- I come now to the fifth thing propounded in prosecution of this head of public prayer, and that is some applicatory improvement of this head.
(1.) This shows what reason the people of God, wherever they live, have to pray for good magistrates, especially kings and princes. Regna sunt hospitia ecclesiæ—as the inn is to the traveller, so kingdoms are to the church in its pilgrimage here on earth. As they are, such is its usage in the world, and entertainment that it finds. ‘Pray for kings,’ saith the apostle, ‘and all in authority; that we may lead quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty,’ I Tim. 2:2. By godliness he means in an especial manner the free profession of the truth and public exercise of God’s pure worship. No magistrate may hinder the saints living godly as to the embracing of the truth in their hearts and secret performance of prayer. Daniel would and could pray, do Nebuchadnezzar his worst. But princes carry the keys of the church doors at their girdles, and an shut or open them. When faithful magistrates sway the sceptre, then the ways of Zion are easy and open. When enemies to the ways and worship of God bear rule, then they mourn; church doors are shut and prison doors opened to the servants of Christ. Then the woman flees into the wilderness, and the church into private chambers, as we find in the apostles’ days, when the church was met with the door shut to pray for Peter. O, pray for kings and princes; for, as they carry the keys of the church doors, so God carries the key that opens the doors of their hearts at his pleasure.
(2.) It reproves those that turn their backs off the public worship. Now they are of two sorts—the profane atheist, the scrupulous separatist.
(a) The irreligious atheist—such who, out of a profane spirit, turn their back off the public worship of God. The Jews have a saying of one of their rabbis much in their mouths, quisquis incolit civitatem in quâ extat synagoga, et inibi non pecatur, is est qui meritò dicitur vicinus malus—he that dwells in a city where there is a synagogue, and comes not to prayers there, he is a person that deserves the name of a bad neighbour. How many bad neighbours do we, alas! live among, who are seldom seen in the public assembly from one end of the year to the other? Many live as if they had rent the bond that was sealed at their baptism, and renounced all homage to their Maker, and would tell the world they owe him no worship. Worse brutes these are than the hog in their sty, or horse in their stable. They were made for our use, and accordingly serve us. Man was intended for the service of his Maker—a creature made for religion —by which some would define and distinguish the human nature from that of brutes, rather than by his rational faculty. Indeed, in some brutes there is a sagacity that looks something like man’s discoursive faculty. But religion is a thing their nature is wholly incapable of, and therefore nothing makes man so truly a brute as irreligion. The Jewish Talmud propounds this question, Why God made man vesperâ Sabbathi?—on the evening before the Sabbath? and gives this as one reason, ut protinus intraret in præceptum—that is, God made man on the evening just before the Sabbath, that he might forthwith enter upon the observation of the command to sanctify the Sabbath, and begin his life as it were with the worship of God, which is the chief end why it was given him. May we not therefore wonder at the patience of God in suffering these ungodly wretches to live, that by casting this horrid contempt upon his worship, walk contrary to the very end of their creation? If the bells which call us to the worship of God were to give them notice of a wrestling, foot ball, or drunken wake, O how soon should we have them flock together! But prayers and sermons they care not for. What shall we impute this irreligion and atheism of multitudes among us to? Surely it proceeds from a criminous conscience. It is said of Cain, ‘He went out from the presence of the Lord,’ Gen. 4:16; that is, say some interpreters, from the place where God had his church and worship, there God is especially present.
Guilt indeed makes men afraid of God. This makes them {do} what they can to wear off the thoughts of a Deity that are so troublesome to their flagitious consciences. Now, to do this, they have no other way than to shun those duties which will bring God and their sins to their remembrance. Herod was soon persuaded to cut off that head whose tongue was so bold to tell him his faults; and profane hearts are easily drawn to cast off those duties which will gall and rub hard upon their sore consciences. But that man is in a miserable case that knows no way to get ease but by throwing away the plaster that must heal his wound. Ah, poor wretches! this will not serve your turn. What though the prisoner stops his ears, and will not hear the judge pronounce the sentence against him, will that save him from the gallows? Surely no; but rather procure his being sent thither the sooner for his contempt of the court, who, had he carried himself better, and humbly begged his life at the judge's hand, might possibly have got the sentence reversed. Whether sinners will hear the word or no, come to his worship or no, God will proceed in his work. Flouting against God, and turning thy back on his worship, is not the way to prevent but hasten divine vengeance. How much better were it to make thy humble supplication to thy judge, and wait at the posts of wisdom! While men, though bad, wait on ordinances, there is hope, for they are under the means. But when they cast them off, then their ruin hastens.
(b) The scrupulous separatist—such who do not absent from the public worship out of a profane atheistical spirit, as the former, but from scruples whether they may lawfully be present at the prayers there put up, because there are some maladministrations in the performance of it, or at least {that} which they think to be such. At these they are distasted, and so withdraw. May be it is because the duty of prayer is performed with a set form, which they conceive unlawful. This I shall waive, having spoken already to it. Or, may be it is not a form, but some passages in the form used, that offends them, and therefore they dare not be present. So that the question will be—
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