-Their foot shall slide in due time- Deut. xxxii. 35
In this verse is threatened the vengeance of God on the wicked unbelieving
Israelites, who were God's visible people, and who lived under the means of
grace; but who, notwithstanding all God's wonderful works towards them,
remained (as ver. 28.) void of counsel, having no understanding in them. Under
all the cultivations of heaven, they brought forth bitter and poisonous fruit;
as in the two verses next preceding the text. The expression I have chosen for
my text, Their foot shall slide in due time, seems to imply the following
doings, relating to the punishment and destruction to which these wicked
Israelites were exposed.
That they were always exposed to destruction; as one that stands or
walks in slippery places is always exposed to fall. This is implied in the
manner of their destruction coming upon them, being represented by their foot
sliding. The same is expressed, Psalm lxxiii. 18. "Surely thou didst set
them in slippery places; thou castedst them down into destruction."
2. It implies, that they were always exposed to sudden unexpected destruction.
As he that walks in slippery places is every moment liable to fall, he cannot
foresee one moment whether he shall stand or fall the next; and when he does
fall, he falls at once without warning: Which is also expressed in Psalm
lxxiii. 18, 19. "Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou
castedst them down into destruction: How are they brought into desolation as in
a moment!"
3. Another thing implied is, that they are liable to fall of themselves,
without being thrown down by the hand of another; as he that stands or walks on
slippery ground needs nothing but his own weight to throw him down.
4. That the reason why they are not fallen already, and do not fall now, is
only that God's appointed time is not come. For it is said, that when that due
time, or appointed time comes, their foot shall slide. Then they shall
be left to fall, as they are inclined by their own weight. God will not hold
them up in these slippery places any longer, but will let them go; and then at
that very instant, they shall fall into destruction; as he that stands on such
slippery declining ground, on the edge of a pit, he cannot stand alone, when he
is let go he immediately falls and is lost.
The observation from the words that I would now insist upon is this.
"There is nothing that keeps wicked men at any one moment out of hell, but
the mere pleasure of God." By the mere pleasure of God, I mean his
sovereign pleasure, his arbitrary will, restrained by no obligation, hindered
by no manner of difficulty, any more than if nothing else but God's mere will
had in the least degree, or in any respect whatsoever, any hand in the
preservation of wicked men one moment.
The truth of this observation may appear by the following considerations.
1. There is no want of power in God to cast wicked men into hell at any
moment. Men's hands cannot be strong when God rises up. The strongest have no
power to resist him, nor can any deliver out of his hands.-He is not only able
to cast wicked men into hell, but he can most easily do it. Sometimes an
earthly prince meets with a great deal of difficulty to subdue a rebel, who has
found means to fortify himself, and has made himself strong by the numbers of
his followers. But it is not so with God. There is no fortress that is any
defence from the power of God. Though hand join in hand, and vast multitudes of
God's enemies combine and associate themselves, they are easily broken in
pieces. They are as great heaps of light chaff before the whirlwind; or large
quantities of dry stubble before devouring flames. We find it easy to tread on
and crush a worm that we see crawling on the earth; so it is easy for us to cut
or singe a slender thread that any thing hangs by: thus easy is it for God,
when he pleases, to cast his enemies down to hell. What are we, that we should
think to stand before him, at whose rebuke the earth trembles, and before whom
the rocks are thrown down?
2. They deserve to be cast into hell; so that divine justice never
stands in the way, it makes no objection against God's using his power at any
moment to destroy them. Yea, on the contrary, justice calls aloud for an
infinite punishment of their sins. Divine justice says of the tree that brings
forth such grapes of Sodom, "Cut it down, why cumbereth it the
ground?" Luke xiii. 7. The sword of divine justice is every moment brandished
over their heads, and it is nothing but the hand of arbitrary mercy, and God's
mere will, that holds it back.
3. They are already under a sentence of condemnation to hell. They do
not only justly deserve to be cast down thither, but the sentence of the law of
God, that eternal and immutable rule of righteousness that God has fixed
between him and mankind, is gone out against them, and stands against them; so
that they are bound over already to hell. John iii. 18. "He that believeth
not is condemned already." So that every unconverted man properly belongs
to hell; that is his place; from thence he is, John viii. 23. "Ye are from
beneath." And thither be is bound; it is the place that justice, and God's
word, and the sentence of his unchangeable law assign to him.
