Use 1. Let us take heed how we oppress any, especially that our hearts boil not with rancour and malice against God's children. Injuriousness and cruelty to the faithful will not go unrevenged. It may be you think you do God good service, John xvi. 2. But that doth not excuse you from punishment, for God will not be served with furious and blind zeal. The rule is general, ' It is just with God to recompense tribulation,' &c.
2. Let not the godly be envious and repine at the temporal prosperity of wicked men. Their ruin is certain ; God will remember them that show no mercy, but heavily lay on the yoke, Isa. xlvii. 6. God will put the cup of affliction into other hands, if you can but tarry his leisure, Isa. li. 22.
Secondly, 'And to you that are troubled rest with us.' There is his recompense to the faithful, and that which is appointed to them is rest ; and not barely so, but ' rest with us.' Paul and the other apostles of the Lord were engaged in the same cause, and looked for a like issue. The apostles had a particular promise, Mat. xix. 28 ; but they were all fellow-soldiers in the same warfare, and as to the substance of it, expected the same crown.
Here note two things —
1. That the reward of the faithful is represented under the notion of rest. Here the word is aveais, which signifies a cessation or relax- ation from all their troubles ; but it implieth more than at first appear- eth ; not only a release from their troubles, but eternal glory and happiness in proportion to their troubles, 2 Cor. iv. 7. But a rest it is •called — (1.) Sometimes in allusion to the rest of Canaan, where the people of God fixed their abode after their wearisome pilgrimage. So it is taken Heb. iv. 1, 'We having a promise of entering into his rest left us, let us fear lest any of us should seem to come short of it.' And so it noteth that heaven is the place of our eternal abode, after our pilgrimage in the world ; there is our home and resting-place. (2.) Sometimes it is spoken of with allusion to the sabbatic rest : Heb. iv. 9, ' There remaineth therefore a rest for the children of God.' The word there is o-a/3/SaTtcr/io?. It is a celebration of an eternal sabbath to God. Our abode there and business there is perpetual worship, and we go there not only to enjoy God, but to adore God. Heaven is a temple, and christians are. all priests, Kev. i. 6. We are not fully made kings till we reign with him, nor priests till we come to minister im- mediately before the throne. If the priesthood we have by Christ doth chiefly concern our ministration in the heavenly temple, the case is
VER. 6, 7.] SERMONS UPON 2 THESSALONIANS I. 225
clear; here we are consecrated, fitted by justifying and sanctifying grace. (3.) It is called a rest in opposition to those tedious conflicts that we have about our spiritual estate and condition before God ; but then all is at an end, when the pardon is pronounced by the judge's own mouth, Acts iii. 19. So it is dvayfrv^i1? : then is everlasting joy and refreshing, no more conflicts and agonies of conscience ; our doubts and fears are quite gone, and we are at rest in Christ. (4.) It is some- times called rest in opposition to whatever was grievous and burden- some in our duties : Kev. xiv. 13, ' They rest from their labours.' They cease not from duty, but from whatsoever was burdensome and trouble- some in their duty, either through the weakness of their flesh, or their want of satisfaction in God. (1st.) The weakness of the flesh maketh duty wearisome to us. But there we are all spirit ; even this body shall become a spiritual body, and it shall be no labour to us to serve God. (2d.) Want of satisfaction in God. Adepto fine, cessat motus. When the soul hath what it would have, it is at rest. Fulness of joy, satisfied with thy likeness. (5.) It is called rest iu opposition to the calamities and troubles of the present life. So in the text, and Isa. lvii. 2, ' Best in their beds.' Their souls at rest with God, and their bodies in their graves.
Use. We say rest in God, but we forget our true resting-place. Arise ! here is not your rest, Micah ii. 10 ; as right passengers with their staves in their hands, enter into heaven.
SERMON IV.
Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you ; and to you that are troubled rest with its, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels. — 2 Thes. i. 6, 7.
Doct. That the reward of the faithful is represented under the notion of a rest.
1. We shall inquire what a rest this is.
2. Why it is represented under this notion. I. What is this rest ?
1. It is a felicitating rest ; not a bare cessation from troubles (as the word aveats would seem to import), or a freedom from evil, but the enjoyment of all good.