SSO STIRPRIZE IN DEATH. [DTSC. TIT. expresses it, Luke xvi. S. These will be the conse- quences ofour guilt and folly, ifwe are found in a dead sleep of sin, when our Lord comes to call us from this mortal state. Secondly, let us spend a few thoughts, also, upon the dangerous and unhappy circumstances of those, of whom we may "have some reason to hope they have once begun religion in good earnest, and are made spi- ritually alive, but have indulged themselves in drowsi- ness, and worn out the latter end of their days in a care- less, secure, and slothful frame of spirit." 1. If they have had the principle of vital religion wrought in their hearts; yet " by these criminal slumbers they darken, or lose their evidences of-grace, and, by this means, they cut themselves off from the sweet reflec- tions and comforts of it on a dying bed, when they have most need of them." They know not whether they are the children of God or no, and are in anxious confusion and distressing fear They have scarce any plain proofs öf their conversion to God, and the evidences of true christianity ready at hand, when all are little enough to support their spirits : They have not used themselves to search for them by self enquiry, and to keep them in their sight, and therefore they are missing in this im- portant hour : They have not been wont to live upon their heavenly hopes, and they cannot be found, when theywant them, to rest upon in death. They die, there- fore, almost like sinners, though they may perhaps have been once 'converted to holiness, and there may be a root of grace remaining in them ; and the reason is, be- cause they have lived too much as sinners do: Theyhave given too great and criminal an indulgence to the vain and worldly cares, or the trifling amusements of this life ; these have engrossed almost all their thoughts and their time, and therefore, in the day of death, they fall under terrors and painful apprehensions of a doubtful eternity just at hand. If we have not walked closely with God in this world, we maywell be afraid to appear before him in the next. If we have not maintained a coesta.nt converse with Jesus our Saviour byholy exercises of faith and hope, it is no wonder if we are not so ready with chearfulness and joy to resign our departing spirits into his hand. It 2
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