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Finally, I may be addressing those who have hitherto but little, if at all, considered the awful realities of this great event. me entreat you to begin to-day. It is a subject, the sublimity of which, makes it worthy the contemplation of the highest angel. What a scene will be unfolded, when all nations are assembled before the Judge, and when each individual in mute expectation waits his sentence, the sentence which is to make him happy or miserable for ever! Surely a solemn stillness will be hushed, every breath drawn in; universal silence will prevail. Oh, then, do you now, in the silence of your chamber, meditate upon his appearance; that, influenced by these meditations, you may, by Divine grace, have a place at his right hand. Think of the misery of being condemned in that great day!

We have said that his Advent will be viewed with terror by his enemies. How dreadful, then, will his sentence be! "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." Every word seems to increase the horror of the judg mens. "Depart!" You would not that he should reign over you; now you have your desire; you are sent to the remotest distance. "Depart from ME:" from Me, the fountain of light, and life, and joy; from Me, in whom all the rays of Divine glory centre, and by whom that glory is imparted to all who love my name! from Me, the joy of saints, the delight of angels, the beloved of God: depart from ME! And depart from Me" into everlasting fire." You are not driven into a land of forgetfulness, or into the regions of eternal sleep: you are dismissed from heaven, to abide in hell; to abide in that place "where their worm dieth not, and where the fire never is extinguished." Depart from Me into everlasting fire, "prepared for the devil and his angels." It was not prepared for you: mansions of everlasting bliss were designed by the God of all grace for your habitation; but you have chosen the lot of evil spirits, for you have partaken of their sins, surpassed them, indeed, in wickedness; for they never rejected the offers of mercy, or despised the riches of the grace of God, as you have done-your future residence, therefore, is to be with them: that dread abode, which Divine justice prepared for those evil spirits who were cast out from heaven, is to be your dwelling; there you are to reside forever and ever: "For these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal."

Oh, my friends, it appals the spirits even to think of such a sen

tence. What will it be to have it executed! To be forced, by an irresistable power, to turn away from the joys of heaven, from the society of the righteous, the songs of angels, the sight of the Saviour, the unclouded presence of the ever blessed God,—to turn away from these everlasting joys, and to plunge into an abyss of eternal woe! Oh thou merciful God, who wouldest not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should be converted and live, look down in compassion upon every thoughtless reader who may cast his eyes upon this page, and, ere the sentence be pronounced, turn his heart from sin. Grant him repentance unto life, and free forgiveness through the merits of thy Son.

And you, my beloved friend, my kinsman, my brother, my fellow-sinner, think of these things. I write them, not that I have any pleasure in declaring the terrors of the Lord; but I write them in love to your soul. It may be that it was expressly for your benefit that the God of love and mercy instructed me to write these truths. By all the terrors, then, of that awful day, now "prepare to meet your God." Think not that what has been written is an idle tale; it is the Son of God sent down from heaven, it is the Saviour of sinners, the Judge of quick and deadyes, the very Person before whose bar you must stand-who gives you the warning. He says of his first coming, "I came not to judge the world, but to save the world." He says of his second Advent, that, "He shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him; then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory, and before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth the sheep from the goats: and these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." Receive him, then, as a Saviour, ere he comes as a Judge. Fall before the footstool of the Divine Majesty; and, pleading the name and the merits of his only begotten Son, say unto the Lord, "Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according to the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions: create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me: take away the stony heart, and give me a heart of flesh: O God, be merciful to me, a sinner!"

May the Lord incline you thus to seek his face, and evermore bless you, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.

SERMON VI.

HELL.

By the Rev. EDWARD BICKERSTETH,
Rector of Watton.

MATTHEW Xxv. 41.

Then shall he say to them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.

COULD I, my Christian friends, in faithfulness to your souls, have passed by, in the course of this ministry, the subject of the present sermon, I should have rejoiced to omit it. But to sound an alarm, to utter the warning voice, to give notice of coming danger, is an essential part of ministerial fidelity and love. Did we see men in general, overwhelmed with the terrors of everlasting ruin, distressed with anxious apprehension, and sinking into despondency under the dread of hell, we might forbear to dwell upon a subject, in such a case uninviting and unsuitable; then it would be our more agreeable office to proclaim the riches and greatness of the salvation provided in Jesus for those ready to perish. But when we see men, almost without exception, dreading nothing less than the future punishment, wholly secure and unconcerned, regardless and careless of the miseries that are coming upon them; then how guilty must the minister be who warns not the wicked, who shuns to declare the council of God; that "upon the wicked, God shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest, this shall be the portion of their cup."

