Mysterious Actings of Providence in the World Job 10.3 Psal 73.16 we could before give no account of nor durst demand any How we were afflicted and yet beloved What Souls are as to their Royal Original and what as to their most vivacious Actings without the assistance of any corporeal Organ with innumerable difficulties no Hypothesis in Philosophy can give an exact solution of Oh the knowledge that a Soul one minute in glory hath of delightful Mysteries beyond what on Earth we are capable of by the most painful Converse with Men or Books He knows more than us all and is perfectly happy in the knowledge of what he knows whilst in the knowledge of many things we are miserable and as to our knowledge of what we ought chiefly to know have reason to sigh out the complaint of our ignorance 2. Exactness of conformity in every thing to the divine Image For what Grace in our blessed Conformity thereunto is not then in its liveliest and highest Exercise Our Love our Delight our Joy and Rejoycing is so if not Desire Faith and Fear wholly ceasing As we actually enjoy the good or happiness we wished for believed or dreaded the loss of And as for our obedience in every thing to the Divine Will it is the most chearful constant and perfect or to what end do we pray Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven 3. Constancy of abode They are no longer complaining Heb. 13.14 We have here no continuing City No more restless in their motions from place to place like Noah's Dove that found no rest for the sole of her Foot the Waters had so covered the Earth but plucked in rather by a tender hand into the heavenly Ark where they have rest perpetual are fixed the Citizens of the New Jerusalem that City above where they are for ever at home And oh the happiness of this beyond what possibly at present we entertain the thoughts of It is so undoubtedly as to that Venerable Gray-headed Disciple and Soldier of our dear Redeemer deceased of any man I have known since he first left his Publick Living for the sake of conscientious innocent Nonconformity His Life appeared but one continued Journey and Travel from place to place and no removal thereof was apparently more his death's stroke than his last from his Native County and dear People of his Affections as he often stiled them to sing out his dying sweet and Swan-like Notes with you 4. Sweetest Harmony and Concord one with another It seems the least of doubts that Souls departed know each other in Glory Why not as well as Adam in the state of Innocency Of whom it is said that as soon as he awaked out of his deep Sleep He knew Eve to be bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh And no small part truly of their Happiness is it that they have the highest satisfaction and contentment one in another as partakers of the same Rest and alike imployed in the same most noble and delightful work of Praise Heaven admits of no Mistakes nor misunderstandings one of another and 't is pity this lower World should do it There are no Treacherous Judas's to betray us with a Kiss nor faithless Friends whose friendship is as vanishing as the smoak and vapour but rather a Hooper and a Ridley more fairly-shaking hands than ever they agreed in their Prisons A Luther and a Calvin sworn Friends or rather a perpetual and everlasting Friendship that shall never once be violated begun not only with known Friends deceased but all the Holy Patriarchs Prophets Apostles and Martyrs we never before saw or knew And may there as the liveliest Emblem of Heaven be more of Brotherly Peace Love and Amity on Earth May no trifling difference in Judgment separate Affections but each one for the future make it their only contention who shall most advance the Interest of the Lord Jesus in the World and resolve to leave those of lesser moment to such as think they have greater Concerns to mind than an endless blessed Eternity we are professedly waiting hoping longing for and hastning to And which follows on this 5. Fulness unspeakableness and Eternity of Delight and joy 1. Fulness and unspeakableness It is a Joy redundant and overflowing yet what admits of degrees or it had never been said They that be wise Dan. 12.3 shall shine as the brightness of the firmament and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever But every holy glorified Soul more or less capacious is as truly full of it as the lesser Vessel thrown into the Sea less capacious yet is as full as the greater Matt. 25.21 Psal 16.11 A Joy too great to enter into us for which we are bid to enter into it A Fulness inexhaustible and that lasts for ever A Joy that at present supports under the most painful Tribulations and Afflictive Losses Rom. 5.3 Heb. 10.34 Primitive Worthies gloried therein And took joyfully the spoiling of their goods as knowing they had in heaven a more enduring substance A Joy of which God himself is the Author which was of everlasting