2.12 and of a better temper are fit Means under the Conduct and assistance of Gods Grace wholly to Suppress or Mitigate these Fears Yet our Deliverance from This fear of Death is not the thing I am in Particular to consider but only in General as there is a sufficient Foundation laid for this Deliverance if it be fully Assented to and duly Applied The Main thing therefore to be considered in our Deliverance from the Fear of Death through the Death of our ever blessed and most compassionate Redeemer and through the unexpressible Love of God to Man-kind is this That Christ hath Redeemed us from the Curse of the Law being made a Curse for us Gal. 3.13 Our being obnoxious to the eternal Wrath and Anger of God was the Only thing that was formidable in Death and This being taken away by the Death of Christ there is nothing remains in Death as it is a bare Separation of Soul and Body why we should be afraid of it All those that are truly Penitent and Regenerate by the grace of Gods Spirit have now abundant reason for a perpetual Security and calmness of mind either in Life or Death To all such To live is Christ and to die is gain Phil. 1.21 They can look chearfully upon Death and will not commit the least Sin to decline it It is only their Way to Happiness and all the Harshness that it seems to have is from some Natural Difficulties which the God of Nature seems to have implanted in Men that they might not be out of love with Life and unwilling to serve God here in their Generations till their Change come Gen. 6.9 Job 14.14 To which when a Good man doth understand that he is now made to approach by Providence and the good Hand of God all those natural Impressions being useless do then give place to the Exercise of Faith And he doth not only calmly resign his Spirit into the hands of God and trust the Salvation of his Soul with his gracious Redeemer but to Depart this Life and to enter upon a better becomes now his Wish and his Choice For he is so far now from fearing Everlasting Death that he hath a clear prospect of an happy Eternity Seeing that Christ hath not only abolished death 2 Tim. 1.10 but hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel Rom. 8.15 He hath no longer the Spirit of Bondage to fear but the Spirit of Adoption whereby he can cry Abba Father Being justified by Faith Rom. 5.1 2 3. he hath not only Peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ but by him also he hath access by Faith into this Grace wherein he stands And doth rejoice in Hope of the Glory of God And can therefore glory in whatever Tribulations can befall him Nothing Before could ease him of his Bondage but he was subject to it all his Life-time And nothing Now can disturb the Serenity of his mind Our Spiritual Freedom is extended as far as the Bondage was from which we are freed even to the finishing of our whole course 2 Tim. 4.7 For being delivered out of the hands of all our Enemies we are enabled to serve God without fear of any of them Luke 1.47 75. in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our Life I must further add that the Doctrine of my Text thus explain'd is so far from giving encouragement to Sin that this Deliverance which we have from the fear of Eternal Death by the Death of Christ is in truth one of the most powerful Motives to Holiness of life Seeing that we are hereby assured that our pious Endeavours will be Accepted of in Christ and meet with their wish'd for Success which without the knowledge of our Peace being made with God no man could have any Assurance of If it were not for This All that we could do would be indeed worse than at a Peradventure and could have no better Grounds to warrant its Acceptance with God in order to the Saving of our Souls than only such seemingly fair Hopes and probable Conjectures as a Well-bred Heathen might have had to enforce the application of himself to the study and practice of such Political Virtues as might be beneficial to Man-kind and to keep up that Decorum which the very Manliness of the apprehensions and powers which he had might require from him in order to his supposing of his Condition to be less hazardous when he should leave this World Of whom it may yet be presumed That his Knowledge of that fatal Curse which lay upon all Man-kind was as slender as his Ability could be to direct all he did to the Glory of God which yet is in truth the very Soul and Life of Religion It is therefore to be well observed what St. Paul saith to the Colossians Col. 1.22 That Christ did reconcile them unto God in the Body of his flesh through Death that he might present them holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight Before they were Reconciled to God they could not be thus Unblameable and Unreprovable in any sense And After they were reconciled to God we must suppose that there were many Defects in them which if God had been extream to observe in the greatest Rigour they could not have been able to have defended themselves against his severe Scrutiny Yet they being Reconciled to God through the Blood of Christ those instances of New Obedience which by the Grace of God did truly proceed from the