so that as he hath right by Creation and continual preservation of all his Creatures to govern them as he pleases so his understanding being infinite his will just and his power almighty his government in all he doth must needs be most excellently perfect But who hath known the mind of the Lord or been his counceller and acquainted with his secrets for which reason we should with the Apostle humbly adore them and not vainly enquire after them presumptuously prying into those things which belong not to us O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom aed knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his Judgments and his ways past finding out Rom. 11.33 34. But thô we must not be curious to know what we ought not we must not be careless to know what we ought Scripture frequently requiring us to observe God's dealings incouraging us thereto and condemning the neglect thereof Let us therefore proceed more particularly and for the understanding these riddles of Gods Providence plow with his Heifer the Sacred Scriptures wherin we have a multitude of examples for our instruction and rules also for our direction that we may wisely consider his doings as we are commanded These kinds and manner of Death are considerable in reference to God the persons that Die and the Living that survive As they come from God so they are in themselves Punishments for the breach of his law but very different in their causes and effects according to the diversity of the subjects they are inflicted upon or that are therein concern'd which we must carefully regard lest we dangerously mistake For which end we must consider I. That as all God's glorious Attributes whereby he is pleased to display himselfe are equally in him so those that relate to his government are alwayes jointly though unequally exercised in his works in this world even those that to us seem most opposite as his Mercy and Justice which are singly exercised in the world to come Even the Devils have some Mercy and Patiance mixt with Justice at present being reserved in chains as malefactors unto Judgement for greater Punishments who yet feel so great that they believe and tremble for fear of their future Jude 6. James 2 19. And in the greatest severity towards Men God in wrath remembers some Mercy even to the worst that he suddenly destroys besides the remnant that he saves in warning them before delaying till their iniquities be full and mittigating their Punishment in taking them away none suffering to the utmost here nor none so much hereafter as they should had they lived longer ' to treasure up more Sins against the day of Wrath as the old World Sodom and Gomorrah the Amorites Amalakites and many others But though Justice be very apparently the chief reason of some Punishments especially those extraordinary commonly called Judgements and such as are general yet for the most part especially in particular and ordinary cases God hath many other reasons and greater than that we imagine some of which though unkown at present are yet well known afterwards If not here to be sure hereafter when we shall see a distinct exercise of those Attributes that here are mixt so that there will be no Atheists or Unbelievers of Gods Justice in Hell nor no mistakes of Gods Judgment and Mercies in Heaven In the mean time from this manifold Wisdom of God and the mixture of causes joyntly acting in this Life we may see the fundamental ground of our mistaking Gods dealings with us here and learn to take heed that we separate not those reasons which appears not to us from those which seem most apparent and so divide where we should only distinguish which often arises from our narrow conceptions of the great and holy God and his ways judging of him too often by our selves thô he hath told us that his thoughts and ways are not ours but as the Heavens are higher than the Earth so are his thoughts and ways higher than ours in Pardoning the Penitent which is the choicest of Mercies however they be otherwise dealt with in this World Isa 55.7 8 9. So that though we must take notice of Gods Justice in all Punishments acknowledging our Sins to have deserved greater yet not only and as separate from his goodness and Mercy which may be greater therein for any thing we know though not so manifest at present lest we mistake the Righteouss God in these his judicial dispensations Lam. 3 18-26 In the next place let 's consider the dieing Persons themselves and they are either Righteouss or Wicked there being no middle state and consequently their Death is an entrance into their future Happiness or Misery Now in regard we cannot judge of the Spiritual and Eternal condition of those that die suddenly but by their lives ' for us to conclude either way of them as is too customary from the manner of Death seeing all these externals fall alike to all is great uncharitableness on the one hand or gross presumption on the other To be sure if they belong to God it is more in Mercy to them than in Justice as in freeing them from the fear of Death that King of Terrors as Job calls it or future backslidings and loss of God's Favour which is worse to God's People than Death it self his loving kindness to them being better than Life or taking them away from the evil to come and many other ways unknown to us And is more eligible to those prepared then