Pause awhile, and reflect! Some of you, perhaps, by this time, instead of making a wise resolve, have begun to wonder that so heavy a judgment should be denounced merely against forgetfulness. But look at the affairs of common life, and be taught by them. Do not neglect, and want of attention, and not looking about us to see what we have to do—do not any of these bring upon us consequences as ruinous to our worldly business as any ACTIVE misbehaviour? It is an event of every day, that a man, by mere laziness and inattention to his business, does as certainly bring himself and family to poverty, and end his days in a gaol, as if he were, in wanton mischief, to set fire to his own house. So it is also with the affairs of the soul: neglect of that—forgetfulness of God, who only can save it—will work his ruin, as surely as a long and daring course of profligate wickedness.
When any one has been recollecting the proper proofs of a future state of rewards and punishments, nothing, methinks, can give him so sensible an apprehension of punishment or such a representation of it to the mind, as observing that, after the many disregarded checks, admonitions, and warnings which people meet with in the ways of vice, folly, and extravagance warnings from their very nature, from the examples of others, from the lesser inconveniences which they bring upon themselves, from the instructions of wise and good men—after these have been long despised, scorned, ridiculed—after the chief bad consequences (temporal consequences) of their follies have been delayed for a great while, at length they break in irresistibly like an armed force: repentance is too late to relieve, and can serve only to aggravate their distress: the case is become desperate; and poverty and sickness, remorse and anguish, infamy and death, the effects of their own doings, overwhelm them beyond possibility of remedy or escape. This is an account of what is, in fact, the general constitution of Nature.
But is the forgetfulness of God so light a matter? Think what ingratitude, rebellion, and atheism there is at the bottom of it! Sirs, you have ‘a carnal mind, which is enmity against God.’ (Rom. viii. 7.) Do not suppose that you have but to make a slight effort, and you will cease to forget Him: it is your nature to forget Him: it is your nature to hate Him: so that nothing less than an entire change of heart and nature will ever deliver you from this state of enmity. Our nature ‘is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. They that are in the flesh cannot please God.’ (Rom. viii. 7, 8.) From this state let the fearful menace in the text persuade you to arise! Need we remind you again of the dreadfulness of hell—of the certainty that it shall overtake the impenitent sinner? Enough has been said; and can any of you be still so hardened, and such enemies to your souls, as still to cleave to sin? Will you still venture to continue any more in the hazard of falling into the hands of God? Alas! ‘Who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?’ (Isa. xxxiii. 14.) ‘Can thine heart endure, or can thine hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with thee? I the Lord have spoken it, and will do it!’ (Ezek. xxii. 14.) Observe, that men have dealt with sinners—ministers have dealt with them—apostles, prophets, and angels have dealt with them: at last, God will take them in hand, and deal with them! Though not so daring as to defy God, yet, brethren, in all probability you put on repentance. Will you securely walk a little longer along the brink of the burning furnace of the Almighty’s fury? ‘As the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, there is but a step between thee and death!’ (1 Sam. xx. 3.) When you lie down you know not but you may be in it before the morning; and when you rise you know not but God may say, ‘Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee!’ When once the word is given to cut you down, the business is over. You are cut off from your lying refuges and beloved sins—from the world—from your friends—from the light—from happiness—from hope, for ever! Be wise, then, my friends, and reasonable: give neither sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids, till you have resolved, on your knees before God, to forget Him no more. Go home and pray. Do not dare to fly, as it were, in the face of your Maker, by seeking your pleasure on His holy day; but if you are alarmed at this subject, as well you may be, go and pray to God that you may forget Him no more. It is high time to awake out of sleep. It is high time to have done with hesitation: time does not wait for you; nor will God wait till you are pleased to turn. He hath bent His bow, and made it ready: halt no more between two opinions: hasten—tarry not in all the plain, but flee from the wrath to come. Pray for grace, without which you can do nothing. Pray for the knowledge of Christ, and of your own danger and helplessness, without which you cannot know what it is to find refuge in Him. It is not our design to terrify, without pointing out the means of safety. Let us then observe, that if it should have pleased God to awaken any of you to a sense of your danger, you should beware of betaking yourselves to a refuge of lies.
But, through the mercy of God, many among us have found repentance unto life—have fled for refuge to the hope set before them—have seen their danger, and fled to Christ. Think with yourselves what it is now to have escaped destruction; what it will be to hear at the last day our acquittal, when it shall be said to others, ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.’ Let the sense of the mercy of God gild all the path of life. On the other hand, since it is they who forget God that are to bear the weight of His wrath, let us beware, brethren, how we forget Him, through concern about this world, or through unbelief, or through sloth. Let us be punctual in all our engagements with Him. With earnest attention and holy awe ought we to hear His voice, cherish the sense of His presence, and perform the duties of His worship. No covenant relation or Gospel grace can render Him less holy, less jealous, or less majestic. ‘Wherefore let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear; for our God is a consuming fire.’
