John Flavel, The Fountain of Life
The Fountain of Life opened up:
or,
A Display of Christ in his essential and mediatorial glory.
Containing forty-two sermons on various texts.
Scanned from:
The Works of John Flavel, Volume I
The Banner of Truth Trust, 3 Murray field Road, Edinburgh EHI2 6EL,
PO Box 621, Carlisle, Pennsylvania 17013, U.S.A.
First published by W. Baynes and Son, 1820
Reprinted by The Banner of Truth Trust 1968
Second reprint 1982
ISBN 0 85151 060 4
Printed and Bound in Great Britain by Fakenham Press Limited,
Fakenham, Norfolk
(reprinted by photolithography)
Contents
TO the Christian Readers,
The Fountain of Life
Sermon 1. Opens the Excellency of the Subject.
Sermon 2. Sets forth Christ in his essential en primeval Glory.
Sermon 3. Opens the Covenant of Redemption betwixt the Father and
the Redeemer.
Sermon 4. Opens the admirable love of God in giving his own Son for
us.
Sermon 5. Of Christ's wonderful Person.
Sermon 6. Of the Authority by which Christ, as Mediator, acted.
Sermon 7. Of the Solemn Consecration of the Mediator.
Sermon 8. Of the Nature of Christ's Mediation.
Sermon 9. The first Branch of Christ's Prophetical Office,
consisting in the Revelation of the Will of God.
Sermon 10. The second Branch of Christ's Prophetical Office,
consisting in the Illumination of the Understanding.
Sermon 11. The Nature and necessity of the Priesthood of Christ.
Sermon 12. Of the Excellency of our High-Priest's Oblation, being
the first Act or Part of His Priestly Office.
Sermon 13. Of the Intercession of Christ our High-priest, being the
second Act or Part of his Priestly Office.
Sermon 14. A Vindication of the Satisfaction of Christ, as the
first Effect or Fruit of his Priesthood.
Sermon 15. Of the blessed Inheritance purchased by the Oblation of
Christ, being the second Effect or Fruit of his
Priesthood.
Sermon 16. Of the Kingly Office of Christ, as it is executed
spiritually upon the Souls of the Redeemed.
Sermon 17. Of the Kingly Office of Christ, as it is providentially
executed in the World, for the Redeemed.
Sermon 18. Of the Necessity of Christ's Humiliation, in order to
the Execution of all these his blessed Offices for us;
and particularly of his Humiliation by Incarnation.
Sermon 19. Of Christ's Humiliation in his Life.
Sermon 20. Of Christ's Humiliation unto Death, in his first
preparative Act for it.
Sermon 21. The second preparative Act of Christ for his own Death.
Sermon 22. The third preparative Act of Christ for his own Death.
Sermon 23. The first Preparation for Christ's Death, on his Enemies
Part, by the treason at Judas.
Sermon 24. The second and third Preparatives for the Death of
Christ, by his illegal Trial and Condemnation.
Sermon 25. Christ's memorable Address to the Daughters of
Jerusalem, in his Way to the Place of his Execution.
Sermon 26. Of the Nature and Quality of Christ's Death.
Sermon 27. Of the signal Providence, which directed and ordered the
Title affixed to the cross of Christ.
Sermon 28. Of the manner of Christ's Death, in respect to the
Solitariness thereof.
Sermon 29. Of the manner of Christ's Death, in respect of the
Patience thereof.
Sermon 30. Of the Instructiveness of the Death of Christ, in his
seven last Words; the first of which is here illustrated.
Sermon 31. The second excellent Word of Christ upon the Cross,
illustrated.
Sermon 32. The third of Christ's last Words upon the Cross,
illustrated.
Sermon 33. The fourth excellent Saying of Christ upon the Cross,
illustrated.
Sermon 34. The fifth excellent Saying of Christ upon the Cross,
illustrated.
Sermon 35. The sixth excellent Saying of Christ upon the Cross,
illustrated.
Sermon 36. The seventh and last Word with which Christ breathed out
his Soul, illustrated.
Sermon 37. Christ's Funeral illustrated, in its Manner, Reasons,
and excellent Ends.
Sermon 38. Wherein four weighty Ends of Christ's Humiliation are
opened, and particularly applied.
