Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God
“...Their foot shall slide in due time...” (Deuteronomy 32:35)
In this verse is threatened the vengeance of God on the wicked unbelieving Israelites, who were God's visible people, and who lived under the means of grace; but who, notwithstanding all God's wonderful works towards them, remained (as ver. 28.) void of counsel, having no understanding in them. Under all the cultivations of heaven, they brought forth bitter and poisonous fruit; as in the two verses next preceding the text.
The expression I have chosen for my text, Their foot shall slide in due time, seems to imply the following doings, relating to the punishment and destruction to which these wicked Israelites were exposed.
1). That they were always exposed to destruction; as one that stands or walks in slippery places is always exposed to fall. This is implied in the manner of their destruction coming upon them, being represented by their foot sliding. The same is expressed, Psalm lxxiii. 18. "Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them down into destruction."
2. It implies, that they were always exposed to sudden unexpected destruction. As he that walks in slippery
places is every moment liable to fall, he cannot foresee one moment whether he shall stand or fall the next;
and when he does fall, he falls at once without warning: Which is also expressed in Psalm lxxiii. 18, 19.
"Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them down into destruction: How are they
brought into desolation as in a moment!"
3. Another thing implied is, that they are liable to fall of themselves, without being thrown down by the hand of
another; as he that stands or walks on
slippery ground needs nothing but his own weight to throw him down.
4. That the reason why they are not fallen already, and do not fall now, is only that God's appointed time is not
come. For it is said, that when that due time, or appointed time comes, their foot shall slide. Then they shall be
left to fall, as they are inclined by their own weight. God will not hold them up in these slippery places any
longer, but will let them go; and then at that very instant, they shall fall into destruction; as he that stands on
such slippery declining ground, on the edge of a pit, he cannot stand alone, when he is let go he immediately
falls and is lost.
The observation from the words that I would now insist upon is this. "There is nothing that keeps wicked men
at any one moment out of hell, but the mere pleasure of God." By the mere pleasure of God, I mean his
sovereign pleasure, his arbitrary will, restrained by no obligation, hindered by no manner of difficulty, any
more than if nothing else but God's mere will had
in the least degree, or in any respect whatsoever, any hand in the preservation of wicked men one moment.
The truth of this observation may appear by the following considerations.
1. There is no want of power in God to cast wicked men into hell at any moment. Men's hands cannot be strong
when God rises up. The strongest have no power to resist him, nor can any deliver out of his hands.‑He is not
only able to cast wicked men into hell, but he can most easily do it. Sometimes an earthly prince meets with a
great deal of difficulty to subdue
a rebel, who has found means to fortify himself, and has made himself strong by the numbers of his followers.
But it is not so with God. There is
no fortress that is any defence from the power of God. Though hand join in hand, and vast multitudes of God's
enemies combine and associate themselves, they are easily broken in pieces. They are as great heaps of
light chaff before the whirlwind; or large quantities of dry stubble before devouring flames. We find it easy to
tread on and crush a worm that we see crawling on the earth; so it is easy for us to cut or singe a slender
thread that any thing hangs by: thus easy is it for God, when he pleases, to cast his enemies down to hell.
What are we, that we should think to stand
before him, at whose rebuke the earth trembles, and before whom the rocks are thrown down?
2. They deserve to be cast into hell; so that divine justice never stands in
the way, it makes no objection against God's using his power at any
moment to destroy them. Yea, on the contrary, justice calls aloud for an
infinite punishment of their sins. Divine justice says of the tree that brings
forth such grapes of Sodom, "Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground?"
Luke xiii. 7. The sword of divine justice is every moment brandished over
their heads, and it is nothing but the hand of arbitrary mercy, and God's
mere will, that holds it back.
3. They are already under a sentence of condemnation to hell. They do not
only justly deserve to be cast down thither, but the sentence of the law of
God, that eternal and immutable rule of righteousness that God has fixed
between him and mankind, is gone out against them, and stands against
them; so that they are bound over already to hell. John iii. 18. "He that
believeth not is condemned already." So that every unconverted man
properly belongs to hell; that is his place; from thence he is, John viii. 23.
