thereby taken away from the evil to come And then 3. The shortning of this life doth but the sooner bring them to a Life of Glory in Heaven Indeed if their condition were the same with the condition of the ungodly if they lost Heaven and Earth the lives of their souls and bodies together If their death were an eternal death and the end of their temporal miseries the beginning of eternal torments it were a very sad argument but the case is not so bad Whatever they lose for Christ in this world shall be recompensed a thousandfold in the world to come with eternal Life Now lay all these things together and consider that this strictness or preciseness is commanded by God and is most sutable to the Rules of Christianity And dost thou profess thy self a Christan a Disciple of Christ a Servant of God and one that lives in hope of everlasting Life and hast thou not yet learn'd to forsake all deny thy self take up thy cross and follow Christ Certainly if thou be a Christian indeed and hast received that Wisdom which is from above none of these things will move thee neither wilt thou count thy life so dear to thee as for the saving it to forsake the holy Commandment Having now vindicated this Truth from those Objections that might seem to weaken it I proceed to give a brief hint what use may be made of it Use 1. If they that live most exactly are the wisest men then it is so far from being a shame to live exactly Psal 119.6 that it tends much to the justification and commendation of those that so order their conversations And certainly the world is much mistaken in their censure and judgment concerning them They think it strange that all do not run to the same excess of riot with them 1 Pet. 4.4 and speak evil of them as fools and mad men because they willingly forgo the pleasures and advantages of this present life for things future and invisible but the end will make it sufficiently to appear who are the fools and who are the wise men Therefore 2. Be exhorted and perswaded to exercise this piece of wisdom Wisdom it is and that of the best sort for it is Divine and Heavenly Wisdom So the Apostle tells us Jam. 3.17 That Wisdom which is pure and full of good fruits comes from above it is saving Wisdom In 2 Tim. 3.15 the Apostle tells us that the Scriptures are able to make a man wise to Salvation in as much as they were given by God to make men pefect throughly furnished unto all good works Labour then for this Scripture-Wisdom and search for it as for hid treasures it alone shall abide and the good fruits thereof remain with thee to Eternity when all other wisdom in the world shall perish and by its fall shall ruine the owners and professors thereof I have now finished the third Observation I must use much more brevity in those which remain and so I pass to the fourth which is this Doct. 4. That then especially in evil times we have much need of spiritual wisdom for the circumspect and exact ordering of our conversations Thus the Apostles Argument runs Walk circumspectly and redeem time because the dayes are evil This is a duty at all times but especially in evil times it is both a Duty and an Advantage That we may understand what is meant by evil times or Dayes we must know that there are two sorts of evil First The evil of sin whereof Devils and men are the only authors Secondly The evil of punishment or misery in this sence it is used in Jer. 17.17 18. Amos 6.3 and though sin be the meritorious cause of this evil and Devils and Men yea and good Angels also are made use as instruments of it yet God takes it upon himself as the Author thereof Amos 3.6 Thus the Times or Dayes are evil First When they are sinful Times such times as our Saviour foretold Mat. 24.11 12. When false prophets should arise and deceive many When iniquity should abound and the love of many should wax cold Secondly The Dayes are evil when they are full of trouble and misery These evil Dayes of both sorts are either 1. Common by reason of that sin and misery which are incident to every mans life Eccles 12.1 in respect whereof Jacob told Pharoah that the dayes of his life had been few and evil Gen 47.9 2. Or special When both sin and trouble do abound in more than ordinary measure Again these evil Dayes are either 1. General When both sin and misery do more than ordinarily abound in the World or in a Kingdom 2. Or particular When a man 's own particular life hath been extraordinarily full of sin and trouble The Apostle in the Text doth principally respect the special and general sinfulness and troublesomness of the times but in what kind soever the dayes are evil the evilness of them is an argument for circumspect walking and exact ordering of our conversations For if the Times be sinful 1. In sinful Times there is much liberty and encouragement to sin The Multitude run to sin the stream goes that way and it is an easy thing to go along with the stream but it is certain that the stream will carry a man to perdition So that if we would not perish in sinful times we must strive against the stream by circumspect walking These are those perillous Times from the authors whereof the Apostle warns Timothy to turn away 2 Tim. 3.1 2 3 4 5 6. 2. In Sinful Times there are many temptations and enticements to sin in which respect the Apostle calls such dayes evil dayes and therefore adviseth at such times especially to put on the whole Armour of God that we may be able to stand and keep our selves unspotted from the pollutions of the world Ephes 6.13 If the Times be evil in respect of the trouble and misery that attends them Then 1. In Times of Trouble and Misery a man hath most need to get and keep peace of conscience Oh! it is a sad thing for a man to be lost as much with storms of guilt within as with waves of trouble without But there is no getting or keeping true peace of conscience without circumspect and exact walking The fruit of Righteousness is sown in peace Jam. 3.18 2. In Troublesome Times a man had most need to get and keep the love and favour of God and thereby an interest in the Promises of this life or if those be forfeited yet to be sure of an interest in the Promises of the Life to come But this cannot be done without circumspect walking for it is only Godliness that hath the promises of the life that now is and that which is to come 1 Tim. 4.8 Use How preposterous and foolish a course is it then for any man to think to secure himself from the evil of the times by complying with the times to comply with the evil
and demolish the strong-holds of Satan The conscientious Physitian when he seeth thâ— health and life of the Patient committed to him how diligent is he in watching with and attending his Patient how curious exact in observing the pulse the symptomes workings nature and strength of the disease how careful and diligent to apply proper Remedies and Physick sometimes Corrosives sometimes Cordials and all to restore health and prolong life to his Patient How much more diligent should Ministers Physicians of souls be in observing the several Maladies and Soul-diseases of their People and to apply proper Remedies so many persons so many patients so many sins so many diseases some are brutish and unteachable some are weak others dull some perverse and many ungrateful How should they endeavour to make the brutish to understand to confirm the weak and make them strong to quicken the dull and make them zealous and fervent to allure the perverse and and make them tractable to win the ungrateful and make them kind what is the body to the soul or life temporal in a troublesome world to Life Eternal in unspeakable Happiness the Excellency of the object should heighten our esteem and double our diligence Pretious pretious Souls lie at the Stake One Soul is of more value than ten thousand worlds Jesus Christ shed his pretious Blood for the Redemption of souls but not for the honours dignitys riches of the world Now either Heaven or Hell And how should the joyes of the one and the torments of the other and the eternity of both add indefatigableness to our labours unwearied vigilancy to our perspective care invincibleness to our courage irrefragableness to our arguments â—â—d steep our perswasions in tears and all to keep you from lodging your selves in everlasting burnings and bring you to an Enjoyment of the beatifical Vision of the blessed God! In this decriped age of the world the Devils seem to be possessed with some spirits worse than themselves they turn every stone they improve the dregs of their malice the height of their power if by any means by secret perswasions by hostile invasions by strange delusions turning themselves into Angels of Light that they may drag one soul to Hell and shall not Ministers take much more pains to bring them to Heaven Paul was unwearied in his doing invincible in his suffering How many Cities and Countries did he enlighten with the Gospel Jerusalem Illyricum Damascus Arabia Antioch Arhaja Cilicia Cyprus Epirus Galatia Mysia Lycaonia Pamphilia Physidia Phrygia Selutia Syria Troas Ministers should make the Salvation of Souls their study their care their imployment their practice their whole business We must wait on our Ministry Rom. 12.7 give our selvs continually to it Acts 6.4 We must fulfill our Ministry Col. 4.7 The soundness fatness fruitfulness of the Flock is an honour to the Shepherd The recovered health strength life of a sick weak dying patient is an honour to the Physician It is the glory of Kings according to the rules of the great States-man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to ease and heal their Cities and Kingdoms of those miseries and calamities they groan and languish under to secure their present peace and prosperity to enlarge their bounds and of small to make them great If the Roman Emperour gloried when he said of Rome Lateritiam inveni marmoream reliqui I found it built with Brick but left it built with Marble So it is a great honour for Ministers to do much good to their People to strengthen the diseased to heal the sick to bind up the broken to bring back that which was driven away and seek that which was lost Ezek. 34.16 When of Lead Brass Iron and Tin they make them Gold and Jewels for God when of Lyons they make them Lambs of Rebels they make them loyal Subjects beating their spears into pruning hooks and swords into plowshares when of a barren Wilderness they make them a fruitful Vineyard How exceeding great will that Glory be which God will give at the last day unto his faithful Ministers when they shall stand forth before God his Angels and all men Andrew bringing with him his Achaians whom by his Ministry he hath gained unto Christ John with his Asians Thomas with his Indians Peter with his Jews and Paul with his Gentiles and all the pious and faithful Ministers of Christ with all the Children God hath given them in their respective Ages and Generations and these shall be to them a Crown of Glorifying in the presence of Jesus Christ at his coming 1 Thes 2.19 and the time for the accomplishing of all this at the longest is very short Death if no other providence may sooner than they are aware of throw them into an incapacity of doing any more good unto their People how should they labour to do much in a little while the grand importance of the work the numerous and potent enemies that oppose and hinder it the uncertainty and shortness of time to do it in should make us wonderfully diligent say and do with Paul We seek not yours but you accounting the winning of souls to Christ our greatest gain and glory Sed heu Quantum distamus ab illo how many say in their practice We seek not you but yours seek the fleece and neglect the flock How do Ministers run and ride cap and cringe to get Ecclesiastical Dignities and Preferments to multiply to themselves Church-revenues heaping Steeple upon Steeple as the Gyants of old Pelion upon Ossa and upon both these Olympus to fill their Coffers to maintain their Pomp their full Tables to provide portions for their Children or which is worse to administer more abilities of greater sinning against God and this great and necessary work undone the diseased not strengthened the sick not healed the broken not bound up that which was driven away not brought back that not sought which was lost Wâ— to such Shepherds of Israel of England and of all Christian Kingdoms in the world that feed themselves that eat the fat and cloath themselves with the wooll but feed not the Flock but with force and cruelty rule over them Ezek. 34.2 3 4. How desperate and dreadful is that Charge God layeth upon the Priests of Judah his Watchmen are blind they are all ignorant they are all dumb Dogs they cannot bark sleeping lying down and loving to slumber yea they are greedy Dogs that can never have enough they are Shepherds that cannot understand they all look to their own way every one for gain from his own quarter Come say they I will fetch wine and we will fill our selves with strong drink and to morrow shall be as this day and much more abundant Isa 56.10 11 12. Time will not suffer me to open and enlarge upon these words I leave them to your meditations and observations pardon my trespassing upon your patience the pains is mine the profit is yours 2. If Ministers are not certain of a continued
faithful to preserve your Graces your Knowledge Faith Love Hope Patience Humility c. if God did not keep them they would soon wither decay and come to nothing Satan would soon rob you of them sin would soon wast and destroy them but he will not lose the least dust of this Gold He is faithful to preserve your Joy and Peace of conscience Our Comforts have need of his protection as well as our Graces How soon would temptations sin and persecution blow our Comforts away if not preserved by him In the world yee shall have tribulation but in me ye shall have peace John 16.33 Your heart shall rejoyce and your joy shall no man take from you ver 22. Neither reproaches nor imprisonments nor persecutions shal quench your joy for he can make you sing in prisons and rejoyce in tribulation for his Name Acts 16. Rom 5. And though your Graces be weakened and your Comforts eclipsed yet he will revive and strong then your Graces he will restore your Comforts Though he cast down yet he is faithful he will not cast off though he may suffer your bodies to be imprisoned banished tortured burned yet he is faithful to keep them safe until the Resurrection the great and general Spring when they shall be raised and reunited to your souls and reflourish in a glorified manner to eternity And here is great security concerning temporal danger temptation Graces Comforts and all To which I commend you and your All for Protection and Comfort 4. This is to commit you to the greatest care and diligence Diligence is as necessary in those that will secure and protect others as well as Mercy and Faithfulness Sleepy Guards and Watchmen betray strong Castles and fortified Garisons as well as unfaithful Guards The men of Laish were a secure and negligent People and the men of Dan took their City and destroyed them with the edge of the Sword Judg. 18. Whilst Abner and the Army slept Abisha would have slain Saul their King if David would have permitted him 1 Sam. 26.11 12. How many famous and formidable Armies have been utterly routed and thousands of men slain by an handful of people through carelesness and negligence better is a weak defence with care and diligence than a strong fortified place with negligence But Jesus Christ is very diligent and watchful for the preservation of his Church and People even as the diligent Keeper of a Vineyard alwayes watcheth that none spoil his Vineyard that wild beasts break not in and spoil it so God watcheth and defendeth his Church I the Lord do keep it I will water it every moment lest any hurt it I will keep it night and day Isa 27.3 He knows all the plots and contrivances of ungodly men against his Church Why do the Heathen rage and the People imagine a vain thing and the Kings of the Earth take counsel together against the Lord and his Anointed Psal 2.1 2. He knew all the devices of Senacherib against Jerusalem I know saith God thy abode thy comming in thy going out and thy rage against me Isa 37.28 Many are the devices of wicked men against God's Children and they know them not but God knows them when they are in their deep consultations God's eye is upon them he stands by and hears them God knows the confederacy of Syria and Ephraim against Judah and Jerusalem to take it and set up a King for themselves Isa 7.5 6. He knew the bloody design of Herod against Christ notwithstanding his pretence of worshipping him He saw the desperate Popish Gun-Powder Plot here in England God is very diligent to know all the designs of his Churches enemies He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep Psa 121.3 4. Though the enemies of the Church are vigilent politick and strong yet the Defender of the Church is more vigilent more politick more strong he opposeth his Wisdom to their wisdom his Counsels to their counsels his Power to their power he out-wits them and out-powers them He bringeth the counsel of the Heathen to nought and makes the devices of the People of none effect Psal 33.10 He taketh the wise in their craftiness he maketh them to fall into the same Snare they have laid and into the same Pit they have digged for others Psal 7.15 16. He hangs Haman on the same Gallows he had raised for Mordecai And as he is diligent to discover the plots of his Peoples enemies so he is diligent to defend his People even as the Governour of a besieged Garison is diligent to look to every place and bring fresh aid and new supply where there is most need he encourages them that are fainting saves them that are in danger his care and diligence is a great security and comfort So God is every where with his People diligent to save them to refresh to strengthen them He is with his Josephs in Prison with his Jobs on the Dunghil with his Daniels in the Lions-Den with the three Children in the fiery Fornace Are they imprisoned banished sick pesecured in great dangers God is careful to save them The eyes of the Lord run to and fro upon the whole Earth to shew himself Mighty on the behalf of them that fear his Name 2 Chron. 16.9 He is diligent to preserve the souls as well as the bodies of his People from Satans temptations the allurements of the world and inward corruptions and though he suffers them to be tempted yet he is with them and will not suffer them to be tempted above what they are able to bear He is diligent to preserve the Graces of his People even as the Goldsmith is careful and diligent to keep and save all the filings and dust of his Gold because the least grain of it according to its proportion is precious so the least of your Graces though weak and small in your account is precious and of great worth in the account of God and he will not suffer the least to decay He will not break a bruised reed nor quench smoaking flax God's People are very precious in his esteem they are his Jewels Mal. 3. as dear to him as the apple of his eye Zeph. 2. As a man when his house is on fire is wonderful diligent to keep and save from the flame whatsoever is dear and precious to him his Wife and Children his Silver and Gold and his Jewels So when the World or a Nation is on a flame God is wonderfully careful to preserve his People that are his Jewels his Spouse his Children they are dear to him Are you afraid that the Furnace will be heated too hot that the Temptation will be too strong or the burden of Afflictions too great to bear Let this be your comfort he is your Security and will proportion afflictions to your strength or give strength proportionable to the burden And if he give strength to bear a burden it is as if he laid no burden at all upon you he
