The following sermon is read from Volume 5 of the six-volume set entitled, Puritan Sermons 1659-1689 being the morning exercises at Cripplegate. This complete six-volume set of Puritan sermons is available from Stillwater's Revival Books on Calvinism Bookshelf CD Volume 1 in SWRB's 3-for-1 CD Super Sale at SWRB.com. This set is also available from SWRB in printed format at SWRB.com. Stillwater's Revival Books makes thousands of classic Puritan books and sermons available, free and at great discounts in print, audio and video formats at SWRB.com. If you would like to join our email list to stay up to date about all the new, free and discounted Puritan and Reform resources we make available, please send an email to swrb at swrb.com with the word ADD in the subject line. For more information about the Puritan Publishing Ministry of SWRB, please email us at swrb at swrb.com. Welcome to Sermon 9, continuation of the reading of the misery of man's state by nature. 2. In the Reforbate 1. That he may discover his perfect and infinite displeasure against sin. And in these great letters, that all the world may read his full hatred of it. Eli's faint checks proclaimed his faint dislikes of his son's sins. High dislikes produce answerable checks. Affections in men are the feet and soul goes forth upon, and strong affections go at a very nimble, eager pace. The Lord, much more, because of his infinite contrariety to sin, too, that he may discover the power of his justice and wrath. For this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I may show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Romans 9, 17. those who glorify not God in that manner which he would, he will glorify himself in the manner that they would not. Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord? Exodus 5.2. And trampled his authority and commands underfoot. Now as he did sometimes bring light out of darkness and the apothecary preservatives out of rank poisons, so the Lord, not actively glorified, to fetch the glory of his power and vindictive justice out of sin itself. The walkers in greatest pride and scorn of God, the Lord will have everlasting glory in their everlasting smart, and he will so punish that heaven and hell shall ring of his justice and power and displiance against sin, and that his threatenings to the utmost are made good, and we're not mere scarecrows. 3. Consider the dreadful aggravations of sin. It is a confederacy with the devil. A sworn servant about the prince's person to contract amity and hold correspondence with the worst of his enemies makes the sun rise and his judgments without pity. Should a Christian fall from a mild and gracious prince without a cause and side with the Turk, or worshipper of the devil against him, we should think no punishment too much for him. 2. A defection from, an insurrection against God, and a teasing of the Lord into the lists and field. Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he? 1 Corinthians 10.22. Goliath challenges and defies the host of Israel till David comes forth and sends a stone into his brains and cuts his head off with his own sword and gives his flesh to the fowls of heaven so sinners can they draw the Lord and the weight of his infinite and eternal displeasure forth against themselves even that weight which sinks them and they are never able to rise from under it again. Now sins rise as a quality of the person that they are done against. He that flies in my face and give me blows and wounds thereby, there is an action of battery and damages to be had against him. He that doth the same against the judge of a size, or the king upon the throne, that is treason, and his life and estate are hardly enough to make amends for it. The infinity of God makes the infinity of the evil, a meritoriousness of wrath in sin. The majesty rises and so the guilt and demerit rise infinitely. 3. The contempt of all means used for fetching the rebel in. How often would I have gathered you? Even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not, Matthew 23, 37, men stand out, and if they could have stood, would have stood out, and continued hostility against heaven for ever. How equal is it that a creature nigh to God, falling off to the devil without a cause, and which chooses to have God his enemy, and that no means can reduce, though the danger and evil of sin be evidenced, and his inability to stand, an act of oblivion offered, and highest preferment, and yet will not come in, how just is it, that he reap the fruit of his continuing at a distance from his sovereign, and in disobedience against him? This may inform us of the distemper and pride of man's heart that will charge his misery anywhere rather than upon himself. 