his People of old Hos 12.13 Truly God hath done all in New-England by his Word as long as we hearkened to the Word of God we prospered if we would now hearken all would be well 2 Chron. 20.20 3. That we do what is necessary for the recovery and preservation of the life of Religion with holy religious lively spiritual Devotion to God in his Worship more especially in his House The loss of which hath been and is one great if not the greatest cause of the decay of Religion for Religion lives much by such Devotion to God in his Worship and is kept alive by it Religious Devotion it is much of the life of Religion if we would then recover and preserve the life of Religion we must labour to have our Souls raised unto a very high and dear esteem of and love unto a most sincere and fervent Zeal for the House of God and all the interests and injoyments thereof We must labour to understand the excellency of the Worship of God and of the House of God and the blessedness and happiness of those who have not only visible but a real spiritual interest and standing therein we must give up and devote our selves our very souls unto God in a way of holy Fellowship and Communion with him in his House in all the wayes of his Worship and uphold the Worship of God in the life spirit and power of it we must have our hearts inlarged to take in a fulness of the spiritual and gracious presence of God and raised unto living apprehensions of that presence with spiritual pleasure delight Soul-solace and satisfaction therein That our Souls may be drawn forth more more after it with longing desires earnest Prayer as the Souls of Saints of old were Psal 27.4 36.7 42.1 2. 63.1 2. 84.1 2 10. We must labour to keep the House of God pure and holy and all the services and administrations of it and to obtain a spiritual Soul-settlement therein Psal 92.13 Those that are planted in the House of the Lord shall flourish in the Courts of our God If we would have Religion live we must really dwell in the House for there and therein Religion lives by nothing have we more indangered and destroyed the life of Religion than by withdrawing our hearts from God in his Worship in his House by our formality hypocrisie and spiritual Idolatry therein by slighting neglecting prophaning and polluting thereof and by sinning away the presence of God from it these evils are deadly they are death to Religion so long as these evils remain and so long as we remain so estranged to the House and Worship of God there will be no hope of the life of Religion neither shall we be able to do any thing effectually for the recovery and preservation of it 4. That we do what is necessary for the recovery and preservation of the life of Religion with the special presence and under the power of our Lord Jesus Christ Religion lives only by the presence and power of Christ who is our life and therefore is the life of our Religion That we have by our sins and miscarriages moved our Lord Jesus to withdraw and withhold so much of his presence and power from us thence it is that we suffer such a privation of the life of Religion and unless we obtain a return thereof Religion will dy quite away That we may obtain the return of the presence and power of Christ we must be sensible of and humbled for those sins and evils whereby we have grieved and provoked him Our unbelief and disobedience to the Gospel not subjecting to his spiritual rule and government and to the ministerial exercise of his power therein unfaithfulness to his cause interest and work dissention disorder and confusion in Churches the loss of our first love and life and the great dishonour to his holy Name These evils must be repented of and removed Unconverted Sinners must receive him and give themselves to him by Faith in a way of Gospel-Obedience Christians must awake and rouse up their sleepy Souls out of carnal ease and rest follow him and seek him until you have found him and repossest your Souls of him with a fulness of spiritual joy pleasure and delight in your injoyments of him as the Spouse Cant. 3.4 The Churches must give him free full and open entrance and entertainment in the greatest fulness of his presence and power recovering their first life and love doing their first works in maintaining integrity of love peace union purity of communion regularity and tranquility of order within themselves cleaving to his cause interest and work fully stedfastly and faithfully managing all the affairs of his Kingdom in a way of sincere soul-subjection to him for the advancement of his Name and Glory O if Christians and Churches could thus prepare and dispose themselves unto the return of the presence and power of Christ they would soon feel themselves enabled thereby to perform all that is necessary for the recovery and preservation of Religion the sad cause why we have hitherto Failed in all our undertakings is the want of the presence and power of Christ O there is woful evidence of the want of it until Christ return it nothing will or can be done the return of the presence and power of Christ will instantly infer an happy Resurrection of Religion O let us seek it pray and cry for it under a deep sence of our extream necessity of it and of our woful condition without it let us be moved hereunto from the consideration of the gracious disposition of our Lord Jesus to return it is yet his voice to these as it was to those declining Churches after he had reproved charged threatned them very sharply and severely he concludes all Rev. 3.20 Behold I stand at the door and knock if any man hear my voice and open unto me I will come in by opening to Christ we shall do all and obtain all salvation 5. That we do what is necessary for the recovery and preservation of the life of Religion quickly there must be a sudden quick dispatch of all that is to be done for the life of Religion It must be done presently instantly without delay as we would do any thing for our life when in utmost and extreamest danger if we do not do what we have to do quickly it may be quickly too late and truly it will be Gods infinite mercy if it be not already too late as it was to them Luk. 19.42 Mat. 23.37 O we have lingered and delayed upon utmost peril already it is now high time more than time if we mean to do any thing Hos 10.12 It is time to seek the Lord till he come God is now crying to day whilest it is called to day after so long a time Psal 95.7 Heb. 4.7 God calls for present hast he is every way hastening of us the dying state of Religion and
after this Generation of Vnconverted Sinners You who are yet in your sins in a state and way of Sin and Death remaining secure and senceless therein who have heretofore and hitherunto slighted neglected and rejected all the Calls of the Gospel and all the Ministerial offers of eternal life through Jesus Christ After all the proposals of life after all the calls commands and perswasions that you have been under to move you to chuse Life You are now this day once more called commanded perswaded yea intreated beseeched and prayed in the Name of the Lord and by the Word of the Lord to chuse Life Our Lord Jesus is most graciously pleased by the Ministry of this Word to exhibit himself in all his fulness and sufficiency of Grace and Life all an Alsufficient Saviour and is crying in this General Assembly unto New-England Sinners to chuse him to come to him that they may have life as once he did by his own personal Ministry in a General Assembly of that People far greater than this John 7.37 In the last and great day of the Feast Jesus stood and cried if any man thirst let him come unto me and drink he that believeth on me c. You have been set and have been continued under an extraordinary improvement of all means in this your day of Grace which is continued and protracted beyond the ordinary date of divine patience by an extraordinary protraction of longsuffering in a way of probation and trial God hath been trying and proving of you and waiting upon you a great while But know that his Spirit shall not alwayes strive Gen. 6.3 He hath limited a certain day beyond which he will not wait Heb. 4.7 and upon a supposition that God hath so limited a certain day whereby he hath dated his patience and longsuffering and the period of the present day of Grace unto this Generation of Sinners you may sadly conclude that you live under the latest and last the final and farewel calls and cries of Mercy by the Ministry of the Word that God will not much longer call and cry after you nor strive with you therefore you are warned to flee from the wrath which is to come Mat. 3.7 12. And now also the Ax is laid to the root of the Tree therefore every Tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewen down and cast into the fire You are in extream danger under the power and working of that spirit of unbelief and disobedience to the Gospel which is the Spirit of the times and whereby the Generation that is the generality of Sinners are so strongly inclined and carried out to refuse Life and chuse Death It is much to be feared that many if not the most have already so done and are accordingly in dreadful judgement given up by God unto that fatal choice Psal 81.12 So I gave them up to their own hearts lusts c. O it is high time then now now if ever because you may fear now or never to chuse life to chuse Spiritual Temporal and Eternal Life to make that great comprehensive unchangeable eternal Choice upon which depends not only the Salvation of your own Souls but even the deliverance and salvation of this People and these Churches If you do thus chuse Life all will be well with New-England but if you should refuse generally to chuse Life you will be likely not only to destroy your selves but all posterity it would be fearfully signal if any sinners should be so prodigiously hardened and heightned in their impenitency and unbelief as to be raised unto that presumptuous and desperate resolution with those in the Prophet Isai 22.13 14. Let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall die I have no other word to leave upon such but that which follows in the next verse And it was revealed in mine ear by the Lord of Hosts surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till you die God is also by this word calling upon his own Servants to chuse Life though you have already made the great and most happy choice of Life for your own Souls last spoken of yet you are further to chuse life that is all the wayes and means of life whatsoever may any way conduce unto the furtherance of the work of Conversion and the progress of Reformation the recovery of the life of Religion Chuse indeed that is chuse it practically make a practical choice of it that