Judgment Heaven and Hell And indeed though I look upon it as a great Scripture-Truth and which hath so great Evidence as cannot be contradicted yet I am far from pressing any one to take into Consideration I mean those Apprehensions concerning such a Kingdom of Christ So that they should take off any thing from the serious Meditation of Death and Judgment Heaven and Hell And I would desire only those persons to take them into Consideration that find they are more enlivened and more enlarged and more enflamed by the strong Consideration of the Great Things Scripture hath spoken and that are in a visible and apparent way to bring forth the Glory of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ And therefore I hope there is nothing that can be justly Taxed in endeavouring to seek further into the Doctrines of Christianity beyond those that are but the Beginning Principles of the Doctrine of Christ I would exhort every serious Christian to make these it his continual Meditation and that nothing may take off the edge of his Spirit in these things Say now Am I not to die And must I not come to Judgment Is it not said It is appointed to all men once to die and after this the Judgment Am I not immediately to come into a Judgment and determination of my Eternal Condition And am I not to stand before Christ in Judgment Don't we all own that And is there not a Heaven and an Eternity of Happiness And is there not on the other hand a black and dark Eternity even utter darkness and for ever O that God would enable us to carry this all in our Minds the Eternity of Happiness and the Eternity of Misery You know great Princes are Pictured with great Globes in their hands but Jesus Christ hath those Two great Globes the Keys of Death and Hell and Eternal Life to give Let these things be our plain and constant Meditation Let us cut off every thing that we think is singularity I am still of the same Apprehension that the Scripture hath declared a visible Kingdom and Glory that is near Yet I beseech you that you would get these into your constant Apprehension And O that they might fall upon every one Let nothing of Notion or Opinion take off from these Great Things Let us continually take our Walk and Meditation into those Regions beyond this World Let us say I am to go out of this World and this State and O how Great must the Change be That I must immediately enter into an Eternity of Happiness or an Eternity of Misery Nothing will make the Doctrine of Christ so powerful as to have a strong Meditation of these Things And then In the Seventh Place Let us take heed of the sins of the Time wherein we live though by all means we are to take heed of the open Prophanenesses that are in the Wortd but I beseech you That we may all look to this There are the peculiar Sins of those that are called Virgins There 's something peculiar to every Time And therefore as I have intimated to you in that Rev. 3. 1. That Church of Sardis I have for some time look'd upon it to be the Pourtraiture of these very Times and this very State we are upon It is a Picture of the Church of Christ in that State we call Protestant and in that State we call The Reformation And therefore observe how that is described and let us look very diligently that we don't fall into those very sins And unto the Angel of the Church in Sardis Write These things saith he that hath the Seven Spirits of God and the Seven Stars I know thy works That thou hast a Name that thou livest and art dead O Let us take heed of having a Name To be a Protestant is a Name to live To be of the Reformed Churches is a Name to live Take heed Is it not the General State of this very Age of this very Time We have a Name to live and yet are dead Among all the several Professions and Churches of Christianity in the Reformed way at this Day surely it is a Sin that lies upon every one They have a Name to live and yet are dead We find it one in another but every one may find too much that he hath a Name to live but is dead We may say to our selves Is this like one that is come out of Popery upon the account of Conscience and upon the account of Truth and the Word of God This is a Name to live because say we the things that Papists profess and that they do are not according to the Word of God Why now if it be a Name to live to come out from among them Take heed that we are not dead If we have not the Power of Godliness in the Profession of the Reformed and Protestant Religion It is but a Name to live be watchful and strengthen the things that remain and are ready to die O! how truly may we say That the Things in order to the Kingdom of Christ they are ready to die every where among all sorts of Professors How ready is the Publick Way of Worship to die for want of the Power of what they Profess And if you look upon the Congregated Professors with what reason do they complain They are grown very Proud very Worldly very Vain notwithstanding all their Profession So here 's a Name to live in order to the Kingdom of Christ but they are ready to die Be watchful and strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die Here 's that Watch that Christ speaks of We should take heed and watch that the things which remain and are ready to die might be quickned and have a new life For saith he I have not found thy Works perfect before God I have not found them filled out and filled up They are just like a Stalk of Wheat that looks as if it were something and yet like one of Pharaoh's lean Ears if we come to search and enquire into it and to Rub it as we speak in our hands we find it to be nothing so indeed we may sadly complain when we come to Rub Profession either in others or in our selves it is very thin and lean and lank And therefore our works are not filled up before God Now what saith Christ I will come upon thee as a Thief and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee Let us therefore be very diligent in this thing to look to have the Power of our Profession to have the Power of the Protestant Religion to have the Power of the Reformation For indeed It is a very sad thing that so many of us as have a Zeal against Popery a Zeal against the Corruption of that State That yet we should sink so much below some of the Devotionists among them For undoubtedly There are some among them that seem to be under a greater Profession than many Protestants
World and forced out by the Power and by the Glory of Christ Then shall be this Glorious Solemnity of the Marriage of Christ Rev. 19. 1 2. And so on in the Chapter And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in Heaven saying Allelujah Salvation and Glory and Honour and Power unto the Lordour God For true and righteous are his Judgments for he hath judged the Great Whore What is the Great Whore but only False Christianity called Babylon the Great that hath defiled the Doctrine and defiled the Worship and defiled the Holiness of Conversation and defiled the Spirituality of the Enjoyment of Christ That 's the meaning of the Great Whore When therefore you see Christianity is All Spirit is All Heaven is All Life is All Purity and Truth and Glory and Babylon destroyed when you see that then Immediately shall the Marriage-Supper of the Lamb follow As you shall find in the 7th Verse Let us be glad and rejoice and give honour to him for the Marriage of the Lamb is come and his Wife hath made her self ready And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine Linnen clean and white For the fine Linnen is the Righteousness of Saints And he saith unto me Write Blessed are they which are called unto the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me These are the true Sayings of God That you may not say as the World is ready to do even the Sober World even that which is the Professing World of Christians are ready to say these things are nothing but Whimsie nothing but Fancy it is said These are the true sayings of God To shew us that the things shall certainly and must needs come to pass And it shall be when Christianity shall be no longer in Form and it shall be no longer in Rites and Ceremonies when it shall be no longer in Humane Institutions and Commands and it shall be no longer in the shining Grandeur of the World For Men cannot see the Glory of Christianity because they see such a Glister of this World But all this must go off and what is Glorious indeed must come in its place It shall be all Spiritual Pure and Divine And If any of us can Love such a Jesus if we have such upright Hearts and are drawn with the Savour of His Good Oyntments and such a Name as His be to us as Oyntment poured forth It is certain our State is Good we are of those upright that do indeed Love Christ But If we say Here 's nothing of the Bravery of this World Here 's nothing of the Wit and of the Pass-time and of the Gaudery and of the Retinue and what the World is so pleased with and meeting together to talk of nothing that signifies any thing but shrivells into meer Emptiness and into perfect Vanity and Froth I say except we have these things we don't know what to make of this Jesus and of this Christianity VVhy then we are but Foolish Virgins that while we pretend we have nothing but a Lamp and our Lamp at the proper time for its shining in Glory will go out And so suitably and agreeably to this you may see and I desire you may take notice of it how Scriptures do agree and Breath the very same thing The Apostle John in the Revelation speaks as Solomon who lived many Hundred Years before John yet they both came into the very same Spirit and into the very same Representation For you see that which Solomon Celebrates under a Song of Marriage a Song of Love The Apostle John does in the very same manner Represent I saw saith he The New Jerusalem come down That is the State of Saints in this High and Pure and perfect Enjoyment of Christ I saw it come down as a Bride adorned for her Husband Chap. 22. 2. I saw the Holy City New Jerusalem Which is nothing but the Pure and Holy and Perfect and Happy State of Saints I saw it coming down from God out of Heaven as a Bride adorned for her Husband And now the earnestness of all our desires should be after it As it is said ver 17. The Spirit and the Bride say Come And let him that heareth say Come That is let them who hear say so as struck with a Symphony even as one Lute Answers another the Lute upon the Wall Answers that is struck and Tuned and Play'd upon So every Soul Tuned aright by Grace doth sound alike with the Spirit and with the Bride when he does but hear it say Come It immediately saith Come Thus I have shew'd you that this Allusion Representation and Figure is a Figure Representing this great thing Jesus Christ is the Bridegroom of the Church and every Particular Soul the Bride or Lambs Wife For it is a wild sort of Notion that some people have of a Church Who by it Principally mean a kind of Jurisdiction and Authority and Power and a sort and sett of Men who should enjoy it They mean this by the Church they speak so much of Whereas the Spirit of God means by the Church chiefly Real Christians sound sincere-hearted Professors of Jesus Christ and Lovers of him The upright Love thee This is the meaning of a Church by Christ and not a kind of Authority and Jurisdiction that looks more like a Train and a Court of this World than any thing of the Power of Christianity and the Power of the Gospel I shall therefore come in proceeding in this Discourse to open to you these two things First That there is a State of this Marriage-Relation to Christ understand every thing as I hope you do spiritually and of the Power of Holiness in our Hearts and of the free Communication of the Righteousness and Grace and Spirit of Christ Till all appears in Glory understanding it thus I say There are two great Spaces Two Great States of it one that is Here and then the other that shall be in the Glory of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ And it hath pleased God to take great care that both these should be Represented to us First of all the State of the Soul here It is like an Espousal it is like a Betrothing it is like that that we call among us a Contract of Marriage And according to Scripture there is a distance between it and the Solemnity and Compleating and Consummation of the Marriage And this is very necessary for us to consider that now is the time of preparing and fitting Souls for that Great Solemnity And therefore we read of a Virgin Betrothed to an Husband before the Solemnity of the Marriage upon which Account to the Jews it was appointed by Moses that there should be at least Thirty days between the one and the other And they looked upon it as a Breach and an Infraction upon the Mosaick-Law If there was not such a Time of Preparation And some very Conscientious Ministers of the Gospel have been