Sermon 39. Wherein the Resurrection of CHRIST, with its influences
upon the Saints Resurrection, is clearly opened, and
comfortably applied, being the first Step of his
Exaltation.
Sermon 40. The Ascension of Christ illustrated, and variously
improved, being the Second Step of his Exaltation.
Sermon 41. The Session of Christ at God's right-hand explained and
applied, being the third Step of his glorious Exaltation.
Sermon 42. Christ's Advent to Judgement, being the fourth and last
Degree of his Exaltation, illustrated and improved.
To his much honoured and beloved Kinsman, Mr. John Flavel, of
London, Merchant, and his virtuous Consort, the Author wisheth
Grace, Mercy, and Peace.
My dear and honoured friends
If my pen were both able, and at leisure, to get glory in
paper, it would be but a paper glory when I had gotten it; but if by
displaying (which is the design of these papers) the transcendent
excellency of Jesus Christ, I may win glory to him from you, to whom
I humbly offer them, or from any other into whose hands providence
shall cast them, that will be glory indeed, and an occasion of
glorifying God to all eternity.
It is not the design of this epistle to compliment, but to
benefit you; not to blazen your excellencies, but Christ's; not to
acquaint the world how much you have endeared me to yourselves, but
to increase and strengthen the endearments betwixt Christ and you,
upon your part. I might indeed (this being a proper place for it)
pay you my acknowledgements for your great kindnesses to me and
mine; of which, I assure you, I have, and ever shall have, the most
grateful sense: but you and I are theatre enough to one another, and
can satisfy ourselves with the inclosed comforts and delights of our
mutual love and friendship. But let me tell you, the whole world is
not a theatre large enough to show the glory of Christ upon, or
unfold the one half of the unsearchable riches that lie hid in him.
These things will be far better understood, and spoken of in heaven,
by the noon-day divinity, in which the immediately illuminated
assembly do there preach his praises, shall by such a stammering
tongue, and scribbling pen as mine, which does but mar them.
Alas! I write his praises but by moon-light; I cannot praise
him so much as by halves. Indeed, no tongue but his own (as
Nazianzen said of Basil) is sufficient to undertake that task. What
shall I say of Christ? The excelling glory of that object dazzles
all apprehension, swallows up all expression. When we have borrowed
metaphors from every creature that has any excellency or lovely
property in it, till we have stript the whole creation bare of all
its ornaments, and clothed Christ with all that glory; when we have
even worn out our tongues, in ascribing praises to him, alas! we
have done nothing, when all is done.
Yes, wo is me! how do I every day behold reasonable souls most
unreasonably disaffected to my lovely Lord Jesus! denying love to
One, who is able to compel love from the stoniest heart! yea, though
they can never make so much of their love (would they set it to
sale) as Christ bids for it.
It is horrid and amazing to see how the minds of many are
captivated and ensnared by every silly trifle; and how others can
indifferently turn them with a kind of spontaneity to this object,
or to that (as their fancy strikes) among the whole universe of
beings, and scarce ever reluctate, recoil, or nauseate, till they be
persuaded to Christ. In their unconverted state, it is as easy to
melt the obdurate rocks into sweet syrup, as their hearts into
divine love.
How do the great men of the world ambitiously court the honours
and pleasures of it? The merchants of the earth trade, and strive
for the dear-bought treasures of it; whilst the price of Christ
(alas! ever too low) falls every day lower and lower upon the
exchange of this world! I speak it as a sad truth, if there were no
quicker a trade (as dead as they say it is) for the perishing
treasures of the earth, than there is for Christ this day in
England, the exchange would quickly be shut up, and all the trading
companies dissolved.
Dear Sir, Christ is the peerless pearl hid in the field, Mat.
13: 46. Will you be that wise merchant, that resolves to win and
compass that treasure, whatever it shall cost you? Ah, Sir, Christ
is a commodity that can never be bought too dear.
My dear kinsman, my flesh, and my blood; my soul thirsteth for
your salvation, and the salvation of your family. Shall you and I
resolve with good Joshua that whatever others do, "we and our
families will serve the Lord;" that we will walk as the redeemed by
his blood, shewing forth his virtues and praises in the world? that
as God has made us one in name, and one in affection, so we may be
one in Christ, that it may be said of us, as it was of Austin and
Alippous long ago, that they were sanguine Christi conglutinati,
glued together by the blood of Christ.
