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A34429 An exhortation to firmness and constancy in true religion in a sermon preached at St. Mary Islington, Feb. 2, 1689/90 / by Shadrach Cooke ... Cooke, Shadrach, 1655?-1724? 1689 (1689) Wing C6037; ESTC R20683 19,785 32

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greatest he could use And which he hoped might prevail even upon our Saviour himself For he sheweth him all the Kingdoms of the Earth and the Glory of them And saith unto him all these Things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me Now what could not prevail upon him is God knows too powerful with many of us who either through the Ambition of our Spirits or the Necessity of Nature are by our secular Interest too often carried beyond the bounds of our Duties and hereby made complyant to Unjust and Dishonourable Practices And may not the Apostle seem to have reference to the worst Consequences this way in the 2 Pet. 2. There shall be false Preachers amongst you who privily shall bring in damnable Heresies And through Covetousness shall they with feigned Words make Merchandise of you But now we may the less wonder at that unhappy influence which this Vice hath over Faith and a good Conscience when we remember that Covetousness or the Love of Secular Gain and Interest did make Christ's own Disciple shamefully forsake him and basely betray him to his most Malicious Persecutors and Murtherers One of the Twelve called Judas Iscariot went unto the Chief Priest and said unto them What will ye give me and I will deliver him unto you and they covenanted with him for Thirty pieces of Silver Matth. 26.15 And if the value of about Three Pound Fifteen Shillings could prompt a Disciple to this horrid Treachery we may be apt to suspect at least that a more additional Temptation this way may have too much prevalency upon mean and sordid Spirits Wherefore Love not the World neither the things that are in the World If any Man Love the World the Love of the Father is not in him 1 John 2.15 So powerful are the things here below to keep or to withdraw Men from a hearty Love and Regard of God and Religion The Third and Last thing prevalent to this most fatal Evil and Impiety is The Fear or Danger of present Sufferings A Life of Ease Pleasure and Plenty is grateful to all Men whereupon many do readily imbrace the smooth side of Religion But Suffering and Persecution are things contrary to Flesh and Blood and are indeed severe and terrible Tryals such as will even shake the most steady and resolute Christian Wherefore to speak with the Apostle in this Case also Who is sufficient for these things And whatever Men may now think or talk of it at a distance yet if ever God should call us to this fiery Tryal it will require a most steady Faith together with extraordinary assistance of the Divine Spirit to carry us through such extreme Hardship and Difficulty Peter who was so constant with our Saviour and who was withal so brisk plain and generous in his Profession of Christ and so resolved as nothing could be more And who its reasonable to think was in his own Judgment firm and immoveable was yet we know strangely surprised and utterly confounded when it came to the pinch insomuch that hardly ever Man was guilty of such a base and sudden Revolt He found when Danger was very near and threatning quite different Judgments and Apprehensions of things then when he considered it only at a distance as will be the case of every Man whom God calls to this most severe and difficult Duty There are great and unavoidable Prejudices and Reluctances in human Nature against Torments or Sufferings and very strange Perplexities and Misgivings of Mind in that great Change from this to another World Besides there must needs be unconceiveable Convulsions arise in us from our Injury or Loss in those things that are instrumental to our present Ease and Comforts and therefore our Saviour might well put that Question Are ye able to drink of the Cup that I shall drink of and to be haptized with the Baptism that I am Baptized Matth. 20.22 This he tells us shall be the Portion of some but upon this Rock very many have made Shipwrack of Faith and a good Conscience having proved the greatest cause of Mens being Ashamed of Christ and his Words in an Adulterous and Sinful Generation Having thus considered what that is which our Saviour here warns us against by our being Ashamed of Christ and his Words And Secondly What are or may be the Temptations thereunto I proceed to consider in the Third place The great Guilt or Aggravation hereof which will largely appear to us from the Consideration of these following Particulars 1. Thus to be Ashamed of Christ and his Words is the greatest Disservice and Scandal to Religion For if we consider the Expression according to a meer literal acceptation That is ever more looked upon as most Base and Scandalous which Men are loth or ashamed to own or acknowledge Certain it is That a Disowning or Dissertion of Christ and his Religion in whatever way or kind we do it is an open Declaration to the World of our great dislike thereof a plain Repentance of what we have professed and as it were Advice or Precaution to others against all future concern or regard for God and Religion The Actions of such a Man do seem to speak the Sense of his Mind after this or the like manner All the whole business of Religion is meer Noise Cheat or Imposture And whatever Men talk or say about it is all vain and insignificant Why should we wait on the Lord any longer It is in vain to serve God and what profit is it that we have kept his Ordinance Therefore they say unto God depart from us for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways What is the Almighty that we should serve him And what profit should we have if we pray unto him In short That Religion is not worth the Owning which a Man cannot Suffer Bleed and Dye for 2. And this brings us to a Second Aggravation thereof That it is the highest Indignity or Dishonour to God Such is imply'd in the very Expression for it Whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my Words So that to be thus guilty is to assront God and is a perfect and open Defiance to Heaven it self for 't is the peculiar and immediate Cause of God who is the Author of Religion for whose sake and on whose account this is Instituted and Enjoyn'd us So that thus basely to desert or any wise to forsake or deny him is not only a withdrawing our Fealty and Allegiance from him but the setting up a profess'd Hostility and Rebellion against him and a down-right Declaration that we will not have Him to reign over us In a Word This is the greatest Obstinacy the most daring Provocation the highest Treachery that a mortal Creature can be guilty of against the most gracious and almighty Being of God and carries every thing in it that may render it exceeding Sinful 3. Another great Aggravation hereof is That it is contrary to the Sentiments of our