Discipline amongst themselves if any of their company did commit any grosse sinne they did cast him out of their company and provided a coffin for him intimating hereby they looked upon him as a dead man This heavenly spiritual life whereby a man doth all things by supernatural and holy principles to holy and godly ends deserveth the name of life Hence Ephes 4.18 it 's called The life of God either because of the conformity and likenesse of it to Gods life or because God is the Authour and worker of this life in his children Tell us not then that such a man liveth richly and happily having a great Estate a glorious Seat large Revenues he liveth that liveth this spiritual life and without it as the Apostle saith of those wanton widows They are dead while alive 1 Tim. 5.6 Oh now thou wouldst weep over thy husband thy child if they were corporally dead why doest thou not much more for their spiritual death We reade of the Aegyptians what an outcry they made for the death of one in every family But how many families are there that have none but dead persons in them Alas thou must needs be dead for thou seest not with thy eyes the beauty of spiritual things Thou hearest not with thy ears the lively word of God neither canst thou walk with thy feet in the way to Heaven Thirdly The godly man onely liveth Because he only hath the true blessednesse and comfort of this life He onely hath true joy and peace of conscience and this not onely the Scripture cals life viz. a prosperous happy estate as when they said Live ô King but the Heathens also Vivamus mî amica vixit dum vixit bene vita non est vivere sed valere There are some men who live this life and yet Job saith they long for death Their life is a burden and a torment to them when it 's day they wish it were night and when it 's night they wish it were day This God threatens as a curse to every one that shall not keep the Law Now the godly man he onely liveth so as to have true joy real happinesse because his sinnes are pardoned God is only his portion and delight At thy right hand are pleasures for evermore said Dâ—vid Psal 16.11 And although the godly may sometimes through their own sinne or for their exercise be deprived of this joyfull and blessed life yet that is for their good as Lazarus's death was that his Sisters faith and Gods glory may be the more magnified And besides as Christs body so their souls shall not alwayes be kept under the cords of this death This is therefore by accident The promise to godlinesse is joy and gladnesse of heart They are called upon to doe it they are commanded to it Lay this then downe for a sure Rule That thou doest not live thou hast not a prosperous joyfull and happy heart till thus sanctified Fourthly The godly only live or life is theirs Because they only know how to improve the dayes of their life for God They make the right uâ—e of their life and time here which is to provide for eternity to glorifie God and save their souls When Paul could say I have fought a good fight I have finished my course 2 Tim. 4 7. This was an argument he lived Our Saviour spake many Parables to shew how we should improve our Talents and be alwayes gaining till our Master come whereas if thou spendest thy time on thy losts and pleasures of sinne if thou art idle and negligent thou hast not lived Idlenesse is the burial of a man alive We do not account our time of sleep so properly part of our life because we do nothing then And this is a full proof that only godly men live because they only make honey while the Summer shines they onely husband their time while it's day calling upon God They onely accomplish that work and errand for which God sent them into the world Remember this he liveth that is active for God in his generation that moveth continually for the good of his soul Let it not be said of thee as Seneca of one who kept close in his house Hic situs est Bascia as if he were buried there Fifthly Life is onely the godly mans Because he hath an interest in eternal life John 5.24 He hath passed from death unto life He shall never die that liveth this life Now alas this temporary natural life doth not deserve the name of a life The very Heathens thought so and the Scripture cals it but a shadow not a substance What are a few evil dayes here and full of misery Shall we judge it a life No surely eternal life deserveth only that name where there is no fear of a change where no power or violence can overcome where mortality is swallowed up in immortality This is the life that the Scripture inviteth all unto Did Dives live though he boasted good things were stored up for him No This night thou fool thy soul shall be taken away Wilt thou call this a life to have a few pleasures of sinne for a season and then to go into eternal torments Do not the damned in hell wish they had never been born that this natural life had never been bestowed upon them Do not thou then matter this moment but set thy heart upon eternity Is not this life a vapour a bubble but the life to come that must make me happy When God promised several outward mercies to Abraham O saith Abraham that Ishmael might live before thee All these outward things are nothing if he live not this spiritual and eternal life Sixthly The godly man only liveth Because he taketh his life from God and referreth it to his glory Whether we live we live to the Lord said Paul Rom. 14.8 They receive their life thankfully from God and they live to his glory Now we say he hath a thing that knoweth how to make the right use of it and thus because the godly know how to receive their life from God and to return it again to him Therefore it is that they have life yea they have it because they can readily part with it at Gods Command I die daily said Paul 1 Cor. 15.31 And this is our Saviours sure Rule Luke 17.23 He that will lose his life shall save it and he that will save it shall lose it You see the way to have life is to part from it he hath it that hath it not as the Martyrs who as willingly laid down their lives as we our garments Seventhly The righteous only live Because they mortifie and subdue those sinnes that kill our bodies that take away our lives Wrath and quarrelling that depriveth a man of the peace of his life now he refraineth his tongue he is of a meek spirit whereas anger is like a fire burning in the bowels and so grief is a waster of the very bones Worldly sorrow worketh
active and diligent thou art speaking of thy opinion to all but art thou a Bee making honey or a Wasp stinging others Never care to company with those that you perceive have a sting onely and no honey The Pharisâ—es what a deal of pains did they take to disciple others to themselves They compassed â—ea and Land as Merchants to get wealth and when all was done they made themselves and their hearers in greater danger of damnation than before Thus the Jesuites are as industrious as the Devil compassing the whole world to make a prey of mens souls But all this labour will accuse them the more The Wiseman observeth great vanity in all worldly labour but especially in matters of Religion to labour in vain there to lose all thy nights and thy dayes and thy study and thy pains is beyond expression miserable Fourthly They will lose their inward peace and comfort of conscience How many that have turned aside from the truth to errour have found tormenting worms gnawing their conscience They have not found it a light sinne witnesse Spira and many others He that denieth me saith our Saviour him will I deny before the Father and the holy Angels and the whole world Mat. 10.33 And indeed there can be no sound comfort but upon Scripture truths for Gods presence will go along only with his own truths Even as it is in his Sacraments Gods grace will be exhibited and true comfort conveyed only in his instituted Sacraments if men should appoint any of their own head they cannot look for his presence and efficacy So it is here If men broach errours and false wayes God will not own them a fire of straw and stubble will give but short and little comfort to a cold man Fifthly They lose though not the total seed of grace yet the degree and fervency of it yea in regard of outward appearance all seemeth to be lost They have not that tendernesse that strictnesse they once had Hence the Apostle couples The shipwrack of faith and a good conscience together 1 Tim. 1.19 Lose one and you lose the other How carefull is the Apostle to forbid all those disputes which do not tend to godlinesse and which do not edifie 2 Tim. 2.16 The shell-fish was unclean it had but little meat in it and a great deal of difficulty to get it Men given wholly to dispute do not mind the affectionate part of godlinesse Grapes do not usually grow on such thorns This then should make every one look to what he buildeth take heed thou art not falling into a noisom pit look lest that when thy eye groweth dark thy whole body will quickly grow dark and to decay in grace is a great provocation of God To decay in thy estate in thy health are sad things but in thy love to God in thy fervency in thy zeal is much more miserable Remember from whence thou art fallen and do thy first works Rev. 2.5 It 's our duty to grow in grace and for thee to do the clean contrary to decay in grace must needs provoke Now part of this growing in grace is to keep stedfastly to the truth That is very observable 2 Pet. 3 17. They must not fall from their stedfastnesse And how shall that be By growing in grace and knowledge Yea lastly Men lose their parts and gifts They have not that clearnesse and soundnesse of understanding as they had Hence errour doth corrupt the mind as rust doth the iron To him that hath shall be given it 's spoken of the right using of our talents and from him that doth not use it in a right manner shall be taken away all that he hath Mat. 25.29 Vse 1. Of Exhortation to us Ministers to be much in prayer and diligent study in attending unto the word of God You see here unsound and false preaching may bring us to great and sad losses worse than of outward substance and maintenance even of inward comfort and peace with God and this we are the more to attend to by how much we know but in part and understand but in part As the bodily eye is subject to a world of diseases and any distemper there is very dangerous So the mind of a man is subject to much corruption blindnesse ignorance injudiciousnesse vain and false reasonings insomuch that it 's a proverbial expression Humanum est errare what is that but as much as humanum est damnari if God prevent not Seeing therefore we are thus compassed about with infirmities which may prove destructive this should make us humble modest to say as Hierom Nunquam meipsum habui magistrum I never was my own master If others will be bold and presumptuous yet do thou tremble then thou wilt gain when such shall lose Vse of Admonition to you the people see that in the matters of Religion you be no losers Religion is every mans study the Bible should be every mans book Though God doth not require of you controversal and sublime Divinity yet the knowledge of such Doctrines as are fundamental and necessary to salvation you are to be acquainted with yea you are not to be alwayes in principles but as the Apostle saith To be carried on to further perfection Heb. 6.1 Now in all your study you may be losers You may have a vain faith a vain Religion and that is when it 's not upon the Scripture-foundation every man hopes he shall not lose The Turk thinketh he shall not lose by believing his Alcoran The Jew that he shall not lose his expectation of a Messiah The Papist hopes that all his Image worship all his fastings and pilgrimages shall not be lost but the Word speaketh contrary He shall be saved yet so as by fire A two-fold losse you heard was here threatned to erroneous teachers And the first part we have dispatched and now proceed to the later and the phrase is already explained To be saved as by fire signifieth The great extremity and danger such a man is in of damnation He is like a fire-brand pulled out of the fire For that explication of some of the Greek Fathers especially Chrysostome who in many other places of the New Testament doth often judiciously interpret is in this particular very incredible He shall be saved saith he that is he shall be kept alive and yet in hell fire So that he thinketh the Apostle saith he shall be damned yet this damnation is a kind of a living death and a dying life he shall be alwayes in hell fire yet saved alive He doth use saith Chrysostome a good word in a sad and evil matter Every one may see this is forced We stand therefore to the former explication as that which is most genuine And two things may be observed very material 1. Whereas you see erroneous and false Doctrines though not overthrowing the foundation do yet dangerously shake a mans salvation puts it to a great hazard Observe That even errours of judgement may endanger a