For my own part, I have given in my name to him long since; wo
to me, if I have not given in my heart also; for, should I deceive
myself in so deep a point as that, how would my profession as a
Christian, my calling as a minister, yea, these very sermons now in
your hands, rise in judgement to condemn me? which God forbid.
And doubtless, Sir, your eyes have seen both the vanity of all
creatures, and the necessity and infinite worth of Christ. You
cannot forget what a vanity the world appeared to you, when in the
year 1668, you were summoned by the messengers of death (as you and
all that were about you then apprehended) to shoot the gulph of vast
eternity, when a malignant fever and pleurisy (whereof your
physician has given an account to the world) did shake the whole
frame of the tabernacle wherein your soul through mercy yet dwells;
and long may it dwell there, for the service and praise of your
great Deliverer. I hope you have not, nor ever will forget how vain
the world appeared to your eye, when you looked back (as it were
over your shoulder) and saw how it shrunk away from you; nor will
you ever forget the awful apprehensions of eternity that then seized
your spirit, or the value you then had for Christ; which things, I
hope, still do, and ever will remain with you.
And for you, dear cousin, as it becomes a daughter of Sarah,
let your soul be adorned with the excellencies of Christ, and
beauties of holiness. A king from heaven makes suit for your love;
if he espouse your soul now he will fetch it home to himself at
death in his chariot of salvation; and great shall be your joy, when
the marriage of the Lamb is come. Look often upon Christ in this
glass; he is fairer than the children of men. View him believingly,
and you cannot but like and love him. "For (as one well saith) love,
when it sees, cannot but cast out its spirit and strength upon
amiable objects and things loveworthy. And what fairer things than
Christ! O fair sun, and fair moon, and fair stars, and fair flowers,
and fair roses, and fair lilies, and fair creatures! but, O ten
thousand, thousand times fairer Lord Jesus! Alas, I wronged him in
making the comparison this way. O black sun and moon; but O fair
Lord Jesus! O black flowers, and black lilies and roses; but O fair
fair, ever fair Lord Jesus! O all fair things, black, deformed, and
without beauty, when ye are set beside the fairest Lord Jesus! O
black heaven, but O fair Christ! O black angels, but O surpassingly
fair Lord Jesus."
I hope you both are agreed with Christ, according to the
articles of peace propounded to you in the gospel; and that you are
every day driving on salvation work, betwixt him and you, in your
family, and in your closets.
And now, my dear, friends, if these discoveries of Christ,
which I humbly offer to your hands, may be any way useful to your
souls, to assist them either in obtaining, or in clearing their in
merest in him, my heart shall rejoice, even mine; for none under
heaven can be more willing, though many are more able, to help you
thither, than is
Your affectionate and obliged,
kinsman and servant
From my Study at Dartmouth, John Flavel.
March 14th, 1671.
TO the Christian Readers,
Especially those in the Town and Corporation of Dartmouth, and Parts
adjacent, who have either befriended, or attended these Lectures.
Honoured and worthy Friends,
Knowledge is man's excellency above the beasts that perish,
Psal. 32: 9. the knowledge of Christ is the Christian's excellency
above the Heathen, 1 Cor. 1: 23, 24. Practical and saving knowledge
of Christ is the sincere Christian's excellency above the self-
cozening hypocrite, Heb. 6: 4, 6. but methodical and well digested
knowledge of Christ is the strong Christian's excellency above the
weak, Heb. 5: 13 , 14. A saving, though an immethodical knowledge of
Christ, will bring us to heaven, John 17: 2, but a regular and
methodical, as well as a saving knowledge of him, will bring heaven
into us, Col. 2: 2, 3.
For such is the excellency thereof, even above all other
knowledge of Christ, that it renders the understanding judicious,
the memory tenacious, and the heart highly and fixedly joyous. How
it serves to confirm and perfect the understanding, is excellently
discovered by a worthy divine of our own, in these words:
A young ungrounded Christian, when he sees all the fundamental
truths, and sees good evidence and reasons of them, perhaps may be
yet ignorant of the right order and place of every truth. It is a
rare thing to have young professors to understand the necessary
truths methodically: and this is a very great defect: for a great
part of the usefulness and excellency of particular truths
consisteth in the respect they have to one another. This therefore
will be a very considerable part of your confirmation, and growth in
your understandings, to see the body of the Christian doctrine, as
it were, at one view, as the several parts of it are united in one
perfect frame; and to know what aspect one point has upon another,
and which are their due places. There is a great difference betwixt
the sight of the several parts of a clock or watch, as they are
disjointed and scattered abroad, and the seeing of them conjointed,
and in use and motion. To see here a pin and there a wheel, and not
know how to set them all together, nor ever see them in their due
places, will give but little satisfaction. It is the frame and
design of holy doctrine that must be known, and every part should be
discerned as it has its particular use to that design, and as it is
connected with the other parts.
