Deaths Advantage Opened in a SERMON PREACHED The last Summer at Northampton AT THE FUNERAL OF Peter Whalley Esq Then Mayor of the said Town And now upon the earnest desires of his Friends published by Edward Reynolds D.D. LONDON Printed by Tho Newcomb for George Thomason and are to be sold at his Shop at the Rose and Crown in Pauls Church yard 1657. To the Honorable John Crew Esq SIR HAving been prevailed with by the earnest desires of those who were nearly related unto that worthy Gentleman at whose Funeral this Sermon was preached to let it after it had been it self so long buried something unseasonably revive and go abroad into the world I have taken the boldness to prefix so honorable a name as yours before it upon a double account one relating unto the deceased Gentleman the other unto my self For the former if we may take the character of a wise and worthy man by the affection which he beareth and choyce which he maketh of eminent Examples whose prudence and piety to follâ—w I may truly and therefore without flattery to you or him pronounce this dear Friend now with God a very wise and a very good man having been frequently an ear-witness of the singular Honor he did bear to your person in mentioning of whose zeal and care to promote the glory of God the truth of the Gospel the interest of Religion and good of your Country he did greatly delight to expatiate and whom he did propose to himself as a special pattern for his imitation For mine own part as I have the same reasons which moved him to bear an honorable and high esteem towards your person and the gifts and graces of God bestowed upon you so you have by your abundant favours to me and particularly your earnest and sollicitous endeavors to have preserved my Station in the University when changes in the State caused changes there laid so great a debt upon me as I have no way to discharge but onely by putting you over to the best Pay-master and in my prayers commending you unto him who doth not forget your labour of love To his gracious Protection I commend you and all the branches and interests of your Family and remain Your humble and most obliged Servant ED. REYNOLDS THE Gain of Death PHIL. 1.21 For to me to live is Christ and to dye is Gain THE Apostle having saluted these Philippians and testified his sincere love unto them and hearty prayers for them in the first eleven Verses doth in the next place endeavor to comfort them against any offence or trouble which they might sustain by occasion of his sufferings for the Gospel vers 12 13. assuring them that they tended to the defence thereof many being thereby provoked and by the example of his courage and comfort animated to speak the Word without fear vers 14. And although some indeed had evil and envious intentions to reproach his Apostleship and to add affliction to his bonds yet Christ being preached he did rejoyce notwithstanding his own sufferings as knowing that by the benefit of their prayers and by the supplies of the Spirit of Christ his own salvation and the glory of the Lord should thereby be promoted vers 15-20 And if the Lord may be thus magnifiea and himself saved if his life may tend to the honour of Christ and his death to his own advantage he is most indifferent and contented to yeeld to Gods holy will either way for saith he to me to live is Christ and to die is gain If I live my work my conversation my ministry will be wholly to serve and glorifie him and if I dye my death will not onely be glorious unto him but gainful unto me I shall be ever with the Lord which is best of all The Apostle therefore is at a stand in a strait betwixt two which to chuse On the one side Christ will be magnified in the edification of his Church on the other side he will be magnified by the salvation of his servant the one will be fruitful to the Philippians and the other gainful to himself He is wholly therefore indifferent whether he live or dye because Christ will be both ways an advantage unto him and he shall be both ways serviceable to the glory of Christ We see the coherence connexion and scope of these words Some versions as ours make them two distinct Propositions To me to live is Christ To me to dye is gain Some others make them but one proposition thus In life and in death or whether I live or dye Christ is to me gain In the words there are two parts considerable First The Propositions themselves Secondly The specification of the Subject to whom they belong The Propositions are according to both readings these three First To live is Chrst Secondly To Dye is Gain Thirdly Christ is both in life and in death gain The specification of the Subject of these Propositions to whom they belong To Me a Beleever who am willing and desirous that Christ may be magnified in my body whether it by my life or by my death as being much more tender and sollicitous of his honour then of mine own particular safety First then To live is Christ or Christ is life unto us It is true many men live who are without Christ in the world an animal or a natural life to themselves to other men to carnal to secular to sinful purposes but being alienated from the life of God we may say of them as the Apostle doth of sensual and delicate Widows that they are dead whilst they live Our true life is founded in thâ— life of Christ Because I live you shall live also Jâ—h 4.19 He that hath the Son hath life he that hath