HEZEKIAH'S Return of PRAISE For His RECOVERY By A. L. PSAL. L. 14 15. Offer unto God thanksgiving and pay thy vows unto the most high And call upon me in the day of trouble I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorifie me LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Samuel Tomson at the Bishops-Head in Duck-lane 1668. To the Pious Reader THe Occasion of Preaching this Sermon was sutable to the Text a good Man's Recovery of Printing it the desire of Copies and the Press was for this judg'd the readiest way and thus though intended but for few may be for the use of many The Author is one neither seeks applause nor fears censure if it may do thy soul any benefit he has his end To which purpose this Synopsis was added that thou mightest have the Method and Heads of the Discourse before thee in one view The Doxology in the close being an Extract great part of it out of the Psalter a book which if thou deserv'st the name I called thee by thou art well acquainted with needed no references If by the perusal thou find'st thy self any whit benefited give God the praise and let the Author have thy prayers Farewel The SYNOPSIS The Text divided into IV. Parts I. The Affliction and that either 1. Corporal A sickness describ'd by It's Quality Bitterness and that as it is 1. Undergone by Hezekias Obs. God's dearest ones are not exempt from bitter afflictions 2. Resented by him Obs. Natural apprehensions allow'd even in Exercises of grace It 's Quantity Great bitterness Obs. Great Saints exercised with great Tryals The change For Peace i. e. Health Obs. The truly pious in change of condition change not but serve God for God's sake The surprize Behold Obs. A Christian must stand upon his guard 2. Spiritual Trouble of conscience Obs. A troubled conscience is not alwayes an evil conscience II. The Deliverance considered in The Author God Thou hast deliver'd Obs. God is the sole author of all our deliverances The Motive In love and that to my soul. Obs. Divine mercy is gratuitous Obs. Soul-love is the best of loves The Danger From the pit of corruption Obs. All our life-time we walk on the pit-brink III. The Improvement and Assurance Pardon of sins Thou hast deliver'd thou hast cast my sins c. Obs. God uses to accumulate mercies In love to my soul for thou hast cast c. Obs. Pardon of sins the complement and perfection of mercy From the pit for thou hast cast c. Obs. Where sin is forgiven no fear of hell or the grave All my sins behind thy back Obs. God's pardons are universal and absolute IV. The Acknowledgment Where mark by the way The Connexion For the grave c. Obs. The only Return God expects for mercy is Praise The Synonymy of Praise and Hope Obs. To trust in God is to praise him As 't is set Negatively The grave cannot c. Obs. Death is a silent and hopeless state Positively The living shall Obs. Our life to be spent in the giver's praise Lastly exemplified As I do this day Obs. Signal mercies require solemn Thanksgiving HEZEKIAH's Return of PRAISE for his RECOVERY Is A. xxxviii 17 18 and part of the 19 ver 17. Behold for peace I had great bitterness but thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back 18. For the grave cannot praise thee death cannot celebrate thee they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth 19. The living the living he shall praise thee as I do this day THESE Words are part and indeed the principal part of Hezekiah's Song of Thanksgiving after he was recover'd of a dangerous sickness as you finde in the ninth Verse when all his thoughts were as himself tells us from the 10th to the 15th Verse that he should not live that he should never escape this bout never come abroad more I said that is by an Hebraism I thought in the cutting off of my dayes or as some Versions render it in the midst of my dayes I shall go to the gates of the grave I am deprived of the residue of my years I said I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living I shall never go more to Church never have any further opportunities to wait upon God in his Sanctuary I shall behold man no more with the Inhabitants of the World never go abroad again to converse with men any more c. So that in effect he gave himself up for lost as to this world and perhaps the Physicians did so too Nay and which was more when the Doctors belike had given him over the Prophet brings him the unwelcom message that he must prepare himself For dye he should and not live v. 1. Yet after all when he was in extremis upon his prayer God was intreated to renew his lease and to lengthen his life And so as in the former part of his Song he mournfully commemorates his Sickness So in the latter part from the 15th verse to the end he chearfully returns thanks for his Recovery The words we have made choice of belong to this latter part and there are four things in them observable 1. A sad heavy affliction Behold for peace I had great bitterness 2. A merciful deliverance out of this affliction But thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the put of corruption 3. A blessed improvement of this mercy For thou hast cast all my sins behinde thy back 4. A thankful acknowledgement of this improved mercy in the rest of the