Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A32083
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A funeral sermon preach'd at the internment of Mr. Samuel Stephens for some time employ'd in the work of the ministry, in this city : who departed life the fifth of January, 1693/4 in the twenty eighth year of his age / by Edmund Calamy.
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Calamy, Edmund, 1671-1732.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing C271; ESTC R10147
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15,357
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38
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not but our Work may be at an end as soon almost as we begin and therefore we have need carefully to improve all opportunities of Service and to work apace It is indeed enough to surprize us vvhen we consider all things to think that God should have rais'd up so many of us in so discouraging Times as we have pass'd through that he should have given us any tolerable competency of Fitness for his Service and that he should in any measure own us in it But alas my Brethren let 's not be too confident God can nip budding hopâ— he can if he pleases just show us to the World and then snatch us away again Let 's take care leâ—t we by our sins provoke him to lay us aside as Vessels wherein he hath no pleasure Let 's work therefore for God without Self-seeking Let 's take care to recommend Religion to others by our Lives Let 's love as Brethren and studiously strengthen and no ways weaken one anothers hands Let 's apply our selves diligently to our Work and let this Instance of our Mortality quicken us Let 's often think this Work of ours will soon be at an end in which if we have been faithful we shall be amply rewarded for we shall shine as Stars in God's Right Hand If we have been idle negligent and careless our punishment vvill be proportion'd to our sin Let 's not be so fond as to feed our selves with hopes of a long time of use and service to come but in the Day let 's foresee our Night Let 's seriously bethink our selves that Death will soon seize us and summon us to Judgment Our Souls will take their flight and leave our Bodies behind and we must be beholden to our surviving Friends to do that last Office for us which we are now going to do for the Relicks of our Deceasâ—d Brother Mr. SAMVEL STEPHENS Of whom I shan't say much to you though I could if I thought it needful As for his Family ' t vvas Noble and Honourable in Heavens Blaâ—â—â—ry it having been successively employed in the Work of the Ministry ever since the Reformation his immediate Father only excepted Which Gap the Two Brothers would have made up if both had liv'd But blessed be God that hath spared us One Branch of so Worthy a Stock As for the Person of the Deceased he was design'd for the Ministry from his Younger Years and had as Good Advantages all along for the acquiring the needful Accomplishments for it as this Land vvould afford to those under our Discouragements Which Advantages he so Well Improv'd as at length to become a Workman that needed not to be asham'd He had a Sense of Religion instill'd into him in his early Days about the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Year of his Age ever since which time he hath been observed by those that knew him to have had a very tender Conscience He vvas noted for his frequency in Prayer even while a School-Boy the serious performance of which Duty argues the Greatest Love to God of any He had a most awful Sense of the Ministerial Employment which those with whom he had any intimacy will readily testifie He was very backward to begin to preach though by his most Judicious Friends judg'd sufficiently qualified and earnestly prest thro' his great humility and unwillingness to rush into such a work And I could tell you of a Worthy Divine to whom he to his dying day us'd for the most part to read his Notes before he 'd Venture with Them into the Pulpit His Spirit hath many a Time been so over-awed by a sense of the Sacredness of the Work he was engaged in that he hath been afraid to persist in it and almost perswaded to turn his Thoughts another way And indeed he was humble and modest to a Fault His Natural Temper exposed him somewhat to Melancholy and one thing that tended to make his Life uneasie was his great Scrupulosity and fear of offending God in the smallest matters where others could apprehend no danger But in this he was on the safest side tho the most uncomfortable But he had the happiness to be able to conceal his inward Trouble from the Observation of the World by a free pleasant and cheerful Conversation by which he avoided discouraging others of which he was fearful I look upon him to have had as much of True Generosity in his Natural Temper as most I know He from his heart scorn'd to do any Thing that was mean or base or servile and abhorr'd every Thing