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SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD
by Jonathan Edwards (1703-175
Enfield, Connecticut
July 8, 1741
--Their foot shall slide in due time--
Deut. xxxii. 35
In this verse is threatened the vengeance of God on the wicked
unbelieving Israelites, who were God's visible people, and who
lived under the means of grace; but who, notwithstanding all God's
wonderful works towards them, remained (as ver. 28.) void of
counsel, having no understanding in them. Under all the
cultivations of heaven, they brought forth bitter and poisonous
fruit; as in the two verses next preceding the text. The expression
I have chosen for my text, Their foot shall slide in due time,
seems to imply the following doings, relating to the punishment and
destruction to which these wicked Israelites were exposed.
That they were always exposed to destruction; as one that stands or
walks in slippery places is always exposed to fall. This is implied
in the manner of their destruction coming upon them, being
represented by their foot sliding. The same is expressed, Psalm
73:18. "Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou
castedst them down into destruction."
It implies, that they were always exposed to sudden unexpected
destruction. As he that walks in slippery places is every moment
liable to fall, he cannot foresee one moment whether he shall stand
or fall the next; and when he does fall, he falls at once without
warning: Which is also expressed in Psalm 73:18, 19. "Surely thou
didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them down into
destruction: How are they brought into desolation as in a
moment!"
Another thing implied is, that they are liable to fall of
themselves, without being thrown down by the hand of another; as he
that stands or walks on slippery ground needs nothing but his own
weight to throw him down.
That the reason why they are not fallen already, and do not fall
now, is only that God's appointed time is not come. For it is said,
that when that due time, or appointed time comes, their foot shall
slide. Then they shall be left to fall, as they are inclined by
their own weight. God will not hold them up in these slippery
places any longer, but will let them go; and then at that very
instant, they shall fall into destruction; as he that stands on
such slippery declining ground, on the edge of a pit, he cannot
stand alone, when he is let go he immediately falls and is
lost.
The observation from the words that I would now insist upon is
this. "There is nothing that keeps wicked men at any one moment out
of hell, but the mere pleasure of God." By the mere pleasure of
God, I mean his sovereign pleasure, his arbitrary will, restrained
by no obligation, hindered by no manner of difficulty, any more
than if nothing else but God's mere will had in the least degree,
or in any respect whatsoever, any hand in the preservation of
wicked men one moment.
The truth of this observation may appear by the following
considerations.
There is no want of power in God to cast wicked men into hell at
any moment. Men's hands cannot be strong when God rises up. The
strongest have no power to resist him, nor can any deliver out of
his hands.-He is not only able to cast wicked men into hell, but he
can most easily do it. Sometimes an earthly prince meets with a
great deal of difficulty to subdue a rebel, who has found means to
fortify himself, and has made himself strong by the numbers of his
followers. But it is not so with God. There is no fortress that is
any defence from the power of God. Though hand join in hand, and
vast multitudes of God's enemies combine and associate themselves,
they are easily broken in pieces. They are as great heaps of light
chaff before the whirlwind; or large quantities of dry stubble
before devouring flames. We find it easy to tread on and crush a
worm that we see crawling on the earth; so it is easy for us to cut
or singe a slender thread that any thing hangs by: thus easy is it
for God, when he pleases, to cast his enemies down to hell. What
are we, that we should think to stand before him, at whose rebuke
the earth trembles, and before whom the rocks are thrown
down?
They deserve to be cast into hell; so that divine justice never
stands in the way, it makes no objection against God's using his
power at any moment to destroy them. Yea, on the contrary, justice
calls aloud for an infinite punishment of their sins. Divine
justice says of the tree that brings forth such grapes of Sodom,
"Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground?" Luke xiii. 7. The sword
of divine justice is every moment brandished over their heads, and
it is nothing but the hand of arbitrary mercy, and God's mere will,
that holds it back.
They are already under a sentence of condemnation to hell. They do
not only justly deserve to be cast down thither, but the sentence
of the law of God, that eternal and immutable rule of righteousness
that God has fixed between him and mankind, is gone out against
them, and stands against them; so that they are bound over already
to hell. John iii. 18. "He that believeth not is condemned
already." So that every unconverted man properly belongs to hell;
that is his place; from thence he is, John viii. 23. "Ye are from
beneath." And thither be is bound; it is the place that justice,
and God's word, and the sentence of his unchangeable law assign to
him.
