N00458:585
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.
USE V.
Let it be to exhort every Christian in his place, to do his duty, and so commend it to God. I do not say but that it is good and profitable for us, yea and we ought also to do it •o observe •hat success our labours do ••nd, that we may either take encouragement by the blessing of God upon them, to be the more cheerful in our work, and that God may have the praise from us: or to be quickened and awakened by the unsuccessfulness of them to more diligence: ⟨p. 259⟩But if we have no certainty here, then it calls upon us to do these two things in conjunction.
Let it be to exhort every Christian in his place, to do his duty, and so commend it to God. I do not say but that it is good and profitable for us, yea and we ought also to do it •o observe •hat success our labours do ••nd, that we may either take encouragement by the blessing of God upon them, to be the more chearful in our work, and that God may have the praise from us: or to be quickned and awakened by the unsuccessfulness of them to more diligence: ⟨p. 259⟩But if we have no certainty here, then it calls upon us to do these two things in conjunction.
1. To be faithful in doing what God requires of us. This is our province; we then know our place, and acknowledge it, when we take the command to be our obligation, and do what we do in Obedience thereunto: when we remember that we are Gods Servants, and that it is his work which we are employed in, and he will look after it, and carry on his own ends, in and by it: the love of God must constrain us in thee things as it did Paul,