Honesty and Integrity of their Hearts were so favourably Accepted of that He that had before reconciled their Persons to God through his Death could consequently represent what they thus faithfully did as Holy Unblameable and Unreproveable in the sight of God that is Acceptable in his sight free from all Charge of Sin from the Accuser of the Brethren Rev. 12.10 Thus I have given you some account of the Notion of the Bondage mentioned in my Text and of the Nature of that Deliverance which we have through the Death of Christ from the Fear of Death Which in short is this That Christ did suffer Death upon the Cross in our stead that we might be freed from Eternal Death That our Guilt being taken away we might be Discharged from that Curse to which we were obnoxious by the breach of Gods Law And consequently That being dead with Christ we may believe that we shall also live with him having this undoubted Assurance to encourage us to lead such Lives as become Christians Rom. 6.5 8. That if we have been planted together in the likeness of his Death we shall be also in the likeness of his Resurrection Having therefore by Gods Assistance dispatched the First thing I proposed to my self to treat of in this Discourse I now come 2dly To offer to your most serious Thoughts some of the most pertinent Considerations I can think of to quicken our Apprehensions of the
Ward Mayor Jovis xxjmo die April 1681. Annoque Regni Regis Caroli secundi Angl. c. xxxiij tio THIS Court doth desire Mr. Sill to Print his Sermon Preached at the Guild-Hall-Chappel on Good-Friday last Wagstaffe Freedom from Fear of Death through the Death of Christ A SERMON Preached at GVILD-HALL-Chappel ON Good-Friday A.D. MDCLXXXI By WILLIAM SILL Rector of St. Austins and St. Faiths united and Chaplain to the Lord Bishop of London LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Sign of the Bisheps-Head in St Pauls Church-Yard 1681. To the Right Honourable Sir PATIENCE WARD Lord Mayor Of the City of LONDON AND TO The Court of ALDERMEN Right Honourable THAT this Sermon is made publick is from the humble Regard that I am obliged to pay to the ORDER I have received I am the less concerned for what Censure may pass upon the honest Plainness of it because I judge that I should much less have answered the great Importance of the Subject if I had affected to treat of it upon any other Grounds than what the Scripture doth give us For the most consummate Political or Moral Discipline can afford us no Weapons more equal to encounter with the Power of Death than any of those Arguments it can suggest to us are to obtain a Respite of the peremptory Sentence from this inexorable King of Terrors If upon this account this Discourse may obtain a favourable Acceptance I shall have all that is aimed at by this humble Address from Right Honourable Your most obedient and humble Servant Will. Sill. A SERMON Preached on Good-Friday at GVILD-HALL CHAPPEL ON HEB. II. 14.15 HEB. II. 14. That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death that is the Devil HEB. II. 15. And deliver them who through fear of death were all their life-time subject to bondage THE Excellency and great Usefulness of this Epistle to the Hebrews hath been well judged to have been the cause of the main Attempts that have been made to deprive us of its Divine Authority the consideration of which should move us to attend more earnestly to it For whatever other Difficulties may for some time have been started by such wary Persons as meant no harm to Religion to hinder the Reception of this Epistle with the same readiness that other parts of the holy Scriptures were admitted yet he that well weighs the advantage we have from it of taking a more full and clear account of the Use and Abrogation of the Jewish Ceremonies and of Christs being the End of the Law and of the Nature and Dignity of his Office as Mediator between God and Men will conclude That he that from the beginning hath ever envyed Man-kind whatever might promote their happiness hath been active in giving weight to those Scruples which if they had been pertinaciously adhered to would so far have brought upon the Church an irreparable Loss But the peculiar Meditations which the Solemnity of this Day doth call us to may yet farther offer something to us of more immediate concern in that this Epistle doth fully set forth and magnifie the Priesthood of Christ and the Vertue Benefits and Dignity of the one Sacrifice of his Death Through which seeing that we have the greatest Advantages that our faln and miserable condition did stand in need of and such as the Great God could not bestow upon us any more agreeable This may more especially be presumed to have an Ascendant upon our minds which nothing but a sottish Stupidity or base Ingratitude can defeat to make us acknowledge and admire the watchful Providence of God for our good in that this Sacred Book hath now for many Ages without the least hesitancy been received as inspired from Gods Holy Spirit by the Universal Church of God and consequently to secure our heedful regard to the main Scope of it Which more especially as to the former Chapters of this