care so of Religion And another said I have married a Wife and therefore I cannot come upon that account And in another Evangelist They went to their Merchandise I have a Great Trade and I cannot carry on the present State if I mind so much the Kingdom of Christ And therefore I say The Purchasing and Husbandry and Merchandise and the Enjoyments of this World and Relations they are great Hinderances indeed to the Glory of the Kingdom of Christ But then The Second Thing I would say to you which may give you Great Satisfaction as to this If there were such a Spirit poured out from on high Don't think the World would be so Inconvenient by it It would be brought into a more High a Better and more Excellent State I am sure If the Spirit were so poured out upon the World That Men did not excuse themselves from the Kingdom of Heaven by their Trade Relations and Families And by their Interest in the present VVorld I am sure that the Trees of the Wood would yeild forth of themselves to us The Hills would flow down with Milk and the Mountains with Wine VVhenever God will bring the VVorld into a Religious State indeed Don't take care as if the State of the VVorld could not be upheld For it shall be upheld and be more Happy and Blessed than it is now Joel 3. 18. And it shall come to pass in that day that the Mountains shall drop down New Wine and the Hills shall flow down with Milk and all the Rivers of Judah shall flow with Waters c. Every thing shall be Happy and Prosperous Instead of the Thorn shall come up the Fir Tree and instead of the Bryar shall come up the Mirtle Tree and it shall be to the Lord for a Name and for a Memorial When God comes to make the world truely Good to bring in a Profession of Christianity not in Word but in Power I say when that comes to pass there shall be such a strange plenty to the World such a strange Providence over the Creation All that which we take so much care about and with so much Sin and hatred and envy one at another It will come so freely there will be no need of disturbance of and distracting our selves or one another When we come in High sense to be the Servants of God and to be in such a State All Creatures in Heaven and Earth would come and lay down their Service at our Feet The Heavens would hear the Earth and the Earth would hear the Corn and the Wine and the Oyl And they would hear Jezreel Amos 9. 11. Behold the days come saith the Lord that the Plowman shall overtake the Reaper and the Treaders of Grapes him that soweth the Seed That is the Harvest shall be sooner than the very Plowing All Creatures in Heaven and Earth would offer themselves to us And all the Riches that we dive for now so deep into the Bowels of the Earth and into the bottom of the Sea they would come up and be at our hand in that Day when the Kingdom of Jesus Christ shall be thus Universally upon the World and when the Desire of Nations shall come I would shut up this in a very Brief Application to you Vse 1. In the First Place Let it move us seriously to fill up our Religion with this Character of it The Virgins went forth to meet the Bridegroom There was the great mark in their Eye the great design in their Eye Now ask your selves I beseech you is your Religion in meeting the Bridegroom Is not your Praying Morning and Evening because it is good Family-Order It is a good thing for Reputation and Credit Is it not because you are afraid if you Rise up and Lie down without Prayer God won't Bless you that Day nor give you good rest that Night He won't succeed you in your Calling And in the Duties and Business of it Is it not because natural Conscience would cry out and say what Do you live like a Heathen yea a Brute and like a Beast I acknowledge these are valuable Reasons in their kind But sure there is a Higher a Greater Reason to go forth to meet the Bridegroom Because throughout all the Account that can be given why Men are Religious if this be not Principal if this be not the Supreme End that I would meet the Bridegroom It is not of the Excellent True Alloy Therefore Buoy up your Spirits raise them wind them up to this great height I 'll go forth to meet the Bridegroom I pray this Morning that I may meet with the Bridegroom I go to hear this day That I may meet with the Bridegroom I would not have these great things wound up onely within the Circle of this Life in this manner Here comes Business and here comes Prayer And so there 's Sleep and Eating and Drinking All comes in a Round and we would have this Round always observed And it calls to Publick Prayer and to other of those Duties Now if we turn about onely in this Circle we run on Endlessly about But our care must be higher Viz. To meet the Bridegroom Vse 2. In the Second Place I Beseech you consider whether your Religion be of this excellent kind that you would be willing to meet the Bridegroom Is it that which I believe in my Soul enlightned by the Spirit of God my Conscience bearing me Witness in the Holy Ghost that it will please the Bridegroom Are my Thoughts Affections manner of Conversation such And what reason have we and do we Humble our selves before our Bridegroom when we consider this will not please when we consider this is not fine enough Ornamental enough to his Glory of value enough I would not meet him with Tinsel instead of Gold and real worth I would not meet him with false Diamonds instead of real ones So I would not meet him with Hypocritical formal Prayers without real Grace And then Vse 3. In the third Place I beseech you consider I don't expect there should be many Subscribing to that Account of Time that I have given out Tho it be upon great and strong Foundations in the Word of God Yet I challenge nothing from any but so far as they see in that Light But I would onely ask you this Question upon the occasion of it Suppose it a true and real Scripture Account that I have given out and that within so little a Time there shall be yet so great a change of the World And Men shall begin to unhinge from the Earth and Earthly Foundations Would you be glad of it Or have you not a secret Trouble and Enmity against it And that you would have the World still go on and Ages to run on so I say try your selves as to this I think it cannot be any Injury for any to propose this Seeing we should be continually upon our watch for this very thing when our Lord will come Vse
of first Fruits in regard of his Servants I shall give you two Scriptures and so pass off James 1. 18. Of his own will begat he us with the Word of Truth that we should be a kind of first Fruits of his Creatures And in Rev. 14. 4. These saith he speaking of the Hundred forty and four Thousand that were Sealed These are the first Fruits to God and to the Lamb. 4. The fourth Feast that we read of It was the Feast of Weeks As it is called in that Lev. 23. And it was after seven compleat Sabbaths were past Then there was a Feast which is called Pentecost And at that very Feast was the great pouring Out of the Spirit of Christ upon the Disciples Acts 2. 1. And so there shall be the Feast of the Harvest of all the Servants of God gathered in one after the Pouring out of that blessed Spirit of God All this shall be much greater than that was in Acts 2. This was but a Beginning It was but an Entrance of that which is to be done at the Feast of the Great Harvest Surely never was there such a Feast of Pentecost Such a Feast of Weeks as shall be then Every one who shall be admitted to that Feast His mouth shall be Full of the Wonderful works of God He shall speak abundantly of the Glory of God and of Jesus Christ and of the Riches of Grace He shall speak abundantly of the mighty Works of God in that mighty Pouring out of the Spirit of God 5. In the Fifth Place There shall be the Feast of Trumpets As we read Lev. 23. After the Feast of Weeks was the Feast of Trumpets And that Feast was a Type of the Seven Trumpets in the Revelation ending and fill'd up in the Seventh Trumpet that we read of Rev. 11. The Seventh Angel sounded and immediately there were loud Voices in Heaven saying the Kingdoms of this World are become the Kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ and he shall Reign for ever and ever ver 15. With which you may compare what is spoken in 1 Cor. 15. 52. And in 1 Thes 4. 16. Christ shall descend the Trumpet shall sound and the Dead shall be raised Incorruptible And the Saints shall be changed And he shall come down with the Shout and Voice of the Arch-angel and with the Trampet of God Then shall that great Trumpet sound And then shall be the Feast when all the Dead in Christ and they that have slept In and By Jesus shall arise and shall appear in Glory and shall stand forth in that State of an Incorruptible Resurrection And then is the Blessedness of the Saints changed who live and remain here upon Earth And here all the forenam'd Feasts are together united in one 6. In the Sixth Place There shall be the Day of Attonement the Day of the great Attonement As we read of that also A Day wherein God was reconciled wherein the Entrances into the Holy of Holies were opened All that was to be in the Day of Attonement And so there shall be in the State of the Wedding of Christ The Feast of Attonement of Reconciliation As the Apostle speaks Acts 3. 19. When the times of Refreshing and of Restitution shall come Repent ye therefore and be Convented that your Sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord In that Great Day of Attonement and at the Great Wedding All that make up the Lambs Wife shall meet there if they have been Enemies before to God and Christ they shall be Atton'd They 'll lay aside their Enmity one to another and fall into mutual Kindness and Enjoyment one of another Then all things as the Apostle speaks Col. 1. All things in Heaven and in Earth shall be fully Reconciled by Him Even by Him 6. The last is The Feast of Tabernacles The Feast of a Paradisiacal-State The Feast of Tabernacles The Feast of Goodly Boughs of Olives and Palms And whatsoever was most valuable among the Plants was brought out to make Boughs with at that time And to this the great Feast of the Kingdom of Christ is compared Because it shall be the State of Paradice Restored All the Glory and Beauty and Excellency of the Creation shall then be restored We read therefore Zech. 14. 16 c. of this Happy and Blessed Feast of Tabernacles It is when all shall be Holiness to Jehovah And it shall come to pass that every one that is left of all the Nations which come against Jerusalem shall even go up from Year to Year to Worship the King the Lord of Hosts and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles It is the Feast of that State of Paradice where Instead of Briars and Thorns shall come up the Fir-Tree and the Mirtle-Tree And it shall be to the Lord for a Name and for a Perpetual Remembrance Esay 55. 13. I shall now Briefly shut up all this in Application And I desire you that you would refresh these things in your own Thoughts And that you would bring them to mind You will find every particular Feast that of the Passover Exod. 12. You 'll find at large and every other Feast in Lev. 23. And I desire you would consider and read that Chapter And remember that the Glory and Happiness and Blessedness and Spirituality of those Feasts shall be in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ Vse 1. The first use therefore that I would make of it shall be this To make a present Invitation to you to this Great Feast that is to be held to the Lord our God Even to Jehovah That you would mind this That you would seriously mind it and consider it that all of us are now Invited For now when we may go as in that Matth. 22. One to our Market Another to our Farm Every one to this or that Entertainment of this World At this very Time the Invitation is made to every one of us that we would consider of it Behold this Sermon and this Discourse this Preaching of the Gospel it is sent to you to invite you to this great Supper He sent forth his Servants ver 3. That is the Ministers and Preachers of the Gospel the Expounders and Openers of Scripture to you to call you and to bid you unto this Wedding Now take heed Take heed That you do not go one to your Farm and another to your Merchandize that you don't go every one your own way As it is said They made light of it and went their way They go every one their own way Take heed now Remember when that Wedding-Supper shall be and that it shall then be Proclaimed with that sound of the Trumpet with the Voice of the Arch-angâ—l Blessed are they that are bidden then to the Marriage-Supper of the Lamb If any be bidden They must be bidden now They must be perswaded now they must accept the Invitation at this very time For now it is as I tell