By this means only can the true nature of Theology, together
with the harmony and perfection of truth, be clearly understood. And
every single truth also will be much better perceived by him that
sees its place and order, than by any other: for one truth
exceedingly illustrates and leads another into the understanding. -
Study therefore to grow in the more methodical knowledge of the same
truths which you have received; and though you are not yet ripe
enough to discern the whole body of theology in due method, yet see
so much as you have attained to know, in the right order and placing
of every part. As in anatomy, it is hard for the wisest physician to
discern the course of every branch of the veins and arteries; but
yet they may easily discern the place and order of the principal
parts, and greater vessels, (and surely in the body of religion
there are no branches of greater or more necessary truth than these)
so it is in divinity, where no man has a perfect view of the whole,
till he comes to the state of perfection with God; but every true
Christian has the knowledge of all the essentials, and may know the
orders and places of them all.
And as it serves to render the mind more judicious, so it
causes the memory to be more tenacious, and retentive of truths. The
chain of truth is easily held in the memory, when one truth links in
another; but the loosing of a link endangers the scattering of the
whole chain. We use to say, order is the mother of memory; I am sure
it is a singular friend to it: hence it is observed, those that
write of the art of memory, lay so great a stress upon place and
number. The memory would not so soon be overcharged with a multitude
of truths, if that multitude were but orderly disposed. It is the
incoherence and confusion of truths, rather than their number, that
distracts. Let but the understanding receive then regularly, and the
memory will retain them with much more facility. A bad memory is a
common complaint among Christians: all the benefit that many of you
have in hearing, is from the present influence of truths upon your
hearts; there is but little that sticks by you, to make a second and
third impression upon them. I know it may be said of some of you,
that if your affections were not better than your memories, you
would need a very large charity to pass for Christians. I confess it
is better to have a well ordered heart, than a methodical head; but
surely both are better than either. And for you that have constantly
attended these exercises, and followed us through the whole series
and deduction of these truths, from text to text, and from point to
point; who have begun one sabbath where you left another, it will be
your inexcusable fault, if these things be not fixed in your
understanding and memories, as nails fastened in a sure place:
especially as providence has now brought to your eyes, what has been
so often sounded in your ears, which is no small help to fix these
truths upon you, and prevent that great hazard of them, which
commonly attends bare hearing; for now you may have recourse as
often as you will to them, view and review them, till they become
your own.
But though this be a great and singular advantage, yet is not
all you may have by a methodical understanding of the doctrines of
Christ: it is more than a judicious understanding them, or faithful
remembering them, that you and I must design, even the warm, vital,
animating influences of these truths upon our hearts, without which
we shall be never the better; yea, much the worse for knowing and
remembering them.
Truth is the sanctifying instrument, John 17: 17. the mould
into which our souls are cast, Rom. 6: 17. according therefore to
the stamps and impressions it makes upon our understandings, and the
order in which truths lie there, will be the depth and lastingness
of their impressions and influences upon the heart; as, the more
weight is laid upon the seal, the more fair and lasting impression
is made upon the wax. He that sees the grounds and reasons of his
peace and comfort most clearly, is like to maintain it the more
constantly.
Great therefore is the advantage Christians have by such
methodical systems. Surely they may be set down among the desiderata
Christianorum, The most desired things of Christians.
Divers worthy modern pens have indeed undertaken this noble
subject before me, Some more succinctly, others more copiously:
these have done worthily, and their praises are in the churches of
Christ; yet such breadth there is in the knowledge of Christ, that
not only those who have written on this subject before me, but a
thousand authors more may employ their pens after us, and not
interfere with, or straiten another.