a lingring in regard of its end and for a greater good as the sudden cutting off an Arm or a Leg to save the Life so that the Apostle groand earnestly desiring it not for that he would be unclothed or desired only to die but for its consequents to be clothed upon that Mortality might be swallowed up of Life 2 Cor. 5. v. 4 Though to the wicked or unprepared this circumstance is a sad aggravation as I suggested before and the best of God's Servants in the want of Assurance cry with David to God O spare me that I may recover strength before I go hence yet to them there is more fear than danger their great and blessed Physitian so mixing the poyson of Death with stronger ingredients that sometimes are cordials to comfort them and always means to cure them perfectly of all their and Sins Miseries so that Death in general of what kind soever is reckoned amongst the privilidges of Believers in subordination to their future Glory 1. Cor 3.22 As to the surviving the Death of Relations and Friends in what manner soever is to be accounted an Afflilction in the general but very different many ways according to the qualifications of the Dead and Living their nearness in Relation dearness in Affection kindness and other circumstances aggravating or extenuating the loss and according to their future use both as to Temporal and Spiritual good and their being Sanctified accordingly or otherwise not improved But herein we must
THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD In sudden Death ordinary and extraordinary vindicated and improved In a funeral SERMON for Mrs. MARY REVE Wife to Mr. NICHOLAS REVE Merchant First preached to the English Church in ROTTERDAM January 14. 1685. and since enlarged By JOSEPH HILL B. D. At ROTTERDAM Printed by REINIER LEERS M.DC.LXXXV TO RICHARD HUNTINGTON Esquire SIR THis Sormon which I preached for your daughter's sake ' out of my respects to her and supposal of this office for her had she died with you I now send you enlarged and printed Not for any sollicitations which is the usual modest excuse although I wanted not these from som Gentlewomen in her late condition but because I have not seen this subject notwithstanding the many occasions thereof handled by any thô it may be by some and I not know it And especially because God's providence which is as the soul in the worlds body ruling and acting all things in it is frequently misunderstood by many Some not only complaining when their exspectations are crost as Cato did of its darknes and obscurity and saying with Brutus that vertue is but nomen inane an empty name when they see such things befal the vertuous but are even ready with Epicurus to deny it altogether because of its seeming irregularity Others reading the many temporal promises in the Old Testament mostly relating to the Jews and some to particular persons as David or such places of Scripture as Psalm 91 are apt to judge providence to be so far from fulfilling the word that it is contrary to it and being not able to reconcile them are greatly staggerd and perplext I have therfore cast in my mite of endeavors to reconcile God's word with his works in this one branch of sudden death for satisfaction therein and from that ordinary in the Text and example taken occasion since to treat of most of those extraordinary in Scripture for the better illustrating thereof and this kind of providence both in general and particular in infants as wel as aged by reason of the litle one we have also lost The blessing of heaven accompany it for good to those that peruse it that God may have the glory of his truth and faithfulnes in his word and of equity and righteousnes in his works For your selfe Sir I am sensible what a ful and home blow God hath reacht you in cutting down tree and fruit together the loss of such a daughter with a grandson is great but it is the will of your heavenly Father to which I hope you have learnt to submit You might perhaps have been better satisfyed if she had died by you rather than at this distance but thô Rebekah like she left her native country and Father's house yet not God's nor without his especial providence who sets the solitary in families and fixes the bounds of our habitations And here she liv'd beloved and died lamented and thô she is buried in the dust yet not in oblivion all which to her is indeed fruitles yet may somwhat alleviate your sorrow that she was amongst those that valewd her worth That this sharp affliction may be sanctified so that you may make the best improvement thereof and that the blessed Spirit which is stiled the Comforter may comfort you and all concernd therein is the prayer of SIR Your Servant in the Lord. J. H. GOD'S PROVIDENCE in sudden death vindicated and improved GENESIS xxxv vers 19. And Rachel died and was buried in the way to Ephrath which is Bethlehem IAcob's life as most of God's eminent servants was made up of providences all in checquer-checquer-work being a mixture of mercies and miseries for the most part successively and some times joyntly throughout his pilgrimage And is more particularly described than any of the saints of God in Scripture he being the root of the future Church which God more regards then all the great Kingdoms of the world that are therfore past over in silence whilst poore Jacob with his staf and travels family and flocks remaine upon record to all generations That as Abraham and Isaac so he especially might be a patterne to his posterity whose servitude sufferings and increase in Egypt resembled his in Syria their being pursued at their coming thence with all their litle ones and great riches his by Laban and their passage to and abode in Canaan and after going into captivity his in many things and going in 's old age into Egypt But not to them only being now written for the instruction of us Gentiles allso on whom the ends of the world are come and is as all particular histories most profitable for all thô generall may be more pleasing to many Rom. 15 4. 