into a Condition to meet the Bridegroom with Oil in their Vessels as well as in their Lamps Argum. 3. There is such a Space of Time Determined by God Settled Fixed and Declared in the Sure Word of Prophecy Lin'd out by Four Monarchies that must Runn out Themselves And there is a Particular Assignation of Time to the Last State of the Fourth the Last of Them Viz. Time Times and Half a Time Expounded into One Thousand Two Hundred and Sixty Days of Years Revel 12. 6. 14. And in this Time Wickedness Fills up its Ephah or Measure and is carried as by the Wings of a Stork and Settled for Ever upon its own Base And to this Assignation of Time Jesus Christ Consented and Testified his Consent by Lifting up Both his Hands to Heaven and Swearing There should be this Time Times and Half And therefore no Injury is Done to Him And that then and not before All the Wonders of his Kingdom shall be Finished On this very Account the Apostle so Solemnly Declares 2 Thess c. 2. 1 c. That That Day of Christ could not come Except that Apostacy the Last State of the Fourth Monarchy was Revealed and Blown off by the Spirit of Christ's own Mouth and at Last utterly Consumed by the Brightness and Glory of his Appearance at that his Coming Before it could come to this those Times and Half must be Expired Immediately therefore after the Death and Resurrection of Christ Vision and Prophecy were Sealed Daniel 9. 24. with Relation to that Greatest and Richest Effect of Prophecy Viz. the Kingdom of Christ It was Sealed But then Immediately at the very Beginning of Half Time Christ took the First Opportunity of making a Seizure viz. at the Reformation and of Swearing there should be Time of such sort no more but in the Days of the Seventh Trumpet When he shall begin to found the Mystery of God Viz. The Kingdom of Christ shall be Finishing as he hath spoken by all his Servants the Prophets Which shall begin at 1697 So near approaching All which things have been fully by the Assistances of God made out and publickly set forth And are now onely so far briefly Represented as to give satisfaction to this doubt How comes it to pass that the Coming of the Bridegroom hath been thus long Delay'd And no further Insisted upon in these Sermons Sett for Preaching the Gospel especially under the Grace of the Divine Spirit to work upon the Heart and to engage in all Holiness of Conversation I come therefore to the Practical Reflection on what hath been spoken in these short Applications Appli 1. That we would take heed of the Atheistick and prophane boldness of Scoffers Who because the Bridegroom on so Holy and Wise Reasons as Scripture hath given us Delays his Coming say where is the promise of his Coming They believe no such thing And indeed all Discourses against the Kingdom of Christ and the Prophesies of Scripture or turning them into Allegory and Metaphor Give Countenance and Assurance to such Prophaneness and Boldness of Scoffing Let us aherefore be mindful of the Words of the Holy Prophets and of the Doctrines of the Apostles of the Lord and Saviour 2 Peter c. 3. v 1 c. Appli 2. Let us beware of the Accounting the delay of the Bridegrooms Coming to any thing in the Course of Nature or as if the World could bear up it self or Perpetuate it self As they of whom the Apostle speaks who are willfully Ignorant that the World by the very Word of God was settled so out of and yet in such a Neighbourhood to the Water that it depended wholly on the Word of his Power not to be overflown by it And that the Heavens and Earth that now are are so Reserv'd are Treasured up for Fire at the Time Appointed by God for Perdition of such and of All Ungodly Men That we may be in a continual Dependence upon Him and Preparation for the Bridegroom 's Coming Applicat 3. Let us have Just Apprehensions of the Patience and Long-Suffering of God in the Delay of the Bridegroom 's Coming And that it is no Sluckness concerning his Promise As if He were altogether such a one as our Selves And Let us Account it Salvation And so it will be if we are His For He will let None of His Perish but Every One of Them shall come to Repentance But if we are not His though we Know it not Yet His Goodness Leads to Repentance by its Gracious Invitations and Excitements And if through our Hard and Impenitent Hearts It does not Lead us so we Treasure up Wrath against the Day of Wrath and the Revelation of the Righteous Judgment of God at this Coming of the Bridegroom Rom. 2. 3 4 c. Applicat 4. Let us not Think it Boldness or Presumption to Search the Scriptures and 2 Peter 1. 19 c. to Give Heed to the Sure Word of Prophecy as to a Light that shineth in a Dark Place Till the Day Dawn and the Day-Star Rise in our Hearts Especially to that Line of TIME Times and Half Time For our Lord charges it as Hypocrisie not to Discern the Signs of the Times That is the Characters of Time Scripture hath Impress'd upon it And though there are many Providential Signs as Wars Commotions Earthquakes Yet these will not Define Time to us Onely the Line of Time can Do that And let us Humbly wait upon God therein and take in All Other Marks God hath Given by His Providence therein But as I say The Line of Time is the Sure Rule by which we are to walk and I have full Assurance if we behold according to that the Course of Scripture-Prophecies the Emblems or Prophetical Types and Figures given therein the Numbers of Time proportion'd to and Running all along from Time to Time through those Figures and compare All with the Providences and Great Events God hath taken Care should be Recorded in History brought to our Knowledge or be coming down to our very sight we may be fully Confirmed as by a Threefold Cord not to be Broken and that it is a Line Reaching to 1697. Applicat 5. Let us have Continual Apprehensions of the Glory and Greatness of That Day Let us consider That Day Malac. 3. 18. When we shall Return and Descern between the Righteous and the Wicked Him that Serveth God and Serveth Him not Him that Sweareth and Him that Feareth an Oath and between the Wise and the Foolish Virgins and not put off the Thoughts of it Because we see the World so Earnest in Eating and Drinking Buying and Selling Building and Planting Marrying and Giving in Marriage For so it was in the Days of Noah and of Lot until the very Day And so our Lord saith It shall be in the Day of the Son of Man Applicat 6. Let us so Consider and Apply our Selves to the Examining what manner of Men we ought to be in All Holiness and Godliness
of Conversation and therein to Look for and to Haste on to the Day of God and with the Spirit and under his Influences and with the Bride-like Affection Cry out as Hearers mov'd with an Holy Sympathy or Likeness of Affection Even Cry out in Harmony Come Lord Jesus Come Quickly SERMON VI. On Matthew 25. v. 1. Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened unto Ten Virgins which took their Lamps and went forth to meet the Bridegroom c. I Have in several Discourses led you through the great Importance and Sense of our Lord in this Parable Which is one of those wherein as he speaks Matth. 13. he opened his Mouth in Parables and uttered Things that had been kept secret from the foundation of the World I have spoken of several particulars herein and will go directly upon what is now before us and to be spoken of and that is That while the Bridegroom tarried all these Virgins both the wise and the unwise slumbred and slept Now it is indeed a great difficulty to find out the very meaning and sense of our Lord in this part of the Parable For it seems strange that not only the unwise but that the wise Virgins slumbred and slept And to give a sense of this suitable to the meaning and to the rest of the Parable I shall at this time by the assistance of God undertake and so to Discourse of it accordingly I observe therefore to you That here are two Words used by our Lord They slumbred and they slept I look upon these Words to have two very different senses though they may seem to be perfectly alike And that slumbring and sleeping as indeed Scripture and common Language generally join both together mean one and the same thing But I understand the First concerning the spiritual state of the Churches of Christ during the delay of Christs coming and of the Kingdom of Christ All the whole state of the Christian Church hath been from the very beginning of the working of the Mystery of Iniquity it hath been in a slumbring condition But then the sleeping I look upon that to be an expression of the dying of the Servants of Christ all along from the Time of the Resurrection of Christ to this very Time And the latter is consequent upon the former For I am fully perswaded That if the Power and Glory and vigour of Christianity in a settled state of Christianity if that had immediately followed upon the Resurrection of Christ and the giving of the Spirit that pouring out of the Spirit that was in the Apostles days I do fully believe there had been no such Thing as dying Even as when the Kingdom of Christ comes there shall be no more Death So if the Kingdom of Christ had immediately proceeded upon the first Preaching of the Gospel there had been no sleeping If there had been no slumbring there had been no sleeping And I shall give you two great Reasons why I understand the Word sleeping concerning dying They slumbred that is the Power of Christianity did not shew it self upon them And so they slept that is they died The first Reason I would give you of it is this Because the Intention of our Lord in this Parable is chiefly That we may look to the Power of Christianity in our own hearts to such a power of it as that we should be able to appear with Christ when he comes to the Wedding That our Lamps should not then go out The great Meaning the great Scope of the Parable is this That we should look to have the very Life and Truth of Grace so in our hearts that we may have a Light of it when Christ comes that will not go out in the very time in that very instant Time wherein we should go with him to the Wedding Now it is very plain That the Wise Virgins indeed had this Light For it is said of them ver 10. They that were ready which is spoken of the wise Virgins they went in with him to the Marriage and the Door was shut So that if the wise Virgins had slept in that sense that the foolish Virgins did I say if they had slept in the same sense they would not have been ready to go into the Wedding with Christ So that these wise Virgins they did watch and they did not sleep in the main sense of the Parable For they were ready to go in with him to the Wedding Altho therefore they did die yet in the great concernment of Eternity they did not sleep away their time they did not lose their opportunity of providing a Treasure of Oil. A Second Reason that I give you Why this sleeping is not meant of the spiritual estate of these Virgins but only of their dying is Because it is said At Midnight there was a Cry made And then they arose and trimmed their Lamps Now this Midnight is that state of death in regard of the Body in which all the servants of Christ lie till that Resurrection till that First Resurrection that is spoken of This is indeed like a Midnight For when the Bodies of Saints lie in the Dust it is as if a Midnight were upon them as to that visible state and appearance of Body though their Spirits are indeed with Christ yet their Bodies lie as in a Midnight And if you speak of the Apostles of Christ Peter Paul John and the rest of them they are all of them as it were in a Midnight sleep as to their Bodies And therefore the Midnight is so properly to be understood Whereas in regard of the Spiritual State of the Church of Christ which is before his Coming before the Glory of his Coming it shall not be a Midnight For as I have often endeavoured to make plain unto you That assoon as ever those Time Times and half Time of the Antichristian Power are at an end immediately a great Light and a great Glory of the Gospel shall shine out that it shall not be a Midnight Indeed the Light will not be perfectly clear or precious till the Glory of the Kingdom of Christ But I cannot but hope and expect That within very few years there will be such a state of Christianity such a state of the Gospel the Everlasting Gospel preached through the World There will be such a new Mission and Commission of the Servants of Christ That it shall not be to be accounted a Midnight in that regard Nor shall the Coming of Christ be so on the sudden but that there will be great Light concerning it When that Angel that flyes through the midst of Heaven Rev. 14. shall have preach'd the Everlasting Gospel to every Nation c. These are the Reasons why I cannot understand this Word sleeping to be a representation of the spiritual state of the Church and Servants of Christ But I do understand by the slumbring That there is such a deadish such a drousie such a benumm'd state of Christianity as
