N01488:89
Several sermons wherein is showed, I. That Jesus Christ is a mighty Saviour. II.…Several sermons wherein is shewed, I. That Jesus Christ is a mighty Saviour. II.…
Several sermons wherein is showed, I. That Jesus Christ is a mighty Saviour. II. That God converts his elect some at one age, and some at another, commonly before old age. III. That when godly men dye, angels carry their souls to another and a better world. : With a preface in which there is a brief and true character of the Reverend Mr. Thomas Bridge a lately deceased pastor in one of the churches in Boston. / By Increase Mather, D.D. ; [Four lines of quotations]Several sermons wherein is shewed, I. That Jesus Christ is a mighty Saviour. II. That God converts his elect some at one age, and some at another, commonly before old age. III. That when godly men dye, angels carry their souls to another and a better world. : With a preface in which there is a brief and true character of the Reverend Mr. Thomas Bridge a lately deceased pastor in one of the churches in Boston. / By Increase Mather, D.D. ; [Four lines of quotations]
Boston: printed by B. Green for Benjamin Eliot, 1715
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.
3. There are some of the Elect of God Called and Converted in Old Age. There were some called into the Lords Vineyard at the Eleventh Hour: When the day of Life is just Expiring, and they ready to drop into the Grave, God has looked on them, and had Mercy ⟨p. 75⟩on them. It was Charitably spoken by the Martyr Julius Palmer, when one tempted him to recant, but seeing there was no persuading him to that, said, One of us twain must be damned, for we be of two Faiths, and certain I am that there is but one Faith that Leads to Life and Salvation. I hope (said the Martyr) that we both shall be Saved, For as it has pleased our Merciful Saviour, according to the Gospel Parable, to Call me at the third hour of the day, at the Age of Four and twenty Years, so I trust that he will Call you at the Eleventh hour of this your Old Age, and give you Everlasting Life for your Portion. This indeed is not usual, nevertheless, this sometimes happens, tho' very rarely. One thus Paraphrases on the Text before us, Why stand you all the day idle, you have lost the season of your, Work, and hope of your Reward. The day is almost spent, you have no reason to Expect that I should hire you, or reward you, yet for this once I will do it, though I do not use to do it. God is pleased to Call some at all hours, that Sinners in all ⟨p. 76⟩Periods of their Lives, might have some grounds of Encouragement to Repent, and Return to him. When there was in the Second Chapter of the Acts, three thousand Converted in one Day by one Sermon, no doubt but that there were some Elderly Persons among them. Men must have an Outward Call from the Word of God, before they have the Inward Call, wrought by the holy Spirit. How shall they believe on him of whom they have not heard? Faith c•mes by hearing, and •earing by the w•rd of God. When as there are some of the Elect of God, who have not the Outward •l before Old Age has overtaken them Abraham was Seventy & five Years old, when God called him, G•. 12 4 Indeed if Men have lived under the Light of the Gospel all their •es for the most part either they are Converted before Old Age […] never […] And yet now and then there […] been n Example of such Converted to God. We […] One Instance of i […] in the Scripture,