penalty And if I grant as much of a natural disposition in the Body to a dissolution if not prevented by a Glorifying Change it will no whit advantage their impious cause But withall man was then so far Immortal as that he had a posse non mori a natural capacity of not dying and the mo ietur vel non morietur the actual event of Life or Death was laid by the Lord of Life and Death upon his obedience or disobedience And man having sinned Justice must be done and so we came under a non posse non mori an impossibility of escaping death ordinarily because of the peremptory sentence of our Judge But the day of our deliverance is at hand when we shall attain a non posse mori a certain consummate Immortality when the last Enemy Death shall be destroyed and how that is done I shall next enquire SECT II. YOu have seen the ugly face of Death you are next to see a little of the Love of our great Redeemer You have heard what sin hath done you are next to hear what Grace hath done and what it will do You have seen the strength of the Enemy you are now to take notice of the Victory of the Redeemer and see how he conquereth all this strength 1. The Beginning of the Conquest is in this world 2. The Perfection will not be till the day of Resurrection when this Last Enemy shall be destroyed 1. Meritoriously Death is conquered by Death The Death of sinners by the Mediators Death Not that he intended in his Meritorious work to save us from the stroke of death by a prevention but to deliver us from it after by a Resurrection For since by man came death by man also came the Resurrection from the dead 1 Cor. 15. 21. For as much as the children were partakers of flesh and blood he also himself likewise took part with them that he might destroy him through death that had the power of death that is the Devil and deliver them who through fear of death were all their life time subject unto bondage Heb. 2. 14 15. Satan as Gods Executioner and as the prosperous tempter is said to have had the power of death The fears of this dreadful Executioner are a continual bondage which we are liable to through all our lives till we perceive the deliverance which the Death of the Lord of Life hath purchased us 1. By Death Christ hath stisfied the Justice that was armed by sin against us 2. By Death he hath shewed us that Death is a tolerable Evil and to be yielded to in hope of following life 2. Actually he conquered Death by his Resurrection This was the day of Grace's triumph This day he shewed to Heaven to Hell and to earth that death was conquerable yea that his personal Death was actually overcome The blessed souls beheld it to their Joy beholding in the Resurrection of their Head a virtual Resurrection of their own Bodies The Devils saw it and therefore saw that they had no hopes of holding the Bodies of the Saints in the power of the grave The damned souls were acquainted with it and therefore knew that their sinful bodies must be restored to bear their part in suffering The Believing Saints on earth perceive it and therefore see that their bonds are broken and that to the righteous there is hope in death and that our Head being actually risen assureth us that we shall also Rise For if we believe that Jesus died and Rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him 1 Thes 4. 14. And as Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more death hath no more dominion over him So shall we Rsie and die no more This was the beginning of the Churches Triumph This is the day that the Lord hath made even the day which the Church on Earth must celebrate with joy and praise till the day of our Resurrection We will be glad and rejoyce therein Psal 118. 24. The Resurrection of our Lord hath 1. Assured us of the consummation of his satisfacttion 2. Of the truth of all his Word and so of his promises of our Resurrection 3. That Death is actually conquered and a Resurrection possible 4. That believers shall certainly Rise when their Head and Saviour is Risen to prepare them an everlasting Kingdome and to assure them that thus he will Raise them at the last A bare promise would not have been so strong a help to Faith as to the actual Rising of Christ as a pledge of the performance But now Christ is risen and become the first fruits of them that sleep 1 Cor. 15. 20. For because he Liveth we shall live also John 14. 19. 3. The next degree of destruction to this Enemy was by the gift of his Justifying and Sanctifying Grace Four special benefits were then bestowed on us which are Antidotes against the Enmity of Death 1. One is the gift of saving Faith by which we look beyond the grave as far as to eternity And this doth most powerfully disable Death to terrifie and discourage us and raiseth us above our Natural fears and sheweth us though but in a glass the exceeding eternal weight of glory which churlish Death shall help us to So that when the eye of the unbeliever looketh no further than the grave believing souls can enter into Heaven and see their glorified Lord and thence fetch Love and Hope and Joy notwithstanding the terrours of interposing death The eye of Faith foreseeth the salvation ready to be revealed in the last time and causeth us therein greatly to rejoyce though now for a season if need be we are in heaviness through manifold temptations And so victorious is this Faith against all the storms that do assault us that the tryal of it though with fire doth but discover that â—t is much more precious than Gold that peâ—isheth and it shall be found unto praise and â—onour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ whom having never seen in the flesh we â—ove and though now we see him not yet believing we rejoyce with unspeakable glorious joy 1 Pet. 1. 5 6 7 8 9. and shall shortly receive the end of our Faith the Salvation of our Souls Thus Faith though it destroy not Death it self destroyeth the Malignity and enmity of DEATH while it seeth the hings that are beyond it and the time when â—eath shall be destroyed and the Life where death shall be no more Faith is like David's three mighty men that brake thorow the Host of the Philistines to fetch him the waters of Bethlehem for which he longed 2 Sam. 23. 15 16. When the thirsty soul saith O that â—ne would give me drink of the waters of Salvation Faith breaks thorow death which standeth in the way and fetcheth these living waters to the soul We may say of Death as it is said of the World 1 John 5. 4 5. Whatsoever is born of God overcometh