is chuse it so as to make it your work You are in this respect not only to chuse life for your selves but for others chuse life for your Families for your Children and Servants Josh 24.15 Chuse you this day whom ye will serve But as for me and my House we will serve the Lord. It was a time wherein all the People were put to their choice and Joshuah chose for himself and his House Again chuse life for the Churches It is with a few of the sincere Servants of God to chuse life for the Churches O chuse the way and work of Church Reformation and all means and helps thereunto Life and Death is in this respect set before Churches if the Servants of God in them chuse life for them the Churches will chuse life Finally chuse life for the People the Servants of God in their several places and stations according to their betrustments ought to chuse life for the People chuse all things that do conduce to the preservation of the life of this People in all the forementioned respects O it is a great thing to be charged and betrusted with the life of a People the visible People of God the publick weal the life of a People hath great dependance upon the Wisdome and Faithfulness of those who are and ought to chuse life and blessing for them Thus God hath set New-England between Ebal Gerazim he hath life and blessing on the one hand death and cursing on the other hand brought us to a Trial what we will chuse it is Gods way and work with us so to do by all his dispensations what the issue will be what exit we shall make upon this trial is awful considerable O that it might be the holy will of the blessed God to chuse life and blessing for us and inable us by his spirit and grace to chuse it for our selves and not suffer us to run upon our own ruin by the fatel woful choice of death Wherein we shall make our selves most inexcusably both sinful and miserable because we have been warned according to the charge that God hath given unto his Watch-men Ezek. 33.3 8. The Trumpet hath been blown and the People have been warned It hath been the greatest care and concernment of those of Gods faithful Watchmen who have had fullest discoveries of our extreamest dangers both by sin and judgement so to discharge themselves as to deliver their own Souls that they might themselves be clear from the blood of all men Hence all
A PLEA For the Life of Dying Religion from the Word of the Lord IN A SERMON Preached to the GENERAL ASSEMBLY of the COLONY of the MASSACHVSETS at Boston in New-England May 16. 1683. Being the Day of ELECTION there By Mr. Samuel Torrey Pastor of the Church of Christ at Waymouth Rev. 3.1 I know thy works that thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead 2. Be watchful and strengthen the things which remain which are ready to dye Deut. 30.19 I call heaven and earth to Record this day against you that I have set before you life and death blessing and cursing therefore chuse life that both thou and thy seed may live 20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God and that thou mayest obey his voice and that thou mayest cleave to him for he is thy life Hosea 6.1 Come let us return to the Lord. 2 After two dayes he will revive us and in the third day he will raise us up and we shall live in his sight BOSTON IN NEW-ENGLAND Printed by Samuel Green for Samuel Sewall 1683. TO THE READER IT was the Importunate Solicitation of many and more especially of them whose Request caused the Sermon emitted herewith to be Preached that prevailed with the Reverend and Worthy Author so far to gratifie their desires as to let others have a Copy of what he delivered on so Solemn an Occasion leaving it with them to dispose of as they should see cause I have perused it with great satisfaction finding it to be not only an affectionate and awakening but a rational and judicious Discourse and than which nothing can be more seasonable It hath often been affirmed and truly that the distinguishing Character whereby New-England is differenced from other Out-goings of the English Nation is in that the great motive inducing the first Planters to remove themselves and theirs into a wast and howling Wilderness was like that of the Children of Israel of old the Interest of Religion which their Souls were concerned for And whilest Men continued faithful to that blessed design as the Prophet said to Jehojakim it was well with them They that sought first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness had other things added to them which they never thought nor could in reason hope to enjoy Nor did any Weapon formed against us in those dayes prosper The Lord hath caused us and all the World about us to see that Religion is our life That this Interest without which we our selves cannot live hath been for many years languishing and dying is the observation of all men that have their hearts exercised in discerning things of this nature The complaint is that N-England is not to be found in N-England but we are become like the rest of the Nations being grown into the same conformity to the World with other Plantations whose Interest and profession never was as ours hath been There is a woful decay as to externals and the Form of Religion amongst the Professors of it Hearing the Word as to the publick dispensation thereof Prayer with Fasting and other religious Exercises which reach no further than the Form of Godliness are not so frequent as in former dayes and that is a most certain sign that the power of Godliness is much more in a bleeding and dying state It is not then to be wondered at if the tenour of divine Dispensation hath of later times been changed towards us The hand of God hath been heavy upon many places in the Land he hath smitten us with a deadly destruction The killing Sword a mortal Contagion and other judgements have threatned life it self And since we have let Religion die we have been in greater danger than ever of being deprived both of our Political and Ecclesiastical life Let us not be high-minded but fear If we do not in this our Day know the things of our peace so as to recover the life of Religion the consideration of Gods holy severity towards others may cause trembling of heart lest at last the Lord do unto us as he hath done unto them Are we better than Shiloh where the House of God continued almost four hundred Years Are we better than Jerusalem the perfection of Beauty and Joy of the whole Earth Are we better than the Churches in Asia planted by the Apostles themselves and amongst whom there was once a gracious and glorious presence of the Son of God But those Candlesticks are long ago removed out of their Places not so much as one of them remaining Because they have lost their Religion they have lost their lives and beings A late Historian who about twelve years ago was in those parts saith that horrour took hold upon him as he was viewing the doleful Ruins of those once Glorious Churches fearing lest the sins of other places which as yet enjoy the Gospel might in time expose them to the like miseries He saith that in Ephesus there are now only a few Cottages and not so much as one Christian dwelling there Smyrna is at this day a considerable place in respect of Trade but no settled Inhabitants there to uphold so much as the Name of Christians excepting a few Superstitious Greeks In Pergamus there are but fifteen Families of Christians and those in a state most miserable both as to Spirituals and Temporals In Thyarira the Turks have eight Mosches but very few Christians now residing there Sardis which was once the Metropolis of Lydia is now a beggerly Village Earthquakes and Wars having brought that famous City under horrid desolations There is nothing like a Church there In Philadelphia there is a greater number of Men calling themselves Christians than in any of those Asiatick Churches excepting Smyrna For in that City are two hundred Families of those who are called Christians but they are Idolaters and in miserable slavery to the cruel Turks As for Laodicea which was once a rich and populous place and the Buildings in it exceeding magnificent it is now utterly desolated not so much as one Inhabitant there excepting Wolves and doleful Creatures Thus did all these famous Places and Churches by losing Religion lose their own Lives and Beings Time was when in Africa there were many thousands of Churches but the true Religion being gone out of that vast Continent thrice as big as Europe what but Death is to be seen there Let us look nearer home In the Land of our Fathers Sepulchres there were Churches amongst the antient Britains but when those sins of Pride Drunkenness Contention Worldliness notwithstanding Gildas and other faithful Ministers did zealously testifie against them became common and prevailing Evils God first sent a sweeping Plague amongst them and when that Besom af Destruction could not Reform them the Lord brought the Saxons upon them who rooted them out of their Land And if we consider the dispensations of God since the Reformation successfully begun by the Ministry of Luther Zuinglius Calvin and other great Champions for the Truth
and Reformation And not only so but when God hath given him an opportunity more than once to speak in the Name of the Lord unto this People in respect of the Heads and Representatives thereof he hath delivered his own Soul by giving Warning and what he hath spoken shall turn to him for a Testimony It is an hazardous thing as much as life is worth for men not to comply with the Word of God by whomsoever or to whomsoever spoken If a Josiah regard not the Word of God spoken by a Pharaoh Necho he loses his Life for it and so did Zedekiah because he humbled not himself before Jeremiah the Prophet speaking from the mouth of the Lord. It s true that Ministers in these dayes have no immediate Call or Commission from Heaven yet if they deliver such Messages as are according to the Law and the Testimony it is God that speaketh by them and many times their hearts are inclined to this or that subject by a special operation of the spirit of Christ who is with his Servants to the end of the World Let us then hear that so our souls may live God of his free Grace hath seen meet to dignifie an handful of his People who are separated from their Brethren with the chief and choicest of Blessings It is promised as an high favour Jer. 30.21 Their Nobles shall be of themselves and their Governours shall-proceed from the midst of them We have had these over us who have been as the Expression of the Antient is Nobiles genere Nobiliores sanctitate We cannot be thankful enough for that Blessing Civil Liberty is an invaluable mercy The Jewish Rabbins have a saying that if the Sea were Ink and the Earth Parchment it would not be sufficient to write down the praise due to God for liberty But what then shall be said concerning the Liberties of the Gospel we enjoy all at this day The way to have them continued is for us to approve our selves faithful to the interest of Religion For then God will be for us and if he be for us who can be against us Boston in N. England August 31. 