but seldome that he envyeth such a man because this denoteth a thought that such a man is Superiour to him and that is against the natural pride in every man Secondly Those are subject to this sin of envy who are in a similitude of condition estate trad or profession or where there is any competition for one thing and both cannot have it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One tradesman envyeth another of the same trade or profit thus one Scholler one Gentleman one Favourite another one Co-partner in Government another The reason why Lycinius grew so desperately mad against the Christians whom he had formerly defended was because Christians in their meetings prayed for Constantine and not him the ground of Saul's envy and hatred to David was because the women sang Saul slew his thousands and David his ten thousands Phil. 1.19 Some preach Christ out of envy These were teachers that out of envy to Paul who had all the glory took the occasion now he was imprisoned and could not preach to set forth Christ and they thought Paul like themselves ambitious of glory and esteem and therefore that this would grieve and vex Paul but such was his grace that he could rejoyce in it Thirdly Such are subject to Envy who because they cannot abide the good of others they therefore study all the wayes to disparage and obscure the name and excellency of such If they have any failings if there be any weaknesses they rake in them talk of them neglecting the good as the Kite that flyeth over the pleasant meadows and delights upon the dunghills and Carrion therefore an envious man discovers himself by his talk his words though such a man hath never so much worth and excellency in him yet that he will never mention or if he do it 's only craftily that others may not think he doth it out of envy Thus where charity covereth a multitude of sinne envy covereth a multitude of graces Vse 1. Of all envyings take heed of that which is against men because they are godly because they live more holily then thou dost their lives condemne thy life their purity thy uncleanness their pure worship of God thy superstition and this makes theâ— as full of poyson as a Serpent Oh if there were an opportunity Never did Paul once or Bonner or any persecuter more greedily destroy those that fear God then thou couldst Never comfort thy self that thou dost not envy or hate them for their godliness but thou condemnest them for this fault and that fault for the Pharisees that were so moved with envy against Christ they said it was not for his good works they pretended he spake blasphemy he broke the Sabbath you see they had religious pretexts Take heed of this sinne that bordereth so near upon the unpardonable sinne it's too rife it 's too common amongst men if God give thee not grace to be godly thy self if God give thee not a heart to be holy yet let not the Devil so farre fill thy heart as to make thee envy rage and blaspheme at godliness in other Oh there is a great deal of difference between that sinner whom carnal pleasures or love to the world doth keep from godliness and that sinner whom envy and a secret rancour against godliness makes keep off from the practise of it Vse 2. You that are godly especially take heed of this How contrary is this spirit of envy to that love Christ hath put into you He prayed most earnestly as the great thing before his death that the godly might be one How then comes envyings and bitter thoughts among you you that ought to have one heart one mind yea to lay down your lives for one another How comes this divelish sinne to be in you How come doves to have gall Christ that thought it no robbery to be equall to God yet became in the forme of a contemptible man for the godlyes sake and hast thou so much glory or honour to deny thy self in as he had Grudge not one against another or sigh not as the Greek is no godly man should have the least bitterness or inward sighs and discontentedness against another Jam 5 9. Let us in the next place consider the aggravation of this sinne and howsoever the heathenish Poets have described it in such an ugly loathsome and deformed shape that all may see the unloveliness of it yet they being matter only of fancy and witty invention we shall draw the pourtraiture of it from the Word of God which is a two-edged sword and every arrow from this quiver may justly strike to the heart of it First The wickedness of this sinne may be excellently illustrated by that admirable good it is opposite to for this is a rule That privation is the worst whose habit is the best that is the greatest evil which is opposite to the greatest good Now there is a three-fold good that envy doth oppose as fire water and darkness light 1. The infinite goodness in God 2. The inestimable goodness in Christ 3. The admirable goodness in the grace of love or charity So that if you would know how great an evil envy is say it is as great an evil as God is good as Christ is good it opposeth Gods goodness so that phrase implyeth Is thy eye evil because God is good Mat. 20 15. that is not intensively but privatively for envy doth take God and Christ from me my neighbour from me and my self from my self it maketh Gods goodness and thy neighbours goodness to be his evil who envyeth this bitterness upon thy heart is because God is such a fountain of goodness that he communicates his mercies freely Were envy able to fall upon that pure and spotless Majesty of God he would not have created the world nor made such glorious Angels nor give such excellent perfections to some in the world for many times God loseth his glory by this meanes when they do not praise him but dishonour him yet for all this behold the goodness of God that doth so liberally diffuse it self though his glory be obscured thereby Oh! if it lay in an envious man to make men great or admired or despicable and contemptible how quickly would he make the world a poor Hospital that he might have all the glory Behold then the venemous poison of this sinne of envy which doth grudge and repine at the glorious Attribute of God his bounty and liberality that which David is so ravished with himself and calls upon Angels and other creatures to praise God for viz. His mercy which endureth for ever this the envious man is vexed at There was a seed of this bitter wormwood in Jonah how discontented and grieved was he that God did not destroy that populous City of Ninevâ—h on a suddain and how patiently did God expostulate with him and confute him by his own Gourd that he was troubled at because consumed by a worme on a suddain Jon. 4.10 Oh if an
place unlesse the Lord will Those that cannot adde a cubit unto their own stature do yet think by their own strength to work out their salvation Oh know thou hast laid no sure foundation unlesse all thy strength and power be fetched from Christ Thou art too weak a child to go unlesse he hold thee Christ is the rock we must be built upon Fourthly The last part of this foundation is A renewed and sanctified Nature And this is of great consequence Nicodemus though so great a Master in Israel and exact in the external obedience of the Law yet being ignorant of this did fundamentally erre in all his obedience Therefore of all points you see our Saviour chiefly insists on this Vnlesse a man be borne again John 3. This was a very strange paradox to him and it 's no lesse to thousands of people who goe on in a formall customary road they regard the worke done the action it self but never the Regeneration of the nature from whence it is to flow Whereas this is all in all Make the Tree good and then the fruit will be good said Christ Mat. 12 33 The Spring and Fountain must first be clean ere the streames be The root sweet ere the fruit be Why then art thou pleasing thy selfe with the actions thou doest when thou art in the old polluted defiled nature Can men gather grapes of thornes or figs of thistles Let thy external actions be never so religious so glorious they are but like fine flowers on the dunghill or on a dead corpse there must be the inward uncleannesse the inward filthinesse cured first Oh that men had ears to hear this Oh that God would give you understanding in this thing For till the Old man be put off and the New man put on you are still in your sinnes all that you do is fit fuell for Hell none can deliver you from it till there be a change Thus unlesse Ministers and people beginne here though they should build of gold and precious stone the foundation is but of hay and stubble and that is worst of all And certainly if the Apostle make it so hard a thing to be saved though a man doe lay a good foundation if he build hay and stubble on it How impossible will that mans salvation be whose foundation is hay and stubble Mark then and consider these things in your whole conversation Let every good action have these four foundation stones under it The Scripture to direct justification to accept through Christs merit Christ to inable through his Spirit and a renewed nature to sanctifie For as it was with the Temple and the gold in the Temple The gold did not sanctifie the Temple but the Temple the gold So it is here our actions our duties doe not sanctifies us do not justifie us but these priviledges sanctifie and justifie our actions Now let us consider Why we are to be carefull about laying this Foundation First Because it 's very dangerous and it 's very easie to miscarry in this matter As Austin said about the Trinity That in any matter Nec faciliùs nec periculosiùs erratur Thus it is here Not more dangerously because eternal life and death is more immediately concerned herein The welfare of thy immortal soul should be more unto thee than all the world and that is in thy actions If the foundation be not well laid thou art undone for ever In matters of mens estates or of their bodily life how carefull are they to go upon a sure foundation Only they wilfully venture their ruine in the matters of their soule Thou wouldst be unwilling to live in an house whose foundation was rotten thou wouldst feare the falling of it about thy eares every hour Oh but what feare and trembleing should seize upon thee lest all the good thou hast promised thy selfe in thy soules way should fall to the ground for want of a sure foundation Consider then Am I in the right Timor facit consiliativum Fear would make thee jealous and suspicious As we erre dangerously so here Secondly We mistake easily We see the greatest part of Christians never attend to these things And withall the difference between true and false foundations is spiritually to be discerned Now the blinde man doth easily swallow any flie The hypocrites foundation and the true godly mans are very much alike and without much prayer humiliation and consideration we cannot practically discerne the difference Oh then say I do the outward works of Religion I am carefull to discharge them But how easie may I build all upon a false foundation The Parable our Saviour propounded of a wise builder and a foolish one should alwayes stick upon you Matth. 7. Did he speak it in vain you are all builders And every one is either building a Jerusalem or a Babel Apelles was so carefull in drawing his lines because he would pingere aeternitati as he said All thy actions do build either to an eternity of misery or an eternity of happiness Be then in an holy trembling every prayer every word every action hath influence to eternal life or eternal torment Thirdly Therefore we must look to our foundation because of the great confusion that will be at last on those who have failed therein Thus it was with the foolish builder when the tempests arose his house fell and the fall was great It was terrible and dreadfull He did not think so he looked for a comfortable and quiet possession but it proved otherwise So it is here Thou hast lived thus many yeares thou hast gone on in a customary way of religious duties thou hast performed them over and over again but hast never looked to a foundation Oh the confusion that will fill thy face when at the Day of Judgement God shall say for all those duties I know you not When you shall see all these to be a broken Reed to trust unto Oh if men would but consider afore-hand what the agonies and perplexities are that will then fall upon them they would consider and search and never give over till all be sure What confusion was upon the foolish Virgins How did they bewail their condition running up and down if there might be any hope But all is too late Fourthly Therefore lay a good foundation For if this be wanting thou doest nothing but sinne in all thou doest Not onely those plain gross acts of sin but all thy civil natural and religious actions as coming from thee are altogether sinnes To the unclean all things are unclean Titus 1.13 Who can bring a cleane thing out of an uncleane The bad Tree brings forth only bad fruit Without faith it is impossible to please God Heb. 11. Oh then How terrible is thy estate who hast not laid this foundation Thou art damning thy self all day long Thy eating thy drinking thy waking yea thy praying thy hearing as they come from thee are sinnes continually As the Tâ—â—d cannot vent honey but
