3. The gospel calls you to your generation work. Acts xiii. 36, "For David, after he had served his own generation, by the will of God, fell on sleep." Wherefore were you sent into the world, and made members of society? Was it not to honour God, and to be useful to your fellow-servants? Surely God sent none of us into the world to play ourselves, like the leviathan in the sea; nor to be like mice and rats, good for nothing but to eat that for which others have laboured. Far less did he send you to be agents for the devil, to advance his kingdom, and to oppose the work of the Lord in the places where you live; nor yet like the beasts, only to eat, drink, work, and sleep. To your work, then, your proper work, the service of God. Perhaps ye will say, ye have not been idle; but what have ye done for God in your day? What have ye done for the good of any soul? What have ye done to pluck any brand out of the burning? I fear, if we reckon our days according to what we have done for God in them, most of us may reckon our days lost days. Look up to God, who placed you in the world, and say for what good purpose you have taken up room in his earth. For what use are you in the world? God has given you a talent, what have you gained? He has placed you in such and such situations and relations, have you done the duties of each? I am to shew,

II. Why is it that sinners will not comply with this work?

1. Because it is the work to which, of all works, their hearts are most averse. Rom. viii. 7, "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." They would rather do any thing than go and work in God's vineyard. It is against the grain with unrenewed minds. The prodigal would rather feed swine than go back to his father, till he came to himself. Judas would rather go to a halter, than go to Christ for pardon. It is like cutting off a right hand, and plucking out a right eye. The sinner's neck is flexible enough to the devil's yoke; but it is an iron sinew to Christ's yoke. He that has a will to any thing, he has no will to this, till a day of power make him willing, Psalm ex. 3.

2. Because of prevailing love to carnal ease; Prov. xxvi. 15, "The slothful hideth his hand in his bosom; it grieveth him to bring it again to his mouth." The man loves to sleep in a sound skin, and therefore will die in his nest, if God do not in mercy set a fire to it. Sloth is so sweet a sin, that the carnal heart can never get a fill of it, Prov. vi. 10, "yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep." The man lies in the bed of sloth, and would not miss heaven if it would fall down into his mouth, or if wishing and woulding would do it. But if these will

not do, he must even want it, for he cannot leave the embrace of his dear ease. Fighting, running, praying, striving, wrestling, using heavenly violence, and the like, he cannot away with.

3. Because Satan furnishes them with work more agreeable, and it they will do; therefore God's work they will not meddle with: John viii. 44, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do." When the call of the gospel comes to sinners, Satan does with them as Pharaoh did with the Israelites, holds them more to their tasks; so they have always busy hands, and hearts full of their work, insomuch that they cannot get the work of religion minded to purpose. And what are they doing? They are busy weaving the spider's web; very busy doing nothing, or hatching the cockatrice egg, doing worse than nothing. They have much to do, having the desires of the flesh and mind to fulfil. They have more to do than they are able: they have the devil's swine to feed; they have a fry of living, lively, hungry lusts, that groan about their hearts, crying, Give, give, to satisfy. These they will serve all their days.

4. Because the world gives them another thing to do. Like the people invited to the marriage-supper, Luke xiv. 18, "They all with one consent begin to make excuse." There are too many of Pharaoh's mind, that think religion is only for them who have no other thing to do; as for them, they have no time for these things, and they wonder how any person should expect it of them. They are so delighted with considering what they shall eat and what they shall drink, that they cannot get time to think what they shall do to be saved. They have enough to do to get their daily bread, they cannot get their starving souls minded. They have so much to do to provide for to-day, and to-morrow, that they cannot get time to provide for eternity. They never had such joy in the everlasting covenant, in the benefits of it, or seals of it, which they have in a good bargain where they gain something. Therefore they live like moles in the earth, never to open their eyes, till in hell they lift them being in torment. I go on to enquire,

III. Why this refusal should be retracted? why they should repent and aim at compliance with the gospel-call.

1. Because this refusal is against the respect and duty which you owe to him who calls you to the work: Mal. i. 6, " A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: If I then be a father, where is mine honour and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts unto you. Have you no regard to the authority of God? or has not he that made you a power over you, to prescribe your work? Will ye follow the dictates of your own corrupt pasVOL. IX.

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sions, even against the plain dictates of his Spirit? Shall we thus by our obstinacy affront our heavenly Father, and grieve his Spirit?

2. Because this refusal is full of the basest ingratitude. What is the meaning of all the gospel-calls, but-Sinners, do yourselves no harm? Your interest is advanced by working; Job xxxv. 7, " If thou be righteous, what givest thou him, or what receiveth he of thine hand?" If thou ply the work of religion, the advantage is thine own; if not, the loss remains alone with yourself: Prov. ix. 12, "If thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself; but if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it." It is a great favour that thou hast access to the work. Had not the Son of God made way for it through his own blood, thou hadst never got such a call.

3. It is the most foolish and unreasonable refusal that can be ; and if the sinner were not out of himself, he could not be capable of it. What! will a starving man refuse to have meat when it is offered him? or will a convict refuse liberty? But this ye do in refusing Christ's call, and so judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Are sinners so foolish, as to hold fast and drink the cup of poison, when they are entreated to throw it away? This folly and madness will be bitterness in the end.