1683. INCREASE MATHER A PLEA FOR THE LIFE OF Dying Religion DEUT. 32.47 Because it is your Life IT hath pleased the great and blessed God in his infinite Soveraignty to transact with Man about the everlasting Concernments of his immortal Soul to dispense both his Mercy and Justice both Life and Death to distribute Eternal Rewards and Punishments and to govern Man unto his Eternal State only in the way of a Covenant All Reprobate Sinners are destroyed and damned under the Curse and Condemnation of the Covenant of Works All God's Elect are saved by and through our Lord Jesus Christ according unto and under the Covenant of Grace God hath constituted the Covenant of Redemption in his own Eternal Counsel before the World was and therein laid the Foundation both of the Constitution and Administration of the Covenant of Grace in by through that one only great and glorious Mediator Jesus Christ whose work it is to bring a certain Elect number of sallen Man unto God concerning whom he saith I will be their God and they shall be my People Hence God ever hath had and ever will have a Covenant-People in the World untill this Dispensation of Grace shall be consummated in Glory And when the most High divided to the nations their Inheritance and separated the sons of Adam He set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel For the Lord's Portion is his People and Jacob the Lot of his Inheritance Deut. 32.8 9. This Book it may be in some respects most properly called The Book of the Covenant because it contains not only a more full plain Revelation Exposition of the Covenant it self in the constitution way manner means of the Administration Confirmation of it of the All-Sufficiency of God unto his People therein as their God in Covenant but also a description of that notable Covenant-Transaction wherein all the Duties all the Blessings and all the Curses of the Covenant are expresly and in set form proposed and the people moved unto the most solemn Restipulation of their Souls to God under the most sacred and indispensible Obligations to live to him and walk with him by religious Fear Reverence Faith Love and Obedience as his Covenant-people for ever and this ratified and confirmed by a most awful Contestation whereby Heaven and Earth are called to record Deut. 30.19 20. I call Heaven Earth to record this day against you that I have set before you Life and Death Blessing and Cursing therefore chuse Life that both thou and thy seed may live And now Moses having thus finished his great and extraordinary Ministry wherein he had been accompanied with an extraordinary presence and power of God and was eminently a Type of Christ he doth prepare himself instantly to take leave of the People of his Work and of the World The people he incourageth by a promise of God's Presence to make their Progress unto and Enterance into and full Possession of the Land of Promise His Office and Work he resigneth unto Joshuah whom he did by divine appointment ordain his Successor charging of him with the Care and Conduct of the People unto their Rest in Canaan and this upon full assurance that God would be with him and that he would never fail him nor forsake him The Law which he had received of the Lord and delivered unto the people containing the whole Word and Worship of God and so their whole Religion together with a prophetical Song shewing the diverse State of that Church and People in succeeding Ages under the successive Dispensation of the Covenant this Law and this Song he delivers to the Priests and People for their improvement charging of them most earnestly and affectionately to set their hearts unto it because it was their Life These words because it is thy Life they are some of the last words of Moses that great Prophet and therefore they contain matter of the greatest Importance to the People of God They are together with the Context his last his farewell and dying Charge whereby he set himself in a sentence or two to speak all at once to deliver unto them the Sum or a System of all that Doctrine and Duty which he had before throughout the whole course of his Ministry been delivering unto them all that they were to know to believe or to practise the whole both of Faith and Obedience that is more plainly their whole Religion And he chargeth them to set their hearts unto it that is to prise it love it keep it cleave to it live and walk in the sincere pure powerfull Profession and Practice of it with all their hearts with all their minds with all their Souls with all their might and with all their strength from Generation unto Generation themselves and
their Children for ever And thus he moves them to set their hearts unto Religion Because it is their Life Whence we have this DOCT. That Religion it is the Life of the Covenant-People of God Our Text and Doctrine deliver the great and universal Reason of the Profession and Practice of our Religion Viz Because it is our Life Religion in the most full and comprehensive notion of it It is that whereby Man is qualified and capacitated to live unto God to live with God to live upon God to see and to injoy God in Christ as the Only and All-sufficient Author of Life and Object of Blessedness and Happiness as his last End and chief Good Religion comprehends Man's Deliverance from all both moral and miserable Evil both Sin Death and Hell as also all both moral and beatifical Good Holiness Happiness Grace and Glory And it is consummated in a perfection of Beatifical Vision and Fruition by the Light and Life of Heaven In the Explication I am to shew 1. That Religion is Life 2. That it is the Life of the Covenant-people of God 1. Religion it is Life that is 1. The true and pure Religion It is originally and only from God the living God the God of all Life who is Life it self in the abstract and the Fountain of Life to all living Religion it ariseth from and is founded in the very Being and Nature of the blessed God If there were no such God there could be no such Religion Religion it is of God both in a way of divine Revelation and in a way of divine Operation It is purely of divine Revelation respecting both the Doctrine of it the spiritual supernatural and saving Knowledge of it It is that whereby God hath revealed himself unto man and whereby man hath that saving Knowledge of God and Jesus Christ his Son which is Life eternal Joh. 17.3 It is that whereby God hath commanded Light to shine out of Darkness and by the enlightening power of his Spirit shined into our hearts and given us the light of the knowledge of his Glory in the face of Jesus Christ. 2 Cor. 4.6 It his marveilous Light 1 Pet. 2.9 Religion it is also from God in a way of divine Operation It is the most powerful Effect of the quickening power and operation of the Spirit of God as a Spirit of Life upon the creature hence it is phrased the Life of God Eph. 4.8 Religion it is the most glorious created Emanation of spiritual heavenly and divine Light and Life from God as the fountain of both Psal 36.9 For with thee is the Fountain of Life in thy Light shall we see Light 2. Religion it is also from Christ the Mediator It is founded in the Person Office and Work of Christ The being of Religion the light life good blessedness and happiness of it it is all from the Merit Satisfaction and Intercession of our Lord Jesus Christ and from the power and operation of his Spirit Religion it consisteth in our Faith in Christ and Obedience unto Him and in our practical and experimental Union Communion with his Person and the Application of all his Benefits even eternal Life Thus Religion it is our Life because thereby we are made partakers of Christ who is the Resurrection and the Life Joh. 11.25 The Way the Truth and the Life Joh. 14.6 By having of whom we have Life 1 Joh. 5.12 who is our Life Colos 3.4 Christ is the great PATRON and PROFESSOR of our Religion He hath confirmed it by his own personal Profession and Practice when on earth and is himself the great Apostle and High Priest of our Profession Heb. 3.1 Whence it is most properly called the Christian Religion 3. Religion it is respecting the Principles of it Life The Principles of it are living Principles Principles of Life Religion it is wrought into the hearts of men by the quickening power of the Spirit in that saving work of Grace wherein we are raised from Death unto Life wherein we are passed from Death unto Life 1 Joh. 3.14 Religion it is our spiritual Resurrection and so it is our spiritual Life 4. Religion in the practice of it it is the only way of Life It is by the performance of Religious Duties that men walk in the way of Life Practical Religion it is the narrow way which leadeth to Life Mat. 7.14 It is that way of Life which is above to the wise to depart from Hell beneath Prov. 15.24 It is the Everlasting Way Psal 139.24 5. Religion in the visible external Forms of it in all the religious Institutions Constitutions and Administrations which are of divine Appointment so it is the only Means of Life that whereby God gives Life or works Life In which sence it is said Salvation is of the Jews Joh. 4.22 Religion it is the living Waters the Waters of Life the Tree of Life which gives Life to the Nations Ezek. 47.8 9. Zech. 14.8 Rev. 22.1 2. Where Religion is there are all the Means of Life and the saving Improvement of those Means Where Religion is not there is no Day of Grace no Means of Grace no Life no Salvation 6. Religion it is that wherein and whereby man is brought to God to Christ to God in Christ. It is that whereby we do know God acknowledge him fear him believe hope and trust in him love serve worship and glorifie God and whereby we come to God converse with God have Communion with God and receive all saving Communications from God through Jesus Christ It is that whereby men move and act towards and upon God in and by which God dwells with men on earth it is that whereby we do apprehend cleave unto and live upon God as our Life Deut. 30.20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God and cleave to him for He is thy Life Thus Religion in the Principles of it it is Life in the Practice of it is the Way of Life in the visible and external Forms and Institutions of it it is the Means of Life and respecting the original Object and Ends of it it comes from and leads and brings us up unto God in Christ who is our Life Thus it is demonstrated that Religion is Life Secondly That Religion is Life to the Covenant-People of God that is 1. It is their spiritual Life that whereby they live spiritually It is that whereby every single Saint lives the Life of Grace and Holiness the Life of Faith and New Obedience The spirit and power of Religion in the heart it is Life to the Soul and gives being to the New Creature Rom. 8.6 To be spiritually minded it is Life Hence Religion it is that which makes the People of God a Living People God's People must be a living People Whenever God takes a People to be his People He quickens them with spiritual Life and makes them a Living People Ezek. 37.6 And ye shall live ' and ye shall know that I am
