Part 335

_Direct._ XXVII. Remember how much of sincerity consisteth in seriousness, and how much of hypocrisy consisteth in seeming, and dreaming, and trifling in the things of God and our salvation: see therefore that you keep your souls awake, in a sensible and serious frame.[159] Read over the fifty considerations, which, in the third part of my "Saints' Rest," I have given to convince you of the necessity of being serious. See that there be as much in your faith as in your creed, and as much in your hearts and lives as in your belief. Remember that seeming and dreaming will not mortify deep-rooted sins, nor conquer strong and subtle enemies, nor make you acceptable to God, nor save your souls from his revenging justice. Remember what a mad kind of profaneness it is to jest and trifle about heaven and hell, and to dally with the great and dreadful God. "Seeing all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness?" 2 Pet. iii. 11. You pray for an obedience answering the pattern of the heavenly society, when you say, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven;" and will you be such hypocrites as to pray, that you may imitate saints and angels in the purity and obedience of your hearts and lives, and when you have done, take up with shows, and seemings, and saying a few words, and a lifeless image of that holiness which you never had; yea, and perhaps deride and persecute in others the very thing which you daily pray for. O horrible abuse of the all-seeing God! Do you no more believe or fear his justice? When the apostle saith, Gal. vi. 7, "Be not deceived, God is not mocked;" he intimateth, that hypocrites go about to put a scorn on God by a mock religion, though it is not he, but themselves, that will prove mocked in the end. They offer God a deaf nut, or an empty shell or cask, for a sacrifice. An hypocrite differeth from a true christian, as a fencer from a soldier; he playeth his part very formally upon a stage with much applause; but you may perceive that he is not in good sadness, by his trifling and formality, and never killing any of his sins. Would men show no more of the great, everlasting matters of their own professed belief, in any seriousness of affection or endeavour than most men do, if they were not hypocrites? Would they hate and scorn men for doing but that (and part of that) which they pray and profess to do themselves, if they were not hypocrites? Woe to the world, because of hypocrisy! Woe to the carnal members of the church! Woe to idol shepherds, and the seeming, nominal, lifeless christians, of what sect soever! for God will not be mocked. They are christians, but it is with a mock christianity, while their souls are strange to the true esteem and use of Christ. They are believers, but with a mock belief, described James ii. They believe God should be loved above all, but they love him not. They believe that holiness is better than all the pleasures of sin; yet they choose it not, but hate it.[160] They are religious, with a seeming vain religion, which will not so much as humble them, nor bridle their tongues, James i. 26. They are wise, with a mock wisdom; they are wise enough to prove their sins to be all lawful, or but venial sins: and wise enough to cast away the medicine that would heal them; and to confute the physician, and to answer the learnedst preacher of them all, and to scape salvation, and to secure themselves a place in hell, and keep themselves ignorant of it till they are there. They are converted, but with a mock conversion; which leaveth them as carnal, and proud, and worldly as before; being born of water but not of the Spirit, and being sensual still, John iii. 5, 6; Jude 19. They repent, but with a mock repentance; they repent, but they will not leave their sin, nor confess and bewail it, but hate reproof, and excuse their sin. They are honest, but with a mock honesty; though they swear, and curse, and rail, and slander, and backbite, and scorn at piety itself, yet they mean well, and have honest hearts: though they receive not the word with deep-rooting in their hearts, but are abominable and disobedient, and to every good work reprobate, they are honest for all that, Luke viii. 15; Tit. i. 16. They love God above all, though they love not to think or speak of him seriously, but hate his holiness and justice, his word and holy ways and servants, and are such as the Scripture calleth "haters of God;" and keep not his commandments, nor live to his glory.