preparation Matt. 25.34 and the most affecting Subject of his dearest Son's Intercession He had never Grace more apparently poured into his Lips Psal 45.2 than when he uttered These things I speak in the world that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves John 17.13 v. 24. Or as the everlasting subject thereof he pleaded Father I will that those whom thou hast given me be with we where I am that they may behold the glory which thou hast given me for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world A Joy compleatly satisfactory and that as to the place of it Heaven excelling in glory all that is earthly Luke 23.43 Rev. 21.10 Rev. 21.2 Luke 22.29 Luke 12.32 Matt. 25.32 Rev. 4.8 Rev. 2.10 It is stiled upon this Account Paradise the great City the new Jerusalem the Kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world the work of it Praises and Thanksgiving of any the most noble and delightful Its advancement Thrones Scepters and Crowns our Company God Christ and glorified Beings And our heavenly Converse as with the former so the latter communicating their thoughts to us and we ours to them in a way much more noble and excellent than that at present of our quaintest and exactest Oratory Oh the various Delights and Joys resulting from each part of such our fulness and variety of Happiness yet no way diverting us from God the Chief but leading of us rather to the greater admiration of his rich Sovereign Love and Goodness in preparing each part of it for Creatures the most vile and unworthy and the highest thankfulness to him for the Death and Satisfaction of his Son by which only it hath been obtain'd and purchased And 2. Eternity It is what shall never have an end We are never more dreading
end be like his Embrace Piety as your richest gain avoid sin as your highest folly and remember That as aged and stricken in years the hoary head is a crown of glory Prov. 16.31 when found in the way of righteousness so as young you are called upon to Remember your Creator in the days of your youth Eccl. 12.1 The dedication of your youthful parts strength and vigour to him and his service seems greatly intended in that under the Law Deut. 18.4 Chap. 26.2 Mat. 21.15 John 21.7 of the first fruits for Sacrifice The Hosannahs of Children were pleasing to Christ in the Temple St. John of any his youngest Disciple was evidently his most beloved Disciple On you of any are founded the fairest hopes of being the most faithful Instruments of service in Church and State in the room of those deceased You are of any both the joys and fears of indulgent Parents and painful Preachers almost weary of this world they can do no more good in it and you only are those that can turn the old Hellish Proverb A Young Saint and an Old Devil into what looks more like Truth and appears divine be the Doctrine of our final Perseverance in Grace begun acknowledged such a Saint in Youth and a bright Angel for Holiness in Old Age an Angel in Youth and a Seraphim in Glory To be with Christ at our death Doct. III is far better than any bodily continuance on the earth In the prosecution of which I shall only shew 1. How or in what respects it is so 2. The Use 1. How or in what respects it is so And here where shall I begin or where shall I end What a work have I undertaken How unfit am I to discourse of the blissful state of departed souls in Heaven who know so little of Souls or Spirits on Earth Shall I describe a City or Plantation I never saw or viewed but in the History or Map Much less a future Glory which I am sure much more to fail in the description of Methinks I hear it more than whispered Who is this that darkneth counsel Job 38.2 by words without knowledge Stop thou stammering Tongue and frail Mortal thy blackest Pen with which thou art sure but to shade and darken what thou fondly hopest in lively colours to paint out and enliven 2 Cor. 12.4 They were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 words unutterable or unspeakable the blessed Apostle the great St. 1 Cor. 2.9 Paul heard in his highest Rapture Eye hath not seen ear hath not heard nor heart conceived the things which God hath prepared for them that love him And wilt thou attempt to tell us more 't is impossible alas impossible But a dark and blurr'd discovery being better than none be pleased to take it in this two-fold particular only viz. 1st A total removal of all Evil. 2dly The actual possession and enjoyment of all Good 1. A total removal of all Evil as of Sin and Sorrow 1. Of Sin Sin our greatest burthen here Rom. 7.24 the which made us often to utter the Apostolick Complaint Oh wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death shall be none then but be destroyed rather as in its Actings and Woundings so in its very Esse or Being Not a vain Thought the sinfulness of which once enkindled in the Almighty A repentance of his ever making man Gen. 6.5 6. Jer. 4.14 and