the world and this is the victory that overcometh the world even our Faith who is he that overcometh but he that believeth c. For greater is he that is in us than he that is in the world 1 John 4. 4. The believing Soul foreseeing the day when death shall be swallow'd up in Victory may sing beforehand the triumphing song O Death where is thy sting O grave where is thy Victory 1 Cor. 15. 54 55. For this cause we faint not though our outward man perish our inward man is renewed day by day For our light affliction though it reach to death which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding eternal weight of glory while we look not at the things that are seen but at the things which are not seen for the hings which are seen are temporal and therefore not worthy to be looked at but the things that are not seen are eternal and therefore more prevalent with a believing Soul than either the enticing pleasures of sin for a season or the light and short afflictions or the death that standeth in our way 2 Cor. 5. 16 17 18. Heb. 11. 24 25 26. 2. A second Antidote against the Enmity of Death that is given us at the time of our Conversion is The Pardon of our sins and Justification of our persons by the blood and merits of Jesus Christ When once we are forgiven we are out of the reach of the greatest terrour being saved from the second death Though we must feel the killing stroke we are delivered from the damning stroke Yea more than so it shall save us by destroying us It shall let us into the glorious presence of our Lord by taking us from the presence of our mortal friends It shall help us into Eternity by cutting off our Time For in the hour that we were justified and made the Adopted Sons of God we were also made the Heirs of Heaven even Coheirs with Christ and shall be glorified with him when we have suffered with him Rom. 8. 17. As Death was promoting the Life of the world when it was killing the Lord of Life himself So is it hastnening the deliverance of believers when it seems to be undoing them No wonder if Death be that mans terrour that must be conveyed by it into Hell or that imagineth that he shall perish as the beast But to him that knows it will be his passage into Rest and that Angels shall convey his Soul to Christ what an Antidote is there ready for his Faith to use against the enmity and excess of fears Hence faith proceedeth in its triumph 1 Cor. 15. 56 57. The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law But thanks be to God that giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ Let him inordinately fear Death that is loth to be with Christ or that is yet the heir of Death eternal Let him fear that is yet in the bondage of his sin and in the power of the Prince of darkness and is not by Justification delivered from the curse But joy and holy triumph are more seemly for the Justified 3. A third Antidote against the Enmity of Death is the Holiness of the soul By this the Power of sin is mortified and therefore the fears of Death cannot actuate and use it as in others they may do By this the Interest of the flesh is cast aside as nothing and the flesh it self is crucified with Christ and therefore the destruction of the flesh will seem the more tolerable and the fears of it will be a less temptation to the Soul By this we are already crucified to the world and the world to us and therefore we can more easily leave the world We now live by another Life than we did before being dead in our selves our life is hid with Christ in God and being crucified with Christ we now so Live as that it is not we but Christ Liveth in us the life which we Live in the flesh is by the faith of the Son of God that hath loved us Gal. 2. 20. The things that made this life too dear to us are now as it were annihilated to us and when we see they are Nothing they can do nothing with us Sanctification also maketh us so weary of sin as being our hated enemy that we are the more willing to die that it may die that causeth us to die And especially the Holy Ghost which we then receive is in us a Divine and heavenly Nature and so inclineth us to God and Heaven This Nature principally consisteth in the superlative Love of God And Love carrieth out the soul to the beloved As the Nature of a prisoner in a dungeon carrieth him to desire Liberty and Light so the Nature of a holy Soul in flesh inclineth it to desire to be with Christ As Love maketh husband and wife and dearest friends to think the time long while they are asunder so doth the Love of the Soul to God How fain would the holy loving Soul behold the pleased face of God and be glorified in the beholding of his glory and live under the fullest influences of his Love This is our conquest over the Enmity of Death As strong as Death is Love is stronger Eccles 8. 6 7. Love is strong as Death the coals thereof are coals of fire a most vehement flame which will not by the terrible face of Death be hindered from ascending up to God Many waters cannot quench Love neither can the floods drown it if a man would give all the substance of his house for Love that is to bribe it and divert it from its object it would utterly be contemned If the Love of David could carry Jonathan to hazard his life and deny a Kingdom for him and the Love of David to Absalom made him wish that he had died for him and the Love of friends yea lustful love hath carried many to cast away their lives no wonder if the Love of God in his Saints prevail against the fear of Death The power of holy Love made Moses say Else let my name be blotted out of the Book of Life And it made Paul say That he could wish that he were accursed from Christ for his brethren and kindred according to the flesh Rom. 9. 3. And doubtless he felt the fire burning in his breast when he broke out into that triumphant challenge Rom. 8. 35 36. to the end Who shall separate us from the love of God shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword As it is written For thy sake we are killed all the day long we are counted as Sheep to the slaughter Nay in all this we are more then Conquerours through him that loved us For I am perswaded that neither Death nor Life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other Creature shall be able
is above the pride and vanities of this world and doth converse by a life of faith above and is usefull and exemplary in their generation alas how soon are they snatcht away and we are left in our temptations ripening and murmuring at God as Jonah when his gourd was withered as if the Lord had destinated this world to be the dwelling of unfaithfull worthless men and envied us the presence of one eminent Saint one faithful friend and one that a◠Moses when he had talkt with God hath a face that shineth with the reflected raies of the heavenly glory when indeed it is because this world is unworthy of them Heb. 11. 38. not knowing their worth nor how to use them nor how to make use of them for their good and because when they are ripe and mellow for eternity it is fit that God be served before us and that Heaven have the best and that be left on earth that is earthly Must Heaven be deprived of its inhabitants Must a Saint that is ripe be kept from Christ and so long kept from his inheritance from the company of Angels and the face of God and all lest we should be displeased and grudge at God for glorifying those whom he destinated to glory before the foundations of the world and whom he purchased and prepared for Glory Must there a place be empty and a voice be wanting in the Heavenly Chore Iest we should miss our friends on earth Are we not hasting after them at the heels and do we not hope to live with them for ever and shall we grudge that they are gone a day or week or year before us O foolish unbelieving souls We mourn for them that are past mourning and lament for our friends that are gone to Rest when we are left our selves in a vexatious restless howling wilderness as if it were better to be here we mourn