assures you are kept by the Power of God to Salvation 1 Pet. 1.5 6. It is a Word to revive and quicken you in soul-deadning times and in soul-deadning sins The Faith of God's People begins oftentimes to stagger when the proud are called happy and they that work wickedness are set up and they that tempt God are delivered Mal. 3.14 15. This staggered Jeremiah 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 that deal treacherously Chap. 12.1 And David when he saw the ungodly prosper in the Earth that they are not in trouble as other men that they are not plagued like other men said He had cleansed his heart in vain in vain had he washed his hands in Innocency Psal 73.5 12 13. but when he came into the Sanctuary of God and consulted the Word of God then he understood their end v. 27 28. Read to this end and purpose Psa 37. and consider it well and it will revive you under these dispondencies of soul When Afflictions like waters upon fire fall on you and deaden your Graces and Comforts this Word will revive you and them this is my comfort in my affliction Thy Word hath quickened me And again Unless thy Law had been my delight I should have perished in my affliction Psal 119.50 92. And sin committed will deaden your Comforts your Graces Great sins are like a great blow upon the head astonishes a man layes him in a swond so great sins lay your Graces Comforts in a swound but this Word will revive you be as Aqua vitae to you David's sins of Adultery and Murder laid him in a spiritual swound well nigh for the space of a year if not all out a year or more he repented not of his sins in all this time but when Nathan the Prophet came to him with the Word of God David then revived 2 Sam. 12. And so for comfort under sin 7. This Word is an Antidote of Sovereign Efficacy to preserve you in the worst of times When a man lives in an Air in a City in a Town in a Family that are infected with the Plague he will take a Cordial to fortifie himself against the Infection Infection of an house with the Plague is dreadful to the Inhabitants and to have the Plague-sore upon the body is a sad affliction but to be infected with the Plague in our souls is worse that brings temporal this eternal death unless cured or prevented Now you live in an infected and an infecting world amongst corrupting and corrupted persons and the danger is great but here is a word that will fortifie you against evil examples promises preferments threatnings and sufferings and keep you from sin make you good in bad times healthy and strong in a bad air I have hid thy Word in my heart that I might not sin against thee Psal 119.11 8. This Word will edifie and build up in Grace As we by a constant feeding upon our food of infants a foot long we grow and increase to be men and women of a full stature So when we are babes in Christ new born this Word by a daily feeding upon it by Faith doth nourish us until we come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ our Graces grow and are increased and strengthned according to our feeding upon it Here is Milk for babes Wine for the faint strong meat for them that are strong Christians The builders of an house cut their timber and square their stones and add timber to timber and stone to stone until the house be built up So saith the Apostle this Word is able to build you up it cuts off the remaining knots of sin and polisheth you from the remainders of corruption until you be made fit for the Temple of God in the highest Heavens 9. It will give you an Inheritance amongst them that are sanctified It gives not by way of merit and purchase but it shews you not only the Kingdom of Heaven but points out the way and directs you to it It doth not only shew and lead you that way but fits you for Heaven Unless we be fitted for Heaven we cannot come thither The Lepers must not enter the Camp so long as the Leprosie was upon them And no unclean thing shall enter into Heaven Rev. 21. ult The Temple of Solomon was all squared and fitted in the field before it was brought together to be built up So you must be fitted in the field of Grace before you can be laid in the Temple of Glory This Word then sanctifieth you purgeth the corruptions the sins of Nature this Word strengtheneth and increaseth your Graces it makes you holy with Saints here and will make you happy with them hereafter it brings Heaven and Glory into your souls here and will bring you into Heaven and Glory hereafter and give a possession of that Inheritance which was prepared for you before the foundation of the World purchased for you by the Blood of Jesus an Inheritance far better than all the Crowns and Kingdoms of the World one corner of it is better than a thousand Worlds for firmness purity duration certainty and scituation An Inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in the Heavens for you 1 Pet. 1.4 where you shall have the best society them that are sanctified Abraham Isaac and Jacob all the Prophets Apostles and Children of God both Minister and People shall be gathered as Wheat and safely reconded in the Garners of Glory There shall be no Ishmael to deride and scoff our devotion no Esau to pursue us no Pharoah to oppress us no Ahab to persecute us no Doeg maliciously and falsly to accuse us no Judas to betray us no Devil to tempt us no Sin to wound us All tears shall be wiped away from our eyes and we shall enjoy Him whom to enjoy is fulness of joy and pleasures for evermore Now my Brethren to this Word that is of such indispensible necessity such compleat perfection and of daily use and advantage as being abundantly filled with all suitable Excellencies and Remedies for your souls in every condition I commend you Here is Light to enlighten and guide you a Touchstone to manifest Doctrines what they are unto you Here is a weapon to defend your selves and conquer your enemies Here is Rain to cool you to soften you to refresh you Here is a Cordial to comfort you to revive and quicken you an Antidote to preserve you Here is Liberty to free you Fire to purge you Food to nourish you your Magna Charta wherein your Laws Priviledges and Immunities are enrolled a Treasury of Comfort a Testament full of Legacies your Souls preservative from Sin and preparative to Glory I have done with the Doctrinal part I come now to the Application And though I have spent my self and happily
did 2 Chron. 36.16 2. But however What wisdom were it for a man to undo himself for ever because others scorn at him for taking the right course to make himself happy for ever Should Job have forsaken his integrity Job 21.3 or Christ left off the work of Redemption Mat. 27.29 or Paul his Preaching Acts 17.32 or Jeremiah his Prophesying Jer. 20.7 or the Apostles their Ministry Act. 2.13 or the Martyrs their Constancy Heb. 11.36 because they met with mockings scorns and reproaches what wisdom would there have been in that How sad would it have been for them and us You cannot but know that a strict life in the wayes of God is the way to eternal happiness but the loose broad way of sin is the way to Hell Mat. 7.13 14. and therefore if you will forsake the narrow way and walk in the broad way and so undo your poor souls for ever because fools scorn at you you will make your own folly appear to be the greatest in the end 3. Though the men of the world scorn them for their preciseness yet they have the câ—mmendations both of God and all good men Their praise is of God Rom. 2.29 and as for good men all their delight is in them as the only excellent Ones upon Earth Psal 16.3 And which is better the praise of God or the praise of men the praise of good men or the praise of wicked men judge ye Certainly those scorns are avoided at too dear a rate which are avoided with the loss of the favour both of God and all that are good Obj. 4. But they get themselves many enemies by their preciseness and what wisdom is in that Answ 1. And who are those Enemies of theirs None but the Devil the World and the Flesh And is the friendship of these so desirable a thing or is it not better lost than won Would you have the Devil your friend sure there will be little gotten by that Would you have the World for your friend surely the gain would not recompence the loss for the friendship of the World is enmity with God Jam. 4.4 Would you have the flesh to be your friend It will but flatter you to your own destruction Therefore the People of God do not at all value the friendship of these false counterfeit and destructive friends But 2. They have God for their Friend Jam. 2.23 and good Angels Luke 15.7 10. and all good men Psal 16.3 Put case now that God Angels and Saints stood on one side and the Devil World and Flesh stood on the other side and you were put to make your choice which three you would have for your friends and which three for your enemies which would you chuse Answer this Question and the Objection is fully answered But further 3. Their friends are more and a thousand times better and stronger than their enemies Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world saith the Apostle 1 John 4.4 And with this very consideration the Prophet Jeremy encourages himself against all the spite and malice of his enemies Jer. 20.10 11. Fear not therefore ye that walk strictly in the paths of Righteousness for though the enemies were a thousand times more and stronger than they are yet they shall not prevail against you to harm you whilst you are followers of that which is good 1 Pet. 3.13 but in God's good time you shall be more than Conquerors over them all through Christ that hath loved you Rom. 8.37 Obj. 5. But they expose themselves to many sufferings by their preciseness and what wisdom is there in that Answ 1. If they do suffer they are but therein made conformable to Christ Rom. 8.17 and partakers of his sufferings 1 Pet. 4.13 Christ himself hath led the way through manifold sufferings and they do but follow their Lord and Master A good Souldier will live and die with a good Captain and a good Subject will sink and swim with a good Prince nor will they account it any discredit and why should any Christian who hath devoted himself to the service of Christ as his great Lord and Master think much to follow the Captain of their Salvation through difficulties and sufferings 2. Their sufferings shall not be for their hurt but their good not their loss but their gain If we suffer with Christ it is that we may be glorified with him Rom. 8.28 And then by the Apostle's Arithmetick we may well reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with that glory which shall be revealed in us Rom. 8.17 18. But 3. The Lord will deliver them out of all their troubles Psal 34.19 And this God doth many times in this life by removing their enemies or restraining their wrath or even making them at peace with them Pro. 16.7 or however God will deliver them by translating them to a better life and setting them thereby out of the Gunshot of all their enemies and so at once he wipes away all tears from their eyes and sorrow from their hearts for ever Obj. 6. But they many times shortten their own dayes by their preciseness and what wisdom is there in that Ans 1. This Argument will not affright the men of the world from their Worldliness Ambition and Flesh-pleasing And shal it affright us from our Religion the care of our souls and the service of our God Do not the Drunkard Glutton fill their bodies with many loathsome and mortal diseases and a dart strike through the Adulterers liver Prov. 7.23 Do not Theeves end their dayes at the Gallows and those that clime to the top of Honour commonly sacrifice their necks upon a Block Is it not the peremptory Decree of the GREAT KING that Bloody men shall not live out half their dayes And yet we see that the ungodly will hearken to none of these warnings either from God or man O consider this with shame Shall not we be as bold and venturous for God and Christ and our precious souls as the men of the world are for their filthy lusts and beastly pleasures I shall here record an excellent speech to this purpose of that man of God Mr. Whitaker reported at his Funeral by his now companion in Glory Mr. Ash As Mr. Whitaker was riding with with a freind of his by Tyburn he stopped his Horse and uttered these words with great affection O what a shame is it that so many thousands should dye for the satisfaction of their lusts and so few be found willing to lay down their lives for Christ Why should not we in a good Cause and upon a good Call be ready to be hanged for Jesus Christ It is everlasting honour and it is a thousand times better to dye for Christ to be hanged to to be burnt for Christ than to dye in our beds 2. If they do shorten their dayes it is but a miserable momentary life which they shorten and they are but
afterwards conclude with Directions Motives 1. Consider halting is very unseemly The Linsey-woolsey-coat is but an uncomely garment How ill doth it become a Child of God the Kings daughter Psa 45.13 14. Lameness or crookedness is a deformity in the body Not to walk uprightly is very uncomely among Professors There is an expression Psa 52.9 I will praise thee for ever and I will wait on thy Name for it is good before thy Saints Constancy and perseverance in God's Worship and Service and in our dependance upon Him this is good before the Saints And the contrary to see souls falling off from God and His Wayes is evil in their account They blush are asham'd to see it It is a sad and strange sight to them Gal. 1.6 I marvel saies the Apostle to these halting backsliding Professors I marvel that you are so soon removed from Him that called you into the Grace of Christ Yea this is unseemly not only before the Saints but before wicked men Hence it is that the uncircumcised Philistines do so rejoyce and triumph when they can see or hear that any of Israels Worthies are fallen As the Psalmist complains Psa 38.16 When my foot slippeth they magnifie themselves against me They insult over the Righteous when they see them fall into any trouble and distress and no lesse when they fall into sin when they can take notice of any thing in their carriage and practice unbecoming their profession 2. Halting in Religion is most unreasonable No fair pretence that can be put 〈◊〉 As the Lord expostulates with them Jer. 2. 〈◊〉 What iniquity have your Fathers found in me that they are gone far from me and are â—â—lked after vanity What a strange course they take wâ—â—â— turn aside from God from the true God to walk after vanity The People were convinced of the folly of such a course in Josh 24.16 God forbid that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods That were a folly and madness indeed God forbid we should forsake our own mercy our happiness to follow lying vanities How foolish was the Prodigal in leaving his Father's House to feed upon husks When the Galatians were halting in Religion how strangely the Apostle bespeaks them Gal. 3.1 O foolish Galatians Who hath bewitched you and verse 3. Are ye so foolish What so foolish q. d. none can be more foolish than thus If the Lord be not God why do we follow Him at all And if He be God as nothing more sure Why do we not follow the Lord fully If it be not good to be truly religious why do we make any profession of it why are we not open avowed Atheists And if it be good indeed Why are we no more careful to walk up to our profession Thus if we did but attend to Reason it would inform us thus much that either we should quite lay down our profession or indeavour to bring up our lives to our profession 3. Halting in Religion is exceeding hurtful As there is an expression Jer. 7.6 Neither walk after other gods to your hurt That some instead of cleaving to the Lord followed Baal-peor was it not to their hurt Deut. 4.3 4. see Ezek. 6.22 If we belong to God and yet are halting in our course before Him we may look to smart for it here if we are turning aside from him He will fetch us in with the rod Psa 89.30 c. 4. We have gone â—n halting too long already It is more than time we â—â—â—ld now seek for cure that we should now mend of it Hath not this been our manner from our youth As Moses said of the Children of Israel Ye have been rebellious against the Lorâ—â—rom the day that I knew you Have not we been still at this pass at â—ff and on playing fast and loose with God I may here allude to that in Josh 22.17 18. Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us from which we are not cleansed unto this day but that we must turn away this day from following the Lord We have been too long unsteady and uneven in our course 5. This halting in Religion is hard to cure And the longer any soul goes on in it it is still so much the worse As a leg out of joynt the longer it goes so it is so much the more difficult to set it right again Oh that this was seriously considered every step we take awry we are making work for Repentance And as it is not so easie but exceeding painful to have a broken leg set right and sound again so it is no such easie matter to have a lapsed soul restored by â—â—pentance 6. If we have made any progress in Christianity to halt now would deprive us of the comfort of it O what comfort is to be found iâ— close walking with God! The whole world if you search it through has no such cordial for a fainting dying creature as the sense of ones integrity and former upright-walking before God When Hezekiah had received the sentence of death this was more to him than all his Kingdom again Isa 38.3 On the contrary when we are halting in our course we undermine our own peace lay a foundation for inward troubles jealousy of our estates John 8.31 If ye continue in my Word then are ye my Disciples indeed Mark it If ye continue But otherwise you would only seem to be my Disciples It 's not enough to begin well but we must continue And otherwise all that we have done in Religion or suffered upon this account will be lost and in vain Gal. 3.4 And if our goodness be but as the morning cloud and early dew that soon passeth away even such will our hopes be Our comfort will hold out and continue no longer than we hold fast our integrity 7. Halting will really set us back cast us very much behind in our Christian course A lame man makes but a bad traveller So halting Christians drive on very heavily in the wayes of God A man that is careless of keeping in his way no wonder if he comes late and weary home And if we are oft turning into crooked paths how will this hinder us in the way to heaven This is going about indeed and no getting thus to heaven but we must return by weeping cross Thus every step we take awry is one step out of our way 8. It is a most unworthy thing to halt with God He keeps touch with his No God like him that keeps Covenant with them that walk before Him with all their heart 1 Kings 8.23 No God like him for this All besides Him are found lying vanities It was horrible blasphemy that message which Senacherib sent to Hezekiah Isa 37.10 Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee Little danger or fear of this Never to this day that the Lord deceived any one soul that trusted in him and was faithful to him 1 Sam. 10.19 Ye have this day rejected your God who himself
and perswading the things concerning the Kingdom of God Luke 24.32 Did not our hearts burn within us whilest he talked with us and opened unto us the Scriptures 5. The Lords Table where he feasteth his Friends as Cant. 5.1 and bids them welcome saying Eat O Friends Drink yea drink abundantly O Wel-beloved I appeal to the consciences of many sincere Christians when they have taken most pains with their own hearts to get them into frame against a Sacramental day when they have been deeply humbled in self-abhorrency broken in confessions with sighs and groans that cannot be uttered if God have not spoken peace to their souls Son daughter be of good chear thy sins be forgiven if their hearts have not danced for joy as David did before the Ark 6. The Lord's People his faithful Members are they thy friends thy companions of thy intimate society dost thou prefer them to others Psal 16.3 as the only excellent ones 119.63 I am companion to all that fear thee to all even to poor Saints as well as rich despised as well as honourable dost thou relieve them in want succour them in misery visit them if in Prison and therefore because they belong to Christ have much of Christ in them This he taketh kindly Mark 9.41 because they belong to Christ 7. Dost thou love the Day of Christ's appearing which though it be black and gloomy a terrible day to the proud and all ungodly enemies of Christ yet is it a day much to be desired by all that love the Lord who may rejoyce and lift up their heads in joyful hope of this Dayes approach their Redemption draweth nigh now is their Salvation nearer than when first they believed now shall the Elect receive the end of their Faith and Hope and Prayers and Tears and Sufferings 2 Tim. 4.8 It is made a character of the righteous that they love the appearing of Jesus Christ Heb. 5. ult Unto them that look for him Tit. 2.13 Looking for c. Not only looking for but hasting to the coming of the Day of God 2 Pet. 3.12 3d. Note is in Christ's own words John 14.15 If ye love me keep my Commandments all one as well as another hard as well as easie John 15.14 Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you Abraham is called the Friend of God and his friendship was tried and approved by his obedience to those hard Commandments of leaving his Country and offering up his only son his son Isaac whom he loved The partial obedience of most people is no obedience at all argueth no sincere love to Christ 4. To suffer for Christ to part with our dearest interests for him argueth sincere love to him Jacob endured a hard service of seven years for Rachel which though long because hard yet seemed to him but as a few dayes for the love he had unto her Jonathan endured his father's displeasure for David whom he loved and was well content to part with his hope in the Kingdom because he loved him as his own soul The Martyrs Rev. 12.11 loved not their lives unto the death The Apostles went away rejoycing they were counted worthy to suffer shame for the Name of Christ If we dare not adventure to suffer the spoyling of our Goods dare not hazard the frown or displeasure of a Landlord dare not suffer the loss of Name or Reputation for Christ and his Gospel how dwelleth his Love in us 5. Who love the Lord in sincerity will not easily part with Him his Comforts his Graces his Presence and Power of his Ordinances Exod. 21.5 The servant that loved his master and the family would not go out free Love prevailed above Liberty which is very desirable To sincere Christians the absence of Christ is grievous how they mourn to part with Ordinances in which they have found sweet communion with Christ David in the Wilderness how he longed after God! Psal 63.1 With sorrow and weeping tears the Disciples take their leave of St. Paul Acts 20. ult when they were to see his face no more Those people that with those Jews Acts 13.50 expel Ministers out of their coasts or with them Luke 4.29 thrust Christ out of their City or with the more mannerly Gadarens who besought him to depart from them who can be content to suffer a famine of the Word rather than be at the cost of maintaining a Preaching-Minister they will not buy the Truth so dear who are well enough pleased to see their Ministers removed burning and shining Lights put under a bed or a bushel Teachers driven into corners do give a plain demonstration how little love they have to Jesus Christ it is evident they prefer their Swine their Gain their Money to Jesus Christ Now I beseech you Brethren take a little pains to try the truth of your Love to Christ It will be the greatest comfort to your souls of any thing in this world if upon good ground it may appear you are of them that love the Lord in sincerity What bonefires of joy may such Christians make in their hearts in the saddest times and darkest night of affliction Psal 112.4 To the upright ariseth light in darkness If you love Christ be sure ye are of him beloved Prov. 8.17 I love them that love me To you he will be a never-failing friend in trouble in sickness in all afflictions in life and death and at the day of Judgement to them he will pronounce that heart-chearing sentence Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom c. But if by the foregoing Evidences taken out of the Scriptures of Truth the contrary do appear and we be not found amongst Christs real Friends but however we may flatter our selves among his enemies and of them that hate Him then shall we from his mouth hear that heart-breaking doom Depart from me ye cursed c. I never knew you And if any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ let him be Anathema Maranatha SERMON VI. Ephes 6.24 Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity VVE come now to speak to the second Doctrine which is this Doct. 2. The best thing in the world is Grace not gifts parts which are Gratiae gratis datae of an inferiour nature which the Apostle elsewhere wisheth for his Corinthians 1 Cor. 14.5 But here being to take his leave of his People wisheth for them saving Grace such as Faith Remission of sins Fellowship with all Saints in the general Resurrection So Haimo in locum That Grace is so excellent a thing appeareth in this That the Apostle in all or most of his Epistles both begins and ends with it His first salutation in the entrance is Grace be unto you and Peace to which he sometimes addeth Mercy Grace to renew our nature Peace of conscience Mercy for pardon of sin If we find sin pardoned our persons accepted our natures altered then may we comfort our selves c. saith Dr. Sibbs In
in God 1. The foundation of this Interest is laid in the free Love of God to their souls We can shew no other ground of all those rich heavenly priviledges Believers enjoy but only this because God loved them from eternity this is the bottom of all every one of our priviledges is laid in God's love Whom God loved from eternity them he chose from eternity to be a People nigh unto him that should have interest and propriety in him Hence it is Believers are called Elect and Chosen ones Eph. 1.4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world 2. ' T is ratified and made sure by the Covenant of Grace When God having brought the soul over to himself and enriched it with Faith and other Graces comes actually to strike covenant with him than is this interest and propriety in God established and made firm this appears from the very tenour of the Covenant of Grace Jer. 31.33 This shall be the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those dayes saith the Lord I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts and will be their God and they shall be my People God hath given his People an interest in himself and he hath confirmed this by Oath and Covenant he hath sworn that he will be the Believers God Come we to apply this Doctrine 1. Have Believers an interest in God We may here stand and wonder at the honour that is bestowed upon Believers Surely the outward glory of Solomon fell short of this to be a People near to God is a high honour to be related to him is a great dignity but to have a right to God and all in God is a priviledge not to be fathomed by humane arms and yet this honour have all the Saints though in their outward condition never so poor and contemtible t is the greatest honour in the world to be able to say My God If David was filled with admiration that he should be son in law to the King How may the hearts of Believers run over when they consider what honour they have in being Sons of God! 2. Have Believers an interest in God Then in vain do Satan and his Instruments labour to make them miserable Can any man be miserable that hath an interest in God Men would have judged David a miserable man but he hath a friend to stand by him in whom he encourageth himself Will God forsake his People will he suffer men to spoil his Jewels No they do but polish them if Satan and his instruments could dissolve this interest and pluck Believers out of God's arms than were their misery at hand but this they cannot do God feels the blows which Believers receive Saul Saul Why persecutest thou me He is touched with all their injuries and surely he is able to save them 3. Have Believers an interest in God Then hath God also an interest in them and this Believers must know and remember this propriety is mutual betwixt God and his Saints as he is theirs so they are his not their own This must put us in mind of our duty that we do not altogether dwell upon priviledges and forget duty We must not boast of our propriety in God and serve our selves and our own lusts As God in his Covenant sayes I will be their God so he adds and they shall be my People and for this end he promiseth to put his Laws in our inward parts and write them in our hearts that so we may yeeld him Covenant-obedience Remember Christian thou art not thine own but God's 't is not for thee to serve love and please thy self but God As we have right to all God hath and can do so hath God right to all we have and can do our gifts parts strength time and estates must be laid out for God 4. Have Believers an interest in God then let them pity such as have not and strive to bring them under this happiness let our souls bleed within us to consider how many thousands are strangers yea and enemies to God and without God in the world Canst thou call God thy God there are many thousands in the world that cannot do this Canst thou call God Father O how many are there that cannot do this in Faith Pity such and pray for them yea labour by all means to bring them home to God See whether there be no such in your families or amongst your kindred and neighbours Are not many of these in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity if so pity such souls and labour to pray them in to God that they also may have an interest in him 5. Have Believers an interest in God This speaks exceeding great joy and comfort to Beleivers such as can say with David The Lord my God If we knew God better we should understand more of this great consolation The serious thought of this interest in God is able to make a Believers joy to exceed all bounds The consolation will empty it self into these four chanels 1. If God be thine thou then art Gods and he will own thee he will preserve thee he will provide for thee thou needest not torment thy self with carefulness who hast such a God to care for thee There is as much comfort in that last branch of the Covenant they shall be my People as their is in the former I will be their God 2. If God be thine then is his Christ thine thou hast an interest in Christ and all his Sufferings his Merits and Righteousness He is made of God to us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption whole Christ is thine Christ and all that he hath done Christ and all that he hath suffered Christ in his Person and in his Portion thou maiest say of him with the Spouse My Beloved is mine and I am his 3. If God be thine then is his Spirit thine to lead thee into all Truth the Comforter to abide with thee the Spirit of Grace to sanctifie thee the Witness to testifie thy Sonship to God and to seal thee unto the day of Redemption this Spirit is thine if God be thine 4. If God be thine then is his Kingdom thine his Glory thine T is your Fathers good pleasure to give you the Kingdom a Glorious Kingdom whose builder and founder is God an Inheritance incorruptible undefiled that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for you such as can call God theirs shall be sure one day to Reign with their God in the Kingdom of his Glory Proceed we to the second Observation from the words which was this 2. There is enough in God to encourage a Believer when greatly distressed 'T is clear from this instance of David he was greatly distressed as you have heard yet he encouraged himself in his God Follow him from hence to the 23. Psal the 4. ver and there you may find him insulting over the