They are now the objects of that very same anger and wrath of God,
that is expressed in the torments of hell. And the reason why they
do not go down to hell at each moment, is not because God, in whose
power they are, is not then very angry with them; as he is with
many miserable creatures now tormented in hell, who there feel and
bear the fierceness of his wrath. Yea, God is a great deal more
angry with great numbers that are now on earth: yea, doubtless,
with many that are now in this congregation, who it may be are at
ease, than he is with many of those who are now in the flames of
hell.
So that it is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and
does not resent it, that he does not let loose his hand and cut
them off. God is not altogether such an one as themselves, though
they may imagine him to be so. The wrath of God burns against them,
their damnation does not slumber; the pit is prepared, the fire is
made ready, the furnace is now hot, ready to receive them; the
flames do now rage and glow. The glittering sword is whet, and held
over them, and the pit hath opened its mouth under them.
The devil stands ready to fall upon them, and seize them as his
own, at what moment God shall permit him. They belong to him; he
has their souls in his possession, and under his dominion. The
scripture represents them as his goods, Luke xi. 12. The devils
watch them; they are ever by them at their right hand; they stand
waiting for them, like greedy hungry lions that see their prey, and
expect to have it, but are for the present kept back. If God should
withdraw his hand, by which they are restrained, they would in one
moment fly upon their poor souls. The old serpent is gaping for
them; hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if God should
permit it, they would be hastily swallowed up and lost.
There are in the souls of wicked men those hellish principles
reigning, that would presently kindle and flame out into hell fire,
if it were not for God's restraints. There is laid in the very
nature of carnal men, a foundation for the torments of hell. There
are those corrupt principles, in reigning power in them, and in
full possession of them, that are seeds of hell fire. These
principles are active and powerful, exceeding violent in their
nature, and if it were not for the restraining hand of God upon
them, they would soon break out, they would flame out after the
same manner as the same corruptions, the same enmity does in the
hearts of damned souls, and would beget the same torments as they
do in them. The souls of the wicked are in scripture compared to
the troubled sea, Isa. lvii. 20. For the present, God restrains
their wickedness by his mighty power, as he does the raging waves
of the troubled sea, saying, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no
further;" but if God should withdraw that restraining power, it
would soon carry all before it. Sin is the ruin and misery of the
soul; it is destructive in its nature; and if God should leave it
without restraint, there would need nothing else to make the soul
perfectly miserable. The corruption of the heart of man is
immoderate and boundless in its fury; and while wicked men live
here, it is like fire pent up by God's restraints, whereas if it
were let loose, it would set on fire the course of nature; and as
the heart is now a sink of sin, so if sin was not restrained, it
would immediately turn the soul into a fiery oven, or a furnace of
fire and brimstone.
It is no security to wicked men for one moment, that there are no
visible means of death at hand. It is no security to a natural man,
that he is now in health, and that he does not see which way he
should now immediately go out of the world by any accident, and
that there is no visible danger in any respect in his
circumstances. The manifold and continual experience of the world
in all ages, shows this is no evidence, that a man is not on the
very brink of eternity, and that the next step will not be into
another world. The unseen, unthought-of ways and means of persons
going suddenly out of the world are innumerable and inconceivable.
Unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a rotten covering, and
there are innumerable places in this covering so weak that they
will not bear their weight, and these places are not seen. The
arrows of death fly unseen at noon-day; the sharpest sight cannot
discern them. God has so many different unsearchable ways of taking
wicked men out of the world and sending them to hell, that there is
nothing to make it appear, that God had need to be at the expense
of a miracle, or go out of the ordinary course of his providence,
to destroy any wicked man, at any moment. All the means that there
are of sinners going out of the world, are so in God's hands, and
so universally and absolutely subject to his power and
determination, that it does not depend at all the less on the mere
will of God, whether sinners shall at any moment go to hell, than
if means were never made use of, or at all concerned in the
case.