And such is the deliciousness of this subject, that, were there
ten thousand volumes written upon it, they would never cloy, or
become nauseous to a gracious heart. We use to say, one thing tires,
and it is true that it does so, except that one thing be virtually
and eminently all things, as Christ is; and then one thing can never
tire; for such is the variety of sweetness in Christ, who is the
deliciae humani generis, the delights of the children of men, that
every time he is opened to believers from pulpit or press, it is as
if heaven had furnished them with a new Christ; and yet he is the
same Christ still.
The treatise itself will satisfy you, that I have not boasted
in another man's line, of things made ready to my hand; which I
speak not in the least to win any praise to myself from the
undertaking, but to remove prejudice from it; for I see more defects
in it, than most of my readers will see, and can forethink more
faults to be found in it, than I now shall stand to tell thee of, or
answer for. It was written in a time of great distractions; and
didst thou but know how oft this work has died and revived under my
hand, thou wouldst wonder that ever it came to thine.
I am sensible it may fall under some censorious (it may be,
envious) eyes, and that far different judgements will pass upon it;
for pro captu lectoris habent sua fata libelli: And no wonder if a
treatise of Christ be, when Christ himself was to some, "a stone of
stumbling, and a rock of offence." I expect not to please every
reader, especially the envious; magna debet esse eloquentie, quae
invitis placet. It is as hard for some to look upon other men's
gifts without envy, as it is to look upon their own without pride;
nor will I be any further concerned with such readers, than to pity
them; well knowing that every proud, contemptuous and envious
censure is a grenado that breaks in the hand of him that casts it.
But to the ingenuous and candid reader, I owe satisfaction for
the obscurity of some part of this discourse, occasioned by the
conciseness of the stile; to which I have this only to say, that I
was willing to crowd as much matter as I could into this number of
sheets in thy hand, that I might therein ease thee both in thy pains
and thy purse. I confess the sermons were preached in a more relaxed
stile, and most of these things were enlarged in the pulpit, which
are designedly contracted in the press, that the volume might not
swell above the ability of common readers. And it was my purpose at
first to have comprised the second part, viz., The application of
the redemption that is with Christ unto sinners, in one volume,
which occasioned the contraction of this; but that making a just
volume itself, must await another season to see the light. If the
reader will be but a little the more intent and considerate in
reading, this conciseness will turn to his advantage.
This may suffice to show the usefulness of such composure, and
prevent offence; but something yet remains with me, to say to the
readers in general, to those of this town in special, and to the
flock committed by Christ to my charge more especially.
1. To readers in general, according as their different states
and conditions may be; there are six things earnestly to be
requested of them.
(1.) If you be yet strangers to Christ, let these things begin,
and beget your first acquaintance with him. I assure thee, reader,
it was a principal part of the design thereof; and here thou wilt
find many directions, helps, and sweet encouragements, to assist a
poor stranger as thou art, in that great work. Say not, I am an
enemy to Christ, and there is no hope of reconciliation; for here
thou wilt see, how "God was in Christ reconciling the world to
himself." Say not, all this is nothing except God had told thee so,
and appointed some to treat with thee about it; "for he has
committed unto us the word of this reconciliation." Say not, yea,
that may be from your own pity and compassion for us, and not from
any commission you have for it; for we "are ambassadors for Christ,"
2 Cor. 5: 20.
Say not, O but my sins are greater than can be forgiven: the
difficulties of my salvation are too great to be overcome,
especially by a poor creature as I am, that am able to do nothing,
no, not to raise one penny towards the discharge of that great debt
I owe to God. For here thou wilt find, upon thy union with Christ,
that there is merit enough in his blood, and mercy enough in his
bowels, to justify and save such a one as thou art. Yea, and I will
add for thine encouragement, that it is a righteous thing, with God
to justify and save thee, that canst not pay him one penny of all
the vast sums thou owest him; when, by the same rule of justice, he
condemns the most strict, self-righteous Pharisee, that thinks
thereby to quit scores with him. It is righteous for a judge to cast
him that has paid ninety-nine pounds of the hundred, which he owed,
because the payment was not full; and to acquit him, whose surety
has paid all, though himself did not, and freely confess that he
cannot pay one farthing of the whole debt.