4. They are now the objects of that very same anger and wrath of God, that is
expressed in the torments of hell. And the reason why they do not go down to
hell at each moment, is not because God, in whose power they are, is not then
very angry with them; as he is with many miserable creatures now tormented in
hell, who there feel and bear the fierceness of his wrath. Yea, God is a great
deal more angry with great numbers that are now on earth: yea, doubtless, with
many that are now in this congregation, who it may be are at ease, than he is
with many of those who are now in the flames of hell.
So that it is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and does not
resent it, that he does not let loose his hand and cut them off. God is not altogether
such an one as themselves, though they may imagine him to be so. The wrath of
God burns against them, their damnation does not slumber; the pit is prepared,
the fire is made ready, the furnace is now hot, ready to receive them; the
flames do now rage and glow. The glittering sword is whet, and held over them,
and the pit hath opened its mouth under them.
5. The devil stands ready to fall upon them, and seize them as his own,
at what moment God shall permit him. They belong to him; he has their souls in
his possession, and under his dominion. The scripture represents them as his
goods, Luke xi. 12. The devils watch them; they are ever by them at their right
hand; they stand waiting for them, like greedy hungry lions that see their
prey, and expect to have it, but are for the present kept back. If God should
withdraw his hand, by which they are restrained, they would in one moment fly
upon their poor souls. The old serpent is gaping for them; hell opens its mouth
wide to receive them; and if God should perrnit it, they would be hastily
swallowed up and lost.
6. There are in the souls of wicked men those hellish principles reigning, that
would presently kindle and flame out into hell fire, if it were not for God's
restraints. There is laid in the very nature of carnal men, a foundation for
the torments of hell. There are those corrupt principles, in reigning power in
them, and in full possession of them, that are seeds of hell fire. These
principles are active and powerful, exceeding violent in their nature, and if
it were not for the restraining hand of God upon them, they would soon break
out, they would flame out after the same manner as the same corruptions, the
same enmity does in the hearts of damned souls, and would beget the same
torments as they do in them. The souls of the wicked are in scripture compared
to the troubled sea, Isa. lvii. 20. For the present, God restrains their
wickedness by his mighty power, as he does the raging waves of the troubled
sea, saying, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further;" but if God
should withdraw that restraining power, it would soon carry all before it. Sin
is the ruin and misery of the soul; it is destructive in its nature; and if God
should leave it without restraint, there would need nothing else to make the
soul perfectly miserable. The corruption of the heart of man is immoderate and
boundless in its fury; and while wicked men live here, it is like fire pent up
by God's restraints, whereas if it were let loose, it would set on fire the
course of nature; and as the heart is now a sink of sin, so if sin was not
restrained, it would immediately turn the soul into a fiery oven, or a furnace
of fire and brimstone.
7. It is no security to wicked men for one moment, that there are no visible
means of death at hand. It is no security to a natural man, that he is now in
health, and that he does not see which way he should now immediately go out of
the world by any accident, and that there is no visible danger in any respect
in his circumstances. The manifold and continual experience of the world in all
ages, shows this is no evidence, that a man is not on the very brink of
eternity, and that the next step will not be into another world. The unseen,
unthought-of ways and means of persons going suddenly out of the world are
innumerable and inconceivable. Unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a
rotten covering, and there are innumerable places in this covering so weak that
they will not bear their weight, and these places are not seen. The arrows of
death fly unseen at noon-day; the sharpest sight cannot discern them. God has
so many different unsearchable ways of taking wicked men out of the world and
sending them to hell, that there is nothing to make it appear, that God had
need to be at the expence of a miracle, or go out of the ordinary course of his
providence, to destroy any wicked nian, at any moment. All the means that there
are of sinners going out of the world, are so in God's hands, and so
universally and absolutely subject to his power and determination, that it does
not depend at all the less on the mere will of God, whether sinners shall at
any moment go to hell, than if means were never made use of, or at all
concerned in the case.
