regard but know that his goodness in his patience and bounty yet exercised is to melt thy heart and move thee to repentance But God shall wound the head of his enemies and the hairy scalp of such a one as goes on still in his trespasses Destruction is to the wicked even at their portion from God and a strange punishment to the workes of iniquity Job 31. 3. Psal 68. 21. And infinitely better it is to be judged yea to have our judgement in this world then in the world to come Seeing therefore Gods judging us here is by a Mediator and that he may not judge us in the world to come but that we may escape the damnation of Hell Learn at least when so judged by him timely to humble our selves under his mighty hand and to judge our selves that we fail not of his grace that is yet bringing salvation in the way of his judgements nor be further judged by him Be not mockers lest your bands be made strong for if under all these judgements in this life and notwithstanding them the Whoremonger and Adulterer and so the Murtherer and Covetous person who is an Idolater remain still such until the day pass that is to say If either they continue in the evil way and course of acting serving or following and making provision for it for there is no such dispensation from heaven that a man may continue in the act of sin or in the course and way of sinning and yet be free from the guilt of it The liberty to which we are called by the Gospel is not liberty to the flesh Or if they have left some particular way and course of sinning in which they have before walked or it have left them if yet they remain under the guilt of it not being washed in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God as aforesaid And so their iniquity not being purged from them till they dye which it cannot be but by the blood of Christ and if they be not purged till death they can never be purged after for there is no wisdom knowledge work or device in the grave or in the disappearing state of death to which we are going Eccles 9. 10. no Purgatory there nor any returning again to perfect any thing left undone under the Sun For though all men shall return again from the grave and from the disappearing state of death yet not to perfect any thing left undone under the Sun but to appear before the Judgement-seat of Jesus Christ to receive every one according to the deeds done in the body in this life whether they be good or bad according to the Gospel-rule of judging if therefore they still remain such in Gods account they still remain under the decree For Whoremongers and Adulterers God will judge And so dying in their sins 3. They fall under the eternal judgement of the wrath of God the full and proper wages of their sin and cannot escape the damnation of Hell-fire where their worm dyeth not and their fire is not quenched For from the very time of death there is a great gulf fixed between them and those that have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour and are not again intangled therein but dye in the Lord yea between them and those that are yet among the living to whom there is hope so that he that would pass from the one to the other cannot From thenceforth they are sealed up and reserved in prison to the judgement of the great day and their spirits have no rest day nor night but are in continual horrour in remembrance of what infinite mercy they have slighted abused and sinned against and in the sence and apprehension of the dreadful wrath of the Lamb that is now become their portion for ever Luk. 16. 19-26 Rev. 14. 11. with Prov. 14. 32. And in that imprisoned state of darkness and horrour they shall remain till they shall have their dead bodies raised up by the voice of the Son of man the Lord Jesus Christ that dyed for them and re-united with their spirits And that resurrection of them shall be to everlasting shame and confusion world without end For then they shall be brought before his Judgement-seat and there shall be particularly and fully brought to light and manifested all the grace they have sinned against all the warnings and reproofs they have despised and every secret thing and hidden work of darkness they have done It shall be made manifest before God Angels and men to evidence the equity and righteousness of his Judgement which themselves also shall then upon clear conviction acknowledge just for from their own mouths he shall judge them and so proceed to that righteous and dreadful sentence which from thence in the execution shall for ever seize on soul and body Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels which is to them the second death and the smoke of their torment aseendeth up for ever and ever And God and his holy Angels and sanctified ones shall rejoyce when they see the vengeance for there shall be no more mercy bowels or pity in God Angels or men towards them for ever as in this day there was God himself shall laugh at their calamity and mock when their fear cometh and they shall be tormented for ever from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power I say for ever in soul and body together for there is no darkness or shadow of death left in which the workers of iniquity may then hide themselves no pains or torments shall ever be able to put an end to their sensible being or make a dissolution of soul and body again but when an hundred a thousand ten thousand yea ten thousand times ten thousand years have passed yet is not the time at all shortned it is still for ever and for ever Nor is there any intermission their worm dyeth not and their fire is not quenched and it is infinitely sorer punishment then any merciless torments that can be suffered in this life yea the pains and miseries of this first death and the Hell pertaining thereto will be cast into that lake to boot all aggravating the terrour of it yet there will be degrees of torment by the worm and by the fire and they will be most dreadful and in the highest degrees upon those that have sinned against most mercy who knoweth the greatness and power of his wrath it will be even according to his infinite greatness and power to execute it and according to the grace abused for then there shall be no Mediator to plead for any abatement as now there is nor any to deliver Oh consider it in time ye that forget God lest he come and tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver surely then it will appear no small mercy to have been now delivered from the wrath to come
