Serle - BT590 N2 S47 1776

EVERLASTING FATHER. iSg the Biel-fin. Let this encourage thee, therefore, fear- ful Chriftian, to venture, with faithful Boldnefs, upon thy redeeming GOD. Come, like a fimple helplefs Child, to Him, thy gracious, thy tender, thy everlaft- ing Father. Speak out all thy Complaints; and, it thou canft not fpeak them, flip them again and again. Thy LORD will never fend thee empty away. He does not require fine Language, but a feeling and a contrite Heart. He feeks not the Eloquence of Words, but the far more irrefiftibleEloquence ofGroans and Tears. And never did his Spirit put a Cry into the Soul, which his everlafting Love did not mean to anfwer. The Word, Abba, Father, uttered with Faith, has infinitely more Prevalence, than a copious Prayer of an Hour long without. 'Tis a meek, a child-like, Cry, which pierceth into the very Ears and Heart of jefus. O that it were oftener heard onEarth ; for it would even heighten the Joy of Heaven !* The Heart, which is enabled to utter it, gains, in the Proportion ofFaith, a Pledge of Heaven here below. The Children of GOD ate never fo happy, as when the Senfe of their Adoption lays warm upon their Hearts. The holy Fire within will kindle a generous Ardour in all their Converfation. without. How happy are thofe Hours, that are fpent with CHRIST, andfor CHRIST ? And if Happinefs, the leaf]: Portion of Happinefs, can gladden the Heart in this dreary Scene of dying Things ; what will be the Joy, and what the Ecftafy, above, where all things are pure and perfect, and perfeét and pure, for everlafting ? One Apoftle calls it a joy unfpeakable and frill of Glory even on Earth ; and what then muff it be called in Heaven ? Another defcribes it by an exceeding and eter- nal Weight. of Glory ; for the Weight of it would beg- gar all Language, and exceed all Conception. And\ yet (wonderful to fay !) all this Joy unfpeakable, all this Weight of Glory, is the unalienable, undeniable, and everlafting Inheritance of the meaneft, the weakeft, s Luke xv. io, and

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