4. This reward is not in this life, but in the life to come ; treasure in heaven. What is it to be rich in this world ? They are but uncer- tain riches : 1 Tim. vi. 17, ' Charge them that are rich in this world that they be not high-minded, nor trust in uncertain riclies ; but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy.' Bracelets of copper and glass and little beads, and such like trifles, are valued by the rude barbarians, that are contemptible with us. The use and valu- ation of earthly things ceaseth in the world to come ; it only holdeth on this side the grave. What we now lend to the Lord we must make it over, that we may receive it by exchange there.
5. It is a very pleasing thing to God : Acts x. 4, ' Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before the Lord.' They are a delight to God : Heb. xiii. 16, ' For with such sacrifices God is well pleased ; ' as the sweet incense that was offered with the sacrifice ; not appeased, but well pleased. So Phil. iv. 18, ' An odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God.'
SERMON XXIV.
Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. —Mat. XXV. 41.
I COME now to speak of hell. Startle not at the argument ; we must curse as well as bless. See our gospel commission, Mark xvi. 16.
In this verse you have — (1.) The persons sentenced j (2.) The sentence itself.
^ Qu. action,' or some such word ? — Ed.
78 SERMONS UPON MATTHEW XXV. [SeR. XXIV.
First, The persons sentenced ; in that title, or terrible compellation, ye cursed.
Secondly, The sentence itself ; where we have —
1. Poena damni, the punishment of loss, depart.
2. Poena scnsus, the pains, into fire.
3. The duration, everlasting.
4. The company and society, the devil and his angels. I shall prosecute the text in this order : —
1. Show you that there are everlasting torments in hell, prepared for the wicked.
2. These torments shall be full at the day of judgment.
3. Concerning the persons sentenced ; it shall light upon the cursed.
4. The nature of those torments ; the loss of communion with God in Christ, and the horrible pain of fire ; the duration, everlasting ; and the company, the devil and his angels.
First, That there is a place of everlasting torments in hell, prepared for the wicked.
This being a truth hated by flesh and blood, ought the more strongly to be made evident to us. Now there is a hell, if God, or men, or devils may be judge.
1. Let God be the judge. He hath ever told the world of a hell, in the Old Testament and the New.
[1.] In the Old Testament, but sparingly, because immortality was reserved as a glorious discovery, fit for the times of the gospel : Deut. xxxii. 22, ' A fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn to the lowest hell.' God's wrath is still represented by fire, which is an active instrument of destruction ; and the seat and residence of it is in the lowest hell, in the other world. So Ps. xi, 6, ' Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, and fire, and brimstone, and an horrible tempest.' First snares, and then fire and brimstone. Here they are held with the cords of vanity, and hereafter in chains of darkness. Here they have their comforts, crosses, snares ; then hell-fire for their portion. So Isa. XXX. 33, ' For Tophet is ordained of old ; yea, for the king it is prepared : he hath made it deep and large, the pile thereof is fire, and much wood ; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it.' Tophet is the same place which is called the valley of Hinnom and Gehenna in the New Testament ; a filthy hateful place, which the Jews defiled with dead men's bones : 2 Kings xxiii. 10, * And he defiled Tophet, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter pass through the fire to Molech. And he brake in pieces the image, and cut down the groves, and defiled their places with the bones of men.* Infants were burnt there, with horrible cries and screeches, and sound of drums and tabrets and other instruments, to drown the noise ; and those that were condemned were burnt in that valley, as also the bones of malefactors. Now, to the piles of wood, and the piles con- tinually burning there, doth the prophet allude. This was re})resented in Sodom's burning as a type, as the drowning of the world was a figure of Christ's coming to judgment : the burning of the sacrifice, which, in the interpretation of the law, was the sinner himself, was the figure of it.
VeR. 41.] SERMONS UPON MATTHEW XXV. 79
[2.] Now come we to the New Testament. There are places with- out number. It is sometimes represented by fire, where we read of a furnace of fire : Mat. xiii. 42, ' And shall cast them into a furnace of fire ; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' God's wrath is compared in the Old Testament to a fiery oven, where the contracted flame appeareth most dreadful. Sometimes to a lake of fire : Rev. xix. 20, ' And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet, that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image ; both these were cast into a lake of fire, burning with brimstone.' At other times it is compared to a prison : 1 Peter iii. 19, ' By which also he went and preached to the spirits that are in prison.' Or to a bottomless pit: Eev. is. 11, 'And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit.' There is darkness, and chains, and gaoler, and judge ; the chains of invincible providence, and their own horrible despair. There is no making an escape; but of this more hereafter. So that, unless we will count God a liar, there is such a place of torment provided.