and weep for the souls that are triumphing in their Masters joy And yet we say we believe and hope and labour and wait for the same felicity Shall the happiness of our friends be our sorrow and lamentation O did we but see these blessed souls and where they are and what they are enjoying and what they are doing we should be ashamed to mourn thus for their change Do you think they would wish themselves again on earth or would they take it kindly of you if you could bring them down again into this world though it were to reign in wealth and honour O how would they disdain or abhor the motion unless the commanding will of God did make it a part of their obedience And shall we grieve that they are not here when to be here would be their grief But thus our lives are filled with griefs Thus smiles and frowns desires and denyals hopes and frustrations indeavours and disappointments do make a quotidian ague of our lives The persons and the things we love do contribute to our sorrows as well as those we hate If our friends are bad or prove unkind they gall and grieve us while they live If they excell in holiness fidelity and suitableness the dart that kills them deeply woundeth us and the sweeter they were to us in their lives the bitterer to us is their death We cannot keep mercy but sin is ready to take it from us or else to marr in and turn it into Vinegar and Gall. And doth not Death accidentally befriend us that puts an end to all these troubles and lands us safe on the Celestial shore and puts us into the bosome of perpetual Rest where all is calm and the storms and billows that tost us here shall 〈◊〉 or trouble us no more And thus Death shall make us some recompence at last for the wrong it did us and the mortal blow shall hurt us less then did the dreadful apparition of it in our fore-thoughts Let not our fears then exceed the cause Though we fear the pangs and throws of travel let us withal remember that we shall presently rejoyce and all the holy Angels with us that a soul is born into the world of glory And Death shall gain us much more then it deprived us of DIRECTION X. THE last Direction that I shall give you to conquer the Enmity of Death is this Give up your wills entirely to the will of God as knowing that his will is your beginning and your end your safety your felicity and rest in which you should gladly aquiesce When you think of Death remember who it is that sends it It is our Fathers messenger and is sent but to execute his will And can there be any thing in the will of God that his servants should inordinately fear Doubtless his Will is much safer and better for us then our own And if in generall it were offered to our choice Whether all particulars of our lives should be disposed of by Gods will or by ours common reason might teach us to desire to be rather in Gods hands then our own The fulfilling of his will is the care and business of our lives and therefore it should be a support and satisfaction to us at our death that it is but the fulfilling of his will His Justice and punishing Will is good though selfishness maketh it ungratefull to the offendor But his children that are dear to him and tast no evil but that which worketh for their good have no cause to quarrell at his will Whatsoever our surest dearest friends would have us take or do or suffer we are ready to submit to as being confident they will do nothing for our hurt if they do but know what is for our good And shall we not more boldly trust the will of God then of our dearest friend He knows what he hath to do with us and how he will dispose of us and whither he will bring us and his interest in us is more then ours in our selves and shall we then distrust him as if we had to do with an enemy or one that were evil and not with love and infinite goodness It is the will of God that must be the everlasting Rest the Heaven the pleasure of our souls And shall we now so fear it and fly from it as if it were our ruine Look which way you will through all the world your souls will never find repose nor satisfying quietness and content but in the will of God Let us therefore commit our souls to him as to a faithful Creator and desire unfeignedly the fulfilling of his will and believe that there is no ground of confidence more firm Abraham may boldly trust his Son his only Son on the will of God And Christ himself when he was to drink the bitter Cup submitteth his own naturall love of life to his Fathers will saying Not my will but thine be done 'T is a most unworthy abuse of God that we could be quiet and rejoyce if our own wills or our dearest friends might dispose of our lives and
in the same judgment 1 Cor. 1. 10. The God of patience and consolation grant you to be like minded one towards another acording to Christ Jesus that ye may with one mind and one mouth glorifie God Rom. 15. 5 6. And I beseech you brethren to know them which labour among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you And esteem them very highly in love for their works sake and be at peace among your selves 1 Thes 5. 12 13. And mark those that cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned avoid them Rom. 16. 17. And if there be any consolaton in Christ if any comfort of love if any fellowship of the spirit if any bowels and mercies fulfil ye our joy that ye may be like minded having the same love being of one accord of one mind Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory but in lowliness of mind let each esteemother better then themselves Look not every man on his own things his own gifts and graces but every man also on the things the graces and gifts of others Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God but made himself of no reputation or emptied himself of all worldly glory Isa 53. 2 3 4. As if he had had no form or comliness and no beauty to the eye for which we should desire him but was despised rejected of men not esteemed Phil. 2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. It is not as you imagine your extraordinary Knowledg Zeal and Holiness that inclineth you to divisions and to censuring of your brethren but it is Pride and Ignorance and want of Love and if you grow to any ripeness in Knowledg Humility Self-denial and Charity you will bewail your divideing inclinations and courses and reckon them among the greater and grievous of your sins and cry out against them as much as your more charitable and experienced brethren do 3. To the third sort the Papists I shall say nothing here because I cannot expect they should read it and consider it and because we are so far disagreed in our Principles that we cannot treat with them on those rational terms as we may do with the rest of the inhabitants of the world whether Christians Infidels or Heathens As long as they build their faith and salvation on this supposition that the eyes and taste and feeling of all the sound men in the world are deceived in judging of Bread and Wine and as long as they deny the certaine experience of true believers telling us that we are void of Charity and unjustified because we are not of their Church and as long as they fly from the judgment and Tradition of the ancient and present Church unless their small part may