8. Natural men's prudence and care to preserve their own lives, or the care of
others to preserve them, do not secure them a moment. To this, divine
providence and universal experience do also bear testimony. There is this clear
evidence that men's own wisdom is no security to them from death; that if it
were otherwise we should see some difference between the wise and politic men
of the world, and others, with regard to their liableness to early and
unexpected death: but how is it in fact? Eccles. ii. 16. "How dieth the
wise man? even as the fool."
9. All wicked men's pains and contrivance which they use to escape hell,
while they continue to reject Christ, and so remain wicked men, do not secure
them from hell one moment. Almost every natural man that hears of hell,
flatters himself that he shall escape it; he depends upon himself for his own
security; he flatters himself in what he has done, in what he is now doing, or
what he intends to do. Every one lays out matters in his own mind how he shall
avoid damnation, and flatters himself that he contrives well for himself, and that
his schemes will not fail. They hear indeed that there are but few saved, and
that the greater part of men that have died heretofore are gone to hell; but
each one imagines that he lays out matters better for his own escape than
others have done. He does not intend to come to that place of torment; he says
within himself, that he intends to take effectual care, and to order matters so
for himself as not to fail.
But the foolish children of men miserably delude themselves in their own
schemes, and in confidence in their own strength and wisdom; they trust to
nothing but a shadow. The greater part of those who heretofore have lived under
the same means of grace, and are now dead, are undoubtedly gone to hell; and it
was not because they were not as wise as those who are now alive: it was not
because they did not lay out matters as well for themselves to secure their own
escape. If we could speak with them, and inquire of them, one by one, whether
they expected, when alive, and when they used to hear about hell ever to be the
subects of that misery: we doubtless, should hear one and another reply,
"No, I never intended to come here: I had laid out matters otherwise in my
mind; I thought I should contrive well for myself: I thought my scheme good. I
intended to take effectual care; but it came upon me unexpected; I did not look
for it at that time, and in that manner; it came as a thief: Death outwitted
me: God's wrath was too quick for me. Oh, my cursed foolishness! I was
flattering myself, and pleasing myself with vain dreams of what I would do
hereafter; and when I was saying, Peace and safety, then suddenly destruction
came upon me.
10. God has laid himself under no obligation, by any promise to keep any
natural man out of hell one moment. God certainly has made no promises either
of eternal life, or of any deliverance or preservation from eternal death, but
what are contained in the covenant of grace, the promises that are given in
Christ, in whom all the promises are yea and amen. But surely they have no interest
in the promises of the covenant of grace who are not the children of the
covenant, who do not believe in any of the promises, and have no interest in
the Mediator of the covenant.
So that, whatever some have imagined and pretended about promises made to
natural men's earnest seeking and knocking, it is plain and manifest, that
whatever pains a natural man takes in religion, whatever prayers he makes, till
he believes in Christ, God is under no manner of obligation to keep him a
moment from eternal destruction.
So that, thus it is that natural men are held in the hand of God, over the pit
of hell; they have deserved the fiery pit, and are already sentenced to it; and
God is dreadfully provoked, his anger is as great towards them as to those that
are actually suffering the executions of the fierceness of his wrath in hell,
and they have done nothing in the least to appease or abate that anger, neither
is God in the least bound by any promise to hold them up one moment; the devil
is waiting for them, hell is gaping for them, the flames gather and flash about
them, and would fain lay hold on them, and swallow them up; the fire pent up in
their own hearts is struggling to break out: and they have no interest in any
Mediator, there are no means within reach that can be any security to them. In
short, they have no refuge, nothing to take hold of, all that preserves them
every moment is the mere arbitrary will, and uncovenanted, unobliged
forbearance of an incensed God.
APPLICATION
The use of this awful subject may be for awakening unconverted persons in
this congregation. This that you have heard is the case of every one of you
that are out of Christ.-That world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone,
is extended abroad under you. There is the dreadful pit of the glowing flames
of the wrath of God; there is hell's wide gaping mouth open; and you have
nothing to stand upon, nor any thing to take hold of, there is nothing between
you and hell but the air; it is only the power and mere pleasure of God that
holds you up.
