the first begotten from the dead and the Prince of the Kings of the Earth as gone into the Heavens and there sat down at the right hand of the Throne of God Angels and Authorities and Powers being made subject to him as the Lord of life and glory who is gone to prepare a place for us and will come again and receive us to himself that where he is there we may be also Then will these spiritual things be as much valued by us as now they are despised and we shall as much slight all these bodily enjoyments as now they are overprized We shall not consent for any good in this world to lose our portion with him but chuse rather to dye a thousand deaths than not receive the Crown of life In short the Faith of Christians will then be able to do as much as Sense now doth As that now disparages and thrusts by the things of Faith because they seem Nothing or Uncertain so Faith will put by all the temptations of sense and bid them stand aside because it apprehends coelestial things to be sure and certain too For if they appear as real and certain things they must as I told you be preferred because they are infinitely better than all other and have nothing to disparage them but only their seeming uncertainty They will undoubtedly make us do and suffer the will of our Lord with all chearfulness and patient perseverance while we are here and make us ready to go from hence with the like cheerfulness when or howsoever it shall be his will and pleasure to call for us And what if he send for some of our Friends and dear relations to come away before us Will not the belief of these things make us with some cheerfulness or contentment resign them to him There can be no greater comfort than this Discourse against the grief we are apt to conceive at their departure For death is but the pulling down of an earthly house that they may pass out into an heavenly And it is not the going of our Friends quite away but only their going before and if they be godly they are gone into a better dwelling Why should we mourn then immoderately as those that have no hope Would we not have our Friends advanceed Do we grieve that they are possessed of a more plentiful estate And weep perpetually that they live like Kings and reign with Christ in glorious Pallaces O let not the tears flow too fast Look upon the Heavens and dry your eyes for out of an earthly hole all purified souls take their flight above those spatious Vaults From cold hunger thirst and nakedness they go to a place where there are none of these necessities Would you have your Children lye alwayes in their swadling-clothes Or when they are grown bigger do you desire they should alwayes go in their side-coates Do you sigh to see them beyond their non-age and grown to the state of men and women Would you have them return to their infancy again and become little children meerly that you may play with them Why do you take it ill then that your Friends are grown to an higher stature Why do you lament so heavily that they are stript of their raggs to put on richer apparel Why do you not rather comfort your selves that they are in the condition of Angels and numbred among the Sons of glory being entred into the family of God above in the Court of Heaven Consider I beseech you that too long continued bewailings of the loss of our holy Friends doth betray our Ignorance or forgetfulness of the glory of the other world It is a sign we do not know or else not think of that which the Apostle here preaches We are but in a dream of happiness all this while and see but the shadows and images of it There is little or nothing of this felicity which we touch and feel or that strongly affects our heart For if it did we should be satisfied both because they are gone to it and we may one day follow them If they loved our Lord in sincerity he hath better provided for them than if they had staid in our company And if we love him too and so be perswaded of his love to us they are but poor thoughts that we have of him which cannot supply the place of a Friend a Brother an Husband or a Wife and but low thoughts that we have of his happiness if there be not a great deal more in it to quiet and compose us than there is in the loss of any thing in this world to trouble and disturb us It was a notable saying of one of the Antients that the souls of Philosophers have the Body for their house but they that are ignorant enjoy it but as their prison The truth of which is too apparent For the unbelieving and ungodly are shut up close in their Bodies and fettered within those walls of flesh They are tyed to them by as many chains as they have Members and have no other light but what comes in at the holes of their eyes no other comfort but what they receive by the means of the rest of their bodily senses Whereas all faithfull souls enjoy a greater freedome They can go out of doors and are at liberty to walk abroad and take a view of unseen enjoyments They can look up a while to the highest Heavens and behold in the light of God the glory of our Lord the innumerable company of Angels and the Spirits of just men made perfect The shortest glimpse of whose happiness is able to cheer and refresh their souls in the most disconsolate condition And if they can but think of their Friends departed as Members of that blessed Society the remembrance of them will never fail to be accompanied with such a taste of joy as shall take away the bitterness of all their sorrows Into that glorious assembly of Saints our good Friend I make no question is gone whose earthly house we come here to lay for a time in its Grave In whom you might have seen an example of the force of this Divine Faith which as it was the guide and principle of the actions of his life so it was the exceeding joy and comfort of his heart at death For that he seemed to fear no more than he did his sleep He went as willingly out of this body as he was wont to do out of his own house into this place the House of God and left the dearest relations with such satisfaction as if he were taking a journey to them A very noble degree of Christian confidence And yet no more than might be expected to wait on a long train of other excellent qualities which were eminent in him Of which if I proceed to speak a few words not meerly to comply with Custome but to furnish you with a worthy example as I am sure I shall not wrong the truth so I hope I shall as little
