The prayers and intercessions of the saints are a skreen betwixt wicked men and the wrath of God for a time, Job xxii. 30. The innocent preserve the island. The world stands by the prayers of the saints ; what multitudes of rebellious Christ-despising sinners swarm this day in every part of this nation ? Such as declare, by their open practice, they will not have Christ to reign over them, now contemn his offers, despise his messengers ; but blessed be God, yea, and let them bless him too, that there are others mourning to the Lord for them, beseeching his forbearance towards them. Lit- tle do the wicked know how much they are beholden to the pray- ers of the saints. These and such like reasons prevail with the Lord Jesus to stand in a waiting, patient posture, at the doors of sinners. Ah, how loth is he to give them up ! We now proceed to the uses of this point by way of,
Use 1. And First, This point will be very fruitful for informa- tion of our understandings in divers great and useful points, both doctrinal and practical, wherein every soul among you is deeply concerned ; and therefore, I beseech you, let them be heard and pondered with an answerable attention and seriousness of Spirit ; And the first inference shall be this.
Infer. 1. If the Lord Jesus do exercise such admirable patience towards sinners. Then how much better is itjbr poor sinners to be in the hands of Christ, tlian in the hands of the best and Jwliest man in the world ? O sinner, it is better for thee to fall into the hands of the meek and merciful Jesus, than into the hands of the dearest friend thou hast upon earth ; no creature can bear what Christ bears : no patience like the patience of Christ : It is said of Moses, Numb. xi. 12. " Now the man Moses was meek above all men upon " the face of the earth." There was never such a man born into the world, for patience, meekness, and long-suffering as Moses was ; and yet for all that, this mirror of meekness could not bear t*he provocations of Israel : You rebels, saith he, must I draw water
for you out of the rock ? Thus was his spirit ruffled with the provocations of Israel, and this lost him the land of Canaan. Jo- nah was a good man, a prophet of the Lord ; yet because the Lord would not be so quick and severe with Nineveh, as Jonah would have had him, in what uncomely language doth his angry soul re- turn upon his God ? Jonah iv.' 2. '^ O Lord, (saith he) was not ** this my saying when I was yet in my country ; Therefore ^' I fled before unto Tarshish, for I knew thou wert a gra- " cious God and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, " and repentest thee of the evil ; therefore, now, O Lord, take, *' I beseech thee, my life from me, for it is better for me to die *^ than to hve ;" q. d. Ah, Lord, I knew it would come to this, I knew thy gracious nature, how inclinable thou art to mercy, and that upon the first appearance of their repentance, thou wouldst repent of the evil, and so free-grace would make me as a liar among them,
Nay, give me leave to speak a higher word than all this, and let it not seem strange, that the patience of the glorified saints in heaven is nothing to the patience of Christ towards provoking sin- ners upon earth. Those glorified souls that be above, though they have patience among other graces, perfected in its kind, yet still it is but created, finite patience, and it cannot bear what Christ's patience bears : Take an instance of it out of Rev. vi. 9, 10, 11. " I saw under the altar the souls of those that were slain for the " word of God, and for the testimony which they held ; and they " cried ^vith a loud voice, saying. How long, O Lord, holy and " true, dost not thou judge and avenge our blood on them that " dwell on the earth : And it was said unto them. That they should " rest for a little season.'^ Here you see glorified souls less able to bear the slow pace of justice towards their enemies, than Christ \yas. It is true, here was no sinful impatience, but yet a patience short of Christ's infinite patience. Ah, if you were to depend upon the patience of any creature in heaven or earth, you had worn it out long ago. I will not execute the fierceness of me in an- ger, for I am God and not man. Ah, it is well we have to do with God ; if a man find his enemy, will he let him go away ? 1 Sam. :sxiv. 19. No, he will reckon before he part with him. Sinner, the Lord finds thee daily in thy sins, and yet lets thee go ; vet beware thou try not his patience too far, lest vengeance overtake thee at last, and pay the justice of God with all the arrears due to patience.
Infer. 2. Hence it follows, that convinced and broken-hearted sin- ners need not be discouraged in going to Jesus Christ for mercy ^ seeing he exercises such wonderful patience towards obstinate and 7-efusing sinners^