we are bid to dislodge Not a vain Word Our words are so far so that we may call most of them what the Satyrist calls some Pers Sat. 5. Bullaras nugas utpote simile Bullis vento plenis Rev. 3.4 Bubbly toys they are so like a Bubble full of wind not a sinning Principle a sinning Disposition a sinning Inclination is then remaining We are cloathed in White the most lively Emblem of Holiness and have Spirits made perfect Our Sanctification is compleat Heb. 12.23 1 John 3.12 Ephes 4.13 the Divine Image in which we were at first formed most blessedly restored And oh happy blissful State that at once strips us of all our former rotten Rags of Sin and Lust and most richly adorns us with those of a primitive Perfection and Purity How should this be the Mark and Prize we aim at It was that St. Paul did so in and under his greatest Spiritual Attainments Philip. 3.13 14. 2. Of Sorrow Sorrows of one kind or another attend every worldly Condition We come into the World with a Cry and take our farewel of it with a Groan One of any the severest of Sorrows is bemoaning himself under spiritual Desertions the prevalency of Corruption and Buffetings of Satan Another passionately weeping for the death of Relations this day like Jonah's Gourd flourishing the next dead and withered Now the delight of our Eyes and the chief of our Affections Gen. 24.3 but anon a dead Sarah that must be buried out of our sight Another expressing his Poverty and Losses through Plunderings and Persecutions Another his restless days and nights through Pains and Sickness But farewel Sorrow farewel Grief in Heaven as no place for either Then no more Devil to assault and tempt us nor malicious World to afflict and persecute us no more aking Head sick Heart burning Fever grinding Stone painful Cholick trembling Palsie wasted Strength mouldring Carcase no more scoffing Ishmael profane Esau spiteful Canaanite scratching Thorn pricking Brier but an end of sinning and an end of sorrowing and weeping an end of sinning and an end of dying Rev. 20.4 1 Thess 4.17 a dying once and a living with the Lord for ever And not only is it better to be with Christ at our death than to enjoy the longest bodily continuance here as to this two-fold Evil of Sin and Sorrow we are fully delivered from But 2. As to the actual possession and enjoyment of all good 1. A perfection of Knowledge Here it is blemished with much imperfection and ignorance One who had made the sacred Scriptures his chief study confessed Multo plura nescio quam scio He was ignorant of more than he knew And some of the Jewish Rabbies the like in their known Saying Elias cum venerit solvet omnia Elias when he cometh shall give a solution to all things though we cannot But then shall all our present ignorance and imperfection be done away and our knowledge be no longer in part but compleat and perfect not mediate or at the second hand only by discourse study and meditation but immediate and intuitive And that as of God his Divine Being and Perfections 1 Cor. 13.12 so of Christ his Mysterious Incarnation Union of Natures without change of Properties and of the Holy Spirit of Grace how the same in Essence and yet distinct as to Person How Creation Redemption and Sanctification are the proper work of one or the other and yet as works ad extra alike applicable to either And of the most
the clouding or Eclipses of it but is a Life of joy that lasts for ever A Joy that is essentially compleat at death but will be every way so at the Resurrection in the re-union of our Souls to our Bodies Phil. 3.21 Fashioned like unto Christ's most glorious body It being then this despicable Clay shall arise incorruptible and immortal 1 Cor. 15.53 and be alike Partners in glory with our Souls as they have both been so in work and service Eternally in glory for ever with the Lord And oh madness unspeakable to prefer the greatest Comforts and Enjoyments of Life before such the greatest Happiness and Joy at Death Oh what are Riches Honours and worldly Greatness that you should put them into the same Scale Alas but vain and empty dead Comforts dead Enjoyments that speak you as foolish in the hugging of them as was the Egyptian in that of the Carved Image or Statue of his dead Son he hoped with Crown'd Garlands and a profound respect paid to it would have been the total cure of his Sorrow but as the Historian tells us proved rather the life and resurrection thereof They are but sweet Dishes Death with his Voider will soon sweep away leaving you only a cutting Reckoning to pay for the full feast and meal of them you have made They are but Comforts and Enjoyments that are every day on their wing from you were not you so from them Prov. 23.5 And will you then continue to do this haste rather from their tempting Destruction make sure of more satisfactory Delights I mean those of a heavenly State which righteous Souls as the former Doctrine tells you presently partake