be taken for the whole or the major Vote and as long as they reject our appeal to the holy Scriptures I know not well what we can say to them which we can expect they should regard any more than musick is regarded by the deaf or light by the blind or argument by the distracted If they had the moderation and charity impartially to peruse our writings I durst confidently promise the recovery of multitudes of them by the three Writings which I have already published and the more that others have said against them 4. And for the fourth sort the Hiders and the Quakers I have said enough to them already in my Book against Infidelity and those against Popery and Quakers but in vain to those that have sinned unto death 5. It is the fifth sort therefore that I shall cheifly address my speech to who I fear are not the smallest part It is an astonishing consideration to men that are awake to observe the unreasonableness and stupidity of the ignorant careless sensual part of men How little they Love or Fear the God whom their tongues confess How little they value or mind or seek the everlasting glory which they take on them to believe How little they fear and shun those flames which must feed for ever on the impenitent and unholy How little they care or labour for their immortal soules as if they were of the Religion of their beasts How bitterly many of them hate the holy wayes commanded by the Lord while yet they pretend to be themselves his Servants and to take the Scriptures to be his word How sottishly and contemptuously they neglect and sleight the Holiness without which there is no salvation Heb. 12. 14. How eagerly they desire and seek the pleasing of their flesh and the matters of this transitory life while they call them vanity and vexation How madly they will fall out with their own salvation and from the errours and sins of Hypocrites or others will pick quarrels against the Doctrine and Ordinances and waies of God as if other mens faults should be exceeded by you while you pretend to loath them If it be a sin to crack our faith by some particular error what is it to dash it all to peices If it be odious in your eyes to denie some particular Ordinance of God what is it to neglect or Prophane them all If it be their sin that quarrel in the way to Heaven and walk not in companie as love requireth them what is it in you to run towards hell and turn your backs on the holie Laws and waies of God If it be so lamentable to the Nation and themselves that so many have faln into schism and disorder what is it then that so many are ungodlie sensual and worldlie and have no true Religion at all in sincerity and life and power Ungodliness is all Heresie transcendently in the lump and that in Practice A man that is so foolish as to plead that Arsnick is better then bread may yet live himself if he do not take it but so cannot he that eateth it instead of bread Hereticks only in speculation may be saved but practical hereticks cannot You think it hainous to denie with the mouth that there is a God who made us and is our only Lord and Happiness and so it is And is it not hainous then to denie him with the heart and life and to denie him the love and obedience that is Properly due to God It is odious idolatrie to bow to a creature as to God and is it not odious to love and honour and obey a creature before him and to seek it more eagerly and mind it more seriously then God If it be damnable Infidelity to denie Christ to be the Redeemer it is not much less to turn away from him and make light of him and refuse his grace while you seem to honour him If it be damnable blasphemy to deny the Holy Ghost what is it to resist and refuse him when he would sanctifie you and perhaps to make a scorn of holiness If it be Heresie to denie the holy
Tim. 4. 8 and to look for the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ Tit. 2. 13. The Spirit and the Bride say Come Come Lord Jesus Come quickly is the voice of faith and hope and love Revel 22. 17 20. But I find not that his servants are thus Characterized by their desires to die It is therefore the presence of their Lord that they desire But it is Death that they abhor And therefore though they can submit to death it is the coming of Christ that they Love and long for and it is interposing Death that causeth them to draw back Let not Christians be discouraged by mistakes and think that they love not God and glory because they love not this enemy in the way nor think that they are gracenor think that they are graceless or unbelieving worldlings because they are afraid of death as death But perhaps you will say that if grace prevail not against the fears of death then fear is predominant and we are not sincere To which I answer that you must distinguish between such a prevailing as maintaineth our sincerity and such a prevailing as also procureth our fortitude and joy If grace prevail not to keep us upright in a holy life renouncing the world and crucifying the flesh and devoting our selves entirely to God though the fear of death would draw us from it then it is a sign that we are not sincere But if grace do this much and yet prevail not against all fears and unwillingness to die but leave us under uncomfortable hideous thoughts of death this proves us not to be unsound For the soul may savingly love God that is afraid of death And he may truly love the End that fears this dark and dismal way Yet must there be so much to prove our uprightness as that in our deliberate choice we will rather voluntarily pass through death either natural or violent then lose the happiness beyond it Though we love not death yet we love God and Heaven so well that we will submit to it And though we fear it and abhor it yet not so much as we fear and abhor the loss of Heaven Let not poor Christians therefore wrong themselves and deny the graces of the Spirit as if they had more mind of earth then heaven and of things temporal then of things eternal because they are afraid to die All suffering is grievous and not joyous to our nature Paul himself desired not to be uncloathed but clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven that mortality might be swallowed up of life 2 Cor. 5. 2 4. it being better to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. Even Christ himself had a will that desired that the Cup might have passed from will if it had been agreeable to his Fathers will and the ends of his undertaken Office Matth. 26. 41 42. Raise therefore no unjust conclusions from these natural fears nor from the imperfection of our conquest but praise him that relieveth us and abateth the enmity of death and furnisheth us with his Antidotes and will destroy this enemy at last SECT VIII Use 6. FRom the Enmity of Death we may further learn to study and magnifie the victorious grace of our Redeemer which overcometh the enemy and turneth our hurt into our benefit and maketh death a door of life Though death be the enemy that seemeth to conquer us and to destroy and utterly undo us yet being conquered it self by Christ it is used by him to our great advantage and sanctified to be a very great help to our salvation The suffering of Christ himself was in the hour of his enemies and the power of darkness Luke 22. 