Natural men's prudence and care to preserve their own lives, or the
care of others to preserve them, do not secure them a moment. To
this, divine providence and universal experience do also bear
testimony. There is this clear evidence that men's own wisdom is no
security to them from death; that if it were otherwise we should
see some difference between the wise and politic men of the world,
and others, with regard to their liableness to early and unexpected
death: but how is it in fact? Eccles. ii. 16. "How dieth the wise
man? even as the fool."
All wicked men's pains and contrivance which they use to escape
hell, while they continue to reject Christ, and so remain wicked
men, do not secure them from hell one moment. Almost every natural
man that hears of hell, flatters himself that he shall escape it;
he depends upon himself for his own security; he flatters himself
in what he has done, in what he is now doing, or what he intends to
do. Every one lays out matters in his own mind how he shall avoid
damnation, and flatters himself that he contrives well for himself,
and that his schemes will not fail. They hear indeed that there are
but few saved, and that the greater part of men that have died
heretofore are gone to hell; but each one imagines that he lays out
matters better for his own escape than others have done. He does
not intend to come to that place of torment; he says within
himself, that he intends to take effectual care, and to order
matters so for himself as not to fail.
But the foolish children of men miserably delude themselves in
their own schemes, and in confidence in their own strength and
wisdom; they trust to nothing but a shadow. The greater part of
those who heretofore have lived under the same means of grace, and
are now dead, are undoubtedly gone to hell; and it was not because
they were not as wise as those who are now alive: it was not
because they did not lay out matters as well for themselves to
secure their own escape. If we could speak with them, and inquire
of them, one by one, whether they expected, when alive, and when
they used to hear about hell ever to be the subjects of that
misery: we doubtless, should hear one and another reply, "No, I
never intended to come here: I had laid out matters otherwise in my
mind; I thought I should contrive well for myself: I thought my
scheme good. I intended to take effectual care; but it came upon me
unexpected; I did not look for it at that time, and in that manner;
it came as a thief: Death outwitted me: God's wrath was too quick
for me. Oh, my cursed foolishness! I was flattering myself, and
pleasing myself with vain dreams of what I would do hereafter; and
when I was saying, Peace and safety, then suddenly destruction came
upon me.
God has laid himself under no obligation, by any promise to keep
any natural man out of hell one moment. God certainly has made no
promises either of eternal life, or of any deliverance or
preservation from eternal death, but what are contained in the
covenant of grace, the promises that are given in Christ, in whom
all the promises are yea and amen. But surely they have no interest
in the promises of the covenant of grace who are not the children
of the covenant, who do not believe in any of the promises, and
have no interest in the Mediator of the covenant.
So that, whatever some have imagined and pretended about promises
made to natural men's earnest seeking and knocking, it is plain and
manifest, that whatever pains a natural man takes in religion,
whatever prayers he makes, till he believes in Christ, God is under
no manner of obligation to keep him a moment from eternal
destruction.
So that, thus it is that natural men are held in the hand of God,
over the pit of hell; they have deserved the fiery pit, and are
already sentenced to it; and God is dreadfully provoked, his anger
is as great towards them as to those that are actually suffering
the executions of the fierceness of his wrath in hell, and they
have done nothing in the least to appease or abate that anger,
neither is God in the least bound by any promise to hold them up
one moment; the devil is waiting for them, hell is gaping for them,
the flames gather and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on
them, and swallow them up; the fire pent up in their own hearts is
struggling to break out: and they have no interest in any Mediator,
there are no means within reach that can be any security to them.
In short, they have no refuge, nothing to take hold of, all that
preserves them every moment is the mere arbitrary will, and
uncovenanted, unobliged forbearance of an incensed God.
APPLICATION
The use of this awful subject may be for awakening unconverted
persons in this congregation. This that you have heard is the case
of every one of you that are out of Christ.-That world of misery,
that lake of burning brimstone, is extended abroad under you. There
is the dreadful pit of the glowing flames of the wrath of God;
there is hell's wide gaping mouth open; and you have nothing to
stand upon, nor any thing to take hold of, there is nothing between
you and hell but the air; it is only the power and mere pleasure of
God that holds you up.
