The Blessedness of the Death of These that Die in the Lord, To the reader
To the Christian READER.
Christian Reader.
MAny and various are the vicissituds and changes to which sin hath sadly subjected us poor, transient, itinerary, miserable Mortals, grieving, groaning, dwining, and decaying nothings; the Reireward of all which changes is at length brought up by Death, that last, great, and vastly momentuous change, which putts a final period to all the changes that shall ever befal us in this world; and whereby every one of us without exception of sexe, age, descent, degree, calling or capacity, will be put into an eternally unchangeable state of happinesse or of misery: If so, then sure it is very sad, and never enough to be lamented, if it were with teares of blood, that men and women who have rational and immortal souls endued with a discurring faculty, and capable of eternal happinesse in the enjoyment of God, and of eternal misery in separation and destruction from his presence, should for most part, so much abstract from the serious thoughts of that most important change, followed with so long a train of everlastingly concerning consequents, and in their retired meditations, take so few turnes in this long gallery of Eternity; As if all that the divinely inspired Scriptures say of it, and that many every day experience the truth of, were a meer Romance, or cunningly devised fable: And yet notwithstanding Death is most incontrovertibly certain, all men being by Divine appointment concluded under a necessity of dieing; which appointment taketh in not only the infallible certainty of the thing, but the determination of the precise time, when, of the place, where, and of the manner, how; whither by a violent or natural death, whither by a more sudden and surprising, or by a more lent and lingering, death: For our times are in the hand of the Lord, the years, moneths, weeks, dayes, and moments of them, with all their incident changes and revolutions are at his dispose; There is an appointed time to man on earth, he hath determined the times befor appointed; the times and seasons are keeped in the Father's owne power; our dayes are determined, the number of our Moneths is with him, he hath sett bounds to us which we cannot transgresse: There is no possibility of circumduceing the day prefixed to the continuance of our life by his appointment (which is not at all gainsaid by what the Psalmist sayth of bloody and deceatful men, that they shall not halve, or live out halfe their dayes, that is, they shall often not live halfe or near so long as they might according to the ordinary course of nature, or not halfe or near so long as they desired, designed, and expected, or, they shall be cutt off in the throng of their bussinesse, and in the midst of their projects and designes; nor by that sentence of death of a disease mortal in its own nature, denounced against King Hezekia, and the addition of 15. years to his life, which imports only the change and reverse of a tacitly conditional commination and sentence (as in that against the Ninivits▪ and that against Abimelech in the matter of Sarai) but no change at all of Gods purpose and decree, who is not as man that he should repent▪, whose counsel stands and with whom there is no variablenesse nor shadow of turning, who had decreed in his eternal purpose the drawing forth of Hezekias life that length, and had by his decree infallibly ensured the performance of the condition, to witt, Hezekias praying, humbling himselfe, and rouseing up of himselfe yet more to the serious exercise of Godlinesse, and his useing prescribed means for the recovery of his health; Nor is it gainsaid by any other scripture rightly understood…. So that it seemes to be (to say no worse) Atheologick, and no thing consentient to Divine-Scripture-dictats, positively and peremptorly to deny that the outmost terme and period of this mortal life is unalterably fixed in the eternal purpose of God: It being very unreasonable to substract and exempt so concerning and important a thing as the last terme of man's life, or the precise time of his death, which in the Scripture▪ is by way of eminency above and beyond all other changes called His Change, even that whereby he steps over the border of time into eternity, from the soveraigne influence of his decree and of his Providence that doth most vigilantly and accuratly inspect the infrustrable execution thereof; since they reach the least momentuous and most minute things, even the numbering of our haires, and the falling of a sparrow to the ground. Beside, whatever is or can be said against this, seems with equal strength to militat against the immutability of the divine purposes and decrees about the everlasting state of men; and to inferr as great an uncertainty of the later as of the former. And indeed it is worthy Observation that those who most violently maintain (I say most violently; because I know there are some otherwayes Orthodoxe who demurr in this) that the terme of humane life is unfixed, mutable, and ambulatory, even in the eternal decree and fore-knowledge of God, as well