53. which seemed to have prevailed against him when yet it was but a destroying of Death by Death and the purchasing of life and salvation for the world So also in our Death though sin and Satan seem to conquer it is they that are conquered and not we who are supervictors through him that hath loved us Romans 8. 37. They destroy themselves when they seem to have destroyed us As the Serpent bruised but the heel of Christ who bruised his head so doth he bruise but our heel who in that conflict and by the means of his own execution through the strength of Christ do bruise his head Gen. 3. 15. And this is the upshot of all his enmity against the womans holy seed Though Death was unsuitable to innocent man and is still a natural enemy to us all yet unto sinners it is an evil that is suitable and fit to destroy the greater evil that did cause it and to prevent the everlasting evil The fore-knowledee of our certain Death is a very great help to keep us humble and disgrace all the seducing pleasures of the flesh and all the profits and honours of the world and so to enervate all temptations It is a singular help to quicken a stupid careless siuner and to awaken men to prepare for the life to come and to excite them to seek first the Kingdom of God and to give all diligence to make their calling and election sure and to consider seeing all these things must be dissolved what manner of persons they ought to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hastening to the coming of the day of God 2 Pet. 3 11 12. When we drop asleep the remembrance of Death may quickly awake us when we grow slack it is our spur to put us on to mend our pace Who is so mad as wilfully to sin with Death in his eye or who so dead as with Death in his eye to refuse to live a godly life if he have any spiritual light and feeling Experience telleth us that when health and folly cause us to promise our selves long life and think that Death is a great way off it lamentably cools our zeal and strengtheneth our temptations and dulls our souls to holy operations and the approach of Death puts life into all our apprehensions and affections It is a wonderful hard thing to maintain our lively apprehensions and strong affections and tenderness of conscience and self-denyal and easie contempt of earthly things when we put far from us the day of Death We see what a stir men make for the profits and honours of this world and how fast they hold their fleshly pleasures while they are in health and how contemptuously they speak of all and bitterly complain of the vanity and vexation when they come to dye And if our lives and the world be brought hereby into such disorders when men live so shore a time on Earth what monsters of ambition and covetousnesse and luxury would men be if they lived as long as before the FLOOD even to Eight Hundred or nine hundred years of age Doubtless long life was so great a temptation then to man in his corrupted state that it is no wonder if his wickedness
they have had tryal of cruel mockings and scourgings yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment they were stoned they were sawn asunder were tempted were slain with the sword Heb. 11. 35 36 37. Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Cor. 15. 57. They overcome by the blood of the Lamb and love not their lives unto the death Rev. 12. 11. They fear not them that kill the body and after that have no more that they can do Luke 124. They trust upon his promise that hath said I will ransome them from the power of the grave I will redeem them from Death O Death I will be thy plagues O grave I will be thy destruction Hos 13. 14. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the Death of his Saints Psal 116. 15. Blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the Spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works do follow them Rev. 14. 13. SECT IX Use 7. MOreover from the Enmity of Death we may be directed which way to bend our cares and seeing where our difficulty most lyeth we may see which way our most diligent preparations must be turned Death cannot be prevented but the malignant influence of it on our souls may be much abated If you let it work without an Antidote it will make you live like unbelieving worldlings It will deterr your hearts from Heaven and dull your love to God himself and make your meditations of him and of your Everlasting Rest to be seldom and ungrateful to you And it will make you say It s good to be here and have sweeter thoughts of this present life than of your inheritance It will rob you of much of your heavenly delights and fill you with slavish fears of Death and subject you unto bondage all your lives and make you dye with agony and horrour so that your lives and deaths will be dishonourable to your holy faith and to your Lord. If it were meerly our own suffering by fears and horrours or meerly our loss of spiritual delights the matter were great but not so great But it is more than this For when our joyes are overwhelmed with the fears of Death and turned into sorrows our love to God will be abated and we shall deny him the thanks and cheerful praises which should be much of the employment of our lives and we shall be much discomposed and unfitted for his service and shall much dishonour him in the world and shall strengthen our temptations to the overvaluing of earthly things Think it not therefore a small or an indifferent matter to fortifie your souls against these malignant fears of death Make this your daily care and work your peace your safety your innocency and usefulness and the honour of God do much lie on it And it is a work of such exceeding difficulty that it requireth the best of your skill and diligence and when all is done it must be the illuminating quickning beams of grace and the shining face of the Eternal Love that must dothe work though yet your diligence is necessary to attend the spirit and use the means in subservience to grace and in expectation of these oelestiall rayes And above all take heed lest you should think that carnall mirth or meer security and casting away the thoughts of Death will serve to overcome these fears or that it is enough that you resolve against them For it is your safety that must be lookt to as well as your present ease and peace and fear must be so overcome as that a greater misery may not follow Presumption and security will be of very short continuance To dye without fear and pass into into endless desperation which fear should have wakened you to prevent is no desirable kind of dying And besides resolving against the terrours of Death will not prevent them When Death draws near it will amaze you in despight of all your resolutions if you are not furnished with a better Antidote The more jocund you have been in carnal mirth and the more you have presumptuously slighted Death it is likely your horrour will be the greater when it comes And therefore see that you make a wise and safe preparation and that you groundedly and methodically cure these fears and not securely cast them away Though I have given you to this end some Directions in other writings in the Saints Rest and in the Treatise of Self-denyal and that of Crucifying the world yet I shall add here these following helps which faithfully observed and practised will much promote your victory over Death which conquereth all the strength of flesh and glory of this world DIRECTION I. IF you would overcome the danger and the fears of Death Make sure of your Conversion that it is sound and see that you be absolutely devoted unto God without Reserves Should you be deceived in your foundations your life and hopes and joyes would all be delusory things Till sin be mortified and your souls reconciled to God in Christ you are still in danger of worse than Death and it is but the senselesness of your dead condition that keepeth you from the terrours of damnation But if you are sure that you are quickened by renewing grace and possessed by the sanctifying spirit and made partakers of the Divine nature you have then the Earnest of your inheritance Ephes 1. 