A SERMON Preached at the FUNERAL OF Mr. THOMAS GRIGG B. D AND Rector of St. Andrew-Vndershaft Septemb. 4. 1670. By Symon Patrick D. D. HEB. 13. 14. Here we have no continuing City but we seek one to come LONDON Printed by Robert White for Francis Tyton at the Sign of the three Daggers in Fleet-street 1670. Imprimatur Rob. Grove R. P. Humfr. D no. Episc Lond. Ã sac Dom. Octob. 4. 1670. To the RELATIONS and FRIENDS of the DECEASED TO satisfie your desires I have transcribed this Discourse as soon as my other occasions would suffer and exposed it to the publick view The main Body of it is printed just as it was delivered but I have taken liberty to add the Preface and some part of the Application which then I was constrained to omit If it prove effectual to the furtherance and joy of any ones Faith I doubt not but that very thing will help to mitigate the sorrow which you have conceived for the loss of so worthy a Person A man of so amiable a temper such an unbiassed judgement prudent simplicity unfeigned charity and discreet zeal that it is not to be expected you should ever think of his departure from us without a sigh But the more useful he was to the world and delightful to you the greater will your vertue be in humbly submitting to the will of God by whose order he is removed to a better place We must not teach him how to dispose of us nor repine at his wise appointments no nor suffer the just grief which we feel on such sad occasions to extinguish quite our joy in him who would have us rejoyce in the Lord alwayes What cause we have to do so the ensuing Meditations will in some measure demonstrate Which are plain but solid truths able to support and satisfie our Spirits if we lay them up not only in our Memories to keep safe but in our Understandings to consider and our wills to love and imitate Let us but often ruminate on them and press them on our hearts and live by the faith of the Son of God and there is no disaster in the world so great but we shall be able at least to possess our souls in patience when it threatens to overwhelm us Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God even our Father which hath loved us and given us everlasting consolation and good hope through Grace comfort your hearts and establish you in every good word and work Covent-Garden Octob. 15. 1670. Yours to serve you S. P. A Funeral Sermon UPON II CORINTH V. I. For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the heavens THE Apostle being at the time of his writing this Epistle in great troubles and dangers for the Testimony of Jesus professes himself notwithstanding so abundantly satisfied with the Ministry he had undertaken that he did not faint at aIl nor grow weary of it as you read in the first Verse of the foregoing Chapter That which made him so courageous as to preach under so many discouragements which he mentions V. 8 9. was the same Spirit of Faith which had ever been in the people of God but was now more lively and strong in him through the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus from the dead as he tells us V. 13 14. For this cause saith he we faint not c. V. 16. It was no fool-hardiness that made them expose themselves to so many calamities but the belief of some better things which would reward their sufferings For our light affliction saith he V. 17 18. which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory While we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen c. And if any one should think that these sufferings might end at last in death and bring them down to their Graves he would have them think withal that it was no great matter Let these Miseries proceed so far as to take away our lives this is the worst of it the best is We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the heavens These sufferings it is true may pull down our present habitation but that is all they can do there is a better building which they cannot touch Besides we shall be no great losers by the demolishing of this dwelling for it is but an Earthly House Nay we shall be great gainers for we shall the sooner enter into the coelestial and eternal mansions THis is the sense of the words In which we may consider these three Things 1. The description which the Apostle makes of the present state in which we now are it is in our earthly house of this tabernacle which must be dissolved 2. His description of the future state in which the faithful shall be hereafter they have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the heavens 3. The Certainty of that happy state It is a thing as evident in its kind as the other is As we know that this house of ours is to be dissolved so we know there is a building of God when it is thrown down which stands for ever The one is certain as well as the other Of the two first I have discoursed elsewhere upon the like occasion with this that hath now brought us together Shewing how poor and mean the dwelling is in which our souls lodge while they remain in this world and what goodly preparations our Lord hath made for them in the next There seems to be an opposition here of the one state to the other in five respects 1. We are here only in an house but there is a building for us 2. This is an house of ours but that is a building of God 3. We are now but an house of a Tabernacle then we shall have an house not made with bands 4. And this is an earthly house whereas that is in the Heavens 5. This is to be dissolved but that is eternal in the Heavens As much as to say We are here confined to a very strait and narrow room in which the nobler thoughts and affections of our souls are apt to be choak't and stifled And no wonder considering the meaneness of its original and the poorness of its beginning Our body was once a very small pile so small that it could be inclosed in our Mothers Womb. Then and a long time after our souls were so pent up that they could not find themselves They were forc'd to stay many years before they could gain so much liberty as to turn about reflect on themselves and know that they had a Being Nay so pitifully were they cooped up that the rational Spirit could not breathe or give any sign at all of life And though now