"Ye are from beneath." And thither be is bound; it is the place that justice,
and God's word, and the sentence of his unchangeable law assign to him.
4. They are now the objects of that very same anger and wrath of God,
that is expressed in the torments of hell. And the reason why they do not
go down to hell at each moment, is not because God, in whose power they
are, is not then very angry with them; as he is with many miserable
creatures now tormented in hell, who there feel and bear the fierceness of
his wrath. Yea, God is a great deal more angry with great numbers that are
now on earth: yea, doubtless, with many that are now in this congregation,
who it may be are at ease, than he is with many of those who are now in
the flames of hell.
So that it is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and does
not resent it, that he does not let loose his hand and cut them off. God is
not altogether such an one as themselves, though they may imagine him to
be so. The wrath of God burns against them, their damnation does not
slumber; the pit is prepared, the fire is made ready, the furnace is now hot,
ready to receive them; the flames do now rage and glow. The glittering
sword is whet, and held over them, and the pit hath opened its mouth
under them.
5. The devil stands ready to fall upon them, and seize them as his own, at
what moment God shall permit him. They belong to him; he has their souls
in his possession, and under his dominion. The scripture represents them as
his goods, Luke xi. 12. The devils watch them; they are ever by them at
their right hand; they stand waiting for them, like greedy hungry lions that
see their prey, and expect to have it, but are for the present kept back. If
God should withdraw his hand, by which they are restrained, they would in
one moment fly upon their poor souls. The old serpent is gaping for them;
hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if God should perrnit it, they
would be hastily swallowed up and lost.
6. There are in the souls of wicked men those hellish principles reigning,
that would presently kindle and flame out into hell fire, if it were not for
God's restraints. There is laid in the very nature of carnal men, a foundation
for the torments of hell. There are those corrupt principles, in reigning
power in them, and in full possession of them, that are seeds of hell fire.
These principles are active and powerful, exceeding violent in their nature,
and if it were not for the restraining hand of God upon them, they would
soon break out, they would flame out after the same manner as the same
corruptions, the same enmity does in the hearts of damned souls, and
would beget the same torments as they do in them. The souls of the wicked
are in scripture compared to the troubled sea, Isa. lvii. 20. For the present,
God restrains their wickedness by his mighty power, as he does the raging
waves of the troubled sea, saying, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no
further;" but if God should withdraw that restraining power, it would soon
carry all before it. Sin is the ruin and misery of the soul; it is destructive in
its nature; and if God should leave it without restraint, there would need
nothing else to make the soul perfectly miserable. The corruption of the
heart of man is immoderate and boundless in its fury; and while wicked
men live here, it is like fire pent up by God's restraints, whereas if it were
let loose, it would set on fire the course of nature; and as the heart is now a
sink of sin, so if sin was not restrained, it would immediately turn the soul
into a fiery oven, or a furnace of fire and brimstone.
7. It is no security to wicked men for one moment, that there are no visible
means of death at hand. It is no security to a natural man, that he is now in
health, and that he does not see which way he should now immediately go
out of the world by any accident, and that there is no visible danger in any
respect in his circumstances. The manifold and continual experience of the
world in all ages, shows this is no evidence, that a man is not on the very
brink of eternity, and that the next step will not be into another world. The
unseen, unthought‑of ways and means of persons going suddenly out of the
world are innumerable and inconceivable. Unconverted men walk over the
pit of hell on a rotten covering, and there are innumerable places in this
covering so weak that they will not bear their weight, and these places are
not seen. The arrows of death fly unseen at noon‑day; the sharpest sight
cannot discern them. God has so many different unsearchable ways of
taking wicked men out of the world and sending them to hell, that there is
nothing to make it appear, that God had need to be at the expence of a
miracle, or go out of the ordinary course of his providence, to destroy any
wicked nian, at any moment. All the means that there are of sinners going
out of the world, are so in God's hands, and so universally and absolutely
subject to his power and determination, that it does not depend at all the
less on the mere will of God, whether sinners shall at any moment go to
hell, than if means were never made use of, or at all concerned in the case.