indeed we see in the very best to this day Therefore the Observation that I shall lay down and endeavour to open to you is this That Christianity in regard of the present state of Christians and as they have been since Ephesus Rev. 2. left its first love since there was a decay of the Glory and. Purity and presence of the Gospel from the Apostles Time Since then I say Christianity in the Power and Spirit of it though it hath not downright slept yet it hath been as in a slumber For indeed I have often said it and I cannot be in a remove from it That Christianity is not as it was intended by Christ it should be We have not seen the State and Glory of it And therefore I shall make it my business to represent to you by such Representations as the Scripture hath given us how the Power of Christianity hath faultred thus long and that it will come to its perfectly awakened State when the Kingdoms of this World are Proclaimed to be the Lord's and his Christ's And I shall date this failure especially to two Times and one of them will fall directly upon our selves First of all the Time when the Mystery of Iniquity was working in the Apostles days For you may plainly behold that by the very express words of the Apostle that in his own Time there was a working of the Mystery of Iniquity Then began the great decay and bringing down of the Glory of Christianity 2 Thes 2. 'T is a Scripture that I have often turned you to and therefore I hope you are acquainted with it I am perswaded the first Christians in the Apostles days needed as much to be restrained in thinking that the Day of Christ was at hand as we have need to be spurr'd on and to be provoked and to be earnestly perswaded to think that the Day of Christ is at hand For so the Apostle writes We beseech you saith he as if he was in a business of greatest earnestness and that he could not tell how he should prevail enough upon them to whom he wrote in it ver 1. We beseech you Brethren by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering together unto him That ye be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled neither by Spirit nor by Word nor by Letter as from us as that the Day of Christ is at hand They were ready to think The Day of Christ was to come just then Therefore the Apostle makes this earnest entreaty of them that they would not expect it You see what a different posture we are in now It is a hard matter to perswade any one to take off their hearts from the World and from loving it too deep and from thinking here 's a security in this World and we may do as our Fathers have done before us for so many Hundred Years in the Profession of Christianity We may be buying and selling and getting Estates and laying a foundation in this World Who is it that doth not count it a sort of Madness to disswade them from such a thing But the Christians of that Time they needed as earnest a perswasion That they might not think that the Day of Christ was so near at hand And so Christ in the 19th of Luke speaks that Parable that they should not because they did think The Kingdom of Heaven was nigh at hand He spake a Parable on purpose to assure them that it was not so nigh But Alas we need strong perswasions to the contrary And I may say the contrary to the Christians of this Time I beseech you Brethren by the coming of our Lord Jesus and by our gathering together unto him that you would not be shaken in mind by the general way of Peoples Profession and Preaching and Hearing as if the Day of Christ were not at hand And as the Apostle saith Let no man deceive you by any means for that day shall not come except there come a falling away first and that Man of Sin be revealed the Son of Perdition So I say to you That day is near approaching For that falling away that Apostacy from Christianity it hath been and it is now very near to its expiring And therefore the great reason why it could not be then it is now a reason why it must speedily be because the Apostacy hath been so long because the Time and the last Date by God and by Christ is almost run out and expired that is the Time Times and half Time Here therefore to speak and bring home the thing to the present purpose I am upon Since this Apostacy began to work since that very Time Christianity hath been in a slumber For in this second Chap. v. 7. saith the Apostle the Mystery of Iniquity doth already work Now as soon as ever the Mystery of Iniquity began to work immediately there began a slumber upon the Christian Religion And therefore one would wonder Indeed it is a place that one would wonder to read and to find in the Epistle to the Philippians what the Apostle speaks Chap. 2. 20. For I have no man saith he like-minded speaking of Timotheus who will naturally genuinely sincerely care for your state For saith he All seek their own not the things which are Jesus Christ's I speak of him as an extraordinary Person saith the Apostle By this we may plainly see it was a great variation from what you read in the second and third Chapters of the Acts where they minded nothing but only the Promotion of Christianity No one called any thing their own they minded nothing but Christianity it self But Christianity hath been in a slumber ever since or else we should be Christians of another Life of another Spirit of another Power I say were it not that Christianity hath been in a slumber so long And this is with a great deal of spiritual Wit if I may so speak and a great deal of spiritual Elegancy set out to us in the Song of Solomon I shall have occasion to make great recourse to the Description that is there given to us Sol. Song c. 5. v. 2. I sleep but my heart waketh it is the voice of my Beloved that knocketh saying open to me my Sister my Love my Dove my undefiled for my Head is filled with Dew and my Locks with the Drops of the Night What 's the meaning of this Indeed I know Men are ready to say That these things are only Imaginations and Whimsies and Apprehensions of ones own that speaks of them But I have found a clear Thread and Line drawn from David's time till the very Glorious Coming of Christ in this very Song of Solomon And I find that the Time when the Apostacy came in is just under the very description that we here have As therefore when after a clear Day a Sun-shiny-day at Night the Drops of Dew you know they fall thick upon the heads of those that are in the Air. So
Christ doth declare A night should come at that time upon his Church My head saith he is wet with the drops of Dew of the Night Because Christianity was drawing its Ceremonies long they began then at that very time they begun then to draw out the shadows of the Evening A great many Ceremonies came into Christianity and a Form and Way of Prayer suitable and agreeable to it and such ways of Preaching as prepar'd for it And then they came to be more intent upon the Remembrance of such a Saint and such a Martyr and keeping their Days and drawing as many outward Forms and Ceremonies of Religion as they could and they neglected the Power of it And this Christ observes and calls it the Drops of Dew the Drops of the Night upon his Head And then the Church of Christ began to slumber And this is the first Time that is to be taken notice of in regard of the slumbering even of the wise Virgins Of which I shall speak presently more particularly to you The Second is this And I desire that none would be offended or think me censorious in speaking of it For I design nothing I can truly Appeal to God but only to speak the Truth and the Reality of Things in a Point where Scripture calls for the speaking of it That is This Slumber hath been since the Reformation As soon as ever the first Power had shewn it self There was indeed a mighty Spirit of Truth and Spirit of Holiness in the first Reformation Men and Women were then Christians of a high Rate of a high Degree of a high Excellency How willing were they to suffer in the days of Queen Mary in our own Nation How did they love one another How did the Power and Glory of Christianity appear in them But I hope it will be no scandal to say this That it hath been in a decay for a Hundred Years For it is the very express words of one that is Dr. Burnet that we know by the Name of the Bishop of Salisbury he spake it plainly and openly in this City That the Reformation has Sermon Of not falling out by the Way been losing ground for these Hundred Years And whence is this But only a great slumber hath fallen upon the Profession of the Protestant Religion for a Hundred Years And the Glory and Power and Excellency of Christianity we have not yet restored to its own Beauty and to its own Glory And this I have endeavoured several times both in Discourse and in Writing to make plain That the Church of Sardis is the Representation of the Generality of the Christian Churches under the Reformation And I desire that you would but read and weigh the Description that is given of that Church Rev. 3. 1 2. And to the Angel of the Church in Sardis write These things saith he that hath the Seven Spirits of God and the Seven Stars I know thy works that thou hast a Name that thou livest and art dead Be watchful saith he and strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die Be watchful What 's the meaning of that But only to shew that the State of the Protestant Churches had fallen into a great slumber a great drowsiness And therefore it is that we know so little of the Power of Christianity at this day And saith he I have not found thy works perfect before God Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard and hold fast and repent If therefore thou shalt not watch observe that I will come on thee as a Thief and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee if thou dost not watch Here we plainly see what is opposed to slumbering it is watching And when Christ saith Watch so often and so much it signifies that his Church would fall into a slumbering condition it had a Name to live it was not perfectly dead But it was not vigorous and powerful in the ways of Christianity And therefore watch and strengthen the things that remain which are ready to die I 'll give you only two Arguments why I am of this Judgment That this very Parable I am upon does look directly upon the state of the Protestant Churches and so upon our selves as in the Profession of the Protestant Religion at this very Time I 'll give you the two Arguments and then I 'll go on in a more practical way of discoursing the particulars of this slumbring of Christians in the Profession of Christianity The First Argument I give you is Because it is now the Time It is now the Time especially when our Lord delays his coming For there shall not be Time Times nor so much as half Time any more whole and entire For at the Reformation Christ began to make an appearance of his Kingdom and of his Coming And it is certain the bringing in of the Reformation as all true Protestants own it was one of the greatest Works of Providence that ever hath been known in the World and especially since the days of Christ It was strange and wonderful in the Times when God did it that he should bring in a Reformation against such high Pretences as that of The Catholick Church as Rome was called and against the Papacy and Hierarchy that took upon themselves to be the great Patrons of and Pretenders to Christian Religion and the true Votaries and Servants of it to have all things good within themselves Now That such a poor inconsiderable Person as Luther was should make opposition to such a Body when as the Kings and Princes of Europe were utter Enemies to the Reformation It was a Mighty Power of God And as I have often shew'd Rev. 10. is the very Representation of the Reformation Christ came down from Heaven clothed with a Cloud and with a Rainbow upon his head And he set his right Foot upon the Sea and his left Foot upon the Earth and cryed with a loud Voice as when a Lyon roareth and sware by him that liveth for ever and ever That Time and Times and even of half Time that it should be no longer Who would not I say but have expected that Christ should immediately have come and changed the World and brought in his Kingdom But our Lord delays his Coming only till the Hundred and Eighty Years are made up of which there wants only now but Five Years And at the present there is a great delay though I make no doubt It will not be long But yet Men think Christ hath delayed his Coming and where is the Promise of it and that he hath quite forgot it In this Time therefore of the Lord 's delaying his Coming there is such a great slumber upon the Christian Church In the second Place I have this great Reason that moves me much to think that the present delay that the Parable speaks of under that spiritual slumber of the Churches of Christ hath run along with the Time since the