not the Son hath not life 1 Joh 5.12 Now Christ is our life in every way of causality First Vid Fr Gomar To. 1. p. 288. He is thâ— Author and efficient of our life whether we speak of life natural In him was life and the life was the light of men he lighteth every man that cometh into the World Joh. 14.2 By him all things consist Col. 1.17 In him we live and move and have our being Act. 17.28 He formed us in the belly his hands made us and fashioned us round about Job 10.8 Jer. 1.5 Psal 139 15 16. In every work of continued Creation the Son worketh as well as the Father My Father worketh hitherto saith he and I work Ioh. 5.17 Or whether we speak of life spiritual the life of Grace I live saith the Apostle yet not I but Christ liveth in me Gal. 2.20 In him is the primitive seat of life and grace from whom it is diffused upon his body For as the Head and the Members are animated by one soul so Christ his Church by one spirit we being joyned unto the Lord are one Spirit 1 Cor. 6.17 Vid. Aug. de Gen. ad lit l. 4 c. 12. lib. 5 c. 20.
Or lastly whether we speak of Life eternal the life of Glory this our life is hid with Christ in God and when Christ who is our life shall appear we shall also appear with him in glory Col. 3.3 4 Of these two especially the Life of Grace and the Life of Glory Christ is the efficient cause per modum pretii as a Meritorious Procurer of it laying down no less a price then his own life to purchase ours For we are bought with a price 1 Cor 6.20 and by vertue of that price we are quickened together with him Gomar to 3. disp 15 Parker de descens lib. 3. sect 49. Ephes 2.5 2. Per modum Principii by his Holy Spirit fashioning us to his Life and likeness for being a Second Adam he is unto us a quickening Spirit 1 Cor. 15.45 and having life in himself doth derive it upon whom he will Joh. 5.21 26. As the living Father hath sent me and I live by the Father so he that eateth me shall live by me Joh. 6.57 Secondly Christ is the matter of our Life As meat is the matter on which life feedeth Aug. Tract 26 in Joan. Euseb cont Marcel cap. 12. and by which it is preserved so Christ is the spiritual Manna the bread which came down from Heaven of which they who eat shall live Joh. 6.51 The Sacrifices after they were offered for expiations were many times eaten for the comfort and reviving of those that offerâ—d them Christ therefore who was our Passover having offered himself as a propitiation to take away our sin by the Sacrifice of himself was thereupon pleased to institute his Last Supper and therein to set forth himself as that spiritual food whereby the life of Grace in his people is nourished and preserved Thirdly Christ is the very form of spiritual life in a Beleever in which respect he is said to live in us and to be formed and fashioned in us as the childe is shaped in the womb of the Mother Gal. 4.19 and this both as forma essentialis the very soul that actuateth a beleever he is a quickening Spirit If Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin but the Spirit is life because of righteousness Rom. 8.10 and as forma exemplaris the Idea model and pattern of our life for he hath given us an example that we should follow his steps 1 Pet. 2.21 Fourthly Qui esse vult sibi non tibi nihil esse incipit inter omnia Bern. in contr Serm. 20. Christ is the end and scope at which our whole life is to aim and to be directed it must be wholly consecrated unto him nothing in all our concernments must be so dear unto us as Christ whether we live we must live to him or whether we dye we must dye to him because for this end he both died and rose again that he might be the Lord both of the dead and of the livings Rom. 14.7 8 9. therefore as by bringing forth much fruit we do glorifie the Father Job 15.8 so also do we thereby honour the Son out of whose fulness we receive grace for grace for he that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father Joh. 5.23 This seems here principally intended To me to live is Christ My life time studies imployments are wholly taken up in the things of Christ that he may have honour and service by me Wicked men live to themselves to them to live is lust and vanity they follow their own wils they walk in the imagination of their own hearts they rule themselves by no counsel but their own carnal and corrupt wisdom as it is said of Jeroboham that he set up a worship which he had devised of his own heart 1 Reg. 12.33 and the the people professed to Jeremy that they would do whatsoever should go forth out of their own mouth Jer. 44.17 They direct all they do to themselves looking after onely their own gain ease pleasure credit advantage fasting eating drinking to themselves and assembling themselves for corn and wine Zach. 7.6 Hos 7.14 They withdraw themselves from that subjection and subordination wherein God hath placed them and do in effect say as Pharaoh Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice Ex. 5.2 Now â—is is a very strange folly because our salvation and the glory of Christ are twisted together as the coherence of the 19. and 20. verses of this Chapter doth demonstrate When we neglect his glory we forfeit our own salvation and when we seek our own salvation he esteemeth himself glorified thereby As when a great stone doth fall from an Arch the little ones that were bound and knit in by it do fall for company so when men do neglect