134 FOURTH SERMON potent. Jehoshaphat did so, and his ships were broken, 2 Chron. xx. 35. 37. Ahaz did so, and his people were distressed, 2 Chron. xxviii. 21. It is impossible for God's enemies to be cordial to God's people, so long as they continue cordial to their God. There is such an irreconcilable enmity between the Seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, that it is incredible to suppose that the enemies of the church will do any thing which may in itself tend to the good of it, or that any end and design by them pursued can be severed from their own malignant interest. Let white be mingled with any colour which is not itself, and it loseth of its own beauty. It is not possible for God's people to join with any that are his enemies, and not lose of their own purity thereby. He must be as wise and as potent as God who can use the rage of God's enemies, and convert it when he hath done to the good of God's church, and the glory of God's name, and be able at pleasure to restrain and call it in again. We must ever take heed of this dangerous competition between our own interests and God's to be so tender and intent upon that, as to hazard and shake this. Jeroboam did so, but it was fatal to him and to all Israel. The end of Judah's combining with the Assyrian, was that they might rejoice against Rezin and Remaliah's son : but the consequence of it, which they never intended, was, that the Assyrian came over all the channels, and over all the banks, and over- flowed, and went over, and reached to the very neck, and if it had not been Immanuel's land, would have endangered it to the drowning of it, Isa. viii. 6 -8. If Israel for his own ends join with Asshur, it will hardly be possible for him in so doing, though against his own will, not to promote the ends of Asshur against God's church and against himself too. And yet the
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