You probably are not sensible of this; you find you are kept out of hell, but
do not see the hand of God in it; but look at other things, as the good state
of your bodily constitution, your care of your own life, and the means you use
for your own preservation. But indeed these things are nothing; if God should
withdraw his band, they would avail no more to keep you from falling, than the
thin air to hold up a person that is suspended in it.
Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend downwards with
great weight and pressure towards hell; and if God should let you go, you would
immediately sink and swiftly descend and plunge into the bottomless gulf, and
your healthy constitution, and your own care and prudence, and best contrivance,
and all your righteousness, would have no more influence to uphold you and keep
you out of hell, than a spider's web would have to stop a falling rock. Were it
not for the sovereign pleasure of God, the earth would not bear you one moment;
for you are a burden to it; the creation groans with you; the creature is made
subject to the bondage of your corruption, not willingly; the sun does not
willingly shine upon you to give you light to serve sin and Satan; the earth
does not willingly yield her increase to satisfy your lusts; nor is it
willingly a stage for your wickedness to be acted upon; the air does not
willingly serve you for breath to maintain the flame of life in your vitals,
while you spend your life in the service of God's enemies. God's creatures are
good, and were made for men to serve God with, and do not willingly subserve to
any other purpose, and groan when they are abused to purposes so directly
contrary to their nature and end. And the world would spew you out, were it not
for the sovereign hand of him who hath subjected it in hope. There are black
clouds of God's wrath now hanging directly over your heads, full of the
dreadful storm, and big with thunder; and were it not for the restraining hand
of God, it would immediately burst forth upon you. The sovereign pleasure of
God, for the present, stays his rough wind; otherwise it would come with fury,
and your destruction would come like a whirlwind, and you would be like the
chaff of the summer threshing floor.
The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present; they
increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is given;
and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its course,
when once it is let loose. It is true, that judgment against your evil works
has not been executed hitherto; the floods of God's vengeance have been
withheld; but your guilt in the mean time is constantly increasing, and you are
every day treasuring up more wrath; the waters are constantly rising, and
waxing more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere pleasure of God,
that holds the waters back, that are unwilling to be stopped, and press hard to
go forward. If God should only withdraw his hand from the flood-gate, it would
immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and wrath of God,
would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with
omnipotent power; and if your strength were ten thousand times greater than it
is, yea, ten thousand times greater than the strength of the stoutest,
sturdiest devil in hell, it would be nothing to withstand or endure it.
The bow of God's wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and
justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing
but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or
obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with
your blood. Thus all you that never passed under a great change of heart,
by the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon your souls; all you that were
never born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in sin, to
a state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light and life, are in the
hands of an angry God. However you may have reformed your life in many things,
and may have had religious affections, and may keep up a form of religion in
your families and closets, and in the house of God, it is nothing but his mere
pleasure that keeps you from being this moment swallowed up in everlasting destruction.
However unconvinced you may now be of the truth of what you hear, by and by you
will be fully convinced of it. Those that are gone from being in the like
circumstances with you, see that it was so with them; for destruction came
suddenly upon most of them; when they expected nothing of it, and while they
were saying, Peace and safety: now they see, that those things on which they
depended for peace and safety, were nothing but thin air and empty shadows.
The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or
some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked:
his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing
else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have
you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than
the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely
more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet it is nothing but his
hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be
ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you
was suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep.
And there is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell
since you arose in the morning, but that God's hand has held you up. There is
no other reason to be given why you have not gone to hell, since you have sat
here in the house of God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner
of attending his solemn worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given
as a reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.
O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great furnace of
wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath, that you are held
over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and incensed as much
against you, as against many of the damned in hell. You hang by a slender
thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it, and ready every
moment to singe it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest in any
Mediator, and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep off the
flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have done, nothing
that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment. And consider here more
particularly
1. Whose wrath it is: it is the wrath of the infinite God. If it were
only the wrath of man, though it were of the most potent prince, it would be
comparatively little to be regarded. The wrath of kings is very much dreaded,
especially of absolute monarchs, who have the possessions and lives of their
subjects wholly in their power, to be disposed of at their mere will. Prov. xx.
