be made partners in misery. Alas ! what groups of profane persons, formalists, and hypocrites, will then be bound together! May " our souls never be gathered with these ;" but be "bound up in the bundle of life with the Lord our God^!" The "wheat" are "the righteous," who are renewed in the spirit of their minds : they too shall be gathered in order to receive their portion.]
What a wonderful, but awful separation will there then be !
[Among the tares, not so much as one grain of wheat will be found : nor among the righteous will there be left one ungodly person. The ungodly husband shall be torn from the arms of his compassionate wife, and the profane child from the bosom of his religious parent. God will shew no respect to one rather than another. The wicked, stript of their veils, will be consigned over to punishment ; and the righteous, freed from mutual jealousies, shall unite in perfect harmony.]
The awfulness of this separation will be more fully seen,
III. In their eternal destiny —
The wicked will "first" receive the doom for which they are reserved —
[They will be cast, like worthless tares, into the furnace'; nor, however God pities them now, will he shew them any mercy then. Not that the fire shall consume them utterly as it would tares : to prevent this mistake, the metaj)hor is inten- tionally changed. They will " wail" for the mercies they have despised and the opportunities they have lost : they will " gnash their teeth " with anguish and vexation of spirit — against them- selves (like a ruined gamester) for their folly — against each other, for having enticed each other to sin — against God, with impotent malice, for so punishing their transgressions'^. And this doom will be inflicted " first" in the very sight of the godly ^ Thus will the godly see how great mercy they have received.]
The righteous will then receive the kingdom pre- pared for them —
[They, as wheat, shall be treasured up in the granary of heaven. Not that they shall continue there in a state of inac- tivity. To correct this idea the metaphor here is also changed. God himself will not be ashamed to be called " their Father." They shall shine forth in his kingdom like the sun. Their
*i Ps. xxvi. 9. 1 Sam. xxv. 29. ' ver. 42.
k Rev. xvi. 9, 11. ' ver. .30.