Discourses, or, Sermons on several Scriptures

HEB. 10.30, 31. For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord; and again, the Lord shall judg his People. It is a fearful thing to fall into the Hands of the Living God.

HEB. 10.30, 31. For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompence, saith the Lord; and again, the Lord shall judg his People. It is a fearful thing to fall into the Hands of the Living God.

There are two principal Attributes of God, ¹which the Scripture propounds to us as the most powerful and ⟨p. 64⟩efficacious Motives to restrain us from Sin: And they are his Mercy, and his Justice. Mercy tho it be a soft, yet is it a strong Argument to encourage us to Purity and Holiness. And therefore says the Apostle, ²Rom. 2.4. The Goodness of God leadeth us to Repentance. And certainly that Mercy that expresseth it self so ready to pardon Sin, cannot but lay a mighty Obligation upon the Ingenuity of a Christian Spirit to abstain from the commission of it. He that can encourage himself in Wickedness, upon the consideration of the infinite Free-Grace of God, doth but spurn those very Bowels that yearn towards him, and strike at God with his own Golden Sceptre, yea he tares abroad those Wounds which were at first opened for him, and casts the ⟨p. 65⟩Blood of his Saviour back again in his Face. But because Ingenuity is perished from off the Earth, and Men are generally more apt to be wrought upon by Arguments drawn from Fear than Love, therefore the Scripture propounds to us the consideration of the dreadful Justice of God arrayed in all the terrible Circumstances of it, that if Mercy cannot allure us, Justice at least might affright us from our Sins. And as those who are to travel through Wildernesses and Deserts, carry Fire with them to terrify wild and ravenous Beasts, and to secure themselves from their Assaults: So doth the great God, who hath to deal with brutish Men, Men more savage than wild Beasts, he kindles a Fire about him, and appears to