1 Cor. 10 11. Let us therfore view a little the variety of God's dealings with this blessed Patriarch that in this Chapter lead to the text Wherby we may see how God freed him from his fears that he and all his should be destroyd by calling him to Bethel discouraging his enimies and bringing him safely thither to pay his vows which the good man had too long neglected v. 1-7 But thô this removal from his owne dwelling to God's house made a comfortable change yet he soon meets with an alteration for Deborah a grave and picus matron his mothers nurse and his deare friend dies there and is buried with great lamentation v. 8. Which the God of all consolations who usually knits his comforts to his people's crosses lets him not long proceed in but cloths him afresh with the garments of praise by appearing to him againe changing his name from Jacob to Israel and making great promises to him and his seed v. 9-15 But this glorious day of grace is followed with a very dark night of providence in the death of his most beloved Rachel which yet was not without the appearance of a bright star in the firmament of the Church by the birth of a 12th Patriarch his mothers Benoni but his fathers Benjamin From all which we may gather There 's no exspecting constant prosperity for Gods people on earth mercies without miseries are reserved for heaven Being now come to the paragraf of Rachels death which I have chosen as suitable to our Sister 's departed let none stop me with her father's speech to Jacob concerning her It must not be so done in our countrey Gen. 29 26. For thô I will not say as some doe that the want of funeral sermons makes funeral sorrows so small amongst us yet this I must and will say that all are too apt to run into extreams and either desspise the chastening of the Lord or faint when they are rebuked of him Hebr. 12 5. And therfore whatsoever may tend to remedy this is not onely seasonable but very needfull I know at the reformation of these Churches when the generallity of Magistrates and Ministers prevaild for this setlement thô Prince William and some others were Lutherans and this amongst other things of funeral sermons was
it and want them most That God the Author of life and death and all other mercies and miseries doth deprive his best servants as well as others indifferently of their greatest earthly comforts is most apparent by this and other Scriptures Eccless 8 14. 9 2. And that he doth this sometimes with most imbittering circumstances not only suddenly but unexspectedly allso which makes the providence more grievous especially at present as the sudden death of younger friends not exspected is hardlier borne than that of aged having been exspected long and at such times as these comforts are most wanted whereby their loss becoms a continued affliction and matter of constant grief afterwards is allso most evident by this history and many others I need not mention seeing the experience of all ages attest it For what Saint alive then or now so deare to God as Jacob what Relation so neare as a wife and what wife so beloved of a husband as Rachel for whom he served a 7 years apprenteship and how hard soever it was they seemd to him but a few days for the love he had to her Gen. 29 20. Yet notwithstanding God takes away from him this desire of his eyes with a sudden and unexspected stroke as he did after from the prophet Ezekiel c. 24. v. 16. For she had not gon her ful time with child as may be gatherd from their removal from Bethel and traveling towards their father Isaac's house in Hebron which in common prudence they would not have done if they had expected her coming in labor before they could have reached thither And was in a place of no accommodation being in the way nigh Ephrath before they could reach it surprisd with her pangs and must stay there whether in house or tent is not mentioned then which for a woman of her quality and estate nothing could be less exspected Moreover this being her second child it might be hoped in reason had she gon her full time she might with as much or more safety bring forth this than her former son in regard the first birth is usually the most dangerous and the fruit of the womb like that of the trees is easily gatherd when com to maturity Yet God that hath all persons times and places in his power brings her presently here not only to pas through the valley of the shaddow of death as all women doe in travail but allso through the gates of death it selfe dashing all their hopes of her safety and good Jacob thô very sorrowful no doubt is silent at it not once complaning the least that we read of because he knew it was his heavenly father's pleasure Thô it was allso at such a time as made his