2. It is one great part of his office to reduce his people from their straggling: Ps. xxiii. 1, 'The Lord is my shepherd.' What then? Ver. 3, ' He restoreth my soul.' If the Lord be our shepherd, it is a great part of his work to restore our souls. We fall into the disease of sin, sometimes wander out of the path, in which we should perish, if God did not reclaim us from our wandering. Now, it is his work to restore our souls, that is, to keep us from going on still in our bypaths ; therefore we may come and press it. He is inclined to show favour to those who confess their errors, and for the glory of his grace, and constant love, and sworn covenant, he will not be unmindful of us.
3. He delights to guide us in our wanderings, Luke xv. 4, 5. The good shepherd leaves the ninety-nine, and seeks out the strayed sheep upon the hills and mountains, and brings it home upon his own shoulders rejoicing. It is a pleasing thing to Christ to be reducing strayed souls, Ezek. xxxiv. 4. He was angry with the under-shepherds, and rebukes them because they discharged not their duty : 'The dis-
VEE. 176.] SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. 311
eased have you not strengthened,' &c. ; and he promiseth his own care : ver. 6, ' I will seek that which was lost.'
4. He will bear with our infirmities, and if humbly sought to, will take care of us. We straggle sometimes out of weakness, and out of vanity of spirit, and lose ourselves through our own folly ; therefore Christ saith, ' I will seek that which was lost.' Sometimes we are driven away by wolves. Christ will fetch us back again, that we may not be meat for their mouth. If sin be as a breach upon conscience, he will heal that wound and bind up the broken. If we be weak, ready to straggle, he will confirm us, and strengthen us more and more. Having such a shepherd, this should encourage us more to go to him.
Use 5. Here is caution ; take heed not to run into infirmities, as if it were matter of nothing. Why? They must be repented; and it is part of wilfulness voluntarily and allowedly to do that which he must undo again, and necessarily be repented of; as David confessetli his error. Little sins allowed and customarily committed, on the pre- sumption of a pardon, they are not infirmities, but are of a dangerous nature. If you indulge iniquity, you lose your claim as those that are devoted to God ; you will hazard this if you indulge your straying humour. And consider, even infirmities may cost us dear, for though they do not make void the eternal reward, yet usually God reduceth us not by internal grace, but by some smart providence ; as David, Ps. cxix. 67, ' Before I was afflicted I went astray.' God will teach you your duty by briars and thorns, by sharp affliction. And where the distemper is more rooted in us, if it be not an act only, but a kind of rooted distemper, then the dispensation of God's providence may be very sharp. As Paul's thorn in the flesh, when he was apt to be lifted up in pride, he prays thrice : the Lord was terrible to him ; possibly it was the stone, or gout, some racking pain, 2 Cor. xii. Though he prays, God would not release him, but still keeps the pain and trouble upon him. So our strayings will cost us clear. To be sure they must cost us repentance, but they may cost us a great deal of sorrow in the world. We should not incur the hazard of God's temporal displeasure. Again, you have no assurance and command of the time and measure of the Spirit's assistance ; and therefore, if you give way to little failings, they may become grievous enormities in the end, and when you grieve the Spirit, you do what lies in you to drive him from you, and provoke him to suspend his assistance the longer ; and therefore, ' Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed to the day of redemption,' Eph. iv. 30.
SEVERAL SERMONS
UPON THE
TWENTY-FIFTH CHAPTER OF ST MATTHEW.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
To the Eight Hon. William, Earl of Bedford, Baron of Thornangh, and Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter *
My Lord, — If the sovereign disposer of all things had continued the life of the author of the following sermons, he had expressed his thank- fulness for your real and noble favours by the dedication of the best fruits of his studies to your Lordship ; but since it hath pleased God to remove him from the church on earth to the church in heaven, I am desired by his most near surviving relation to comply with his intention, by inscribing your highly honourable name in the frontis- piece of this work.
Your Lordship's esteem of the author, and most free kindness, placed him in an eminent station ; and how faithfully he discharged his public ministry for those great and most worthy ends, the glory of God, and the salvation of souls, as there is a full testimony given by many sincere and understanding persons of all ranks, that were the happy partakers of it, so it is evident to others by the several volumes of most useful sermons printed since his decease. These had been more exact, and worthy of your Lordship's perusal, if they had been published by himself ; but such as they are, I doubt not but they will be very acceptable for the heavenly matter contained in them.