of at their Death And this last they are most unspeakably happy in beyond any the longest bodily continuance on Earth But to hasten to a more practical improvement of what hath been said As The VSE let it be inferred 1st Oh the dreadful Misery of the Damned For if to be with Christ at our death is so desirable to be banished from him then must needs be dreadful Oh the sad exchange they have made of this Life for what is future Tongue cannot express the least part of their Torment and Sorrow and that from the dismal place they are in set forth to us in all the doleful Expressions of Horrour Isa 30 ult 1 Pet. 3.19 Rev. 20.3 Matt. 13.42 Rev. 19.20 Luke 16.28 Matt. 22.13 2 Pet. 2.4 Jud. 13. as of Tophet a Prison Bottomless Pit Furnace of Fire Lake of Fire Place of Torment Outer-Darkness Chains and Blackness of Darkness Their Eternity Ever Ever being as a thousand Daggers wounding or Scorpions stinging and the Accusations of Conscience still gnawing them like Prometheus his Vulture for their inexcusable folly as in running themselves upon the Misery they might so fairly have avoided so in losing the God the Saviour the Kingdom and Glory they might have gained And shall then the Offers of each be slighted any longer by you Why so foolishly contented to be miserable when wooed to be happy Trifle not away one offer of Grace more lest it be your last 2. Be less dismayed if holy and righteous at the approach of death as to your selves and learn more to moderate your sorrow for that of others you had reason to believe such 1. Be less dismayed if holy and righteous at the approach of death as to your selves It is alas as to you but an enemy unstung and disarmed if in its self the King of Terrors Job 18.14 what but lodgeth your Bodies in a Grave the most sweetly perfumed by the Burial of the Son of God and your Souls with him in endless Happiness and so as Conquerors already over each bids you to Triumph Oh death where is thy sting Oh grave 1 Cor. 15.55 56 57. where is thy victory The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the law but thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 2. Learn more to moderate your sorrow for that of others you have reason to believe such For how should the sence of their Gain swallow up all repinings at your Loss and excite you to as great a willingness of parting with them as any have to the parting with their Children to the remotest ends of the earth for the sake of Temporal Advancements Methinks upon this account sorrow too often usurps the Throne of Joy We should even be weeping at the Birth of an Infant and rejoycing at the Death of a Saint Or if which Nature allows us the eye must drop a tear and the poor pained heart ease it self in sighs and groans it should be for this chiefly That they have gotten so much the start of us as to be at their Kingdom and Rest before us Which as we are called to in the deaths of others so particularly in that of this Worthy Person deceased Concerning whom I may modestly speak That if his Soul be not now with his Redeemer in Heaven there are but few of us who have not reason to despair of getting thither So heavenly truly and spiritual at all times were his words and discourse that we might have thought him unfit for earth long before he left it His Observation of the Lords Day was most exemplary as never tho most mornings the earliest riser sooner from his bed nor later in it even impatient through the whole of it of having his Mind and Ears filled with worldly Concerns or to see any part of it unredeemed And as for his Industry and Painfulness in his Ministerial Work where he last was both in Lectures and Fasts it must be confessed He laboured more abundantly than us all 1 Cor. 15.10 His Affections to you in his coming to you drowned greater Offers as thinking himself more happy in the Affections than the Fleece of his Flock And how painful and acceptable his short-liv'd Labours were among you needs no fuller a proof than his Last Sermon he Preached with Death's cold Dart stricken to his heart and the general Lamentations you express for him Upon the Death of his dearest Relation in very affecting expressions he uttered the deepest sense of his own he was heard thus to express himself The Lord fit those whose turn is next Ah! What would I not do what would I not forgo for Christ and Heaven And where is he now but with him reaping the full Reward of all his Painful Labours Not complaining any longer with his dearest Lord John 1.11 He came to his own but his own received him not Nor bleeding under the unkindnesses of Friends or Enemies But as to his own fulness of Joy and the miseries that seem to threaten you speaking tho dead the same Language the other did Luke 23.28 Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me but weep for your selves and for your children And surely as his gain you should acquiesce in your loss for can you bring him back