nable him to hear the voice of the rod, and understand its language. Hence it is faid, "He is a man of wifdom that feeth God's name upon it," Mic. vi. 9. Now, this wisdom muft only come from above: Therefore, 3. Go to God, and earneftly beg for this wisdom, that you may know his mind, and the meaning of the rod. Do as Rebekah, when the children struggled in. her womb; she went to enquire of the Lord, faying, "Why am I thus ?" Gen. xxxvv. 22. Cry to God to give you his Spirit to teach and enlighten you to see fin in its evil, and the particular evils you are guilty of. This was Job's courfe in his affliction; "Shew me," fays he, "wherefore thou contendest with me. which I fee not teach thou me. Make me to know my tranfgreffion and my fin." There is no better way for a prifoner to know the reafon of his confinement, than to afk the magiftrate that committed him. God is a wife agent, and can give the best account of his own actions. That 4. If thou canst not find out the particular fin for which God afflicts thee, then labour to repent of every known fin, and cry for pardon of every unknown and forgotten fin alfo. Do that out of wisdom, which Herod did out of malice; who, because he could not find out the babe Jefus, killed all the children of Bethlehem, that he might be fure to kill Jefus among them. Let us seek the utter ruin and death of all our fins, that we may be fure to destroy that fin for which God afflicts us. 5. Study to exercise a ftrong faith, and a humble fubmiffior, while God keeps you under the filent rod. Believe firmly that God is moft juft, though you know not for what he contends. And, however long he thinks fit to make you walk in the dark, refolve humbly to wait on him, and commit yourself to him, who has many times guided the blind in the way they knew дот. E 2 DIRECT. DIRECT. III. When any fit of Sicknefs attacks you, think seriously upon Death, and make diligent preparations for it. I DO not mean that any man may delay the work of preparation for death, till ficknefs cometh: No, no, this fhould be the great and uptaking business of every man in the time of his health and ftrength. But ficknefs and diseases being the harbingers of death, and meffengers fent from God to warn us of its coming; every man is thereby called to renew the work of preparing for death with all earnestnefs and application. God's voice by every fit of fickness is that in Deut. xxxii. 29. “O that they were wife, that they underftood this, that they would confider their latter end!" God knows our folly, and readiness to forget this great work in the day of health and therefore in his mercy he fends ficknefs and affiction, to teach us fo to number our days, that we may apply our hearts to this piece of heavenly wisdom, of making preparation for death. And here I fhall drop, 1. Some motives to prefs it. 2. Advices for the doing it right. 1. For motives, confider these things: 1. Confider God's mercy and patience towards youj in giving you fo many warnings, and fo many years to prepare for death; and in fending his meffengers and warnings fo gently and gradually, to excite you to this work; when many younger and ftronger than you are hurried into eternity, and little or no time given them to think where they are going. Have you not been fpared many years in the midft of dangers, when you have feen that bold archer, Death, fhooting his arrows, and killing thousands of your neighbours and friends round about you? Sometimes the arrow hath glanced over your head, and flain fome great man your fuperior; fometimes it hath lighted at your feet, and cut off a child or fervant, your inferiors; fometimes it hath gone by on your left hand, and killed your enemy; at other times it hath paffed on your right hand, and killed your near relations. So that you have feen friends and to what fome martyrs have endured for the truths of the gospel. 4. Get very low thoughts of yourself, and a deep fenfe of ill defervings for fin. O! fhould a fire-brand of hell murmur for temporal afflictions? 5. Be ftill examining thyfelf, rather than cenfuring God. Doth God feem to neglect thee, fay, Alas, it is moft juft! Have I not neglected him, and given a deaf ear to his calls many a-day? 6. Bear in mind that thofe troubles will not laft; there is a great change near; either they will iffue in life or death. If life, you will be ashamed you had no more patience when fick; if death, then if you belong to Chrift, it will give a finishing ftroke to all troubles and complaints, and heaven will make amends for all. But if you be not in Chrift, whatever your afflictions be now, troubles a thousand times worse, are abiding you in another world: Death will turn thy croffes into pure unmixed curfes; and then, how gladly wouldft thou return to thy former afflicted ftate, and purchase it at any rate, were there any poffibility of fuch a return? You now fly out in a paffion, and fay you are not able to bear what you complain of; but confider, if you will not obediently bear God's rod now; you will then bear more, whether you will or not; and God will make you able to bear more, when there will never be any hopes of relief. 