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prone to fuffer Chrift to fleep within them, and fo to neglect the lively actings of faith in Chrift; but when the ftorm of affiction begins to arife, and they are ready to be overwhelmed with diftrefs, then they cry, "None but Chrift, none but Chrift."

VII. God tryfts with ficknefs and diftrefs, in order both to prove and improve his people's graces, Deut. viii. 2. Rev. ii. 10. Grace is hereby both tried and ftrengthened. 1. Such afflictions do prove both the truth and ftrength of our graces, as they ferve to try if we love God for himself, if we can endure to hold out in ferving him, waiting and depending upon him, notwithftanding of difcouragements. That faith will fuffice, for a little affliction, that will not fuffice for a great one. Peter had faith enough to come upon the fea at Chrift's call; but, as foon as the waves began to fwell, his faith began to fail, and his feet to fink, till Chrift mercifully caught hold of him, faying, "O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?" Mat. xiv. 31. Little did Peter think his faith was fo weak till now.

2. They tend to improve our graces alfo, by quickening and ftrengthening them. They ferve as a whetftone to sharpen faith, fo as the foul is made to renounce earthly fhelters, and to clafp about God, in Chrift, as its only refuge and portion. They excite to repentance and ferious mourning for fin; for, like the winter frofts and fnows, they make the fallow ground of our hearts more tender. They prompt us to heavenly mindedness, self-denial, and patient waiting on God. Yea, the experience of God's people can atteft it, that grace is never more lively than under affliction. David never found himself better, as to his spiritual state, than when he was perfecuted and hunted as a partridge on the mountains; and hence he fays, Pfal. cxix. 17. " It is good for me that I have been afflicted."

VIII. God's aim is, to awake us to redeem time, to prepare for flitting, and clear up our evidences for heaven. In time of health, we are apt to trifle away time, loiter in our journey, and forget that we are pilgrims on the earth; wherefore God fends fickness as his meffenger to mind us hereof.

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Now it highly concerns us, when fickness attacks us, to confider and meditate upon those ends for which God brings on diftrefs, and pray earnestly that they may be accomplished in us; and fo our ficknefs fhall not be unto death, (fpiritual or eternal) but to the glory of God, and the good of our fouls.

DIRECT. II. Let all who are vifited with fickness and distress, fearch for the Achan in the camp, and enquire diligently what is the ground and cause of God's controverfy with them.

IT hath been the practice of God's people, in fcrip ture-times, to enquire into the cause and meaning of God's rods which have been laid upon them. So David, 2 Sam. xxi. When the land of Ifrael was three years under the stroke of famine, he enquired into the meaning of it. So Job is exceedingly defirous to know why God fet him up as a mark for his arrows, Job vii. 20. And hence it is that he makes that petition, Job x. 2. which is most suitable for every man in diftrefs, "Shew me wherefore thou contendeft with me."

I grant, indeed, that God fometimes vifits his people with affliction, for the trial and exercife of their grace, and for their fpiritual inftruction, more than for the correction of their fin. But, fin being the original and foundation of all affliction, it is fafeft, when it is our own cafe, and moft acceptable to God, to look on fin as the procuring caufe. Or, if our fins have not immediately procured the prefent affliction, yet the best of God's children mustown, that they have at least deferved it. We fee the fin of the Corinthians is mentioned as the cause of their fickness, 1 Cor. xi. 30. "For this caufe many are weak and fickly among you. The Pfalmift concludes the very fame thing, Pf. evii. 17, 18. "Fools, becaufe of their tranfgreffions and their iniquities, are afAlicted; their foul abhorreth all manner of meat, and they draw nigh unto the gates of death." But ordinarily by

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fickness the Lord points at fome one fin in us more than another; fome Jonah in the ship that hath raised the ftorm, which the Lord would have us to search out, and throw over-board without delay.

2. But how fhall we difcover and find out the particular fin for which God afflicts us with fickness and diftrefs?

Anf. 1. Study the Lord's word, and the chaftifements there recorded, which he hath inflicted upon people for their fins; and enquire if you be guilty of the like. Obferve what hath been God's mind to his people, and what fin he hath pointed out to them when they have been brought under fuch a rod, and fo you may learn his mind to you, Rom. xv. 4. "For whatfoever things were written aforetime, were written for our learning."

2. Confider what is the fin which confcience doth most of all accuse thee for, in thy most serious and folitary hours. Confcience is God's deputy, and thy bo fom-monitor, whofe voice perhaps thou haft little regarded in the day of thy health; wherefore God hath fent a fharper meffenger to fecond the voice of confcience. Hear now the voice of the rod, for it is the famé with the voice of confcience. In the day of profperity, carnal profits and pleasures made fuch a noise, that the voice of confcience could not be heard; wherefore God hath brought on thee the filent night of adverfity, that his deputy may obtain audience. Well then, give ear; What faith confcience now? may you not hear it faying, as Reuben to his brethren in diftrefs, fpake I not to you in the day of health, do not commit fuch a fin, and do not delay repenting for such a fin, but you would not hear? O man, let conscience get a hearing at laft as it got with the Patriarchs when they were brought to diftrefs in Egypt, and made them confefs their fins in felling of Jofeph, Gen. xlii. 21. "We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguifh of his foul, when he befought us, and we would not hear him therefore is this diftrefs come upon us." 3. Confider what are thofe evils that others have ob ferved in you, whether they be friends or foes; hear

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ken to what a Christian friend noticeth in you, either when speaking to you, or to others about you," Let the righteous fmite me," faith David, "and it fhall be a kindness." Yea, do not difregard what even enemies fay of you as David got good by the malicious reproaches of Shimei, in the day of his affliction, fo may you in the time of diftrefs; for fometimes malice itfelf will speak truth. Enemies are sharp-fighted to fpy out our faults, and so may, through the divine bleffing, prove monitors to us, both with refpect to fin and duty.

4. Confider the nature and circumftances of thy diftrefs. Oft times the affliction is so suitable to the tranfgreffion, that we may clearly read our fin written on the forehead of our punishment, as in the cafe of Adonibezek, and many others. And also you may be helped to find it out by the Lord's timing of the rod to you; was it fent when you was under much formality in duty or when you was eagerly pursuing the things of the world; or when you was under the power of fome prevailing luft or other? then the rod comes to reprove you, and awake you to fee the evil thereof.

5. Confider what is the fin that hath been formerly moft affrighting to thy thoughts, and perplexing to thy confcience, when thou haft been in the immediate view of death and a tribunal. It is very likely (if thou haft not truly repented of it) that is the fin which God now intends to awake thee to fee the evil of, that thou mayeft fincerely mourn for and turn from it, looking to God in Chrift, for pardon and mercy.

Object." Ah! (faith one) it is my lot to lie under a dumb and filent rod, I do not understand its language, I cannot hear its voice, I cannot find out the fin that is pointed at by it; what courfe fhall I take?

Anf. 1. Be deeply humbled under this trial, and bewail thy cafe before the Lord; for it very much aggravates the affliction to God's people, when they know not the language of it; hence was it that Job lamented fo heavily, that his way was hid, and he knew not the reafon of God's contending with him, Job iii. 23.

2. A believer's cafe may be fometimes fo dark, that it requires a good deal of fpiritual art and wisdom to e

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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 must 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; fhe 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 contendeft with me. That 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 reason of his confinement, than to ask the magiftrate that committed him. God is a wife agent, and can give the best account of his own actions.

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 wifdom, 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 feek 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 strong faith, and a humble fubmiffior, while God keeps you under the filent rod. Believe firmly that God is most just, 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

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