Thus Jude vers 23. speaking to this purpose of many people led aside with errours saith Save them with fear pulling them out of the fire They were in as great danger as a child fallen in the fire whom the father pulleth out with great fear and amazement Thus Joshua Zech. 3.2 is said to be a fire-brand pulled out of the fire that is delivered from great and imminent dangers The same expression is Amos 4.11 Ye were as a fire-brand pluckt out of the fire he speaketh of such who had escaped the pubâ—ick judgements oâ— God upon them This proverb the Latines and Gâ—ecians also have e slammâ cibum petere This being so clear we would wonder what should make the Popish Interpreters dream of a Purgatory fire for they hold Purgatory a real fire even as that of Hell but the Apostles expression is As it were by fire which denoteth a meer similitude and comparison Gods examination and judgement as also the Word and heavy afflictions these are the fire which he must go thorow Besides many of them hold That the Apostle speaks of the Day of Judgement when all mens works shall be examined and judged so that this fire must not be till the Day of Judgement whereas they hold Purgatory fire presently upon a mans death and so necessarily before the Day of Judgement So that Austin long ago farre more probably interpreted it of afflictions in this life Even as a Merchant in a dangerous tempest throweth away all his goods and â—oseth all that he loved to escape with his own life So shall it be with any man that builds unsound and false opinions when God shall awaken him by tâ—â—bulations he will be content to throw all away to lose all He will forsake all those Doctrines he was so dearly inamoured with that he himself may escape Now here may be a very profitable Question raised Whether there be any Doctor or Teacher in the Church of God yea or Church though never so reformed that doth onely build gold and silver and not some hay or stubble Answ To this onely in the general we say That setting aside the Apostles who were infallibly inspired and directed There is ignorance and sinfull affections cleaving to every man in part and so to every Church and therefore even the most excellent men and Churches have had their straw and stubble whereby even every mans salvation though never so eminent even on his Doctrines part not attending to his life is very difficult All the Fathers had their Navi their hay and stubble And this is true of all though never so eminent in after ages But from the first observe That every man will be altogether a loser in any errour or false way that he hath maintained He shall suffer losse Sometimes by false wayes men propound base carnal ends wealth riches honours and applause in the world sometimes they think of spiritual ends more comfort and peace of heart more enjoyment of God but what Doctrine or wayes are not of God a man is sure to be frustrated of his expectations if they have them for a while they will quickly vanish away as the crackling of thorns make a blaze but continue not In the first place we shall shew Wherein they shall be losers First If they thought by erroneous wayes to better themselves in an outward condition in this world in this they are sure to lose How many have turned from truth when persecuted to errours and false wayes only to have their lives and liberties and external comforts but in the issue have been deceived of all When the Turk so prosperously prevailed many Christians imbraced the Turkish Religion In Popery and times of bloody persecution men through fear and love of the world denied the truth asserted and maintained false Doctrines But what got they many of them Did not our Saviours Rule prove true He that will save his life shall lose it and he that will lose it shall save it Mat. 16.25 And doth not the Prophet Jonah tell us a good lesson They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy Joâ— 2.8 They that would worship Idols or go into superstitious wayes they forsake that very mercy God hath provided for them otherwise Oh that this were well thought of by those who think to better themselves by those wayes that are not of God! Secondly If they looked for honour and outward dignity to be applauded and esteemed this also they shall be losers in For by the judgement of those Churches or persons that are orthodox they shall fall from all that repute and esteem they had The Church of Rome was set up like an high Mountain Did not all the people of the Christian world when there were breaches in Religion look upon her like a brazen Serpent thinking to be heard presently The repute and authority she had in all mens consciences made the politick Popes triumph over all the great ones of the world thereby and enlarge both Civil and spiritual jurisdiction But when her Idolatries and errours were discovered How odious and abominable is her very memory Now it 's the Sodom the Babylon the Aegypt John speaks of So that howsoever errours may have great applause and glory for a while yet God in time will make them vile as dung As of those corrupt Priests in thâ— worship of God God said He would spread dung upon their faces Mal. 2 3. The Phâ—risees by their superstruction of hay and stubble they intended glory and honor of the people They did all things as men acting upon a Theaâ—re but when Christ came and preached the pure word of God and discovered all theâ—r vanity and hypocrisie then their esteem and honour fell immediately inâ—o the dust Mat. 5.19 Our Saviour speaking against false teachers saâ—th If any teach the breaking of the least commandment he shall be called the leâ—st in the kingdom of Heaven The kingdom of Heaven is the Church in this life as some expound And he shall be called the lâ—ast that is He shall be of no repute and esteem Thus the names of all the Heretiques that have lived are they not of unsavoury memory And though some had excellent parts and held many truths yet this dead flie falling into their ointment marred all Thirdly They lose all their ministerial labour and study they used in building such stubble And truly this losse should much affect every man whether Minister or private Christian Some opinions thou hast thinking them truths but they being errours all thy preaching for them writing for them all thy indeavour to proselyte others to thee thy going farre and near to make others of thy mind all this is lost labour It will not have so much reward as a cup of cold water given â—n Christs name will have A Wasp is busie and flieth up and down as well as a Bee but a Bees businesse brings honey a Wasps doth nothing but a sting Thus it may be thou art
erre or be of this or that opinion is no great matter is as much as to say faith is no great matter the truths of the Scripture are no great matter It was well said of Austin Veritas Christianorum est incomparabiliter pulchrior Helenâ Graecorum The Christians truth is more lovely than the Grecians Helena for whom there was much strife Hence the Apostle commands us To strive earnestly for the faith once dâ—livered to the Saints Jude v 3. Thirdly They endanger salvation Because all errours come from a damnable cause Gal. 5.20 Heresies are said to come from the flesh as opposite to the Spirit and therefore are reckoned in the same Catalogue with grosse sinnes So that if you go to the first fountain you shâ—ll find errours in Doctrine and loosnesse in practice boâ—h came from the same ground they are both fruits of the flesh though they be different streams yet they are united in one â—pâ—ing Though they may struggle one with another yet both are twins in the same womb Oh what an antidote would this be against these soul-infections that are abroad to think that errours and ungodly practices come both from the same fountain They are all fruits of the flesh and therefore have a damnable cause Fourthly Errours in judgement endanger salvation Because they lead into sinfull and dangerous practices In Philosophy we are â—old of the great connexion that is between the understanding will and affâ—ctions Now the understanding that is the Sunne in this firmament and if that be in an Eclipse you know that evils are portended thereby The understanding is the counsellour and if that be corrupt the will and affections must be very sinfull and unruly Vse of Admonition To take heed we be not led aside with any errour or corrupt Doctrines You see death is in these things as well as in lusts yea if the mind be corrupt all else will be corrupt If the eye be dark the whole body will be dark Errours will breed loosnesse and prophanenesse of life They are a disease in the choisest part of a man and know it is not thy wisdome thy care can preserve thee It 's the Spirit of God through his Word that leadeth us into truth Christ is the truth the way and the life John 14.6 The greatest learning and knowledge will not keep a man learned men have been Heretiques but two things will especially keep us 1. Humility and lowlinesse of mind To such God giveth grace To babes and sucklings he revealeth himself And 2. An holy conformity to Gods will so farre as we know When we do not detain truth as a prisoner in our lives Doct. 2. Whereas you see an eminent Officer in the Church building but hay and stubble is yet hardly saved We may hint this Doctrine though not insist on it That every godly man though never so eminent yet is very difficultly saved If hay and stubble will put us to such danger what then will evident poison If these errours of the mind which are so hardly prevented what will the constant lusts and daily infiâ—mities even of all men Which makes the Apostle Peter say The righteous man is scarcely saved 1 Pet. 4.18 Which although some understand of a temporal salvation he is very hardly delivered from those temporal afflictions that fall out in this life yet by consequence it reacheth to eternal salvation Hence is that command To work out our salvation with fear and trembling Phil. 2.12 Yea Paul who had one foot in Heaven yet he said He kept under his body lest while he preached to others he himself should be a reprobate 1 Cor. 9. ult Now the Grounds of these truths are First From the exactnesse and strictnesse that is in the way to Heaven Godlinesse is on the high hill as he placed virtue Strive to enter in at the strait gate Luke 13.24 Be in an agony yea how strait is it as in Matth 7 14 by exclamation few do enter therein To lay out the nature of a godly man or godlinesse from Scripture-rules would be almost like Tullies description of a perfect Orator or Plato of a Commonwealth Our Saviour speaking of the difficulty of a rich man to be saved that is one who trusteth in them as one Evangelist saith Mar. 10.24 The Disciples cry out Who then can be saved They do not say What rich man but who can be saved because every man hath something or other be trusteth in as well as the rich man in his riches Secondly The difficulty doth appear from that remainder and relique or corruption that is in every man which is in danger to break out Our Saviour bid hiâ— Dâ—sciples Beware of drunkennesse and surfeting though they seemed to be â—arre from it Luke 21.34 Paul how doth he mourn under the powerfull vigor of sinne still abiding in him Rom. 7. Yea the Apostle speaking of a combate in all The Flesh lusteth after the Spirit and the Spirit against the Flesh Gal. 5. So that by this means he is in constant danger of being undone There is heart against heart affections against affections c. Thirdly There are many afflictions and tribulations which God brings on his people and they do much endanger Did not God break out upon Aaron Eli David and Moses very dangerously as if he would have cast them quite off and therefore the Apostle brings in the difficulty of the righteous mans salvation upon that Judgement must begin at the house of God 1 Pet. 4.17 So that if we consider the tempests and rocks in the sea of this world it 's a wonder any can come to the haven Vse of Exhortation Be quickned up to more exact strict and diligent walking If Paul that knew how to abound and want and to do all things who was like a gyant running his race and yet hardly gets to Heaven Where wilt thou appear Hear what he saith I presse forward I forget what is behinde if I may attain to the prize of the high calling Oh then how inexcusable is thy negligence thy dissolutenesse Is thy life a striving an agony Art thou like one in a combate and conflict By this we may see the number of men that shall be saved is very few there are so few that strive that pray that work with fear and trembling that are violent for the Kingdom of Heaven and get it by force Verse 16. Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you THe Apostle though he alter his Metaphor yet continueth in the same matter In the verses before he compared the Church of Corinth to a building here he sheweth what kind of building it is even a sacred holy building The Temple of God So that as in the Temple of old which was consecrated to God whosoever did bring in any unclean and unconsecrated things to the Temple he did pollute it and was to be punished thus all corruptions in Doctrine Worship or
