[4.] Obedience. You should walk the more humbly and strictly with God. David was at a loss : ' What shall I render ? ' This was one of his resolutions : Ps. cxvi. 9, ' I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.' This is your duty, to bind yourselves to a more humble and holy walking with God. This is a good use of experiences. The army that have seen so much of God should be a school of piety to
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the nation. There is a notable place : Judges ii. 7, ' And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the Lord that he did for Israel.' Whilst there were any to keep alive the memo- rial of such experiences, what an awe was it upon their hearts ! Oh ! that you could get your hearts in such a frame. Methinks you should have such arguings as this : Shall I, that have seen the wonders of the Lord, be proud, vain, carnal, contemptuous of holy things ? Such holy reasonings argue a good frame : Ezra ix. 13, ' Seeing that thou our God hast given us such deliverance as this, should we again break thy commandments ? ' Certainly none sin so dearly, and with so much expense, as a people saved by the Lord's mercies.
II. To render accordingly, What is that ? It implieth two things —
1. Keal mercies require real acknowledgments. When your lives were in jeopardy in the high places of the field, did God compliment with you, or save in jest ? And now, in the day of your thanksgivings, wiU you compliment with God, and put him off with a little bodily presence ? What is a little cold thanks if you be proud and injurious, and despisers of the ministry, regardless of God's institutions, cavilling at his ordinances, neglectful of church-communion, a thing grown into fashion with many ; they content themselves with a loose profession of Christ, living out of the communion of any particular church ; a sad thing! God would have coals lie together. Wine is best preserved in the hogshead, and saints in communion. Did God take their thanks well that would own a mercy but oppress the people ? Zech. xi. 5, ' Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty, and they that sell them say. Blessed be God, I am rich.' They were grown great and high, and God must have the glory by all means ; but they used the people severely at their own pleasure. There was a thanksgiving, but withal there was disobedience and abuse of authority ; and in that case keeping a day will be to no purpose. The devil's leading Christ to the top of the pinnacle was but to persuade him to cast himself down again.
2. The acknowledgment must answer the proportion of the mercy, be it in word or deed. It is true we cannot vie with God for degree and measure, but we must do what we can.
[1.] If the acknowledgment be in word: Ps. cxlv. 3, 'Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised ; ' it must be taken notice of in a more than ordinary manner. The more of God is manifest, the more it should be taken notice of : Ps. cl. 2, ' Praise him according to his excel- lent greatness.' According to the great appearances and manifestations of God so must our praises be : ' Let the high praises of God be in their mouth,' Ps. cxlix. 6. There are higher and lower praises, more and less solemn according to the proportion and size of our mercies. The spouse's eyes were as ' dove's eyes,' Cant. iv. 1, to peck and look upward.
[2.] If in deed, some notable thing must be done for God. When Ahasuerus had heard of a good deed done by Mordecai, he saith, What lionour and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this ? Esther vi. 3. So, what honour hath been done to the Lord ? What have we
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done for him ? Saitli David, 2 Sam. vii. 2, 'I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains.' The Lord hath advanced me from a sheep-hook to a sceptre ; what love have I showed to God ? what excellent thing have I done for God ? wherein am I carried out with zeal for God ? Use. To reprove —
1. Those that, instead of rendering according, render the quite con- trary, who, the more God liath blessed them, grow unthankful, proud, sensual, dead, formal in prayer, less in communion with God, more licentious in their actions. They are like tops, never well but when they are scourged ; abuse their mercies to the contempt of God, as the Israelites took the earrings of gold and silver, which were the spoils of the Egyptians, and made a golden calf of them. As the sea turneth all the sweet dews and influences of heaven into salt water, so they turn all their mercies into occasions of sin.