Reformation Because Christ saith in the first Words Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened unto Ten Virgins When Why it shall be at that Time as in the 24th of Matthew though we divide Chapters yet the sense is not divided nor our Saviour's Sermon divided but our Lord is still going on in his Discourse Mat. 24. 48 49 c. But and if that evil Servant shall say in his heart my Lord delayeth his coming and shall begin to smite his fellow-servants and to eat and drink with the drunken The Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him and in an hour that he is not aware of and shall cut him in sunder and appoint him his portion with the Hypocrites There shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth There was never a greater Hypocrisie in the World than the Papacy To which they say you know in Reverence Your Holiness as we say to Princes Your Majesty or Your Highness And they say Your Holiness a Blasphemous Assumption and therefore he shall appoint him his portion with the Hypocrites Because he hath been the Evil Servant that hath said My Lord delayeth his coming And so he begins to Eat and Drink with the Drunken and to Smite the Men-servants and Maid-servants That is to Persecute the true Servants of Jesus Christ and of the Gospel Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likned unto Ten Virgins which took their Lamps c. when that Judgment is So that the Time before the punishing of this Bad Servant and the cutting him off and Devoting him to the Wrath and Indignation of God Before this there falls such a Slumber as this Now therefore Having made the way I shall Endeavour to go on and to speak to these two things First To shew wherein as to our particular we are to observe a Spirit of Slumber and that the power of Christianity does take small hold of us And then In the Second place I shall Endeavour to shew you wherein the Wise and Foolish Virgins Differ though they are both in a Slumber and they Die alike they Sleep alike yet there is a very vast and great difference betwixt them In the First place This is a very great Argument that we are under the Slumber of Christianity That we are not really in a Holy Transport in all the Services and Enjoyments and Ordinances of Christianity Indeed we make a shift to pass through the Form to hold up the Form of Prayer and of Preaching and of the Lord's Supper and of good Discourse sometimes one with another But we have not that mighty Affection we are just like Persons in a Slumber You know they understand something of what you say to them and they make some kind of Answer But they are so low and so imperfect herein that we may be sure they are not in the Vigour of their Senses and of their Understanding and of their Reasoning and of their Discourse Surely If we were raised to the Power of Christianity we should have more of those High Elevations of mind that the Apostle speaks of and that the Holy Men of Old in former times speak of We should have such flaming Desires after God and after Christ that our hearts would be Ravished and we should be drawn as it were out of our selves in these things Whereas we do but Nod as I may so express it in our way of Christianity Or when we seem to do something we are presently in a kind of Slumber so that there wants the Power and Life of it When David saith How sweet is thy Word to my taste Sweeter than the Hony or the Hony Comb It was another State than we are in All the 119 Psalm is a perpetual Rapture and Extasie of Heart All that time he was awake So Whom have I in Heaven but Thee And there is none upon Earth that I desire beside Thee And My Heart and my Flesh Faileth but thou art the strength of my Heart and my Portion for ever My Soul breaketh for the longing that it hath unto thy Judgments at all times All our Converse with Christ and with the Holy Ordinances of Christ and all our Drawings nigh to God They would be with a Holy Transport So in the 42. Psalm saith David As the Hart panteth after the water-Brooks so panteth my Soul after thee O God You cannot really suppose but that if we were fully possest with Religion indeed we should be carried out of our selves in Love and Service and Thankfulness and Obedience and all the Powers of Holiness and Religion Whereas now If a Person be but Civil to Religion If he will but sit patiently and hear a Discourse of it Or if he can but endure to be called off from the World to God we look upon it as a great Attainment But I say If Christianity were not under Slumber in the Spirits of Men we should be in a high Transport That as the Apostle speaks in the 2 Cor 5. The love of Christ Constrains us because we thus judge The Word as the Learned Observe signifies such a kind of Transports as when Elijah was taken up by the Spirit and carried hither and thither So the love of Christ constrains us that is Transports us every way Ver. 14. Wherefore saith he henceforth know we no man after the Flesh Ver. 16. Yea though we have known Christ after the Flesh yet now henceforth know we him so no more Surely This is the Slumber of Christianity that we are taken so much with outward appearances with out-sides of men The Apostle observed the Slumber of Christianity upon this account in his Day James 2. 2. If there come into your Assembly a man with a Gold Ring in goodly Apparel c. Here Christianity began to be in a Slumber not but that due regard ought to be to the several Ranks of Men But in this regard we know Men too much after the flesh so that it argues Christianity much in a Slumber Do but read I beseech you don 't think I speak either vainly or without due consideration of what I say Do but read those places of Scripture that are so Eminent in setting out the Glory of Christianity While we look not saith the Apostle in 2 Cor. 4. 18 at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal Now I say who is it that loves thus to look upon the things that are seen as nothing and the things that are not seen as all So saith he We know that if our earthly house of this Tabernacle were dissolved chap. 5. 1. we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens ver 2. For in this we groan earnestly saith the Apostle Who groans earnestly I do not speak at all to be censorious or to tax Men beyond Reason or any way to justifie my self
defire or have a greater value for than to see the Dawns of the Kingdom of Christ Oh! That God would give any of us leave to see this We should have great advantage of making our Calling and Election sure of working out our salvation with fear and trembling of being perswaded of the things that pertain to the Kingdom of God we should have great opportunities every way And therefore as Christ speaks when he propounded the Parable to them Matth. 13. 17. I say unto you That many Prophets and Righteous Men have desired to see those things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them So if God shall continue any of our lives but a few years to see the Kingdom of Christ appearing in this First Glory O happy and blessed shall we be For from the very beginning and foundation of the World to this day Many Prophets and Righteous Men have desired to see those things which we shall see then and have not seen them and to hear those things that we shall hear and have not heard them In the mean time Let none of us be discouraged if God call us sooner out of the World For as the Apostle saith All those that are Christ's he will certainly bring with him And it will certainly be a happier and securer state to be sleeping in Jesus and dying in Jesus For though we do not see these things here our Spirits shall see them above and our Bodies shall be raised in Glory for us to come with Christ in And as to those who are not as they desire to be for my part I know not any thing can be spoken for better Tydings or any thing that should more earnestly engage our Faith and Prayer than to have that great opportunity to wind up our Faith and Love and Repentance to their own height even that of the Coming of the Kingdom of Christ into its Succession and to see those blessed things and to hear them that many excellent persons have desired to see and hear and have not And therefore let none be offended that the Kingdom of Christ is near at hand for we shall have greater and more blessed advantages and opportunities to make our Calling and Election sure when that time comes Let us therefore desire to hear those loud Voices from Heaven Proclaim That the Kingdoms of this World are become the Kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ On which will soon follow that pouring out of the Spirit and the Preaching the Everlasting Gospel SERMON VIII On Matthew 25. v. 6 c. And at Midnight there was a Cry made Behold the Bridegroom cometh go ye out to meet him Then all those Virgins arose and trimmed their Lamps And the Foolish said unto the Wise Give us of your Oil for our Lamps are gone out c. I Have led you through several parts of this great and admirable Parable The last thing I Discoursed to you was concerning the Midnight-Cry and endeavoured to shew you That though there might be some use made of it as a Description of any Judgment that should come upon the Churches of Christ before his Coming Yet That the Principal Intention is That Cry That Voice of the Son of God That Shout that the Lord will descend in That Voice of the Archangel That Trump of God that shall raise all that are asleep in their Graves and shall bring them forth I Endeavoured to open to you That every one shall rise in the very same Circumstances wherein they lay down in Death and in the Grave And therefore That the Day of Judgment coming upon Prophane and Insolent Persons upon the Fools that say in their hearts There is no God will be like the Writing of the Fingers on the Wall before Belshazzar that we read of Dan. 5. And as it comes upon ignorant Persons in Christianity and upon the Worldlings those Fools that say We have much Goods laid up for many Years and therefore Soul Take thy ease Eat Drink and be Merry O! what an Earthquake will it be upon them to see the Kingdom of Christ Now They shall be raised both the Fools that say That there is no God and the Worldlings c. They shall be raised just in the same Terror in the same Consternation as if the Earthquake was now upon them or in the Time of Life now on Earth But I proposed to shew you also Wherein the state of the foolish and the wise Virgins differ wherein this great difference lies That one enter into the Wedding and the other are shut out And that is it which now by the assistance of God I would undertake and go forward to give you a clear Representation of this great Matter For as I told you Virgins bespeaks a being of the Pure and True Religion the true Religion of the Gospel the Doctrine of God in the Gospel For all whatsoever false Doctrine or false Worship does adulterate this it is called in Scripture not by the Name of Virginity but by the Name of Whoredom by the Name of Adultery and Fornication Whatever defiles the Religion of Jesus Christ is not stiled Virginity but by other Names And therefore it is certain That these Virgins must be of the truest and of the purest Religion of Jesus Christ In the second Place I told you That they must needs be of a tollerable sober Conversation They are not of the Prophane the Drunkards or the Swearers or the Sensualists of the World but they are those that walk in such unblameable life that they are worthy to be counted and to be stiled Virgins What a critical Case therefore What a very nice and curious Point is this that distinguishes between the wise and the foolish Virgins If therefore God shall be pleased in any measure to enable me to open this to you and that you may aright conceive and understand so great a Point I hope That by his Blessing our coming together may be for the better and not for the worse I shall therefore apply my self to it First By considering the scope of the Parable in this Matter And I find That it lies here The one had Oyl in their Lamps but they had not Oyl in their Vessels The other had Oyl in their Vessels as well as in their Lamps So that it comes to this One hath a Treasure a Store of Grace beyond the Profession the other hath not I shall Answer very plainly and down-right Discourse in this thing by leading you to some great Expressions of Scripture which do to me assure what our Lord intends In the Third Chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians v. 16 c. The Apostle in that Great and Excellent Prayer begs of the Father of Glory the Father of Glory An Expression most suitable and agreeable to the Kingdom of Christ appearing in its Glory to which this Parable refers That he would grant you according to the