that in the least lookt like undermining He ever retain'd a most grateful sense of the Kindness of those Worthy Gentlemen and others who were his Friends and was always ready to the utmost of his Capacity himself to do any Office of Kindness for any Having been for some years employ'd occasionally in the Preaching Work of the Ministry it so pleased God that a Mortal Distemper seiz'd him which depriv'd the Church of an useful Servant and us of a Fellow-Labourer that might have been very helpful His Distemper with Violence seiz'd his head the Rage whereof was Visibly increased by those awful Thoughts of Eternity wherewith he was possessed I mention this the rather that I may thence take occasion to warn those who will defer and put off their great work to a Dying Bed from this Instance and others of the like nature often to be met with to see their folly and grow wise For several days before he dy'd his Distemper deprived him of the free use of his Reason and so it happens in many Cases who then in his Wits would put off the Great Work he was sent into the World for to such a Time And yet this may be the case of any one of us Our Eternal State may be irrevocably fixt even before we die and we absolutely incapacitated to do any thing in our Soul-Affairs But I hope and believe our deceased Brother's Work was not then to do but was finished before After that his Natural Strength which was very great had for some days grappled with a malignant Fever he was forc'd to yield a Rent was made his Soul took its flight and left his Body lifeless in the Eight and Twentieth Year of his Age. His Work 's soon done but not too soon for him who I hope is happy We are now going to commit his Body to the Earth there to lye and rot which will shortly also be the Case of every one of us His Toil and Warfare and Combat and all painful Work is at an end He 's taken away from those Evils which we may live to see For who knows what is coming upon us We may for ought we know meet with miseries that we little think of before we dye But blessed be God that we have another Life of Rest and Peace and Joy in hope and that tho we cant know what will befall us here yet we know this assuredly That Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord for they rest from their labours and their Works do follow them FINIS Books Printed for and Sold by Abraham Chandler THE Mourners Companion or Funeral Discourses from several Texts 8vo Price bound 1 s. 6 d. Death a Deliverance A Funeral Discourse to bind up with the Mourners Companion Sacramental Discourses on several Texts before and after the Lords Supper together with a Paraphrase on the Lords Prayer 12ves Price bound 1 s. 6 d. Practical Reflections on the late Earthquakes in Jamaica Sicily Malta c. with a particular Historical Account of those and Divers other Earthquakes Price bound 1 s. 6 d. The Day of Grace Or a Discourse concerning the Possibility and Fear of its being past before Death Shewing the groundless Doubts and mistaken Apprehensions of some as to their being finally forsaken and left of God with the dangerous Symptoms and Approaches of others to such a sad state in Four Sermons from Psalm 81. 11 12. Serious Reflections on Time and Eternity with some other Subjects Moral and Divine To which is annexed an Appendix concerning the First Day of the Year how observed by the Iews and may best be employed by a serious Christian. All Six by Mr. John Shower * Viz. That of Beza reserv'd at Cambridge Heb. 9 27. Jam. 3. 17. Rev 14.13
such great and important Work to do we had need double our diligence and if we 'll take this course we shall have no Reason to complain of the Shortness of our Lives for he that does the work of Fifty or Threescore Years in Seven or Eight and Twenty is happier than he that lives so long in the world Oh let 's earnestly endeavour to make such daily advances as that our Work may be at an End as soon as our Day 2. Let us often think of and seriously set ourselves to prepare for an approaching Night We are all my Friends endued with a Power of Foresight Let 's in this case make use of it Let 's think with our selves that as surely as 't is now Day with us 't will e're long be Night as surely as we now live shall we shortly die and let 's endeavour to yield to the Power of such a Thought Whenever we are tempted to Delays to Negligence Indifference and Remissness in our Grand Concern Let 's think how swiftly the Night is hasting towards us and how earnestly Death is pursuing after us and let 's act as those that are in expectation of it Let 's resolve with holy Job that we 'll wait all the days of our appointed time till our change come Job 14. 