Of the Mortification of Sin in Believers

Hast thou received any eminent Mercy, Protection, Deliverance, which thou diddest not improve in a due Manner, nor wast thankful for? or hast been exercised with any Affliction, without labouring for the appointed End of it? or hast thou been wanting to the Opportunities of glorifying God in thy Generation, which in his good Providence he had graciously afforded unto thee? or hast thou conformed thy self unto the World and the men of it, through the abounding of Temptations in the days wherein thou livest?

Hast thou received any eminent Mercy, Protection, Deliverance, which thou diddest not improve in a due Manner, nor wast thankfull for? or hast been exercised with any Affliction, without labouring for the appointed End of it? or hast thou been wanting to the Opportunities of glorifying God in thy Generation, which in his good Providence he had graciously afforded unto thee? or hast thou conformed thy self unto the World and the men of it, through the abounding of Temptations in the dayes wherein thou livest?

If thou findest this to have been thy State, awake, call upon God; thou art fast asleep in a storm of Anger round about thee.

(6) When thy Lust hath already withstood particular dealings from God against it. This ⟨p. 97⟩Condition is described, Isa. 57.17. For the Iniquity of his Covetousness I was wroth, and smote him, I hid me and was wroth, and he went on frowardly in the way of his heart. God had dealt with them about their prevailing Lust, and that several ways, by Affliction and Desertion. But they held out against all: This is a sad Condition which nothing but mere sovereign Grace (as God expresses it in the next verse,) can relieve a man in, and which no man ought to promise himself, or bear himself upon. God oftentimes in his providential Dispensations meets with a man, and speaks particularly to the Evil of his Heart, as he did to Joseph's Brethren in their selling of him into Egypt. This makes the man reflect on his sin, and judge himself in particular for it. God makes it to be the voice of the Danger, Affliction, Trouble, Sickness that he is in, or under. Sometimes in Reading of the Word, God makes a man stay on something that cuts him to the Heart, and shakes him as to his present Condition. More frequently in the Hearing of the Word preached (his great Ordinance for Conviction, Conversion and Edification) doth he meet with men. God often hews men by the Sword of his Word in that Ordinance; strikes directly on their bosom beloved Lust; startles the Sinner, makes him engage into the Mortification and Relinquishment