Imatges de pàgina
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faithful to it ? Have we the stewardship of God's own family, and shall we neglect it? Have we the conduct of those saints that shall live for ever with God in glory, and shall we neglect them? God forbid! I beseech you, brethren, let this thought awaken the negligent. You that draw back from painful, displeasing, suffering duties, and put off men's souls with ineffectual formalities, do you think this is honourable treatment of Christ's spouse? Are the souls of men thought meet by God to see his face, and live for ever in heaven, and are they not worthy of your utmost cost and labour on earth? Do you think so basely of the church of God, as if it deserved not the best of your care and help? Were you the keepers of sheep or swine, you would scarcely let them go, and say, They are not worth the looking after; especially if they were your own. And dare you say so of the souls of men of the church of God? Christ

walketh among them: remember his presence, and see that you are diligent in your work. They are "a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, to show forth the praises of Him that hath called them." And yet will you neglect them? What a high honour is it to be but one of them, yea, but a door-keeper in the house of God! But to be the priest of these priests, and the ruler of these kings-this is such an honour as multiplieth your obligations to diligence and fidelity in so noble au employment.

IV. The last motive that is mentioned in my text, is drawn from the price that was paid for the church which we oversee : "Which God,"

says the apostle, "hath purchased with his own blood." Oh what an argument is this to quicken the negligent, and to condemn those who will not be quickened to their duty by it! "Oh," saith one of the ancient doctors, "if Christ had but committed to my keeping one spoonful of his blood in a fragile glass, how curiously would I preserve it, and how tender would I be of that glass! If then he have committed to me the purchase of his blood, should I not as carefully look to my charge?" What! sirs, shall we despise the blood of Christ? Shall we think it was shed for them who are not worthy of our utmost care? You may see here, it is not a little fault that negligent pastors are guilty of. As much as in them lieth, the blood of Christ would be shed in vain. They would lose him those souls which he hath so dearly purchased.

Oh, then, let us hear these arguments of Christ, whenever we feel ourselves grow dull and careless: "Did I die for these souls, and wilt not thou look after them? Were they worth my blood, and are they not worth thy labour? Did I come down from heaven to earth, to seek and to save that which was lost;' and wilt thou not go to the next door, or street, or village, to seek them? How small is thy condescension and labour compared to mine? I debased myself to this, but it is thy honour to be so employed. Have I done and suffered so much for their salvation, and was I willing to make thee a fellow-worker with me, and wilt thou refuse to do that little which lieth upon thy hands?" Every time we look upon our con

gregations, let us believingly remember that they are the purchase of Christ's blood, and therefore should be regarded by us with the deepest interest and the most tender affection. Oh, think what a confusion it will be to a negligent minister, at the last day, to have this blood of the Son of God pleaded against him; and for Christ to say, "It was the purchase of my blood of which thou didst make so light, and dost thou think to be saved by it thyself?" O brethren, seeing Christ will bring his blood to plead with us, let it plead us to our duty, lest it plead us to damnation.

I have now done with the motives which I find in the text itself. There are many more that might be gathered from the rest of this exhortation of the apostle, but we must not stay to take in all. If the Lord set home but these few upon our hearts, I doubt not we shall see reason to mend our pace; and the change will be such on our hearts and in our ministry, that ourselves and our congregations will have cause to bless God for it. I know myself to be unworthy to be your monitor; but a monitor you must have; and it is better for us to hear of our sin and duty from anybody than from nobody. Receive the admonition, and you will see no cause in the monitor's unworthiness to repent of it. But if you reject it,

the unworthiest messenger may bear that witness against you another day which will then confound

you.

CHAPTER III.

APPLICATION.

SECTION I.

THE USE OF HUMILIATION.

REVEREND and dear brethren, our business here this day is to humble our souls before the Lord for our past negligence, and to implore God's assistance in our work for the time to come. Indeed, we can scarcely expect the latter without the former. If God will help us in our future duty, he will first humble us for our past sin. He that hath not so much sense of his faults as unfeignedly to lament them, will hardly have so much more as to move him to reform them. The sorrow of repentance may exist without a change of heart and life; because a passion may be more easily wrought, than a true conversion. But the change cannot take place without some good measure of the sorrow. Indeed, we may here justly begin our confessions; it is too common with us to expect that from our people, which we do little or nothing in ourselves. What pains do we take to humble them, while we ourselves are unhumbled!

1

Alas!

How hard do we expostulate with them to wring out of them a few penitential tears, (and all too little) while yet our own eyes are dry! how we set them an example of hard-heartedness, while we are endeavouring by our words to melt and mollify them! Oh, if we did but study half as much to affect and amend our own hearts, as we do those of our hearers, it would not be with many of us as it is! It is a great deal too little that we do for their humiliation; but I fear it is much less that some of us do for our own. Too many do somewhat for other men's souls, while they seem to forget that they have souls of their own to regard. They so carry the matter, as if their part of the work lay in calling for repentance, and the hearers' in repenting; theirs in bespeaking tears and sorrow, and other men's in weeping and sorrowing; theirs in crying down sin, and the people's in forsaking it; theirs in preaching duty, and the hearers' in practising it.

But we find that the guides of the church in Scripture did confess their own sins, as well as the sins of the people. Ezra confessed the sins of the priests, as well as of the people, weeping and casting himself down before the house of God. Daniel confessed his own sin, as well as the people's. I think, if we consider well the duties already stated, and how imperfectly we have performed them, we need not demur upon the question, Whether we have cause of humiliation? I must needs say, though I condemn myself in saying it, that he who readeth but this one exhortation of Paul to the elders of the church at Ephesus, and compareth

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