the Lord. V. 14. And shall put my Spirit in you and ye shall live Hence Religion it is Life from the dead to any People Rom. 11.25 What shall the Receiving of them be but Life from the dead The Conversion of the Jews shall be Life from the dead to the World by a general and glorious resurrection of Religion 2. Religion it is the Life of the Covenant-People of God i. e. It gives them their spiritual Being and Constitution under Covenant-Relation unto God It gives a People their spiritual Standing before God as his People his Covenant-People It is the essence and substance of the Covenant Heb. 8.10 For this is the Covenant I will make with the House of Israel after those days I will put my Laws into their mind and write them in their hearts and I will be to them a God and they shall be to me a People taken from Jer. 31.33 Religion in this sence constitutes the Covenant and is the spiritual Constitution of the Covenant-People of God 1 Pet. 2.9 But ye are a chosen Generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculior People It follows V. 10th Which in time past were not a People but now are the People of God Without Religion they were no People but Religion made them the People of God 3. Religion it is the Life of the Covenant-People of God as to their Political Constitution in visible Church-state and Order under the Administration of all Ordinances Religion gives a People their visible Standing under the visible Dispensation of God's Covenant and Administration of his Kingdom as in our Text. For it is your Life and by this thing ye shall prolong your days in the Land whither ye go over Jordan to possess it It was their Religion which gave them a Standing and Settlement in that Land the land of Promise in the full possession of their visible Covenant Interests and Enjoyments as the Covenant-people of God So that it remains a manifest plain Truth from the Word of God that Religion is the Life of the Covenant-people of God The Application follows VSE I. It is for our Information and Instruction in divers Particulars 1. That there is there can be but One only true real Religion and no more Religion hath been is and ever will be One the same unchangeably And because there is but One God but One Lord Jesus Christ One Spirit One work of Redemption One way of Application One Doctrine of Godliness One Faith One Obedience One and the same moral Worship One Covenant of Grace One Covenant-people of God One Family and Houshold of God One State both of Grace and Glory One Life One Heaven therefore consequently but One Religion All the sincere People of God in the World ever have been and ever shall be One in the Profession and Practice of this One Religion whereby all God's Elect are gathered together in One in Christ and perfected both in Grace and Glory unto the completion and perfection of the mystical Body of Christ which is the fullness of Him who filleth all in all Eph. 1.10 23. True it is the Apostle grants 1 Cor. 8.5 that there are which are called gods as there be gods many and lords many So there be that are called religions such religions many But as the Apostle concludes V. 6. but to us there is but One God and One Lord Jesus Christ So ought we to conclude that to us there is but One Religion which is the pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father Jam. 1.27 This is the Religion without which there is there can be no Life or Salvation 2. That this Religion it is the Supreme thing in this lower World viz. because it is in all respects our Life and that nothing else is so Religion in the full and whole nature and notion of it is the most glorious effect and product of divine Wisdom Power Grace Mercy Goodness Truth and Faithfullness yea of the whole divine Sufficiency and Efficiency in the accomplishment of all God's eternal Counsels concerning his own Glory in the Salvation of his Elect. Religion it comprehends all the whole Interest of God of Christ and of his Church and People in this World all that is heavenly spiritual and divine all that is of Heaven upon Earth respecting both State Interest and Enjoyment It gives a Being Standing to all Saints both in Grace and in Glory Oh! Religion it is a marvellous high and heavenly thing All the real worth and excellency that is in the World it is from Religion There would be nothing of God that is of the knowledge of God of the spiritual gracious and saving Presence of God were it not for Religion Those who are without Religion are without God in the World Eph. 2.12 We have no more of God than we have of Religion Again there could have been no Good or Goodness in the World had it not been for Religion The World would have been a meer Vacuum of all good nothing else but a receptacle of desperate Sinners a very Hell of Sin and Misery there could have been nothing of Light or Life or Grace Holiness or Happiness there would have been nothing but Darkness and Death and all kind of woe no news of Heaven no hope of Heaven yea there could have been no Heaven unto fallen Man without Religion Religion doth in a sence give being unto Heaven There had not been such Place or State of Blessedness unto Man neither had Man ever been capacitated to live in Heaven otherwise than by this Religion No wonder then that God by his Word doth extoll it and advance it as the most excellent inestimable invaluable incomparable thing Prov. 3.15 She is more precious than rubies and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared to her And it is advanced because it is our Life Prov. 4.13 Keep her for she is thy Life V. 21 22. Keep them in the midst of thy heart for they are thy Life It is Religion that doth make the poor despised Saints of God the Excellent Ones of the Earth Psal 16.3 Prov. 12.26 It is Religion that doth make the Church of God beautifull the perfection of Beauty the Joy of the whole Earth Psal 48.2 Lam. 2.15 Yea an Eternal Excellency Isa 60.15 3. That it is the Infinite Grace Mercy and Goodness of God to any People that He doth give them Religion The greatest part of the World and of the Nations of the World are most miserable without it all the Pagan and Popish World O that so great so much the greater part of Mankind should so ly buried in gross Ignorance and Atheisme without God and Religion 1 Joh. 5.19 The whole World lieth in Wickedness So much the more is the Mercy of God magnified to such People and Nations unto whom He hath granted Religion in the light life and power of it It is the happiness honour and glory of any Nation or People It
was so of the People of Israel It made them great and glorious above all other Nations Deut. 33.29 Happy art thou O Israel A People saved by the Lord And great above all Nations it also made them Deut 4.7 For what Nation so great that hath God so nigh unto them High also it made them above the Nations in praise in name and in honour Deut. 26.19 It made them a Crown of glory in the hand of the Lord and a royal Diadem in the hand of their God Isa 62.3 That God hath made our People and Nations at least in these latter Ages so much a Glory among the Nations and so much the Bulwark and Defence of Religion in the World it ought to be acknowledged with Doxologie That God hath bless'd poor New-England with so much of Religion planted these Heavens and laid the foundations of this Earth in such an happy subserviency thereunto this we ought to commemorate with Thankfulness yet not without some yea much diminution of our joy and comfort under a sorrowful sense of our present Defection therein VSE II. It ought to be for Admonition If we are a People of Religion if Religion be our Life O let us then be Admonished to take heed that we do not destroy our Religion and so destroy our own Life destroy our selves utterly and most miserably by destroying our Religion And we are the more concerned to give most diligent and earnest heed to such an Admonition and Warning because our Lord Jesus seems to speak to these Churches as to the Church of Sardis Rev. 3.1 I know thy works that thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead That there hath been a vital decay a decay upon the very Vitals of Religion by a deep declension in the Life and Power of it that there is already a great Death upon Religion little more left than a name to live that the things which remain are ready to dye and that we are in great danger of dying together with it This is one of the most awakening humbling Considerations of our present State and Condition Oh! the many deadly Symptoms Symptoms of Death that are upon our Religion Consider we then how much it is dying respecting the very Being of it by the general failure of the work of Conversion whereby only it is that Religion is propagated continued and upheld in being among any People As converting work doth cease so Religion doth dye away though more insensibly yet most irrecoverably How much Religion is dying in the very Hearts of sincere Christians by their Declensions in Grace Holiness and the Power of Godliness How much it is dying respecting the visible Profession and Practice of it partly by the Formality of Churches but more by the Hypocrisie and Apostasie of formal hypocritical Professors How much it is dying under the prevailing power of those Sins and Evils which are utterly inconsistent with and destructive of the Life of it Those Sins continuing and prevailing Religion cannot live it must needs dye Such as are the deep and general Degeneracy of the Generations Unprofitableness under all means of Grace Unbelief Disobedience to the Gospel Formality Hypocrisie and spiritual Idolatry in the Worship of God Prophanation and Pollutions of the House of God Slighting and Neglect of Holy Things Interests and Injoyments thereof Worldliness Prophaneness Sensuality All these Sins more especially when they are become the very Spirit of the Times and Generation when they are penal and judicial then they will certainly issue in general and total Apostacy and so will destroy not only the life and power