14. 2 Cor. 1. 22. 5. 5. and the fire is kindled in your breast that in despight of Death will mount you up to God DIRECTION II. TO Conquer the Enmity of Death you must live by faith in Jesus Christ as men that are emptied of themselves and ransomed from his hands that had the power of Death and as men that are redeemed from the curse and are now made heirs of the grace of life being made his members who is the Lord of Life even the second Adam who is a quickning spirit The serious believing study of his design and office to destroy sin and death and to bring many Sons to glory and also of his voluntary suffering and his obedience to the death of the Cross may raise us above the fears of Death When we live by faith as branches of this blessed Vine and are righteous with his righteousness justified by his blood and merits and sanctified by his Word and Spirit and find that we are united to him we may then be sure that Death cannot conquer us and nothing can take us out of his hands For our life being hid with Christ in God we know that we shall live because he liveth Col. 3. 3. Joh. 14. 19. and that when Christ who is our life appeareth we shall also appear with him in glory Col. 3. 4. And that he will change our vile bodies and make them like to his glorious body by his mighty power by which he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3. 20 21. In our own strength we
and loatheth himself for all his abominations and is possessed with that Justice that provoketh him to self revenge in an ordinate sort and therefore doth love and honour that Justice that inflicteth on him the penalty of Death Especially since Mercy hath made it a useful Castigation As some penitent malefactors have been so sensible of their crimes that they have not deprecated Death but consented to it as a needful work of Justice as it s written of the penitent Murderer lately hanged at London So Holiness doth contain such a hatred of our own sins and such impartial Justice on Gods behalf that it will cause us to subscribe to the righteousness of his sentence and the more quietly to yield to the stroke of Death DIRECTION IX IT will somewhat abate the fears of Death to consider the Restlesness and troubles of this life and the manifold evils that end at Death And because this Consideration is little available with men in prosperity it pleaseth God to exercise us with adversity that when we find there no is hope of Rest on earth we may look after it where it is and venture on Death by the impulse of necessity Here we are continually burdened with our selves anonyed by our corruptions and pained by the diseases of our souls or endangered most when pained least And would we be thus still We live in the continual smart of the fruit of our own folly and the hurts that we catch by our careless or inconsiderate walking like children that often fall and cry and would we still live such a life as this The weakness of our faith the darkness of our minds the distance and strangeness of our souls to God are a continual languishing and trouble to our hearts How grievous is it to us that we can love him nomore nor be more assured of his love to us that we find continually so much of the creature and so little of God upon our hearts that carnal affections are so easily kindled in us and the Love of God will scarce be kept in any life by the richest mercies the most powerful means and by our greatest diligence Oh what a death is it to our hearts that so many odious temptations should have such free access such ready entertainment such small resistance and so great success that such horrid thoughts of unbelief should look into our minds and stay so long and be so familiar with us that the blessed mysteries of the Gospel and the state of separated souls and the happiness of the life to come are known so slightly and believed so weakly and imperfectly and meet with so many carnal questionings and doubts that when we should be solacing our souls in the fore-thoughts of Heaven we look toward it with such strangeness and amazement as if we staggered at the promise of God through unbelief and there is so much Atheism in our Affections God being almost as no God to them sometime and Heaven almost as no Heaven to them that it shews there is too much in our Understandings O what a Death is it to our minds that when we should live in the Love of Infinite goodness we find such a remnant of carnal enmity and God hath such resistance and so narrow so short so cold so unkind entertainment in those hearts that were made to love him and that should know and own no love but his What a bondage is it that our souls are so entangled with the creatures and so detained from the love of God and that we draggle on this earth and can reach no higher and the delightful Communion with God and a Conversation in Heaven are things that we have so small experience of Alas that we that are made for God and should live to him and be still upon his work and know no other should be so byassed by the flesh and captivated by self-love and lost at home that our affections and intentions do hardly get above our selves but there we are too prone to terminate them all and lose our God even in a seeming Religiousness while we will be gods to our selves How grievous is it that such wonders and glorious appearances of God as are contained in the incarnation life and death of Christ and in all the parts of the work of our Redemption should no more affect us than they do nor take up our souls in more thankful admiration nor ravish us into higher joyes Alas that Heaven commands our souls no more from Earth that such an infinite glory is so near us and we enjoy so little of it and have no more savour of it upon our souls That in the hands of God and before his face we do no more regard him That the great and wonderful matters of our Faith do so little affect us that we are tempted thereby to question the sincerity of our Faith if not the reality of the things believed and that so little of these great and wondrous things appeareth in our lives that we tempt the world to think our Faith is but a fancy Is not all this grievous to an honest heart and should we not be so far weary of such a life as this as to be willing to depart and be with Christ If it would so much rejoyce a gracious soul to have a stonger Faith a more lively hope a more tender Conscience a more humble self-abhorring heart to be more fervent in prayer more resolute against temptations and more successfully to fight against them with what desire and joy then should we look towards Heaven where we shall be above our strongest Faith and Hope and have no more need of the healing graces or the healing Ordinances nor be put upon self-afflicting work nor troubled with the temptations nor terrified by the face of any enemy Now if we will vigorously appear for God against a sinful generation how many will appear against us how bitterly will they reproach us how falsly will they slander us and say all manner of evil against us and it is well if we scape the violence of their hands and what should be our joy in all these sufferings but that Great is our reward in Heaven Matth. 