How can it be otherwise in the very nature of things? Ever since the fall, there has been an irreconcileable enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. Wicked men hate GOD, and therefore cannot but hate those who are like him: they hate to be reformed, and therefore must hate and persecute those, who, by a contrary behaviour, testify of them, that their deeds are evil. Besides, pride of heart leads men to persecute the servants of JESUS CHRIST. If they commend them, they are afraid of being asked, Why do not you follow them? And therefore because they dare not imitate, though they may sometimes be even forced to approve their way, yet pride and envy make them turn persecutors. Hence it is, that as it was formerly, so it is now, and so will it be to the end of time; “He that is born after the flesh, (the natural man, does and) will persecute him that is born after the Spirit,” the regenerate man. Because christians are not of the world, but CHRIST hath chosen them out of the world, therefore the world will hate them. If it be objected against this doctrine, that we now live in a christian world, and therefore must not expect such persecution as formerly; I answer, All are not christians that are called so; and, till the heart is changed, the enmity against GOD (which is the root of all persecution) remains: and consequently christians, falsely so called, will persecute as well as others. I observed therefore, in the beginning of this discourse, that _Paul_ mentions those that had a form of religion, as persons of whom _Timothy_ had need be chiefly aware: for, as our LORD and his apostles were mostly persecuted by their countrymen the _Jews_, so we must expect the like usage from the Formalists of our own nation, the _Pharisees_, who seem to be religious. The most horrid and barbarous persecutions have been carried on by those who have called themselves Christians; witness the days of queen _Mary_; and the fines, banishments and imprisonments of the children of GOD in the last century, and the bitter, irreconcileable hatred that appears in thousands who call themselves Christians, even in the present days wherein we live.
Persons, who argue against persecution, are not sufficiently sensible of the bitter enmity of the heart of every unregenerate man against GOD. For my own part, I am so far from wondering that christians are persecuted, that I wonder our streets do not run with the blood of the saints: was mens power equal to their wills, such a horrid spectacle would soon appear. But,
Persecution is necessary in respect to the godly themselves. If we have not all manner of evil spoken of us, how can we know whether we seek only that honour which cometh from above? If we have no persecutors, how can our passive graces be kept in exercise? How can many christian precepts be put into practice? How can we love, pray for, and do good to, those who despitefully use us? How can we overcome evil with good? In short, how can we know we love GOD better than life itself? _Paul_ was sensible of all this, and therefore so positively and peremptorily asserts, that “all who will live godly in CHRIST JESUS, shall suffer persecution.”
Not that I affirm, all are persecuted in a like degree. No: this would be contrary both to scripture and experience. But though all christians are not really called to suffer every kind of persecution, yet all christians are liable thereto: and notwithstanding some may live in more peaceful times of the church than others, yet all christians, in all ages, will find by their own experience, that, whether they act in a private or public capacity, they must, in some degree or other, suffer persecution.
Here then I would pause, and, _lastly_, by way of application, exhort all persons,