That Grod is the author or efficient cause of this dreadful judgment of fire that is at any time inflicted upon cities and countries, will sufficiently appear in these following scriptures : Amos iii. 6, ' Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid ? shall there be evil in the city, and the liOrd hath not done it ?' This is to be understood of the evil of punishment, and not of the evil of sin. Amos iv. 11, 'I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand j^lucked out of the burnings : yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord,' Here ' I ' is emphatical and exclusive, as if he should say, ' I, and I alone.' Amos i. 14, ' But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah,' — that is, in the metropolis or chief city of the Ammonites, — ' and it shall devour the palaces thereof Rabbah, their head city, was a cruel, bloody, covetous, and ambitious city, ver. 13 ; and therefore, rather than it should escape divine vengeance, God will kindle a fire in the wall of it, and burn it with his own hands. Ezek. xx. 47, ' And say to the forest of the south,' — that is, to Jerusalem, that did lie southwards from Chaldasa — ' Hear the word of the Lord ; Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour every green tree in thee, and every dry tree : the flaming flames shall not be quenched, and all fuel from the south to the north shall be burnt therein:' ver. 48, ^ 'And all flesh shall see that I the Lord have kindled it : it shall not be quenched.' Men shall see that it was God that kindled the fire, and not man, and therefore it was beyond man's skill or power to quench it, or to overmaster it. Jer. vii. 20, ' Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, mine anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground ; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.' The point being thus proved ; for the further opening of it, premise with me these things : —
(1.) First, That great afilictions. dread fid judgments, are likened unto fire in the blessed Scriptures : Ps. Ixvi. 12, ' We went through fire and water :' Jer. iv. 4, ' Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabi- tants of Jerusalem ; lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings :' Jer. xxi. 12, ' 0 house of David, thus saith the Lord, Execute judgment in the morning, and deliver hiin that is spoiled out of the hand of the
^ You will find this scriiiture fully opened in the following discourse. VOL. VI. B
18 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
oppressor, lest my fury go out like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings :' Lam. ii. 3, 4, ' He hath cut off in his anger all the horn of Israel : he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy, and burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about : he hath bent his bow like an enemy : he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that was ])leasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion : he ])oured out his fury like fire : ' Ezek. xv. 7, ' And I will set my face against them ; they shall go out from one fire, and another fire shall devour them : and ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them : ' Ezek. xxii. 20-22, ' As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it ; so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you : yea, I Avill gather you, and blow upon you in the fire of my wrath, and ye shall be melted in the midst thereof : as silver is melted in the midst of the furnace, so shall ye be melted in the midst thereof; and ye shall know that 1 the Lord have poured out my fury upon you.' Thus you see that great afflictions, great judgments, are likened unto fire.
Quest. But in what respects are great afflictions, great judgments, like unto fire ?
Ans. In these eight respects they are like unto fire : —
[1.] First, Fire is very dreadful and terrible to men's thoughts, spirits, and apprehensions. How dreadful was the fire of Sodom, and the fire of London, to all that were near it, or spectators of it ! It is observable that some are set out in the blessed Scriptures as monu- ments of most terrible and dreadful vengeance, whom the kings of Babylon roasted in the fire ; of them, it is said, shall be taken up a curse, Jer. xxix. 21, 22. When any imprecated sore vengeance from the Lord upon any one, it is said, ' The Lord make thee like Ahab and Zedekiah, whom the kings of Babylon roasted in the fire.' It is very dreadful and terrible for a man to have the least member of his body frying in the fire ; but how ten-ible and dreadful must it be for a man's wliole body to be roasted in the fire ! so are the judgments of the Lord very terrible and dreadful to the children of men. ' My flesh trembleth for fear of thee ; and I am afraid of thy judgments,' Ps. cxix. 120. Hab. iii. 16, ' When I heard, my belly trembled ; my lips quivered at the voice: rottenness entered into my bones, and I trembled in myself, that I might rest in the day of trouble.' But,
[2.] Secondly, Fire is very painfid- and tormenting — in w-hich respects hell-torments are compared to fire — so are great afflictions and judgments ; they are very painful and tormenting, they put a land into sore travail. Next to the pangs of conscience, and the pangs of hell, there are none to those pangs that are bred and fed by terrible judgments, Isa. xxvi. 17, 18. But,
[3.] Thirdlj, Fire is of a discovering nature ; it enlightens men's eyes to see those things that they did not see before ; so do the terrible judgments of God enlighten men's minds and understandings tometimes to know the Lord, Rev. xv. 4 ; Ezek. xxi. 3-7. Hence it
ISA. XLII. 24, 25] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 19
is that, after judgments threatened, God doth so often tell them that they shall know the Lord. Sometimes God, by his judgments, enlightens men's minds to see such an evil in sin that they never saw before, and to see such a vanity, mutability, impotency, and uncer- tainty in the creature that they never saw before ; and to see such a need of free-grace, of rich mercy, and of infinite favour and goodness, that they never saw before ; and to see such majesty and terribleness in God that they never saw before, Ps. Ixvi. 3, 5. Job xxxvii. 22, ' With God is terrible majesty.' But,