1. Upon instruments foreign that do inflict, rather than sin within, for which the same is inflicted. The Lord scourges sin by that which is the inflicted sin too. They have no warrant to do, and yet we justly suffer from them as organs are brought in God's hand. 2. Upon God himself. The foolishness of man perverted his way, and his heart threatened against the Lord. Proverbs 19.3. The malefactor blames the judge when it was himself that delivered himself over into the judge's power, and armed the Lord with power of doing all that is done against him. 5. This may inform us of the grounds and advantages the Lord has given us to humility and self-abasement. Wipe the sweat off from thy brows and say, This is the fruit of sin. See the clothes on thy back, and these are the coverings of that shame which came in by sin. Look into thy body, soul, estate, relations, person. Whatsoever is crooked and afflictive pertains to this account, and is to be set at the foot of sin. When beaten, consider the fault that thou art beaten for, and accept the punishment of thy iniquity. Leviticus 26.41 Thy eye cannot turn, but there are remembrances of sin, and provocations to lie thyself in the dust before the Lord. This may inform us of their folly that kindled this wrath yet more. The princess spake well to the two tribes and a half. Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us, from which we are not cleansed until this day? Although there was a plague in the congregation of the Lord, but that ye must turn away this day from following the Lord, Joshua 22, 17. So are those wrath-provoking pollutions of nature too little for us. by which we are so far defiled and troubled unto this day, that by increases of sin we should augment yet the fierce anger of the Lord, Numbers 32, 14. While abiding in this estate we do this more and more continually. Use 2. Exhortation. And this is double. 1. To carnal and unregenerate persons Arise ye and depart, for this is not your rest, Micah 2.10. This is not an estate to be quietly abode one moment in. Motive 1. Who can dwell with this wrath, which God describes to be, one, burning wrath? He appendled his wrath against me, Job 19.11. 2. Tearing wrath, which sets the bears a-work, 2 Kings 2.24. Consider this, Ye that forget God, lest ye tear you in pieces. Psalm 50, 22. 3. Piercing wrath that goeth down into the very inwards of other conscience. When all visible blessings stand entire round about, and not a hair of the head is ruffled. This curse often works in the middle of blessings, and ripens by them insensibly for hell itself. 4. abiding wrath the prisoners of which are bound hand and foot and there is no starting Zechariah 5.4 5. Surprising wrath when he is about to fill his belly God shall cast the fury of his wrath upon him and shall rain it upon him while he is eating Job 20.23 and so of all other times is most cheerful 6. RESERVED ROCK. GLOBE. 21.30. AND TO PETER. 2.9. WHICH, LIKE A WOMAN WITH CHILD, WILL TRAVEL TILL IT HATH BROUGHT FORTH JUDGMENT AGAINST ALL THE ENEMIES OF THE LORD, THOUGH UPON THRONES AND HAVING NATIONS UNDER THEIR FEET. PSALM. 78.30.31. WAS SODOM A CITY FIT TO BE DWELT IN, ESPECIALLY when the Lord had given him notice of the cloud of fire and brimstone hovering, and ready to come down upon the same? This climate is too hot for any that have spiritual senses to dwell a minute in. Motive 2. Shall all our warnings be lost that tell you of the storm, merely to drive you under cover, and that ye may understand and savour that glorious name, Jesus that delivers from wrath to come, 1 Thessalonians 1.10, the avenger of blood is in your necks to quicken your haste into this city of refuge. Why should he make the furnace hotter, and to the Father's wrath, which is quenchable in the blood of Christ, superadd the wrath of the Lamb, which is absolutely unquenchable? Shall we only stand forth to clear the justice of the Lord against you in the last day? Motive 3. the great and swaying care of all God's people as soon as ever they saw themselves in the glass of the law of liberty was to be found in Christ, James 1.25 and Philippians 3.9. This was Paul's prevailing care when sought for and to be set to God's bar, to be found clothed with Christ's righteousness and to have his image legibly engraven upon him. The like care should be ours. Directions. Direction 1. Stir up shame and sorrow and fear and indignation against yourselves. No sins are heavier than those we count light of. Is it a light thing to the house of Judah that they commit the abominations which they commit here? Ezekiel 8, 17. Take this oppositely to a double evil. 1. Men pair and lessen their sins and make a very small matter of them and consider not that lessening their own indignation they increase God's. Fools make a mock at sin. Proverbs 14.9 It is a sport to a fool to do mischief. Proverbs 10.23 So those, against whom do you sport yourselves? Against whom make ye a wide mouth and draw out the tongue? Isaiah 57, 4 They fell to other gods, and laughed the prophet to storm that made such a business of it. So when Christ and grace and life were offered, they made light of it, and went their ways. Matthew 22, 5 That is, made light of grace. and are the sin of contempt of grace. 