riches of his Glory to be strengthned with might by his Spirit in the inner man That Christ may dwell in your hearts by Faith I look upon this to be Oyl in the Vessel It is Christ abiding in the heart For tho indeed the Vessel is not the Fountain yet it speaks the Vessel closely conjoyned with the Fountain and the Fountain continually springing into 't Another place of Scripture that I would give you You know Faith and Love they are much required and insisted on in the Gospel now observe what the Apostle saith in the 1 Tim. 1. 14. And the Grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with Faith and Love which is in Christ Jesus Where is the Treasure of Faith and Love It is in Christ Jesus it is never out of him the Spring of it is never out of him Faith and Love which is in Christ Jesus The Spring overflows to the Vessel with Faith and Love but the Spring and the Fountain is Christ himself And so 2 Tim. 2 1. Thou therefore my Son be strong in the Grace that is in Christ Jesus Be strong in the Grace that is in him It is never out of him though it flows to the Souls and Spirits of Believers yet it is never out of Christ So that here is the Oyl in the Treasure of it it is when the Soul is united to Christ the Fountain of it here is the Oyl that is able to bear up For in two things I think the comparison lies that our Lord intended in this Parable between Grace and Oyl First It must needs be of such an excellent quality that it can bear up with the Glory of that Day And then In the Second place It must be so abundant that it can last with the Glory of that Day For if the Oyl be not of the high and excellent kind it will presently go out As you know the higher Light of the Sun it puts out the lower Light of Fire or Tapers that we have below so the Glory of that Day will put out any Light but only the Light of the Righteousness and Grace that is in Jesus Christ and none else will last There 's no Spring of Light but only that which comes from him Heb. 7. 16. who is after the power of an endless life It is only Christ that is Oil in the Treasure Therefore take the most Excellent Grace That 's the Point that I would endeavour to carry out to you Take the most Excellent Grace if it be out of Christ if it be only in the Person himself it is a Lamp that will go out but if the Vessel be at the Fountain Head and is joined to the Fountain then it is able to supply to the Glory of that Day And I shall represent it to you therefore by a History of Scripture that may serve as an excellent Parallel to Expound the Parable that I am now upon In 2 Kings 4. 1. There cried a certain Woman of the Wives of the Sons of the Prophets unto Elisha saying Thy Servant my Husband is dead and thou knowest that thy Servant did fear the Lord and the Creditor is come to take unto him my two Sons to be Bond-men And Elisha said unto her What shall I do for thee Tell me What hast thou in the House And she said Thine Hand-Maid hath not any thing in the House save a Pot of Oil. Then he said Go Borrow thee Vessels abroad of all thy Neighbours even empty Vessels borrow not a few And when thou art come in thou shalt shut the Door upon thee and upon thy Sons and shall pour out into all those Vessels and thou shalt set aside that which is full So she went from him and shut the Door upon her and upon her Sons who brought the Vessels to her and she poured out And it came to pass when the Vessels were full that she said unto her Son bring me yet a Vessel And he said unto her There is not a Vessel more And the Oil stayed Now this is the thing only That I would represent to you That to us that are in a miserable and needy and wanting condition and in danger to be Bond-Men and Bond-Women to the Wrath and Justice of God for ever Here is the Oil multiplied The Oil multiplies from the Fountain from the Infinite Grace that is in Jesus Christ that we may stand at that Day And therefore That which I would advise and press upon every one of us from this very Point is That above all things we would mind our being in Christ I shall endeavour to free it from all Objections that you may be ready to make before I close the Point But to give you a Parable or a Representation that is nearer and does indeed intend this very thing If you look into the Prophet Zachary you shall see what it is to have Oil not only in the Lamp but in the Vessel that is to have a continual supply For though indeed this Parable seems to go no further than Oil in the Vessel yet when we come to enter into it we must needs find that it must be Oil from the Fountain alone that can do us good Zach. 4. 1 2. And the Angel that talked with me came again and waked me as a Man that is wakened out of his sleep And said unto me what Seest thou and I said I looked and behold a Candlestick all of Gold with a bowl upon the top of it and his Seven Lamps thereon and Seven Pipes to the Seven Lamps which were upon the top thereof And two Olive-Trees by it one upon the Right side of the Bowl and the other upon the Left side thereof And it came to that The Sons of oyl as they are called v. 12. through the Golden Pipes empty the Golden Oil out of themselves into the Golden Bowl Now What 's the Meaning of all this Not by Might nor by Power but by my Spirit saith the Lord that 's the Meaning of all They Empty the Golden Oil out of themselves That Golden Oil by which our Lamps will bear up and shine at that Day it must come from those Sons of Oyl That is From those Olive-branches Both which are only a Representation of Christ's Fulness in his Righteousness and in his Spirit So that here is that that alone can bear us up and bear up the Shining of our Lamps in that Day of the Glorious Solemnity of the Marriage of the Lamb That which alone can bear us up is the Righteousness and Spirit of Jesus Christ Which are always Connected and Joyned one with another And Proportionable hereunto are other Similitudes The Wedding-Garment that we read of Matt. 22. which a Man not having on when he came to the Wedding he was sound Speechless That is Nothing but the Garment of the Righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Graces of his Spirit The King came in to see the Guests he saw there a Man which had not
the sure Place nothing of Good can be expected But if you would hang even the least Vessel the Vessel of least Quantity any where hang it upon Christ Hang it upon the Nail in the sure Place And if any of you have any Troubled Thoughts or Contest of Mind about these Things I beseech you That you would go up to this Nail that is fastned in a sure Place For that Vessel that we hang any where else it shall certainly be cut down and the Nail we hang it upon will certainly be cut down or removed for the Lord hath spoken it All our Lamps that shine in their own Light they will go out in that Day at the Appearance of Christ like Sparks that we compass our selves with of our own kindling All that do so shall lie down in Sorrow The Last Objection is But how shall we know that we are in Christ Can we discern it any otherwise than by the Marks and Signs of Grace that we find in our Selves If therefore we find not Faith if we find not Repentance and all the Fruits of Holiness How can we think or dare we think that we are in Christ Now therefore To this I would give you this Twofold Answer First It is certain That the Supream Witness to any of our Souls it must be from the Spirit of Christ it must be from the Spirit of Adoption crying Abba Father He is called the Spirit of the Son I beseech you seriously consider it Gal. 4. 6. Because ye are Sons God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your Hearts crying Abba Father Why does he call it the Spirit of the Son But to shew that it is the Witness coming from Christ If therefore it comes from him The Great Witness of the Spirit is That we are in Christ It doth not come to us in our own Righteousness For then Why should it be called The Spirit of the Son No not in our own Sanctification does it come to us But it is The Spirit of the Son And It 's a sure Testimony of its Glorifying Christ in taking the Things that are Christ's and Giving to us even in its Testimony You may say This may Deceive us And we don't know Whether it is the Spirit or not Observe what the Apostle saith in 1 John 5. speaking of the Witness of the Spirit latter part of the 6th Verse And the Witness of the Spirit is Truth Why does he say The Witness of the Spirit is Truth but to meet with the Things that are in our Hearts that we are ready to say There are other Good Witnesses we dare not Believe the Spirit alone But we have other Good Witnesses and we must bring them in And if they say so too then we may Believe the Spirit or else not Now the Apostle saith The Witness of the Spirit is Truth To let us know there is a separate single Witness of the Spirit of God that is true I know no Reason at all That we should be afraid to Affirm this For If the Spirit of God dwells as Generally the Best and most Judicious Discoursers of these Things allow if the Spirit of God dwell in us Why should it be strange that the Spirit of God should whisper its Witness in this way And the Apostle speaks of this very Witness when he saith The Witness of the Spirit is True But then In the Second Place I do acknowledge this freely and abundantly That the Spirit of God doth make use of this or that particular Grace or Holiness in general in a Saint of Christ As he pleases sometimes he Witnesseth only by himself sometimes by such and such Graces And why Not because the Graces themselves are alone able to bear up the Witness That I plainly deny But then The Spirit Witnesseth not only of Grace of Faith of Repenâ—ance and Holiness c. but as they are in Christ Faith and Love in Christ Jesus And as they are made up of his Righteousness and flow from his Death Resurrection and Intercession And here is that that I said to you Christ takes any Grace of his Servants and shews it at the Day of Judgment Not as it is out of himself but as it is in himself and in his own Righteousness and by his Spirit He now shews to any of his Servants any of their Graces but not as out of Christ but as in Christ surrounded made up fill'd up with his Righteousness As I remember the Expression in the Book of Exodus where the Jewels that were in the Vrim and Thummim in the Breast-plate of the High-Priest Their setting is called Filling up They were filled up in the Gold the Receptacles and Lodgings of them were filled up Exod. 28. So I say In every Grace there 's the filling up of the Righteousness of Christ Take all the Graces of Paul and of Peter or any of the Servants of Christ And if they had not been Set in the Righteousness of Christ if there were not a Filling up by the Righteousness of Christ they would all come to nought And therefore they are filled up with his Righteousness And so I do acknowledge That it may be That the Spirit of God may give his Servants a Witness and a Testimony from their own Graces And so in 1 John 4. 17. Herein saith he is our Love made perfect That we may have Boldness in the Day of Judgment Because as he is so are we in this World There is no Fear in Love but perfect Love casteth out Fear He that feareth is not made perfect in Love Here the Apostle speaks of a Tormenting a Disturbing and Perplexing Fear The Power of Love to Christ drives it out Because as he was so are we in this World That is The more Christ is pleased to Sanctifie his People taking it still for a Sanctification in himself as he is made to us Wisdom in our Calling Righteousness in our Justification Holiness in our Sanctification and Eternal Glory stiled Redemption all in him and from him I shall therefore wind up This in these two Brief Applications The First is You see here as Solomon speaks in another Case When all is spoken that can be spoken We know saith he it is but Man It is nothing but Man That is speaking of the Weakness of Man All that can be said saith he you have nothing but Weak Frail Man And on the other side speaking of Christ There 's nothing to be said but this He is All All in All we are nothing Here 's the Sum of the Matter We are Nothing all that is in us is Nothing All that God or his Spirit hath wrought in us it is nothing if you could take it out of Christ it will be a Lamp put out in obscure Darkness Carry this constantly upon your Thoughts He that hath the Son hath Life And he that hath not the Son of God hath not Life We rest upon nothing when we rest upon our selves Let us
