O Sabbath-breaker, fecure and prayerlefs finner, turn from your fins unto God and holiness; flee to Chrift for fhelter from them, and the wrath due to them; righteousness and redemption are only to be found in him. Would you not count him mad, who being condemned to a cruel death for base crimes, and might efcape it if he would accept of a pardon ready provided for him, and leave off fuch vile acts for the future, would yet obftinately refufe to do it? And, are not you yet madder, that flight your Saviour, and hug your luits, when your danger is a thousand times greater! What madnefs is it to difhonour God, and damn your soul, to gratify the devil, or please a vile carcafe, that shortly will be fo lothsome, that men cannot endure it above ground? O finner, I beseech you, in the name of the great and glorious Jehovah, and in the name of our glorious Redeemer, be reconciled to God, accept of a pardon through Christ's blood, and engage to quit these fins that would deftroy you Will you pleafe God, and fhew kindness to your poor foul by doing it? However much you have abufed God's patience, trampled his love, fiighted his calls, defpifed his threatenings, and undervalued his pro-` mifes; yet he is ftill ftanding and befeeching you to be reconciled to him. O will not all this goodness melt your heart, and caufe you, with Ephraim, Jer. xxxi. 18. to bemoan yourself, and cry, Turn thou.me, O Lord, and I fhall be turned ?" Without this turning, fee that you venture not to this facred ordinance; let none with the running ulcers of fin upon them offer to fit down at this holy table, for God's pure eyes cannot look upon them. And if you would turn a-right, fee that ye turn believingly to God in Chrift: For there is no accefs, to the King of heaven, without bringing the Prince of peace, the King's Son, in your arms; no atonement without Chrift, no acceptance but in the Beloved. Lastly, If you would turn to God aright, ye must not only turn from fin, but also turn to the ways of holiness and new obedience. It is not enough to cease to do evil, but you must also learn to do well. Some do part with their fins of commiffion, but continue ftill in fins of omif fion; they leave their grofs out-breakings, but ftill neglect commanded duties. But the tree is not only adjudged to the fire that bears evil fruit, but alfo the tree that bears no fruit:: So that the neglect of duty will damn us as furely as the commiflion of fin. Communicants that God will fmile upon, are fuch as not only forfake all known fin, but do fincerely endeavour through grace, to yield obedience to the whole revealed will of God, and in Chrift's ftrength do fet about the perform ance of every commanded duty. But as for thofe communicants that do not study new obedience, and do not make confcience of performing every known duty, God will fay to fuch, as he faith to the wicked, Pfal. 1. 16. 17. "What haft thou to do, that thou fhouldft take my covenant (or the feal of my covenant) in thy mouth, seeing thou cafteft my words behind thee?" They can expect no communion fellowship with him at his table. and But, on the other hand, he makes very gracious and comfortable promises to those that study obedience, Jer. vii. 24. "Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you fhall be my people." As the prophet Ifaiah speaks to the Jews of the good things of the land of Canaan, fo may we fay to you concerning the good things of the facrament, Ifa. i. 16. "If ye be willing and obedient, ye fhall eat the good of the land." As the land of Canaan produced very precious fruits, fo doth the Lord's fupper; and these far more excellent than those. It is here that the marrow and fatness of God's houfe is diftributed to his children. Well, if you be willing and obedient, ye shall eat of the good things of the facra ment. But fee that your obedience spring from right principles, from love and gratitude to God, from a true hatred to fin, and high esteem of holiness. It was an excellent faying of one, Were there neither heaven nar hell, yet fin fhould be my bell, and balinefs my heaven. The fpiritually enlightened foul doth fee an unfpeakable defor mity in fin, which causeth him to abhor it: He fees fuch a charming beauty in holiness, that he cannot but love and defire it. DIRECT. DIRECT. XIII. Meditate much upon the Death and Sufferings of our Lord Jefus Chrift, before you approach to his Table. WOULD you have your hearts put in a fuitable communion-frame, then read and think much of the fufferings of Chrift; and, in a fpecial manner, take a clofe view of them on the Saturday's night before the communion. Think on them till your hearts melt, and affections warm; yea, refolve you will not give over till then; and beg God's bleffing on your meditations for this end. Think and wonder at the greatness of the humiliation of the Son of God. Admire the low ftoop and conde fcenfion of the Son of God, and the King of glory, that he fhould be content for us to become a creature, and fuch a mean creature as man; that he, who was equat with God, fhould become lefs than God, John xiv. 28. yea, less than angels, Heb. i. 7. yea, to be depreffed below the