from God some thing therefore is said in this Tract to quicken to this to be pitiful and tender hearted one to another Clouds return after rain and make more and greater storms some thing is said of this too and much more may be felt if we do not repent Kadesh Barnea was so called from a double punishment which was there inflicted GOD may sanctify Himself upon Us because he is not sanctified in Us. And he may make us wandering Sons because we still wander much from Him It was called Kadesh because there the Lord sanctified himself upon the People for their corporal and spiritual Whoredomes with the Midianites And it was called barnea or the wandering Son because there was the Decree made for their long wandering in the Wilderness Pray God we be not called Kadesh Barnea too for our making so little good use of former punishments God's double punishments and troops of calamities even all his waves may pass over us justly some thing of this also is said in the last part of this Tract the Lord bless all to all that peruse these things The People of God loving one another fervently profiting one another with their Gifts Graces Estates being sober sound in the faith holy heavenly and about