as it is contingent and uncertain in respect of natural and second causes, do also patronize and peremptorly plead for the mutability and conditionality (for both come to the same amount) of God's decrees about men's spiritual and everlasting state, making him either dayly to acquire new knowledge, though knowne to him be all his workes from the beginning, or at least to be doubtful and irresolved in his purposes till new emergents arising from an uncontrolled and selfe-governing Free-will cause him take new measures and resolutions: Which is a doctrine justly exploded by all truly Orthodoxe Divines, as being unworthy of, and injurious to, the infinitly wise and absolutly supreame Governour of the World; And as haveing a tendency (however it may be honested and plaistered over with specious and splendid pretences of somewhat else to narrow and limit the soveraigne dominion and will of the infinit Majesty of God the Creator, that the will of the finit and fecklesse Creature may have the greater scope and latitude of liberty; which yet is no liberty indeed, nor worthy the name of liberty; because it is not that wherewith the Son of God makes free: And to take the crowne of the glory of the conversion and salvation of sinners off the head of free grace, and to sett it most sacrilegiously on the head of their own Lord Paramount Free-will: And in downe right contradiction to the Scriptures of truth, to make poor man proudly boast, that it is not God, but he himselfe, who hath made him to differ from others; and that he is more oblidged in the Matter of his conversion and salvation to his own toward, tractable, gentle, courteous, complyant, and obsequious Free-will, then to God's decree of election, and the efficacious, omnipotently sweet, and sweetly omnipotent, infallibly and necessarily will-inclining and determining, though not forcibly violenting, or compulsorily coacting, influence of soveraignly free grace: If wantonly curious, superciliously insolent, tumultuantly mutinous, corrupt humane Reason (ambitiously affecting to take up and comprehend the great Abysse, the shoarlesse, bottomlesse, and incomprehensible Ocean of the Decrees and Providence of God within it's owne litle and shallow cockle-shellcapacity) would suffer its selfe to be sobered and becalmed into a humble and just consideration of things, all those high and haughty reasonings and debatings against the unalterable fixednesse of the last terme of mans natural life, and against the immutability of his Decrees in reference to their spiritual and everlasting state, would quickly be let fall; for then it would easily see the great congruity, and pleasing sutablnesse that is in subjecting all, and particularly the rational Creatures being but derivat and borrowed bitts of being from that first fountain, and original being, that being of beings, in all the events that befal them, and in all their motions, actings, and operations, according to their respective natures, entitatively, morally, or graciously good; And all the adhering…nomies, ataxies, and vitiosities of them; to the Majesty of the most high God, as to his efficient produceing of the one, and as to his permitting, bounding, ordering, and directing of the other, to his owne holy and blessed ends; without being justly chargeable with any the least culpable accession to them; who is, by the most absolute perfection of his purest nature, infinitly removed from all possibility of being reached by any tincture or touch of pollution: It would also see clearly the most profoundly and admirably wise connexion, that in these Decrees of God, and in the execution of them by his all eye-providence, is ordered betwixt the ends, and all the several midses leading thereto; it being evident beyond all hazard of rational contradiction, that the boundary of the life of Ahab, and of that unbeleeving Samaritan Lord who was trode to death in the gate of Samaria, and of our blessed Lord Jesus himselfe, was determinatly prefixed, since it was expresly fore-told, as the Scripture clears; And it is simply impossible that Divine predictiones can prove false; And yet the man that shot at Ahab acted freely in so doing: Those who trampled that Lord to death were not forced by any to gather themselves togither into such a croud, or to be so reguardlesse of a person of honour; and the Murderers of Christ were not a whit the lesse guilty, that they did nothing but what God's hand and counsel determined befor to be done, nor yet did our Lord any thing that was irrational or foolish, in using lawful and fitt means for his owne preservation, in so frequent retireing and hyding himselfe from the jewes violence as he did, though as the Scripture often makes mention, His hour was not yet come; by which instances it is very clear, that the determinatnesse of the decrees of God, doth no wayes violent or infringe the native freedome of the wills of Men, nor yet is it any excuse for their sin, or encouragement to their neglect of means, since it is by the using rightly or neglecting of these, that God causeth his unalterable decrees to take their designed effect.