rejected Tit. 3.10 Those then are nearest to perdition who after Admonition and Information do still continue refractory Lastly Of all those who defile the Temple and are marked out for perdition Antichrist it is and his party that are the great defilers of Gods Temple He is alled The man of Perdition 2 Thes 2.3 both actively and passively Actively because he is a means to destroy so many thousand souls and passively because he is appointed by God to remarkable destruction Take heed therefore thou art not found in the number of that Antichristian society which is marked out by God for destruction Come out of Babylon least you be partakers of her plague Rev. 18.4 If you ask why God should be thus provoked by corruptions in truth or worship the Reason is plain Because his Glory is more immediately interrested in these things Practical godlinesse and obedience are acceptable but his truth and his worship are that which immediately relate to him Herein his jealousie is said to be drawn out Vse of Admonition Pray and take heed you fall not from your stedfastnesse and be led aside with the errours of the wicked You see here is no dallyance no wantonnesse allowed in this matter God will destroy Art thou not afraid of Gods wrath of Gods vengeance If it were but the anger of a man or the persecution of a man it might be endured but God who is a consuming fire he will never bear this He will not endure this This Text would be like a flaming sword to keep men from false and erroneous waies if duly considered This is that which undoeth us people are either very sottish and stupid not regarding any thing of Religion at all or if they do they do not with that sobriety that humility that fear and trembling addresse themselves to know Gods truths as they ought to do There is a prophane proud unmortified frame of heart upon us and then then no wonder we defile his Temple Him shall God destroy This is the punishment threatned to the Temple-defilers and though but two words God destroy yet both have their weight There are many evils and calamities that yet are not a destruction that is the utmost of all paenall evils and then it 's a destruction from God whose wrath is like himself Incomprehensible It 's not man but God shall destroy Now what this destruction is we have told you not an annihilation of soul and body as Socinians would have it not a Physical destruction but moral viz. depriving the wicked man of all happinesse and comfort We have handled this relatively already as it is the Portion of the Temple-defilers I shall now consider it absolutely Eternal wrath and damnation is described here under the name of destruction which is the reward of every wicked impenitent man whether his sinnes be intellectual or bodily And the Doctrine I shall raise is That Eeternal Damnation is the Destruction of a man It 's the undoing of a man for ever This Doctrine or Truth hath a sting in it and because men are generally so bruitish and feared in their evil waies I do the rather pitch upon it because truths that are of a more sublime nature do not so easily penetrate Let us then improve this Eternal Damnation is the Destruction of a man It 's the eternal undoing of a man To clear this consider First That it is the Scriptures way to represent Hell and Damnation under all those evils that are most terrible to sense as on the contrary Heaven is described by such nams as do usually delight most men Hence it 's called a Kingdom and a Crown of Glory and a City paved with precious stones These are condescending expressions to us who are apt to apprehend nothing great and admirable but what is so to sense and were not our natural corruption so greatly prevailing over us such Scripture baites would soon take us As it is thus for Heaven so for the contrary Hell and eternal damnation is described by all such terrible Objects that the very naming of them should fill us with great horrour and do not think these are vain scare-crows no these expressions do no more represent to the full the torment and pain of the damned indeed then a painted fire doth a reall burning fire Whatsoever the Scripture saith of this destruction of wicked men doth not arise up in the least manner to the torment indeed Therefore that the meditation and preaching of this subject may be profitable set Faith on work believe there is such a state of destruction coming upon impenitent men that all the undoing we can have in this life is nothing to that eternal undoing Let Faith warm and heat thy heart with this and it will work wonderfully to thy reformation If to die be a thing of terrour what is eternal death What is eternal destruction If skin for skin and all that a man hath he will give for his life how much rather for this eternal life Secondly This destruction consists in two things The good it 's privative of And The evil it 's positive of Schoolmen call it the punishment of losse and the punishment of sense The Scripture brings in God inflicting both in that terrible sentence at the Day of Judgment Depart from me into eternal fire Mat. 25.41 Depart from me there is the privation of all good Into eternal fire there is the position of all evil and misery Divines have disputed which is the greatest evil of these two but Chrysostome answers The privation of Gods face is farre worse then all the torments in Hell That Depart from me is more terrible then eternal fire Certainly seeing such a destruction is coming how much doth it concern all to watch and pray about it Descendamus in infernum viventes ne descendamus morientes said Bernard Let us descend into Hell while alive by meditation lest we really descend thither when we die But singularia sunt quae pungunt Let us therefore consider What losse it is First that this destruction doth consist in And First It 's the losse of God in whom only is all happinesse Depart from me At his right hand are pleasures for evermore Psal 16.11 To be with God and to enjoy him is that happinesse which eye hath not seen nor can the heart of a man conceive For such as God himself is such is the enjoying of him He is the bonum in quae omnia bona bonum quo nihil melius cogitari potest The Jehova The beings of all created comforts that are scattered up and down and parcelled in creatures with their several imperfections are united and conjoyned in him in transcendent perfection only To represent what God is and the enjoyment of him would be to empty the Ocean with a shell Then do we best esteem of him when we judge him inestimable Now our destruction lyeth in being deprived of all that good which God would have been to us Oh
with what indignation and anger should a wicked man look upon his sins You have deprived me of God and do you ask what I aile My lusts my wickednesse have taken God from me how can I then but rore out Would these be as good as a God to me This should make thee cast off all sinne as Paul did the Viper saying Wilt thou be as good as great as all-sufficient to me as God would be if I do serve him Secondly This privative destruction lyeth in the want of all comfort and peace and joy that might be in the soul Take away the Sunne and there remaineth nothing but horrible darknesse take God away and the soul is full of all darknesse and horrour Hence in Hell are said to be gnawing wormes and weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth Dives desired but a drop of water to coole his tongue and but the top of his tongue yet could not obtain it not a drop and for the top of the tongue This was to shew that there could not be the least comfort the least ease the least quietnesse of conscience and indeed this is the great part of Hell Some have thought Hell to be nothing but the torments and horrour of conscience but the Scripture cannot so be put off Yet certainly this is the Hell of Hell the greatest part of destruction that the guilt of a mans sinnes shall perpetually gnaw and teare his conscience which will then be awakened and will fall like so much scalding Lead into the eye of a man And if a good conscience be a continual Feast that tormenting disquieted conscience in Hell will be a continual unspeakable evil Oh we see but what the very drops of this torment hath wrought upon men Cain went up and down trembling all the pleasures all the delights and travils he took could not drive out that trembling Judas with what horrour doth he cry out He cannot beare his burden And therefore the damned brought in crying to the mountains to cover them and the hils to hide them Rev. 6.16 Oh is this nothing to you or a light matter who sit and hear these things Those grosse and foul sinnes which now make no torment nor gripings in thy conscience thou canst runne into all beastly excesse and thou findest no gnawing worms upon thee Oh consider and believe it the time is coming when conscience will be awakened and not the least corner of thy soul will be freed from torments and howlings Go on then and eat and drink and care for none of these things but remember this destruction will fall upon thee whether thou wilt or no. Oh that men would pitty themselves Or rather Oh that God would pitty your souls and make you to consider the latter end of your sinnes At last they will bite like an Adder and sting like a Serpent Thirdly There is a losse of all outward help and comfort from others Here in this world though we many times are in grievous losses yet some comfort from a friend is like the pleasant showers to the parched ground and though they cannot deliver out of trouble yet a word of comfort doth much refresh But here the destroyed sinner is excluded from comforts and friends and all When Absolom was shut out of Davids presence then there was a Joab to mediate for favour again but when this destruction is then no Saint or Angel can either comfort or help us Yea which is saddest of all then that Mediatory Office of Christ doth cease Then there is no Advocate to make Intercession then the Blood of Christ will do no good In the midst of all that guilt and trouble for sinne we have in this life there is still this hope That Christ is a Mediatour to reconcile God and the sinner but when this eternal destruction shall come upon thee then there is no more hope or help by Christ then Christ is of no more use or advantage to thee So that the losse of all help and all hope through Christ must needs make this destruction more terrible And as for the second part of this Destruction which is Positive That lieth in the accumulation and heaping up of all misery imaginable and possible even for a God to inflict or the soule and body of man to receive It 's I say in the heaping up of all misery For the state of blessednesse lyeth not in any one or many comforts but in the aggregation of all desirable mercies So this state of destruction lyeth not in the sustaining of one or many miseries but the aggregation and conflux of all Therefore the Scripture expresseth it under many names of terrour sometimes darknesse utter darknesse sometimes a prison and chaines of darknesse therein sometimes fire and brimstone eternal fire sometimes a place of weeping wailing and gnashing of teeth sometimes death and everlasting death sometimes judgement and condemnation Now the Scripture useth not these words in vaine but would hereby awaken and terrifie us that we might at last cast away our sinnes which are the onely fuell for this fire In the next place Let us consider the Aggravation of this Destruction And First It 's an Eternal Destruction A destruction that is alwayes destroying and yet the party is not extinguished If the Socinian annihilation were this destruction or Origen's opinion for the salvation of men and Devils at last after thousands of yeares torments could prove true here was some hope but it 's a living death and a dying life it 's everlasting fire it 's the worme that never dieth In all earthly calamities on this side Hell this is a mitigation that they are not everlasting they are but evil for a moment there will be an end But here thou art kept alive to be tormented for ever Oh what a thunder bolt is that word for ever Torment for ever Horrour for ever Fire for ever yet so it is Secondly It 's an Vniversal Destruction in a moral sense There is not the least mixture of any joy of any hope For as Heaven is a state of unmixed happinesse there cannot a drop of gall fall into that ocean of happinesse So here there cannot a drop of honey fall into that ocean of gall we told you not a drop of water for the top of the tongue only could be obtained much lesse for the whole body Thirdly It 's an Inevitable Destruction God will destroy Who can stop Gods hand Who can hinder his blow If a little of Gods wrath be kindled Who can abide How much lesse when he stirreth up all his wrath It is the day of his wrath when Kingdomes and Nations feele the day of his temporal wrath How sad hath it been Jerusalem had her day of Gods wrath but these are onely drops to that ocean of his wrath Now manifold Uses may be made of this but I shall instance onely in one here Of Instruction Here is a plain and evident discovery of the madnesse and
