iii. 12.

Thou art

gone, his foul is departed from thee, Jer. vi. 8. like a leg out of joint hanging by, whereof a man hath no ufe, as the word there ufed doth bear. Lofing God, thou haft loft the fountain of good and fo, all grace, all goodness, all the faving influences of his Spirit. What cant thou do then? What fruit canft thou bring forth, more than a branch cut off from the ftock? John xv. 5. Thou art become unprofitable, Rom. as a filthy rotten thing, fit only for the dunghill. (3.) Death has come up into thy windows, yea, and has fettled on thy face; for God, in whofe favour is life, Pfal. XXX. 5. is gone from thee; and fo the foul of thy foul is departed. What a lothfome lump is the body, when the foul is gone? Far more lothfome is thy foul in this cafe. dead, while thou liveft. Do not deny it,. feeing thy fpeech is laid, thine eyes clofed, and all fpiritual motion in thee ceafeth. Thy true friends, who fee thy cafe do lament, because thou art gone into the land of filence. (4.) Thou haft not a steady friend among all the creatures of God; for now that thou halt loft the Mafter's favour, all the family is fet against thee. Confcience is thine enemy; the word never speaks good of thee: God's people lothe thee, fo far as they fee what thou art, Pfal. xv. 22. The beafts and ftones of the field, are banded together against thee, Jeb. v. 23. Hof. ii. 18. Thy meat, drick, clothes, grudge to be ferviceable to the wretch that has loft God, and abufeth them to his dishonour. The earth groaneth under thee; yea, the whole creation groaneth, and travaileth in pain together, becaufe of thee, and fuch as thou art, Rom. xxi. 22. Only hell from beneath is moved for thee; for, "There fall in no wife enter into it, any thing that defileth, Rev. xxi. 22. Only hell from beneath is moved for thee, to meet thee at thy coming, Ifa. xiv. 9. . Laftly, Thy hell is begun already. What makes hell, but exclufion from the prefence of God? " Depart from me ye curled." Now ye are gone from God already, with the curfe upon you. fhall be your pupillment at length, (if ye return not) which is now your choice. As a gracious ftate, is a ftate of glory in the bud; fo a graceless state, is hell in the bud; which if. it continue, will come to perfection at length.

That

MOTIVE 3. Confider the dreadful inftances of the wrath of God; and let them ferve to awaken thee to fee out of this ftate. Confider, (1.) How it has fallen on men. Even in this world, many have been fet up as monuments of divine vengeance; that others might fear. Wrath has fwept away

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multitudes, who have fallen together by the hand of an angry God. Confider how the Lord" fpared not the old world, bringing in the food upon the world of the ungodly: and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an example unto thofe that after fhould live ungodly," 2. Pet. ii. 5, 6. But it is yet more dreadful to think of that weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth, amongst thofe, who in hell lift up their eyes, but cannot get a drop of water to cool their tongues. Believe these things, and be warned by them; left deftruction come upon thee, for a warning to others. 2.) Confider how wrath fell upon the fallen angels, whofe cafe is abfolutely hopeless. They were the first that ventured to break the hedge of the divine law; and God fet them up for monuments of his wrath against fin. They once left their own habitation, and were never allowed to lock in again at the hole of the door; bat they are" referved in everlasting chains under darkness, unto the judgement of the great day," Jude 6. Laftly, Behold how an angry God dealt with his own Son, ftanding in the room of elect finners. Rom. viii. 32. "God fpared not his own Son." Sparing mercy might have been expected, if any at all. If any perfon could have obtained it, farely his own Son would have got it; but he fpared him not. The Father's delight is made a man of forrows: he who is the wildom of God, becomes fore amazed, ready to faint away with a fit of horror. The weight of his wrath makes him fweat great drops of blood. By the fierceness of this fire, his heart was "like wax melted in the midft of his bowels." Behold here how fevere God is against fin! the fun was ftrack blind with this terrible fight, rocks were rent, graves opened, death, as it were, in the excefs of aftonishment, letting its prifoners flip away. What is a deluge, a fhower of fire and brimstone on Sodomites, the terrible ngife of a diffolving world, the whole fabric of heaven and earth falling down at once, angels caft down from heaven int the bottomlefs pit? What are all thefe, 1-fay, in comparifor, with this? Ged fuffering! groaning, dying upon a crofs! infinite holinefs did it, to make fin look like itfelf, viz. infinite' And will man live at eafe,while expofed to this wrat! LASTLY, Confider what a God he is, with who m thou haft to do, whofe wrath thou art liable unto: He is a God of infiaite knowledge and wifdom: fo that none of th fecret, can be hid from him. He infallibly fi whereby wrath may be executed towar

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fins, however nds out all meaus the fatisfying of juftice

Juftice. He is of infinite Power, and fo can do what he will against the finner. How heavy muft the ftrokes of wrath be, which are laid on by an omnipotent hand! infinite Power can make the finer prifoner, even when he is in his greatest rage against heaven: It can bring again the feveral parcels of duft, out of the grave; put them together again, reunite the foul and the body, fift them before the tribunal, hurry them away to the pit, and hold them up with the one hand thro' eternity, while they are lafhed with the other. He is infinitely just, and therefore must punish: it were acting contrary 'to his nature to fuffer the finner to efcape wrath: Hence the executing of this wrath is pleafing to him; for tho' the Lord hath no delight in the death of the finner, as it is the deftruction of his own creature; yet he delights in it, as it is the execution of justice;" Upon the wicked he fhall rain fnares, fire and brimftone, and an horrible tempeft:" Mark the reafon, " For the righteous Lord loveth righteoufnefs," Pfal. xi. 6, 7." I will caufe my fury to rest upon them, and I will be comforted," Ezek. v. 13“I alfo will laugh at your calamity," Prov. i. 26. Finally, He lives for ever, to purfue the quarrel: Let us therefore conclude, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