I leave you all in the Arms of Jesus Christ Shall I leave any of you wedded to your sins and lusts Shall I leave any of you glued to the world and not espoused to one Husband even Jesus Christ Shall my liberty to preach Christ to you cease before you can all say of him My Beloved is mine and I am his O that if it were the will of God it might not be so Brethren my hearts desire and prayer for you is that you may be saved My earnest request and suit to you this day is that you will come to Jesus Christ and be married to him for ever Have pity upon me cryeth sorrowful Job in another case Have pity upon me O ye my friends the Hand of the Lord hath touched me Have pity upon me O my People have pity upon your afflicted grieved dying Pastor And this is the pity I crave at your hands that you would none of you rest in a Christless condition but expect Blessings and Blessedness only through Christ that whether I come again to you or be absent I may hear of your affairs that ye prize and love Christ fervently that ye obey him sincerely constantly and universally having respect to all his Commandments that ye set a high estimation and stick close to his Truths that ye abhor Evil and account Gospel-administrations glorious that ye stand fast in the Faith and abound in every Grace Unum erat c. said Monica to her son Augustine It was one thing for which I desired to live a little longer that I might see thee a Christian ere I dye So say I to you this day whose cheeks I see bedewed with tears If my heart deceive me not I desire my Natural and Civil life a little longer that I might see you Israelites indeed and grown in Grace I seek not yours but you O my Flock I labour not to draw you after me but after Christ So far am I from murmuring at this sad providence exercising me this day that I bless God who bringeth good out of evil that hath given so many of his Ministers opportunity and hearts to confute those Scandals cast on them by unstable souls of being Hirelings Baals Priests greedy Dogs Balaams loving the wages of unrighteousness Diotrephes and loving preheminence preaching for filthy lucre supposing Gain to be Godliness c. from whom men ought to withdraw themselves Let such as are guilty answer as they can Let Baal plead for himself We are sure that the Judgment of God is according to Truth against them that commit such things That God who hath so far rouled away our Reproach can in his due time make our Righteousness shine forth as the noon day Only my Beloved let me not have cause to take up such sad complaints of you that I have bestowed on you labour in vain that I have piped and ye have not danced that I have mourned and ye have not lamented that ye have not believed my report that ye will not come to Christ that ye might have life that I come in my Fathers Name an Embassador in Christs stead and ye receive not my Message but if another come in his own name him ye will receive that ye are easily perverted marvelous soon shaken See Gal. 1.6 7 8 9. and your minds corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ to fall in love with will-worship and empty things of mans devising but will not be converted nor fall in love with Christ nor take his yoke upon you Good People add not thus to my affliction but let me have joy of you that I may say Ye are my Crown and Rejoycing Now I live seeing my Peoples souls are alive and prosper and have their hearts established with Grace so as they cleave with purpose of heart unto God escaping the temptations and pollutions of the world and running like the River Arethusa through the salt Sea yet keep their sweetness and the Word of God abideth richly in them Monica Leapid for joy at Augustine's conversion Cumulatius c. My God hath done abundantly for me that I see thee his Servant So let me have cause to rejoyce and say My God hath granted my desire letting me see you that were serving divers lusts serving the Lord Christ and you that were dead in sin spiritually alive and you that were Swearers fearing an Oath and you that were lost found And you that were haters of Holiness following Holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Sirs think not that Angels or some from the dead should ever come to invite you to Christ and testifie these things neither may you expect Christ himself in bodily presence to preach to you when he was on earth He went about doing good calling sinners Come unto me Follow me If any man will be my Disciple let him follow me but now his work is in Heaven where he is about his Peoples Business pleading their Cause Nay you may not expect me to be preaching to you any longer but once more I am here tendering to you Jesus Christ I come a wooing in behalf of my Lord and Master who was dead and is alive and behold he liveth for evermore In his Name who was preaching of old by his Spirit in Noahs time to souls that by their obstinacy and disobedience are in prison in Hell 1 Pet. 3.19 I come to tell you that Except you Repent ye shall all likewise perish and except you believe ye shall be damn'd Mark 16.16 that unless you obey Christ ye will fall short of eternal Salvation and if ye have not the Son ye have not Life I come to tell you of your poverty and blindness of your nakedness misery without Christ that all your hope will perish unless it be built on Christ the Corner-stone and that you can obtain no Blessing but through Christ 'T is recorded that the dead that Sampson slew at his death were more than they whom he slew in his life To allude to it O that this my dying Sermon might shake the rotten pillars on which souls have built their hopes of Heaven short of Christ that more sins might be mortified and more souls quickened and converted than ever by any Sermon in the course of my Ministry that now at the end of the liberty of my publick Ministry you might all be the seals thereof being pricked to the heart and feeling the weapons of our warfare mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth it self against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ Joseph's Brethren thought evil against him but God meant it for good to save much People alive And O that this sad breach betwixt us this day might occasion some poor souls to say Periissem nisi periissem I had been undone if I had not been undone The smiting of the Shepherd and scattering of the Sheep was
the occasion of a Sermon that enlightened me quickened me This breach brought me to Christ acquainted me with my necessity of interest in Christ I am not of the temper of that Emperour who said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when I dye let the Earth be burned But O that my Civil Death might minister occasion of your Spiritual and Eternal Life O that this divorcing day betwixt you and me might be the day of your Espousals to Christ Dying David bespeaketh Solomon I go the way of all the Earth Keep the charge of the Lord thy God that thou mayest prosper 1 Kings 2.1 2 3 4. My loving People I am this day going the way of all that will live godly in Christ Jesus the way of tribulation I charge you keep the Lord's way as you expect any blessing and prosperity look for them only through Christ the Way the Truth and the Life I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge both quick and dead as the Apostle when his time of departure was at hand charged Timothy that ye rest not without Interest in Christ and I leave this Sermon as Joshua did the Pillar as a Memorial that I admonished and besought you to come to Christ and become his Servants O let not the Word I have spoken to keep my self pure from your blood condemn you in the day of Christ You cannot plead We were not bidden to the Wedding-Feast we were not called to Christ No if you be found out of Christ at that great day how will it torture you to consider How have we hated Instruction and have not obeyed the voice of our Teachers In vain may you wish O that we had the day of Grace once again Domine cur non modo c. said Augustine at his conversion Lord why not now an end of my filthiness So say I to you Why not now a parting with sin and closing with Christ Take these Considerations or Motives 1. The Lord Christ calleth you whilst we are testifying these things to you Whilst Noah was preparing the Ark Christ was preaching See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh from Heaven 2. Others who have had as great hindrances as you have followed Christ at his Call James and John Mat. 4 22. left the ship and their father immediatly and followed Christ neither enjoyments not imployments nor relations could hinder them Zacheus a rich man of low stature in a great press yea of a wicked Sect a Publican great obstacles yet he breaketh through all he runs and climeth to see Jesus If you come not to Christ you will be inexcusable 3. Let the Loveliness of Christ draw you he is the Rose of Sharon the Lilly of the Valley the bright and morning Star the Sun of Righteousness chiefest among ten thousands and altogether lovely O let his Fulness and Perfections win your hearts and attract your affections 4. Let the Love of Christ constrain you his condescending and dying for you to save you from everlasting death Will not such bonds of Love hold you 5. The Lord taketh exact notice how long your Teachers are labouring with you what means you have and what fruit appeareth These three years have I come seeking fruit Luke 13.7 6. You must shortly appear before the Judge to give account how you have profited by all the Sermons and Lectures you have heard c. 7. Now is the Ax laid at your roots Judgment begining at the house of God your Teachers ready to be removed into corners possibly you may go from Sea to Sea and not find that refreshing food for your souls nor those advantages which you have had Now therefore what mean you O sleepers are you set on fire round about and not lay it to heart Let the time past of your life suffice you to have been servants of sin It is high time for you to awake out of sleep and to follow Christ 8. If you will not come this day what if the Lord should write you Christless and swear in his wrath You shall never enter into his Rest nor tast of his Supper saying I would have purged you and ye were not purged never be purged dye in your sins he that is filthy let him be filthy still 9. Christ is willing to be yours if you will be his he will not reject you if you come you have as fair Encouragement to come as ever any had 10. They are very fair terms propounded Is it not fit you serve him if you expect him to save you that you obey him if you hope for his Salvation Had he bidden you do some great thing should you not have done it how much more when he requireth nothing but what is your reasonable service befitting you as his Creatures They are fair terms Repent and be conuerted that your sins may be blotted out Come to me and find rest Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved Be faithful unto death and obtain the Crown of Life 11. And lastly Let your necessity drive you to Christ Is there but one Ark in the world to save you from drowning but one City of refuge to keep off Vengance from you O hie thither apace Is there but one day-Star to shine into your hearts but one Son of Righteousness with Healing under his wings but one Sacrifice for sin accepted But one Mediator betwixt God and Man the Man Christ Jesus O get interest in Him Oh! why do any of you linger and not hasten to this Zoar when Fire and Brimstone are so nigh so certain to all that reject Christ Oh! why do you draw back when drawing back is unto Perdition Know my Brethren these things as much concern you as ever any souls in the world what need have you of Christ to be your Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption without Him you are cursed captivated and condemned John 3.18.36 without Christ ye are deaf and dead poor and polluted and have no title to Heaven to the Promises nor any thing but sin and its wages Death Nay if you obey not whilest Christ calleth Come unto me you must with honour hear that other voice Depart ye cursed Those mine enemies that would not that I should rule over them bring forth and slay them before me Let me hint to you on what terms you must be in your coming to Christ 1. You must be divorced from your sins make sure you take off the heads of your dearest lusts 2. Disclaim all other Saviours besides Christ renounce confidence in the flesh Phil. 3.3 rest not in your outward priviledges nor performances but when you have done all you can say We are unprofitable servants 3. Rest not in a bare notion of Christ take heed lest you sit down with Fancy instead of Faith 4. Take a whole Christ Christ to rule you to teach to sanctifie you as well as save you 5. Give your selves wholly to Christ without reserve give him your ear open to his
Charge upon us 2. But it will be said If we suffer not for our former faults yet it is for our present fault that we suffer we may if we please submit and continue in our Places it is our wilfulness and obstinacy fear of losing credit adherence to a party c. that exposes us to suffering To this I must not make a full answer nor shall I reflect upon what is done by Authority I acknowledge it my duty to obey passively and suffer patiently where I cannot with a good Conscience yeeld active Obedience Yet to hint something 1. I beseech you seriously to consider whether it be probable that a man out of meer obstinacy or the like principle should expose himself to such hardships as we are like to undergo which of you would do it make it but your own case and you will soon discern the unreasonableness of this charge Consider but what Obligations are upon us to continue in our Places and Ministry and then see how probable this harsh censure is Twofold Obligation First Sacred 1. Conscience of Duty to God and to the Souls of our People that is a religious tye upon us which nothing in the world but the avoiding of sin can free us from Beloved think not that I or my Brethren make it a light matter to lay down the Exercise of our Ministry I say the Exercise for as to the Office it self none on Earth can deprive us of it I know that of the Apostle 1 Cor. 9.16 A necessity is upon me I remember that of our Saviour Luke 9.62 No man having put his hand to the plow It is not the heaviest burden were it a burden only not a sin nor the greatest meer inconveniencies that should drive me from my Station I well remember when I entred into this sacred Function I promised not to lay it down till I should lay down the Tabernacle of this Body and I desire to look upon it as a high dignity which the Lord hath conferd upon me had I been but a Door-keeper in the House of God c. Psal 84.10 But as to my Obligation you see how sacred and inviolable it is Now my Brethren you must needs conclude him to have little conscience or sence of duty left upon his spirit who can out of meer humour and wilfulness shake off such an Obligation And this Beloved is my hope and confidence as to my self and many of my Brethren that should we out of a surly humour or the like principle out-run our Embassy our own Consciences would raise a storm as effectual to reduce us as that which brought back Jonah to Nineveh when he fled to Tarshish Conscience of Duty would I hope soon work out obstinacy and frowardness Secondly Civil 1. But suppose this Obligation could be shaken off there is yet a Civil Tye which one would think might be sufficient to hold us and that is Provision for our selves and Families Can it be imagined that a man would out of meer wilfulness expose himself and family to Poverty and Beggary it may be to Imprisonment or Exile if one or two should be so desperately obstinate yet that so many hundreds yea if reports be true some thousands should do it is a thing attended with the highest improbability and those such at least some of them as for Parts Piety Prudence and other moral and religious accomplishments are not inferior to any in the Nation surely such a censure must needs argue superlative uncharitableness in those that pass it You cannot judge us to do what we do on meer humour wilfulness but you must conclude us to have put off all sense of Duty to God and your Souls all Humanity and Care of our selves and Families and in that respect to be worse than Infidels in a word to be Sons of Belial Men of most wretched and profligate Principles and Practices which if you do remember that With what Judgment you judge others your selves must be judged of God 2. But give me leave to put you in mind That the things for which we suffer are of that nature that ordinary Christians are little able to judge of and therefore should not rashly judge us for them Some of them are such as I must not mention nor shall I trouble you with many things To instance in the business of Re-ordination or taking a new Ordination at the hands of a Bishop How can I who have exercised as a Minister for these Fourteen years or upwards now take a new Ordination in a way to say no more of it that supposes me no Minister till then without notorious Dissembling both with God and Man Should one of your selvs among whom I have exercised urge on me this Dilemma If you were no Minister before why did you Exercise in that Function why did you Preach Pray and administer Sacraments as a publick Officer in the Church how will you justifie the Baptizing of our Children and administring to us the Lord's Supper If you were why do you now seek a New Commission is your old Commission expired c. I seriously profess Beloved should I submit in this particular my mouth would be stopt I should have nothing to say against such an argument Will you say there is no hurt in it Yes in my apprehension it is a taking the Name of God in vain a perverting of an Ordinance from its right End and so in effect making it no Ordinance besides that it is a tacit condemning of the Ministers of the Reformed Churches as no Ministers because they want Episcopal Ordination and which is not the least mischief it doth or may give just Occasion to our People to question the Validity of all our Ministerial Actings and will you say this is no hurt To instance again in the business of the Ceremonies we are not the first that have scrupled them they have been a bone of Contention ever since the beginning of the Reformation I fear are like to be while they are thus pressed The Question is not whether men may impose the wearing of a White Garment the making a Cross upon a Childs Fore-head c. but whether men may introduce into Gods Worship and impose upon others such things as are confessedly of humane invention annexing them to or mixing them with God's Worship as being significant of inward Graces as tending to Edification and to excite the dull mind of man or engage him to his duty Under this Consideration and for these Ends they are imposed as the Preface to the Common-Prayer-Book tells you Mean while it is acknowledged That neither Christ nor his Apostles used or urged these things yet we must be imposed upon and sworn to use and approve them I appeal to any rational unprejudiced Christian whether there be not enough in this case to beget a consciencious doubting or refusal Will you say they are not forbidden no more are thousands of Popish Superstitions which yet I hope our imposers will