[161] They love the servants of God, but they care not if the world were rid of them all; and take them to be but a company of self-conceited, troublesome fellows, and as very hypocrites as themselves; and the poor christians that are cruelly used by them, think they are neither in good sadness nor in jest, when they profess to love the worshippers of God. They love not their money, nor lands, nor lusts, with such a kind of love, I am sure. They have also always good desires; but they are such mock desires as those in James ii. 15, that wished the poor were fed, and clothed, and warmed, but gave them nothing towards it: and such good desires as the sluggard hath, that lieth in bed and wisheth that all his work were done, Prov. xxi. 25. "The desire of the sluggard killeth him, because his hands refuse to labour." They pray, but with mock prayers; you would little think that they are speaking to the most holy God, for no less than the saving of their souls, when they are more serious in their very games and sports. They pray for grace, but they cannot abide it; they pray for holiness, but they are resolved they will have none of it; they pray against their sin, but no entreaty can persuade them from it. They would have a mock ministry, a mock discipline, a mock church, a mock sacrament, as they make a mock profession, and give God but a mock obedience; as I might show you through all the particulars, but for being tedious. And all this, because they have but a mock faith: they believe not that God is in good earnest with them in his commands, and threatenings, and foretelling of his judgments; as Lot to his sons-in-law, Gen. xix. 14, "He seemeth to them as one that mocked," and therefore they serve him as those that would mock him. O wretched hypocrites! is this agreeable to your holy profession? You call yourselves christians, and profess to believe the doctrine of Christ: is this agreeable to christianity, to your creed, to the ten commandments, to the Lord's prayer, and to the rest of the word of God? Had you none but the holy, jealous God to make a mock of? Had you nothing less than religion, and matters of salvation and damnation, to play with? Do you serve God as if he were a child, or an idol, or a man of straw; that either knoweth not your hearts, or is pleased with toys, and compliments, and shows, and saying over certain words, or acting a part before him as on a stage?[162] Do you know what you offer, and to whom? His power is omnipotency; his glory is ten thousand-fold above that of the sun; his wisdom is infinite; millions of angels adore him continually; he is thy King and Judge; he abhorreth hypocrites. If thou didst but see one glimpse of his glory, or the meanest of his angels, the sight would awake thee from thy dreaming and dallying, and frighten thee from thy canting and trifling into a serious regard of God and thy everlasting state. Mal. i. 8, "Offer this now to thy governor: will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person, saith the Lord of hosts?" If your servants set before you upon your table the feathers instead of the fowl, and the hair and wool instead of the flesh, and the scales instead of the fish, would you not think they rather mocked than served you? How dear have some paid even in this life for mocking God, let the case of Aaron's sons, Lev. x. 1-3, and of Ananias and Sapphira, Acts v. inform you: if with the fig-tree, Matt. xxi. 19, you offer God leaves only instead of fruit, you are nigh unto cursing, and your end is to be burned. Do you not read what he saith to the church of Laodicea, Rev. iii. 15, 16, "I would thou wert cold or hot; because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth:" that is, either be an open infidel, or a holy, downright, zealous christian: but because thou callest thyself a christian, and hast not the life or zeal of a christian, but coverest thy wickedness and carnality with that holy name, I will cast thee away as an abominable vomit. It would make the heart of a believer ache to think of the hypocrisy of most that usurp the name of christians, and how cruelly they mock themselves. What a glory is offered them, and they lose it by their dallying! What a price is in their hands, what mercy is offered them, and they lose it by their dallying! What danger is before them, and they will fall into it by their dallying! Doth not the weight of your salvation forbid this trifling? You might better set the town on fire, and make a jest of it, than jest your souls into the fire of hell. Then you will find that hell is no jesting matter. If you mock yourselves out of your salvation, where are you then? If you play with time, and means, and mercy till they are gone, you are undone for ever. O dally not till you are past remedy. Alas, poor dreaming trifling hypocrites! Is time so sweet, and life so short, and death so sure and near, and God so holy, just, and terrible, and heaven so glorious, and hell so hot, and both everlasting, and yet will you not be in earnest about your work? Up and be doing, as you are men! and as ever you care what becomes of you for ever! Depart from iniquity, if you will name the name of Christ, 2 Tim. ii. 19. Let not a cheating world delude you for a moment, and have the kernel, the heart, while God hath but the empty shell. A mock religion will but keep up a mock hope, a mock peace, and a mock joy and comfort, till Satan have done his work, and be ready to unhood you and open your eyes. Job viii. 13, "So are the paths of all that forget God; and the hypocrite's hope shall perish." Job xxvii. 8, 9, "For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul? Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him?" Job xx. 4-7, "Knowest thou not this of old, that the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds, yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he?" Away then with hypocritical formality and dalliance, and be serious and sincere for thy soul, and with thy God.