the great end of living to the honor of Christ they do greatly endanger all their own subordinate ends thereby What is it then for Christ to be our life or for a man truly to say To me to live is Christ It is First In our hearts to acknowledge him for our Lord unto whom we owe our time and strength our fear and honour Isa 8.11 Mal. 1.6 Secondly in our lives to do every service with good will and in singleness of heart as unto him Eph. 6.5 6 7. to do it by a warrant from his word I will hear what God the Lord will say Ps 85.8 Proving what is the good and perfect and acceptable will of God Rom. 12.2 and what it is which Christ would have us to do Act. 9.6 To set him always before us and to do every thing as in his presence and with a desire to approve our hearts in well doing unto him Ps 16.8 for as he behaved himself towards his Father doing always those things that pleased him Joh. 8.25 6.38 so are we to behave our selves towards him who as he hath made us the Sons of his Father by Adoption Joh. 20.17 so is he himself our Father by Regeneration and calleth us in one respect his Brethren and in another his Children Heb. 2.11 12 13. To do every thing unto his glory as vessels fitted for our Masters use and prepared unto every good work 2 Tim. 2.21 To value our life not cheifly for it self but for the service which therein we are to do unto our Lord I count not my life saith the Apostle dear unto my self so that I may finish my course with joy and the Ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus Act. 20.24 And herein likewise we imitate his example who in conformity to the command of his Father did himself lay down his own life for his sheep and became obedient unto death even the death of the cross a servile an ignominious Vid. Lips de Cruce cap. 12. Casaub in Baron exercit 16 c. 77. a cursed death Joh. 10.11 15 18. Phil. 2.8 This it is for a man to say To me to live is Christ my thoughts studies aims purposes imployments do all fix and terminate upon
it is not enough for a man to do good to others though he could to all if he remain an enemy to himself Like Shel-fishes which breed pearls for others to wear but are sick of them themselves lik a Mercury Statue which shews the way to others but stands still it self like a whetstone which sharpeneth the knife but is blunt it self If thou be wise saith Solomon be wise for thy self Many men are like Plutarchs Lamiae which had eyes for abroad but were blinde at home like Bees that gather good honey but are smothered themselves But our dear Brother had an eye inward was wise to the interests of his own soul Like the Cynamon tree which lets not out all its sap into leaves and fruit which will fall off but keeps the principal of its fragrancy for the bark which stays on like a tree planted by the water side which though it let out much sap to the remoter boughs yet is specially careful of the root that that be not left dry And in truth what profit would it be to a man if he could help and heal all the sick men of the world and be incureably sick himself If he could get all the men on the earth all the Angels in heaven to be his friends and have still God for his enemy If he could save others and then lose his own soul to be like the ship Act. 27. broken to peeces it self though it helped others to the shore Like those that built the Ark for Noah and were drowned themselves Herein therfore he shewed himself truly a wise man that he took care of his own soul Some men are like Achitophel very careful to set their houses in order but then cast away their souls But our dear Brother though he had by the variety of his imployments the cares of Martha upon him was yet specially mindful of Maries unum necessarium the care of his own salvation And he did not take up his Religion with the times that he might magis uti Deo quam frui make gain godliness as the Samaritans who would be Jews when the Jews prospered and enemies to them when they suffered but he was as is said of Mnason Act. 21.16 an old Disciple a Professor of Religion in the worst times when piety was nick-named preciseness and he that departed from evil made himself a prey Isa 59.15 Temporibusque malis ausus es esse bonus did dare to be good in bad times Religion sometimes is like oyl gets highest and the faeces and amurca are at the bottom when the horn of the righteous is exalted Psal 75.10 Sometimes it is like gold in the Mine lies deep and depressed like the sap of a tree in winter fain to shrink under ground There are many Summer Christians will be religious in the sun shine our dear Brother was a winter Christian kept his religion in the storm and as then he was so he continued a steady Christian a ship well ballanced with sound knowledge and rooted sincerity and love of the truth not carried about with every wind of doctrine It is said of Christ he is yesterday and to day the same Heb. 13.8 Christians should therein imitate him and having tried all things hold last the good and with purpose of heart cleave to God God hath beautified several of his servants with several Graces we read of Jobs patience Moses his meekness Abrahams faith Maries love Davids devotion Solomons wisdom Apollo his eloquence our dear Brother was eminent in many likewise in meekness and mildness of soul he was a man of an amiable and calm temper yet sweetly quickned with zeal for Gods glory He was a great lover of an