It is not in the language of severe and hard denunciation, that I desire to bring so fearful a subject before you, but in that of the tenderest compassion and earnest desire to promote your salvation. I am a poor sinner, even as you; I, by nature, am "a child of wrath" as you; if I hope to escape, it is only by sovereign

grace and mercy in Christ Jesus, and by daily flying to that Saviour who has delivered us from the wrath to come; and, having myself hope in him, can I but long to see you safe in this refuge? "Knowing the terrors of the Lord, we persuade men."

"The wicked go away into everlasting punishment."-The punishment of which we now speak, is the punishment to be inflicted on the wicked after the day of judgment. And in order to have distinct views, remember there is, to the righteous dying in the Lord, a double state of blessedness, a paradise before the judgment day, as well as the glory of heaven after the judgment day. There is also to the wicked dying in sin, a double state of misery, a hell before the day of judgment, and after that judgment, the lake of fire and brimstone, in which the wicked are tormented for ever and ever. It is said, by Job, "The wicked is reserved to the day of destruction, they shall be brought forth to the day of wrath." And, Peter declares: "The Lord knoweth how........to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished." They are now in the prison of hell, where the rich man was cast on his death, and they are there with the fallen angels, "delivered into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment."

What that judgment is, we have now to consider. I will point out,

1. The Judge who sentences them-2. The loss of good-3. The suffering of woe-4. The accursed society--5. The perpetual punish

ment.

I. THE JUDGE WHO SENTENCES THEM.

Here is the first fearful part of the woe. There is but one Saviour for lost sinners even now. There is but one Mediator and Advocate. He is tender, he is full of compassion; but this very Being becomes the awful Judge. "The wrath of Him that sitteth on the throne," is "the wrath of the Lamb." If it were a

cruel tyrant who sentenced them, there would be less ground for despair and horror. But it is one whose love is as unquestionable as his justice. He who left his Father's glory, who emptied himself of Divine fullness, and took upon him the form of a servant, to die, that sinners might not die eternally, he must love man. He who wears our nature, must know our frame, and therefore must be an equitable Judge. And yet such is his truth, his purity, and his holiness, that from his own mouth proceeds the unuttera

bly dreadful doom, "Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels."

O when I think how the sinner will at the last day tremble in his presence; and look now at the way in which he slights and despises him, I am struck with amazement at his present unconcern. Talk to men now about subjection to Christ, they mock at you as enthusiasts; but O the day will come, when the remembrance of a dishonored Christ will cut the heart with bitterest regret. 'O my madness!' will the lost soul say, Christ was proclaimed in my ears; I was invited to come to receive freely from him salvation. He was a sufficient Redeemer, but now the only possible Redeemer, is my judge, my sentencer, my condemner for

ever.'

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Mark again the punishment as it consists in privation; or,
II. THE LOSS of good.

This is implied in that fearful word depart,-" Depart from me." Our Lord frequently thus describes the condition of the lost. "Then will I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity." So we are told, Psalm v. 5, "The foolish shall not stand in thy sight; thou hatest all workers of iniquity."

Now, to understand this, remember that sinners can have nothing, and hope for nothing from a holy God, but through the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the only channel by which any good, either for our souls, or our bodies, for time or for eternity can come to us. But this Mediator has been rejected and despised by those on whom this sentence is denounced. They would not have Christ for their Saviour, they would not have spiritual blessings through him; they would not acknowledge that their worldly good was given through him. Most justly, then, is all good taken away. ALL THE GOOD OF THIS WORLD, its riches, honors, and pleasures; its health and vigor, its cheerfulness and mirth, its case, independence, security, and comfort, all, all are then lost. The ALLEVIATIONS ALSO OF THIS WORLD'S EVILS, are there removed. There is disease from head to foot, but no medicine, no physician, no healing balm; there is malice, hatred, revenge, wrath and enmity to the uttermost, but no love and forgiveness, no friend to protect and comfort; there is shame and contempt without measure, but no respect, and honor, and approbation.

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