The officers had seated themselves behind the preacher, that they might retire in case of dislike, and one of them employed himself in feeding the geese; so it had happened in the case of the missionary Paul, and Martyn wrote: ‘God, I trust, blessed the sermon to the good of many. Some of the cadets and soldiers were in tears.’ The complement[17] of this truth he soon after displayed to them in his sermon on the message through Ezekiel xxxiii. 11. As I live, saith the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
Men have been found in all ages who have vented their murmurs against God for the severity of His final punishment, as well as for the painful continuance of His judgments upon them in this life, saying, ‘If our state be so full of guilt and misery as is represented, and God is determined to avenge Himself upon us, be it so; then we must take the consequences.’ If God were to reply to this impious complaint only by silence; if He were to suffer the gloom of their hearts to thicken into tenfold darkness, and give them up to their own malignity, till they died victims to their own impiety and despair, the Lord would still be righteous, they would then only eat of the fruit of their doings. But, behold, the Lord gives a very unexpected message, with which He bids us to follow men, to interrupt their sad soliloquies, to stop their murmurs. ‘Say unto them,’ saith He, ‘As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn ye, turn ye, from your evil ways; for why will ye die?’
Behold the inseparable connexion—we must turn, or die. Here there is a question put by God to sinners. Let sinners then answer the question which God puts to them,—‘Why will ye die?’ Is death a motive not strong enough to induce you to forego a momentary pleasure? Is it a light thing to fall into the hands of the living God? Is a life of godliness so very intolerable as not to be repaid by heavenly glory? Turn ye at His reproof—‘Why will ye die?’ Is it because there is no hope? God has this very hour testified with an oath that it is His desire to save you. Yea, He at this moment expostulates with you and beseeches you to seek Him. ‘Why will ye die?’ You know not why. If, then, you are constrained—now accustomed as you are to self-vindication—to acknowledge your unreasonableness, how much more will you be speechless in the last day when madness will admit of no palliation, and folly will appear without disguise!
Are any returned to God? Do any believe they are really returned?—then here they have consolation. It is a long time before we lose our slavish dread of God, for our natural prejudices and mistakes become inveterate by habit, and Satan opposes the removal of them. But come now, and let us reason together. Will ye also dishonour your God by accounting Him more willing to destroy than to save you? Will ye think hardly of God? Oh, that I had been able to describe as it deserves, His willingness to save! Oh, that I could have borrowed the pen of a seraph, and dipped it in a fount of light! Could plainer words be needed to describe the wonders of His love? Hearken, my beloved brethren! Hath He no pleasure in the death of the wicked, and will He take pleasure in yours? Hath He promised His love, His tenderness to those who turn from their wicked ways, and yet, when they are turned, straightway forgot His promise? Harbour no more fearful, unbelieving thoughts. But the reply is often that the fear is not of God, but of myself, lest I have not turned away from my evil ways. But this point may surely be ascertained, brethren; and if it may, any further refinements on this subject are derogatory to God’s honour. Let these words convince you that, if you are willing to be saved in His way, He is willing to save you. It may be you will still be kept in darkness, but darkness is not always the frown of God; it is only Himself—thy shade on thy right hand. Then tremble not at the hand that wipes away thy tears; judge Him not by feeble sense, but follow Him, though He lead thee by a way that thou knewest not.
There are some of you who have reason to hope that you have turned from the error of your ways. Ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. It is but a taste, a foretaste, an antepast of the feast of heaven. It was His pleasure that you should turn from your ways; it is also His good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Then what shall we recommend to you, but gratitude, admiration, and praise? ‘Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise thy God, O Zion.’ Let each of us abundantly utter the memory of His great goodness, and sing aloud of His righteousness. Let each say, ‘Awake, lute and harp; I myself will awake right early.’ Let us join the chorus of angels, and all the redeemed, in praising the riches of His love in His kindness towards us through Christ Jesus.
As the fleet sailed from San Salvador, the captains were summoned to the commodore, to learn that Cape Town and the Dutch settlement formed the object of the expedition, and that stout resistance was expected. This gave new zeal to the chaplain, were that possible, in his dealings with the officers and men of his Majesty’s 59th, and with the cadets, to whom he taught mathematics in his unrewarded friendliness. Many were down with dysentery, then and long a peculiarly fatal disease till the use of ipecacuanha. His constant service made him also for some time a sufferer.