2. "The fear of a king is as the roaring of a lion: Whoso provoketh him to
anger, sinneth against his own soul." The subject that very much enrages
an arbitrary prince, is liable to suffer the most extreme torments that human
art can invent, or human power can inflict. But the greatest earthly potentates
in their greatest majesty and strength, and when clothed in their greatest
terrors, are but feeble, despicable worms of the dust, in comparison of the
great and almighty Creator and King of heaven and earth. It is but little that
they can do, when most enraged, and when they have exerted the utmost of their
fury. All the kings of the earth, before God, are as grasshoppers; they are
nothing, and less than nothing: both their love and their hatred is to be
despised. The wrath of the great King of kings, is as much more terrible than
theirs, as his majesty is greater. Luke xii. 4, 5. "And I say unto you, my
friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that, have no more
that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom you shall fear: fear him, which
after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell: yea, I say unto you, Fear
him."
2. It is the fierceness of his wrath that you are exposed to. We often
read of the fury of God; as in Isaiah lix. 18. "According to their deeds,
accordingly he will repay fury to his adversaries." So Isaiah lxvi. 15.
"For behold, the Lord will come with fire, and wifh his chariots like a
whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of
fire." And in many other places. So, Rev. xix. 15, we read of "the
wine press of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God." The words are
exceeding terrible. If it had only been said, "the wrath of God," the
words would have implied that which is infinitely dreadful: but it is "the
fierceness and wrath of God." The fury of God! the fierceness of Jehovah!
Oh, how dreadful must that be! Who can utter or conceive what such expressions
carry in them! But it is also "the fierceness and wrath of Almighty
God." As though there would be a very great manifestation of his almighty
power in what the fierceness of his wrath should inflict, as though omnipotence
should be as it were enraged, and exerted, as men are wont to exert their
strength in the fierceness of their wrath. Oh! then, what will be the consequence!
What will become of the poor worms that shall suffer it! Whose hands can be
strong? And whose heart can endure? To what a dreadful, inexpressible,
inconceivable depth of misery must the poor creature be sunk who shall be the
subject of this!
Consider this, you that are here present, that yet remain in an unregenerate
state. That God will execute the fierceness of his anger, implies, that he will
inflict wrath without any pity. When God beholds the ineffable extremity of
your case, and sees your torment to be so vastly disproportioned to your
strength, and sees how your poor soul is crushed, and sinks down, as it were,
into an infinite gloom; he will have no compassion upon you, he will not
forbear the executions of his wrath, or in the least lighten his hand; there
shall be no moderation or mercy, nor will God then at all stay his rough wind;
he will have no regard to your welfare, nor be at all careful lest you should
suffer too much in any other sense, than only that you shall not suffer
beyond what strict justice requires. Nothing shall be withheld, because it
is so hard for you to bear. Ezek. viii. 18. "Therefore will I also deal in
fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though they cry
in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear them." Now God stands
ready to pity you; this is a day of mercy; you may cry now with some
encouragement of obtaining mercy. But when once the day of mercy is past, your
most lamentable and dolorous cries and shrieks will be in vain; you will be wholly
lost and thrown away of God, as to any regard to your welfare. God will have no
other use to put you to, but to suffer misery; you shall be continued in being
to no other end; for you will be a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction; and
there will be no other use of this vessel, but to be filled full of wrath. God
will be so far from pitying you when you cry to him, that it is said he will
only "laugh and mock," Prov. i. 25, 26, &c.
How awful are those words, Isa. lxiii. 3, which are the words of the great God.
"I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and
their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my
raiment." It is perhaps impossible to conceive of words that carry in them
greater manifestations of these three things, vis. contempt, and hatred,
and fierceness of indignation. If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far
from pitying you in your doleful case, or showing you the least regard or
favour, that instead of that, he will only tread you under foot. And though he
will know that you cannot bear the weight of omnipotence treading upon you, yet
he will not regard that, but he will crush you under his feet without mercy; he
will crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled on his
garments, so as to stain all his raiment. He will not only hate you, but he
will have you, in the utmost contempt: no place shall be thought fit for you,
but under his feet to be trodden down as the mire of the streets.