that are his 2 Tim. 2.19 Though you be in Prisons in Dungeons in Banishments though the wool be scratcht off and the skin tore by Persecutions yet he knows you even you who are given him of the Father in his eternal Election John 17.6 Thine they were and thou gavest them me Such of you as have his Image upon your souls and his Fathers Name wrote upon your foreheads Rev. 14.1 such of you as have the sprinkling of his Blood and are washed white in the Lambs Blood Rev. 7.14 Shepherds use to preserve their Flock David hazarded his Life to preserve the Flock from the roaring Lyon and revenous Bear 1 Sam. 17.34 Shepherds watch night day to preserve their Flocks as Jacob Gen. 31.40 and the Shepherds to whom Christ's Birth was preached Luke 2.8 Jesus Christ is that careful Shepherd who defends his from them that would destroy them the Devil was never yet able to get the least Lamb of his Flock Those that thou hast given me I have kept and none is lost but the Son of Perdition John 17.12 and never shall the Devil be able to get any of Christ's Sheep John 10.29 my Father is greater than all and none shall be able to pluck them out of my Fathers hand This Shepherd will heal you of all your spiritual Maladies and Diseases He is the great Physician of Souls in the dayes of his flesh he healed all that came or were brought to him He made the Blind to see the Deaf to hear the Lame to walk the Dumb to speak He cleansed Lepers raised the Dead and cast out the Devils Mat. 11.4 5. And He is the same for the soul no disease to great for him to cure He heals us of the Guilt of Sin by Pardon and Justification Thus He healed Noah of his Drunkenness Lot of his Incest David of his Adultery and Murder Solomon of his Idolatry Peter of his Denial Mary Magdalen of her Whoredoms Paul of his Persecution He heals us of the filth and dominion of Sin by Sanctification The God of Peace sanctifie you throughout in spirit body and soul He enlivens and raiseth them that are dead enlightens them that are blind softens them that are heard cleanseth the unclean making a dunghil of sin 〈◊〉 Temple of his Spirit and the souls that are 〈◊〉 stituâ—ed Adulteresses to Sin and Satan a Spouse to himself He is anointed to bind up the broken in heart to proclaim Liberty to the captives to open the Prison-doors to them that are bound He gives Beauty for Ashes and the Garment of Praise for the Spirit of Heaviness Isa 61.1 2. This Shepherd will gather his Sheep together his Gentile Sheep scattered and Jewish Sheep dispersed both these he will gather The Gentiles John 10.16 the Jews also One end of the Ministry is to gather in all the Elect into a state of Grace out of the state of Nature and one end of the Ministry and Discipline is to gather in all that have strayed or been scattered since their conversion He will gather all that have been scattered by Storms and Dogs all that have been devoured all that have dyed in Prisons Dungeons Banishments in loathsome and unknown places the Sea shall give up her dead and the Grave give up her dead and shall separate them from the Goats and lead and conduct them safely into the Folds of Heaven and Glory 4. This is to commit you to the Father of the Church who hath begotten his People unto himself by the Immortal Seed of his Word Joh. 1.11 12 Jam. 1.18 who loves delights in pitties provides for and defends his People even as a Father loves delights in pitties and provides for and defends his Children 5. This is to commit you to God the Husband of his Church and People who hath chosen them out of the mass of mankind and espoused them unto himself Hos 2.19 20. and made one with them according to the antient Law of Marriage And they two shall be one â—â—esh Ephes 5.30 31. and dwells with his People in every place and condition Heb. 13. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee He partakes of our humane nature and makes his People partakers of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1.4 As your Husband he sympathiseth with you in all your sufferings accounting your afflictions his Isa 63.9 As your Husband he derives upon him all your sins Isa 53.5 2 Cor. 5. ult The wife is not suiable at Law but the husband Jesus Christ is the Husband of you that are Believers he answers and non-suits all Bills of Indictments put up against you There is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus Rom. 8.1 And as he takes your sins upon himself so he communicates to you the Riches and Priviledges Purchases of his Grace and Sufferings here The Glory that thou hast given me I have given them Joh. 17.22 The Kings Dunghter is all glorious within Psal 45. And he will communicate to you the Greatness of his Glory and Blessedness hereafter Joh. 17.22 Father I will that they whom thou hast given me be where I am that they may behold the Glory thou hast given me Here Christ doth win and contract his People by his Ambassadours but at the great Day of his glorious Royalty when he shall be attended upon with a glorious Retinue of blessed Angels he will publickly solemnize the Marriage betwixt himself and his People Here they are in a Pilgrimage then they shall be brought into the Brides Chamber here you have a Crown of Grace then he will put upon you a Crown of Glory Now if you faithfully consider that God to whom I commit you is the Fulness Sweetness of all these Relations to you that are his People the most potent politick victorious Captain the most powerful wife and rich King the most diligent and skilful Shepherd the tenderest Father and most loving Husband to his Church and People it must needs be ground of Security and Comfort in this your left and desolate condition Eighthly This is to commit you to that God who works wonderous things for the deliverance of his Church and People Exod. 15.11 Who is like unto thee O Lord amongst the gods Who is like unto thee glorious in Holiness fearfull in Praises doing Wonders 1. He is wonderful in disappointing the great plots and desperate counsels of his Churches enemies He bringeth the counsel of the Heathen to nought he maketh the devices of the People of none effect Psal 33.10 Syria and Ephraim had combined and plotted together to take Jerusalem and set up a King for themselves but God said It shall not stand neither shall it come to pass Isa 7.4 5 6 7. How wonderful was he in disappointing Hamans bloody design when the Order for the destruction of the Jews was procured signed and sent by Posts in the Provinces of the King and the day appointed for slaughter drew nigh and the Jews a weak unarmed captivated People had no Power
is pure enlighteneth the eyes Psal 19.8 This is the Chariot wherein the Sun of Righteousness rideth and by which he will arise and shine in the Horizon of your Souls and turn you from Darkness to Light This Light will guide you in all your wayes and actions a Light unto your feet and a Lanthorn unto your Paths Psal 119.105 This Light will discover Satans Temptations the Worlds Allurements and direct you how to avoid the precipices of Prophaness the sinks of Sin and how to walk in the Way of Purity and Peace This Light will direct and comfort you in the darkest Night of Affliction 2. It is a Touch-stone to try Doctrines whether false or true When you suspect a piece of money you will bring it to the touch-stone to try it that you be not deceived and take Brass for Gold Guilt-Tin or Copper for pure Silver so you are to bring all Doctrines to the tryal and touch-stone of the Word Isa 8.20 To the Law and to the Testimony if they speak not according to this Word it is because there is no Light in them And John adviseth us not to believe every spirit but to try the spirits whether they be of God or no because there are many false Prophets gone out into the world 1 John 4.1 Take heed of Doctrines that hold a strickness above what is written as the Popish doctrines of Self-whippings voluntary Poverty Vows of Continency The Apostle gives an Antidote against these and many such-like Col. 2.18 to 23. Reject doctrines that set up our own righteousness whether of Morality or Sanctification in the room of Christs Righteoâ—â—ness that place good works in the Throne of Christ doctrines contrary to Godliness opening a door to Libertinism Prophaness crying down the Morality of the Sabbath and Family-duties reject for the Doctrine of the Gospel is a Doctrine according to Godliness Tit. 1.1 a Mystery according to Godliness 1 Tim. 3.16 Doctrines crying up the Traditions of men placing Purity and Worshiping of God and Religion in them but neglecting the Commandments of God for such worshiping of God is a vain worship Mark 7.1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9. Doctrines crying up Purity to the ruine of Unity reject for the Gospel calleth for Unity as well as for Purity Ephes 4.3 4 5 6. And Christ prayed for the Unity as well as for the Purity of the Church John 17.21 22. Time will not permit me to give you any more instances but I commit you to this true infallible Touch-stone of God's Word and see that you be like those noble Bereans searching the Scriptures daily whether these things you hear be so Acts 17.11 3. This is a Weapon to defend you When the Souldier is to fight with his enemies he arms himself and takes his weapon in his hand You Sirs are the Lord's Souldiers to fight his battles against Sin and Satan you have innumerable Enemies to encounter with and overcome before you can wear or obtain a Crown of Glory The Israelites must conquer and kill the Canaanites before they could possess the Land of Canaan Heavens Way and the Crown of Glory is beset with many Enemies enemies within you enemies without you so many sins lusts and corruptions so many Enemies so many Temptations so many Enemies so many Devils so many Enemies and all these must be conquered before we can be saved Now the Weapon by which you must conquer them is thâ— Word of God's Grace the Sword of the Spirit Ephes 6.17 This is the Sword whereby the Captain of our Salvation conquered our Grand Enemy the Devil in all his attempts Mat. 4. His Practice calls for our imitation his Conquest is our Encouragement Are we tempted to Pride this tells us God resisteth the Proud and gives Grace to the humble Jam. 4.6 Are we tempted to comtemn Reproof this tells us Such as harden themselves being often reproved shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy Prov. 29.1 Are we tempted to Drunkenness to Whoredom and Uncleanness this tells us None such enter into the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6.9 10. In a word face and affront all Temptations to Sin with the Threatenings of God and with his Judgments upon wicked men Doth the World and Devil promise thee great Preferments and Riches if thou wilt follow them tell them God doth promise greater better and more durable Riches and Dignities Doth he tempt thee to dispair tell him of the Fulness and Freeness of God's Grace the Fulness and Freeness of God's Promises the Greatness and Value of Christ Sufferings And by a faithful and skilful managing of this Weapon you shall overcome Resist the Devil and he will fly from you 4. This Word is a spiritual Rain Deut. 32.2 My Doctrine shall drop as the Rain my speech shall distil as the Dew as the small rain upon the tender herb and as the showres upon the tender grass What rain is to the Eâ—râ—â— and fruires thereof the same is this Word to the Godly Christian when you are enflamed with Corruption pursued with Satan scorched with the Frownings of the Almighty this as a pure Chrystal Stream will cool you and refresh you As the Hart the chasted Hart painteth after the Water-brooks so doth my soul after God after the Ordinances of God Psal 42.1 This will soften your hard hearts Isa 66.2 2 Kings 22.11 19. As rain this will wash you clean when you are defiled Sanctifie them through thy Truth thy Word is Truth John 17.17 This Word as rain will make you fruitful and recover your decaying withering Graces and Comforts and make them fresh and flourishing like Trees planted by the Rivers side Psal 1. Isa 61.3 5. This Word is a Comforter unto you In all your Sorrows and Sufferings this Word affords suitable and seasonable Comfort to you Are you with David in great straits and exigencies and your thoughts and debatings within you like a troubled Sea you know not what to resolve on which way to take this will then afford you comfort Psal 94.19 In the multitude of my thoughts thy Comforts delight my soul O God And again Thy Statutes have been my songs in the House of my Pilgrimage Psal 119.54 Are you filled with sorrow concerning your sins here are Promises assuring your Scarlet-dyed sins shall become as white as Snow Isa 1.18 Here is a Sea of Mercy that can swallow Mountains as well as mole-hills Mich. 7.18 19. Are you troubled about the wants of Grace here are gracious Invitations for every one that will come and take of the Waters of Life freely Rev. 22.17 Are you troubled about the weakness of Grace he hath promised not to break the bruised reed nor quench smoaking flax Mat. 12.20 Are you troubled concerning Temptation he hath promised his Grace is sufficient for you to lay no more on you than you are able to bear and glorifie his Strength in your weakness 1 Cor. 10.13 2 Cor. 12. Are you afraid you shall not persevere this
exercised your patience to the full and the time far gone yet give me leave a little more have patience for your dying Minister God knows whether ever or never I shall trouble you thus again the pains is mine I pray God the profit may be yours If the Word of God's Grace be such Security Comfort to a left People Be exhorted 1. To attend upon the Publick Preaching of the Word This is the ordinary and appointed means to get benefit for your souls Those that came to Christ were healed of their several infirmities and maladies Would you have your spiritual maladies healed your natures sanctified corruptions mortified Grace implainted Grace increased strengthned Wait on the Word for this is the standing and appointed means When Joseph and Mary sought for Christ they could not find him in the Company nor amongst their Friends nor in the City but in the Temple Luke 2.43 44 45 46. Think not to find God and Christ in sinful company in your houses nor in your fields nor flocks but in his Ordinances these are his Wine-Cellers and Banqueting-houses wherein he will feast your souls with spiritual dainties and varieties Cant. 2.4 2. Be frequent in reading it labour to understand and believe it The oftner you reade it the more you shall understand it the more you understand it the more you shall believe it and the more you believe it the more comfort and benefit you shall reap by it What advantage will all the excellencies be to us if we do not believe them and how can we believe them unless we understand them and how can we understand them unless we reade it and hear it preached Therefore be constant in reading every day some part of God's Word season your souls with it in the morning let it lock up your thoughts in the evening Here you have a prescribed remedy for every malady a plaister for every sore here is comfort for every sorrow and in all affliction here is counsel in all your straits Deprive not your selves of the benefit for want of reading studying the Word You feed every day your bodies with your daily food feed your souls with this food 3. Treasure up the Word in your hearts Let the Word of Christ saith the Apostle dwell in you richly in all wisdom Col. 3.16 Where there is a Malady there the Remedy must be applied Your Malady is within So many sins so many diseases so many sins so many wounds This will be Physick to cure your diseases A Plaister to heal your wounds Blindness is the disease of the understanding Vanity the disease of the mind Stuborness the disease of the will And the sin of each faculty of the soul and member of the body is the disease and wound of that faculty and member But this Word dwelling powerfully in you enlightens your understandings fils your minds with heavenly mindedness makes your wills obedient heals every faculty and every member though it be in part Physick doth not cure us Cordials do not comfort nor strengthen us unless we drink them Plaisters do not heal us unless we apply them Food doth not nourish us unless we eat and digest it No more will the Word of God be as Physick as a Cordial as a Plaister as Food to purge sin to comfort us to heal us to nourish our Graces unless it dwell within us How can a Souldier defend himself and beat his enemies when he is a naked man without his Weapons you are naked unarmed if the Word dwell not in you Well than Be well acquainted with God's Menaces against sin and his Judgments upon it Be well acquainted with his Promises that you have both in readiness when occasion requires 4. Walk according to it Make it a light to your feet and a lanthorn to your paths Psal 119.105 This is the way of peace And as many as walk according to this Rule peace be upon them and the whole Israel of God Gal. 6.16 It is the way of security read Isa 33.15 16. It is the way of blessedness Not the hearers but doers of the Word shall be blessed in the deed Jam. 1.22 23 24 25. I shall give you three or four instances First In sanctification of the Sabbath God hath given us six dayes to do our work in and hath taken himself but one in seven to be served in and it is a robbing of God not to keep his Day holy The Christian Sabbath is a weekly commemoration of Christ's arising from the dead and accomplishing the great work of our Redemption and in thankfulness for so great a mercy be sure you keep holy be strict in religious Duties publick and private Make conscience of performing duty and make conscience of a right manner of performing duty when others play sport walk abroad sleep or talk at home reade you the Word or good Books pray and sing praises to God Such as are not careful to sanctifie God's Day care not for God nor Religion any day Such as deny him publick Worship will deny private Worship Such as are careless in performing publick Duties are careless in performing private Duties and Cursed be they that do the work of the Lord negligently Mal. 1. ult Secondly Be careful to govern your Families according to the Word It was Joshuahs resolution That he and his house would serve the Lord Chap. 24.15 and David would suffer no wicked man in his house Psal 10â— Be careful to offer to God a morning and an evening Sacrifice reading some portion of God's Word Be careful and constant to instruct your Families your Children and Servants in principles of Religion in the fear of God season them while they are with you that they may be preserved from infection when they are from you Endevour that Husbands be holy that your Wives be holy that Children be holy that Servants be holy that your Families be as little Churches of God The holiness of a Family is the glory the safety the riches of a Family Thirdly Live in subjection to Supream Power and Authority of the Nation We are branded for Rebels Fomenters of divisions labouring to fire the Nation with civil Discord and engage it in another War but our Practice and our Doctrine shall witness the contrary to the world And therefore I charge you before God's holy Angles and God himself the great Judge of the world that ye be subject to the higher Powers Be actively obedient so far as you may keep peace and a good conscience within and when you cannot obey actively obey passively Fear not Josephs Prison nor Jeremiahs Dungeon nor Daniels Lions Den for a good conscience Praying for all in Authority that under them we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in ALL godliness and honesty Labour I beseech you by your quiet and peaceable lives to vindicate the innocency of your Ministers and their Doctrine from those black-mouthed blasphemies and reproaches envie and malice and ignorance hath cast upon them and doubtless