Epistle is to recommend to us the Doctrine of Christ and to require our hearty Reception of it and Submission of our selves to the power and efficacy of it Heb. 2.1 That we give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard lest at any time we should let them slip considering with our selves what possibility there can be for us to escape if we neglect so great Salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord Ver. 3 4 and was confirmed by them that heard him God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own Will Now the Reasonableness and Necessity of all this is farther laid before us by the holy Pen-man of this Epistle from the Dignity and Preeminence of the Person of Christ not only above Moses but far above all the great and glorious Angels of God And this partly from the Eternity of his Essence this Eternal Son of God being the brightness of his Glory and the express Image of his Person by whom he made the Worlds Heb. 1 2 3. and who upholds all things by the word of his power And partly from what this Eternal Son after he was Incarnate and had assumed our nature did acquire or was conferr'd upon him God having appointed him Heir of all things and therefore directing us to expect all that Good which by the fall of Adam from that Right and Capacity he was created to we had lost only in and through Christ Ver. 3. who when he had by himself purged our sins sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high and was for the suffering of Death Crowned with Glory and Honour having all things put in subjection under him Heb. 2.8 9. God thereby signifying That that state of Humiliation to which the Son of God was pleased to submit himself whatever mean thoughts vain and proud men might entertain of it was a thing highly pleasing to him and in his infinite Wisdom directed to excellent Ends in which his Goodness and Propensity to favour Man kind should be most eminently apparent to the astonishment indeed both of Men and Angels but to the peculiar benefit of the first Heb. 2.16 For he took not on him the Nature of Angels but he took on him the Seed of Abraham and that in order to this infinitely good and wise End advantageous to miserable and lost Man even to a miracle Heb. 2.9 That he by the grace of God should tast Death for every Man And shall this which was so highly pleasing to God on the behalf of Man not be sufficiently esteemed and valued by Man who hath the sole benefit of it Should not this unexpressible Condescension of the Eternal Son of God be a powerful Motive to us to make us most freely exert the utmost Powers we have in giving a ready and affectionate entertainment to the Gospel of Christ and in yielding a most cordial and sincere submission to it even
of Sin and of Punishment The Devil was the Author of and the Solicitor to Sin by the entrance of which into the World Death also entred Rom. 5.12 and passed upon all Men for that all have sinned And through Sin it was that he had the power of death that is of inflicting death both of body and soul By this it was that the Devil reigned over Men to their eternal destruction For in that sense this Kingdom of his may be conceived to be fitly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Empire Dominion of death from the effect of it in that it was deadly and destructive to Man But to the great joy of us all and that we may ever adore and magnifie the blessed and only Potentate 1 Tim. 6.15 the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and submit our selves to God James 4.7.12 the one Law-giver who is able to save and to destroy having now this assurance that if we resist the Devil he will flee from us this dreadful Empire is now brought to its fatal period and the Tyrant as such being wholly deprived of his Tyranny is destroyed too as if he were not at all as to any hurt that he can do us our strong Helper and mighty Deliverer the holy and ever blessed Jesus God and Man having rescued us out of the jaws of death and destruction by destroying him that had the power of it The promised Seed of the Woman hath punished that piercing and crooked Serpent Isa 27.1 hath broken the head of that fierce and terrible Leviathan Psal 74.14 in such a way as that he hath truly shewed himself to be the Seed of the Woman The Conquest was obtained by him in Humane nature and that not without receiving such Wounds as he in that nature was capable of not without the honourable marks of a Bloody Victory For as Christ the Seed of the Woman did bruise the Serpents Head Gen. 3.15 so also the Serpent was permitted to bruises his Heel Through Death he destroyed him that had the Power of death And now having thus far given some account of the several words and expressions in my Text the full import of the Doctrin of it will be more clearly stated by comparing the proper Notion of the Bondage and Deliverance there mentioned with some few particulars which are to be considered as they are Dependant and Consequent upon that which is primarily to be understood or as they belong to that Application which it is but reasonable we should make of the whole to our selves 1. That there is a Yet-remaining