but the external Form Order and Interest of Religion also Hence how is Religion dying in Churches Churches which are constituted on purpose for the propagation and preservation of the Life of Religion that live and have their being only by the life of Religion how little is there of the life of Religion left in them and how are Churches themselves languishing and dying together with Religion How is Religion dying in Families through the neglect of the religious Service and Worship of God and of the religious Education of Children and Youth in Families Truly here and hereby Religion first received its death's wound Hence Religion is dying in all other Societies among all Orders and Degrees of men in all ways of Converse both Civil and Ecclesiastical O there is little or nothing of the Life of Religion to be seen or appearing either in the Frame or Way Hearts or Lives of the generality of the Professors of it And that which remains thereof ready to dye How much and great cause have we then to take heed that we do not quite destroy it That is 1. Take heed that we do not exchange our Religion for the World that we do not commit that Heaven-astonishing Sin which God charged his People with Jer. 2.11 12 13. But my people have changed their Glory for that which doth not profit Be astonished O ye heavens at this be horribly afraid be ye very desolate saith the Lord. For my people have committed two evils they have forsaken Me the Fountain of living waters and hewed them out cisterns broken cisterns that can hold no water They had exchanged their God and their Religion for the World they had advanced the Interest of the World above the Interest of Religion and thereby Inslaved themselves V. 14. Is Israel a servant is he a home-born Slave why is he spoiled God destroyed them by that worldly Interest whereby they had destroyed their Religion If once a People do set their hearts upon the World so as to make it their highest and heart-interest their preponderating ruling Interest which doth sway all and carry all before it when the Spirits Principles Counsels and Designs of a People are all for the World set for the promotion and advancement of their worldly Interest when the Interest and Concernments of Religion yea even Religion it self is made subordinate and subservient to the World yea prostituted by worldly men to worldly Lusts and thereby exposed to all kind of abuse scandal shame reproach and made an Opprobrium when the visible Professors of Religion are not only in heart alienated from but are become secret Enemies to it when Religion is oppressed and depressed when it is made not only to serve but also to suffer under the rising ruling Interest of the World WO then will be to such a People for they have exchanged their Religion for the World therefore their Religion will dye The spirit of the World and of Worldliness hath been is and is like to be the most general and powerful Principle of Apostacy to the professing people of God and it is often yea ordinarily the death of Religion It is always so when where it prevails 2. We are admonished to take heed that we do not desert Religion If we desert it it will certainly dye dye without remedy That we do not desert it by
be so much danger of the Death of Religion O then let all who love and desire life both temporal spiritual and eternal life and who fear death so great a death be moved to labour with all our hearts minds souls might and strength by all ways and means to recover and save the life of Religion which is our own life This Exhortation proposeth and presseth all the great and general Dutys of the Covenant People of God at such a time and in such a case as we are Moses applied all the whole Word of God at once to the People by this one Word of Exhortation Set your hearts unto all the Words c. because it is your life It is also the sum of all which our Lord Jesus propounds to the declining Churches Rev. 3.2 Be watchful and strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die I am though most unworthy called forth this day and set in this General Assembly to speak for the life of Religion to plead in the Name of the Lord and by the Word of the Lord for the life of Religion to plead for the life of dying Religion Oh! were the heart of N-Engl rightly and fully prepared resolved and set for the recovery and safety of the life of Religion God would then most graciously make clear and full discoveries of our whole way and work therein and of all the means thereunto Yea God himself would soon bring all to pass for us To this end we ought to be throughly convinced of and deeply humbled even unto shame and confusion of Face under the sense of the decaying dying state of Religion and withal charge judge condemn loath and abhor our selves for all that Sin and Apostasie whereby we have brought Religion into such a state Under such Conviction and Humiliation we must set our selves to labour unto the resurrection of Religion and that with extraordinary Zeal Courage Faith-fulness and Resolution in the improvement of all means with one heart and one soul as one man even as for our lives and more than for our lives still acknowledging that when we have done all that we can Religion must be revived not without the greatest Miracle of Divine Power Grace and Mercy by God himself Ezek. 37.12 O my People I will open your Graves That we may obtain the accomplishment of this great promise it will be necessary 1. That we do under an humbling heart-breaking sense of our present absolute and extream necessity of the mighty power and working of the Spirit of God in a way of Soveraign Grace and Mercy for the recovery of the Life of Religion labour unto an extraordinary exercise of Faith and Hope in God for it Plead and improve his Covenant and all his Promises to that end We have great encouragement from the Word of God so to do Hos 6.1 2. Come let us return unto the Lord After two dayes he will revive us in the third day he will raise us up and we shall live in his sight If we could thus come unto God by Faith he would revive us there is nothing more dangerously Symptomatical than when a People grow senseless secure stupid sottishly supine in the depth of Apostasie None of the declining Churches so irrecoverably gone as that of Laodicea and that because utterly senseless and secure Rev. 3.17 Because thou sayest I am rich and increased with Goods and have need of nothing and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked So the People of Israel I mean the ten Tribes when they were sunk in their Apostasie past recovery God by the Prophet Elijah put them upon the utmost trial by that great proposal 1 King 18.21 How long halt ye between two Opinions If the Lord be God follow him if Baal then follow him and the People answered him nor a word Observe the People answered him not a Word which fignifies plainly that although they were fully convinced of their Apostasie and manifested by their silence that they were judged and self-condemned yet they were so stupid and sottish under it that they were not at all careful nor concerned about it nor willing to trouble themselves their minds or thoughts with it God grant it may not be so with us 2. That we do carefully and very curiously observe and labour to understand the Time the Way the Work of the Lord when and wherein he is graciously willing and working to revive and raise up yielding up our selves unto him as the Subject of so great a Work It is the greatunhappiness and misery of any declining People not to understand when and how God is labouring with them to revive and raise them Hos 11.3 I taught Ephraim also to go taking them by their Arms but they knew not that I healed them Hence it was they abused all both ordinary and extraordinary means and mercies unto their own deeper defection and utter destruction as Hos 7.1 When I would have healed Israel then the Iniquity of Ephraim was discovered and the Sin of Samaria the more God laboured with them to heal them the worse they were until at last they became wilfully unwilling to be healed and even desperately resolute in their Apostasie Jer. 2.25 But thou saidst there is no hope no for I have loved Strangers and after them I will go So Jer. 18.12 Isai 30.15 This made the Prophet to lament to dolefully without hope Jer. 8.18 20. When I would comfort my self against sorrow my heart is faint in me the Harvest is past the Summer ended and we are not healed for the hurt of the Daughter of my People I am hurt I am black astonishment hath taken hold upon me That which broke the heart of his hope was they had not known nor improved the time and means of their healing and salvation and therefore now their case was hopeless and remediless this made our Blessed Lord Jesus to weep out the Bowels of his Compassion over Jerusalem in that doleful lamentation Luk. 19.41 42. And when he was come near he beheld the City wept over it if thou hadst known even thou at least in this thy Day the things which belong to thy peace but now they are hidden from thine eyes Verse 44. Because thou knewest not the time of thy Visitation So Mat. 23.37 O Jerusalem Jerusalem c. How often would I have gathered thy Children c. and ye would not behold your house is left unto you desolate When a People do not will not observe nor understand the time way and work of the Lord and so refuse to be healed and saved God doth then give them up as a reprobate People Jer. 6.29.30 The Bellows are burnt the Lead is consumed of the fire the Founder melteth in vain for the wicked are not plucked away reprobate Silver shall men call them because the Lord hath rejected them Ezek. 24.13 Because I have purged thee and thou wast not purged thou shalt not be purged