body which in the Platonical opinion is but a Prison in the Apostolical is a Temple when it is in Christ When our Lord possesses and governs it he elevates the condition of this vile body even while it is upon the earth He makes it a place where God dwells where God is worshipped and glorified where God appears and manifests himself What a strong invitation is this to all that believe to turn from every evil way and to be holy as he that hath called us is holy in all manner of conversation Whereby they will be turned into such beautiful and glorious Tabernacles as to become the habitation of God through the Spirit 4. And what can more powerfully move us than all these considerations to be stedfast and unmoveable in the work of the Lord if any temptation assault us and begin to shake the constancy of our Christian resolution The Apostle might well beseech us to stand fast as a body doth that is firmly seated upon a good basis and foundation for we know saith he that our labour shall not be in vain in the Lord. As we know that the temptations which flatter us are very inviting to our fleshly appetites as we feel the allurements of the pleasures and advantages of this world so we know if we be believers that there are infinitely better things to counter-ballance and weigh down the fairest of all the temptations which sollicite us We are assured if we keep our station and preserve our selves holy and undefiled that we have a building with God that is unmoveable and cannot be shaken Let us keep our selves therefore in our seat let us not be moved by any of the enticements of the world nor by any shock which violent hands may give us for we are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets who were sent by the will of God according to the promise of life which is in Christ Jesus Ephes 2. 20. 2 Tim. 1. 1. Our hope stands fast let us do so too and building up our selves in our most holy faith praying in the Holy Ghost keep our selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life Jude 20 21. There are but these three things my beloved to be done for the attaining of this heavenly condition First Strongly to believe that there is such an happy state Secondly To believe that they only shall enjoy it who love God and live in obedience to the Gospel of Christ And Thirdly To be led by this faith and act according to the necessary direction of it Now how easie is that when we have convinced our selves thoroughly of the two former All the difficulty and labour is to believe seriously and stedfastly to perswade our selves of the truth of those things which God hath prepared for those that love him When they are become sensible to us and we look constantly for the mercy of our Lord unto eternal life we cannot chuse but endeavour to attain them more than the best condition that this world affords And when we see that they cannot be possessed without an holy life what should hinder us from having our fruit unto holiness whose end is everlasting life It is manifest that as the nature of man is formed to chuse that which is deemed good and to leave and eschew that which is apprehended to be evil so it is made to preferr a great good before a little and to abandon a trifling enjoyment if by that means we may escape a sore mischief and gain a more noble and illustrious happiness Now it is no less apparent that a Royal Pallace is more desirable in all mens eyes than a little hovel of Turf and Straw an everlasting building that will need no repairs nor ever fall to the ground to be chosen before a tottering frame which every gust of wind shakes and must shortly tumble into the dust upon which it stands What is the matter then that men preferr the condition of a Beggar before that of a Prince That they set their hearts upon that which is built upon a dung-hill before that whose foundations are in Heaven and stands upon the immutable Promise and Power of God I mean that the pleasures and enjoyments of this life gain an higher esteem in their thoughts than the delitious joyes of the world to come And the dull entertainments of this body are advanced and lifted up to an higher place in their affections than all the entertainments of the soul yea and those which God hath provided for the body it self if we would manage and order all its desires according to his holy will There can no cause be assigned of this preposterous choice but only this that they feel these present things but have no feeling of those that are to come They let sense prevail above faith and what here addresses it self to them they receive with a greater affection than they do the reports of those heavenly things which our Saviour hath brought to light by his Gospel They taste the pleasures of meat and drink and all the enjoyments of a fleshly Nature but have little or no rellish at all of those delights which are spiritual for the hope of which our Lord and his Apostles despised the other as not worthy to be compared with the pleasures that are at Gods right hand for evermore They feel this Body wherein they now are and though it be heavy and burdensome in some conditions of life yet it is better a great deal than none at all And such the heavenly building seems to be because our souls are not united to it and have no sense of it but look upon it as a thing that is not and never shall be bestowed on them We must perswade our selves then of the reality and certainty of the state which is to come we must labour to touch it and live in a constant sense and expectation of it By faith we must bring our minds to some such union and conjunction with that house not made with hands as they have with this tabernacle wherein they now inhabit We must let our thoughts as they say dwell upon it for though a thing be never so certain in it self yet if we do not apprehend it so to be it will no more move us than if it were not at all And according as the reasons and motives that we have of faith are little or great so will our perswasisions be weak and feeble or strong and powerfull If we would have our Faith then do any thing worthy of the Gospel and produce any good effects in our hearts we must firmly lay the grounds of it and keep them alwayes visible naked and bare to our eye and we must often look upon them and diligently consider them else all that we build upon it will shake and waver and be apt upon every temptation to be overthrown That is we must constantly represent to our selves the Lord Jesus as