fair in the Wisdom of God and they are both to be offered to the Minds and Consciences of men and they shall both work Effectually for the great ends and purposes that God hath appointed And as as Christ saith If any one be offended let them be offended Why Because every Plant which my Heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up That is there shall be no Plant lost but what God leaves to it self in his just and righteous Judgment That is A Moral Man and an Honest Man and a Sober Man so by the Grace of God he shall be so still God hath chosen and mark'd him out to be such a one And he that is truly good he shall be so And yet all this shall be conveyed in the power of Preaching and in such kind of Threatnings and Promises such kind of Expostulations as Scriptures speak and therefore I would not have you think that these things should be put to a Jarre by any Mens Preaching for every one is under the righteous Government of God Now therefore let Truths run ever according to the Word of God let them run freely as a stream from Free Grace Let them then be with all the Freeness and Publickness spoken of that can be And as it is said in Exodus 14. There was a Pillar of Cloud and a Pillar of Fire in one And the Pillar of Cloud was turned that is the dark side was turned upon the Egyptians and the light side upon the Israelites So I say when the Word of God is preached the Light side shall be upon the person that God will have a sober honest righteous good man and the dark side shall be upon the dissolute and upon the prophane and upon the intemperate And so the dark side shall be upon them that God leaves to themselves and the Light side shall be upon those that God will bring under his Grace and under his Spirit and under the Power of Holiness And so I have Discoursed the Doctrinal part of this great Point to you and I hope so That none of you should have any just cause of being offended at what I have spoken but that it should engage every one of us to run up to Grace and to Christ for the hopes are greater that I have laid down to you out of the Scriptures wherein our Springs lie then when they call upon us for our own Action and Duty And when they do so they shew us the great necessity of Christ of the Spirit of Christ of Free Grace For don't we see Men are Preaching up Free-Will and Works as much as they can And yet for all that was there ever so much prophaneness and wickedness was there ever any less Power and Life of the Gospel since the Reformation than now there is And therefore though the Pulpits be full of this yet we don't see the powerful Grace of God go along so that we have reason to rejoice at such Preaching but those that Preach the Righteousness of Christ without Works and set forth the fulness of Free Grace and of the Supream Dominion of God and yet in a way of Holiness I can remember and trace back That there were great effects of this Mens Lives were mightily Changed and Reformed They were mightily changed notwithstanding that this Preaching was endeavoured to be stifled and stopt There were many effects both in City and Country in bringing Men to God and to Christ by that Preaching and so there are still and therefore to close all in the Application 1. In the First Place I would earnestly beseech you That you would prize this Grace And Oh! that God would be pleased to turn the Bright-side of what I have now spoken on and that you would go into your secret Closets and Meditations and lay your selves low before God and acknowledge the freeness of God's Grace One have I chosen and another have I left Be not afraid of this I say it shall do you no hurt at all God may make it a time of Love And the more you depend upon Grace upon the Righteousness of Christ the more holiness and the more you shall find the Power and Breathing of the Spirit of Jesus Christ upon you And therefore Remember the Three things whereupon we stand viz. The Free Grace of God before the Foundation of the World The Righteousness of Jesus Christ our whole Trust as to our acceptance witâ— God The Spirit of Grace in building up in the ways of Holiness And 2. In the Second Place Let not from all that I have spoken any think That any thing will be accepted without sincerity of Grace For where-ever there hath been the Love of God or the Righteousness of Christ that hath taken hold of any ones State and Condition and where the Spirit of God hath taken hold upon any ones heart there shall be sure to be the mighty Effect of Grace and Holiness and Spirituality and that in a Man 's own action he shan't lie still and say I 'll see what God will work upon me but he shall be up and be up and be doing because the Lord is with him He shall be active and full of motion striving and full of industry because the Light-Side of the Scripture is upon him and he is kept from every thing that offends His foot shall not be taken as Scripture saith while he holds himself close in dependance upon Free Grace upon the free Choice and Election of Grace I am sure you shall not be ashamed if God move your hearts and if the Light-Side of Scripture be upon you in these things you shall find God will be your Confidence and your sure and strong hold his Name in these things shall be your strong Tower to which ye shall run and be safe In the Third Place I desire you would give me but one Moments time to move you to beg for the Coming of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and for the Time it shall first be preparing for its Glory and which I have declared to be so near upon so great Ground of Scripture Now I would give you Ground of earnestly begging for this Kingdom of Christ and the succession of it And why Because there shall be great Converting Grace bringing in Strangers to God and to Christ There shall be a greater Power in bringing men to the Purity and Simplicity that is in Christ Then many foolish Virgins yet shall be made wise many not Virgins yet shall be Espoused to Christ And if you say Why was not this always The Answer that I shall give you is this It is in the power of God to dispence Grace as he pleases You may as well say Why had not our fore-Fathers the Gospel as pure as we have Why had they not the Scripture so clear And why had they it not in their own Language Two or Three or Four or Five Hundred Years ago It was a dangerous thing within these Two Hundred Years to
do for that After-State let us do it now For in dying Spirits going out of Bodies enter into their Determinative State They enter in the State they were in here They carry out the Oil they have whether only in the Lamp of their Profession or in the Vessel the Heart united to Christ the Fountain And so they must abide so they must appear when the Bridegroom cometh This is the holy and wise Decree of God concerning the Human Spirit and who dare controll it From hence then it necessarily follows That this Watch is to be maintained in this Present State and that it can be only here and that therefore it is only in order to and with relation to the Coming of the Bridegroom but not with relation to the Time of his Coming for then the Doctrine of Watching had not been proper to Persons living so many Ages before it but because every person successively living since the Time our Lord spake these words is in the Time of his Life to exercise this Watch that is to see he hath the Oil in his Vessel and not in his Lamp only that he may stand before the Son of Man at his Coming Therefore it is a Doctrine necessary to every Age as well those furthest off as those nearest to his Coming because every one hath but a Life-Time to Watch in and he is much more to be wrought upon by the sence of the shortness and incertainty of his own Life than by the nearness of the Bridegrooms Coming and the incertainty of the time of that as we plainly see by every Days Experience And this is much the more uncontestable by observing the Apostle Paul's earnestness against the Christians of those Times thinking the Day of Christ was then at hand which he solemnly affirms could not be till an Apostacy of 1260 Days of Years should have come in and that not immediately neither and have run out Yea our very Lord himself when They thought the Kingdom of God should immediately have appeared Luke 19. 11 c. gives the Parable of a Nobleman going into a far Country and returning importing a distance of Time all which had been a contradiction to watching because we know not the day nor hour if the meaning had not been a making provision in the present Life for the Bridegrooms Coming how many Ages after soever it should be and that else it would come upon us at unawares and on the sudden and find us unready unprovided for it Argument 2. It further appears That Watching is the making such provision in this present Time for the Bridegrooms Coming as will bear up to the Glory of that Time because in the same State wherein we lie down we shall rise at that day whenever it be and openly appear therein in the face of Heaven and Earth The Judgment of Spirits though it be before God and Christ and Aangels and Saints yet Scripture speaks of it as of a private Judgment for the Day of the Appearance of Christ is spoken of Rom. 2. 5. as the Revelation or uncovering that righteous Judgment of God which as pass'd upon Spirits returning to God that gave them is as covered and secret There is greatest reason to be assured That when Spirits of Saints come into the hand of Christ there is joy in Heaven for if there be joy at their Conversion in the presence of the Angels of God and so of Saints there is much more so in the coming of Spirits to Glory but this Joy and the Shouts of it are not heard down on Earth But at that Appearance of Christ they are presented with exceeding joy before Heaven and Earth And so are All not in Christ with contempt and dishonour And this is the great Mystery and Wonder of the Oeconomy the Order of that Day That persons rise in the very same State wherein they lie down God will have it so for the clearness of his Judgment though persons die in the corner of a Bed as the Prophets expression is yet they shall openly appear in the same circumstances they died God will have every ones Judgment as in all orderly Governments to be sub Dio openly in the Face of Heaven and Earth they shall all appear as in the Fact 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus he will be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that believe in that day and justified in the Condemnation of all whom he condemns If God should dispose of some to Hell and some to Heaven and that there were no publick account of the matter we might think they were so disposed of by God as by an Arbitrary Power and in secret and so his Justice called in Question But when Spirits that have been so disposed of in private both Spirits so publickly and Bodies are called for together and the Judgment affirmed This is clear and open proceeding and therefore a Day of Judgment and of Resurrection is so often spoken of All shall be brought Face to Face and we shall not only know one another who have conversed together but even of all Ages Abraham Isaac and Jacob Cain and Esau Saul Achitophel and Judas All shall be known and we shall know what becomes of every one to Eternity Death here and Spirits entring into their everlasting state is not All of which we may say Who knows the Spirit of a Saint of a wise Virgin that goes upward of a wicked man of a foolish Virgin that goes downward But at that Day shall be known All the Good Men we have read of in Scripture or in true Accounts of History And the Evil Men and Hypocrites Each Company and Person apart and apart God and Christ will pass upon all openly and in Publick And that which I would further urge every one shall Rise in the very Fact the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in which they lay down Belshazzars in their way Diveses in their way the Worldlings in their way and the Foolish Virgins in their way Crying Lord Lord without Truth and Power as here The great Tyrants Enemies of the Kingdom of Christ in their way To that purpose they are describ'd as having laid their Weapons of War under their Heads with their Iniquities upon their Bones Ezek. 32. 17. and so they 'll come to the Battel of Armageddon The Iniquity and the Bones the Persons and Weapons of War will appear together in that Day of the Revelation of the Righteous Judgment of God as even then in actual War against the Lamb and his Saints This is the Great and stupendious management of the Day of Judgment of that Day and Hour of which in this Sense especially and not as relating to Time no one knows no Angels no not the Son as Man The Father only the Eternal Beeing alone had Wisdom to find out Authority Dominion and Power thus to execute It is therefore the great Point of watchfulness to Live so and so to Dye as we would desire to Rise and