words The Affliction aggravated 1. By a description of it in its own nature both in the quality of it 't was bitterness and in the quantity of it 't was great bitterness 2. By opposition of the contrary blessing which it remov'd 't was for peace a word that comprehends in the notion of it all our worldly enjoyments all temporal blessings whatsoever and more particularly in Holy Writ is taken for health a blessing without which all other blessings have no rellish in them give no true satisfaction to the enjoyer For peace I had great bitterness i. e. for the health which he had formerly enjoy'd he had had a very bitter sickness And then lastly the bitterness of this change is heightned by the surprize of it Behold as a strange thing Behold how all on a sudden upon my peace came great bitterness as the Margin reads it Bitterness and great bitterness and that in exchange for peace for a state of health and prosperity and all this with a sudden strange surprize Behold for peace I had great bitterness This was his Affliction And this much further aggravated still if we unde stand it as we must in a spiritual sense too that his sickness calling his sins to remembrance and causing some distrusts of God's love instead of that peace of conscience and quiet
Grace to his Glory Should God require any greater matter of us as Naaman's servants tell him when we lie on the bed of sickness when we are incompass'd with distresses would not we have done it and when for our deliverance all that he looks for at our hands is praise only he must be of an extraordinary disingenuous impiety that should refuse to testifie his thanks in so cheap a Sacrifice This civility we deny not to men 't is a Physician 's reputation when his patient recovers and we usually besides his Salary allow him our good word Let not us grudge God the honour of a poor acknowledgement Again praising and celebrating God and hoping for his truth his mercy say the LXX his Salvation the Chaldee Paraphrast are here made Synonyma's to mean the same thing If so then a generous trust in God's mercy is the right celebration of it To trust in God is to praise him I have been afflicted God has deliver'd me I praise him for it how by trusting that he will still deliver me I have been exercised with grievous sickness God has visited me with his loving kindeness I come to return him due praise for his goodness how by entertaining and professing a just confidence in God that he will never fail me never leave me destitute And this as 't is a comfortable so 't is a rational and a natural duty We ordinarily do it to men when we have had tryals of their fidelity in matters of any moment we stick not to trust them farther and by so doing recommend their honest just dealing to the world Shall we not much more do so to God whose mercy and faithfulness we have so often experimented when no one could help us out but He He that distrusts God scandalizes his goodness and calls his truth in question David is not asham'd to make one of the first and earliest acts of God's common providence towards him when he was an infant an argument of his trusting God his whole life after Thou art he that tookest me out of my Mothers Bowels What then my praise shall be alwayes of thee A little after upon the strength of this confidence he prayes Cast me not off in the time of old age forsake me not when my strength faileth Further in that the Grave cannot praise God nor they that go down into the pit hope for his truth it appears that Death is a silent and a hopeless state The Grave indeed opens a wide mouth but 't is to swallow the man not to praise God with And how can Divine Praises be celebrated by death which puts all the Organs and Instruments of Speech out of tune when as the Preacher phrases it all the daughters of musick are brought low and then for those that go down into the pit they together with their lives quit their hopes and are lodg'd now in a remediless condition No hope to be met with at the bottom of that pit because the pit it self is bottomless for so the Septuagint have it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Those that are in hell they that are in Gehenna says the Arabick and by the Targum the pit is interpreted the lake of perdition Hope is a vertue peculiar to life and when the man dies hope fetches its last gasp and dyes with him After death there 's no recovery Faith and repentance can now no longer exercise any vital acts If thou dye in thy sins thou will lie and rot in thy sins and rise again in thy sins No imbalming can preserve thy soul or take from thee the stench of thy sins in that pit of corruption Death concludes thee to an unalterable condition Here thou mayest manage thy resolutions and shape thy course to please thy self and if thou wilt to please thy God if thou wilt let his grace pilot thy vessel but when thou art once put into harbour the ship then is laid up and there 's no mending the miscarriages of thy past voyage Be sure then to live godly if thou wouldst dye comfortably and then thy grave will prove a bed of spices and thy dust be preserv'd as the Phoenixâ—ashes in hopes of a joyful resurrection To draw to a conclusion a 4th Note may be this that Life