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NEARNESS
TO
GOD
CSERM.
XI.
God
should
be
numbered among the
instruments of
real
misery.
Does
Satan,
the
fallen
angel,
solicit
our
youth
with
his
flatteries;
that
it
is
time enough
to
mind religion
yet;
let
us
have,
a
few
more gaudy days first
?
Does
he
frighten the
aged
sinner with terrible
falsehoods, and
tempt
him
to
an
utter
despair
of
grace
?
Let
his
wicked
suggestions be
renounced
with disdain,
and let
him
never
prevail to keep one soul
of
us
at
a distance
from
God
;
for
his
first business
was
to divide
us
from
God, and to
ruin our
happiness:
And
it
is. his
daily
employment
to
hold
us
fast
in
the chains
of
iniquity and death,
and thus
to prevent
our return
to God.
.
Does
..the
flesh
allure
us to pursue
sinful delights
?
Does it
awaken and charm
our
imagination
with
the
flowery
and
fatal
scenes
of
luxury and mirth? Do
the
lusts
of
the
flesh,
or
the lusts
of
the
eye,
persuade
us
to
seek happiness among
them? And tempt
us,
at
least
for the present,
to lay
aside
the thoughts
of
God
?
Let
us
set
a
strict
guard upon
ourselves,
and
watch
all
the
avenues
of
sense
and appetite, lest
we
be
drawn off from
the practice of
piety,
and the
service,
and
the
love
of
God,
where
true
happiness
is
only to be
found.
Do
you find,
O christians,
that
the world
begins
to
creep into your hearts
?
Do
you
find
any
creature sit
too
near your
souls,
and take
up
any
of that
time
and
room
which
God
should
have
there
?
Awake, betimes,
and bestir
yourselves,
lest it divide
you from
your hap-
piness.
When
you
feel
your spirits
at
any time grow
cold
in
religious worship, when
you
can
pass a day with
an indifference about secret
converse
with
God, and
be
content
to be long
absent
from
him,
search
with
dili-
gence
what
enemy
it
is
that
has
crept
in secretly,
and
in-
terposes betwixt
G
od
and you; and when
you
have found
it, never rest,
till
by
the aids
of
divine grace, you have
removed the idol from
your
thoughts,
and your
soul
be
restored
to its holy
nearness
to
God
again.
I
might
say
in general, concerning
all
this
world,
keep
your hearts
aloof
from it,
while
your
hands, and
perhaps
your
heads
too,
are engaged
in
the necessary
affairs
of
it.
The nearer your
souls.
are
to the
creatures, the farther
they
depart
from
God
and
blessedness.
As
a
natural
con-
sequence
from this thought,
we
may
raise a
is
,