(2.) If thou be a self deceiving soul, that easily takest up
thy satisfaction about thine interest in Christ, look to it, as thou
valuest thy soul, reader, that a fond and groundless conceit of
thine interest in Christ do not effectually and finally obstruct a
true and saving, interest in him. This is the common and fatal error
in which multitudes of souls are ensnared and ruined: for look as a
conceit of great wisdom hinders many from the attaining of it; so a
groundless conceit that Christ is already thine, may prove the
greatest obstacle between Christ and thee: but here thou will meet
with many rules that will not deceive thee, trials that will open
thy true condition to thee.
Thou sometimes reflectest upon the state of thy soul, and
enquirest, is Christ mine? may I depend upon it, that my condition
is safe? Thy heart returns thee an answer of peace, it speaks as
thou wouldst have it. But remember, friend, and mark this line, Thy
final sentence is not yet come from the mouth of thy Judge; and what
if, after all thy self-flattering hopes and groundless confidence, a
sentence should come from him quite cross to that of thine own
heart? where art thou then? what a confounded person wilt thou be?
Christless, speechless, and hopeless, all at once!
O therefore build sure for eternity; take heed lest the loss of
thine eternal happiness be at last imputed by thee to the
deceitfulness and laziness of thine own heart: lest thy heart say to
thee in hell, as the heart of Apollodorus seemed in his sufferings
to say to him, I am the cause of all this misery to thee.
(3.) If thou be one whose heart is eagerly set upon this vain
world, I beseech thee take heed, lest it interpose itself betwixt
Christ and thy soul, and so cut thee off from him for ever. O
beware, lest the dust of the earth, getting into thine eyes, so
blind thee, that thou never see the beauty or necessity of Christ.
The god of this world so blinds the eyes of them that believe not.
And what are sparkling pleasures that dazzles the eyes of some, and
the distracting cares that wholly divert the minds of others, but as
a napkin drawn by Satan over the eyes of them that are to be turned
off into hell? 1 Cor. 4: 3, 4.
Some general aims, and faint wishes after Christ you may have;
but alas! the world has centered thy heart, intangled thy
affections, and will daily find new diversions for them from the
great business of life; so that, if the Lord break not this snare,
thou wilt never be able to deliver thy soul.
(4.) If thou be a loose and careless professor of Christ, I
beseech thee, let the things thou shalt read in this treatise of
Christ, convince, shame, reclaim thee from thy vain conversation.
Here thou wilt find how contrary thy conversation is to the grand
designs of the death and resurrection of Christ. Oh, rethinks as
thou art reading the deep humiliation, and unspeakable sorrows
Christ underwent for the expiating of sin, thou shouldest
thenceforth look upon sin as a tender child would look upon that
knife that stabbed his father to the heart! thou shouldst never whet
and sharpen it again to wound the Son of God afresh. To such loose
and careless professors, I particularly recommend the last general
use of this discourse, containing many great motives to reformation
and strict godliness in all that call upon the name of the Lord
Jesus.
(5.) If thou hast been a profane and vain person, but now art
pardoned, and dost experience the superabounding riches of grace, my
request to thee is, that thou love Jesus Christ with a more fervent
love than ever yet thou hadst for him. Here thou wilt find many
great incentives, many mighty arguments to such a love of Christ.
Poor soul, consider what thou hast been, what the morning of thy
life was, what treasures of guilt thou laidst up in those days; and
then think, can such a one as I receive mercy, and that mercy not
break my heart? Can I read my pardon, and mine eyes not drop? What!
mercy for such a wretch as I! a pardon for such a rebel! O what an
ingenuous thaw should this cause upon my heart! if it do not, what a
strange heart is thine.
Did the love of Christ break through so many impediments to
come to thee? Did it make its way through the law, through the wrath
of God, through the grave, through thine own unbelief and great
unworthiness, to come to thee? O what a love was the love of Christ
to thy soul; And is not thy love strong enough to break through the
vanities and trifles of this world, which entangle it, to go to
Christ? How poor, how low and weak is thy love to Christ then?
(6.) Lastly, Art thou one that hast through mercy at last
attained assurance, or good hope, through grace, of thy interest in
Christ? Rejoice then in thy present mercy, and long ardently to be
with thine own Christ in his glory. There be many things dispersed
through this treatise, of Christ, to animate such joy, and excite
such longings. It was truly observed by a worthy author, (whose
words I have mentioned more freely than his name in this discourse)
That it is in a manner as natural for us to leap when we see the new
Jerusalem, as it is to laugh when we are tickled: Joy is not under
the soul's command when Christ kisseth it. And for your desires to
be with Christ, what consideration can you find in this world strong
enough to rein them in? O when you shall consider what he has done,
suffered, and purchased for you, where he is now, and how much he
longs for your coming, your very hearts should groan out those
words, Phil. 1: 23, "I desire to be dissolved, and to be with
Christ." The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into
the patient waiting for of Christ.