it self is a blessing to be spent in the giver's praise From these words The living the living he shall praise thee The word is twice repeated to shew we should do it with chearfulness with a life and with constancy through our whole life If we had a hundred lives they would be all well spent in God's service It will be the business and imploy of our eternity to praise him and we must aforehand acquaint our selves with it and so practice this lesson here that we may be found worthy to wait upon the Lamb and sing Hallelujahs in heaven But then if we would praise God to the life we must live to his praise by doing things praise-worthy Further consider what this life of ours is 't is but a breath We must begin this task then out of hand presently There 's nothing of our life ours but the present the Nunc instans this very instant of time For all that 's past of our lives was indeed ours once but now is not nor can we recal what 's gone for improvement or amendment and what is to come is not ours yet and we know not whether it will be in our power or no and therefore the great duty interest of life is the right husbanding of our present time Upon this moment hangs our eternity and this infinite advantage our short-liv'd service has that he that lives to God's glory here shall hereafter be made partaker of it Thus have I as well as I could gather'd a posie of Observations as they grew in this fragrant piece of Scripture and if some Rue and Wormwood be found amongst the sweeter herbs their wholesomeness will make amends for their bitterness Myrrh and Aloes as they are bitter drugs so they are rich perfumes in either notion great preservatives they are against corruption The Psalmist tells us Psal. XLV that All the Churches garments smell of them 'T is not amiss if we have pounded and mix'd somewhat of them with the Frankincense of this days Thanksgiving Which brings us to the close of all the Exemplification as I do this day And that will yield us a considerable remark to make an end with that signal mercies require solemn thanksgiving So Hezekiah is eager to go up to the house of the Lord and closes this Ode of his with a resolution there to sing his songs all the days of his life And this on purpose to draw in others by his example to partake in the duty Thus David after such a deliverance Psal. XXXIV invites others O magnifie the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together In the 6th verse as it were pointing to himself This poor man cried and
tranquillity of minde he had had heretofore his spirit was now troubled and greatly imbittered And a wounded grieved spirit who can bear On the other hand the mercy of the Deliverance wants not its heightning circumstances too as 1. From the efficient cause 't was God deliver'd him But thou hast deliver'd 2. From the motive or impulsive cause 't was out of Love not out of design as men usually do courtesie but out of a free kindeness and that a love of the best sort 't was in love to his soul. And 3. From the danger he was deliver'd out of and that no ordinary one it was a pit and no ordinary pit neither 't was the pit of corruption even the Grave the very state of death But thou hast in love to my soul deliver'd it from the pit of corruption So then however he came by his sickness he is sure 't was God recover'd him out of it and he did it out of Love out of an especial love he bore to the soul of him which was sufficiently manifested by this that his life was precious in Gods sight God delivering it from the pit of corruption Nor is this all You heard 't was a spiritual mercy for 't was in love to his soul and therefore the health of body was to be attended with the welfare of his soul and so for a full Assurance of Divine love to his soul and for a further Improvement of this temporal bodily mercy 't is added for thou hast cast all my sins behinde thy back that as God had imbrac'd his soul in the arms of his love so the Interlinear Version Amplexus es amore animam meam and as it were put her into his bosom so he had cast all his sins behinde his back never to come more into remembrance This is the Crown of Mercies when temporals are thus accumulated with spirituals this a recovery indeed of the whole man when health is improv'd into salvation and strength of body accompanied with pardon of sins This is right saving Health and deserves the returns of a grateful Acknowledgment which now follows in the last place And that is set forth first by shewing the impossibility for the dead to perform this duty which is very elegantly express'd by three Synonymies For the grave cannot praise thee Death cannot celebrate thee They that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth which all come to one meaning And then on the contrary shewing not the possibility only but the probability that the living will i. e. such as divine mercy continues in life and especially such as are by that mercy preserv'd from imminent danger of death The living the living he shall praise thee And this probability exemplified in himself made good by his own practice As I do this day Thus having open'd the several scenes of our intended meditation I shall now proceed to draw from them some