leave them thus? If they will not hear me, yet do thou hear me. O that they may yet live in thy sight! Lord, save them, or else they perish. My heart would melt to see their houses on fire about their ears, when they were fast asleep in their beds; and shall not my soul be moved within me, to see them falling into endless perdition ? Lord, have compassion, and save them out of the burning: put forth thy divine power, and the work will be done; but, as for me, I cannot prevail. CHAPTER IV. SHEWING THE MARKS OF THE UNCONVERTED. WHILE We keep aloof in generals, there is little fruit to be expected: it is the hand-fight that does execution. David is not awakened by the prophet's hovering at a distance in parabolical insinuations; he is forced to close with him, and tell him plainly, "Thou art the man." Few will, in words, deny the necessity of the new birth; but they have a self-deluding confidence that the work is not now to do. And because they know themselves free from that gross hypocrisy which takes up religion, merely for a colour, to deceive others, and for covering wicked designs, they are confident of their sincerity, and suspect not that more close hypocrisy, (wherein the greatest danger lies,) by which a man deceiveth his own soul.' But man's deceitful heart is such a matchless cheat, and selfdelusion so reigning and so fatal a disease, that I know not whether be the greater, the difficulty and displacency, or the necessity, of the undeceiving work that I am now upon. Alas! for the unconverted! they must be undeceived, or they will be undone. But how shall this be effected? 1 James i. 26. Help, O all-searching Light, and let thy discerning eye discover the rotten foundation of the self-deceiver; and lead me, O Lord God, as thou didst the prophet, into the chambers of imagery, and dig through the wall of sinners' hearts, and discover the hidden abominations that are lurking out of sight in the dark. O send thy angel before me, to open the sundry wards of their hearts, as thou didst before Peter, and make even the iron gates to fly open of their own accord. And, as Jonathan no sooner tasted the honey, but his eyes were enlightened, so grant, O Lord, that when the poor deceived souls, with whom I have to do, shall cast their eyes upon these lines, their minds may be illuminated, and their consciences convinced and awakened, that they may see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and be converted, and thou mayest heal them. This must be premised before we proceed to the discovery, that it is most certain men may have a confident persuasion that their hearts and states be good, and yet be unsound. Hear the Truth himself, who shews, in Laodicea's case, that men may be wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked, and yet not know it: yea, they may be confident they are rich, and increased in grace.1 "There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet not washed from their filthiness."2 Who better persuaded of his state than Paul, while he yet remained unconverted ? so that they are miserably deceived who take a strong confidence for a sufficient evidence. They, that have no better proof than barely a strong persuasion that they are converted, are certainly as yet strangers to conversion. But to come more close: as it was said to the adherents of Antichrist, so here; some of the unconverted carry their marks in their forehead more openly, and some in their hands more covertly. The apostle reckons up some, upon whom he writes the sentence of death; as in these dreadful catalogues, 1 Rev. iii. 17. 2 Prov. xxx. 12. 3 Rom. vii. 9. which I beseech you to attend to with all diligence. "For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words; for, because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience."1 'But the fearful, and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death."" "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God." Woe to them that have their name written in this catalogue! Such may know, as certainly as if God had told them from heaven, that they are unsanctified, and under an impossibility of being saved in this condition. "3 There are, then, these several sorts that (past all dispute) are unconverted: they carry their marks in their foreheads. 1. The unclean. These are ever reckoned among the goats, and have their names (whoever is left out) in all the forementioned catalogues.* 2. The covetous. These are ever branded for idolaters, and the doors of the kingdom are shut against them by name.3 3. Drunkards. Not only such as drink away their reason, but withal (yea, above all) such as are too strong for strong drink. The Lord fills his mouth with woes against these, and declares them to have no inheritance in the kingdom of God." 4. Liars. The God that cannot lie has told them, 1 Eph. v. 5, 6. 2 Rev. xxi. 8. 3 1 Cor. vi. 9, 10. 4 See also Gal. v. 19-21. 5 Eph. v. 5; Col. iii. 5; 1 Cor. vi. 9, 10. 6 Isa. v. 11, 12, 22; Gal. v. 21. that there is no place for them in his kingdom, no entrance into his hill; but their portion is with the father of lies, whose children they are, in the lake of burnings.' 5. Swearers. The end of these, without deep and speedy repentance, is swift destruction, and most certain and unavoidable condemnation.2 6. Railers and backbiters, that love to take up a reproach against their neighbour, and fling all the dirt they can in his face, or else wound him secretly behind his back.3 7. Thieves, extortioners, oppressors, that grind the poor, or over-reach their brethren when they have them at an advantage: these must know that God "is the avenger of all such." Hear, O ye false and purloining and wasteful servants? hear, O ye deceitful tradesmen, hear your sentence. God will certainly hold his door against you, and turn your treasures of unrighteousness into the treasures of wrath, and make your ill-gotten silver and gold to torment you, like burning metal in your bowels." 8. All that do ordinarily live in the profane neglect of God's worship, that hear not his word, that call not on his name, that restrain prayer before God, that mind not their own nor their families' souls, but “live without God in the world." 9. Those that are frequenters and lovers of vain company. God hath declared he will be the destroyer of all such, and that "they shall never enter into the hill of his rest.7 10. Scoffers at religion, that make a scorn of precise walking, and mock at the messengers and diligent servants of the Lord, and at their holy profession, and make themselves merry with the weakness and failings 1 Psalm xv. 1, 2 ; Rev. xxi. 8, 27; John viii. 44; Prov. vi. 17. 2 James v. 12; Zech. v. 1, 2, 3. 1 Thess. iv. 6. 5 1 Cor. vi. 9, 10; James v. 2, 3. 6 John viii. 47; Job xv. 4; Psalm xiv. 4, lxxix. 6; Eph. ii. 12, and iv. 18. 7 Prov. ix. 6, and xiii, 20; Psa. xv. 4, of professors: "Hear ye despisers," hear your dreadful doom.1 Sinner, consider diligently whether thou art not to be found in one of these ranks; for if this be thy case, thou art in the " gall of bitterness, and bond of iniquity;" for all these do carry their marks in their foreheads, and are undoubtedly the sons of death. And, if so, the Lord pity our poor congregations! Oh, how small a number will remain, when these ten sorts are left out! May God shew you your danger, and constrain you to cry, "Lord, have mercy upon us!" Sirs, what shift do you make to keep up your confidence of your good state, when God from heaven declares against you, and pronounces you in a state of damnation? I would reason with you as God with them, "How canst thou say, I am not polluted? See thy way in the valley; know what thou hast done." Man, is not thy conscience privy to thy tricks of deceit, to thy secret sins, to thy way of lying? Yea, are not thy friends, thy family, thy neighbours, witnesses to thy profane neglect of God's worship, to thy covetous practices, to thy envious and malicious carriage? May not they point at thee as thou goest? There goes a gaming prodigal: there goes a drunken Nabal, a companion of evil-doers: there goes a railer, or a scoffer, or a loose liver? Beloved, God hath written it as with a sunbeam, in the book by which you must be judged, that these are not the spots of his children, and that none such (except renewed by converting grace) shall ever escape the damnation of hell. 66 O that such as you would now be persuaded to repent and turn from all your transgressions, or else iniquity will be your ruin !" Alas! for poor hardened sinners! Must I leave you at last where you were? Must I leave the tippler still at the ale-bench? Must I leave the wanton still in his vices? Must I leave the malicious still in his venom, and the drunkard 1 Prov. xix. 29, and iii. 34; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 16. 2 Jer. ii. 23. |