to the spiders web that is of no defence or use when a boistrous wind ariseth Read over the History of the Bible and there you shall see to that which the wise men of the world intended God brought about the clear contrary Come saith Pharaoh let us deal wisely and oppresse the Israelites Exo. 1.10 lest they grow to numerous Now by that very means the people of Israel did more multiply The Pharisees thought when they had crucified Christ they had laid all Christianity in the Grave with him but by his Ascension his power was the more seen When I am lifted up said Christ viz. upon the Crosse I will draw all men to me Joh. 12.32 That which in probability would have driven all men from him by that he did efficaciously bring all unto him Hence he compareth his death to the grain of Corn thrown into the ground which untill it die doth not bring forth a great crop So that the wisdome of man must needs be made great folly when it shall be forced to bring about those things which it hates so much Sixthly Herein the wisdome of the world is made foolishnesse because it doth not only work a vain deceitfull work but also a destructive one to its self so that all the wisdome they have is only to destroy themselves Thus like fools they runne their swords in their own bowels How often doth David speak this of his wise and potent enemies Their feet were taken in their own snares and they were fallen into the pit they digged for others Was not all Pharaohs wisdome but to ruine himself and his Kingdome The Jews that thought to be so wise in crucifying Christ thereby to prevent the Romane Caesar yet for a reward had the Romane enemy come and utterly destroy them Thus as they work a spiders web in regard of the unprofitablenesse of them so they are said to hatch cockatrice egges because of the hurtfull poisonous nature of them even to the owners Seventhly The wisdome of the world becometh foolishnesse because God many times infatuateth and blasteth the parts and abilities of the wise men of the world He takes away their understanding from them That as we read of Nebuchadnezar God bereaved him of his wisdome and judgment so that he became like a beast and lived with beasts so he doth either in whole or in part pervert and darken the thoughts and counsels of wise men Hence he is said by the Prophet to Diviner's mad Isa 44.25 as also Isa 19.14 Et quos Deus vult perdere prius dementat as we see in Haman and in Belshazer and in Herod all these died as fools and were destroyed by their own foolish thoughts Thus we read of Ely's Sons and others they would not hearken to the good counsel of the Lord because it was of the Lord to destroy them Eightly Herein God doth also make their wisdome folly because by their pride and haughtinesse they undoe themselves God lets them prosper and the wisdome of the world seemeth to flourish a great while but it is that their destruction may be the greater Thus Heb. 1.11 it s said of Nebuchadnezar after all that great successe which he attributed to himself His mind should change and he should passe over and offend Prosperity slayeth the foolish one saith Solomon Prov. 1.32 And Psal 18. With the froward that is the crafty worldly wise man opposite to the pure and upright in heart thou wilt wrestle as it were and give a fall unto according to the Hebrew As the wrestler lifts a man up from the ground that he may throw him down with the more violence so doth God give a man of the world his hearts desire that he shall attribute all to his wisdome and prudence and this is to be his overthrow Thus we have the Prophet insulting over Aegypt and the wise men thereof as also over Tyre and Zidon that set their heart as God and thought she had the wisdome of Daniel Ezek. 28.2 Now to adde one Caution we must distinguish of a two-fold humane wisdome One that is the same with true prudence whereby men are able to mannage publique places of trust they do prae esse ut prosint for the publique good they have the art of ruling well And this the Text meaneth not For though it be not a virtue yet it is the eye to all a mans actions It 's as necessary to publique affairs as the Sunne to the world therefore God gave it Solomon as a special mercy Secondly Their humane wisdome which originally cometh from the corrupt reason of man and for the manner of it is only according to worldly and fleshly considerations and tends only to worldly advantages And lastly For its nature it is opposite formally to all heavenly and Scripture wisdome Of this we speak Vse 1. How vain a thing it is to trust in humane policy and worldly wisdome Thou thinkest by it to raise and advantage thy self but God turneth it into folly Insomuch that we may say more have been undone by earthly wisdome then by meer simplicity None have had such tragical and dismall ends as they Therefore uprightnesse and an holy fear of God that is the best wisdome And although Christ himself and the Martyrs who abounded in this wisdome did not escape the miseries of the world yet that cometh from the wise and high dispensations of God who hath ordered that through many tribulations we must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Vse 2. To judge that only wisdome which the wise God judgeth so Who so is wise and prudent he will foresee the evil day of death and judgment and accordingly prepare himself He will lay up Treasure for the life to come He layeth that Principle as the chiefest of his Politiques What will it profit a man to winne the whole world and loose his own soul Mat. 16.26 For it is written he taketh the wise in their own craft That divine axiome asserted by the Apostle in the former part of this verse he now confirmeth by a two-fold testimony The one is from Job 5.13 and this we are to handle at this time They are the words of Eliphaz to Job who though with the other Friends they did erre in the particular application of their speeches to Job yet the general matter taken in an abstracted sense was full of wisdome and truth The words are worthy of all diligent consideration though I shall not insist long hastning to the other matter that followeth The Testimony is a Proposition declaring Gods carriage and power to the earthly wise men of the world And 1. Let us consider Gods Efficiency 2. The Subject of this Gods Efficiency is described in that expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Septugint hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The original word in the Hebrew is used several waies and very applicable to this matter in hand 1. It is used of taking any thing by force of armes jure belli Thus
good and so if they abuse the creatures to all manner of wickednesse they can do no otherwise They had them for this end to accomplish sinne thereby If every thing works to their damnation this may make them sin the more desparately But First Divines have a good distinction about Gods Will. There is a will of Complacency or Approbation and there is his will of Efficiency what he will bring about and none shall hinder Now it 's the will of Gods approbation that all things should be improved by the wicked for their good It 's his approving and commanding will that every Sermon should be received by Faith that every mercy be improved fruitfully The goodnesse of God doth invite such to Repentance The afflictions and scourges God brings on them are to humble them and make them to repent of their sinnes But if we regard the will of Efficiency so these things are the savour of death to them that perish The Apostle saith this plainly The Word was the savour of life to such as are saved and the savour of death to such as perish 2 Cor. 2.15 That their is such a will of God will appear by that instance to Pharaoh God inflicted strange and miraculous judgments upon him it was his approving and commanding will that by those Pharaoh should be humbled and repent and let the people go For this end Moses and Aaron are sent to exhort him to this duty Yet if we respect Gods will of Efficiency we see he told Moses that Pharaoh's heart was hardened and he would not let them go and his heart grew harder by these wonders So then Gods will of Approbation and Command is That even the wicked should make all things theirs though Gods will of Efficiency doth not bring it about Secondly If thâ—se things are poison to the wicked and snares to them they may still blame themselves for it 's the corruption of their natures not any violence God offereth them that makes them turn every thing to their own destruction Thy perdition is of thy self O Israel Hos 13 9. So that every wicked man having a corrupted nature and this wickednesse strengthened through actual impieties no wonder if every thing promote his damnation But still it 's of himself As you see poisonous creatures Serpents and Toads they turn every thing they eat to poison because of their venomous constitution So it is here wicked men turn all good things into ill Vnumquodque recipitur ad moâ—um recipientes Put the sweetest liquor into a noysome vessel it will have an ill tincture Paul sheweth this evidently The Law that was for life he found for death Rom. 7. The Law was good aand spiritual yet it stirred up all sinne in him because he was carnal It 's that within thee which defileth all without thee Wicked men sinne as wilfully and as industriously attend to pervert all things to their damnation as if there were no contracted necessity upon them to offend against God in all things The third Doubt is If all things be the Godlies Why then are they so uncomfortable so dejected complaining of wants as if nothing were theirs If this be true we would thinke no godly man should ever be in a plunge he may take up this Text and it would be an antidote against all fears and cares It can be no night with him as long as this Sunne shineth Answ It 's true it should be so but we are weak in faith we do not live upon Scripture-principles and priviledges but sensible and then we stagger and reel up and down While we are cloathed with the Sunne and have the Moon under our feet we walk in light and comfort David when his faith is lively then God is his shepherd he shall want nothing and he will lay him down and sleep because God taketh care for him But let him come from this Mountain of faith and look on the waters of afflictions below his head goeth round and he knoweth not where he is Now a two-fold faith is necessary to bear up the head and heart the one Firmly assenting to the truth of the things The other Fiducially applying them to our selves If we have not the first faith we look upon such things as meer good words as bare expressions Even as if a man should think he had such a Country because he had the Map of it Oh this divine historical faith strongly perswading our selves these things are Gods truth they cannot be a lie they cannot deceive us would greatly establish us And then Fiducial application is the hand that takes these things making them to be ours So that if you ask How all present and future things life and death are ours It 's by faith only A quiet resting and reposing of the soul upon Gods promise puts us into the possession of all these things Secondly As they want faith So an heavenly prudence and skill how to improve them spiritually Though all things be for their good yet they must have wisdome to know how to use all things Therefore Paul who said He had all things saith He was instructed in it as in a mystery Phil. 4.11 Prescribe the best medicines in the world if men have not judgement rightly to order them they can never get good What is a fountain sealed up or a Book that cannot be read though it hath never such admirable matter Thus are all things though never so usefull if thou hast not Christian wisdome There is no condition affliction or event but thou mayest say if I had heavenly wisdome I might make excellent use of it The last Doubt is How are all things the Godly mans seeing for the most part they are most wanting they are in the greatest necessities Had not Dives all things when Lazarus had not not so much as crums Doth not this Doctrine give a mock-comfort as those in Jam. 2.16 who bid some be cloathed and warmed but gave nothing Answ 1. This place doth not so much speak of the possession of all things as the spiritual serviceablenesse of them Those things which they have no possession of may yet serve for their souls good He doth not so much mean what they have as what tends to their good 2. If the godly have not all things they would that want is good for them The want of any outward mercy may sometimes be better than the having of them To lose blood when there is too much fulnesse is healthfull So then complain not saying I have not this or that good thing the not having it is good 3. Thou hast what is best for thee and that according to the wise Gods ordering Let this silence thee alwayes These afflictions these exercises these wants are the best The wise great God of Heaven doth dispense them and they come from his hand 4. Thou hast better things then any earthly thing thou wantest thou hast Christ thou hast a title to Heaven and eternal glory
