of the several vanities that he had observed under the Sun and one is this which he mentions chap. 6. vers 7. All the labour of man is for his mouth and yet the belly is not filled Man labours and toyls and yet he hath not out of all his labour that which can fill his appetite His appetite is capable of more then his labour can bring him in which was a vanity he observed But now he that is in sincerity serving the Lord when he comes to enjoy the fruit and the reward of his service he shall find that which will be satisfaâ—tion to his soul for he shall find God himself both in that service and especially at the end of the service As the good servant in the Gospel that had faithfully served the Lord was bid to enter into his Masters joy Other servants that are serving the World and serving their Lusts may enter into the joy of the creature and the joy and pleasure of sin but not into the joy of the Lord which is only that joy that can satisfie the heart of man Lastly consider this If a man doth not serve the Lord he doth not Live I say again he doth not live It is true take life in a large sense so it is the whole activity of the Reasonable Soul displaying it self in the several actions of man in the world But take life in a stricter and Theological sense and so it is the activity of the soul displaying it self by the power of the holy Ghost in the service of God So that when the service of God is the Sphaere and the Spirit the Principle of the souls activity this is most truly and properly life The Apostle saith of the Widdow that liveth in pleasure She is dead while she liveth The Widdow indeed She serveth God day and night as he 1 Tim. 5. 6. said before But she that liveth in pleasure not serving God is dead whiles she liveth I suppose you have heard the story of him that was converted in the latter end of his days and therefore would have this Inscription upon his Tomb after his death Diu fui in Mundo parum vixi I have been long in the world but I have lived but a little For that life which man lives whiles he is serving himself and acting his lusts and promoting his own carnall interests is so far differing from that life which he at first reveived from God in innocency that it is quite another and not that life as if he that had lived the life of a man should come to live the life of a beast as Nebuchadnezar did you would say this is another and not the same life So that when a man is in sincerity serving the Lord this is his original life and his only true life Thus I have spoken to you as men and the ingagements you see that lie upon you on that lowest account are very strong to be serving the Lord but those that follow are yet stronger wherein I shall speak to you 2. Secondly as Christians Christians I mean not in the largest sence as Baptized only into the name of Christ but in a stricter sence as Baptized into his Spirit for I believe I speak to many such at this time and as such you are peculiarly ingaged to serve the Lord. For 1. First you are those that the Lord hath bought peculiarly bought for though Christ in a more general sence hath purchased all men yea the whole creation for his Lordship and dominion over all creatures comes in upon him upon the account of his death yet his death and the purchase of it doth more peculiarly relate to his people Being the Saviour of all men yet especially of those that believe Now the Apostle argues 1 Cor. 5. last concerning the believing Corinthians Ye are not your own why For ye are bought with a price What then Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are the Lords As a servant that is but hired is ingaged to serve his Master how much more if bought with his money as those servants under the Law So that the Lord hath a stronger title to you then others as being not only his by the more common right of Creation but the more peculiar right of purchase And the price that purchased you is not Silver and Gold which yet are accounted the most precious things in nature but the blood of Christ the blood of God which is indeed the greatest that Heaven or Earth could yeeld So that Gods expectation cannot but be greater upon his people then upon any others that whoever deny him service yet that they should yeild it to him And so saith the same Apostle 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. If one died for all then were all dead c. that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him that died and rose again As if he should say we were indeed all dead but we are purchased from death into life by Jesus Christ and this life now we are not to live it to our selves but unto him by whose death we come to live 2. As Christians you are Married to the Lord. He hath divorced you from your first Husband which is the Flesh which you were in League with and obedient to and he hath married you to himself Now why are you thus married the Apostle tels you Rom. 7. 4. We are married to him that is raised from the dead that we should bring forth fruit to God We are married to Christ Crucified that we might be dead to sin and to Christ raised from the dead that we might live a new life which is to bring forth fruit to God As we know in Marriage a man marries a wife that she might bring forth her fruit as by himself and not by another so to himself and not to another also Now this is to serve the Lord when the fruit we bring forth we bring it forth not to our selves but unto him And we know also by the Law of marriage the wife is not her own but her Husbands and hath not power over her own body but the Husband as the Apostle speaks 1 Cor. 7. 4. So is the case here ye that are married to the Lord the Law of that spiritual Relation doth take you off from being your own or having a power over your selves so as to be serving your selves and doth ingage you to be the Lords and to be serving him 3. As Christians and Saints he hath bestowed more cost and workmanship upon you then upon others he hath formed you for himself He hath Created you again So saith St. Paul Eph. 2. 10. We are his workmanship why So are all Creatures but he adds Created in Christ Jesus we have a new creation in him but to what are we created To good works that we should walk in them and what is that but to be serving the Lord Why was it that the Lord did so expect fruit