As then it is most indubitably certain, that we must die, so the time for the continuance of our life and dayes here, is very short, even but as an hand-breadth, and our age as nothing befor him, our dayes are spent as a tale that is told, they are as a shaddow on the earth, and there is none abyding; they are swifter then a Post, they flee away and see no good; they are passed away as the swift Ships, as the Eagle that hasteth to the prey, they are swifter then a Weaver's shutle; our life is even as a vapour that appeareth for a litle time, and then vanisheth away; as a litle warme breath, that is turned in and out at our Nostrils, which is very easily and quickly stopped. The precise time also of the expiring of this breath of life is (however to God, to whom (as is said) are knowne all his works from the beginning, most infallibly certain) to us most uncertain; death comes on us ordinarly, in such an hour as we do not think of; It comes on us as a thief in the night; We are now strong and in good health, and on the sudden we grow weak and sicken: Now we live, and by & by we die, & see men no more in the land of the living. All which, to witt, the certainty of our death, the exceeding brevity of our frail and brittle life, with the great uncertainty of the precise time of our dieing, do with one voice unanimously call aloud unto us seriously to mind, and with all our might to make for an other life; to make sure peace and friendship with God thorough the blood of Christ's crosse; to secure an interest in him (the choice and wale of all interests, the only everlastingly durable interest, in comparison of which, all other interests are but petty and inconsiderable, to which they all ought to cede and give place, and, as it were, to strick their flag and lower their top-sail) by sincere closing with Jesus Christ on his owne termes, and cordially consenting to, and taking hold of, the Covenant of Grace; and to live so as it becomes them, who are very certain that we shall die, and very uncertain how long we shall live: To endeavour thorrow grace to have our loines girded, to have our affections, as it were, trussed up that they may not hang down and traile on the earth, and to have our lights burning, not only to make sure on solide and good grounds that we have a stock of habitual grace, but to endeavour to have it▪ lively and vigorous in its excercise, even as it were burning into a flamme; that we may be as men that wait for the coming of their Lord, that in whatsoever watch he shall come, we may be ready to open to him immediatly, even at the very first knock, were it on a night's, or a day's, or an hour's, yea, were it but on a moment's warning, having our house (to say so) in such order, and the spirituall affaires of our soules so well disposed of, and in so good a postour and case, that we may not be taken tardy or napping, nor be on the sudden sadly surprised to our unspeakable prejudice; even to be in that most desirable and delightful condition, that to us to live may be Christ, that the very principal scope and end which we propose to ourselves in desiring life and health, may be the honour and glory of Jesus Christ; looking at life with all the external conveniencies and comforts of it, as but litle valueable and unworthy to be desired were it not mainly in order to this end: And then we may confidently and comfortably conclude, that death whenever, wherever, and however it should overtake us, would be gain to us, by puting a final and eternal period to all the remainders of indwelling sin, to all tentationes to sin, to all desertion, and to all complaints and fears of desertion and hydings of God's face; to all doubtings about our gracious estate and about our interest in God; to all feares of backsliding, and of offending, or of giving offence; to all trouble, sorrow, sadnesse, and sighing on whatsoever account; to all indisposition to serve, worship, and glorify God; to all interruptions of fellowship with him, and to all fellowship that is but mediat and in part: To all smful ignorance and imperfect knowledge, or but in part; These great Theologues there read all their divinity without book, and without any the least difficulty in that beatifical immediat Vision of God's face: And by ushering us in to that blessed estate, wherein we shall be satisfyed with his likenesse, and that both objectively and subjectively▪ being then admitted to see him in himselfe as he is, face to face, even to full, immediat, and never to be interrupted fellowship with him; and being priviledged to see him in ourselves, perfectly conformed to his image in holinesse according to Creature-capacity; and put in case to serve him there, where his Servants serve him as well as ever we desired to serve him in the best frames we were ever in, and in the best houres we ever had on earth in the most countenanced publick ordinances, or in the sweetest secret duties of his worship; Nay, which is yet more, where we shall serve him as well as ever he commanded us to serve him, or shall desire us to serve him, that sure will be in such spiritually noble state as we never befor served him while we sojourned here on earth. Alace! How few, how very few, how lamentably few are there, even amongst the great multitudes of professing Christians, of pretenders to godlinesse, and to the hope of that gain and blessednesse