wound the deeper this befalling him when he had most need of her for his present solace in his afflictions from his childrens miscarriage and other crosses and future comfort in his old age his elder children being ready to marry and leave him and for the helping him in the education of Joseph and especially Benjamin now borne to them For as no earthly comforts are so great as those of man and wife or more alleviate their troubles from others so no nurse for a husband like his wife nor for children like their own mother I have been the larger in these circumstances because they set out history to the life and correspond most of them to the occasion our deceased Sister having come in travail before her time died of her second son c. and to my designe of speaking to such a death as is in the text suitable to the example before us Reasons of these kind of providences are many which I shall now proceed to handle taking it for granted all along amongst Christians that it is God that doth all these things by his over-ruling providence as Scripture every where declares But shall pas over most of the Efficient causes that are well known the Principal as God's being our soveraign Lord and therfore may so deale with any of us sinners and his will and pleasure which is so to deale with som as we see as also because he is infinitly wise knowing what things most conduce to his glory and our good and how by his Power to use them as well as work them for these ends and Jâ—st or righteous in all his ways and Holy in all his works and Good allso yea very Mercifull his tender mercies are over all his works Ps 145 9. and 17. Every of which and much more all of them serve to silence us and teach us submission tho we know not how to reconcile these concurring causes in many particular occurrences And the Instrumental causes as Angels men and other creatures imployed by God herein actively commanding them or permissively suffering them to execute his pleasure allways powerfully limiting ordering and over-ruling them so that he is to be eyed and owned in all that befalls us Job 1. And shall only speak of the Impulsive causes wherein the maine difficulty lies and afterwards of the Final I. The meritorious cause of these and all other punishments is sin for which the Justice of God inflicts them Sin being the transgression of Gods law and death the punishment threatned on all mankind for the same every death must needs be a punishment seeing it is the execution of the threatning and the destruction of the sinner And much more that which is sudden this circumstance being an aggravation thereof as appears by its being as such denounced Deutr. 7 4. 1 Sam. 2 31. Is. 29 5. and 30 13. Prov. 6 15. and 29 1. executed Job 22 16 and 36 14. Ps 37 2. Eccles 7 17. 1 Thes 5 3. bewailed Jer. 4 20 and 6 26. imprecated Ps 55 16 and deprecated as such Ps 102 25. The Pelagians indeed of old as the Socinians of late denyed mans mortality to be the effect of his sin affirming it to arise from his natural constitution at the first but were generally opposed therein and refuted by the Orthodox as Councels Fathers and Histories both general and of them particularly written by many * Alvarez Latius Vossius Jansenius Norris do declare It having been the constant opinion both of the ancient Jews and Christians that every kind of death was the punishment of sin as the learned Grotius de satisfactione assures us I confess many of our Divines writing against the Popish opinion of humane satisfaction to divine justice by sufferings in this life and purgatory afterwards granting death to be a punishment per se naturâ suâ * Dallaeus de poenis do yet deny it to be properly so to those whose sins are pardond through Christ distinguishing the afflictions of this life and death allso into chastissements of the righteous and punishments of the wicked But Scripture is not so nice calling those that befall the righteous punishments somtimes Ezra 9 13. Ier. 30 11. and 46 28. Lament 3 39. Amos 3 2. and somtimes those
sentence of dividing the child would have thought it cruelty if he had gon away without seeing or after knowing the end and effect much more may we mistake the Allwise God if we look on his providence by piece-meals and wait not till we see the issue For thô there be sin in all and that be the only meritorious cause of death yet that is original sin that is alike in all from Adam all being equally related to him so that thence coms no distinction of this or that kind of death but as most conceive from actual transgressions Which being not discernd in infants who yet die in great variety both in regard of diseases and violent murders their death is generally laid on their parents as the widow of Sarepia cried to Elijah art thou come unto me to call my sins to remembrance and to slay my son I Kings 17. For the Jews knew well that God visits the iniquities of the fathers on the children by many Scriptures threatning it and examples of it's being executed and appears particularly in that fearfull imprecation that Christ's blood might be on them and on their children the fulfilling whereof the whole nation lie under to their confusion and the confirmation of Christianity to this day But we must take heed of applying this alike to all for where no extraordinary sins God may and somtimes doth in soveraignty take away