3.40 HAPPINESS OF SEPARATE SPIRITS. joined to the Lord in the nearest union in heaven, may well be called one spirit with him, since the apostle says the same thing of the saints on earth; 1 Cor. vi. 17. As our love of God is imperfect here, so is all our devotion and worship. While we are in this world, sin mingles with all our religious duties : We come before God withour prayers and our songs, but our thoughts wander from him in the midst of worship, and we are gone on a sudden to the ends of the earth. We go up to his temple, and we try to serve him there an hour or two ; then we return to the world, and we almost forget the delights of the sanctuary, and the. Godwe have seen there. But the spirits of the just made perfect are before the throne of God and serre him day andnight in his temple ; Rev. vii. 15: And though they may not be literally engaged in one everlastingact of worship, yet they are ever busy in some glorious services for him. If they should be sent on any message to other worlds, yet they never wander from the sight of their God : For if the guardian angels of children always behold the face ofour heavenly Father; Mat. xviii. 10. even when they are employed in their divine er- .Tands to our world ; much more may we suppose the spirits of just men made perfect never lose the blissful vision, whatsoever their employments shall orcan be. And as 'our acts of worship on earth, andconverse with God, are -very imperfect, so is our zeal and activity for God extremely defective, but it shall be ever bright and burning in the upper world: When we would exert our zeal for God on earth, howmany corrupt. affections mix with that zeal and spoil it? Dead flies, that cause that noble ointment to sendforth a stinking satour! Howmuch of self, and pride, and vain ambition too often min- glewith our desires to serve Christ, and his gospel? Somehave preached Christ out of vain glory, or envy; and a mixture of those vices may taint ourpious ministrations. When we seem to drive furiously like Jehu to the destruction of the priests and the worship of Baal, too often the wild-fire of our lusts and passions, our envy and wrath, and secret revenge join together to animate our chariot-wheels. Whenwe are ready to say with him, come, and see my zeal for the Lord, perhaps God espies in our hearts too muchof the same carnal mixture ; for Jelin exalted the true God, that he might establish himself a king; 2 Kings R. i8. But the spirits of the just are perfect in zeal, and pure from all mixtures. Their very natures are like the angels, they are so many flames of sacred and unpolluted fire, the ministers of God that do his pleasure, and then hide their faces behind their wings ; when theyhave done all for God, they fall down and confessthey are nothing. Temptation-and sin have no place in-those happy regions.
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