11. 12. Alas how are we continually here annoyed by the presence and the motions and the success of sin in our selves and others It dwelleth in us night and day we cannot get it to stay behind no not when we address our selves to God not in our publick worship or our secret prayers not for the space of one Lords Day or one Sermon or one Sacrament in ordinary or extraordinary duty O what a blessed day and duty would it be in which we could leave our sin behind us and converse with God in spotless innocency and worship and adore him without that darkness and strangeness and unbelief and dulness and doubtings and distractions that are now our daily miseries Can we have grace and not be weary of these corruptions Can we have life and not be
shortly begin their everlasting triumph The sin which thou hatest and longest to be delivered from and art willing to use Gods means against it is the conquered enemy which may assure thee of a full and final conquest supposing that thy hatred is against all known sin and that there is none so sweet or profitable in thy account which thou hadst not far rather leave then keep Quest 4. Moreover art thou not truly willing to yield to all the terms of grace Thou hast heard of the yoak and burden of Christ and of the conditions of the Gospel on which peace is offered to the sinful world and what Christ requireth of such as will be his Disciples What saith thy heart now to those terms Do they seem so hard and grievous to thee that thou wilt venture thy soul in thy state of sin rather then accept of them If this were so thou hadst yet no part in Christ indeed But if there be nothing that Christ requireth of thee that is not desirable in thy eyes or which thou dost not stick at so far as to turn away from him and forsake him and refuse his Covenant and grace rather then submit to such conditions thou art then in Covenant with him and the blessings of the Covenant belong to thee Canst thou think that Christ hath purchased and offered and promised that which he will not give Hath he sent forth his Ministers and commanded them to make the Motion in his name and to invite and compell men to come in and to beseech them to be reconciled to God and that yet he is unwilling to accept thee when thou dost consent If Christ had been unwilling he had not so dearly made the way nor begun as a suitor to thy soul nor so diligently sought thee as he hath done If the blessings of the Covenant are thine then Heaven is thine which is the chiefest blessing And if they be not thine it is not because Christ is unwilling but because thou art unwilling of his blessings on his terms Nothing can deprive thee of them but thy refusal Know therefore assuredly whether thou dost consent thy self to the terms of Christ and whether thou art truly willing that he be thy Saviour and if thy conscience bear thee faithful witness that it is so dishonour not Christ then so far as to question whether be be willing who hath done so much to put it out of doubt The stop is at thy will and not at his If thou know that thou art willing thou mayst know that Christ his benefits are thine if thou be not willing what makes theewish groan pray labour in the use of means Is it not for Christ his benefits that thy heart thus worketh and thou dost all this Fear not then if thy own hand be to the Covenant it is most certain that the hand of Christ is at it Quest 5. Moreover I would ask thee Whether thou see not a beauty in Holiness which is the Image of Christ and whether thy soul do not desire it even in perfection So that thou hadst rather if thou hadst thy choice be more Holy then more rich or honourable in the world If so be assured that it is not without Holyness that thou choosest and preferrest Holyness Hadst thou not rather have more faith and hope and love to God and patience and contentment and communion with Christ then have more of the favour and applause of man or of the riches or pleasures of this world If so I would know of thee whether this be not from the spirit of Christ within thee and be not his Image it self upon thee and the motions of the new and heavenly nature which is begotten in thee by the Holy Ghost Undoubtedly it is And the spirit of Christ thus dwelling in thee is the earnest of thy inheritance Dost thou find the spirit of Christ thus working in thee causing thee to love Holiness and hate all sin and yet canst thou doubt of thy part in Christ Quest 6. Moreover canst thou not truly say that Christs friends so far as thou knowest them are thy friends and that whinh is against him thou takest as against thy self If so undoubtedly thy enemies also are to him as his enemies and he will lay them at thy feet Thy troubles are as his troubles and in all thy afflictions he is as careful of thy good as if he himself were thereby afflicted Fear not those enemies that Christ takes as his own It is he that is engaged to overcome them And now when Conscience it self beareth witness that thus it is with thy soul and that thou wouldst fain be what God would have thee be and desirest nothing more then to be more like him and nearer to him and desirest no kind of life so much as that in which thou maist be most serviceable to him Consider what a wrong it is then to Christ and to the honour of his Covenant and grace and to thy poor dejected soul that thou shouldst lie questioning his love and thy part in him and looking about for matter of accusation or causeless suspition against his spirit working in thee and that thou shouldst cast away the joy of the Lord which is thy strength and gratifie the enemy of thy peace When sickness is upon thee and death draws nigh thou shouldst then with joy lift up thy head because thy warfare is almost accomplished and thy Saviour ready to deliver thee the Crown Is this a time to fear and mourn when thou art entring into endless joy Is it a time of lamentation when thou art almost at thy journeys end ready to see thy Saviours face and to take thy place in the Heavenly Jerusalem amongst those millions of holy souls that are gone before thee Is it seemly for thee to lament thus at the door when they are feasted with such unconceivable joys within Dost thou know what thy Brethren are now enjoying and what the heavenly Host are doing how full they are of God and how they are ravished with his Light and Love and canst thou think it seemly to be so unlike them that are passing to them I know there is such difference between imperfection and perfection and between earth and heaven that it justifieth our moderate sorrows and commandeth us to take up infinitely short of their delights till we are with them But yet let there not be too great a disproportion between the members of Jesus Christ We have the same Lord and the same Spirit and all that is theirs in possession is in right and title ours They are our elder brethren and being at age have possession of the inheritance but we that are yet in the lap of the Church on earth our Mother and in the arms of our Fathers grace are of the same family and have the same nature in our low degree They were once on earth as low as we and we shall be shortly in heaven as high