children elder or younger as Job's for tryal and other ends more than in justice lest we judge and speake amis of God's dealings with men as Job's friends and many others are accustomed to doe For when men see any misery befall any one out of the common road of providence having natural conceptions that sin and punishment are related they presently conclude that some extraordinary sins either of them or their parents are the procuring cause on their parts and punitive justice answering to it on God's part whereof we have many narratives in Scripture to which I confine my self of Barbarians Jews and Christians but I will only mention that in John 9. at present which hath occasioned most of the thoughts I have imparted concerning these impulsive causes considering that there is the same general nature in all evils of punishment as consisting in the privation of their opposit good The disciples rightly supposed that the blindnes of the man so born was from God justly that he punishes children for their parents sins but mistook in taking it for granted that either his parents or he in his soul before his body was formed had been more than ordinary sinners or in som kind at least which was the cause of his blindnes and asked Christ whether it was who answered neither hath this man sinned nor his parents that is as they meant and their question implyed not greaters sinners than others or in relation to this as the cause to the effect But that the works of God should be made manifest in him which intimates a quite different reason from what they imagined not God's punitive justice for either of their sins but his love to Christ and his doctrine in the manifesting his power in a miraculous cure and mercy to the blind man's soul to be the chief causes Where we may observe how Christ diverts them as every where else from curious enquiries resolving this affliction as an insaelicitas or misery into Gods soveraignty that denies or gives his blessings in kind or degree to whom when and in what manner he pleases it being lawful for him to do what he will with his own and denying it to be poena from justice for any greater or particular sins as they judged thô otherwise both were sinners and so a sufficient ground in point of justice to deprive either of sight or any other blessings in life or all in death yet this difference proceeded not there-from and then directs them by the final cause to judge of the impulsive or reason of this providence and to regard the ends and consequences thereof as that which concernd them which in this case were extraordinary in respect of the miracle and ordinary in regard of the spiritual good this affliction occasiond and wrought both for himself and others Les us therfore accordingly now apply our selves to the final cause or the reasons taken from the end not in reference to the dead which in ordinary cases is a secret to us as I have shewn but the living Which we must understand not of the finis operantis or what God designs in particular thereby which is different in all and no further known to us than as manifested by the effects or in general only as tending to his glory which if we speak properly is only his end and all things whatsoever without himself but means joyntly considered tending thereto and which he uses for the same Rom. 11 36 But the sinis operis in reference to us as these providences are means fitted by him for such ends as tend to the common good of the living which is allways superior to particular sufferings And thô sad experience shews us that for the most part providences have not the effects upon us answerable to their ends yet that 's through our default as we see allso in the ordinances and if so be these moral means obtain not their primary end as medicinal to better us yet their secondary serving at least to justify God and render those that make small or no use of them or contrary than they ought wholy inexcusable and more especially those who have the word to direct them and interpret to them their end and use For the end God's word declares allways implies the use we should make of every thing both in the general and particularly according to their kind and degree But I shall pass by the general ends of afflictions and death and only speak of those more peculiar to this kind of death I am upon nor yet of many that might be drawn from the ends thereof in reference to God his son and our Savior his word ordinances and graces of his spirit the good and evil things of this life our sins and those concernd nearly and remotely but of a few that are most comprehensive suggesting the suitable use of them the end implies that my future discourse may be more practical reserving those that are more particular for the Application I Then God thus suddenly and unexspectedly takes away som that the supremacy of his providence may be more apparent and himself thereby better known and acknowledged in the world That this is the general end of God's unexspected dealings with men in mercies and judgements extraordinary and all other cases above their-thoughts and contrivances appears by hundred places of Scripture relating both to his people and heathens exprest in those phrases that ye or they may know that I am the Lord and implied in the effect which is the end accomplisht for finis in actu positus dicitur effectus and