2 If every man out of Christ be in an estate of death, let us not defer repentance,1 but do it whilst we may. Repentance makes a dead man to be a living man: What is it that makes you defer repentance? ye think ye can change your courses, & sorrow when you list, therefore ye defer it. If men be dead, and repentance puts as it were a new soul into them, makes them to pass from death to life, then is it not so easy a thing. Suppose ye had Hezekiah's warning, is it in your power to make your selves live? no, it is beyond your power; God only can do it. Every man lies before God, as that clod of earth, out of which Adam was made. God must breathe life into him, else he continues dead. God doth not breathe life into all, He quickens whom he will. It is your wisdom therefore to wait on him in his Ordinances: if you have good motions begun in you, press them forwards, they are offsprings of life. Think seriously, am I dead, or alive? If dead, why then say, its not in my power to quicken me, its only in God to do it, and he doth this, but in few, those whom he quickeneth are but as Grapes after the Vintage, or as the Olives after the beating; how then shall I be in the number? Give your ⟨p. 34⟩selves no rest; know that it is God that breatheth, and then depend on him. Make that use of the doctrine of election, with care and more solicitude to look to your selves. Phil. 2. God works both the will and the deed of his good pleasure, work out therefore your salvation with fear and Trembling. If repentance be a passage from death to life, if it be such a change, then labour for to get it. The Spirit doth not always strive with men; ye are not always the same, ye will stick in the sand, grow worse and worse, if ye grow not better and better. No more power have you to change your selves, than the Blackamore hath to change his skin, or the Leopard his spots; the time will come, when you shall say as Spira did: O how do I desire faith, would God I had but one drop of it; and for ought we know he had it not.
2 If every man out of Christ be in an estate of death, let us not deferre repentance,1 but doe it whilst wee may. Repentance makes a dead man to be a living man: What is it that makes you deferre repentance? yee thinke yee can change your courses, & sorrow when you list, therefore ye deferre it. If men be dead, and repentance puts as it were a new soule into thē, makes them to passe from death to life, then is it not so easy a thing. Suppose yee had Ezekiahs warning, is it in your power to make your selves live? no, it is beyond your power; God onely can doe it. Every man lyes before God, as that clod of earth, out of which Adam was made. God must breathe life into him, else hee continues dead. God doth not breathe life into all, He quickens whom he will. It is your wisedome therefore to waite on him in his Ordinances: if you have good motions begun in you, presse them forwards, they are ofsprings of life. Thinke seriously, am I dead, or alive? If dead, why then say, its not in my power to quicken me, its onely in God to doe it, and he doth this, but in few, those whom he quickneth are but as Grapes after the Vintage, or as the Olives after the beating; how then shall I bee in the number? Give your ⟨p. 34⟩selves no rest; know that it is God that breatheth, and then depend on him. Make that use of the doctrine of election, with care and more solicitude to looke to your selves. Phil. 2. God workes both the will and the deed of his good pleasure, worke out therefore your salvation with feare and Trembling. If repentance be a passage from death to life, if it bee such a change, then labour for to get it. The Spirit doth not alwayes strive with men; yee are not alwayes the same, yee will sticke in the sand, grow worse and worse, if yee grow not better and better. No more power have you to change your selves, than the Blackamore hath to change his skinne, or the Leopard his spots; the time will come, when you shall say as Spira did: O how doe I desire faith, would God I had but one drop of it; and for ought we know he had it not.
- 1Use 2.Vse 2.