God in his due time will revenge this dishonour done to his Servants whilest they have studied nothing else and nothing more than the gaining of souls in a faithful discharge of their Ministry when he shall manifest to the world vel Hostibus ipsis confitentibus that these railing Rabshakahs proud aspiring and false accusing Hamans malitious Doegs that the Swearers Drunkards Oppressors Whoremongers that the Sinners of a Nation and such as would set up Dagon by the Ark of God or pull down the Ark and set up Dagon in the room of it that these are the bane of Kings the ruine of Crowns and Kingdoms That it is these men that turn our Calm into a Storm our Peace into War our Plenty into Scarcity these even these are the Achans that trouble our Israel these are the Jonahs that raise these dreadful Storms that tear our Sails break our Main-masts and ready to drive this goodly English Vessel and split her upon the Rocks of Division And demonstrate that the Godly are the Iron-Bulwarks the Brazen-Gates the Chariots and Horse-men of a Nation that neither Kings nor Kingdoms prosper better than when the Godly and pure Religion prosper and are defended For saith the Wise man Righteousness exalteth a Nation but sin is a reproach to any People 4. Walk according to this Word in your mutual negotiations with men Oppress not cheat not cozen not lye not for advantage be upright just and honest in your traffiquing in the world account not gain to be godliness but godliness with contentment to be great gain And while you negotiate the concernments of the world with men take heed you trade not with them for their sins Do all the good you can to others and if you cannot do that good you would take heed you receive not from them that evil you should not receive It is no small part of pure Religion for a man to keep himself unspotted from the world Jams 1.27 Take heed of the sins of the times and places you live in and of the sins of the persons you live and commerce with Labour to be good in bad times like Noah in the old world like Lot in Sodom and good Obadiah in Ahabs Court That you may be blamless and harmless the Sons of God without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse Nation among whom shine ye as Lights in the world Phil. 2.15 Now I have done with what I intended but not as I could have desired According to those weak abilities God hath given me I have shewed you where your Security and Comfort lyes in this my forced departure from you When our Saviour was about to leave the world he commends the tuition of his Disciples to God the Father When Paul left Ephesus he commended the Ministers to God and the Word of his Grace And now I am departing from you I commend you to the same I leave and intrust you with the three Persons of the Sacred Trinity I commend you to God the Father who I hope hath chosen some of you to himself before the foundation of the world who hath give you to Christ and made you accepted in his Beloved to pardon you to govern you to provide for and afford you all things pertaining to life and godliness I commend you to God the Son your Mediator your Head your Brother your Husband to deliver you from all the evil you fear and obtain for you all the good you desire I commend you to God the holy Ghost to direct and teach you to furnish and adorn you to purifie and cleanse you to support and comfort you Here is the Omnisciency of God whereby he knows what ever you want and hurts you Here is infinite Wisdome to teach and guide you here is infinite and unchangable Love to delight in you in your meanest and lowest conditions here is infinite Mercy to pity you in all your wants weaknesses and sufferings Here is infinite Faithfulness and Diligence to save and secure every thing committed to you that nothing miscarry Here is infinite Power to support you to defend you to deliver you here is an inexhaustible Fountain of Grace to relieve your wants and weakness Here is the fulness and sweetness of all relations the Captain the Shepherd the King the Father the Hushand of the Church here is a wonder-working God wonderful in disappointing the Plots of his Churches enemies wonderful in delivering them by small means wonderful in creating means when there is none wonderful in turning the Plots upon the Enemies head Here is infinite Alsufficiency to provide for you that can send you an Elisha after an Elijah that can feed you with the ministry of a black Raven that can make your souls look fresher fairer with Pulse than those that feed on the dainties of Kings Tables that can enrich your souls with the Gold and Jewels with the Parts Abilities and Learning of the Egyptians or if he bring you into a Wilderness can and will provide supplies of Grace to bear your charges to Glory These and whatever else there is in an infinite God that may further make for your security and comfort I commend you to it leave and entrust you with Him who is able to do for you abundantly more above what I or you are able to ask or think I commend you also to the Word of his Grace which is of indispensible necessity which is perfect in all suitable excellencies and remedies for you in all conditions and miseries and of daily use to you A Light to guide you a Touchstone to manifest Doctrines what they are unto you a Weapon to defend you Rain to refresh and cool you a Cordial to comfort quicken revive you an Antidote to preserve you that is able to build you up in Grace and fit you for Glory And as I entrust you with these so it is your great wisdom and prudence to improve these seasonable and suitably to your condition The improvement of small things is advantagious when careless neglect makes great things unprofitable What profit hath the Bee of the Hive in a Storm if she fly not to it What profit in dainty Food rich Attire and Armour of proof if we feed not on our Food wear not the Attire put not on the Armour What security and comfort can you have in God and in the Word of his Grace if you do not improve them Well then as you would have security and comfort be frequent in fervent Prayer to God that as he is the great Shepherd of his Church so he would provide for you an able Minister of the New-Testament that may heal the diseased strengthen the weak reduce them that are stragled and feed you with that food that will nourish you even Life Eternal It is very sad to be as Sheep without a Shepherd pray for the supply of desolate Congregations Pray for your Minister and all others cast out that God would comfort them support them provide for
perfect Rule see how they have agreed or disagreed Look your faces daily in the Glass of God's Word and then you shall see how many spots are upon them This very thing would make and keep us humble while we live and shew us the shortness of our own wayes and drive us to Jesus Christ who hath perfect Righteousness The Swan is a proud bird but when she looks at her black feet she mourns The reason why most are so self-conceited of their own goodness is because they look upon themselves in present abstinence from sin or in present good mood and never look back upon former sinâ—â—â— In a word Let your sins be ever before your eyes 4. Beware of earthly-mindedness Let it not be your only care to get the things of this life 1 John 2.15 16. Love not the world neither the things that are in the world VVe are prone by Nature to mind Earth and nothing else But consider that those that are earthly-minded are enemies to the Cross of Christ Phil. 3.18 19. There are many of whom I tell you weeping who are enemies to the Cross of God viz. those who mind earthly things Such persons frustrate Christ of the end of his dying He died to purchase an heavenly treasure for us he arose and went to Heaven that we should imitate him If ye then be risen with Christ seek those things that are above Col. 3.1 Earthly persons undervalue the death of Christ he died to purchase Heaven they care for Earth more than Heaven Again Earthly persons will have a sad end Their end is destruction Phil. 3.19 Seeing such men put away Salvation from them whilst on Earth at last they shall be put away from Salvation Again Things below are neither a suitable nor a satisfying portion Not suitable your souls being spiritual these earthly not satisfying your souls having infinite desires whereas these are finite your souls everlasting these fading 1 John 2.17 The World passeth away When we have got never so much it may leave us we must leave it Again Earthly-mindedness is Idolatry Col. 3.5 And Covetousness which is Idolatry That which men desire love and delight in most even so much as to make it their portion that is their God Now we know that no Idolater shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Be exhorted in the words of Christ John 6.17 Labour not so much or chiefly for the meat that perisheth but for that which endureth to everlasting life Luke 10.41 42. Be not with Martha careful about many things so as in the mean time to neglect the one thing needful 5. Be convinced that God is the best portion and make him yours You are never in a safe condition till you can experimentally say Who is there in Heaven but God and who is there on Earth I can desire besides God Psal 73.25 26. Labour to say with the Psalmist Psal 31.14 I said thou art my God And with Thomas My Lord and my God To this end get an interest in Christ receive him by Faith He that hath the Son hath the Father also God promiseth it as a special priviledge to be the God of any person or People I will be their God Jer. 31.33 When God is yours Pardon of sin is yours I will remember your iniquities no more He wil accept and delight in your persons The Upright are his delight He will take pleasure in all your services Cant. 2.14 Let me see thy face and hear thy voice for sweet is thy voice and thy countenance is comely Your Prayers Praises Alms c. shall come up before God as Incense Acts 10.4 Phil. 4.18 He will alwayes be with you in every place in every condition When you are in your own and when in a strange Country when you are in prosperity when in adversity Moreover all the Promises are yours When God is yours the Covenant is yours of which the Promises are so many branches If you be troubled with the sence of sin he can pardon you if assaulted with corruptions he can strengthen you If you be sad he will comfort you if you be sick he will be your Physician if weak he can strengthen you If darkness be upon your steps he can cause the Light to shine upon your paths If you are in wants he can supply you his is the Earth and the Fulness thereof if in Prisons he will visit you and cause you to sing with Paul and Silas He is an omnipresent Good and an omniscient Good a willing and omnipotent and a sure good Men may take away your Friends or you from them but they cannot take away your God your Estates but not your God your liberty but not your God your lives but not your God God will be a satisfying Good whilst you live a comforting and supplying Good when you dye an Everlasting Good after Death Above all things then get a share and interest in this God for he is the best Good none like him and as the Wise Man saith of Wisdom so let me say of God Get God get Christ God is the principal thing therefore get him and withal thy gettings get an Interest in Christ 6. Get your hearts possessed with an awe dread of Gods all-seeing Eye Walk with a constant fear of God upon your souls Prov. 23.17 Be thou in the fear of the Lord all day long whatever you think speak or do consider God stands by and sees and hears all he knows what thou thinkest and actest even in thy bed-chamber This consideration wrought mightily upon Davids spirit which made him express himself in this manner Whither shall I go from thy Presence whither shall I flee from thy Spirit there is not a thought in thy heart nor a word in thy tongue but lo he knows it altogether Psal 139. Per totum Many would be the advantages of such a temper it would keep us from many a sin we run into Prov. 16.6 By the fear of the Lord â—â—en depart from iniquity yea this is prescribed as a Remedy against all sin in general Exod. 20.20 That his fear may be before your eyes that ye sin not The reason why men do commit secret sins is Because they think no eyes sees them When Satan tempts thee saying Thou art alone the door is lockt the windows shut then say Oh but God sees me the darkness and the Light are both alike to him To this end beg of God he would maintain in your soul more of an actual sence of his Presence plead that Promise in which he saith I will put my fear in them that they may not depart frrom me Jer. 32.40 Unless God renew the fence of his Holiness and Omnipresence we shall groâ—â— atheistical and very secure 7. Serve God according to his Mind and Will neither add nor diminish in God's Worship do what he bids us all he bids us and no more Deut. 12.32 What thing soever I command you observe to do it add not to it nor
when the whole harvest was gathered in Oh let God have the first and last of every day How shall your Families be distinguished from your Stables if you do not sanctifie them by Prayer The Creatures which God hath given us for our use they eat drink work and sleep now if we call not upon God daily what difference would there be betwixt our houses and our stables And so enter into your Closets Mat. 6.6 and pray unto your Father which seeth in secret Have you no secret sin to bewail no secret request to put up no particular Mercy to praise God for which you would not have others to know of Is it not a rare Priviledge that we may have liberty to prefer our private Petitions to the King of Heaven every day that we may confess our faults beg pardon ease our heavy hearts by laying them open before that God who will neither upbraid us for our weaknesses wants nor sins Brethren be constant spiritual and fervent in Prayer and it will prove like Sauls Sword and Jonathans Bow which never returned empty Do not hearken to the excuses of flesh and blood which are many but attend to God's Command the Example of Christ and his followers which will oblige you in point of duty and to the Sweetness and Benefit of it which may encourage and allure you 11. Think much of and live in preparation for death walk now and then amongst the Tombs live every day as dying men Get into such a Condition as would fit us for Death every hour Dye daily Deut. 32.29 Oh that you were so wise as to consider your latter â—â—d Dying thoughts would not be a little advantageous they would keep from sin What sin this hour when thou mayest die next they would keep us from doting upon the world from pride of life Why art thou proud of hair and beauty when both shall be turned into dust ere long Shall you and I idolize a coloured piece of clay who though now it proudly and haughtily treads upon the Earth within a few dayes shall it self be trodden upon as mire and dirt O get to be in the number of those servants whom Christ when he comes shall find so being and so doing The Prophet said to Hezekiah Set thy house in order I say to you Set your souls in order against the hour of dying The want of this is of ill consequence for hence it is that men go on securely in sin live as Atheists without God idolize the World and never look to the state of their souls 12. Prepare for Judgement make your Answer ready Put the case before-hand to your selves say with thy self I must ere long appear before the Tribunal of God what can I answer what can I say for my self at that day Who is it that will be Advocate or have I an Advocate that will speak for me how shall I come off shall I stand or shall I fall what will be my sentence Brethren be like him who thought he heard this voice alwayes sounding in his ears Arise ye Dead and come to Judgment The Apostle Paul thought seriously of it and lived as one to be judged 2 Cor. 5.10 For we must all appear before the Judgment-Seat of Christ to give an account of the things done in the body whether they be good or evil 13. Be often thinking of Eternal Death Walk now and then upon the brinks of Hell get your hearts affected with the reality and greatness of Hells torments Meditate with thy self what Hell is say with thy self Can I endure to lose the smiles of God how shall I endure the frowns of an infinite Majesty If God's terrors have distracted his Friends on Earth what will they do with me if I go to Hell Think what a torment it wil be to be shut out of the company of Saints to see Abraham Isaac Jacob Peter Paul and the rest of the Disciples and Servants of God in all ages in the Kingdom of Heaven and you your selves shut out and what a vexation it will be to be amongst none but damned wretches How canst thou endure to hear the Saints singing praises in Heaven and thou thy self roaring in the infernal Pit Often think of the Worm of Conscience How shall we endure to have Conscience alwayes setting our sins before our eyes It 's a burden now to lie under the gallings of an accusing Conscience O consider that Conscience will continually gnaw and fret in Hell It will be alwayes telling thee of thy sins the place where the time when the persons with whom and all the circumstances that aggravate thy sin Such a time remember thou wast overcharged with Drunkenness such a time thou blasphemedst the holy Name of God with Oaths and Curses Such a time in such a chamber with such a person thou wast wanton and impure Remember what means of Grace thou hast enjoyed what and how many Sermons thou didst or mightst have heard how many able Ministers lived and dyed in thy time Remember will Conscience say what Instruction Reproof and Corrections thou hadst from thy Parents Tutors and Covernours yea remember thou wast not far from the Kingdom of Heaven thou didst fully expect to have gone thither and now thou must be tormented in this flame Again think what a misery it will be to be there where is no mercy where there will be pain without ease sorrow without any joy despair without any hope eternity without end O Eternity Eternity Eternity Often to think of eternal death is the way to escape it If you would not descend into Hell really descend into it mentally If you would not be in Hell by possession be much in it now by meditation This would make us jealous and put us upon trying the state of our souls lest it should unexpectedly be our portion to be amongst the Devil and his Angels for ever 14. Begin betime to be Religious Put not off Holiness Righteousness and Sobriety till old age 1 Kings 18.12 It 's written in commendation of Obadiah that he feared the Lord from his youth It 's King Josiah's honour that while he was yet young he began to seek the Lord God of his fathers 2 Chron. 34.2 3. It 's Mnasons honour that he was an old Disciple Acts 21.16 he began betime and continued till old age Timothy knew the Scriptures from his youth Consider we know not whether old age will be granted us to be religious in be religious whilst ye may The sooner we set upon Piety the sooner we shall honour God and the better God will take it He will remember the kindness of religious youth And by minding Religion soon we may be secured from many sins which others run into and so be secured from the smart and torment of Conscience which old sinners find at Conversion 1. The longer we continue in sin and profaness the more sorrow contrition and humiliation we are like to meet with if ever we be changed Old Oaks must
