Before I conclude this use, I would lay down a few motives, if so be thou mayest be prevailed with to look after thine own everlasting state.
1. Consider, God hath put man above all the creatures in this visible world, into a state of abiding forever; they cannot be annihilated, they shall never again be turned into nothing but must live with God or the devil forever and ever. And though the scripture saith, ‘Man hath no pre-eminence over a beast in his death,’ yet the beast hath pre-eminence above many men, for he shall not rise again to come into judgment as man must, nor receive that dismal sentence for sin and transgression as man shall; this, therefore, is worthy to be considered with seriousness of all that have souls to be saved or damned—’They must one day come to judgment,’ there to stand before that Judge of all the earth whose eyes are like a flame of fire, from the sight of which thou canst not hide one of thy words, or thoughts, or actions, because thou wants the righteousness of God. The fire of his justice shall burn up all thy rags of righteousness wherewith by the law thou hast clothed thyself and will leave thee nothing but a soul full of sin to bemoan and eternal burnings to grapple with. O the burnings that will then beset sinners on every side, and that will eat their flesh and torment their spirit with far more terror than if they were stricken with scorpions! And observe it; the torment will be higher than others where there is the guilt of neglecting Jesus Christ; he is indeed the Saviour, and he was sent to deliver men from the wrath to come.
2. Consider once past grace and ever past grace. When the door is shut against thee, it will open no more, and then repenting, desires, wishing, and inclinations come all too late (Luke 13). Good may be done to others, but to thee, none; and this shall be because, even because thou hast withstood the time of thy visitation, and not received grace when offered: ‘My God will cast them away because they did not hearken unto him’ (Luke 19:41-43; Hosea 9:17). Cain was driven out from the presence of God, for aught I know, some hundreds of years before his death; Ishmael has cast away after seventeen years of age; Esau lived thirty or forty years after he had sold his birthright. Oh! Many, very many are in this condition! Though God is gracious, he will not always be slighted or abused; there are plenty of sinners in the world—if one will not, another will. Christ was soon repulsed by and sent away from the country of the Gadarenes, but on the other side of the sea, many were ready with joy to receive him (Luke 8:37,40). So, when the Jews contradicted and blasphemed, ‘the Gentiles gladly received the word’ (Acts 13:46-48). Look to it, sinner, here is life and death set before thee; life, if it is not too late to receive it; but if it be, it is not too late for death to swallow thee up. And tell me, will it not be dreadful to be carried from under the gospel to the damned, there to lie in endless torment, because thou wouldst not be delivered therefrom? Will it be comfort to thee to see the Saviour turn Judge? To see him that wept and died for the sin of the world now ease his mind on Christ-abhorring sinners by rendering them the just judgment of God? For all their abominable filthiness, had they closed with Christ, they had been shrouded from the justice of the law and should not have come into condemnation. ‘But had been passed from death to life’; but they would not take shelter there; they would venture to meet the justice of God in its fury, wherefore now it shall swallow them up forever and ever. And let me ask further, is not he a madman who, being loaded with combustible matter, will run headlong into the fire upon a bravado? Or that, being guilty of felony or murder, will desperately run himself into the hand of the officer, as if the law, the judge, the sentence, execution, were but a jest, or a thing to be played withal? And yet thus mad are poor, wretched, miserable sinners, who, flying from Christ as if he were a viper, are overcome and cast off forever by the just judgment of the law. But ah! How poorly will these be able to plead the virtues of the law to which they have cleaved when God shall answer them, ‘Whom dost thou pass in beauty? Go down, and be thou laid with the uncircumcised’ (Eze 32:19). Go down to hell, and there be laid with those that refused the grace of God.
Sinners take my advice, with which I shall conclude this use—Call often to remembrance that thou hast a precious soul within thee; that thou art on the way to the end, at which thy precious soul will be in special concern; it is then time to delay no longer, the time of reward being come. I say again, bring thy end home; put thyself in thy thoughts into the last day thou must live in this world, seriously arguing thus—How if this day were my last? What if I never see the sunrise more? How if the first voice that rings tomorrow morning in my heavy ears be, ‘Arise, ye dead, and come to judgment?’ Or how, if the next sight I see with mine eyes be the Lord in the clouds, with all his angels, raining floods of fire and brimstone upon the world? Am I in a case where I am thus near my end? To hear this trump of God? Or to see this great appearance of this great God and the Lord Jesus Christ? Will my profession, or the faith I think I have, carry me through all the trials of God’s tribunal? Cannot his eyes, which are as a flame of fire, see in my words, thoughts, and actions enough to make me culpable of the wrath of God? O, how serious should sinners be in this work of remembering things to come, of laying to their heart the greatness and terror of that notable day of God Almighty, and in examining themselves, how it is like to go with their souls when they shall stand before the Judge indeed! To this end, God makes this word effectual. Amen.
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