2. Having delivered my message to the reader in general, I have
somewhat more particularly to say to you of this place.
You are a people that were born under, and bred up with the
gospel. It has been your singular privilege, above many towns and
parishes in England, to enjoy more than sixty years together an able
and fruitful ministry among you. The dew of heaven lay upon you, as
it did upon Gideon's fleece, when the ground was dry in other places
about you; you have been richly watered with gospel-showers; you,
with Capernaum, have been exalted to heaven in the means of grace.
And it must be owned to your praise, that you testified more respect
to the gospel than many other places have done, and treated Christ's
ambassadors with more civility, whilst they prophesied in sackcloth,
than some other places did. These things are praise-worthy in you.
But all this, and much more than this, amounts not to that which
Jesus Christ expects from you, and which in his name I would now
persuade you to. And O that I (the least and unworthiest of all the
messengers of Christ to you) might indeed prevail with all that are
Christless among you, (1 ) To answer the long continued calls of God
to you, by a thorough and sound conversion, that the long-suffering
of God may be your salvation, and you may not receive all this grace
of God in vain. O that the damned might never be set a wondering, to
see a people of your advantages for heaven, sinking as much below
many of themselves in misery, as you now are above them in means and
mercy.
Dear friends, my heart's desire and prayer to God for you is
that you may be saved. O that I knew how to engage this whole town
to Jesus Christ, and make fast the marriage-knot betwixt him and
you, albeit after that I should presently go to the place of
silence; and see men no more, with the inhabitants of the world. Ah
sirs! me thinks I see the Lord Jesus laying the merciful hand of a
holy violence upon you: methinks he calls to you, as the angel to
Lot saying, "Arise, lest ye be consumed; And "while he lingered, the
men laid hold upon his hand, the Lord being merciful unto him. And
they brought him without the city, and said, Escape for thy life,
stay not in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be
consumed," Gen. 19: 15. How often (to allude to this) has Jesus
Christ in like manner laid hold upon you in the preaching of the
gospel, and will you not flee for refuge to him? Will you rather be
consumed, than to endeavour an escape? A beast will not be driven
into the fire, and will you not be kept out? The merciful Lord
Jesus, by his admirable patience and bounty, has convinced you how
loth he is to leave or lose you. To this day his arms are stretched
forth to gather you, and will you not be gathered? Alas for my poor
neighbours! Must so many of them perish at last? What shall I do for
the daughter of my people?
Lord, by arguments shall they be persuaded to be happy? What
will win them effectually to thy Christ? They have many of them
escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the
Lord and Saviour. They are a people that love thine ordinances, they
take delight in approaching to God; thou hast beautified many of
them with lovely and obliging tempers and dispositions. Thus far
they are come, there they stick; and beyond this no power but thine
can move them. O thou, to whose hand this work is and must be left,
put forth thy saving power and reveal thine arm for their salvation;
Thou hast glorified thy name in many of them; Lord, glorify it
again.
(2.) My next request is, that you will all be persuaded,
whether converted or unconverted, to set up all the duties at
religion in your families, and govern your children and servants as
men that must give an account to God for them in the great day. O
that there were not a prayerless family in this town! How little
will their tables differ from the manger, where beasts feed
together, if God be not owned and acknowledged there, in your eating
and drinking? And how can you expect blessings should dwell in your
tabernacles, if God be not called on there? Say not, you want time
for it, or that your necessities will not allow it; for, had you
been more careful of these duties, it is like you had not been
exposed to such necessities: besides, you can find time to be idle,
you can waste a part of every day vainly; Why could not that time be
redeemed for God? Moreover, you will not deny but the success of all
your affairs at home and abroad depends upon the blessing of God;
and if so, think you it is not the right way, even to temporal
prosperity, to engage his presence and blessing with you, in whose
hands your all is? Say not, your children and servants are ignorant
of God, and therefore you cannot comfortably join with them in those
duties, for the neglect of those duties is the cause of their
ignorance; and it is not like they will be better, till you use
God's means to make them so.