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Be awakened then, O young finner; be awakened, O old 'finner, who art yet in the ftate thou waft born. in: Your, fecutity is none of God's allowance, it is the fleep of death: rife out of it ere the pit clofe its mouth on you: It is true, you may put on a breast plate of iron, make your brow brafs, and your hearts as an adamant; who can help it? But God will break that brazen brow, and make that adamantine heart, at last, to fly into a thousand pieces: Ye may, if ye will, labour to put thefe things out of your heads, that ye may yet fleep in a found fkin, tho' in a fate of wrath: Ye may run away with the arrows fticking in your confciences to your work, to work them away or to your beds, to fleep them out or to company to fport and laugh them away: but convictions fo ftifled will have a fearful refurrection: and the day is coming, when the aws of wrath fhall fo flick in thy foul, as thou fhalt never be able to pluck them out thro' the ages of eternity, unless thou take warning in time.

But if any defire to flee from the wrath to come: and for that end, to know what courfe to take; I offer them these few advices, and obteft and befeech them, as they love their own fouls, to fall in with them (1.) Retire yourselves into fome fecret place, and there meditate on this you mifery; Believe

it, and fix your thoughts on it: Let each put the question to himfelf, How can I live in this ftate? How can I die in it? How will I rife again, and stand before the tribunal of God in it? (2.) Confider feriously the fin of your nature, heart and life: A kindly fight of wrath flows from a deep fenfe of fin: They who fee themselves exceeding finful, will find no great difficulty to perceive themfelves to be heirs of wrath(3.) Labour to justify God in this matter: To quarrel with God about it, and to rage like a wild bull in a net, will but fix you the more in it: Humiliation of foul before the Lord, is neceffary for an efcape: God will not fell deliverance, but freely gives it to thofe, who fee themselves akogether unworthy of his favour. Laftly, Turn your eyes, O prifoners of hope, towards the Lord Jefus Chrift; and embrace him as he offereth himfelf in the gofpel: "There is no falvation in any other," Acts iv. 12. God is a confuming fire ye are the children of wrath if the Mediator interpofe not betwixt him and you, ye are undone for ever. If ye would be fafe, come under his fhadow; one drop of that wrath cannot fall there, for he "delivereth us from the wrath to come," Taeff. i. 10 Accept of him in his covenant, wherein he offereth himself to thee and fo thou fhalt, as the captive woman, redeem thy life, by marrying the Conqueror. His blood will quench that fire of wrath, which burns against thee: in the white raiment of his righteousness thou shalt be fafe; for no form of wrath can pierce it.

II. I fhall drop a few words to the fainter

FIRST, Remember, that at that time, (namely, when ye were in your natural ftate) ye were without Chrift—having. no hope, and without God in the world." Call to mind that ftate ye were in formerly; and review the mifery of it. There are five memorials 1 may thence give in to the holy affembly, of the faints, who are no more children of wrath, but heirs of God, and joint heirs with Chrift, tho' as yet in their minority. (1.) Remember, that in the day our Lord took you by the hand, ye were in no better condition than others. O what moved him to ta's you, when he past by your neighbours? . found you chilaren of wrath, even as others; but he did not leave you fo. He came into the common prifon, where you lay in your fetters, even as others and from amongst the multitude of condeinned malefactors, he picked out you, commanded your fetters to be taken off, put a pardon in your hand, and brought you into the glorious liberty of the children of God

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while he left others in the devil's fetters.. (2.) Remember there was nothing in you to engage him to love you, in the day he first appeared for your deliverance. Ye were children of wrath, even as others, fit for hell, and altogether unfit for heaven: yet the King brought you into the palace: the King's Son made love to you a condemned criminal, and efpoufed you to himself, on the day in which ye might have been well led forth to execution. "Even fu, Father, for fo it feemeth good in thy fight," Matth. ix. 26. (3.) Remember, ye were fitter to be lothed than loved in that day. Wonder, that when he faw you. in your blood, he looked not at you with abhorrence, and paffed by you. Wonder that ever fuch a time could be. "a time of Love," Ezek. xvi. 3. (4.) Remember, ye are decked with borrowed feathers. It is his comelinefs which is upon you, ver. 14. It was he that took off your prifon-garments, and clothed you with robes of righteoufuefs, garments of falvation garments wherewith ye are arrayed as the lilies, which toil not, neither do they fpin. He took the chains from off your arms, the rope from about your necks; put you in fuch a drefs as ye might be fit for the court of heaven, even to eat at the King's table. (5.)" Rentember your faults this day:" as Pharaoh's butler, who had forgotten Jofeph. Mind how you have forgotten, and how unkindly you have treated him, who remembred you in your low eftate." Is this your kindness. to your friend?" In the day of your deliverance, did ye think ye could have thus requited him, your Lord?

SECONDLY, Pity the children of wrath, the world that lies in wickednefs. Can ye be unconcerned for them, ye who were once in the fame condition? Ye have got afhore indeed, but your fellows are yet in hazard of perishing; and will not ye make them al! poffible help for their deliverance? What they are, ye fometimes were. This may draw pity from and engage you to ufe all means for their recovery. Tit. ii. 1, 2, 3.

you.

See

THIRDLY, Admire that matchelefs love, which brought you out of the fate of wrath. Chrift's love was active love, he loved thy foul from the pit of corruption." It was no eafy work to purchale the life of the condemned finner! but he gave his life for thy life. He gave his precious blood to quench. that flame of wrath, which otherwife would have burnt thee up. Men get the best view of the ftars, from the bottom of a deep pit; from this pit of mifery into which thou waft caft by the Ett Adam, thou mayft ger the best view of the Sun of Righteouf

nefs