unknown tongues 1 Cor. 14. do fully reach to this Ministers may affect such obscure unprofitable and impertinent matter as that the people may no more be bettered then if all things were done in Latine The Apostle had rather speak five words to edification then five hundred other wayes Insomuch that a powerfull profitable way of preaching is a great gift of God a special blessing unto a people And though some Ministers partake of it more than others yet all are to bend themselves for the peoples profit Si non vis intelligi cur vis legi said he we may adde cur vis audiri we see the nurses care is to make the childs meat most conveniently eatable and fit for nourishment and Ministers that do otherwise are such unkind fathers that our Saviour speaketh of as not possible when the children aske bread they give them a stone when they aske fish they give them a serpent Thirdly In that all things are the Churches is implied That no Officers have an absolute dominion over their peoples faith neither may lord it over them according to their lusts and ambitions but to doe all things for their souls good Paul though an Apostle would not assume such dominion 2 Cor. 1.24 Not that we have dominion over your faith And 1 Pet. 5.3 forbids all lordship over Gods inheritance They are Gods inheritance they are his field that they are to dresse and till not for themselves but their Masters use The Pope of Rome with his Abettors do infinitely transgresse in this particular who though he style himself Servus servorum the servant of servants is yet the Lord of Lords whatsoever they give us to eat we must swallow without chusing All our Sacrifices must be without eyes the more ignorance in our faith the more devotion No all the power and authority of Church-officers is not Magisterial but Ministerial we must come with Thus saith the Lord As it is written That which we have received that we are to deliver and when they keep to this then He that heareth them heareth Christ and He that despiseth them despiseth Christ No man may adde to or detract from the last will of a man much lesse Gods Testament which is to be the rule to the Church while she is in this world Fourthly In that all Officers are the Churches there is implied That not onely finis operantis but operis also not onely the end of all Ministers but the end of the offices and gifts themselves are for the Churches good God when he set Pastours and Teachers he gave them for the perfecting of the Saints and compleating their graces and bringing them to a full stature in Christ Eph. 4.11 12 13. Now it 's good to consider the manifold ends why God hath given such offices and gifts to his Church And First It 's to multiply and gather in more to the Church even the whole number of the elect Thus they are called fishers of men Mat. 4.19 they cast in the spiritual net of the Gospel and out of the bitter waters of the world they take up many for Gods Kingdom Many thousands were taken at the beginning of the Gospel Thus they are also called Fathers because by the Word they beget many to eternal life So then the Officers of the Church are yours to bring you home to God of Wolfs to make you Lambs of Beasts to make you Saints Oh consider whether the Ministry hath ever been yours in this sense or no! Hath it removed those mountains those high Towers of sinne that exalt themselves against Christ Hath it reformed thee of thy lusts of thy beastlinesse Oh may you not say in a contrary sense to Paul You have ten thousand Instructers yet no Fathers you have had many preachers but no father none hath begot thee anew to a spiritual and heavenly life Secondly It 's to convince and reprove to trouble and disquiet the soul for sinne and thus they are yours though wretched man had rather be without them Paul was very sharp and severe against the errours and vices of believers All Ministers are commanded To reprove and rebuke with all authority Tit. 2.15 To lift up their voices like a trumpet and to tell Israel of their transgressions This is for your advantage more than all false and daubing delusions You see God himself would not spare Aaron or Moses though never any talked to God face to face as he did yet God reproved him for his rashnesse Because he did not sanctifie him before the people and therefore would not let him enter into the Land of Canaan Oh it 's a good sign when you can receive a sharp reproof and rebuking Sermons as yours as profitable to you desiring not to be spared Thirdly They are yours for quickning and increasing of grace To bring us to a full stature as you heard the Apostle calleth it Desire the sincere milk of the Word that you may grow thereby 1 Pet. 2.2 There is watering as well as planting Paul reproveth these Corinthians as carnal that he could not speak to them as spiritual And Heb. 6. he speaketh terribly to those that are still in their first principles and are not carried on to further perfection Consider then here is the Ministry and all the gifts and Sermons you have enjoyed for your benefit and profit Is your understanding more enlightned your hearts more tender your lives more reformed Is your knowledge bettered your graces more quickened and your whole conversation more fervent and zealous Fourthly They are for consolation and comfort unto the tender and broken hearted for sinnes Hence they are the Ministers of the Gospel and they bring the glad tidings of peace We are sent to comfort and give rest to those that are loaden with sinne Oh that we could meet with a people that need this balm of the Gospel that want this oil of Gods grace in their wounds There are thousands of people to whom we must not we dare not dispense the comforts of the Gospel we cannot say these glad tidings are to be published to you Lastly Not onely their gifts and office but all events whatsoever do befall them Their honour or disgrace their life or their death their esteem or their persecution is for the Churches good 2 Cor. 5.13 Whether we be besides our selves or sober it is for you saith Paul And in another place he makes one end of all his sufferings to be for the Churches sake Col. 1.24 If the Ministers of the Gospel runne through good report or bad report life or death it 's for the Churches good And therefore Chrysostome understands that life and death after mentioned of the Ministers so that you are not only to learn by their Sermons but by all their mercies or by all their sufferings not only their tongues but all things else should teach you Vse of Exhortation Take heed that through thy unbelief and other sinnes the Ministry and all the abilities and gifts thereof
was for his eternal torment They call such things the blessing of God and so indeed in themselves they are but to wicked men they are curses For as the godly mans afflictions come from Gods love Whom he loveth he chasteneth Heb. 12. so wicked mens mercies come from Gods anger Had God loved thee thou hadst had it may be more afflictions more wants and exercises Secondly Wicked men have not the world Because they are overcome by it the world hath them rather Therefore they are called as you heard the world as if their very souls as well as bodies were made of the dust of the earth whereas the godly have the world as if they had it not they have God and the world too they have Heaven and Earth too they do not prâ—â— the worse their duties are not the more thinne and distracted As Abraham and David these were rich and great men in the world yet if you reade Davids Psalmes you will finde his heart set on God above all these things Thirdly Wicked men have not the world Because they do not own and acknowledge God as the giver of all neither do they live to him but the things of the world are instruments to draw out their lusts to make them the more wicked They take the good creatures of God and abuâ—e them to wickednesse Therefore Rom 8. The whole creation is said to groan under them as being weary of them The very Air the very Earth is weary of them yea the timber in the house and the stones of the wall do witnesse against them they are by the things of the world made more wicked Lastly They have not the world Because they have not an holy contentation of mind They are not quiet or satisfied in their condition they have no true peace notwithstanding all their abundance and the reason is because they have not pardon of sinne and enjoyment of Gods favour with these and they are only blessed who are so Matth 5. Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth You see the whole earth is promised to a meek humble contented spirit whereas a wicked man is compared to the Sea that is alwayes foaming and never lieth still The Vse is two-fold 1. Of Comfort and Exhortation to the godly Comfort in what distresse and strait soever thou art in Say not I have not this I want this I am poor and miserable for thou hast Heaven and Earth onely set faith on work This is the hand to receive those treasures This faith is not a fancy it 's not a foolish imagination but a real investing of thee with all things But it 's of Exhortation also to have the world for thy spiritual use Take heed of the wickednesse of it We have not received the spirit of the world 2 Corin. 4. Oh it 's an excellent thing not to have the spirit of the world but of God! Vse 2. Of Instruction To shew the power and miserable estate of the richest and greatest men in the world that want godlinesse none is so poor so miserable as they Thou sayest this is thine and that is thine Alas because Christ and the Promise are not thine nothing is indeed thine If they be thine they are thy poison thy destruction thy damnation and thus they are thine Or Life We proceed to the third thing in order and that is the several Conditions or Estates we are in Life is yours and Death is yours Chrysostome and Grotius after him limit this to the life and death of the Ministers in the Church If they live enjoying their liberties and outward comforts it 's for you If they die if they lose their liberties and lives it 's for the Churches sake As Paul said He was willing to be a Sacrifice offered up for the Philippians faith Phil. 2.17 This is indeed a truth but as the world is a general so there is no reason but that we should take Life and Death in as General a sense And indeed this limited one may well come under the first enumeration Paul and Apollo all are yours At this time we shall treat of Life The Scripture speaks of a three-fold Life 1. Animal which is in beasts 2. Humane belonging to men as rational And 3. Supernatural or an heavenly life which onely deserveth the name of it The other being but shadows and dying lives Now we shall especially speak of this humane life being perfected with that supernatural life Observe That Godly men do onely live or The Godly onely doe make a spiritual use of their life Life is only theirs 1 Pet. 3.10 He that loveth life and would see good dayes let him refrain his tongue from evil let him eschew evil and do good Here you see the only way to live and to have good dayes is to avoid all evil and imbrace all good Hence Christ John 6. cals himself The bread of life and he giveth the water of life none liveth till they be united to him We shall insist on these things 1. That only godly men live 2. That wicked men though in the midst of all their jollity yet the Scripture doth not account of them as living persons And First The godly man only liveth Because he is united to God and Christ the fountain of life David doth often style God The fountain of life Psal 36.9 And in his favour there is life And in the New Testament especially by John Christ is made the Author of all life He is therefore compared to the Head and to the Vine If the members or branches be separated from these they die and wither presently as John 15. This is so frequent an assertion that we need not dilate on it If not a member of Christ there is no life in thee Aut es in membris aut in humoribus said Austin Thou art either among the members or the humours of the body of the Church Gal. 3.20 Paul said He no longer lived but Christ in him and the life he lived was by faith in the Sonne of God What did not Paul eat and drinke and enjoy the common Aire as we doe Yes this he doth not call his life Oh they live who no longer live but Christ in them Thy sense thy carnal reason thy corrupt affections thy worldly inclinations these no longer live but Christ in thee and his graces Secondly Onely the godly man liveth Because he hath a spiritual and a new life added to his animal life For as the soul is the life of the body so grace is the life of the soul Hence our Saviour cals all wicked men dead men Let the dead bury the dead Matth. 8.22 That is a strange expression but very true No dead corpse is more destitute of life and apprehension than their souls are of any heavenly motions any spiritual hungrings or thirstings All the merry and jolly men in the world they are dead men if living in their sinnes Therefore among the Pythagoreans who kept strict