to the precious bloud of Christ as declared in the Gospel or as the grace in him through it is discovered to them or have not submitted to the washing efficacie thereof not so received the love of the truth as to save them to baptize or wash them into Christ for righteousness and strength For these are still under the guilt of their former sins and so still reputed as such with God though from some other cause or reason they may have ceased from their former course of acting or walking in them or through decay of nature and so of the fleshly strength and lust their former sins may have left them yet the wrath of God abides on them even for those sins of their youth because they have not believed on the Name of the onely begotten Son of God And if still they abide in wilful ignorance and unbelief of that truth through the knowledge of which the Son makes free they are not free indeed for the soul being without this knowledge of God in Christ cannot be good not reconciled to God and so not washed from its sins and therefore so remaining till the day of Gods grace and patience pass away from them they shall die in their sins For if ye ye to whom that hath been testified in the evidence and demonstration of the Spirit believe not saith our Saviour that I am he if with the heart ye embrace not or close not with the Testimony of Jesus The Christ in those manifestations of it brought to you to save you from your sins ye shall die in your sins Joh. 3. 18 36. 8. 24. with Prov. 19. 2. This description of Whoremongers and Adulterers that are so repuced of God according to his rule of judging men by Jesus Christ and the grounds of it may be further demonstrated from the Testimony of Jesus as to say 1. That they are children of disobedience to the grace of God that is by and through Christ and such onely that do abide under the guilt and imputation of sin from God so as to remain under his wrath for sin this or any other This is thus demonstrated The guilt of the disobedience of the first man Adam in which we have all sinned and of our natural uncleanness or filthiness of the flesh as meerly and necessarily from thence derived to us in which we are by nature altogether filthy sinners enemies to God full of all ungodliness unrighteousness fornication c. These being by imputation laid upon Christ or caused to meet together upon him and he having been made sin and a curse for them he hath thereby made peace and atonement with God for them and by himself purged them away from before the Father so that he hath redeemed us all mankinde of the Father from under the curse of the Law to himself The Father hath released us into his hands and judgeth no man otherwise then by Jesus Christ unto whom as our surety he hath remitted and released the old debt and first judgement he had against us and hath committed all judgement unto him so that in this his judging by Jesus Christ he holds no man under wrath or at a distance from his Majestie merely because they have a sinful Nature full of enmity to God and inclined to all that is contrary to his Law nor for such sinful actions as merely break forth through natural infirmity or violence of temptations nor shall there be any occasion for that Proverb in the eternal judgement of all men by Jesus Christ The fathers have eaten sowre grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge And though now men do bear some fruit of that first sin and natural sinfulness as thence derived in mortalities and death now reigning upon them yet is that death abolished the sting taken out of it and no man shall perish in it but be raised out of it and brought before the Judgement-seat of Christ For as by man came death so by man the resurrection of the dead for as in Adam all dye so in Christ shall all be made alive from this death And now while they live here though in mortal state yet are they not by these fruits of sin remaining upon them nor for this filthiness of the flesh held out from God or under his wrath Col. 1. 20. Heb. 1. 3. Gal. 3. 13. Joh. 5. 22. Rom. 5. 18. Ezek. 18. 1. with 2 Tim. 1. 10. 1 Cor. 15. 21 22. But this is the condemnation that when light is come into the world men love and chuse darkness rather and for this the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who withhold or smother the truth of God in unrighteousness and would not so receive it as to save them from their ungodliness and unrighteousness Because that which may be known of God was manifested in them and they liked not to retain God in their knowledge John 3. 19. Rom. 1. 18 29. Yet also II. That all that consent to sin so as to yeild up their members to commit or serve it or voluntarily follow after its sinful and unclean lusts and make provision for them to fulfill them that they are guiley before God and under wrath as sinning against that grace that brings salvation to all men this we learn from that branch of the testimony of Jesus that declares him in the vertue of his ransom for all a faithful testimony of Gods goodness to men in due time and therewith warning of the danger of hiding retaining and following the sins of the youth shewing the necessity of being washed from them and leading to repentance even so soon as there is any capacity in the soul to know any thing and strength to act voluntarily after their own choice so soon doth he prevent every man with his goodness that they are not left under a necessity of committing or serving sin nor are their sins and iniquities so left upon them that they may not by the grace of God deny and resist them for though they be naturally dead in sins and trespasses yet the dead are made to hear the voice of the Son of God that in hearing or adhering to what they are made to hear by his preventing grace they might live Though the spirit of a man be as a candle out that cannot light it self nor be lighted by a meer blowing upon it yet the inspiration of the Almighty giveth it understanding that true light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world is as we have said a testimony in due time a faithful witness therefore whoever sinneth he is of the Devil and hath voluntarily refused to see know or take notice of Gods goodness which bringeth salvation to all men in due season and therewith teacheth that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world 1 Tim. 2. 6. John 16. 8. Rom. 2. 4. Ezek. 33. 10. Joh. 5. 25. Job 32. 8.