the World may offer yet God doth infinitely out-bid them what they offer is but a piece of light and fading vanity but what God offers is a weight an eternal weight of glory The Reward must needs be great because God rewards not only according to mans work but according to the riches of his own grace and bounty A great King accounts it his shame to give a mean reward he must do all things like himself It is said Heb. 11. 16. of those believing Patriarchs God was not ashamed to be called their God why for saith the Text he hath prepared for them a City that is if God had not well provided for them if he had not prepared a glorious habitation for them somewhat like himself he might have been ashamed to be called their God so This Reward excels in the sureness of it It will certainly come Though we may fail of success in our work yet we shall not misse the reward of it as the Prophet Isaiah speaks Isai 49. 4. I have laboured in vain there he mist his success yet my judgment is with the Lord and my works with my God there he finds the reward And it is the Apostles argument 1 Cor. 15. ult let us abound in the work of the Lord and the Argument is not only because there is a reward but the reward is sure as knowing that our labour is never in vain in the Lord. It is true God doth defer it at least the greatest part of it but why is it that he might learn us to live upon Trust He having given us such a sure promise he may presume that we have enough to support and encourage us though the reward be for a season deferred Therefore saith the Apostle Heb. 10. 35 Cast not away your confidence which hath great recompence of reward Oh but we do not see the recompence we possess it not therefore he adds yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry and the just shall live by faith 2. The second work of the spirit is a work of mortification Mans selfish nature must be mortified else he will be serving himself and not the Lord. That life in a believer that serves the Lord springs out of the death of his carnal life as man ceaseth to be his own so doth he come to serve the Lord and live to him The message that Moses carried to Pharaoh from the Lord was this Let my people go that they may serve me they must go out of the Land of Egypt and from under the power of Pharaoh that they might serve the Lord. So must man go out of that selfish nature that keeps him in bondage and out of the power of the infernal Pharaoh before he can be capable of serving God And this is done in us by the Spirit that smites those enemies that held us in bondage that we might go forth into the liberty of serving God pride must be smitten and self-love must be smitten and unbelief must be smitten c. before any man doth indeed enter into the Lords service No man saith Christ can serve two Masters especially two Masters whose commands are contradictory now every lust is a Master which man is serving and till the Spirit crucifie them man cannot be serving Jesus Christ 3. The third work is a work of renovation The faculties of the soul must pass under a spiritual renovation before they can be fit to serve the Lord. For I am not of their opinion who think that if lust be mortified the soul would of it self return into its primitive course as a river that is stopt if you remove the dam it runs of it self or a stone that hangs in the ayr by a string if you cut the string of it self it falls to the centre but there must be aliquid divinitus infusum a principle infused from above to act it towards the Lord and in his service Lust it is a confining thing it makes man dwell at home and serve himself but grace is enlarging it lets man out of himself and brings him home to the Lord and to the service of the Lord. He that is a fit servant for a Prince must have many accomplishments to fit him for it And so would I dwell here I might shew you how many things are necessary to accomplish a man for the Lords service as Faith Love Hope Humility Self denyal c. are all necessary that he may be a vessel of honour prepared for his Masters 2 Tim. 2. 21. use For natural accomplishments may fit a man for the service of man but man must be accomplisht from Heaven to fit him for the Lords service But I passe Use 2 That which I infer next from the Doctrine as more suitable to the day is matter of Lamentation Ah may we not mourn over our selves mourn over the City mourn over the Nation yea mourn over the world that that which is mans great work is laid aside as if it was none of his work at least other work hath the praeeminence Oh that the Devil that hath no true right to us for he neither made us nor bought us and that payes no wages but death and misery and that the lusts of the flesh to which as the Apostle saith we are no debtors yet these should have more real more free more chearful service then God then Christ to whom we are indebted by so manifold ingagements and obligations This is true but ah is it not sad Hath not Christ think you better deserved of the World Hath he not Might not Jesus Christ promise himself that after he had manifested such stupendious love as to lay down his life for an undone world that they should be so amazed so ravisht with this love as to be ambitious who should love him most and honour him most and serve him most that the very naming the name of Christ should be argument enough to provoke them to ingage in any service for him Yea and after he had laid down the price of his blood the greatest price that Heaven or Earth could give to purchase us might he not promise himself that the Sons of men would no longer be their own but his wholly his But alasse we see nothing lesse then this in the world Men after all this are their own live to themselves serve themselves and Christ and his service both are despised and rejected of men may not Heaven and Earth even tremble and be astonisht at this Or when men are serving Christ do they serve him with the best do they serve him with such life and vigour as they serve themselves and the world do not they bring him the lame the blind the torn the maymed as if any thing was good enough for Christ as Jeroboam made Priests of the lowest of the People so do men think the lowest of their affections the very dreg of their time and strength good enough for God Was there ever