useful Observations interweaving their applications all along with that brevity and clearness as such copious heads of matter may in such straights of time admit and that rather in a cursory Explanation then in an elaborate discourse First then for the Affliction 't is not only bitter but in the abstract bitterness it self The sense of Taste is the most necessary of all our senses it being that by which all Animals live and take in their food and nourishment and therefore has in it a power to judge what is grateful and convenient to the nature of each kinde what not Now there is no gust the palate so much dis-relishes as the bitter nothing that nature shews a greater abhorrence to or that is less welcome to her whereupon the Psalmist in the person of Christ looks upon it as one of his enemies greatest unkindenesses that they gave him Gall and Vinegar to drink and Christ himself upon the Cross I suppose out of his meer natural aversation as he was man when he had tasted of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He would not drink it Upon this score 't is that by an usual Metaphor every thing that is highly displeasing to any of our affections and senses either to the rational or sensitive appetite is termed bitter every thing I say that is any way afflictive to flesh and blood any thing that ails us in Minde or Body or Estate or good name whether grief or pain or poverty or reproach and the like we may as Hezekiah here calls his sickness give it the name of bitterness nay even though those afflictions come from the hand of God himself our gracious Father by whose providential dispensations every particular event be it good or bad is so carefully managed that not a Sparrow falls to the ground without his order And yet this bitterness too though never so unpleasant may be made profitable if we make a right use of it as we may learn two things from it here 1. not to be impatient 2. not to be insensible When we are under Gods hand in any affliction Fiezekiah's being in bitterness teacheth us one and his complaining of it the other Who Good King Hezekiah in bitterness sick and that unto death this is bitterness indeed that such a Prince who was a National blessing that such a Saint who had walkt before the Lord in truth and in the sincerity of his heart done that which was good in his sight should be cut off in the midst of his dayes at XXXIX for that was his age at this time the fifteen years which were now added making up his whole life LIV. and should by a bitter and untimely death be sent away to the gates of the Grave after the languishment of a pining distemper Hence we observe that Gods dearest ones are not exempted from bitter afflictions And what are we then that we should repine and murmur and think our selves hardly dealt with Are we better then all those Saints who have gone before us who have pledg'd their Master in hearty draughts of his Passion-Cup and have march'd after him in the dolorous way towards heaven This should teach us not only with patience but even with chearfulness to take up our crosses and to deny our selves in our healths in our fortunes in all our enjoyments And to recommend this vertue the more to us let us take along with us some considerations why it pleases God to imbitter many times as he does the condition of his Children and Servants in this world Now God does it upon such reasons as these for the chastisement of sin from which the very best are not free for tryal and exercise of their faith and other Graces which else would lie idle upon their hands for what use of patience in time of health and prosperity and consequently for their amendment and improvement The Furnace is heated over and over that having all their dross burnt up their graces may be burnished and throughly refined as Silver purified seven times in the fire
And tell me now O impatient soul whoever thou art what reason hast thou to take Gods dealings unkindely Tell me canst thou say with any shew of reason that he deals otherwise then justly and kindely by thee in all this who orders all so to thy good that his greatest severities are if thou wilt but rightly understand them the most advantageous mercies Further he does it to wean us from the world and to take off that hank which the flesh has upon us to mortifie carnal lusts and worldly desires and give us a heavenly relish Thus when the Breast is imbittered the Childe will of himself forsake it And lastly to prepare us for our great change These conflicts and encounters we have with all sorts of affliction during our whole life are but Essayes and Specimens of that conquest which we must through Christ make at last of death that as he has overcome the world and swallowed up Death in victory we may be made partakers of his triumphs and having fill'd up his sufferings may in his name set up our banners and our trophies the banners of our confidence and the trophies of our victory And now if we have any ingenuity to acknowledge our sins any zeal to imploy our graces any holy ambition to better and improve our selves any desires towards heaven or savour of spiritual things in a word any thought or design of living holy and dying happy what reason have we with more