Bondage to which the Fear of Death doth make Particular men Subject must be acknowledged which may admit of several Degrees as they are more or less the Servants of Sin Rom. 6.16 17 c. Rom. 8.9 13. Because not having the Spirit of Christ not through the Spirit mortifying the deeds of the Body But serving divers Lusts and Pleasures living in Malice and Envy Hateful and Hating one another Tit. 3.3 They must in their own Thoughts be concluded to be so far from having any Benefit by that Deliverance which Christ hath obtained as in truth to be the Enemies of the Cross of Christ Phil. 3.18 Though the Gospel of Christ be preached unto them as well as unto others Heb. 4.2 yet the Word preached doth not profit them not being mixed with Faith in them not begetting that Hope in them 1 John 3.3 by which they are enabled to purifie themselves to have always a Conscience void of offence toward God and toward Men. Act. 24.16 And therefore unless they be grossy deluded being sensible that the Death of Christ is of no Advantage to them while they Continue in an impenitent State It is impossible but that they must Fear Death and cannot be supposed even to think themselves Delivered from this Fear by the Death of Christ But the Bondage in my Text and our Deliverance from it are in this present Discourse to be looked upon not with respect to the Particular Subject but to the Common Nature of Man Christ himself only excepted The Bondage as incident to Humane Nature as Faln and Depraved And the Deliverance from it as that which All men stand in Need of and of which all are Capable as to the Foundation of it that is laid in the Death of Christ and with the Refusal of which all are Chargeable to whom the tender of it is made by the Preaching of the Gospel We are All either Actually under it or as to any thing that is in our selves Subject to the greatest extremity of it or we are in some Measure actually Delivered from the Effects of it and have a comfortable prospect of a Compleat Deliverance All have Sinned and come short of the glory of God Being justified freely by his Grace Rom. 3.23 24. through the Redemption that is in Jesus Christ Only of this to prevent all Presumption we must ever be mindful that those Only are the persons to whom now there is no Condemnation Rom. 8.1 2. who are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit Such in whom the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus hath made them Free from the Law of Sin and Death 2. There is also a Farther Bondage which is Consequent on the Fear of Temporal Death when Men for Fear of Persecution or Death do commit Sin or neglect any part of their Duty by that means endeavouring to avoid what they fear our Deliverance from which is Consequent upon our cordial Belief of that Deliverance which Christ hath obtained for us by his Death For if we truly believe That and acquiesce in it as our Happiness Why should we be afraid of them which Kill the Body but are not able to Kill the Soul Mat. 10.28 Nay doth not our Faith if it be lively and sincere teach us above all things to fear him which is able to Destroy both Soul and Body in Hell Heb. 4.1 c. Ever fearing lest a Promise being left us of entring into Gods rest any of us should fail of it through Unbelief Of which there can be no greater instance than by Slighting that Deliverance our Saviour hath obtained for us to declare that we place no Confidence in it 3. There is also a Fear of Death to which Weak though Sincere Christians may be in some measure Subject which may at Sometimes so much Disturb them as to Approach very near to the Bondage here in my Text and which is at all times both their Unhappiness and their Sin This proceeds from great Defects in their Faith and in other Graces and generally from great Neglect of what their holy Profession doth call them to Now though the serious Consideration of the Deliverance here in my Text and mens hearty Endeavors to work out their Interest in it with fear and trembling of another nature Phil.
us from the Fear of Death and from the eternal Wrath of God To which we were before Obnoxious and so should have been to all eternity without any Hopes of Deliverance from this dreadful Bondage or without any Possibility that by any thing we could do we should be Accepted of by God and admitted to his Favour If we were not assured from the great Mercy which we this day Commemorate That it is the Blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God that doth purge our Conscience from dead works to serve the living God Heb. 9.14 Two things therefore more I shall briefly do 1. I shall give some more particular account from the Scripture of Christs Dying for us And 2. I shall point at some of those Heads from whence your own Thoughts may make a yet farther and a more close Practical Improvement of the whole 1. Some more particular account from the Scripture 1. The Death of Christ is represented to us in the Scripture as a Propitiatory Sacrifice and the Price of our Redemption Rom. 5.11 By him we have now received the Atonement And When we were Enemies we were reconciled to God by the Death of his Son V. 10. V. 1. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ He hath made peace through the Blood of his Cross Colos 1.20 We have Redemption through his Blood even the forgiveness of sins Colos 1.14 The Chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes we are healed Isa 53.5 And this is more apparent because together with the mention of I his there is a manifest Intimation of Gods Acceptance of it in our Stead Christ is said by the Grace of God to have tasted Death for every man Heb. 2.9 In our Stead he suffered Death and Gods Grace and special Favour is acknowledged in all this in that it was For Us that he died that God Accepted it As Such And therefore God's Love did appear to the World in giving his only begotten Son In sending him that the World through him might be saved John 3.16 17. God by all This hath shewed himself so clearly to be for us that the Apostle asks the question Who then can be against us He that spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all How shall he not with him also freely give us all things Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect It is God that justifieth Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again who is even at the right hand of God who also maketh Intercession for us Rom. 8.31 32 33 34. His Resurrection giving abundant evidence of the Dignity of the Sacrifice of his Death and of Gods gracious Acceptance of it And his Intercession for us making good to us the Effects of it 2. That Gods Favour to us was to be obtained in This Way namely by the Death of Christ is so clearly foretold in Isa 53. that nothing can be more And the same was also Typified by the Paschal Lamb by the Sacrifices and by what the High-Priest did on the great Day of Atonement Thus Christ did put away Sin by the Sacrifice of himself Heb. 9.26 By his own Blood he obtained eternal Redemption for us Ver. 12. 3. That this should be done is represented to us in the Scripture as a gracious and wise Contrivance of God and as an Agreement between God the Father and the Son Thus what was done against Jesus Acts 4.27 28. is said to have been before determined by the Hand and Counsel of God And Act. 2.23 the Jews are said to have taken Jesus and by wicked hands to have crucified and slain him being delivered by the determinate counsel and fore-knowledge of God And as to the Agreement between God the Father and the Son Bp. Pearson on the Creed p. 185. that the Son should do all this on our behalf we read Isa 53.10 11. of the Lords bruising him and putting him to grief and of making his Soul an offering for Sin and that he should bear the Iniquities of many Upon his doing all which it 's said that he shall see his Seed he shall prolong his days and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand Now the Declaration of the Sons Readiness to do all this that so all might be effected that was agreed to by the Father to follow upon it is expressed Heb. 10.5 c. Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not but a Body hast thou prepared me In Burnt-offerings and Sacrifices for Sin thou hast had no pleasure Then said I Lo I come to do thy Will O God And the Apostle adds ver 10. By the which Will we are Sanctified through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all Than all which nothing can be more clear So that those men must be supposed to Delight in Contradiction that can be bold and forward to object any thing against the manifest Evidence of all this 4thly and lastly The Scripture doth give us some Grounds according to our weak measure of judging of the great and high things of God whereupon we may observe the Fitness of all this and the Suitableness of those Means that have been used to the good and wise Ends for which they were used That an Expiation in general was necessary Mans Weakness to fulfil the Law doth seem to be one Reason Rom. 8.3 What the Law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh Or as the Expression for sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is otherwise expressed in the Margent of that Place By a Sacrifice for sin he condemned sin in the flesh And many Reasons have been given why a Satisfaction should be made before God would pardon Sin with respect to the Holiness of God and to the securing a due Honour and Regard to his Law and to the expressing how Odious Sin was in the sight of God That so men by having Pardon over-easily granted might not be Encouraged to Sin or at least not so much Deterr'd from it And that we might the better judge of All This by considering at what a heavy Price our Redeemer purchased Pardon for us And the Wisdom of God doth farther appear in this That the Price of our Redemption was to to be paid in Our Nature In which Nature also he was to take Possession of Heaven and therefore a little before he left this World he laid this Consideration before his Sorrowful Disciples to Comfort them Joh. 14.2 3. I go to prepare a Place for you that where I am there ye may be also Other Reasons may also be given in Explication of such Places as these namely That the Captain of our Salvation was to be made perfect through Sufferings Heb. 2.10 Luke 24.26 And That