1 Joh. 3. 6 8. Tit. 2. 11 12. And the heynousness and sinfulness of this kind of sin or sinning is evidenced and aggravated by the grace of God in and through Christ against which it is committed Yea III. That this sin and so all sins of this nature are still retained in heaven against men and they reputed as guilty before God whether they go on in the course of acting or serving them still or no while yet they are not washed in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God this likewise is to be seen and understood in the light of Gods testimony concerning Jesus Christ which declares it to be his peculiar work and office in the name of the Father and by the power of the eternal Spirit by and with the vertues of what he hath done and is become in himself for us to save and wash us from our sins It is to him that all the Prophets bear witness that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive the forgiveness of sins And by him all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses Act. 10. 43. 1. 3. 39. Neither is there any other name given under Heaven whereby we may be saved but the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth He hath deputed no man or Church as his Vicar or substitute to do this but himfelf by and through the knowledge of himself is the justifier and cleanser from all unrighteousness Isai 53. 11. 1 Joh. 1. 7 9. And so it is attributed to the Apostles and to them that believe through their word and have that word of reconciliation to minister I say it is attributed to them in their faithful ministration of that Word because of the promise of his spiritual presence with them therein alway to the end of the world that whose sins they remit namely in that ministration and by the power of their word they are remitted in heaven c. For it is Jesus Christ that makes them free through the knowledge of that word of truth it is Christ spiritually ministring and ministred by them he sent his word and healed them Joh. 20. 21 23. with Mark 16. 15 16. and Matth. 28. 19 20. Joh. 8. 32 36. Psal 107. 20. And truely if he wash them not men can have no part with him nor are they washed from their filthiness how clean or pure soever in their own or others eyes Whence it is said of the Corinthians Such were some of you namely fornicators covetous c. But ye are washed ye are sanctified ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God he saith not in the name of the Church or of some High Priest or Bishop on earth no not in the name of Paul or Peter Was Paul crucified for you says he to them 1 Cor. 1. 13. or were ye baptized into the name of Paul But in the name of the Lord Jesus c. 1 Cor. 6. 9 11. Implying that untill they were washed in that name they were not washed nor free indeed nor was their name changed with God but they are still reputed as such with him whatever other washings and cleansings they have had and in what other name soever But being washed in his name in that washing of regeneration and renewing of the holy Ghost which is poured forth abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour they are no longer reputed by the Almighty as Whoremongers and Adulterers but are by him graciously owned and called by a new name Sons of God heirs with Christ elect beloved of the chosen generation Behold what manner of love is this that even such may have their sins so blotted out in heaven as to be called The sons of God who would not make haste to this fountain while it is yet held open for the washing us from our sin and uncleanness We knowing the terrour of the Lord against them that will not be made clean whose sins are still retained in heaven against them cannot but perswade men though they count us fools and mad-men for our pains for see the sentence and decree of the holy One Whoremongers and adulterers God will judge which leads us to the last consideration here propounded namely 3. How in what sence and after what manner God will judge them The opposition of Gods judging them in this saying But whoremongers and adulterers God will judge I say the opposition of it unto what is before affirmed of the honourableness of Marriage shews it to be such a correction punishment or judgement for it as is fitly opposed to the honourableness of Marriage and the bed undefiled that is he will put them to shame and wound them with reproach and dishonour And though this may be and is in the beginnings of it in mercy and for their healing and therefore with much mixture of mercy yet still persisting such he will more severely judge them as those that break Wedlock and shed blood are judged a wound and dishonour shall he get and his reproach shall not be wiped away and in the issue they still going on in their trespasses or not being washed in the blood of Christ he will judge them to everlasting shame and confusion as he will do all makers and worshippers of Idols who are spiritual adulterers and fornicators and all that are incensed against him See this distinctly in three branches or steps of Gods proceeding in his judging them according to a threefold sense of Gods judging spoken of in the Scripture Gods judging is sometimes taken for the judgements of his mouth as Psal 105. 5. and of them oft-times more particularly for his passing sentence for or against a man his approving or disapproving his justifying or condemning in respect of which it is said that that he judgeth even now in this present day without respect of persons according to every mans work 1 Pet. 1. 17. and 2. 23. with Joh. 8. 16 26 50. 12. 48. 5. 30. Yet because sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed the hearts of the sons of men are fully set in them to do evil Likewise more oft and frequently his judgements are taken for the judgements of his hand his executing judgement according to the righteous sentence of his mouth and so sometimes for his judging in this life and world Gen. 15. 14. That nation whom they shall serve will I judge 1 Sam. 3. 13. God would judge the house of Eli for ever Ezek. 7. 3 27. He would judge them according to their ways and deserts Chap. 16. 38. I will judge thee as women that break wedlock and shed bloud And sometimes for his eternal judgement in the world to come After death the judgement Heb. 9. 27. God hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given assurance unto