You probably are not sensible of this; you find you are kept out of
hell, but do not see the hand of God in it; but look at other
things, as the good state of your bodily constitution, your care of
your own life, and the means you use for your own preservation. But
indeed these things are nothing; if God should withdraw his band,
they would avail no more to keep you from falling, than the thin
air to hold up a person that is suspended in it.
Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend
downwards with great weight and pressure towards hell; and if God
should let you go, you would immediately sink and swiftly descend
and plunge into the bottomless gulf, and your healthy constitution,
and your own care and prudence, and best contrivance, and all your
righteousness, would have no more influence to uphold you and keep
you out of hell, than a spider's web would have to stop a falling
rock. Were it not for the sovereign pleasure of God, the earth
would not bear you one moment; for you are a burden to it; the
creation groans with you; the creature is made subject to the
bondage of your corruption, not willingly; the sun does not
willingly shine upon you to give you light to serve sin and Satan;
the earth does not willingly yield her increase to satisfy your
lusts; nor is it willingly a stage for your wickedness to be acted
upon; the air does not willingly serve you for breath to maintain
the flame of life in your vitals, while you spend your life in the
service of God's enemies. God's creatures are good, and were made
for men to serve God with, and do not willingly subserve to any
other purpose, and groan when they are abused to purposes so
directly contrary to their nature and end. And the world would spew
you out, were it not for the sovereign hand of him who hath
subjected it in hope. There are black clouds of God's wrath now
hanging directly over your heads, full of the dreadful storm, and
big with thunder; and were it not for the restraining hand of God,
it would immediately burst forth upon you. The sovereign pleasure
of God, for the present, stays his rough wind; otherwise it would
come with fury, and your destruction would come like a whirlwind,
and you would be like the chaff of the summer threshing
floor.
The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the
present; they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher,
till an outlet is given; and the longer the stream is stopped, the
more rapid and mighty is its course, when once it is let loose. It
is true, that judgment against your evil works has not been
executed hitherto; the floods of God's vengeance have been
withheld; but your guilt in the mean time is constantly increasing,
and you are every day treasuring up more wrath; the waters are
constantly rising, and waxing more and more mighty; and there is
nothing but the mere pleasure of God, that holds the waters back,
that are unwilling to be stopped, and press hard to go forward. If
God should only withdraw his hand from the flood-gate, it would
immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and
wrath of God, would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would
come upon you with omnipotent power; and if your strength were ten
thousand times greater than it is, yea, ten thousand times greater
than the strength of the stoutest, sturdiest devil in hell, it
would be nothing to withstand or endure it.
The bow of God's wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the
string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the
bow, and it is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an
angry God, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the
arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood. Thus all
you that never passed under a great change of heart, by the mighty
power of the Spirit of God upon your souls; all you that were never
born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in
sin, to a state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light
and life, are in the hands of an angry God. However you may have
reformed your life in many things, and may have had religious
affections, and may keep up a form of religion in your families and
closets, and in the house of God, it is nothing but his mere
pleasure that keeps you from being this moment swallowed up in
everlasting destruction. However unconvinced you may now be of the
truth of what you hear, by and by you will be fully convinced of
it. Those that are gone from being in the like circumstances with
you, see that it was so with them; for destruction came suddenly
upon most of them; when they expected nothing of it, and while they
were saying, Peace and safety: now they see, that those things on
which they depended for peace and safety, were nothing but thin air
and empty shadows.
The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a
spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is
dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he
looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the
fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight;
you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the
most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him
infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet
it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the
fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you
did not go to hell the last night; that you was suffered to awake
again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there
is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell
since you arose in the morning, but that God's hand has held you
up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not gone to
hell, since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his
pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn
worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason
why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.