death 2 Cor. 7. the godly therefore take heed of it as that which murders the body So inordinate and worldly cares we see how such do even devour men they have so many thorns in their flesh and what life do such live Impatience is a sudden Devil possessing a mans soul In patience possesse your souls Luke 21.19 A man doth not possesse himself he is not master over his own spirit that is passionate and furious So that men in such sins they live but as those that have been thrown to wilde beasts or serpents to be devoured by them Lastly The godly man only liveth Because even in the last breathings of this life his hopes and comforts do most remain The righteous hath hope in his death Prov. 14.32 And this hope is called A lively hope yea the godly die not at all because all live to God their very dead bodies if you regard the Covenant of Grace and Gods power are alive Luke 20 38. At that moment when all a wicked mans hope perisheth his life faileth him his comforts his friends all forsake him then are the godly to lift up their heads for their redemption draweth nigh Though they were dead they shall live Dives had the good things of this life but doth he not lose all with his soul at his death Lazarus may say Soul take thy ease when dying which Dives could not But In the second place How can it be said that the wicked do not live when they are said to have their portion chiefly in this life And David by many Psalmes informeth us they do not onely vivere but valere not onely live but flourish Their eyes stick out with fatnesse yet they doe not live because 1. They are dead in their sins And hereby their faith their Religion their Christianity is all dead as you heard 2. They do not live Because they are in a condemned estate they are appointed to wrath As Adam is said to die in the day he did eat of the forbidden fruit and as the Scripture cals some the sonnes of death or dead men because appointed thereunto Oh this should enter deep into thy heart As long as thou livest in thy sinnes thou art a dead man a damned man as the malefactor condemned to die is a dead man though he live a day or two before execution 3. They doe not live Because all their time is lost so all the time of a mans unregâ—neracy is no life All those dayes were lost those duties lost all that time lost 4. They make every thing an instrument of death Their health their wealth their honours are all deadly herbs in the pot their tongue speaks the words of death their hands work the works of death Vse of Instruction to the Godly so live that your life may appear to be yours not the Devils not sinnes that thou doest not live to the world Let thy mouth be a Well of life Be thou a tree of life Prov. 11.20 as Solomon speaks of the righteous Do not thou only live but cause others to live Let thy life put life in others as one candle lightens another one candle kindleth another Vse 2. Of Terrour to wicked men You live not you rejoyce not you have no true mirth or gladnesse False joy is real misery A man that hath an estate of brasse for gold is not rich thou art a dead man as yet even condemned to Hell every day the sentence may be executed on thee and it 's plain thou art dead because thou feelest not thou complainest not under this heavy burden Or Death all things are yours We are upon the third part of the Apostles Enumeration and that is the different conditions which are in the world expressed under those two titles Life and death Not only life is yours but death also And in this later lieth the greater wonder For how Death which was inflicted at first as a curse and punishment for sinne and is the period of all outward comforts in this life should be for our advantage is hard to imagine and then that two contraries should meet in the same issue both life and death produce the like effects makes it still the greater paradox But the more unlikely and impossible it is to humane reason the easiâ—r it is to a divine faith In the Scripture Death admits of several senses 1 Sometimes it 's taken for the spiritual death of the soul in sinne Thus men are often said to be dead and well may this want of grace be called Death because such a man is like Lazarus buried and even putrified in the grave of sinne There is no sense no motion there is nothing but loathsomnesse they are putrifying carkasses and not living men though never so externally glorious in the world 2. There is an eternal Death often mentioned in the Scripture as the reward of every sinne who though they live yet it is a dying life 3. There is the natural Death viz. the dissolution of those two dear friends the soul and the body Lastly Death is put for any great extremity and misery in which sense God is said to raise the dead 2 Cor. 1. And the Israelites captivity is expressed under the similitude pf dead men dead bones and their restauration is a resurrection or living again Ezek 37.1 In these two later considerations we may take it as death comprehends all outward afflictions and miseries as also the separation of soul from body Observe That even Death which in it self is so terrible yet is for a godly mans advantage It 's his mercy it 's his gain as well as life is He may call it his death in a comfortable sense as well as he may call any mercy his To open this consider First That God created man at first after his own Image in righteousnesse and true holinesse and thereby he was immortal Not as God who is absolutely immortal and therefore said Only to have immortality 1 Tim. 6.16 Now as the Angels who are immortal from their intrinsecal constitution having no corruptible principles only God can annihilate them but he was made immortal conditionally had he continued in that state of integrity he had not been capable of death as appeareth by the commination In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt die Gen. 2.16 And the Apostle Rom. 5. concludeth That by sinne death reigned over the world where by death is not only meant actual death but potential also or a state of mortality Now the original of death or how it came into the world was not known by the Heathens They called it a tribute that all must pay to nature but why men should die and how it came about at first that they were ignorant of Secondly Vpon Adam 's fall In quo uno omnes peccarunt whose sinne was the sinne of all mankind as Rom 5. Death was inflicted as a punishment upon all So that if we consider death in the abstracted nature of it it is
a curse a punishment and so can be no more for good then hell and damnation can be Insomuch that to the wicked man death and hell are both alike they are of the same nature He can take no more comfort from one then from the other when death is approaching then also is hell and everlasting torments This is decreed immutably for every man once to die It was a vain boast of Paracelsus to think That if he had had the ordering of himself from his birth he could have preserved his life alwayes These are mad delusions Where sinne is there death followeth and it would be an excellent Antidote against sinne to consider what followeth it When thâ—u entertainest any sinne thou biddest death also come in at the door as pleasant and as delightfull as it is yet it brings death Thirdly Though death be in it self thus a curse and cometh as a punishment to wicked men yet unto the godly it is of a clean contrary nature The guilt and curse of it is taken away It 's no more the execution of that dreadfull sentence Thou shalt die but the chastisement of a loving Father because God loveth his children therefore they die death is made like Jacob's Chariot as the old man rejoyced when he saw that because it would carry him to see Joseph whom he so much longed for Thus doth death to the godly man It 's the glad messenger that comes to carry him to his Father to eternal glory It 's true the godly man dieth as well as the wicked he hath the same diseases the same paines but the Nature of them is farre different one is a curse to the wicked a beginning of hell and torments The other is a mercy to the godly and a passage to eternal glory Even as the afflictions which befall the godly they come from Gods love Whom I love I chasten Heb. 12. Thus it is also with death it self Lastly The ground why death is thus altered to the godly man why he should thus differ from the wicked men is wholly from Christ and his death as appeareth 1 Cor. 15.54 O death where is thy sting Death is swallowed up You would think the grave swalloweth up the godly man but his body swalloweth up the grave The sting of death is sinne if that be taken away the Snake cannot hurt now the guilt of sinne is removed by Christ Do not then think it impossible that ever such a terrible thing as death should be made lovely and the thoughts of it sweet and comfortable Yes by Christ all the terrour is done away As death had no power over him so neither shall it have over the godly These things premised Let us consider in how many particulars death is a godly mans it 's for his benefit and comfort And First In this respect Because by death he gaineth he is invested with greater glory joy and happinesse than this world can afford All the while a godly man liveth in this world he is a loser he is kept from his best treasures he is not enjoying his best blessings which will be vouchsafed to him This the Apostle you have admirably expressing Phil. 1.23 Paul is there in a great strait he knoweth not how to be content to live he can hardly satisfie himself to be kept from Christ so long To die is gain saith the Apostle and to depart and to be with Christ is farre better Paul is willing to live for the Churches good but yet that is not so good to him as to die Oh if a godly man could raise up his heart to such faith as Paul had he would even think this world an Aegypt this life a prison it 's to my losse to be here I might have better company better glory better joy every thing transcendently better Indeed we reade of Elisha and Jonah desiring death from impatiency because of the vexations upon them but that was sinfull But to long for and hasten the coming of Christ to be above the love of life and all outward comforts above the fear of death because of the heavenly affections the soul is transported with to Christ this is admirable Oh then that we were not such worms but like Larks could rise out of the earth and soar up into Heaven with holy joy and delight of spirit then death would be as a gain to us and life as a losse Yet this is not so to be understood as if death in it self were to be desired or to be prayed for for in it self it is a natural evil and so is only to be submitted to patiently not desired but the consequent of it viz. eternal glory this is to be prayed for as the Apostle doth fully expresse it 2 Cor. 5.4 We would gladly be cloathed with immortality yet to put off this mortal body is grievous as little children cry for their new garments and yet cry while they are putting them on Secondly Death is a godly mans Because it putteth a period to all those miseries and troubles he was here exercised with It 's the haven after all the tossings he had in this world If we had hope only in this life saith Paul 1 Cor. 15. we were of all men most miserable therefore death is that which makes them happy Alas were it not for death their reproaches would be eternal their persecutions would be everlasting Insomuch that death must be as welcome to them as the divisions of the waters of Jordan were to the Israelites to come out of Aegypt Mat. 24. Lift up your heâ—d for your redemption draweth nigh And Christs coming not only at the Day of Judgement but at the particular death of every godly man is the coming of the Bridegroom Then all tears are washed from their eyes Their happinesse doth not begin till death arrests them Now in this world for the most part the godly have the bitter things thereof Dives had the good things of this life when Lazarus had the bitter Besides the hatred and opposition in the world They groan under the guilt of sinne under the power of sinne Now death puts a stop not onely to worldly troubles but all spiritual diseases This flux of blood will run no more they shall have no more pride no more unbelief no more doubting about the pardon of sin in a moment their souls will be made like a paradise like the upper region no clouds no fears at all Thirdly Death is theirs Because it 's the finishing of all their worke and servâ—ce and by that they come for their wages How doth the labouring man long for the end of the day or the week that he may come to receive his wages Thus is death God putteth all his children on work he giveth them all talents and he takes them not away till they have done their work for which he appointed them Thus Moses Gods servant dieth Thus David served in his generation Thus Paul finished his course When they have done all their
