5SO THE PARDON OF SIN TO EE HIGHLY ESTEEMED, APPLICATION. First. If it be so, if the children of God under tem- poral afflictions pray in the first place most earnestly for a sense of pardoning mercy, and if the comforts that arise from it are so great, then, in the time' of ease and health, let us labor after a sense of sing and a hope of pardon ; and let us not be satisfied without it. If men are horn to .affliction as sparks. fly upwards, how can we promise ourselves security; and if sorrow surprise us before we have any hope of pardon, what a,dreadful con- dition must we be in 1 Secondly. Those that have believed in Jesus, that have had a hope of justification through faith, should keep up a sight of a forgiving God ; for that is the best preparative for, suffering. As then you are not secure from afflictions, never satisfy yourselves to go a day with- out a sight ofyour freedom from condemningguilt, with- out some hopes ofpardon. O wrestle and be importunate with God with this petition. Do not condemn me. Let mot the evidences of our love to God be blotted or, dark- ened by a disorderly course of life. Let us not lose our evidences of a better world by our unwatchfulness, lest sorrow come upon us by surprise, and seize us at once, and we have all ,these things to seek which might beour support.
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