The Christians labour and reward, or, A sermon, part of which was preached at…

and what can he want, that hath God for his Provider? what, or whom need he fear, that hath God for his Protector? For though all the Saints have a right in Promises, yet none have a pleasant aptitude to apply the comfort of any one Promise, while they are idle and negligent; no, this is the portion of the laborious Christian, that walks in the actual exercise of his Grace: No good thing shall he want that walks uprightly. When God engageth to Abraham his Almightiness, it is to him, as walking before him, not as sitting in the chair of sloth. Thirdly, The Christians labour is rewarded here with inward peace of Conscience, and serenity of Mind; Great peace have they ⟨p. 56⟩that keep thy Law, and nothing shall offend them, Psalm 119.166. Peace be on them that walk by this rule, as on the Israel of God, Gal. 6. These are they, in whose bosoms this Bird of Paradise sings her sweet Notes, and her sweetest in foulest weather; when sickness comes, and death approacheth. Now he that hath the testimony of his Conscience, for having been a faithful Labourer in the Lords work, will be able to make a comfortable reflection upon his past life: For mens expectations of what is coming to them at death, depends upon what their past lives have been. Life is the time of sowing, and death of reaping; as they have sown, so only can they expect to reap. Life is a time for working, and death for receiving the reward, suitable to the work. Hence it is, when death is approaching, Conscience (if not seared, and past all feeling) is then carried back to review what the man hath been doing, for whom he hath been labouring; and therefore must needs bring in heavy ⟨p. 57⟩tidings to the sinner of his approaching misery; then it rips up all the stitches of that false peace, which the ungodly wretch had been bolstered up with, and tells him, that now the Righteous Judge is at hand, to pay him the dismal wages due to him, for all the wicked works he hath done, which makes the thoughts of death a terror to him. But the Sincere Christian, who hath laboured faithfully in the Lords work; he then hath a pleasant Prospect to behold, when he looks back upon his conscionable walking, and can thence make his humble appeal to God, and desire him to remember how he hath walked before him in Truth, and with a Perfect Heart.