tive who was most dear to you? Whose mind does not recur to the time when your family was visited by death in the ordinary way? Do you recollect when your mother was carried out to bury? Do you remember when you followed your child to the grave? Do you remember how you felt, when you sat down for the first time, with your children around your table, after your husband or your wife died? But we have not been reproved by judgments only. How many mercies have you enjoyed, and O, how many have you abused? You have enjoyed health-God gave it to you. wealth-God gave it to you. friends-God gave them to you. peace-God gave it to you. You have enjoyed You have enjoyed down, and sees and knows us, what must he behold? Pride, and vain glory, and a hard heart. This leads to the second thing that was proposed. II. What we are to understand by hardening the heart, and how this is done. Sometimes hardening the heart, is put for an act of the Almighty, in a judicial point of view, as in the case of Pharaoh; but, in our text, it is considered as the act of the sinner himself. We have already intimated, that this is an effort in the sinner to brave the terrors of Almighty wrath, and to sin without even the checks of conscience. It is in vain with such, that the Almighty has given them a revelation : of his will: they love their sins, and therefore will not suffer his word to have its desired effect on their hearts. In vain may the Spirit strive; they resist his operations, or drown their emotions in intemperance, or company, or dissipation. In vain may the Lord speak his power in the voice of thunder; they dismiss their alarms, as soon as the cloud is removed. In vain may the Lord send them the softening influence of the Gospel if they are obliged to feel its effects for a moment, they soon say, "Go thy way for this time:" let me get rid of my present alarm, and then I will hear you again. In vain may the Lord visit them with judgments of war, or fire, or sickness, or death: if they for a moment feel the necessity of religion, they hasten to lose their alarm in the cares, honours, or pleasures of the world. In vain the Almighty blesses them with health: they make it a curse to themselves, by abusing its ardour in the pursuit of sin. In vain does he give them riches: they make them ministers to pride, and luxury, and self-indulgence; and though the Lord cries out, "Hear, O heavens! and give ear, O earth! for I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me!" "Yet they say, who is the Almighty, that I should serve him; and what profit shall I have, if I pray unto him, Surely it is a vain thing to serve the Lord." If after war he blesses them with peace, they forget the rock of their salvation, and perhaps burn incense to their own net, or sacrifice to their own drag. If he has blessed them with a circle of friends, they perhaps make use of their utmost endeavours to prevent them from embracing religion. O how many ways are there for sinners to harden the heart, and blunt the emotions of conscience. If you would be candid, would you not be forced to acknowledge that you have been guilty in this respect? And what do you think will be the consequence? This leads to the third thing that was proposed, namely, III. To speak something of the sudden destruction which must be the result of this obstinacy. This is expressed in the words of the text, they shall be suddenly destroyed, and that without remedy. Great God! how truly alarming is the expression, issuing from the lips of eternal truth. We said in our introduction, that this destruction was, the having all the faculties of the soul, which are calculated to be inlets to pleasure, to become eternal inlets to anguish and wo. What pleasure must it yield the pious, in eternity, to employ their improved understandings in tracing the perfections of Deity, which all stand engaged to make them blessed. But O! what destruction and perversion of this power must it be, to employ, through eternity, the wretched understanding in contemplating that power, holiness, and justice, which must ever inflict anguish and wrath on the lost sinner, who hardened his heart, and would have none of the reproofs of the Almighty. That memory, which will yield an exquisite delight to the upright when they get to heaven, by recalling circumstances in which they will then see that the hand of the Lord was upon them for good; will augment the misery of the sinner, by recalling the seasons of grace which he has so frequently enjoyed and so unceasingly abused, by hardening his heart and casting off his fears. That will, which, having been brought into subjection to the will of God, shall yield a perennial stream of joy to the blessed must yield to the sinner, whose will has not been conquered, the bitterest wo, while, chained down under the awful frowns of that God whom he hates, he feels the vengeance of eternal fire. Those tender affections which the blessed shall feel, and which shall bind them to the bosom of God, shall be turned into the most invincible hatred in the case of the lost soul. Brethren, my heart makes a noise within me. How terrible is this destruction that awaits the sinner, who, being often reproved, continues to harden his heart! You have read of famines, and earthquakes in divers places; but what are these to the destruction of the soul? You have heard of populous cities demolished in a day; but what is this to the destruction of a soul in hell? An attempt to express it is vain: human thought cannot reach so far, as to conceive the horrid state of that sinner, who, having enjoyed the glorious light of the Gos pel, has hardened his heart, sinned away his day of grace, and just entered into an eternity of wo. But this destruction shall be sudden-unexpected. Yes, you are crying peace and safety, while sudden destruction is at the door. Yes, sinner, when you least expect it, God shall say, cut down that fig-tree, why cumbereth it the ground? Yes, swearer, you will swear but few more times. Yes, drunkard, you have almost drunk your last cup. Liar, you will soon have done telling lies. Adulterer, a few more debauches and you will tumble into hell. Yes, extortioner, you who disregard the cries of the poor, shall soon hear the groans of the damned. Yes, Gospel-slighter, you shall soon perish, and that without remedy. To be in pain when there is no remedy-this is hell with a witness. When you have been sick, you have had a physician; when you have been hungry, you have had something to eat; when thirsty, something to drink. When the sinner has become penitent, he has had the blood and mercy of Christ to resort unto; but the destruction of which we speak, excludes all these mitigations. Then no minister to preach-no father and mother to pray-no Saviour to plead our cause-no mountain to fall on us, and hide us from the presence of him that sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. No, sinner-You must stand forth as a mark for the thunderbolts of eternal vengeance. You must plunge into a fiery world. You must be punished with everlasting destruction |