be broken they will not bend Rough Trees must be hewn with Axes so old Sinners must find rough dealing at conversion If you would come home to God comfortably come quickly and early The sooner you begin the more sweetness you will find All God's Wayes afford Pleasantness and in all his Paths there is Peace 2. Having delivered the Counsels that concern you all in general let me now direct my speech to the Regenerate in particular To you whom the Word of God hath been the Power of God to Salvation I would commed these things that they may be kept in remembrance II. COUNSEL 1. Be very thankful for any good which God hath wrought in you by the means of Grace God is takeing away in some measure the pure and powerful dispensation of his Ordinances and this is matter of sorrow O but God hath made them advantagious to your souls already and this is matter of praise 1 Thess 1.3 5. Give thanks to God seeing the Gospel hath come to you not in word only but in the power of the holy Ghost You then that can experience a new Light in your minds Conviction in your conscience a change in your wills and holiness in your affections and union with Christ give God the praise It had been a misery indeed if God had taken us away from Ministers or Ministers from us before we had got any good by them Those amongst you that are ignorant hard-hearted unbelieving sinners have reason to be grieved at the very heart The Sun of the Gospel is eclipsing and you are not yet enlightened by it the fire is putting out before your souls be warmed It is a sad sign those are in the number of the sons of perdition from whom the clear Gospel is hid 2 Cor. 4.3 If the Gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost The Child unborn cannot midwife it self into the world when the Mother is dead but there is hopes that an Infant that is born may be nourished up even unto a perfect man Why Brethren unconverted persons are unborn and if Faithful Ministers and Ordinances should be altogether taken from you both Father and Mother dye and then who shall make you partakers of the new Birth But now you that are born again you will be able in some measure to feed your selves the meat is before you in the Scriptures and the holy Ghost will help you to feed on it If there should not be a succession of Pastors amongst you your condition may be sad but it is safe if you should dye without the continuance of Ordinances having a part in the Resurrection from sin to a new Nature and holiness of life the second Death shall have no dominion over you If you live longer you have former Experiences former Truths former Promises old Store to live on You have the granary of Experiences and of the Scriptures to maintain you in spiritual Life if there should come a Famine of publick Ordinances God hath not dealt with every soul as with yours Two or three of you have lived under the same Ministry have sit and heard together in the same Seats yea one of you is taken the other is left Say then with a thankful heart as Christ Why hast thou revealed thy self to me and not to others Even so Father because it seems good in thy sight Mat. 11.25 2. Walk humbly before God in a sence of your insufficency to good and proness to evil Mic. 6.8 walk humbly with thy God Never walk securely ever be jealous of your deceitful hearts Take heed of falling into sin though at present you stand Ever live under the sence of that truth that the heart is deceitful above all things and madly wicked What Master that knows the deceitfulness of a Servant would trust him too far and so who that hath had frequent experience of the falsness of his heart would put too much confidence in it for the future Ever keep low thoughts of your selves live continually in dependance upon God for strength to perform duties to subdue corruptions resist temptations and to bear afflictions Paul prayed thrice i. e. often when he had a thorn in the flesh a messenger of Satan to buffet him 3. Beware of every sin have and express godly sorrow for it break off every iniquity by repentance Beware especially of and keep your selves from your iniquities Psal 18.23 Cut off your right hand and pluck out your right-eye-sins Mat. 5.29 God hates it Jer. 44.4 it grieves him They rebelled and vexed his Spirit it will grieve you also 1 Pet. 2.11 and wars against the soul i. e. against the Peace and Tranquilty of your minds every sin contracts guilt and guilt creats trouble It 's impossible a Christian should walk comfortably whilst he showes any liking to any sin Sin doth especially prejudice us as to Prayer both before in and after Prayer it shuts our eyes that we dare not lift them up to Heaven O my God I blush and am ashamed to look up Ezra 9.6 It stops our mouths that we cannot speak and manacles our hands and contracts our hearts that we cannot lift them up to God If we would lift up hearts and hands in Prayer without doubting we must lift up holy hands 1 Tim. 2.8 Sin makes a Christian act like an enemy towards God and to think God is justly turned to be his enemy and who can with any heart ask any favour from an enemy If we would draw near to God in full assurance of Faith we must come with an heart sprinkled from a guilty and defiled conscience and our lives washed with pure water Heb. 10.22 Again the least sin smiled upon puts us back in our Christian course it weakens Faith takes away our Courage disheartens us from doing our very duty How canst thou reprove another with courage saith conscience when thou thy self knowest thou standest in need of reproof well than exercise daily repentance for daily failings sue out a pardon every day and get one Seal more added to your Pardon daily you have as much need to pray for daily forgiveness as for daily bread 4. Grow in Grace 2 Pet. 3.18 Make progress in holiness take heed of decaying beware lest God's Ministers lose the things they have wrought upon and amongst you 2 Ep. John ver 8. Increase your knowledge Follow on to know the Lord let your repentings for sin be kindled go from one degree of Faith to another let your love to God abound more and more The more Grace you have the more you will glorify God the fitter you will be to do him service the more able to bear affliction a little Grace is not enough to bear great Trials and the more Grace the fitter for Glory yea and very probably the more Glory To this end continue in the use of those means that uphold and encrease Grace Ex eisdem nutrimus ex quibus constamus Feed upon the Milk of God's Word and the
of sin to avoid the evil of trouble This is to make a covenant with Hell and to be at an agreement with Death But when the overflowing scourge shall pass through the Land God shall disanull their Covenant and break their Agreement Isa 28.15 18 19. This there carnal wisdom shall be destroyed the iniquity of their heels shall compass them about and they shall be taken in the snare of Vengance so much of this fourth Observation the next is this Doct. 5. That it is a special part of Christian Wisdom to redeem Time to know and discern time and Opportunities doth very much conduce to this redeeming of Time but this the Wise man makes the property of a wise mans heart Eccles 8.5 Redeeming of Time implies some kind of recovering that time which is already lost a diligent improvement of that which is present to the best advantage and a getting before hand with time by making sure of Eternity I would have told you how to redeem Time in three particulars 1. The loss and former misspending of precious time must be heartily bewailed and repented of 2. Those lusts and affections by which time hath The Conclusion My Brethren I have now finished my Text and my Work together for so it hath pleased God in his wise Providence to order affaires that I may not be any longer amongst you in that capacity in which I have been I dare not murmur nor repine I desire with the holy Psalmist to be dumb and not open my mouth because the Lord hath done it Neither men nor any other creatures can do any thing but what God is â—â—â—â—sed to permit them to do I profess seriously from my soul that could I have kept a good Conscience and my station among you also I do not know what good this World could afford that could have prevailed so far upon my affections as to have drawn me away from you In that little time that the Lord hath been pleased to give me an abode among you I have had very great comfort and contentment in my relation to you I desire to bless God from my heart who hath made you teachable and tractable willing to be instructed and informed for that is my rejoycing above all other things which will be my rejoycing in the great Day of the Lord Jesus Though I forget not your Love to me as your Minister expressed in common Courtesies and Civilities yet this is not a place and time to make mention of them But your diligent attendance on God's Word and Ordinances in publick your willing submission to private Instruction and Reproof the flocking of many of you to Repetion the chearful coming of the younger sort to Catechising and the progress they have made therby in the knowledge of God and Christ and the way to Life these things and whatsoever good it may have pleased God to have wrought in you by my poor labours among you have been the comfort of my heart and the remembrance of them will be my joy when I have other sad thoughts enough to press if not oppress my spirits after this day Well my Glass is run my time is short and I have but a few more words to speak to you I am now for ought I know preaching my last Sermon and my face which you have often seen in this Pulpit you are never never like to see here any more I would fain speak one word that might stick by you longer than ordinary as the last words of a dying Friend are wont to do A dying man especially a dying Father hath commonly some word of advice to give to his Friends and Children about him and something to request of them before he leaves the world God hath made me in the room of a spiritual Father to you and now I am as a dying Friend that must never speak in publick to you again I have a word of advice to give you and something to intreat of you and this Advice and Request I shall leave with you as my last Legacy 1. My first Word of Advice shall be the same which the Apostle hath here given us in the Text That you would with all seriousness endeavour to walk circumspectly and to live exactly according to the Rule of Gods Word in performing all holy Duties that God hath required and in avoiding all sins that God hath forbiâ—den This Advice is for your own good and yoâ— cannot reject it without rejecting the Command of God himself and therefore I do the more earnestly press it upon you You know not what Temptations and Tryals you may come to meet withal and therefore get it fast fixed and rooted in your hearts and consciences that you ought to live exactly and strictly Perhaps the time may come when you may neglect Duties and no body put you in mind of them when you may sin freely and none check or reprove you for it when you may swear and curse and blaspheme the Name of God and be drunk and prophane the Sabbath and have no body to tell you of your sins or to warn you of the danger of them nay perhaps you may be encouraged to these sins or perswaded to them or led to them by the evil example of those who should draw you from them and you may be hated and reproached for Fanaticks and Puritans and I know not what if you make any scruple of running into all excess of riot God forbid that this should ever come to pass but if it should and you not have a principle of Circumspection Exactness within your own breasts and consciences to restrain you my heart trembles to think what a sad condition you would be in and in how great danger you would be of being led away with the errour of the wicked to the utter and everlasting undoing of your poor Souls Well God write this Memento upon every one of your hearts and Consciences I beseech you my Brethren for Christ's sake and for your own poor Souls sake that you will not slight or forget this Advice Oh remember remember I beseech you that it is but a little a very little while before you and I and all the world shall meet together and stand naked before the Judgement Seat of Jesus Christ to give an account of this very thing and to answer to this very question Whether we have lived circumspectly and exactly or no Oh how sad a thing would it be if I should meet any of you there who having neglected this Advice and gone on in your sinful wayes and lived loosely and dyed impenitently if I should meet you I say trembling with guilt before the face of Jesus Christ and should be necessitated to confess and say Lord these very men and women I did advise warn perswade intreat beseech with all seriousness and earnestness that they would break off their sins by repentance and spend the rest of their dayes in walking circumspectly and living exactly and told them in thy
Name the danger of a loose careless prophane and worldly life let them now speak let their own consciences say if I did not and yet they would not hear they would not obey Oh Sirs how would you be able to look Jesus Christ in the face Nay how would you be able to look me in the face at that day I beseech you think of this seriously before hand before it be too late I profess to you your souls are so dear to me that I would not for a thousand worlds be your accuser before the Judgment Seat of Jesus Christ but yet if you will not be advised your blood shall be upon your own heads and I shall be free I shall now conclude this Particular with that one word of the Apostle 2 Pet. 3.11 14. Seeing then that the Heavens and Elements and Earth and all the Works that are therein shall be dissolved what manner of Persons ought ye to be in all holy Conversation and Godliness Wherefore beloved seeing that ye look for such things be diligent that ye may be found of Christ in peace without spot and blameless 2. The second Word of Advice that I have to leave with you I shall likewise take out of my Text and that is That you would carefully redeem precious Time for God and your own poor souls A common understanding might easily suggest reason enough to follow this Advice Do but consider how little a time we have yet to live in this World how much time we have already spent in vain how sure an account we must give for our time as well as other talents remember that Eternity depends upon this moment we owe God all our time and we cannot lay it out better than for our poor souls Especially consider this grand Argument of the Apostle in the Text that the dayes are evil If it be bad Weather and an unseasonable Harvest and all the Corn upon the ground be like to be spoiled the Husbandman will be sure to raise the price of his good old Corn. Do but use the same Spiritual good husbandry for your souls You may perhaps think that you have many years to live in the world still that is very uncertain Oh but however consider that opportunities of doing and receiving good are few and like to be fewer still and by how much the more rare they are shall they not be the more precious with you God in mercy prevent our fears and jealousies but it is too suspitious that a good Sermon may be rare a good Exhortation or Reproof may be rare a good Minister may be rare an opportunity of Christian Friends praying together may be rare Therefore redeem time while you may lay hold upon every opportunity of good and labour to know in this your day the things that belong to your eternal peace before they be hid from your eyes When Death comes and Judgment comes it will then be too late and therefore in vain to cry out for a little more time for one more good Sermon for liberty of praying once more to God for Grace and Mercy I should have enlarged my Advice in some particulars of strict walking and improving precious time Pray hard set up that great duty of Christianity in your Families Keep Wickedness not only out of your hearts and houses but out of the Town too to the utmost of your power Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy What help you want in publick make up by your holy diligence in private Reade the Scriptures and other good Books much You that have learned your Catechism do not forget it Parents and Masters have a care of your