[8.] When professors grow worldly, this awakeneth worldly rage and God's rods. The men of the world take mammon for God, and the conveniences of this life for their portion. Now, when the children of God put in for a sharQ; and are all for worldly hopes and interests, it stirreth up their enmity. They cannot endure to be discountenanced ; it is their generation and sphere : Luke xvi. 8^ ' The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light ; ' full of watchful malice ; so God's rod. When the world gets into tne church, God whippeth it out again by the world. God will show us the vanity of our aspiring projects. The spirit of the world is breath- ing in most christians, prowling for greatness, as if they served the god of the world. Many dream now of a carnal pomp and dominion, fit for a worldly hope. The disciples had such a dream, and Christ cureth it by those threatenings : Mat. xxiv. 6, ' Ye shall hear of wars, and rumours of wars ; nation shall rise against nation,' &c.
But enough of England's dansrer ; and to prove that it is in a great measure God's language to us, ' Thus will I do unto you.'
2. England's duty : ' Prepare to meet thy God.' Which let us all set upon.
[1.] We are all concerned. God taketh it ill when we do not meet him in his wrath, and prevent him in his judgments : Ezek. xiii. 5, ' Ye have not gone into the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord.' God besiegeth the church with judgments, to try the w^atchfulness and valour of his people. Our standing in the gap is by humiliation, invocation, and repentance. If you oppose the Lord, it must be with spiritual weapons of his own choosing and appointing. So Ezek. xxii„, SO, ' I sought for a man to stand in the gap, and found none.' He threateneth, to prevent the execution.
[2.] You are involved in the common guilt till you take this course : 2 Cor. vii. 11, ' You have approved yourselves clear in this matter.' The whole church was not guilty of incest. We contract a share and fellowship in the common guilt, unless we mourn for it and wrestle with God ; you enter your protest and dissent before the Lord. But especi- ally this concerneth you,, the representative body of this nation ; you that should be the repairers of the breaches, Zech, iii. 3. Joshua, the high "priest, the public officer and ruler of the nation, stood before the Lord in filthy garments, as representing the people's iniquity. Magis- trates and ministers are most concerned. The measures of the sanctuary were double to other measures : ' Prepare to meet your God.'
(1.) Get the sin stated, and the great cause of the breach between us and God. You had need advise about it. See where the business
36 A FAST SERMON PREACHED BEFORE THE PARLIAMENT.
sticks ; otherwise we shall chop logic with God, as the carnal Jews did : Mai. iii. 7, ' Even from the daj's of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them : Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts : but ye said, Wherein shall we return ? ' Knowledge of a disease is a good step to the cure. It was Ceesar's complaint of the Britons, It is harder to find them out than to vanquish them. There must be a searching and trying before returning : Lam. iii. 40, ' Let us search and try our ways, and turn unto the Lord.' It is a very critical business to us that are blinded with lusts and interests. I observe, in our humiliation either we fling dirt in one another's faces, and one party accuseth another ; what one is for, another condemns ; or else we take up customary terms and superficial acknowledgments, or pitch upon sins by the by : Amos ii. 4, ' For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof, because they have despised the law of the Lord.' There be many sins, and yet one main one. The Corinthians were guilty of foul disorders, yet, ' For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep,' 1 Cor. xi. 30. If the right cause of God's displeasure were truly and impartially stated, we should soon see where our business lieth. I doubt it is not the work of a private person ; he hath not skill, and his testimony would be more liable to suspicion ; if he should alone bear the burden of such a discovery, he would be made a reproach. If many of the most judicious and godly- wise were called together for such a work, it would be very acceptable to the Lord, and comfortable to the nation : Hos. v. 15, 'I will return to my place till they do acknowledge their offence.' Trouble will pursue till this be done, till we plead guilty, and humble ourselves as a people that have such a burden upon them.