which attends them that die in the Lord, who make it the great bussinesse of their life to live thus? even all the dayes of their appointed time, to wait till their change come; coveting and crying in prayer to God that he would graciously and effectually so teach them to number their dayes, that they may apply their hearts to wisdome? How many are there that may at their death sadly complain, as it is storyed of one Similis Captain of the Roman Emperour Hadrian his Guard▪ who having lived long in the City and at Court, and having some seven years befor his death retiered himselfe unto a privat Countrey-house, where he thought, it is like, he enjoyed himselfe more, being freed from the avocations, distractions, noise, and cumbersome converse of a Court-life, commanded that after his death it should be written over his grace, Here lyeth Similis who was many yeares, but lived only seven: How many Professors of Religion are there, I say, that may thus sadly and sorrowfully complain of themselves when they come to die, Ah! we have been many yeares, but have lived either none at all, or but very few yeares: For that life that is not lived to God, and to the honour and glory of Jesus Christ, is not at all worthy the denomination of life, since we are all the time we live so, but dead while we live: It is astonishing to think that Reasonable Men and Women professing they have immortal soules, living especially under the clear light and sun-shine of the Gospel, who do not at all designe nor endeavour to live to God, nor to live the life that they now live in the flesh by the faith of the Son of God, should foolishly fancy themselves to live, and fondly flatter themselves in a golden dreame, that they shall be well at death, and die in the Lord, and so be blessed with them that die thus; who rest from their labours, and whose works follow them; who enter into peace and rest in their beds, every one walking in his uprightnesse; O! fools Paradise; O! deplorable and damnable delusion. Who ever therefor would be, (as all of us are unspeakably concerned to be) undeceived as to this selfe-murthering and soul-ruining grosse practical error and mistake, and seriously and sincerely desire to live so as they may have the well-grounded hope of dieing in the Lord, and of being truely blessed at and after their death; (without which it had been much better for them never to have lived at all, or to have lived the life of brutes, even of the most abject, vile, contemptible, and abominable brutes, which when they are dead are done, annihilated, and gone) Let them diligently peruse, and gravely ponder these few following Sermons, and pray for the blessing of them; The Designe whereof (excellently driven by the Author, who did most edifyingly and exemplarly, most convinceingly and comfortably▪ live and die thus) is to rectify such miserable mistakes; and to airth right (which he doth by a most admirably divine arte) towards the only sure and safe way of dieing happily, which is by living holily.
I doubt not, Christian Reader, of thy having read several other Tractats on this subject, but I suppose thou hast hardly read any more solidly and succinctly, more pertinently, powerfully, and pungently writen, and withall, more suted to the various cases and conditions of all sorts of Readers, then this. As for me, while I was revising these Sermons, and making them ready for the presse, I was sometimes, as I still am, made to doubt (I shall not deny but my litle acquaintance with other men's writings may considerably influence this doubt) whither any ordinary Minister of the Gospel, hath readily to this purpose handled so many notable purposes to better purpose, several of them surprising, yet all of them clearly dependent upon, and natively consequent unto, one another, in so few words.
Read then this litle Book (which is Mr. DURHAMS, from whose pen or mouth, no thinge hath hitherto dropped into the presse, that hath been unsavoury or unacceptable to the Churches of Christ) again and again, and digest it well, and I think I may with humble boldnesse say, that if thou shouldst read nothing else on this concerning subject but it, and what is writen thereof in the book of the sacred Scriptures, (which in this and all the other purposes treated of in it, doth infinitly transcend all the writings of the ablest and holyest men in the world) thou mayst, through God's blessing, be sufficiently instructed thence, how to die the blessed Death of them that die in the Lord. Now blessed eternally be our blessed Lord Jesus who by his accursed, but most blessed Death, hath procured all this Blessednesse that attends and follows the death of them that die in him; Who are all blessed and shall be blessed in despight of the Devil, of the World, and of the Remainder of Corruption dwelling in them till their dieing day; He himselfe hath pronounced the blessing on them, and who shall, who dare, who can reverse it? They are all blessed that live and die in the Lord, and none but they; all true blessednesse is entailed upon, ingrossed and monopolized unto, this honorable Society; Not a drahme-weight of it (to say so) being to be found all the World over beside; Whatever ignorant, deluded, and befooled men may fancie to the contrary. That thou mayst be found associated with this blessed Company, is the earnest desire of
Thy Servant in the Gospel J. C.