8. Natural men's prudence and care to preserve their own lives, or the care
of others to preserve them, do not secure them a moment. To this, divine
providence and universal experience do also bear testimony. There is this
clear evidence that men's own wisdom is no security to them from death;
that if it were otherwise we should see some difference between the wise
and politic men of the world, and others, with regard to their liableness to
early and unexpected death: but how is it in fact? Eccles. ii. 16. "How dieth
the wise man? even as the fool."
9. All wicked men's pains and contrivance which they use to escape hell,
while they continue to reject Christ, and so remain wicked men, do not
secure them from hell one moment. Almost every natural man that hears of
hell, flatters himself that he shall escape it; he depends upon himself for his
own security; he flatters himself in what he has done, in what he is now
doing, or what he intends to do. Every one lays out matters in his own mind
how he shall avoid damnation, and flatters himself that he contrives well for
himself, and that his schemes will not fail. They hear indeed that there are
but few saved, and that the greater part of men that have died heretofore
are gone to hell; but each one imagines that he lays out matters better for
his own escape than others have done. He does not intend to come to that
place of torment; he says within himself, that he intends to take effectual
care, and to order matters so for himself as not to fail.
But the foolish children of men miserably delude themselves in their own
schemes, and in confidence in their own strength and wisdom; they trust to
nothing but a shadow. The greater part of those who heretofore have lived
under the same means of grace, and are now dead, are undoubtedly gone
to hell; and it was not because they were not as wise as those who are now
alive: it was not because they did not lay out matters as well for themselves
to secure their own escape. If we could speak with them, and inquire of
them, one by one, whether they expected, when alive, and when they used
to hear about hell ever to be the subects of that misery: we doubtless,
should hear one and another reply, "No, I never intended to come here: I
had laid out matters otherwise in my mind; I thought I should contrive well
for myself: I thought my scheme good. I intended to take effectual care; but
it came upon me unexpected; I did not look for it at that time, and in that
manner; it came as a thief: Death outwitted me: God's wrath was too quick
for me. Oh, my cursed foolishness! I was flattering myself, and pleasing
myself with vain dreams of what I would do hereafter; and when I was
saying, Peace and safety, then suddenly destruction came upon me.
10. God has laid himself under no obligation, by any promise to keep any
natural man out of hell one moment. God certainly has made no promises
either of eternal life, or of any deliverance or preservation from eternal
death, but what are contained in the covenant of grace, the promises that
are given in Christ, in whom all the promises are yea and amen. But surely
they have no interest in the promises of the covenant of grace who are not
the children of the covenant, who do not believe in any of the promises,
and have no interest in the Mediator of the covenant.
So that, whatever some have imagined and pretended about promises
made to natural men's earnest seeking and knocking, it is plain and
manifest, that whatever pains a natural man takes in religion, whatever
prayers he makes, till he believes in Christ, God is under no manner of
obligation to keep him a moment from eternal destruction.
So that, thus it is that natural men are held in the hand of God, over the pit
of hell; they have deserved the fiery pit, and are already sentenced to it;
and God is dreadfully provoked, his anger is as great towards them as to
those that are actually suffering the executions of the fierceness of his wrath
in hell, and they have done nothing in the least to appease or abate that
anger, neither is God in the least bound by any promise to hold them up
one moment; the devil is waiting for them, hell is gaping for them, the flames
gather and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on them, and swallow
them up; the fire pent up in their own hearts is struggling to break out: and
they have no interest in any Mediator, there are no means within reach that
can be any security to them. In short, they have no refuge, nothing to take
hold of, all that preserves them every moment is the mere arbitrary will, and
uncovenanted, unobliged forbearance of an incensed God.
APPLICATION
The use of this awful subject may be for awakening unconverted persons in
this congregation. This that you have heard is the case of every one of you
that are out of Christ.‑That world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone,
is extended abroad under you. There is the dreadful pit of the glowing
flames of the wrath of God; there is hell's wide gaping mouth open; and
you have nothing to stand upon, nor any thing to take hold of, there is
nothing between you and hell but the air; it is only the power and mere
pleasure of God that holds you up.