work then they die to receive their wages And this certainly is very comfortable to all the children of God especially Ministers that God will give them their liberties and lives till they have done their work No man can stop Gods way and power no more than they can hinder the Sunne in running its race Why should death then be grievous to thee when God hath no more for thee to do here when thou canst be no more usefull to promote his glory Fourthly Death is the godly mans Because the meditation and thoughts of it are sanctified to him He liveth as one that expecteth it daily And although every one knoweth he must die yet we cannot have the sanctified knowledge of it without Gods grace Teach me to number my dayes saith the Psalmist Psal 90. that we may apply our hearts to wisdome And Paul I die daily Thus the Scripture bids us not put confidence in future things what we will do or whither we will go because our life is a vapour Jam 4 13. Oh it 's great proficiency in Christianity to live as a mortal dying man Alas such an one will provide for eternity not account any thing in this world can make him truly happy his heart is weaned from all worldly comforts and delights Thus that there is such a thing as death it is a great argument to the godly man to live with all heavenly and holy affections Fifthly Death is the godly mans Because he only knoweth how to dâ—e well as we told you Life was his Because he onely could tell how to live So death is his because he only knoweth how to die Simeon saith Lukâ— 2.29 Now Lord let thy servant depart in peace when he had taken Christ in his arms and seen his salvation Thus they only by faith lay hold on Christ they only have oil to their lamps they only are prepared to give up their accounts Oh it 's an art of arts to die well Few are so prepared and disposed that at what hour soever the Master shall come he shall find them doing his will It 's true many wicked men are not afraid to die they flatter themselves and can bid death welcome but it is their ignorance their boldnesse makes them thus they know not what it is do die upon what terms to appear before God and therefore do suddenly drop into hell Sixthly The godly man hath death as an advantage if you respect the time and season of his death His death is not only mercy but the time of his death is mercy The term of every mans life is appointed by God To him belong the issues of death Psal 68.20 Now God in great wisdom and mercy hath determined the time of thy death And although we cannot alwayes see how it is a mercy to die at such and such a time yet it is so The righteous is gathered from the evil to come Isa 57.1 as jewels when the house is on fire as cattel are driven into a refuge before the storm beginneth Hezekiah must not live to see all that publique ruine which was coming on Israel Thus though they die in their younger years it 's a mercy Hence the death of righteous men is accounted a sad prognostique of future calamities Lastly Even the violent death of Martyrdome which cometh by the cruel and bloudy oppression of implacable enemies that is theirs It 's a mercy a gain and honour The Apostles rejoyced that they were accounted worthy to lose what they had for Christs sake To you it 's given not only to believe but to suffer Phil. 1 19. If any man suffer as a Christian blessed is he for the spirit of glory shall rest upon him 1 Pet. 4.14 It 's the greatest honour that can be put upon thee Though it be matter of scorn and reproach with the world yet God and the holy Angels approve such As Christ is said to be exalted and glorified by dying so it is with his children Vse of unspeakable Consolation to the godly in their temptations and fears about death Oh that is terrible to thee thou knowest not what to do But why so If thou art one of the members of Christ who by faith art ingraffed in him this should be matter of joy Then and never till then doest thou beginne to be happy then thy bridegroom cometh to meet thee then the gates of Heaven are set open to give thee glorious entertainment if yet these things do not raise thee it 's because thou art not heavenly thou doest not by faith live on Scripture arguments Vse 2. Of Terrour to wicked men who must die and yet to die is onely losse to them They lose their wealth their friends their greatnesse all the mirth they had and then beginneth thy eternal woe Oh the very name of death and mortality should strike terrour into thee for this is the beginning of hell it putteth an end to all the comforts of this life Or things present or things to come We are now come to the last Enumeration of those several things which belong to the Churches treasure and that is all kind of events distributed according to their time either things present or future By present things some understand those gifts in the Church which were extraordinary of healing and such like cures and by future things the gift of revelation concerning things to come But this is too much restrained We rather take the largest sense and by present things understand all those events which for the present do befall us And by future whatsoever may in time come upon us So that this Text is a soveraign cordial to the godly whatsoever fals out they are sure to be gainers by Nothing comes amisse they are in a sure Ark while others float on the waters Observe That whatsoever fals out for the present to a godly man it is for his good Every day is in travel and brings forth some new thing or other Now as often as there is any new event so often is there a new mercy Our Saviour Matth. 6.34 saith Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof implying thereby that every day hath a womb as it were and it brings forth some affliction some evil or other and it is sufficient to the day we need not trouble our selves afore-hand Qui dolet antequam necesse est dolet plusquam necesse est yet the evil of the day is the good of the day to the believer A godly man may say he never had an ill day since his regeneration As we reade of a devout man who being wished a good day he said He never had an ill one in all his life And being asked How that could be He answered Every morning he laboured to conform his will to Gods will that what pleased God should please him and by this means every day was a good day to him Now the things which fall out may be divided into two contrary heads and you shall find both of
perseverance in the state of grace that they shall never totally and finally fall off from the favour of God For this is the greatest thing that might be feared not the losse of riches honours or our estates but the losse of grace is to be feared Oh if left to my self I may prove a Prodigal become destitute of all holinesse There is nothing should more make the godly afraid than this Hence they are commanded to have a godly trembling about it He that standeth let him take heed that he doe not fall 1 Corinth 10.12 Works out your salvation with fear and trembling Philip. 2.12 Blessed is he that feareth alwayes Prov. 28.14 Now though there be such a godly fear required yet the godly at the same time are to be perswaded that what grace God hath begunne he will perfect and therefore this fear is promised as a means to preserve them Jer. 32.40 I will put my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me So that we have many glorious promises for our continuance and stedfastnesse in the way of God that neither the subtil devices of false prophets shall be able to deceive them nor open and violent persecutions shall take them out of Christs arms for they must be stronger than Christ that can do this Lastly Death which is surely to come upon every one even about that the godly need not be troubled You heard it was their gain it was the time of their redemption it was Jacobs Chariot Now although it be so yet the most godly have trembling thoughts about it Christ himself as he was a man had a natural fear of death and many of Gods children are tempted about it lest they should have no comfort be filled with despair or not able with readinesse and willingnesse to resigne themselves into Gods hands But the Scripture doth excellently fortifie against this The righteous hath hope in his death Prov. 14.32 And 1 Cor. 15.55 O death where is thy sting And Psal 4.15 see what an expression there is The Lord will strengthen him on the bed of languishing and the Lord will make all his bed in his sicknesse All his bed Do not then fear to be left comfortlesse at that hour This must come and it will come blessed unto thee And as for the things to come in the world to come they are so theirs that they are prepared onely for them Here riches and honours the good have them and the bad have them but there onely the godly do possesse the good things of that life Now what tongue of men or Angels is able to speak of them The Scripture cals it Life eternal life Glory and immortality The Kingdome of Heaven A Crown that never withereth nay whatsoever may be said of it comes short because it may be said Then we rightly esteem of it when we account it inestimable Now this everlasting glory is so sure though to come that they are said to have it already He hath already passed from death to life 1 John 3.14 He is already set down with Christ in heavenly places Ephes 2.6 And Heb. 1. They have faith which is the substance and evidence of things not seen So that were the godly for the present to lie under all imaginable misery yet that which is to come would make amends for all Thus Paul We account these light afflictions not comparable to that eternal weight of glory 2 Cor. 4.17 It 's no matter what is for the present so that what is to come be so glorious Now let us passe from the Mount of Blessing to that of Cursing Let us see how it is with the wicked man in respect of what is to come And First How rich and pleasant and full their condition is for the present yet they may expect fulnesse of wrath to come upon them every day Jam. 5.1 Go to now ye rich men howl and weep for the miseries that are to come upon you God storeth up vengeance he hath a treasure of it and the ungodly may tremble every hour lest it fall upon them Therefore thou that art now jolly and confident fear what is to come what the next day may bring upon thee Sodome had a fair morning but fire and brimstone quickly fell upon them In Deut. 28. we have the curses of a wicked man described That in the morning he should wish for evening and he should be in continual fear of what may come upon them Even as Cain went up and down fearing every one would kill him So that all the curses in the Word all the wrath of God may justly be feared by thee every day thou arisest or walkest abroad Secondly Although they have the good things of this life yet they are rather to tremble then to be confident thereby For the Parable of Dives and Lazarus instructeth us of Gods proceedings herein Luke 16. Abraham told Dives He had received the good things of this life and therefore was to have the evil things of the life to come As Ishmael had part of the earthly possessions of this world but nothing of Canaan or the promise Thy misery and confusion hereafter will be the greater by how much the rather thou hast been accustomed to ease and pleasures and the longer God keeps off his wrath the more heavy and weighty will it be when it shall come Vse 1. Of Instruction He only is happy who shall be so in the world to come Judge not of a mans blessednesse by this moment our lives are shadows that passe away what shalt thou be to all eternity Say that to thy soul Oh prophane Atheist that crieth Give me the present and let others take the future Thou doest not believe the great things coming therefore thou thinkest and speakest so Oh what a vast difference will there be between thy laughing here and thy roaring in hell thy pleasures here and thy torments there Oh that this eternity coming that this world to come should not be more in your minds and hearts Vse 2. Of Consolation to the godly who may say Soul take thy spiritual ease If they may not who may lay themselves down and sleep if not such for whatsoever fals out it shall be well with them They have a promise for the future and therefore it 's their weaknesse and unbelief if they torment themselves saying what if this be and that be How shall I do if such things come upon me What shall not such promises as I have named quiet thee Mayest thou not trust God upon his Word Vse 3. Of Terrour to the wicked Do not with Agag rise up comfortably and walk delicately saying The worst is past No God reserveth his bitter gall to come All the grief pain and misery thou hast had in this life is nothing to those dregs thou must drink up hereafter Break off thy sins quickly by repentance think what will those cost me hereafter How do the damned in hell think of those wicked wayes