A fourth volume containing one hundred and fifty sermons on several texts of Scripture…

1. To begin with Sin, that is the worst Evil. Affliction is Evil, but it is not Evil in it self, but only in our Sense and Feeling; if a Man had a Dedolency, it is no Pain to a benumbed Joint to be scourged. But Sin is evil, whether we feel it or no, but it is worst when we feel it not. Certainly that is Evil which separateth from the chiefest Good; Affliction doth not separate from God, it is a means and an Occasion to make us draw nigh to him; many had never been acquainted with God, but for their Afflictions: but Sin separateth us from God; Isa. 59.2. Your Iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your Sins have hid his Face from you, that he will not hear. Let a Man be never so loathsome, yet if he be in a State of Grace, he is dear to God; the Lord taketh Pleasure in him, though rough-cast with Ulcers and Sores, and thrown into a Prison, yet God will kiss him with the Kisses of his Mouth. There is nothing so loathsome and odious to God as Sin: This grieveth the Saints most; Rom. 7.24. O wretched Man that I am! who shall deliver me from this Body of Death? If any Man had Cause to complain of Afflictions, ⟨p. 117⟩Paul had, he was often in Perils, whipped, imprisoned, stoned; but he doth not cry out, When shall I be delivered from these Afflictions? O but this Body of Death was worst of all, Lusts troubled him more than Scourges, and his Captivity to the Law of Sin more than Chains and Prisons. This is the Disposition of the Saints, they are weary of the World, because they are sinning here, whilst others are glorifying God, not only that they are suffering here, whilst others are enjoying God. A Beast will forsake the Place where he hath neither Meat nor Rest. Carnal Men, when they are beaten out of the World, have a Fancy to Heaven, as a Place of Retreat; but that which troubles Godly Men is their Sin. Well, but in Heaven there is no Sin; Eph. 5.27. That he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not having Spot or Wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should be holy, and without Blemish. There is neither Spot nor Wrinkle upon the Face of the glorified Saints. Their Faces were once as black as yours, but now Christ presenteth them to God as a Proof of the cleansing Virtue of his Blood.