You probably are not sensible of this; you find you are kept out of hell, but
do not see the hand of God in it; but look at other things, as the good state
of your bodily constitution, your care of your own life, and the means you
use for your own preservation. But indeed these things are nothing; if God
should withdraw his band, they would avail no more to keep you from
falling, than the thin air to hold up a person that is suspended in it.
Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend
downwards with great weight and pressure towards hell; and if God should
let you go, you would immediately sink and swiftly descend and plunge into
the bottomless gulf, and your healthy constitution, and your own care and
prudence, and best contrivance, and all your righteousness, would have no
more influence to uphold you and keep you out of hell, than a spider's web
would have to stop a falling rock. Were it not for the sovereign pleasure of
God, the earth would not bear you one moment; for you are a burden to it;
the creation groans with you; the creature is made subject to the bondage
of your corruption, not willingly; the sun does not willingly shine upon you
to give you light to serve sin and Satan; the earth does not willingly yield
her increase to satisfy your lusts; nor is it willingly a stage for your
wickedness to be acted upon; the air does not willingly serve you for
breath to maintain the flame of life in your vitals, while you spend your life
in the service of God's enemies. God's creatures are good, and were made
for men to serve God with, and do not willingly subserve to any other
purpose, and groan when they are abused to purposes so directly contrary
to their nature and end. And the world would spew you out, were it not for
the sovereign hand of him who hath subjected it in hope. There are black
clouds of God's wrath now hanging directly over your heads, full of the
dreadful storm, and big with thunder; and were it not for the restraining
hand of God, it would immediately burst forth upon you. The sovereign
pleasure of God, for the present, stays his rough wind; otherwise it would
come with fury, and your destruction would come like a whirlwind, and
you would be like the chaff of the summer threshing floor.
The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present;
they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is
given; and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its
course, when once it is let loose. It is true, that judgment against your evil
works has not been executed hitherto; the floods of God's vengeance have
been withheld; but your guilt in the mean time is constantly increasing, and
you are every day treasuring up more wrath; the waters are constantly
rising, and waxing more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere
pleasure of God, that holds the waters back, that are unwilling to be
stopped, and press hard to go forward. If God should only withdraw his
hand from the flood‑gate, it would immediately fly open, and the fiery
floods of the fierceness and wrath of God, would rush forth with
inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with omnipotent power; and
if your strength were ten thousand times greater than it is, yea, ten thousand
times greater than the strength of the stoutest, sturdiest devil in hell, it would
be nothing to withstand or endure it.
The bow of God's wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string,
and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is
nothing but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without
any promise or obligatioti at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from
being made drunk with your blood. Thus all you that never passed under a
great change of heart, by the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon your
souls; all you that were never born again, and made new creatures, and
raised from being dead in sin, to a state of new, and before altogether
unexperienced light and life, are in the hands of an angry God. However
you may have reformed your life in many things, and may have had
religious affections, and may keep up a form of religion in your families and
closets, and in the house of God, it is nothing but his mere pleasure that
keeps you from being this moment swallowed up in everlasting destruction.
However unconvinced you may now be of the truth of what you hear, by
and by you will be fully convinced of it. Those that are gone from being in
the like circumstances with you, see that it was so with them; for
destruction came suddenly upon most of them; when they expected nothing
of it, and while they were saying, Peace and safety: now they see, that
those things on which they depended for peace and safety, were nothing
but thin air and empty shadows.
The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or
some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully
provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as
worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than
to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more
abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours.
You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his
prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the
fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go
to hell the last night; that you was suffered to awake again in this world,
after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be
given, why you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning,
but that God's hand has held you up. There is no other reason to be given
why you have not gone to hell, since you have sat here in the house of
God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending
his solemn worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a
reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.
O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great furnace of
wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath, that you are held
over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and incensed as
much against you, as against many of the damned in hell. You hang by a
slender thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it, and ready
every moment to singe it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest in
any Mediator, and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep
off the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have
done, nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment.