these things shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God wherein the Heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements melt with fervent heat But we according to his promise look for new Heavens and a new Earth wherein dwelleth righteousness 2 Pet. 3. 7 8 9 10 11 12 13. Beza marvelleth at Tertullian for saying that the Christians in their holy Assemblics prayed pro mora finis Apologet. c. 39. And so he might well enough if it were not that to Christians the Glory of God is dearer than their own felicity and the salvation of millions more precious than the meer hastening of their own and the glory of the Church more desirable than our personal glory and the hallowing of Gods Name were not to be prayed for before the coming of his Kingdom and the Kingdom of grace must not necessarily go before the Kingdom of glory But as much as we long for the coming of our Lord we are content to wait till the Elect be gathered and can pray that he will delay it till the Universal Body be made up and all are called that shall be glorified But to our selves that are brought out of Aegypt into the Wilderness how desirable is the promised Land When we think on our own interest we cry Come Lord Jesus Come quickly The sooner the better Then shall our eyes behold him in whom we have believed Not as he was beheld on earth in his despised state but as the glorious King of Saints accompanied with the Celestial Host coming in flaming fire to render vengeance to the rebellious and Rest and Joy to believing souls that waited for this day of his appearance Then Faith and Patience shall give up their work and sight and fruition and perfect love shall everlastingly succeed them The rage of Persecutors shall no more affright us the folly of the multitude shall no more annoy us the falseness of our seeming selfish friends shall no more betray us the pride of self-conceited men shall no more disturb us the turbulency of men distracted by ambition shall cast us no more into confusions The Kingdom that we shall possess shall not be lyable to mutations nor be tossed with pride and faction as are these below There is no monthly or annual change of Governours and Laws as is in Lunatick Common-wealths but there will be the same Lord and King and the same Laws and Government and the same Subjects and obedience without any mutinies rebellions or discontents to all eternity The Church of which we shall then be members shall not be divided into parties and factions nor the members look strangely at each other because of difference of opinions or distance of affections as now we find it to our daily grief in the militant Church We shall then need no tedious debates to reconcile us Unity will be then quickly and easily procured There will be no falling out in the presence of our Lord. There will be none of that darkness uncharitableness selfishness or passion left that now causeth our dissentions When we have perfect Light and perfect Love the perfect Peace will be easily attained which here we labour for in vain Now there is no Peace in Church or State in Cities or Countries in families or scarce in our own souls But when the glorious King of Peace hath put all his enemies under his feet what then is left to make disturbance Our enemies can injure us no more for it is then their portion to suffer for all their former injuries to Christ and us Our friends will not injure us as here they do because their corruption and weakness is put off and the relicks of sin that caused the trouble are left behind O that is the sight that faith prepareth for that is the day the blessed day that all our dayes are spent in seeking and waiting and praying for then shall the glory of holiness appear and the wisdom of the Saints be justified by all that now is justified by her children Then it shall be known Whether faith or unbelief whether a heavenly or earthly mind and life was the wiser and more justifiable course then shall all the world discern between the righteous and the wicked between them that serve God and them that serve him not Mal. 3. 18. Then sin that is now so obstinately defended and justified by such foolish cunning shall never more find a tongue to plead for it or a Patron to defend it more Then where is the man that will stand forth and break a jest at godliness or make a scorn of the holy diligence of Believers How pale then will those faces look that here were wont to jear at piety What terrour will seize upon those hearts that here were wont to make themselves sport at the weaknesses of the upright servants of the Lord That is the day that shall rectifie all judgements and cure the errours and contemptuous thoughts of an holy life which no perswasions now can cure that is the day that shall set all straight that now seems crooked and shall satisfie us to the full that God was just even when he prospered his enemies and afflicted the souls that loved him and walkt in their integrity before him We shall then see that which shall fully satisfie us of the reason and equity of all our sufferings which here we underwent we shall marvel no more that God lets us weep and groan and pray and turns away his face and seems not to regard us We shall then find that all our groans were heard and all our tears and prayers did succeed which we suspected had been lost We shall then find that a duty performed in sincerity through all our lives was never lost no nor a holy thought nor a Cup of cold water that from holy love we gave to a Disciple We shall then see that our murmurings and discontents and jealous unbelieving thoughts of God which sickness or poverty or crosses did occasion were all injurious to the Lord and the fruit of infirmity and that when we questioned his Love on such accounts we knew not what we said We shall then see that Death and Grave and Devils were all but matter for the glorifying of Grace and for the triumph of our Lord and us Up then my soul and shake off thy unbelief and dulness Look up and long and meet thy Lord. The more thou art afraid of death the more desire that blessed day when mortality shall be swallowed up of life and the name of death shall be terrible no more Though death be thy enemy there is nothing but friendly in the coming of thy Lord. Though death dissolve thy nature the Resurrection shall restore it and make thee full reparation with advantage How glad would I have been to have seen Christ but with the Wise Men in the Manger or to have seen him