Lastly, You are ruined if you stand to your refusal. That obstinacy will bar you out of heaven and the favour of God for ever. Heaven is a rest prepared, not for loiterers, but for labourers; and you that will have your ease now, must bid farewell to it for ever in another world: Prov. i. 24, "Because I have called, and ye refused. I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof; I also will laugh at your calamity, I will mock when your fear cometh; when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon me, and I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me; for that they hated knowledge, and did choose the fear of the Lord." Salvation-work will not work, unless men bestir themselves; but damnation-work will go on when men sit at ease, and are carried down the stream into the ocean of the wrath of God.

IV. In the last place, I am to make some practical improvement; in doing which, I shall confine myself, for the present, to an use of exhortation. I would exhort refusers of Christ and of religion to take their word again, and to comply with the gospel-call. Ye have had many calls to engage in the work of religion with earnestness, but the answer of the most part is, I will not; and thus one refusal comes on the back of another.

You have had many calls from the word of God to fall to your work, and what has been your answer to these messages of God by his servants, but that-I will not? Have you not heard many exhortations which have never affected you? Have you not gone back to those very sins for which reproofs have met you in public ordinances, and yet you have held them fast? Has not duty been laid plainly before you, and you have found means to put it by? and still the answer is, I will not.

2. Has not God pursued some of you by afflictions to drive you to your work, and yet no awakening to repentance and reformation, but still the language of your practice has been, I will not. The Lord, in his holy providence, has sent you losses, crosses, and distresses of divers sorts, to bring you to your duty; but, O! may it not be written on rod after rod, You have not yet returned to the Lord?

3. Nay, has not the Lord sometimes so met you in a sinful course, that you could not but say, This is the finger of God? and yet ye would be froward, ye would go back to the sin again. What is the language of that, but-I will not? Have ye not fallen under Jotham's curse again and again? Judges ix. 15, whereby fire has flashed out of some one or other bramble, under which you have rested, on your faces to burn you, instead of that shade ye thought to find under it to refresh you. Has not your conscience awakened on you sometimes, and the arrows of conviction fastened on you, and yet you have refused? Ye have murdered convictions, and never been at ease till conscience has been silenced. You have run away from God, even with his arrows sticking in you, saying in opposition, I will not.

Yet for all that is time yet. What is

Lastly, Have you not often delayed complying with the call of God, and set the time for your going to work? come and gone, your eyes have never seen that delaying but plainly a refusal ?—"I will not." For there is no word of God that says, Go, work to-morrow, or the next day; it is, To-day, if ye will hear his voice; son, go work to-day. So that he that will not work to-day, but pretends he will do it afterwards, plainly refuses the call, and will not.

To promote your compliance with the call, I would offer a few weighty motives; as,

1. Repent now, and fall to that work ye have formerly refused; for it is a work preferable to all other works. The work of religion is your main, your chief work. (1.) It is the most pleasant work. Many are disgusted at the work of religion, because they think it unpleasant. But they have not yet tried it, and therefore are not fit judges. You have a more favourable account of it from Prov.

iii. 17, "Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." See also Psalm iv. 7, 8, "Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increased. I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep; for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety." There is work indeed in the vineyard that is very unpleasant to corrupt nature; but even out of this arises the most refined satisfaction to the new nature. And what are all the pleasures of the world, to reconciliation with God, and that peace of conscience and joy that there is in believing? (2.) It is the most profitable work. The profit thereof is both for time and for eternity; 1 Tim. iv. 8, " For bodily exercise profiteth little, but godliness is profitable unto all things, having the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come." The profits of it are durable profits they last, and will be profitable, when all others will be of no avail. Hereby you will gain the life of your souls, and, as the loss is incomparably great, so also is the gain of it. (3.) It is the most necessary work. It is the one thing needful, absolutely needful, Luke x. 42. We cannot be happy here or hereafter without it; we are undone for ever.

2. Ye are always working something. The greatest idler on earth is in some sort always busy. God does not require of you more work, but other work. The soul of man is like a watch, that goes as fast in going wrong as in going right. How sad is it, that, seeing men are always doing something, they should refuse only that work which would honour God, and save their own souls! Will you not, then, for God's sake, and your own sake, change your work?

3. It is sad work you are working while you refuse this. If you be not working out your own salvation, you are working out your own damnation. We are always going forward; if not pressing a step nearer heaven, you are a step nearer hell. Every refusal, yea, every sin, is a new impediment in your way to heaven, a new call to Heaven for vengeance on the sinner, builds the separation-wall the higher, and lays on the greater weight to sink you for ever under the wrath of God.

4. Consider, if ye be not in some sort at as much pains to ruin your souls, as otherwise might save them. There are difficulties in the ways of sin, as well as in the ways of God. Is the work of religion a toilsome work? but do not ye many times weary yourselves to commit iniquity? Is there not as much pain when a sinner deprives himself of his night's rest, racking himself about the world, as when a saint communes with his heart on his bed about eternal things? The sinner travels to bring forth sin, Psalm vii. 14. What more than this at the hard duties of religion! Since he that en