constituted in his own power He distributes them as he pleases Why did not our Lord Jesus appear sooner in the World He came in the End of the World and in these last days God hath spoken to us by his Son And saith our Lord to his Disciples Many Prophets and Righteous Men have desired to see the things you see and have not seen them and to hear the things you hear and have not heard them But when that Time comes how will the Bridegrooms near approach change the World Converts will come in as the Drops of Dew from the Womb of the Morning which is stiled The Dew of Christs youth Then shall the eyes of the blind see out of obscurity the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped and the Tongue of the stammerers shall speak plainly Isa 29. 18. 32. 3 4. The Lame shall leap as an Hart and the Tongue of the dumb shall sing and there shall be a way it shall be called the way of holiness the unclean shall not pass over it It shall be so plain and easie that wayfaring Men though fools shall not err therein it shall be so secure That no Lion nor ravenous Beast shall be there it shall be for those viz. the servants of Christ Oh! how shall all this flowing from the powring out of the Spirit from on high awaken to make provision of Oil in the Vessel to look to the truth of union to Christ and secure against Foolish Virginity For the Wilderness shall become a fruitful field But the more particular Application I reserve for the following Discourse as conclusive of the whole SERM. XI On Matth. 25. 13. Watch therefore for ye know neither the Day nor the Hour wherein the Son of Man cometh I Shall at this Time by the assistance of God fully conclude the long Discourse that I have had upon this Great Parable by recollecting all that hath been spoken in practical Applications of it wherein I cannot but remember what I have so often mentioned of our Lord's saying I will open my mouth in Parables and utter things that have been kept secret from the foundation of the World By Jesus Christ himself it is applied to himself And surely this is an exceeding great Parable and it is especially fitted to every one that draws near to God and to Christ in the profession of the Gospel For so as I have told you it is very evident That this Name of Virgins necessarily implies the most Excellent State of Profession of Christianity that is not truly and thoroughly and universally sound for were it not that the word Foolish comes in and like a dead Fly as I told you makes the whole Box of oyntment to send forth a stinking savour the very name of Virginity every where in Scripture is on purpose to set forth the reality of Grace and of a State in Christ It is said therefore The Virgins shall be brought unto thee in Rayment of Needle-work Psal 45. It is a Great State So I have espoused you as a chaste Virgin to Christ It is said of the 144000 on Mount Sion with the Lamb They have not defiled themselves with Women for they are Virgins Rev. 14. 4. So that if Christ did not diminish and abate this of Virgins with Folly it could not but import the perfect and best state of Christianity And therefore the more we look upon our selves as Christians and Christians of the right stamp the more we must look that we be not Foolish Virgins that our Virginity be not turned into folly As it is said of Achitophel God turned the counsel of Achitophel into foolishness the very Virginity of his Counsel and Wisdom that was esteemed as an Oracle and never disgrac'd till that time So when the Virginity of the Soul is turned into foolishness It is a very great Judgment and the very expression of it ought to awaken and rouze all our Spirits Not to discourage the thoughts of the sincere servants of Christ and to make them sorrowful whom God would have to be made glad and to rejoice But that there may be a holy Jealousie in every one over our selves and that we may not take Counterfeit for Gold indeed and for Pearl indeed I have therefore closed with this Application our Saviour hath made of his whole Discourse Watch therefore for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of Man cometh That is as if Christ should say as I told you there will be nothing done at that time you can make no advantage you cannot command that day and that hour there 's nothing at all to be done All shall be in so speedy a Motion that there will be nothing to be done by way of Amendment or Reparation of the Errors that we have committed Now therefore as I proposed to you the last day several great particulars so I shall pursue them at this time in a way of fuller and more close Application First Take notice of that which is especially meant by watching It must be that very thing wherein the foolish Virgins fell short for though the wise as well as the foolish in the sence I have given to you slumbred and slept yet for all that the foolish Virgins only did not watch They are they that our Saviour grounds the Application upon Watch therefore for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of Man cometh The wise Virgins did watch in the main Point because they looked to it that all was done that was necessary to be done to meet Jesus Christ at his coming and to go in with him to the Wedding And therefore The First particular wherein we are to exercise this Watch is to look That we have the Divine and Spiritual Life in us For no Man hath watched that hath not looked well to this That he is as our Saviour expresses it passed from death to life If any of us go out of the World as I told you In this very life every thing is to be looked unto For though the Day of Judgment and the Coming of Christ be a different thing in many reguards from dying yet notwithstanding whatever we would do for that Day of the Coming of Christ we must do it now while we are here in the World All is sealed for Judgment and Eternity at Death There 's no purpose nor counsel in the Grave concerning this point whither we are going When any rise from the dead our Saviour makes it very apparent John 5. They rise either to Life or Condemnation There 's no arising so as with any possibility of passing from death to life at that time v. 28. Marvel not at this At what it is plain what viz. at the mighty quickning Voice of Christ now for of that Christ had spoken just before for the hour is coming in the which all that are in the Graves shall hear his voice and shall come
I only draw out the main scope of the Parable by way of Recollection unto you and so conclude I say seriously consider What ever you think to do for your souls do it now because there is no Time after Work while it is day the night cometh when none can work All the time that persons have lain in the Grave as we speak or that their Spirits have been in Happiness or in Misery they have not done the least thing for their souls they have not added one Cubit nay not one Hairs breadth to their Stature they have not made one Hair as our Lord speaks Proverbially either white or black as to the State of their Spirits And when Spirits come to meet their Bodies in the Day of the Resurrection every thing will be in such a speed such a World in highest motion That you cannot stay to change one ill Posture or Appearance ot Representation of your souls You must not stay I would speak according to the Language of the Parable Can the Bride forget her Attire If any of us have forgot our Attire we cannot mind any thing that is amiss We cannot fasten one Pin in that distress of our souls We must be in the Wedding Garment perfectly attired and arrayed For what is done then as I have often said is done in an Atome of Time The dead shall be raised incorruptible Wicked Men and Foolish Virgins shall be raised just as they die And therefore mind seriously to do for your souls what you 'd do in this present state And then Lastly As I have said I say again That you would earnestly pray for the Preparation of that Time Pray earnestly for the pouring out of the Spirit Do you think it will not be better for you when God shall pour out his Spirit upon all flesh when your Sons and your Daughters shall Prophesie when your old men shall dream Dreams and your young men shall see Visions When there shall be an universal Prophesie upon the People of God as I have greatest reason to hope that the time is very near Why should we not earnestly pray for it and desire it You think there will be too much Clutter and ado about Religion then don't mistake Whatsoever is done shall run so easie and quiet then with such advantage and the Great Cares and Disadvantages of the World shall be taken off and every thing shall be in a merciful order that we may be prepared for that Great and Notable Day of the Lord. And therefore Let us earnestly pray and wait That a better state both of Christianity in General and the Reformation in particular may come forth That those Thunders that have been Sealed since the Reformation for almost an Hundred and Eighty Years That their Mouths may be open and their Voices may utter themselves That every thing may be that tends to increase and promote Holiness Purity and Spirituality and Heavenliness for I am not speaking nor never did speak to you of a Kingdom of Eating and Drinking and putting on Glorious Apparel but that there shall be an universal knowledge of God and Jesus Christ And that none but those that are resolved to be filthy should remain filthy and those who give up themselves in Holy ways should be Encouraged and should mount up with Eagles Wings and Grow stronger and stronger And therefore that there is but the Hopes of these things Let us Bless God Exceedingly For many Prophets and Wisemen and Kings and Righteous Men have desired to see those things which you see and have not seen them and to hear those things which you hear and have not heard them And yet for all that If any of us are called to Die who are Sincere and faithfull God will give us so much certainly of that Spirit of Prophesie of Illumination of Revelation That shall carry us safe to Heaven and shall Search and Try us so That we shall be led out of any wicked way into the way that is Everlasting And therefore Let not these things Discourage you But let them Enflame our Care Zeal Endeavours and Desires That we may Watch Because Nothing con be done when our Lord comes but only They that are Ready Go in with Him to the Wedding FINIS AN APOLOGY For the Hope of the Kingdom of Christ Appearing Within This Approaching Year 1697. Wherein some of the Principal Arguments for such an Expectation are briefly Couch'd and the Greater Objections Answered Presented to the Notice and Examination of the Arch-Bishops and Bishops Now in PARLIAMENT Assembled By T. BEVERLEY Ezek. 10. 13. As concerning the Wheels It was cryed to them in my Hearing Oh! Revolution LONDON Printed for and Sold by Will Marshal at the Bible in Newgate-Street and John Marshal at the Bible in Grace-Church-Street 1697. An APOLOGY for the Hope of the Kingdom of Christ Entring Its Succession within this Now Beginning 1697. And an Answer of Principal Objections presented with It. To the Archbishops and Bishops as in Parliament at This Time Assembled Most Reverend Right Reverend I Have now by the Space of Fourteen or Two Weeks of Years been Serving for that Beautiful Rachel-State of the Church of Christ in the place of that Rachel in the Wilderness weeping for her Children in Sackcloth and under Death and would not be comforted Because They were not I have set my self all along by Meditation and Supplication to the Father of Lights to search out and by the Assistance of the Spirit of Prophecy to Find What or What Manner of Time the Spirit of Christ did signify for the Fullfilling that Grand Petition of his Servants Thy Kingdom come That thy Name may be Sanctified and Thy Will done as in Heaven and upon Earth and I am now Wrestling to the Break of Day and I Hope the Dawn of the Morning and Resolv'd not to Let Go Till I obtain the Blessing of it The Time that from the First and throughout it pleased the Lord of Time to fix upon my Mind as the Time of That Kingdom Entring into its Succession and Preparation for its Glory was and is This Approaching 1697. A Year to which I could have no Temptation either in Regard of Nearness or Distance or on any Account whatever but as a Scripture-Line of Time and Concurrent Reasons of Prophecy and History very many and in a Series and Continuation have Led me On this Foundation having Setled I have by Gracious Vouchsafements of Help from God Turn'd my Self to All the Grand Prophetick Points of Scripture and Found New Confirmations and have Given as Publick Accounts of them as I could attain and presented some of Them to Your Selves and to the Great Councel of the Nation And in as much as Supreme Goodness hath Granted me to Set up an Eben Ezer now at the Portal of 97. I have Thought it my Duty to offer this Apology for the Kingdom of Christ so near Approaching And that The Great Isaac The Son of Promise of