Children and Servants Husbands and Wives watch over one another provoke one another to that which is good Neighbours exhort and admonish one another pray with and for one another and go before one another in an holy Example But I have not time to ennumerate all I have now given you my Advice and I pray God that you may follow it in truth and now I come in the last place to make my last publick Request unto you I bless God I covet no mans Silver nor Gold my Conscience bears me witness that I have not sought yours but you and now at last all that I shall beg of you is your prayers for me and that I hope none of you will deny me I have taken some pains among you I have often prayed for you and by the Grace of God shall never cease praying for you that the Lord would keep you from evil and furnish you with his Grace and afterwards bring you to Glory All the recompence that I ask of you is That you would not forget me at the Throne of Grace but let me have a share in your prayers In many respects I do earnestly and heartily beg your prayers but I must not now mention them all One is this That God would be pleased to pardon my great Unfaithfulness and Unprofitableness among you I beseech you Brethren do not think that I am now complementing with you Something I have done and God forbid that I should not have some ground to hope that God hath blessed my poor Labours to the doing of some good amongst you and perhaps my weak Labours have been acceptable yea and I bless God for that acceptance they have found with you yet truly Sirs God knows and mine own Conscience tells me that I have come much short very much short of that which was my duty to have done which if not pardoned in the Blood of Christ I should never be able to answer before God in the day of my Accounts and therefore I heartily beg your prayers on this behalf Another thing for which I beg your prayers to God for me is That it would please the Lord not to lay me aside as a broken vessel and an unprofitable creature upon the face of the Earth but that yet in what capacity soever the Lord sees good I may do him some service before I go hence and be no more seen I have but a little inch of time to live in this world and my great desire is that while I do live I may be useful for otherwise life will be but a sin or a burden I beseech you pray also that I may be delivered from or strengthened under temptations I am a poor weak creature and cannot stand but by the Grace and Strength of God and I know not what condition the Lord hath allotted for me Only this I have learn'd from the Word of God that they that will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer Persecution 2 Tim. 3.12 Pray therefore that what sufferings foever the Lord shall at any time call me to I may be enabled by his Grace and Strength so to behave my self under them as that even by suffering I may glorifie his Name and bear witness to the Truth and practise what I have preached and give a good example to others and credit the Gospel and that Profession which I have made thereof My Brethren methinks I have much yet to say and I know not where to break off yet I must come to a conclusion Leave my Work in publick I must and leave you I must or else I must break with God and my own Conscience This is my great grief but yet it is my greatest grief of all that I must leave any unconverted sinners amongst you I profess to you seriously that if I know my own heart I could with chearfulness and joy forsake not only my Living and Livelihood but even my Life also so that I could but see every Drunkard and Swearer and Curser and Sabbath-breaker and Worldling and Prophane person among you converted to a life of Faith and Holiness I dare not not onely for fear of man but chiefly out of conscience I dare not open my lips to utter one word to encourage you to Faction or Schism or any unquietness but with the Apostle I exhort you to follow the things that make for Peace and to wait upon God for the mending of what is amiss But this I must tell you withall that if you do not follow after the things that make for Holiness also you shall never see the Face of God to your comfort Therefore follow after Holiness Follow not that which is evil but that which is good 3 John 11. In the midst of all my other griefs and troubles I shall have no greater joy than to see or hear that any of you walk in the Truth I have preached the Word of Truth to you according to that understanding in the Scriptures which God hath given me I beseech you remember what I have spoken to you in the Name of God and Christ and look to your selves that we lose not those things which we have wrought but that we receive a full reward Let me use the following words of the Apostle to you 2 John 8 9 10 11. Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the Doctrine of Christ hath not God he that abideth in the Doctrine of Christ he hath both the Father and the Son If there come any unto you and bring not this Doctrine receive him not into your house neither bid him God speed For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds I must conclude though unwillingly my Farewelwords to you shall be the same with the Apostle's last Farewel to the Elders of Ephesus Acts 20.32 And now Brethren I commend you to God and the Word of his Grace which is able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified Amen Amen FINIS
Glory by Christ Jesus make you perfect stablish strength settle and confirm you unto the end that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ I now come to make some improvement of the Point And because I want time and strength to speak more fully to it I shall limit my self onely to one branch of Application Vse And I beseech you Brethren suffer the word of Exhortation O that my Counsel might be acceptable to you this day That if indeed I should never have liberty of preaching to you more yet this Word this Exhortation of mine mine did I say nay this Exhortation of the Apostle might ever be fresh in your thoughts and as it were continually sounding in your ears O whatever you do or leave undone be â—ure to look after your main business to work out your Salvation And now what I might have brought in as Reasons of the Doctrine I shall offer to you here as Motives to enforce the Exhortation to press you to the duty 1. Consider there is no work you can set your selves about so necessary as this to work out your Salvation Either do this or you do nothing Leave this undone and you are undone for ever You know the wages of the slothful and unprofitable servant Cast him into utter darkness where is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth If we are loth to be at any pains for Heaven this slothfulness shall be scourged at last with the endless insufferable pains of Hell Though there were never so many Lions in the way to Heaven yet should we resolve to go on and otherwise we are sure to fall into the Lions mouth that our souls shall be made his prey 2. Consider the work of our Salvation sticks no where if it stick not at us it sticks not on Christ's hand O how did he sweat at this work the purchasing of Salvation for us It drave him into a bloody sweat yet he went thorow with his work And now he is able to save to the uttermost all that come to him and he would be the Author of eternal Salvation unto all that obey him Heb. 5.9 This blessed work sticks not on the Father's hand who is willing all men should be saved first coming to the knowledge belief and obedience of the Truth God excludes none from Salvation who are willing to be saved in that way the Gospel sets forth He excludes none who exclude not themselves The work sticks not at the Spirit neither who is so oft moving and perswading yea striving with us to set about this good work How unreasonable a thing is it now if the work sticks on our hands who are most concerned to promote it Oh how strange if it should stick here 3. Consider this is the end of all the labours of God's Ministers They are sent from God to shew you the way of Salvation They are God's Stewards and Overseers to call you to and direct you in your work Ah Beloved it 's well if so many of them as are now like to be laid aside be not therefore taken off their work to punish the negligence of the most because Hearers have been too mindless generally of their work Verily this will be unprofitable for you that your poor Ministers should have bestowed on you labour in vain Though we would bless God for any the least success for blessing our endeavours unto any yet surely we should have had more comfort at this day could we have seen more good done that souls had less need of us 4. Consider that diligence in working out of your Salvation would not obstruct but rather promote and bring a blessing on other works you have to take in hand Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness let your main care be laid out that way take most thought for your souls and for the life to come and all these things shall be added unto you Believe it Sirs Godliness is the greatest gain for that it hath the promise both of the life that now is and of that which is to come 1 Tim. 4.8 See Deut. 29.9 5. Again have not many of us done something this way already If we would not lose the things we have wrought then let us go through-stitch with out work O let us not be weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not O my Friends how sad it is to faint and tire in the way to Heaven As it 's the portion of such to lie down in sorrow Let us therefore fear as the Apostle exhorts in Heb. 4.1 lest a promise being left us of entring into his rest any should seem to come short of it That we should have been once in a fair way for Heaven but since we were not careful to hold on our way and therefore have fallen short at last O how would such thoughts eternally torment us Blessed be God I may say in reference to many of you as the Apostle Peter 1 Pet. 5.12 That this is the true Grace of God wherein ye stand Wherein if you continue and persevere you shal ere long see the work of Grace in your souls crowned with Glory And I am perswaded am confident of this very thing that he which has begun a good work in many of your souls will perform will carry on the same unâ—il the day of Jesus Christ And therefore gird up the loins of your minds up and be doing for now is your Salvation nearer than when first ye believed 6. I add but this one consideration more The more pains you are at here in your life-time in working out your Salvation the more peace and comfort may you expect in the hour of death The rest of the labouring man is sweet They that now are taking most pains for Heaven when they come to dye enter into peace indeed O the vast difference betwixt those who in fear have wrought out their salvation here and those that have wrought out their destruction without fear We shall see a difference betwixt these one day And as I have told you often I tell you this once more It is better better a thousand thousand degrees to go toiling and sweating to go sighing and weeping yea or bleeding to Heaven than to go slugging and sleeping or to go singing and dancing to Hell Now perhaps some of you are ready to say These are weighty considerations and we are now convinced how much it is our duty and our wisdom to set about this work and therefore we resolve upon it if you would give us the best direction you can about it Here I would close up this subject with some directions but first let me give you two or three necessary cautions 1. Take heed of having your heads hearts and hands too deeply engag'd in the World They that make that their great study and business to be rich in this World take a ready way to destroy their souls 1 Tim. 6.9 Many in
their over eager desires to embrace this present World have let Heaven go have lost that for ever 2. Take heed of following mens examples further than you see them to follow the Rule of God's Word the world is ever ful of bad examples if we would walk safely we must walk by Rule If we think it enough only to do as the most there is little hopes of our working out our salvation Matt. 7.13 The word of Christ must judge you hereafter O let it guide you here As many as walk according to this Rule peace shall be upon them and mercy In matters of Religion of Salvation believe none follow none further than there is ground for their opinions and practices in God's written Word Were we to follow mens examples or mens traditions in matters of Religion besides the Scriptures then will not this follow viz. That the Scriptures are not a perfect Rule as the Papists teach that it must be eeked out with unscriptural traditions and the commandments or documents of men And do but once admit this and we shall have no certain Rule at all 3. Take heed of consultiâ—â— here with flesh and blood In the matters of our Salvation not the Flesh who is ever at that Master spare thy self but Conscience informed out of God's Word must be our Counsellor Our souls interest and our carnal interest are many times cross to one another Hence it is our Saviour so much insists on the duties of self-denial and taking up the Cross Yea he further tells us He that findeth his life shall lose it and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it You know great works are seldom perfected at a small charge A rich Mine it will cost a man something before he comes to it but when he has found it it soon recompenseth him for all his former pains and expences both Heaven and Salvation is such a Treasure though we should lose all our earthly comforts this would certainly repair all our losses and make and enrich our souls for ever 4. Take heed of delaying to set to this work Oh! have we not delayed too long Have we not lost time and lost special opportunities lost such advantages for carrying on this work as for any thing we know we may never enjoy again It is high time now to awake out of sleep to shake off Spiritual sloath to apply our selves to the work in good earnest who knows but the day of our visitation the time of our life and of God's patience may be very near an end It may be the eleventh hour However the longer it is ere we set to our work the more difficulty we shall find in it I now come to the Directions 1. See that you understand your work Be ye not unwise but understanding what the will of the Lord is Yea study to be filled with the knowledge of his Will Rest not in good meanings My People are destroyed for lack of knowledge Hos 4.6 â—ee here though bare knowledge cannot save one yet many a one is destroyed for lack of knowledge Beloved though we may not be permitted to preach publickly yet I know not that it would be any crime for us to instruct such in private as repair to us for assistance and advice O that poor souls were as ready to make use of us as we are willing to afford them the best help we can 2. Be sure your Ground-work be good Build on the Rock Christ so indeed you need not fear but your Work will stand Other Foundation can no man lay If ye build besides this Rock or build partly on Christ and partly on your selves the work will come to nought We are quite lost and ruined in our selves that we must be taken off from our own bottoms brought out of our selves to Jesus Christ or we cannot be saved 3. Do all in Christ's strength Phil. 3.13 This way the Apostle Paul went to work Then the work of our Salvation is like to go forward when we have Christ the Saviour putting to his helping hand and joyning with us O as ever you would have your work to prosper be sure you take Christ along with you 4. As Noah being moved with fear fell to work and prepared an Ark to the saving of himself and of his house so let us work out our Salvation with fear We should have a reverent fear towards God to quicken us to duty and to awe and make us exceeding serious in duty Again we should have a jealous fear of Satan and our own sinful deceitful hearts to look narrowly to them who like Sanballat and Tobiah will do but what they can to hinder and take us off our work 5. Labour much with God in prayer Thus there were hopes the work would be going forward Observe what immediately follows the Text It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure When it could â—â—â—aid of Paul Behold he prayeth then was Ananias â—â—nt to confirm him that he might receive his sight and be filled with the holy Ghost Acts 9.11 17. The Work is great to work out your Salvation and it is possible you may want some helps you have had yea and meet with greater hindrances new difficulties in it O pray in strength to carry you thorow It may be you shall not have liberty to hear so much to quicken you the more to prayer You may have fewer hearing-opportunities that you shall have more time to pray 6. Up and be doing when you can find the Spirit at work in your hearts Attend to the motions of God's Spirit This is a special season not to be let slip when we have an offer of his co-operating Grace 7. Do all as in the sight of God Set the Lord ever before you Eye-service is a fault in our servants condemned Eph. 6.6 but a vertue in God's servants Indeed could we but ply our work while God's eye is on us we should never be idle or ill-employed 8. Let out the strength of your spirits in the weighty matters of God's Law and not about trivial unnecessary things Such things as God no where requires of which he sayes In vain do they worship me after the traditions of men If we make our selves busie in building hay and stubble on the Foundation our work shall be burnt and we shall suffer loss 9. Improve the day time God hath alotted to you wherein to work The day of Grace O that we had known our day we have had a large space and a fair season of working granted to us and yet I am afraid that as to the most of us little of our work is done The consideration of our former loss of time should cause us henceforward to double out diligence Now let not a day pass over your heads wherein you do not some way further thâ—â—â—â—â—rk of your salvation Especially improve the Lorâ—â— Day Sabbath-dayes are dayes of resting from outward labours from