7. Study to give vent to thy forrow in a way of prayer and praife. An oven ftopped is the more hot within; but the breath of prayer, or praife, gives eafe. If we did complain more to God, we should complain lefs of God. What a mercy is it, that you have ftill God to go to Improve the privilege, confefs unworthinefs, and beg the grace of patience and fubmiffion out of Christ's full treafures. Be alfo praifing God for mercies received; and, however bad thy cafe is, blefs God it is not in hell; you are in the land of hope. of your inability to help yourself, and of your need of Chrift to help you. And labour to be deeply humbled before God under a fenfe of your fin and folly, "Ah, how foolishly, how rebelliously, how unthankfully have I carried! I have abufed God's mercies, and left undone the work for which I was made, preferved, and enjoyed the gospel. Oh! I had all my by-past time given me to make preparation for endless eternity, and I have never minded it, till now that fickness, the harbinger of death, is come upon me. And now what fhall I do to be faved?" Well, then, in order to convince and humble you the more, caft back your eyes upon the fins of your nature, and of your by-past life; view them in their nature, number, aggravations, and deferts. O, do not fo many years fins need a very deep humiliation? O, do you not stand greatly in need of fuch a perfon as Chrift, to be your Saviour and Ransomer from such a vast number of fins ? O but their weight will prefs you eternally down to the loweft hell, if left to yourself, and laid upon your back. our in your 3. O finner, art thou deeply humbled, and defirous of mercy upon any terms? Believe, then, that thy cafe is not remedilefs, but that there is a facrifice provided for your fins, and an able and all fufficient Savioffer. Believe that the Lord Jefus Chrift is the Son of God, and become flesh to be a furety for that he is both able and willing to fave to the utteryou, moft all that come unto God by him. Though your fins, your dangers, and your fears, were never fo great, yet he is able and willing to fave. O flee presently to this refuge-city, whofe gates are open to receive you. Trust your fouls upon Chrift's facrifice and meritorious blood for mercy and falvation. Apply humbly to him, that he may teach you the will of God, reconcile you to his Father, pardon your fins, renew you by his Spirit, and save you from eternal wrath. 4. Give up yourselves to God in Christ, by way of covenant and folemn refignation. Every man doth this facramentally in baptifm; but you must alfo renew it perfonally and explicitly, and thereby give a cordial and and voluntary confent to the covenant of grace. Acquiefce cheerfully in the gospel way of falvation through Chrift and his righteoufnefs; and accept of God, in Chrift, as thy portion. Make choice of God the Father, as thy reconciled Father in Chrift; and God the Son as thy Redeemer and Saviour; and God the Holy Ghoft for thy fanctifier, guide, and comforter. And likewife give up thyfelf, foul and body, and all thou haft, to be the Lord's; engaging in Chrift's ftrength to live for God, and walk with him in newness of life. And ftudy to do all this deliberately, unfeignedly, and cheerfully. Though, perhaps, you have done this hypocritically at former times, you have profaned God's covenant, and behaved unftedfaftly and perfidiously therein; yet now endeavour to be fincere with God for once. 5. Be living daily in the exercife of faith and repentance; renew the acts thereof frequently, in proportion to your renewed fins and guiltinefs, cleave clofe to glorious Chrift your high-priest and furety, and be ever washing in his blood. As long as you are in the world, you have need to wash your feet, John xiii. 10. Come death when it will, let it find you at the fountain, always looking to and making use of Jefus Chrift. You have great need of Chrift every day of your life, more efpecially in fickness; but most of all at a dying hour. O what need will you have of Chrift then as an advocate with God, when the queftion is to be determined, where your mansion is to be affigned through all eternity, Whether in heaven or hell? O then be looking always to Chrift with the eye of faith. Live, in the conftant thoughts of this bleffed Mediator. Let him be firft in your thoughts in the morning, and last in your thoughts at night. 6. Be ftriving to mortify every fin and luft, both outward and inward. By dying to fin daily, that fo you may not die for fin eternally. O that fin may be daily losing its strength, and dying in you! so that it may be certainly dead before you. Pray earnestly, that all your fins may die before you die: for if they die not |