any more from thy filthiness until I have caused my fury to rest upon thee I the Lord have spoken it I will do it I will not go back neither will I spare neither will I repent If a People will not be healed and saved they must be they shall be destroyed O that we understood how much we are concerned to discern know and improve the present time lest the Harvest should be past and the Summer ended and the things of our peace of our temporal spiritual and eternal welfare should be hidden from our eyes 3. That we do wait earnestly upon God in an extraordinary way of Humiliation and Supplication under the Administration of his Word and Worship for the dispensation of his Spirit and of Converting Grace No hope no possibility of the Resurrection of Religion otherwise than by such a dispensation of the Spirit and Grace of God until God shall pour out his Spirit from on High Isai 32.15 Vntil the Spirit be poured upon us from on High and the Wilderness be a fruitful Field that De structions and Desolations were to remain upon them until God should work a general work of Conversion and the Resurrection of Religion thereby They were to remain dead and buried in their Graves until God should accomplish that great Fundam ental Covenant Promise Ezek. 36.26 27. A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will put my Spirit within you So Ezek. 37.13 14. When I have opened your Graves and brought you up out of your Graves and shall put my Spirit in you and ye shall live Therefore it is high time for us to seek the Lord until he rain Righteousness Hos 10.12 Of if God shall please to pour out his Spirit upon our Seed and his Blessing upon our Off-spring then there will be a glorious Resurrection of Religion with the rising Generation They shall spring up as amongst the Grass and as Willows by the Water-courses Isai 44.34 O that we could approve our selves an Humble Penitential Prayerful People prepared for such a dispensation of the Spirit and waiting upon God under the promise of it 4. That we strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die This is our Lord Jesus his Direction in terms Rev. 3.2 keep alive and cherish that of the life of Religion which is left the remains of it O Christians let dying Religion have a Reviving and a Resurrection in your hearts and lives live it up to life again there is there can be nothing more of the life of Religion kept in the World than what is preserved and upheld in the heart of a few and they are comparatively but a very few living and lively Christians there never hath been nor ever is but a little of Religion in the life spirit and power of it in this lower World it is a very choice rare thing in the best of times but there is never less of it than when sincere Christians are fallen into a frame and way of Declension nothing more deadly to Religion than the declension of Christians which strikes at the very heart and life of it so much the more should you labour to rise to the utmost height of attainment in Grace and Holiness even unto a conspicuous eminency therein that Religion may not only live but shine in all your Converses throughout your whole Conversations that you may shine as Lights in the World Phil. 2.15 16. Christians if you do not thus revive and raise Religion in your hearts and lives before you die you may not expect that it will long survive you though Religion cannot die so long as you live yet if you suffer Religion to live a dying Life in you you may fear that though it cannot die in you it may notwithstanding die with you 5. That we set our hearts unto and upon Religion Make it our highest our dearest even our heart-interest our whole our all as to Interest and Injoyment in this World that which we live for that which we live by that which is our Life viz. because it is that whereby we live to with and upon God in Christ let our Souls therefore be drawn forth after and ingaged unto Religion in esteem love zeal desire delight that our minds may be so exercised unto the Doctrinal Practical and experimental Knowledge of it as that we may be raised to real spiritual discoveries and apprehensions of the excellency glory and perfection of it with a transcendency above all the glories and perfections of this lower World That we may account all Worldly Interests and Injoyments but loss for the excellency of the Knowledge of it as the Holy Apostle did Phil. 3.8 And may by Faith also apprehend our own Interest in it with most certain assurance that it is ours our own and that nothing is so or so much ours our own as our Religion that is our God our Christ and our Religion as it is and because it is our life O if we could thus devote our selves to Religion become true real Votaries to Religion Religion would then revive and live 6. That we set our selves in whatsoever we have are or can do in a full and direct Subserviency to the Propagation and advancement of Religion Lay out our selves improve all time strength and gifts grace and estate power Authority interest influence unto our utmost capacity and possibility for Religion and that with utmost Care Conscience Zeal Courage Faithfulness in a way of stedfast perseverance through all incounters and conflicts to the last making of it our main design our whole work and business in all our transactions both with God and Man That we therefore labour servently and instantly with God in Prayer That for Zions sake we do not hold our peace and for Jerusalems sake we do not rest that we never hold our peace day nor night give him no rest until he establish and make Jerusalem a praise in the Earth Isai 62.1 6 7. That we henceforth transact with God and one with another with religious sincerity in truth and faithfulness in and about that great and most important business of Reformation in suppressing all the great and general Sins and performing the great and general Duties of the times that we trifle dissemble falsifie no more therein as heretofore we have too much done and as the People of old did to their own ruin and destruction Jer. 3.10 Nothing hastned their utter defection and destruction more than their formal hypocritical Reformations That we also labour to retrieve and raise the visible Interest of Religion and advance it above the head of our chief joy Psal 137.6 That we do cleave by an Heart-Engagement to the Word Worship Ordinances Administrations Ministry Order Rule and Government of Christ in his Church to the whole Cause Interest and Kingdom of Christ That we keep the Word of his Patience and do not deny His Name but hold fast that which we
confounding shame and scandal unto this Generation of New-England Christians before the World If having had Religion transmitted to us by our Fathers who through the grace of God upheld it in so much of the power and purity of it while they lived and being still priviledged with all Religious interests and injoyments as the highest advantages and incouragements to preserve the life of Religion we should notwithstanding through our carelessness slothfulness unfaithfulness suffer to decay languish and dye away yea and by our own declensions therein give it a mortal wound Surely if Religion die Christians will in this respect be more inexcusably guilty of the death of it than others O let this be considered and laid to heart The general Exhortation speaks also to Churches as such Religion in the most proper sence of the Text and Doctrine is most properly the life of Churches it is that which gives them being and which is the great end of their being God hath constituted Churches both by Religion and for Religion therefore it is the great design and ought to be the great work of Churches to propagate and preserve the life of it that is recovering and maintaining Holiness Purity in Ecclesiastical constitution union communion administrations both of Doctrine and Worship by religious fear reverence sincerity and solemnity in all Religious Assemblies Attendancies Performances and Churches transactions in the Name of Christ by Zeal Courage Faithfulness in the whole work of Christ and in the management of all the Affairs and the whole interest of Religion Let him that hath an ear hear what the spirit saith to the Churches The Exhortation speaketh also unto Families Parents Masters Heads of Families to move you to keep Religion alive in your Families by being truly Religious your selves in all your Family converses by training up your Children and Servants Religiously unto and for Religion by exercising and upholding the Worship of God in all the wayes of it and in the Life Spirit and Power of it in your Families hereby Religion shall live in Families Thus Abram Gen. 18 19. I know him that he will command his Children and Houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord. The Exhortation speaketh to all who are the Children of the Covenant and of the Promise though you may at present have no saving Knowledge and Experience of or Interest in Religion and therefore no hearts ingagement to it or hearty care or concernment for it but are in your present state and way Enemies unto it Yet O Remember that Religion is your life also you have been born and bred up under the visible dispensation of the Covenant and Kingdom of God in the House of God for Beligion and therefore if you have any care of your Souls or hope of Salvation if you would not be cast off for ever as a Reprobate Generation a Generation of Gods wrath O apply your selves to Religion approve your selves Religions labour by all means to make Religion your own in a saving work of Conversion prepare your selves to undertake and uphold a pure and sincere Profession and Practice of it that you may not only keep it your selves but transmit it to succeeding Generations then Religion shall be your life also Then the Lord your God will be with you as he was with your Fathers he will not leave you nor forsake you 1 King 8.57 And now O that all who do understand and believe any thing either concerning God or their own Souls concerning good or evil life or death Heaven or Hell may at lest so far take notice of and bare this Exhortation as to suffer themselves to be moved thereby no more to slight or set light by Religion but to have high and appreciating thoughts of Religion most seriously and solemnly to consider of the eternal concernment of your own immortal Souls therein in the Being Life and Continuance of it as that whereby you may live spiritually live eternally and without which you will most certainly perish inevitably utterly and everlastingly May we not ought we not all in the conclusion to reinforce this Exhortation upon our Souls by that vehement contestation whereby Moses doth in a most solemn and awful manner as it were conjure that People unto Faith and Obedience Deut. 30.19 I call Heaven and Earth to Record against you this day that I have set before you life and death blessing and cursing therefore chuse life that both thou and thy Seed may live that thou love the Lord thy God and obey his voice and cleave to him for he is thy life When God doth thus set life and death before his Covenant People and put them to their full Trial as to final choice O then it is their most important Duty and Interest to chuse life that both they and their Seed may live May we not with fear and trembling apprehend our selves even these Churches and this whole People New-England as it were standing before God upon our great Trial for Life and Death O that we understood that the great case of Life and Death is now depending between God and New-England what reason have we to take heed as for our lives how we approve our selves upon this great trial that God hath set Life and Death before us all the World is witness Heaven Earth may be called to record against us that he hath done it God hath set Life before us by setting the whole way of Life before us his Law his Gospel his Covenant his Kingdom all both Temporal Spiritual and Eternal good he hath set Religion before us and exhibited himself unto us through his Son as our life God hath also set Death and Cursing before us by setting all our whole way of Sin and Apostasie before us the whole way of Death and Destruction which we have been walking in as also by setting both Temporal and Eternal Judgement before us in those Threatnings which have been denounced against us This proposal of Life and Death hath been made in an extraordinary way and manner by the concurrent voice and cry of the Ministry more especially by such of the Servants of God whom he had made eminently able and faithful who have finished their Testimony and are removed God hath also made this Discovery and Proposal of Life and Death general to all Sorts Orders and Degrees to all the Churches to all the People in all the Congregations and God continueth thus to set Life and Death before us by all seasons and opportunities but more plainly expresly fully and generally upon such occasions and in such General Assemblies as these and that with extraordinary Solemnity It hath been Gods great work of late to set Life and Death Blessing and Cursing before us by the Ministry of his Word and he is so doing unto this day wherein God is yet in infinite Mercy crying unto us Chuse life that both you and your Seed may live By this Word God is once more calling