disturbances Yea if the people will not come to hear it preached but be spending their time in drinking and revelling and the like when they should be attending upon it he may command them to give their attendance upon it at least in one place or another especially such as own the Christian profession as we do generally in this Nation 3. He is not only to remove obstructions but he ought to countenance and encourage the true Preachers and Ministers of the Gospel in their preaching and the Professors of the Gospel in their profession He is to take them under the wing of his Government and to protect them in their just Liberties against all opposers and to furnish them with convenient places for their meetings and publique Worship and to provide what maintenance may be necessary for the furtherance of the preaching the Gospel and spreading of it as Constantine did in his time And all this he is to do because of that Supream Right that the Gospel hath from him that is the King of the Earth to be published in the world 4. But lastly He may also upon the same account inhibite the divulging and propagating of any principles opinions or religion so called which will directly tend to the undermining and subverting of this Gospel For it is only the true Gospel that hath a right to be propagated and received in the world So that the Magistrate is under no ingagement to any Religion but the true Religion any Gospel but the true Gospel any profession but the true profession for that only hath a right as I said to be propagated and entertained So that if any man will come and preach another Gospel then what the Apostles had a commission from Christ to preach and will preach such Doctrine as will tend to the undermining of it The Magistrate is under no ingagement to give to that liberty much lesse countenance but rather to restrain it because it is not that Gospel and that true revelation of the mind of God which he hath decreed to be entertained of men If a man will come and preach up Paganisme Turcisme Judaisme Papisme yea and to go farther Pelagianisme Socinianisme or Arminianisme in the grosser points of it and claim liberty and protection from the Magistrate in so doing let him shew by what right he would claim this liberty for where can he shew that ever any man had a commission from Christ to preach up these religions or opinions in the world I would be understood to speak only of those opinions that do undermine the true Gospel and that way of truth which God hath revealed for the salvation of the world and which may be accounted in the number of those Heresies that are damnable and not of lesser mistakes either in point of Doctrine or Discipline wherein the godly both have and may differ for in things that are doubtful or not fully certain there ought to be a forbearance least the truth be restrained in stead of errour Neither have I pleaded for the punishing of any mans person meerly because he holds this or that opinion what I have said is that the Magistrate is under no ingagement to errour as errour or to give liberty to the spreading of those opinions that rase the Foundation of our Christian Religion Object 1. But there are such câ—ntroversies in religion that we know not how to be sure what is a truth or what is errour and so we may oppose truth in stead of errour and make way to errour in stead of truth Answer Are we not sure that the Christian Religion is the true Religion if we are not sure of that we leave our soules in a desperate hazard and lie sadly open to the snares and temptations of the Devil and of men Cunning to deceive But if you say you are sure the Christian Religion is the true Religion may you not then be sure also of those great truths which are as the pillars upon which it stands May we not be sure that Jesus Christ is the true Messiah and that he was really in the nature of man and that in that nature he suffered death for the Redemption of the world May we not be sure that he is risen from the dead and lives for ever making intercession in that nature wherein he died and that he will come again to judg the world May we not be sure that the Scripâ—ures are the written word of God and the rule of our Faith and obedience by which all light in the hearts or Doctrines of men is to be examined Again may we not be sure that we are justified by Faith and not by the works of the Law May not we be sure that there shall be a Resurrection of mens bodies at the last day and that some shall rise to eternal life and others to go into everlasting fire c. If we cannot be sure of such things as these my preaching may be vain and your Faith also vain Object But the Magistrate is not to determine what is truth and what is errour Answ 1. I do not say he is â—o determine yet I say he is to be instructed as the Text speaks and to know which is the true Religion and the great truths upon which it is built and when he knows them he is to give freedom countenance and what furtherance he may to them And if some Magistrates have through ignorance or prejudice turned their power against the truth yet it was their duty to have improved their power for it in those wayes and upon that ground that I before mentioned His ignorance and inability to discharge his duty doth not at all exempt him from it Thus I have shewn briefly and I hope clearly wherein the Magistrate may befriend the Gospel and the true Religion and so upon that account be serving the Lord. There are other things also of another nature wherein he may serve the Lord As in suppressing open vice and wickedness putting down those houses that are the nourishers and maintainers of them I mean disorderly Ale-houses and Taverns whereof we have yet too too great a store every where Something I perceive hath been done upon that account in the Countries and I could wish they were a little more narrowly lookt after in the City God had a sad controversie with Eli though a good man that when his Sons did wickedly he restraind them not He 1 Sam. 3. 13. was a Magistrate and though he could not change their hearts yet he might have restraind their practise And I think this will somewhat befriend the Gospel and the passage of it among us And then as for other things wherein you may serve the Lord as Enacting righteous Laws doing justice and judgment relieving the opprest establishing the Liberties of the Nation so far as may consist with the just liberties of the people of God and the security of that cause wherein the godly of the Nation have been and yet are
