( 3i3 ) DISCOURSE III. SURPRIZE IN DEATH. MARK Xüi. 35, 36. Watch ye, therèfore; lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping. AMONG the parables of our Saviour, there are seve- ral recorded by the evangelists, which represent him as a prince, or lord and master of a family, departing, for a season, from his servants, and in his absence, appoint- ing them their proper work, with a solemn charge, to wait for his return ; at which time, he foretold them, that he should require an account of their behaviour in his absence ; and he either intimates, or expresses a se- vere 'treatment of those, who should neglect their duty while he was gone, or make no preparation for his ap- pearance. He informs them also, that he should come upon them on a sudden, and, for this reason, charges them to be always awake, and upon their guard, verse 35. Watch ye, therefore; for ye know not when .the master ofthe house comet/i, whether at even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or in the morning: Though the ultimate design of these parables, and the coming of Christ mentioned therein, refer to the great day of judgment, when he shall return from heaven, shall raise the dead, and call mankind to appear before his judgment-seat, to receive a recornpence according to their works ; yet both the duties, and the warnings, which are represented in these parables, seem to be very ac- commodable to the hour of our death; for then our Lord Jesus, who has the keys of death and the grave, and the unseen world, comes to finish our state of trial, and to put a period to all our works on earth He comes then to call us into the invisible state; he disposes our bodies to the dust, and our souls are sent into other mansions, and taste some degrees of appointed happi- ness or misery, according to their behaviour here. The solemn and awful warning, which my text gives us con- cerning the return of Christ to judgment, may be perti- B
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