And consider here more particularly
1. Whose wrath it is: it is the wrath of the infinite God. If it were only the
wrath of man, though it were of the most potent prince, it would be
comparatively little to be regarded. The wrath of kings is very much
dreaded, especially of absolute monarchs, who have the possessions and
lives of their subjects wholly in their power, to be disposed of at their mere
will. Prov. xx. 2. "The fear of a king is as the roaring of a lion: Whoso
provoketh him to anger, sinneth against his own soul." The subject that very
much enrages an arbitrary prince, is liable to suffer the most extreme
torments that human art can invent, or human power can inflict. But the
greatest earthly potentates in their greatest majesty and strength, and when
clothed in their greatest terrors, are but feeble, despicable worms of the
dust, in comparison of the great and almighty Creator and King of heaven
and earth. It is but little that they can do, when most enraged, and when
they have exerted the utmost of their fury. All the kings of the earth, before
God, are as grasshoppers; they are nothing, and less than nothing: both
their love and their hatred is to be despised. The wrath of the great King of
kings, is as much more terrible than theirs, as his majesty is greater. Luke
xii. 4, 5. "And I say unto you, my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the
body, and after that, have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn
you whom you shall fear: fear him, which after he hath killed, hath power to
cast into hell: yea, I say unto you, Fear him."
2. It is the fierceness of his wrath that you are exposed to. We often read
of the fury of God; as in Isaiah lix. 18. "According to their deeds,
accordingly he will repay fury to his adversaries." So Isaiah lxvi. 15. "For
behold, the Lord will come with fire, and wifh his chariots like a whirlwind,
to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire." And in
many other places. So, Rev. xix. 15, we read of "the wine press of the
fierceness and wrath of Almighty God." The words are exceeding terrible.
If it had only been said, "the wrath of God," the words would have implied
that which is infinitely dreadful: but it is "the fierceness and wrath of God."
The fury of God! the fierceness of Jehovah! Oh, how dreadful must that
be! Who can utter or conceive what such expressions carry in them! But it
is also "the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God." As though there would
be a very great manifestation of his almighty power in what the fierceness
of his wrath should inflict, as though omnipotence should be as it were
enraged, and exerted, as men are wont to exert their strength in the
fierceness of their wrath. Oh! then, what will be the consequence! What
will become of the poor worms that shall suffer it! Whose hands can be
strong? And whose heart can endure? To what a dreadful, inexpressible,
inconceivable depth of misery must the poor creature be sunk who shall be
the subject of this!
Consider this, you that are here present, that yet remain in an unregenerate
state. That God will execute the fierceness of his anger, implies, that he will
inflict wrath without any pity. When God beholds the ineffable extremity of
your case, and sees your torment to be so vastly disproportioned to your
strength, and sees how your poor soul is crushed, and sinks down, as it
were, into an infinite gloom; he will have no compassion upon you, he will
not forbear the executions of his wrath, or in the least lighten his hand; there
shall be no moderation or mercy, nor will God then at all stay his rough
wind; he will have no regard to your welfare, nor be at all careful lest you
should suffer too much in any other sense, than only that you shall not
suffer beyond what strict justice requires. Nothing shall be withheld,
because it is so hard for you to bear. Ezek. viii. 18. "Therefore will I also
deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though
they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear them." Now God
stands ready to pity you; this is a day of mercy; you may cry now with
some encouragement of obtaining mercy. But when once the day of mercy
is past, your most lamentable and dolorous cries and shrieks will be in vain;
you will be wholly lost and thrown away of God, as to any regard to your
welfare. God will have no other use to put you to, but to suffer misery; you
shall be continued in being to no other end; for you will be a vessel of
wrath fitted to destruction; and there will be no other use of this vessel, but
to be filled full of wrath. God will be so far from pitying you when you cry
to him, that it is said he will only "laugh and mock," Prov. i. 25, 26, &c.
How awful are those words, Isa. lxiii. 3, which are the words of the great
God. "I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and
their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my
raiment." It is perhaps impossible to conceive of words that carry in them
greater manifestations of these three things, vis. contempt, and hatred, and
fierceness of indignation. If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far
from pitying you in your doleful case, or showing you the least regard or
favour, that instead of that, he will only tread you under foot. And though
he will know that you cannot bear the weight of omnipotence treading upon
you, yet he will not regard that, but he will crush you under his feet without
mercy; he will crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be
sprinkled on his garments, so as to stain all his raiment. He will not only
hate you, but he will have you, in the utmost contempt: no place shall be
thought fit for you, but under his feet to be trodden down as the mire of the
streets.