2. Men stick in vile practices, and think their sacrifices and prayers will salve all up again which the Lord so earnestly declares against. Isaiah 1.14. But stir ye up sorrow, shame, displeasure. 2 Corinthians 7.11. Repentance hath its adjunct, and proceeds to and deals with, and chiefly with, this first-bottom sin. Direction 2. Lie down neatly at the Lord's feet. This follows upon the practice of the first direction. 1. In submission to any the sharpest dispensations. As passions stir up passions, and one cold kindles another, so are frettings the Lord's wrath. There are tangs of this sin, in the godly themselves. 2 Samuel 6, 8 Jonah 4, 5 but grace takes it by the throat. Psalm 51, 4. 2. In supplication. The Lord's servants have humbly and earnestly deprecated Roth. Jeremiah 10, 24 and Psalm 6, 1. Direction 3. Embrace the Lord Jesus in the force of all his blessed officers, and then go, fly to, and lift up thy face without spot before the Father in him. Know, one, that it is a dreadful thing to have a settled war and plague in the nation, much more to be in the Jew's case that rejected and would not be under the blessing of Christ, and are under the curse of God, and wrath has come upon them to the uttermost 1 Thessalonians 2.16 and hath rested already these 1,600 years 2. That there is no other remedy propounded to remove this wrath which we came into the world children and heirs of but only Christ Acts 4.12 He hath the keys of hell and death Revelation 118, to let the soul out of the body and into hell when he will, to infer and remove wrath. If any receive not him, this wrath tarry still, and will cleave to and abide upon him for ever. John 3.36. He speaks with authority. Those mine enemies that would not that I should reign over them, bring them and slay them before me. Luke 19.27, and it shall be done. 3. That the psalmist makes it, as it is, a point of wisdom in the greatest, to kiss the Son with a kiss of homage and subjection, lest he be angry. What is the danger of that? And ye perish in the way of your hopes and purposes, and never comfort grace nor glory, if his wrath be kindled but a little. Blessed are all those which put their trust in him. Psalm 2, 11 and 12. 4. That then ye may plead with the Lord with humble boldness. Why doth thine anger smoke against the sheep of thy pasture? Remember thy congregation, which thou hast purchased of old, the rod of thine inheritance which thou hast redeemed is Mount Zion wherein thou hast dwelt Psalm 74 1 and 2 5 and assure your hearts of welcome a gift in secret pacifieth wrath and a reward in the bosom strong wrath Proverbs 21 14 mark their policy and Herod was highly displeased with them of Tyre and Sidon. But they came with one accord to him, and having made Blastus the king's chamberlain their friend, desired peace, because their country was nourished in the king's country. Acts 12.20 And be assured that the relations of Christ are beloved of the Father. Then he is gracious to him, and saith, Deliver him from going down to the pits. I have found a ransom. Job 33, 24. 2. To those whom the Lord hath translated out of their natural condition, 1. Bring the work often to the touchstone, that you may not boast in a false gift. Gold will endure the test, and be more fully manifested to be gold indeed. And finding the work to be right, live with an enlarged heart, to the praise of that grace which hath made this change. 2. Deal seriously in the mortification of sin, which God only strikes at, and in order thereto count sin the worst of evils. If this were done, and thoroughly and fixedly done in our spirits, there is nothing of any other directions that would be left undone. To set up this judgment there needs one ploughing carefully with the Lord's heifer, namely, search into the oracles of God. There and there only are lively portraitures of sin and the genuine products and train of sin. 2. The I-self of the Spirit. We are blinder than bats in this matter and are indisposed very much or rather wholly to let this truth sink down into our hearts. 