N00458:408
The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the…
The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the woeful danger of all who abide unfruitful under Gospel privileges, and Gods husbandry. Being the substance of sixteen sermons preached on Christ's parable of the fig-tree. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. ; [Four lines from Matthew]The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the woful danger of all who abide unfruitful under Gospel priviledges, and Gods husbandry. Being the substance of sixteen sermons preached on Christ's parable of the fig-tree. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. ; [Four lines from Matthew]
Boston: printed by Benjamin Harris, 1691
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
7. Cutting down is for some other use. When the Owner cuts up his fig-tree, and casts it out of the Vineyard, he doth not throw it away and make no improvement of it; no, though it will not bear figs, yet it will make fires; and so it will not be altogether unprofitable, though it answers not the end of its planting, yet there is an use that he puts it to; he therefore makes it up into faggots, and so burns it as he hath occasion for it; and such is the improvement which God makes of such as did not serve and glorify him ⟨p. 171⟩in his Church; he cuts them down, he destroys them; but still he makes use of them; though they are not fit to be vessels of honour, yet he makes them vessels of dishonour, and that also turns to his honour and glory. There is an hell which God hath prepared for the exalting of the glory of his revenging Justice in; and there are the monuments on whom this glory is exalted, and in whom it is manifested eternally: now such as being fruitless in the vineyard, provoke God to cut them down, are thus disposed of by him, and he is so glorified in them for ever: he is known in his Judgments which he executeth; thus are the tares and the chaff, which grow together with the good grain in the field, disposed of, Mat. 13 30. 3. 12. thus, the tree that brings not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire, verse 10.
7. Cutting down is for some other use. When the Owner cuts up his fig-tree, and casts it out of the Vineyard, he doth not throw it away and make no improvement of it; no, though it will not bear figs, yet it will make fires; and so it will not be altogether unprofitable, though it answers not the end of its planting, yet there is an use that he puts it to; he therefore makes it up into faggots, and so burns it as he hath occasion for it; and such is the improvement which God makes of such as did not serve and glorifie him ⟨p. 171⟩in his Church; he cuts them down, he destroys them; but still he makes use of them; though they are not fit to be vessels of honour, yet he makes them vessels of dishonour, and that also turns to his honour and glory. There is an hell which God hath prepared for the exalting of the glory of his revenging Justice in; and there are the monuments on whom this glory is exalted, and in whom it is manifested eternally: now such as being fruitless in the vineyard, provoke God to cut them down, are thus disposed of by him, and he is so glorified in them for ever: he is known in his Judgments which he executeth; thus are the tares and the chaff, which grow together with the good grain in the field, disposed of,