O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great
furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of
wrath, that you are held over in the hand of that God, whose wrath
is provoked and incensed as much against you, as against many of
the damned in hell. You hang by a slender thread, with the flames
of divine wrath flashing about it, and ready every moment to singe
it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest in any Mediator,
and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep off
the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever
have done, nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one
moment. And consider here more particularly,
Whose wrath it is: it is the wrath of the infinite God. If it were
only the wrath of man, though it were of the most potent prince, it
would be comparatively little to be regarded. The wrath of kings is
very much dreaded, especially of absolute monarchs, who have the
possessions and lives of their subjects wholly in their power, to
be disposed of at their mere will. Prov. xx. 2. "The fear of a king
is as the roaring of a lion: Whoso provoketh him to anger, sinneth
against his own soul." The subject that very much enrages an
arbitrary prince, is liable to suffer the most extreme torments
that human art can invent, or human power can inflict. But the
greatest earthly potentates in their greatest majesty and strength,
and when clothed in their greatest terrors, are but feeble,
despicable worms of the dust, in comparison of the great and
almighty Creator and King of heaven and earth. It is but little
that they can do, when most enraged, and when they have exerted the
utmost of their fury. All the kings of the earth, before God, are
as grasshoppers; they are nothing, and less than nothing: both
their love and their hatred is to be despised. The wrath of the
great King of kings, is as much more terrible than theirs, as his
majesty is greater. Luke xii. 4, 5. "And I say unto you, my
friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that,
have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom you
shall fear: fear him, which after he hath killed, hath power to
cast into hell: yea, I say unto you, Fear him."
It is the fierceness of his wrath that you are exposed to. We often
read of the fury of God; as in Isaiah lix. 18. "According to their
deeds, accordingly he will repay fury to his adversaries." So
Isaiah lxvi. 15. "For behold, the Lord will come with fire, and
with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury,
and his rebuke with flames of fire." And in many other places. So,
Rev. xix. 15, we read of "the wine press of the fierceness and
wrath of Almighty God." The words are exceeding terrible. If it had
only been said, "the wrath of God," the words would have implied
that which is infinitely dreadful: but it is "the fierceness and
wrath of God." The fury of God! the fierceness of Jehovah! Oh, how
dreadful must that be! Who can utter or conceive what such
expressions carry in them! But it is also "the fierceness and wrath
of Almighty God." As though there would be a very great
manifestation of his almighty power in what the fierceness of his
wrath should inflict, as though omnipotence should be as it were
enraged, and exerted, as men are wont to exert their strength in
the fierceness of their wrath. Oh! then, what will be the
consequence! What will become of the poor worms that shall suffer
it! Whose hands can be strong? And whose heart can endure? To what
a dreadful, inexpressible, inconceivable depth of misery must the
poor creature be sunk who shall be the subject of this!
Consider this, you that are here present, that yet remain in an
unregenerate state. That God will execute the fierceness of his
anger, implies, that he will inflict wrath without any pity. When
God beholds the ineffable extremity of your case, and sees your
torment to be so vastly disproportioned to your strength, and sees
how your poor soul is crushed, and sinks down, as it were, into an
infinite gloom; he will have no compassion upon you, he will not
forbear the executions of his wrath, or in the least lighten his
hand; there shall be no moderation or mercy, nor will God then at
all stay his rough wind; he will have no regard to your welfare,
nor be at all careful lest you should suffer too much in any other
sense, than only that you shall not suffer beyond what strict
justice requires. Nothing shall be withheld, because it is so hard
for you to bear. Ezek. viii. 18. "Therefore will I also deal in
fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and
though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear
them." Now God stands ready to pity you; this is a day of mercy;
you may cry now with some encouragement of obtaining mercy. But
when once the day of mercy is past, your most lamentable and
dolorous cries and shrieks will be in vain; you will be wholly lost
and thrown away of God, as to any regard to your welfare. God will
have no other use to put you to, but to suffer misery; you shall be
continued in being to no other end; for you will be a vessel of
wrath fitted to destruction; and there will be no other use of this
vessel, but to be filled full of wrath. God will be so far from
pitying you when you cry to him, that it is said he will only
"laugh and mock," Prov. i. 25, 26, &c.
How awful are those words, Isa. lxiii. 3, which are the words of
the great God. "I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample
them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my
garments, and I will stain all my raiment." It is perhaps
impossible to conceive of words that carry in them greater
manifestations of these three things, vis. contempt, and hatred,
and fierceness of indignation. If you cry to God to pity you, he
will be so far from pitying you in your doleful case, or showing
you the least regard or favour, that instead of that, he will only
tread you under foot. And though he will know that you cannot bear
the weight of omnipotence treading upon you, yet he will not regard
that, but he will crush you under his feet without mercy; he will
crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled on
his garments, so as to stain all his raiment. He will not only hate
you, but he will have you, in the utmost contempt: no place shall
be thought fit for you, but under his feet to be trodden down as
the mire of the streets.