ordinary condition of man, Pfal, xxii. 6. "I am a worm," &c. Think how he denuded himself of all his riches and glory; that though he was the heir of all things, yet, for our fakes, he became fo poor, that he had not a cradle of his own to ly in when born, a house to lay his head in while he lived, nor a grave to be buried in when he died. He left his throne of ftate, to lodge in the virgin's womb: He is born, not in his mother's house, but in a common inn, and the bafeft place of the inn, a ftable,, the inn being probably taken up by perfons of richer quality: He is cradled in a manger, having no better place allowed him on earth, though the highest heavens were too mean for him, Think how he was carried to a wilderness to faft and watch, and live forty days among the wild beasts, haunted and tempted by the devil, and fadly buffeted by his own flaves; and all this for us. View him going about on foot, hungry, thirsty, and weary, yet always doing good: And the more good he did to fouls and bodies, the more was he hunted and perfecuted, perfecuted, reproached and blafphemed; and all this for our fakes. View him entering into the garden of Gethsemane, beginning to fear, turn heavy, and cry out, My foul is exceeding forrowful even unto death. What made him heavy, but the dead weight of our fins, and the curfes of the law annexed to them? Behold him complaining to his poor difciples, that could make no help to him; neither they nor the angels in heaven durft touch his load, nor rafte his cup: He could have helped them, but they could not help him. Yea, he got not fo much as fympathy from them; they fell asleep when he was at the worst, and left him to tread out the wine press alone, and all for our fakes. View him in his fearful agony and bloody fweat, falling fometimes on his knees, and fometimes on his face, praying once, praying again, and praying the third time, that the cup might pafs from him, till he is overwhelmed and covered with his own blood. Behold the great drops of blood burfting through and standing a bove his garments, and falling and lying upon the ground round about him; being at this time preft betwixt the milftone of God's juftice and our fins. Behold him fweating without heat, and bleeding without a wound; the fire and the wound were inward, even in his foul. How freely did the fountain of his precious blood open and run to wash us? Every vein and pore pours out a ftream, not waiting for the tormentors, and all for our fakes. Behold him betrayed and fold for thirty pieces of filver, taken and bound with cords like a thief; yea, bound fift, as Judas bade, and fo faft (as fome fay) that the blood did burft out of his tender hands. Can your hearts or eyes hold, to fee thofe hands, that made heaven and earth, wrung together and bruised with hard cords: To fee him bound that came to fet the prifoners free, and loofe us who were Satan's bondflaves! Bleft Jefus, had not the cords of thy own love tyed thee faster than the cords of thy enemies, though they had been the ftrongeft cabels or iron chains, they could could not have held thee: But thou waft a willing prifoner for our fakes. Behold him struck upon the face, fpit upon, buffeted, blindfolded, mocked, and cruelly affronted by rude foldiers, a whole night: Though he could have breathed them into hell, yet he meekly holds his peace, and patiently fuffers all for our fakes. Behold his lovely countenance all disfigured by their plucking the hair from his cheeks with pincers, Ifa. 1. 6. The fweeteft face that ever the fun faw was all befmeared with "blood and spitting, yet he hid not his face from fhame." Behold him led up and down from place to place, with a ridiculous garb put upon him, and yet never refifts: He is abused and difgraced; a Barabbas, a murderer, the vileft malefactor in all Jerufalem, is preferred before him; and yet he complains not. View him as he was used by his own family, his chofen disciples; one of them betrays him, another of them denies him, and all the reft forfake him, and leave him alone among his bloody enemies hands. Behold him, that clothes the lilies of the field, tripped naked: Behold him fcourged back and fide; yea fcourged above measure. (Pilate thinking thereby to fave his life) till all the pavement of Pilate's judgment-hall about him is bedewed with his precious blood: Yet he wil lingly gave his back to the fmiters, that we might be freed from the everlafting lafhes of God's wrath in hell. Behold him with a platted crown of thorns upon his head, with the fharp points turned inward, and driven into his head, till they pierced his head and skull in an hundred places; and fo he is content to be as the ram caught in the thickets, to be facrificed in our room. Behold a new shower of blood running down his neck and whole body: Oh! it was my fins that platted the thorns, and they were the reeds that drave them in. Behold him, after all these fufferings, put to bear his heavy cross, upon his fore and biceding fhoulders; with what patience and humility did he bear the law curfed tree that was weighed down with our fins, and the law's curfes fastened to it? Yea, he bears without complaint |