Besides, prayer is a part of natural worship, and the vilest
among men are bound to pray, else the neglect of it were none of
their sin. O let not a duty, upon which so many and great blessings
hang, fall to the ground, upon such silly (not to say wicked)
pretences to shift it off. Remember, death will shortly break up all
your families, and disband them; and who then think you will have
most comfort in beholding their dead? The day of account also
hastens, and then who will have the most comfortable appearing
before the just and holy God? Set up, I beseech you, the ancient and
comfortable duties of reading the scriptures, singing of psalms, and
prayer, in all your dwelling-places. And do all these
conscientiously, as men that have to do with God; and try the Lord
herewith, if he will not return in a way of mercy to you, and
restore even your outward prosperity to you again. However, to be
sure, far greater encouragements than that lie before you, to oblige
you to your duties.
(3.) More especially, I have a few things to say to you that
have attended on the ministry, or are under my oversight in a more
particular manner, and then I have done. And,
1st, I cannot but observe to you the goodness of our God, yea,
the riches of his goodness:
Who freely gave Jesus Christ out of his own bosom for us, and
has not withheld his Spirit, ordinances and ministers, to reveal and
apply him to us. Here is love that wants an epithet to match it:
Who engaged my heart upon this transcendent subject in the
course of my ministry among you: a subject which angels study and
admire, as well as we:
Who so signally protected and overshadowed our assemble in
those days of trouble, wherein these truths were delivered to you.
You then sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit
was sweet to your taste: his banner over you was love; your bread
was then sure, and your waters failed not: Yea, such was his
peculiar indulgence, and special tenderness to you, that he suffered
no man to do you harm; and it can hardly be imagined any could
attempt it that had but known this, and no worse than this, to be
your only design and business:
Who made these meditations of Christ a strong support, and
sweet relief to mine, now with Christ, and no less to me, under the
greatest exercises and tries that ever befel me in this world;
preserving me yet (though a broken vessel) for some farther use and
service to your souls:
Who in the years that are past left not himself without witness
among us, blessing my labours, to the conversion and edification of
many; Some of which yet remain with us, but some are fallen asleep:
Who has made many of you that yet remain, a willing and
obedient people, who have in some measure supported the reputation
of religion by your stability and integrity in days of abounding
iniquity: my joy and my crown; so stand ye fast in the Lord!
Who after all the days of fears and troubles, through which we
have past, has at last given us and his churches rest; "that we
being delivered out of the hands of our enemies, might serve him
without fear in righteousness and holiness (which doing, this mercy
may be extended to us) all the days of our life."
In testimony of a thankful heart for these invaluable mercies,
I humbly and cheerfully rear up this pillar of remembrance,
inscribing it with EBEN-EZER, and JEHOVAH-JIREH!
2dly, As I could not but observe these things to you, so I have
a few things to request of you, in neither of which I can bar
denial, so deeply Christ's, your own, and my interest lie in them.
(1.) Look to it, my dear friends, that none of you be found
Christless at your appearance before him. Those that continue
Christless now, will be left speechless then. God forbid that you
that have heard so much of Christ, and you that have professed so
much of Christ, should at last fall into a worse condition than
those that never heard the name of Christ.
(2.) See that you daily grow more Christ-like by conversing
with him, as you do, in his precious ordinances. Let it be with your
souls, as it is with a piece of cloth, which receives a deeper dye
every time it is dipt into a vat. If not, you may not expect the
continuance of your mercies much longer to you.
(3.) Get these great truths well digested both in your heads
and hearts, and let the power of them be displayed in your lives,
else the pen of the scribe, and the tongue of the preacher, are both
in vain. These things, that so often warmed your hearts from the
pulpit, return now to make a second impression upon them from the
press. Hereby you will recover and fix those truths, which, it is
like, are in great part already vanished from you.
This is the fruit I promise myself from you: and whatever
entertainment it meets with from others in this Christ-despising
age, yet two things relieve me; one is, that future times may
produce more humble and hungry Christians than this glutted age
enjoys, to whom it will be welcome: the other is, that duty is
discharged, and endeavours are used to bring men to Christ,, and
build them up in him: wherein he does and will rejoice, who is a
well-wisher to the souls of men.
John Flavel.
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