The misery you are exposed to is that which God will inflict to
that end, that he might show what that wrath of Jehovah is. God
hath had it on his heart to show to angels and men, both how
excellent his love is, and also how terrible his wrath is.
Sometimes earthly kings have a mind to show how terrible their
wrath is, by the extreme punishments they would execute on those
that would provoke them. Nebuchadnezzar, that mighty and haughty
monarch of the Chaldean empire, was willing to show his wrath when
enraged with Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego; and accordingly gave
orders that the burning fiery furnace should be heated seven times
hotter than it was before; doubtless, it was raised to the utmost
degree of fierceness that human art could raise it. But the great
God is also willing to show his wrath, and magnify his awful
majesty and mighty power in the extreme sufferings of his enemies.
Rom. ix. 22. "What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make
his power known, endure with much long-suffering the vessels of
wrath fitted to destruction?" And seeing this is his design, and
what he has determined, even to show how terrible the unrestrained
wrath, the fury and fierceness of Jehovah is, he will do it to
effect. There will be something accomplished and brought to pass
that will be dreadful with a witness. When the great and angry God
hath risen up and executed his awful vengeance on the poor sinner,
and the wretch is actually suffering the infinite weight and power
of his indignation, then will God call upon the whole universe to
behold that awful majesty and mighty power that is to be seen in
it. Isa. xxxiii. 12-14. "And the people shall be as the burnings of
lime, as thorns cut up shall they be burnt in the fire. Hear ye
that are far off, what I have done; and ye that are near,
acknowledge my might. The sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness
hath surprised the hypocrites," &c.
Thus it will be with you that are in an unconverted state, if you
continue in it; the infinite might, and majesty, and terribleness
of the omnipotent God shall be magnified upon you, in the ineffable
strength of your torments. You shall be tormented in the presence
of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb; and when you
shall be in this state of suffering, the glorious inhabitants of
heaven shall go forth and look on the awful spectacle, that they
may see what the wrath and fierceness of the Almighty is; and when
they have seen it, they will fall down and adore that great power
and majesty. Isa. lxvi. 23, 24. "And it shall come to pass, that
from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another,
shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they
shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have
transgressed against me; for their worm shall not die, neither
shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto
all flesh."
It is everlasting wrath. It would be dreadful to suffer this
fierceness and wrath of Almighty God one moment; but you must
suffer it to all eternity. There will be no end to this exquisite
horrible misery. When you look forward, you shall see a long for
ever, a boundless duration before you, which will swallow up your
thoughts, and amaze your soul; and you will absolutely despair of
ever having any deliverance, any end, any mitigation, any rest at
all. You will know certainly that you must wear out long ages,
millions of millions of ages, in wrestling and conflicting with
this almighty merciless vengeance; and then when you have so done,
when so many ages have actually been spent by you in this manner,
you will know that all is but a point to what remains. So that your
punishment will indeed be infinite. Oh, who can express what the
state of a soul in such circumstances is! All that we can possibly
say about it, gives but a very feeble, faint representation of it;
it is inexpressible and inconceivable: For "who knows the power of
God's anger?"