so deeply interested that our motion may not be Retrograde and we loose the things that we have wrought As also for the carrying on your affairs at Sea and the war wherein you are ingaged with Spain wherein you would ask counsel from Heaven this day it is not for me to advise any thing in these things they being so much out of my sphaere I shall only say The Lord direct you Yet only this I shall say that the Monarchy you have to do against is deeply defiled with blood and with that blood which hath the loudest cry and when its iniquity is at the full and its defence taken off it shall be as Caleb said of the Canaanites but as bread for those Instruments that God shall employ to take vengeance Only let me bold humbly to advise you as that which is of the greatest concernment to the success of your Affairs That you would Interest God as much as may be in them all For seeing you are men that do pretend to God in what you do and have his Name upon you you are to expect your success to come in not in a common way of Providence but in a way of prayer faith and sincere serving him in all your undertakings This is the third Inference Fourthly I shall infer somthing by way of Tryal in a word or two that we may a little know our own hearts and whom we are serving whether our selves or the Lord. You may know it First by this If you serve the Lord in what you do then you expect your Reward principally from him for the thing or the person that man is serving from the same doth he expect his reward He that is serving man expects his reward from man He that is serving mammon from mammon he looks for his reward And he that is serving the Lord he expects also his chief reward from the Lord And the sence of that reward which he shall have from God is the motive that quickens him more in his work then any he may receive from man Secondly He that serves the Lord in what he doth hath his eye upon him as his ultimate end He that looks no farther then himself this man is serving himself let his work be what it will be as I said before But when the Lord is Finis operis the end of the work or at least Finis operantis the end of him that worketh then is the Lord served Lastly He that serves the Lord he endeavours to manage his work so as it may be most serviceable to him If a Minister uprightly serve the Lord he will preach the Word and manage the whole course of his Ministry not in such a way as may be most pleasing to men but most to the good of souls and the honour and service of Christ And so I may say of Magistrates and of private Christians if they are serving the Lord they then will so endeavour to act and so steer the whole course of their life as that the Lord may be most served and honoured by them Vse 5 The last thing I infer from the Doctrine is encouragement and comfort to the good and faithful servant The service of the Lord though we may suffer reproach in it yet it is the most honourable and loss in it yet it is the most gainful and pain and trouble in it yet it is the most pleasant service in the world Ah much honoured Senators you that are in the integrity of your hearts serving the Lord besides all that peace and pleasure that you may have at present there is a day coming wherein all your service and labour of love will be returned into your Bosoms an hundred fold Oh how honourably doth that man live and how blessedly shall that man die that hath been doing the Lord's work in the world Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord c. for they rest from their labours and their works follow them Rev. 14. 13. their works are ceased as to the labour of them but follow them and will be with them for ever as to the reward of them The rich mans riches shall not follow him the voluptuous mans pleasures shall not follow him nor the honours of the honourable shall not follow them but the faithful servants works shall follow him and be with him for ever It is said of David that after he had served his generation according to the will of God he fell asleep Acts 13. 36. How sweetly may that man lay himself down in the sleep of death that hath in his life been serving his generation according to the will of God The Lord himself will give Testimony to such a man as he doth to the faithful servant in the Parable VVell done thou good and faithful servant For a Magistrate for a Minister Mat. 25. 21. for a Christian to have an Euge from Christ for the Lord himself to give an honourable Testimony to a man and his service is the truest honour and the highest commendation And though he be but a servant yet his Master will make him sharer with himself and that in the best thing which he hath which is his joy Enter thou into thy Masters joy And is not this enough to encourage you But yet if a bigger word then this can be spoken we have an expression or two falling from Christ's own mouth and recorded by Luke chap. 12. which I cannot think of without wonder The one you find in the 43 44. verses Blessed is that servant whom the Lord when he cometh shall find so doing Of a truth I say unto you that he will make him Ruler over all that he hath Can any thing be spoken more Yes in ver 37. we have a greater word then this which I durst not have spoke if Christ had not spoken it himself Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching Verily I say unto you he shall gird himself and make them to sit down to meat and will come forth and serve them In the former expression he saith That all that he hath shall be at their service and that is very much But in this latter he saith a great deal more That he himself will gird himself and put himself as into the posture of a servant and come forth and serve them And now Beloved who would not be the Lord's servant And thus I have spoken to the matter of the counsel here given to the Kings and Judges of the Earth which is to Serve the Lord. I shall next in a word speak to the manner how the Lord is to be served and that the Text saith is with Fear Serve the Lord with fear Though they are Kings and Judges and are a Terror to others yet even they must serve the Lord with fear and though they are men that usually have the greatest defence about them yet lie as open and naked to God as any others and therefore must serve with fear Quest But