The misery you are exposed to is that which God will inflict to that end, that
he might show what that wrath of Jehovah is. God hath had it on his heart to
show to angels and men, both how excellent his love is, and also how terrible
his wrath is. Sometimes earthly kings have a mind to show how terrible their
wrath is, by the extreme punishments they would execute on those that would
provoke them. Nebuchadnezzar, that mighty and haughty monarch of the Chaldean
empire, was willing to show his wrath when enraged with Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego;
and accordingly gave orders that the burning fiery furnace should be heated
seven times hotter than it was before; doubtless, it was raised to the utmost
degree of fierceness that human art could raise it. But the great God is also
willing to show his wrath, and magnify his awful majesty and mighty power in
the extreme sufferings of his enemies. Rom. ix. 22. "What if God, willing
to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endure with much long-suffering
the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction?" And seeing this is his
design, and what he has determined, even to show how terrible the unrestrained
wrath, the fury and fierceness of Jehovah is, he will do it to effect. There
will be something accomplished and brought to pass that will be dreadful with a
witness. When the great and angry God hath risen up and executed his awful
vengeance on the poor sinner, and the wretch is actually suffering the infinite
weight and power of his indignation, then will God call upon the whole universe
to behold that awful majesty and mighty power that is to be seen in it. Isa.
xxxiii. 12-14. "And the people shall be as the burnings of lime, as thorns
cut up shall they be burnt in the fire. Hear ye that are far off, what I have
done; and ye that are near, acknowledge my might. The sinners in Zion are
afraid; fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites," &c.
Thus it will be with you that are in an unconverted state, if you continue in
it; the infinite might, and majesty, and terribleness of the omnipotent God
shall be magnified upon you, in the ineffable strength of your torments. You
shall be tormented in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of
the Lamb; and when you shall be in this state of suffering, the glorious
inhabitants of heaven shall go forth and look on the awful spectacle, that they
may see what the wrath and fierceness of the Almighty is; and when they have
seen it, they will fall down and adore that great power and majesty. Isa. lxvi.
23, 24. "And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and
from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith
the Lord. And they shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that
have transgressed against me; for their worm shall not die, neither shall their
fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh."
4. It is everlasting wrath. It would be dreadful to suffer this
fierceness and wrath of Almighty God one moment; but you must suffer it to all
eternity. There will be no end to this exquisite horrible misery. When you look
forward, you shall see a long for ever, a boundless duration before you, which
will swallow up your thoughts, and amaze your soul; and you will absolutely
despair of ever having any deliverance, any end, any mitigation, any rest at
all. You will know certainly that you must wear out long ages, millions of
millions of ages, in wrestling and conflicting with this almighty merciless
vengeance; and then when you have so done, when so many ages have actually been
spent by you in this manner, you will know that all is but a point to what
remains. So that your punishment will indeed be infinite. Oh, who can express
what the state of a soul in such circumstances is! All that we can possibly say
about it, gives but a very feeble, faint representation of it; it is
inexpressible and inconceivable: For "who knows the power of God's
anger?"
How dreadful is the state of those that are daily and hourly in the danger of
this great wrath and infinite misery! But this is the dismal case of every soul
in this congregation that has not been born again, however moral and strict,
sober and religious, they may otherwise be. Oh that you would consider it,
whether you be young or old! There is reason to think, that there are many in
this congregation now hearing this discourse, that will actually be the
subjects of this very misery to all eternity. We know not who they are, or in
what seats they sit, or what thoughts they now have. It may be they are now at
ease, and hear all these things without much disturbance, and are now
flattering themselves that they are not the persons, promising themselves that
they shall escape. If we knew that there was one person, and but one, in the
whole congregation, that was to be the subject of this misery, what an awful thing
would it be to think of! If we knew who it was, what an awful sight would it be
to see such a person! How might all the rest of the congregation lift up a
lamentable and bitter cry over him! But, alas! instead of one, how many is it
likely will remember this discourse in hell? And it would be a wonder, if some
that are now present should not be in hell in a very short time, even before
this year is out. And it would be no wonder if some persons, that now sit here,
in some seats of this meeting-house, in health, quiet and secure, should be
there before to-morrow morning. Those of you that finally continue in a natural
condition, that shall keep out of hell longest will be there in a little time!
