[2.] As pronounced and declared. So it shall be at the last day by the judge of all the earth : Acts xvii. 30, * Because he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness ;' and 2 Thes. i. 8, ' He shall come in flaming fire, taking vengeance on all them that know not God, and obey not the gospel.' Then the sentence is full and solemn, pronounced by the judge upon the throne, in the audience of all the world. Then it is final and peremptory, and puts men into their everlasting estate. And then it is presently executed ; they go away to that estate to which they are doomed. Of this the scripture speaketh : John v. 39, ' They that have done evil shall arise to the resurrection of damnation.' It is miserable to be involved in a sentence of condemnation by the word ; now that shuts up a sinner as in a prison, where the door is bolted and barred upon him till it be opened by grace. But doleful will their condition be who are condemned by the final sentence of the judge, from ■vyhich there is no appeal nor es- cape nor deliverance.
2. Consider, The punishment to which men are condemned. And that is twofold, either the 'poena damni, the loss of a heavenly kingdom ; they are shut out from that : ' But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into utter darkness : there shall be weep- ing and gnashing of teeth,' Mat. viii. 12 ; or poena sensus, the torments and pains they shall endure, called the ' damnation of hell,* Mat. xxiii. 33. Both together are spoken of : Mat. xxv. 41, * Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.' Words that should cut a sinner to the heart, if he had any feeling of his condition. Now, to be exempted from condemnation to
VeH. 1.] SERMONS TTPON ROMANS VTTT. 387
this punishment is the greater mercy. It is enough to heighten in our thoughts the greatest sense of the love of God, that we are freed from the curse, that Jesus hath ' delivered us from wrath to come,' 1 Thes. i. 10 ; that we are as brands plucked out of the burning ; but much more when we consider that we shall be admitted into God's blessed • presence, and see him as he is, and be like him, 1 John iii. 2 ; and for the present that, ' being justified by faith, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life,' Tit. iii. 7. The apostle expresseth both parts of the deliverance in one place : 1 Thes. v. 0, * For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.' Mark the antithesis, ' Not to wrath, but to obtain salva- tion,' which should increase our sense of the privilege, that, when others lie under the wrath of God, we shall see him and love him and praise him in heaven to all eternity.
3, How justly it is deserved by us, by reason of original and actual Bins, both before and after conversion. Original sin, — for the scripture telleth us, Kom. v. 16, ' The judgment was by one to condemnation ;' and again in ver. 18, ' By the oifence of one, judgment came upon all to condemnation.' All Adam's children are become guilty before God, and liable to death, or brought into such an estate wherein they are condemnable before God. So by many actual sins it is deserved by us. As we are ' by nature children of wrath,' Bph. ii. 3 ; so for a long time we have ' treasured up wrath against the day of wrath,' Rom. ii. 5. We have even forfeited the reprieve which God's patience allowed to us, and have more and more involved ourselves in condemna- tion. Till we comprehend our great need of pardon and exemption from condemnation we cannot understand the worth of it. Nay, we have deserved this condemnation since conversion.
He doth not say here, ' There is no sin in us,' but, ' There is no con- demnation.' Sin in itself is always damnable, and our redemption doth not put less evil into sin ; but in strict justice we deserve the greater punishment : this is another consideration that should endear this privilege to us.
4. How conscience standeth in dread of this condemnation. For if 'our own hearts condemn us,' 1 John iii. 20, they are a transcript of God's law, both precept and sanction ; and therefore do not only check us for sin, and urge us to duty, but also fill us with many hidden fears, which sometimes are very stinging. When we are serious, the more tender the heart is, the more it smiteth for sin : Rom i. 32, * Who knowing the judgment of God, that they that commit such things are worthy of death.' In your consciences you will find an inward conviction that God is your judge, and will call you to an account for the breach of his law. We feel this, living and dying: Heb. ii. 15, 'Who were all their lifetime subject to bondage through fear of death;' and 1 Cor. XV. 56, ' The sting of death is sin,' only it is more piercing and sharp when we die.