have which was the Commendation and Direction given to the Church of Philadelphia Rev. 3.8 10 11. If thus we live and labour for Religion then Religion will revive and live 7. That we stir up our selves to take hold of God who hath hid his face from us that is to recover and retain the presence of God the grace and favour of God If we suffer God to depart Religion will die If God depart the Glory will be removed but if God return Religion will live for God is our life Deut. 30.20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God that thou mayest obey his voice and that thou mayest cleave to him for he is thy life O if all those who have a real interest in God and who have power with God would stir up themselves and set themselves by Faith in Prayer to take hold upon him we might we should certainly prevail with him to return to us to abide and continue with us as our God and Saviour for he delights to return and meet his People in such a way Isai 64.5 Thou meetest him that rejoyceth and worketh righteousness those that remember thee in thy wayes behold thou art wroth for we have sinned in those is continuance and we shall be saved Our returning unto God and Gods returning unto us will infer a blessed Resurrection of Religion That we may labour effectually in all these wayes to recover and preserve the life of Religion It is necessary 1. That we do and perform all with Mourning and deep Humiliation Mourning for and over our selves mourning for and over sinners mourning over our Families mourning over our Churches mourning over the rising Generations and over this whole People mourning under the sense of our own Sins and the Sins of others all the Sins of the times mourning under the sense of the dying state of Religion mourning under the sense of Gods displeasure of his departure and the woful effects of both mourning after God after the Lord Jesus Christ after the returns of his presence after his pardoning purging reconciling saving grace and mercy and all the effects thereof O that we could do all that we have to do even our whole work mourning in a frame and way of mourning with a spirit of mourning To that end we should set our selves apart retire our selves unto mourning as that mourning Prophet did Jer. 9.1 2. Oh that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day night Oh that I had in the Wilderness the lodging-place of a way-faring man that I might leave my People go from them Mourn alone in secret places Jer. 13.17 My soul shall weep in secret places We should be mourning and alwayes without ceasing without intermission Jer. 14.17 Let mine eyes run down with tears night and day let them not cease Lam. 3.49 Mine eye trickleth down and ceaseth not without intermission Mourning with a deep and bitter mourning and lamentation sighing and crying bitterly unto the breaking of our loyns Ezek. 9.4 Set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry Ezek 21.6 Sigh therefore thou Son of man with the breaking of thy loyns and with bitterness sigh before their eyes With an inward spiritual mourning with contrition humiliation and much soul-affliction admitting no comfort no common or carnal comfort Isai 22.4 Look away from me I will weep bitterly labour not to comfort me Mourning in a way of Prayer and Supplication Pray and Mourn and Mourn and Pray So Nehemiah he wept and mourned fasted and prayed Neh. 1.4 So Daniel Dan. 9.3 We must Sigh and Cry sighing and crying to God is the true voice of mourning and of mourners Our Prayers must be the voice of weeping Psal 6.8 9. The Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping we must mourn unto God So Nehemiah wept and mourned before the God of Heaven Nehem. 1.4 So bemoan our selves to him in our mourning that he may earnestly remember us still and that his bowels may be troubled for us and his compassions moved towards us Jer. 31.18 20. So mourn unto him as that our tears may drop into his Bottle and be written in his Book Psal 56.8 We must follow God mourning seek him mourning turn unto him mourning Jer. 31.9 They shall come with weeping and with supplication will I lead them Observe this is the way wherein God promiseth to revive his People and to raise them up by a Resurrection of Religion out of their deepest defection Jere. 50.4 In those dayes and at the time saith the Lord the Children of Israel shall come they and the Children of Judah together going and weeping as they go they shall seek the Lord their God they shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward Such a Mourning is the certain effect of the saving dispensation of the Spirit and converting Grace and is the only way of turning to God in a saving work of Conversion and reformation Zech. 12.10 11 12. And I will pour out upon the house of David and upon the Inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of Grace and Supplication and they shall mourn in that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem And the Land shall mourn every Family apart c. Without such mourning there is no hope or possibility of any deliverance or salvation either from sin or judgement if we will not mourn we shall perish in our Apostasie Ezek. 24.23 Ye shall not mourn nor weep but you shall pine away for your iniquities it is most fearfully signal to a People when God leaves a People without a spirit of mourning and takes away his Mourners Jer. 16.5 Thus saith the Lord enter not into the house of mourning neither go to lament or bemone them for I have taken away my peace from this People saith the Lord even loving-kindness and mercys O if God shall please to frame us to such a mourning then he will most certainly save us from our Sin and Apostasie and turn us unto himself then he will prepare dispose and spirit us unto all his work we shall go on and go through with the work of God which now we can do nothing in when we come to labour in it mourning God will do all by his Mourners Isai 57.18 I have seen his way and I will heal him I will restore comfort to him and his Mourners O that we could mourn after this spirit of Mourners God is speaking mournfully to us by his Word he is mourning to us by his Ministry Mat. 11.7 God sets matter and cause of Mourning before us the wayes and works of God towards us call for Mourning Our Land begins to mourn under the sins of the times God is many wayes calling to weeping and mourning and baldness and girding Sack-cloth Isai 22.12 O that sincere Christians who have through Grace received the spirit and principle of mourning would stirr up themselves thereunto and beg this Grace of God it is your
Calling as Christians to mourn to be Gods mourners Sions Mourners O how much might you do for God and these Churches in this frame and way of mourning More especially if those of the Servants of God who are betrusted with the work of God and the publick weal of the People and these Churches were such Mourners and did labour in their work mourning Ezra Nehemiah were great Mourners and the work of the Lord prospered in their hands whilest they carried it on mourning Nehem. 1.4 Ezra 10.1 6. Joel 2.17 Let the Priests the Lords Ministers weep between the Porch and the Altar and say spare thy People O Lord Then the Lord will be jealous for his Land and pity his People 2. We must do what we do for the recovery and preservation of the life of Religion believing and obeying the Word of God I mean the Word of God as it hath been Preached and Delivered unto us by his Servants in the Ministry Those particular and extraordinary Messages which God hath sent to us by his Messengers those full and general Testimonies which God hath given by them against all the Sins of the times and unto all the duties of the times amplified in the delivery of them from the Word of God by so many solemn Words for Conversion whereby God hath charged us plainly expresly and fully with all our Sin and Apostasie judged and condemned us for it declared and denounced wrath and judgement against us in case of impenitency Yet withal most graciously calling of us unto Repentance and Reformation by many general Instructions Exhortations Directions Motives and Arguments proposed and pressed by Promises and Threatnings applied with much instancy and importunity and set home in the Application of them with very severe Admonitions and Warnings for our awakening Yea God hath made Application of his Word unto us in an extraordinary way and manner viz. In that great Ordinance wherein our Lord Jesus Christ was extraordinarily present to discover and to declare the summ of all that hath been spoken to us by the Ministry And whereby all the Churches have declared their conviction and published their confession and acknowledgement thereof Thus God hath spoken to us all that can be spoken suitable and proper to our state and condition we cannot tell what God can say more to us by the Ministry of his Word than he hath done but alas we have not hearkened nor believed nor obeyed those words of the Lord which have been sent unto us so that God may justly complain of us as of them Jer. 7.25 26. Since the day that your Fathers came out of the Land of Egypt unto this day I have even sent unto you all my Servants the Prophets daily rising early and sending them yet they hearkened not unto me nor incleaned their ear and this God chargeth upon them every where as the great cause both of their utter defection from Religion and of their Destruction viz. because they would not hearken unto the Words of the Lord So 2 Chron. 