The misery you are exposed to is that which God will inflict to that end,
that he might show what that wrath of Jehovah is. God hath had it on his
heart to show to angels and men, both how excellent his love is, and also
how terrible his wrath is. Sometimes earthly kings have a mind to show
how terrible their wrath is, by the extreme punishments they would execute
on those that would provoke them. Nebuchadnezzar, that mighty and
haughty monarch of the Chaldean empire, was willing to show his wrath
when enraged with Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego; and accordingly
gave orders that the burning fiery furnace should be heated seven times
hotter than it was before; doubtless, it was raised to the utmost degree of
fierceness that human art could raise it. But the great God is also willing to
show his wrath, and magnify his awful majesty and mighty power in the
extreme sufferings of his enemies. Rom. ix. 22. "What if God, willing to
show his wrath, and to make his power known, endure with much
long‑suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction?" And seeing this is
his design, and what he has determined, even to show how terrible the
unrestrained wrath, the fury and fierceness of Jehovah is, he will do it to
effect. There will be something accomplished and brought to pass that will
be dreadful with a witness. When the great and angry God hath risen up
and executed his awful vengeance on the poor sinner, and the wretch is
actually suffering the infinite weight and power of his indignation, then will
God call upon the whole universe to behold that awful majesty and mighty
power that is to be seen in it. Isa. xxxiii. 12‑14. "And the people shall be as
the burnings of lime, as thorns cut up shall they be burnt in the fire. Hear ye
that are far off, what I have done; and ye that are near, acknowledge my
might. The sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness hath surprised the
hypocrites," &c.
Thus it will be with you that are in an unconverted state, if you continue in
it; the infinite might, and majesty, and terribleness of the omnipotent God
shall be magnified upon you, in the ineffable strength of your torments. You
shall be tormented in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence
of the Lamb; and when you shall be in this state of suffering, the glorious
inhabitants of heaven shall go forth and look on the awful spectacle, that
they may see what the wrath and fierceness of the Almighty is; and when
they have seen it, they will fall down and adore that great power and
majesty. Isa. lxvi. 23, 24. "And it shall come to pass, that from one new
moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to
worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go forth and look upon
the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me; for their worm
shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an
abhorring unto all flesh."
4. It is everlasting wrath. It would be dreadful to suffer this fierceness and
wrath of Almighty God one moment; but you must suffer it to all eternity.
There will be no end to this exquisite horrible misery. When you look
forward, you shall see a long for ever, a boundless duration before you,
which will swallow up your thoughts, and amaze your soul; and you will
absolutely despair of ever having any deliverance, any end, any mitigation,
any rest at all. You will know certainly that you must wear out long ages,
millions of millions of ages, in wrestling and conflicting with this almighty
merciless vengeance; and then when you have so done, when so many
ages have actually been spent by you in this manner, you will know that all
is but a point to what remains. So that your punishment will indeed be
infinite. Oh, who can express what the state of a soul in such circumstances
is! All that we can possibly say about it, gives but a very feeble, faint
representation of it; it is inexpressible and inconceivable: For "who knows
the power of God's anger?"
How dreadful is the state of those that are daily and hourly in the danger of
this great wrath and infinite misery! But this is the dismal case of every soul
in this congregation that has not been born again, however moral and strict,
sober and religious, they may otherwise be. Oh that you would consider it,
whether you be young or old! There is reason to think, that there are many
in this congregation now hearing this discourse, that will actually be the
subjects of this very misery to all eternity. We know not who they are, or in
what seats they sit, or what thoughts they now have. It may be they are
now at ease, and hear all these things without much disturbance, and are
now flattering themselves that they are not the persons, promising
themselves that they shall escape. If we knew that there was one person,
and but one, in the whole congregation, that was to be the subject of this
misery, what an awful thing would it be to think of! If we knew who it was,
what an awful sight would it be to see such a person! How might all the
rest of the congregation lift up a lamentable and bitter cry over him! But,
alas! instead of one, how many is it likely will remember this discourse in
hell? And it would be a wonder, if some that are now present should not
be in hell in a very short time, even before this year is out. And it would be
no wonder if some persons, that now sit here, in some seats of this
meeting‑house, in health, quiet and secure, should be there before
to‑morrow morning. Those of you that finally continue in a natural
condition, that shall keep out of hell longest will be there in a little time!