3. applications to the throne of grace, none but those who deal in good earnest in heaven will see the hell and misery of sin in themselves. He gives the Holy Ghost to them who ask him. Four. Exclusions and communings with yourselves. The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord, searching all the inward parts of the belly, Proverbs 20, 27. And duly made use of, will tell many stories correspondent to the word of truth. Use conscience, and use therewith another and bigger candle to rummage the dark room of thy heart with. Superact to conscience the suckers of the word and spirit, and thou shalt do something in the search, and find out convincingly the swarms of evil in thine own heart. 5. the work of grace. There will be else a beam in the eye and plain things will not be plain to us. God's work holds intelligence and is of amicable affinity with his word. Grace hath the only excellent faculty in looking through sin. Four. Six. Attendance to the Lord's administrations against sin God writes in great letters in the world what he had first written in the scriptures. Every breach by sin should be down into more hatred, brokenness of spirit and shame before the Lord for sin. This is the engaging evil. This engages God and the holy angels and devils and the very man against himself. Nothing can be his friend to whom sin hath made God an enemy. Woe to the man that is in this sense alone and at heaven, and hell, and earth, and all within the continent of them against him. It is impossible for that man's heart and hands to stand strong. This is the mighty prevailing evil. Never was a man so stout as to stand before the face of sin that he shivered, and was like a garment eaten up of moss. Psalm 39, 11. This hath threated the joints of kingdoms in pieces, and made the goodliest houses in the world a heap of rubbish, Zechariah 5.4, who made Babylon, that sits as a queen, an habitation of devils, and the holder of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird, Revelation 18.2, made the angels devils, and heaven itself too hot for them. Never were the like changes made as by sin, Grace makes not changes of richer comfort than sin doth of dismal consequence. It is made by the Holy Ghost an argument of the infinity of the power of God to pardon and subdue sin. Micah 7, 18. 3. They are all afflictions incident to a holy course cheerfully. The martyrs went joyfully into the fire. because the flames of hell were quenched to them, bore their cross easily because no curse and damnation to them in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3.13 4. Reduce your anger to the similitude of God's, which is very slowly kindled, Psalm 103.8, and is an intense holy displeasance only against sin. and is cleansed from all dregs of rashness, injustice and discomposure. Such zeal should eat us up." John 2.17 This sermon consists of rough notes which the author had not measured to amplify, and present in the more tragic form as he intimates, these are hints and no more. This Reformation audio track is a production of Stillwater's Revival Books. You are welcome to make copies and give them to those in need. SWRB makes thousands of classic Reformation resources available, free and for sale, in audio, video, and printed formats. It is likely that the sermon or book that you just listened to is also available on cassette or video, or as a printed book or booklet. Our many free resources, as well as our complete mail-order catalog, Thank you by phone at 780-450-3730 by fax at 780-468-1096 or by mail at 4710-37A Edmonton Alberta Canada T6L3T5. You may also request a free printed catalog. And remember that John Calvin, in defending the Reformation's regulative principle of worship, or what is sometimes called the scriptural law of worship, commenting on the words of God, which I commanded them not, neither came into my heart, from his commentary on Jeremiah 731, writes, God here cuts off from men every occasion for making evasions. since he condemns by this one phrase, I have not commanded them, whatever the Jews devised. There is then no other argument needed to condemn superstitions than that they are not commanded by God. For when men allow themselves to worship God according to their own fancies, and attend not to His commands, they pervert true religion. And if this principle was adopted by the Papists, all those fictitious modes of worship in which they absurdly exercise themselves, would fall to the ground. It is indeed a horrible thing for the Papists to seek to discharge their duties towards God by performing their own superstitions. There is an immense number of them, as it is well known, and as it manifestly appears. Were they to admit this principle, that we cannot rightly worship God except by obeying His word, they would be delivered from their deep abyss of error. The Prophet's words, then, are very important. When he says, that God had commanded no such thing, and that it never came to his mind, as though he had said that men assume too much wisdom when they devise what he never required, nay, what he never knew.