The beatitudes

Excellency. 9 9. Grace hath a soul-securing excellency, it brings safety along with it. You all desire to be safe in dangerous times; if sword or pestilence come, if death peep in at your windows^*, would you not now be safe? nothing will secure you in times of danger but grace; grace is the best life-guard; it sets Christians out of Gun-shot, and frees them from the power of hell and damnation. Prov. 10.2. Righteousness delivers from death. Do not righteous men dye? yes, but righteousness delivers from the sting of the first death, and the fear of the second. It was the saying of one, I am not afraid to dye, but to be damned^*. But here's a believers comfort, the fire of Gods wrath can never kindle upon him; grace is Gods own image stamped on the soul, and he will not destroy his own image. xerxes the Persian, when he destroyed all the Temples in Greece, he caused the Temple of Diana to be preserved for its beautiful structure; that soul which hath the beauty of holiness shining in it, shall be preserved for the glory of the structure; God will not suffer his own Temple to be demolished: Would you be secured in evil times? get grace, and fortify this Garrison; a good conscience is a Christians Fort-Royal. — Murus Aheneus esto Nil conscire sibi. — Davids enemies lay round about him, yet saith he, I laid me down and slept, Psal. 3.5. A good conscience can sleep in the mouth of a Cannon; grace is a Christian Coat of Male which fears not the Arrow or Bullet. True grace may be shot at, but can never be shot through; grace puts ⟨p. 523⟩the soul into Christ, and there it is safe, as the Bee in the Hive, as the Dove in the Ark. Rom. 8.1. There's no condemnation to them in Christ Jesus.

Excellency. 9 9. Grace hath a soul-securing excellency, it brings safety along with it. You all desire to be safe in dangerous times; if sword or pestilence come, if death peep in at your windows