then patience even with kindeness and friendship to entertain afflictions which are to help us in all this Yet let afflictions be as good as they will in the consequents and effects they are afflictions still and may be so resented Hezekiah no question made very good use of his sickness and found as great benefit by it and yet still after his recovery he complains of it and calls it bitterness We must be patient and yet we may be sensible of our afflictions too We are allow'd the apprehensions of nature even in the exercises of Grace A good man may be patient and yet feel his pains and complain of them too or else indeed 't is not a genuine patience I do not think him truly valiant whom armour or amulet has made invulnerable but him that feels the smart of his wounds and yet fights on Thus our Saviour the Captain of our Salvation in his Agony prayes to have the Cup pass from him sayes bemoaningly of himself that his Soul was sad unto death that as he hung on the Cross poor man at the stretch of every joynt flouted by his Adversaries deserted by his followers forsaken by his Father he cries out My God my God c. and being roasted with the scorching flames of Divine Wrath he calls for drink to allay the raging heat of his thirst For although the Divinity could have deaded all the pains which the humane nature underwent and have raptur'd it into a glorious impassibility yet that was not to be since the main merit of his passive obedience lay in this that he had a quick sense of the wrath of God due to sin into the very heart of him and that notwithstanding the natural sentiments of his humanity which put him upon the desire of being excused he yet with perfect submission went through all the sad stages of his bitter passion Yet now the world is grown to that pass as if Religion were turn'd Stoicism and stupidity were Christian Valour that people generally take it for a kinde of bravery to be insensible of God's Judgements and to walk unconcern'd in the midst of publick or personal calamities but sure those of this temper are no other then such as the Apostle tells us of Rom. 1. 31. Void of natural affection Thus then Hezekiah's being in bitterness teacheth us to be patient and his complaining of it allows us to be sensible And no marvel that he complains for 't was not only bitterness but great bitterness both extensively over all parts all over bitterness and intensively all kindes all degrees of bitterness and so as the Original doubles the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one way in Hebrew to express the superlative◠so S. Hierom renders it Amaritudo mea amarissima my most bitter bitterness superlatively bitter Now why God does thus at any time with any of us to make our conditions bitter and bitter again to put in great bitterness more bitter ingredients still besides those reasons we gave before this inlarging the dose being designed to perfect the cure we have two or three more to offer as first to beat us quite off from carnal and secular confidences that being forc'd to let go our hold of all our worldly comforts we may stick the closer to God in our dependences upon him And that good Hezekiah's temper was a little too apt to be peccant in this the next Chapter shews us where out of ostentation he shews Merodach-Baladan's Messengers that came to congratulate his recovery his treasury and armoury and spicery And then to put the higher value upon the following mercy How sweet would health be after such a bitter sickness how soon are the pains and throws of Childe-birth forgotten for joy when the Man-childe is once born into the world the greatness of the danger serving to aggrandize and heighten the deliverance And lastly to teach us a right estimate of our own graces and of that interest we have in God Great Saints must look for great afflictions A more then ordinary strength requires a more then ordinary tryal Every Childe every Novice in Religion can digest a little bitterness Hezekiah is to be treated as a Man to be put upon a becoming task The Sons of Anak and the Zanzummim are fit for such a champion as Joshua to incounter Wherefore if God who uses not to lay more upon us then we are able to bear has laid his hand heavy upon thee has increased thy pains and inraged thy smart bear up brave soul be of good courage in thy conflicts be strong in the Lord when he calls thee forth to such hard service grudge not to lay out that strength God has given thee to bear thee up and to bear thee out in the greatest endurances Thus Holy Job when the whole world was against him the Chaldeans and Sabeans the Devil and his friends and wife and all and God himself seem'd to be an indifferent looker on bore himself up stoutly against them all and by the power of God's Grace in him withstood the worst of Providences without him The Saints are made glorious by their sufferings and 't is their great afflictions put the lustre upon their victorious Graces when patience has had its perfect work Hezekiah was a man of great piety and must therefore meet with great bitterness And this bitterness in the next place is the greater too because it comes in the place of Peace Cujus ipsum nomen dulce est as the great Orator tells us