36.16 Jer. 25.8 4. 35.15 Zech. 7.12 13. Yea God tells them plainly after their return from Captivity that it would never be well with them until they had hearkened unto the words of the former Prophets Zech. 7.7 Religion was never revived and raised they were never able to do any thing effectually in the work of Reformation neither did God work savingly for them by his Spirit until they had so done Neither may we expect any recovery of Religion or Salvation from Sin and Apostasie until we have hearkened to that is believed and obeyed that word Those Words of the Lord which he sent to us and which he is still sending unto us by his Servants And therefore O that Unconverted ones would hearken to the Words of the Lord which he hath sent to them for their awakening conviction humiliation and conversion believe and obey the Gospel that the work of Conversion might have a general and prosperous progress then Religion would revive and live And that those who are the sincere People of God would also hearken to the Word of the Lord which hath been spoken unto you to awaken and convince you to bring you to an humbling sight and sense of your own Sins and of the Sins of the times and of the wrath of God against your selves and against this People and these Churches as also to move and stir you up to quicken and strengthen you unto duty the duty of the times the work of Christs Churches you see all the general Sins and evils of the times growing and prevailing you see Religion decaying and dying You see this People and these Churches sinking and in great danger of perishing in this defection and apostasie you hear God threatning dreadfully and have seen his hand lifted up to Execution and you sit still do nothing are able to do nothing you are unable weak and feeble as other men unto and in the work of Reformation you fail utterly in all your essays to it and the reason is because you do not hear and obey the Word of God Believe it Christians you will never be able to exercise your Faith Hope or Confidence in God or to pray to God in good earnest you will never be able to ingage your hearts in the work of Reformation you will never find your selves quickened sanctified and strengthened thereunto and assisted therein until you have obeyed and subjected your very souls to the Word of God and so do ingage and labour in his work under the power of his Word there are none fit to intermeddle in Religious Reformation but those who tremble at the Word of God Ezra 9.4 Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the Word of the Lord Ezra 10.3 Now therefore let us make a Covenant with our God according to the counsel of my Lord and of those that tremble at the Commandment of God O Christians did you but once tremble at the Word of God you would find your Souls wonderfully raised in love zeal and courage unto and for his work more especially such of the Servants of the Lord who have any peculiar betrustments for others and for the Publick are more than others concerned to subject their Souls to the power of the Word of God Then they will find themselves extraordinarily spirited to their work and assisted by the Spirit of God Then they would prosper in their work Ezra 6.14 And the Elders of the Jews builded and prospered through the Prophesying of Haggai the Prophet and Zechariah Hag. 1.12 Then Zerubbabel and Joshua obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the words of Haggai the Prophet Ver. 14. And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel c. O that we generally and fully understood how much we are concerned thus to hearken to the Word of God God hath magnified his Word to New-England he hath wrought powerfully and gloriously for this People by his Word as for
the dangerous state of this People and of these Churches thereby will admit of no further delay God is hastening in his way and work Zeph. 1.14 The day of the Lord is near it hasteth greatly Christ hath threatned to come against us quickly except we repent and do the first works quickly Rev 2.5 16. In such a case a People must be quick Numb 16.46 47. And Moses said unto Aaron take a Censer and go quickly to the Congregation and make an Attonement for them and Aaron took as Moses commanded him and ran O it was well for the poor People of Israel in that instant of their extream and distressing danger that Moses and Aaron who had the care and charge of their publick Weal were so quick in doing what was to be done for their publick safety and salvation Wherefore Let the general Exhortation be humbly proposed to the Servants of God in the Magistracy Much Honoured It doth in the Name of the Lord by the Word of the Lord in most solemn manner bespeak your utmost help and your very hearts and souls therein for the recovery and preservation of the life of dying Religion It is your greatest Honour that you are betrusted with so much of the care and charge of Religion in the civil concerns of it It will be both your and our Happiness if God shall make you instrumental Saviours of the life of Religion and so of the life of this People and these Churches It is your highest work and although the heaviest yet the happiest part thereof wherein you serve and subserve more directly to the honour and glory of God and highest good of his People and which being fully and faithfully performed will turn to your highest account in the day of Account and add much weight and splendor unto your Crown of glory The General Exhortation It is also proposed to the Servants of Christ in the Ministry the whole Order and Office work of the Ministry it is Religious Ordained by Christ as the great Ordinance for the Ministerial Exercise of his Power for the propagation and preservation of the life of Religion by the progress of the work of Conversion and Edification among men and that in a more direct subordinacy to himself and subserviency to his Name and Glory in the World who is himself the Shepherd and Bishop of Souls it is cause of deep Humiliation unto his Servants that they have been called forth to labour under the sinking discouragement of the decaying state of Religion that Religion should be dying under their hand and they lament lest they should be called to minister under that woful commission given to the Prophet Isai 6.10 Go tell this People hear ye indeed but understand not Make the heart of the People fat lest their Ministry should in just judgment be made penal and judicial and so become a savour of death unto death and so that they should Preach Religion to Death and Preach this People to death Hos 6.5 Therefore I have hewed them by the Prophets and slain them by the words of my mouth The fearful apprehensions of such a danger may move them to labour though lamenting as Gods Servants of old yet with so much the more care love zeal even unto the spending and consumption of their very souls by fervency instancy and constancy in all their prayers and soul-labours throughout their whole work more especially in travelling in birth with Souls until Christ be formed in them until they are born and brought forth to God in a saving work of Regeneration which will be the most certain way and means unto a general Resurrection of Religion in these Churches O how should they then make full proof of their Ministry and approve themselves throughly in their life in their labour in all their ministrations in their whole ministerial Conversations as those who are more than any other Order of Men in the World directly charged and betrusted yea set for the life of Religion and the salvation of Souls The Exhortation it is further proposed as in our Text and Context unto all Israel and Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel It was his final farewel Exhortation to all the whole Covenant People of God The People of these Churches both the passing standing and rising Generations are all the visible Covenant people of God and therefore Religion it is our life we ought generally to care labour pray cry to God for the recovery preservation and continuance of it as for our life You who are sincere Christians are here again moved by this Exhortation not only as before to keep Religion alive in your own hearts but also to discharge your selves fully and faithfully in whatsoever duty or service you may can or ought to labour for the general Resurrection of Religion in these Churches More especially wherein you may be any of you betrusted with any of the concerns of it either Civil or Ecclesiastical Truly Christians the great incumbency the burthen of the work it is upon you the work it is most properly yours Because Religion it is peculiarly yours you are under the most sacred and indispensible obligations both unto God and one unto another to uphold it it is the most general duty of that high holy and heavenly Calling wherewith you are called to be Saints and wherein you are to approve your selves eminently the Servants of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ for the defence and advancement of his Cause Interest Kingdome Name and Glory wherein we shall live and dye as Saints obtaining those glorious promises which Christ made to those who laboured faithfully for the recovery of Religion in those declining Churches of Asia Rev. 2.7 To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the middest of the Paradise of God and ver 10. And I will give thee a Crown of life ver 17. To him that overcometh I will give to eat of the hidden Manna and will give him a white stone and in the stone a new Name which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it Rev. 3.5 He that overcometh the same shall be cloathed in white Raiment Ver. 12. Him that overcometh will I make a Pillar in the Temple of my God Ver. 21. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me on my Throne c. that is in Heaven O what exceeding great and precious Promises hath our Lord Jesus made for the incouragement of those who are his Sincere Servants to labour to uphold Religion in declining times and Churches we believe and are upon good grounds perswaded that there are many that there are enough Sincere Christians yet remaining in these Churches to do and perform whatsoever is necessary for the recovery and preservation of Religion and that if you would do what you might and ought Religion would not die but live and flourish with much spiritual prosperity Will it not then be a