14. Let 's not be so foolish as to hear of others Deaths without reflecting on our own To accompany others to their graves without thinking that we must shortly follow them Let 's Live in the day time as those that have night in their view When the labouring Countreyman sees the night approaching he 'l put to all his strength and vigorously endeavour to finish his undertaken work ere the sun go down Let us do so too and then be our day longer or shorter our Night will be comfortable We may lift up our Heads with joy But on the contrary how doleful will our night be if we work not in the day time How dismal a thing will it be at the close of our Lives to find just cause for this Reflection that we have liv'd in vain without doing that for which God sent us hither What Horror and Amazement will then seize upon us What can we then expect will support or cheer us What Rage and Despair will possess us Would we not have this to be our case Then let us by doing our work in the Day prepare for the Night that 's coming And Oh what account shall we be able to give to the God that sent us hither if we mind not the Work for which he sent us If we can find time now for every thing else but to mind our main Concern how shall we dare to look God in the Face another day How can we think we stand before his Bar to give an account for all our Power and Capacity Time and Opportunity of Working for our Calls Admonitions and warnings to apply our selves to our work for all our allurements and enticements Helps and assistances to work Oh how shall we then stand speechless if now we remain idle Then be confounded if now we are negligent Oh then if we love our selves if we desire to be Happy Let us by doing the work of him that sent us while the day lasts prepare for that night which approaches in which no work can be done but we must receive our Wages And thus much may suffice for general Improvements And now that I may follow this present Stroke of Providence whither it seems more particularly to direct its Voice give me leave to address my self to you my Brethren of the Younger Sort whom God is pleased to call to publick Work in his Vineyard One of our small Number 's gone and he none of the inconsiderablest neither God set him a Work for a little while and then call'd him away and hath not this a Voice and that to us particularly Our Deceased brother and God by him seems to cry aloud to all of us to work the works of him that sent us while 't is day ere the night overtake us The work my brethren to which we have set our hands is sacred and awful 'T is enough I profess seriously to make our hearts to ake and our Knees to tremble to set our selves solemnly to think upon it 'T is difficult work Difficult in it self and more peculiarly so by reason of the circumstances of the time wherein our Lot is cast It hath ever indeed been difficult to bear up Gods honour in the world to vindicate his truths from contempt to engage men heartily in his service and to bring Souls to Heaven But how are the difficulties encreased upon us thro' the desperate malignity of many the Lukewarmness and indifference of most The peevishness and morosness of some and the Giddiness and wantonness of others Alas for us what shall we do to promote that Wisdom that is from above that is pure and peaceable and gentle and easy to be entreated full of good fruits without partiality and without Hypocrisy in the Age we live in in which the wisdom of the world so much prevails and true Religion is so like to expire 'T is true Our Reverend Fathers thanks be to God do as yet bear the Brunt of the Day and God grant they may long do so But alas the Prophets dont live for ever any more than others Within a few years they 'll all drop off and the burthen will lie on young shoulders And what shall we then do What shall we do to stem that Tide of Atheism and Irreligion that hath overflown us What shall we do in opposition to the Scepticism by which we find so many unravell'd and undone What shall we do to recover the Power of Godliness of which our Fathers tell us so much tho we can see so little it being almost lost What shall we do to root out those Prejudices which have so long been rivetted in many peoples minds What shall we do to pacific those angry Heats and stop those raging Contentions vvhich have continued so long till they have almost eat out the Spirit and Life of Religion What shall we do to revive True Generous Catholick Christianity Our Difficulties seem rather to grow than diminish And shall we not then out of a sense of the great opposition we shall meet with on all sides take great care to qualifie dispose and fit our selves for the Great Work that will lie upon us by treasuring up of Knowledge daily laying aside of Prejudices our selves and taking up nothing but upon good Grounds by studying the things that make for Peace on all hands by arming our selves vvith resolution to go through good report and bad report to be above Smiles and Frowns and aboveall by keeping up an intimate Acquaintance vvith that God vvho gives us a Commission and vvho alone can give us assistance and success And yet in the mean time the Day we have to work in is short and uncertain We know