your damnation does not slumber; it will come swiftly, and, in all
probability, very suddenly upon many of you. You have reason to wonder
that you are not already in hell. It is doubtless the case of some whom you
have seen and known, that never deserved hell more than you, and that
heretofore appeared as likely to have been now alive as you. Their case is
past all hope; they are crying in extreme misery and perfect despair; but
here you are in the land of the living and in the house of God, and have an
opportuniry to obtain salvation. What would not those poor damned
hopeless souls give for one day's opportunity such as you now enjoy!
And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ has
thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and crying with
a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and
pressing into the kingdom of God. Many are daily coming from the east,
west, north and south; many that were very lately in the same miserable
condition that you are in, are now in a happy state, with their hearts filled
with love to him who has loved them, and washed them from their sins in
his own blood, and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. How awful is it to
be left behind at such a day! To see so many others feasting, while you are
pining and perishing! To see so many rejoicing and singing for joy of heart,
while you have cause to mourn for sorrow of heart, and howl for vexation
of spirit! How can you rest one moment in such a condition? Are not your
souls as precious as the souls of the people at Suffield*, where they are
flocking from day to day to Christ?
Are there not many here who have lived long in the world, and are not to
this day born again? and so are aliens from the commonwealth of Israel,
and have done nothing ever since they have lived, but treasure up wrath
against the day of wrath? Oh, sirs, your case, in an especial manner, is
extremely dangerous. Your guilt and hardness of heart is extremely great.
Do you not see how generally persons of your years are passed over and
left, in the present remarkable and wonderful dispensation of God's mercy?
You had need to consider yourselves, and awake thoroughly out of sleep.
You cannot bear the fierceness and wrath of the infinite God.‑And you,
young men, and young women, will you neglect this precious season which
you now enjoy, when so many others of your age are renouncing all
youthful vanities, and flocking to Christ? You especially have now an
extraordinary opportunity; but if you neglect it, it will soon be with you as
with those persons who spent all the precious days of youth in sin, and are
now come to such a dreadful pass in blindness and hardness. And you,
children, who are unconverted, do not you know that you are going down
to hell, to bear the dreadful wrath of that God, who is now angry with you
every day and every night? Will you be content to be the children of the
devil, when so many other children in the land are converted, and are
become the holy and happy children of the King of kings?
And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the pit of hell,
whether they be old men and women, or middle aged, or young people, or
little children, now harken to the loud calls of God's word and providence.
This acceptable year of the Lord, a day of such great favours to some, will
doubtless be a day of as remarkable vengeance to others. Men's hearts
harden, and their guilt increases apace at such a day as this, if they neglect
their souls; and never was there so great danger of such persons being
given up to hardness of heart and blindness of mind. God seems now to be
hastily gathering in his elect in all parts of the land; and probably the greater
part of adult persons that ever shall be saved, will be brought in now in a
little time, and that it will be as it was on the great out‑pouring of the Spirit
upon the Jews in the apostles' days; the election will obtain, and the rest
will be blinded. If this should be the case with you, you will eternally curse
this day, and will curse the day that ever you was born, to see such a
season of the pouring out of God's Spirit, and will wish that you had died
and gone to hell before you had seen it. Now undoubtedly it is, as it was in
the days of John the Baptist, the axe is in an extraordinary manner laid at
the root of the trees, that every tree which brings not forth good fruit, may
be hewn down and cast into the fire.
Therefore, let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the
wrath to come. The wrath of Almighty God is now undoubtedly hanging
over a great part of this congregation: Let every one fly out of Sodom:
"Haste and escape for your lives, look not behind you, escape to the
mountain, lest you be consumed."
*A town in the neighbourhood.
(Taken, in part, from a sermon by Johnathan Edwards, entitled “Sinners in The Hands of an Angry God).