How dreadful is the state of those that are daily and hourly in the
danger of this great wrath and infinite misery! But this is the
dismal case of every soul in this congregation that has not been
born again, however moral and strict, sober and religious, they may
otherwise be. Oh that you would consider it, whether you be young
or old! There is reason to think, that there are many in this
congregation now hearing this discourse, that will actually be the
subjects of this very misery to all eternity. We know not who they
are, or in what seats they sit, or what thoughts they now have. It
may be they are now at ease, and hear all these things without much
disturbance, and are now flattering themselves that they are not
the persons, promising themselves that they shall escape. If we
knew that there was one person, and but one, in the whole
congregation, that was to be the subject of this misery, what an
awful thing would it be to think of! If we knew who it was, what an
awful sight would it be to see such a person! How might all the
rest of the congregation lift up a lamentable and bitter cry over
him! But, alas! instead of one, how many is it likely will remember
this discourse in hell? And it would be a wonder, if some that are
now present should not be in hell in a very short time, even before
this year is out. And it would be no wonder if some persons, that
now sit here, in some seats of this meeting-house, in health, quiet
and secure, should be there before to-morrow morning. Those of you
that finally continue in a natural condition, that shall keep out
of hell longest will be there in a little time! your damnation does
not slumber; it will come swiftly, and, in all probability, very
suddenly upon many of you. You have reason to wonder that you are
not already in hell. It is doubtless the case of some whom you have
seen and known, that never deserved hell more than you, and that
heretofore appeared as likely to have been now alive as you. Their
case is past all hope; they are crying in extreme misery and
perfect despair; but here you are in the land of the living and in
the house of God, and have an opportunity to obtain salvation. What
would not those poor damned hopeless souls give for one day's
opportunity such as you now enjoy!
And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ
has thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and
crying with a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are
flocking to him, and pressing into the kingdom of God. Many are
daily coming from the east, west, north and south; many that were
very lately in the same miserable condition that you are in, are
now in a happy state, with their hearts filled with love to him who
has loved them, and washed them from their sins in his own blood,
and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. How awful is it to be
left behind at such a day! To see so many others feasting, while
you are pining and perishing! To see so many rejoicing and singing
for joy of heart, while you have cause to mourn for sorrow of
heart, and howl for vexation of spirit! How can you rest one moment
in such a condition? Are not your souls as precious as the souls of
the people at Suffield, where they are flocking from day to day to
Christ?
Are there not many here who have lived long in the world, and are
not to this day born again? and so are aliens from the commonwealth
of Israel, and have done nothing ever since they have lived, but
treasure up wrath against the day of wrath? Oh, sirs, your case, in
an especial manner, is extremely dangerous. Your guilt and hardness
of heart is extremely great. Do you not see how generally persons
of your years are passed over and left, in the present remarkable
and wonderful dispensation of God's mercy? You had need to consider
yourselves, and awake thoroughly out of sleep. You cannot bear the
fierceness and wrath of the infinite God.-And you, young men, and
young women, will you neglect this precious season which you now
enjoy, when so many others of your age are renouncing all youthful
vanities, and flocking to Christ? You especially have now an
extraordinary opportunity; but if you neglect it, it will soon be
with you as with those persons who spent all the precious days of
youth in sin, and are now come to such a dreadful pass in blindness
and hardness. And you, children, who are unconverted, do not you
know that you are going down to hell, to bear the dreadful wrath of
that God, who is now angry with you every day and every night? Will
you be content to be the children of the devil, when so many other
children in the land are converted, and are become the holy and
happy children of the King of kings?
And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the
pit of hell, whether they be old men and women, or middle aged, or
young people, or little children, now harken to the loud calls of
God's word and providence. This acceptable year of the Lord, a day
of such great favours to some, will doubtless be a day of as
remarkable vengeance to others. Men's hearts harden, and their
guilt increases apace at such a day as this, if they neglect their
souls; and never was there so great danger of such persons being
given up to hardness of heart and blindness of mind. God seems now
to be hastily gathering in his elect in all parts of the land; and
probably the greater part of adult persons that ever shall be
saved, will be brought in now in a little time, and that it will be
as it was on the great out-pouring of the Spirit upon the Jews in
the apostles' days; the election will obtain, and the rest will be
blinded. If this should be the case with you, you will eternally
curse this day, and will curse the day that ever you was born, to
see such a season of the pouring out of God's Spirit, and will wish
that you had died and gone to hell before you had seen it. Now
undoubtedly it is, as it was in the days of John the Baptist, the
axe is in an extraordinary manner laid at the root of the trees,
that every tree which brings not forth good fruit, may be hewn down
and cast into the fire.
Therefore, let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly
from the wrath to come. The wrath of Almighty God is now
undoubtedly hanging over a great part of this congregation: Let
every one fly out of Sodom: "Haste and escape for your lives, look
not behind you, escape to the mountain, lest you be
consumed."