able Minister and of the Ordinances of Christ so dispensed an eminent grace in these times when poor Ministers and Ordinances it is well they go together they are good company suffer together from many whom we cannot wonder at for being so much enemies to others who are so little friends to their own souls he that undervalues his own life may easily despise another mans But by the way it were well if the despisers of Ordinances would consider that little children who play the wantons with their meat are likely not long after to know what difference there is between a smarting rod and a wholsom dinner We may have Ordinances taken away from us too soon let not us take them away from our selves We have viewed him in his private capacity as a Christian if we consider him in his publick as a Magistrate we shall finde how great a loss the Town and Country had of him in this regard as his friends and the Church of God in the other Some men are like Vines very good for fruit but you cannot make a beam or a pin of them to hang any vessells thereon Ezek. 15.3 to such things Magistrates are compared Isa 22.23 24. But our Brother was like the Wallnut tree good both for fruit and for timber His fitness for Magistracy appeared in this that being not an aged man he was twice called to the Majoralty of this Town and once to serve for the same more publickly Tully derided Heraclidâ—s Temnites that he lived to old age and never attained those honors in his Country which others usually did arrive at it could not be said so of him he was of so dexterous a spirit that one may say of him as Livy did of Cato Natum adid unum diceres quodcunque ageret And this is the more considerable in that he was not originally brought up to services of a publick nature It is noted for the honor of Alphenus Varus that having been bred in a shop at a private trade he proved so learned and eminent a Lawyer that he wrote collectanea juris some of which are entred into the pandect and was afterwards Consul of the City And we read in humane stories of Agathocles Justinus Primislaus Pinctus and others who by their wisdom and abilities were raised from Trades and Farms to great Governments Our dear Brothers publick imployments were not the fruits of his own ambition but of the free love of other men who for his wisdom fidelity and fitness called him thereunto And truly a very fit man he was for them an able man fearing God loving truth hating covetousness Exod. 18.21 He had a publick spirit very ready to en tertain and promote every thing which tended to the general good Some men are like the Prophets Vine Hos 10.1 bring fruit onely to themselves and are empty to all the world besides But he was one who could deny himself and his private interest to serve the publick as natural bodies will forsake their own proper motions to prevent a publick breach upon the universe Pompey being disswaded from an expedition hazardous to himself but useful to the publick returned this answer to his friends Necesse est ut eam non ut vivam It is necessary for me to go it is not necessary for me to live And truly besides his Wisdom Zeal for God Dexterity to set forward good works he had one excellent Character for Magistracy he was a man of a milde and meek spirit I call this an excellent temper for Magistracy If it were not so the Lord would not have chosen Moses the meekest man on earth Numb 12.3 nor David who was as a weaned childe to be the Ruler of Israel Psal 131.1 2. Magistrates will meet with many things to provoke passion difficulties in business multitudes of imployment cros sand mutinous distempers in ill-disposed people prophanations and dishonors done to the name of God which exceedingly stirred Moses himself Exod. 32.19 therefore they had need have milde and composed spirits patience is the effect of power Numb 14.17 â—8 Thus he lived in his private capacity a dear Husband a tender Father a faithful friend a sincere Christian Thus he lived in his publick capacity a wise zealous self-denying publick-hearted meek-spirited Magistrate And now as he said oportet imperatorem stantem mori And another Episcopum concionantem that it was honourable for a Commander to die in his Arms and a Bishop in his Pulpit So the Lord ordered the death of our dear Brother with this circumstance of honor in it that he died a Magistrate in his Office Aaron was stripped of his Sacerdotal Ornaments on the mount where he was called to die Num. 20.25 26. And this our Brother did put off his Robe to put on his Shrowd his Magistracy yeelded to his mortality His death was sudden in it self so was old Elies a good man but it is not sudden to a Beleever whose holy life fits him or it for sanctity is a better preparation unto death then sickness It is all one if a man come to heaven whether it be by a Journey or by a Rapture as Paul was caught up thither 2 Cor. 12.3 4. Well he is with Christ which is best of all though we be without him the care of his friends must be by moderation of sorrow to testifie their assured hope of his happiness And the care of the Town must be to testifie their love unto him with chusing a wise holy faithful zealous man to succeed him who may carry on those good works which he had the happiness to begin but not to finish by reason of a greater happiness We leave him with our Apostles Motto upon him To him to Live was Christ and therefore to Dye was Gain FINIS