your damnation does not slumber; it will come swiftly, and, in all probability,
very suddenly upon many of you. You have reason to wonder that you are not
already in hell. It is doubtless the case of some whom you have seen and known,
that never deserved hell more than you, and that heretofore appeared as likely
to have been now alive as you. Their case is past all hope; they are crying in
extreme misery and perfect despair; but here you are in the land of the living
and in the house of God, and have an opportuniry to obtain salvation. What
would not those poor damned hopeless souls give for one day's opportunity such
as you now enjoy!
And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ has thrown
the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and crying with a loud voice
to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and pressing into the
kingdom of God. Many are daily coming from the east, west, north and south;
many that were very lately in the same miserable condition that you are in, are
now in a happy state, with their hearts filled with love to him who has loved
them, and washed them from their sins in his own blood, and rejoicing in hope
of the glory of God. How awful is it to be left behind at such a day! To see so
many others feasting, while you are pining and perishing! To see so many
rejoicing and singing for joy of heart, while you have cause to mourn for
sorrow of heart, and howl for vexation of spirit! How can you rest one moment
in such a condition? Are not your souls as precious as the souls of the people
at Suffield*, where they are flocking from day to day to Christ?
Are there not many here who have lived long in the world, and are not to this
day born again? and so are aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and have
done nothing ever since they have lived, but treasure up wrath against the day
of wrath? Oh, sirs, your case, in an especial manner, is extremely dangerous.
Your guilt and hardness of heart is extremely great. Do you not see how
generally persons of your years are passed over and left, in the present remarkable
and wonderful dispensation of God's mercy? You had need to consider yourselves,
and awake thoroughly out of sleep. You cannot bear the fierceness and wrath of
the infinite God.-And you, young men, and young women, will you neglect this
precious season which you now enjoy, when so many others of your age are
renouncing all youthful vanities, and flocking to Christ? You especially have
now an extraordinary opportunity; but if you neglect it, it will soon be with
you as with those persons who spent all the precious days of youth in sin, and
are now come to such a dreadful pass in blindness and hardness. And you,
children, who are unconverted, do not you know that you are going down to hell,
to bear the dreadful wrath of that God, who is now angry with you every day and
every night? Will you be content to be the children of the devil, when so many
other children in the land are converted, and are become the holy and happy
children of the King of kings?
And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the pit of hell,
whether they be old men and women, or middle aged, or young people, or little
children, now harken to the loud calls of God's word and providence. This
acceptable year of the Lord, a day of such great favours to some, will
doubtless be a day of as remarkable vengeance to others. Men's hearts harden,
and their guilt increases apace at such a day as this, if they neglect their
souls; and never was there so great danger of such persons being given up to
hardness of heart and blindness of mind. God seems now to be hastily gathering
in his elect in all parts of the land; and probably the greater part of adult
persons that ever shall be saved, will be brought in now in a little time, and
that it will be as it was on the great out-pouring of the Spirit upon the Jews
in the apostles' days; the election will obtain, and the rest will be blinded.
If this should be the case with you, you will eternally curse this day, and
will curse the day that ever you was born, to see such a season of the pouring
out of God's Spirit, and will wish that you had died and gone to hell before
you had seen it. Now undoubtedly it is, as it was in the days of John the
Baptist, the axe is in an extraordinary manner laid at the root of the trees,
that every tree which brings not forth good fruit, may be hewn down and cast
into the fire.
Therefore, let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the
wrath to come. The wrath of Almighty God is now undoubtedly hanging over a
great part of this congregation: Let every one fly out of Sodom: "Haste
and escape for your lives, look not behind you, escape to the mountain, lest
you be consumed."