Works of John Bunyan — Complete

by John Bunyan

But would they do thus if they knew the severity of the law? they would as soon eat fire. The severity of the law would be an intolerable, insupportable burden to their consciences; it would drive them, and make them fly for refuge, to lay hold on the hope set before them.

(2.) Or if he slights not the penalty, he will seek to make amends to it by doing of good works for the sins he has committed. This is manifest by the practice of the Jews and Turks, and all that swerve on that hand—to wit, to seek life and happiness by the law. Paul also was here before he meet with Jesus in the way. This is natural to consciences that are awakened, unless also they have given to them to see the true severity of the law; the which that thou mayest do, if my mite will help, I will cast in for thy conviction these four things—

(a.) The law charges thee with its curse, as well for the pollution of thy nature, as for the defilements of thy life; yea, and if thou hadst never committed sinful act, thy pollution of nature must stand in thy way to life, if thou comest not to God for mercy by Christ.

(b.) The law takes notice of, and chargeth thee with its curse, as well for sinful thoughts as for vile and sinful actions. 'The [very] thought of foolishness is sin,' (Prov 24:9), though it never breaks out into act, and will as surely merit the damnation of the soul as will the greatest transgression in the world.

(c.) If now thou couldst keep all the commandments, that will do thee no good at all, because thou hast sinned first: 'The soul that sinneth shall die.' Unless, then, thou canst endure the curse, and so in a legal way overcome it for the sins that thou hast committed, thou art gone, if thou comest not to God by Christ for mercy and pardon.

(d.) And never think of repentance, thereby to stop the mouth of the law; for the law calleth not for repentance, but life; nor will it accept of any, shouldst thou mourn and weep for thy sins till thou hast made a sea of blood with tears. This, I say, thou must know, or thou wilt not come to God by Christ for life. For the knowledge of this will cause that thou shalt neither slight the severity of the law, nor trust to the works thereof for life. Now, when thou doest neither of these, thou canst not but speed thee to God by Christ for life; for now thou hast no stay; pleasures are gone, all hope in thyself is gone. Thou now diest, and that is the way to love; for this inward death is, or feels like, a hunger-bitten stomach, that cannot but crave and gape for meat and drink. Now it will be as possible for thee to sleep with thy finger in the fire, as to forbear craving of mercy so long as this knowledge remains.

4. As a man must know himself, the emptiness of this world, and the law, so it is necessary for him to know that there is a hell, and how insupportable the torments of it are; for all threatenings, curses, and determinations to punish in the next world will prove but fictions and scarecrows, if there be no woeful place, no woeful state, for the sinner to receive his wages in for sin, when his days are ended in this world. Wherefore, this word 'saved' supposeth such a place and state. He is able to save from hell, from the woeful place, from the woeful state of hell, them that come unto God by him.

Christ, therefore, often insinuated the truth of a hell in his invitations to the sinners of this world to come to him; as where he tells them they shall be saved if they do, they shall be damned if they do not. As if he had said, there is a hell, a terrible hell, and they that come to me I will save them from it; but they that come not, the law will damn them in it. Therefore, that thou mayest indeed come to God by Christ for mercy, believe there is a hell, a woeful, terrible place. Hell is God's creature, 'he hath made it deep and large'! The punishments are by the lashes of his wrath, which will issue from his mouth like a stream of burning brimstone, ever kindling itself upon the soul. (Isa 30:33) Thou must know this by the Word, and fly from it, or thou shalt know it by thy sins, and lie and cry in it.

I might enlarge, but if I did, I should be swallowed up; for we are while here no more able to set forth the torments of hell, than we are whole here to set forth the joys of heaven; only this may, and ought to be said, that God is able, as to save, so to cast into hell. (Luke 12:5) And as he is able to make heaven sweet, good, pleasurable, and glorious beyond thought; so he is able to make the torments of hell so exquisite, so hot, so sharp, so intolerable, that no tongue can utter it, no, not the damned in hell themselves. (Isa 64:4) If thou lovest thy soul, slight not the knowledge of hell, for that, with the law, are the spurs which Christ useth to prick souls forward to himself withal. What is the cause that sinners can play so delightfully with sin? It is for that they forget there is a hell for them to descend into for their so doing, when they go out of this world. For here usually he gives our stop to a sinful course; we perceive that hell hath opened her mouth before us. Lest thou shouldst forget, I beseech thee, another time, to retain the knowledge of hell in thine understanding, and apply the burning-hot thoughts thereof to thy conscience; this is one way to make thee gather up thy heels, and mend thy pace in thy coming to Jesus Christ, and to God the Father by him.13

5. It is also necessary that he that cometh to God by the Lord Jesus, should know what death is, and the uncertainty of its approaches upon us. Death is, as I may call it, the feller, the cutter down. Death is that that puts a stop to a further living here, and that which lays man where judgment finds him. If he is in the faith in Jesus, it lays him down there to sleep till the Lord comes; if he be not in the faith, it lays him down in his sins till the Lord comes. (Heb 11:13, 1 Thess 4:14, Job 20:11) Again; if thou hast some beginnings that look like good, and death should overtake thee before those beginnings are ripe, thy fruit will wither, and thou wilt fall short of being gathered into God's barn. Some men are 'cut off as the tops of the ears of corn,' and some are even nipped by death in the very bud of their spring; but the safety is when a man is ripe, and shall be gathered to his grave, as a shock of corn to the barn in its season. (Job 24:20-24, 5:26)