3
Voice, or look for redemption and salvation by any other means than by His Cross and Blood, then we have every reason to fear, that these endeavours of our enemies will be successful; that the light of God's presence will be withheld from us; and that, as He withdrew from the Jews, when they neglected Christ, the Lord of Glory, so He will withdraw from our Nation also, and leave it to the wretchedness of its own chosen ways; to the enjoyment of those idols, the world, the flesh, and the Devil, for which it will have forsaken the Holy One of Israel, and refused to hearken to the voice of the Lamb of God, who died to take away the sins of the world. But if not, if we have reason to hope that there are many true Servants of God still to be found; that there are many who, not with their lips only, but in their hearts and with their lives acknowledge Him the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom He has sent; acknowledge Him so as to obey His voice, and keep and do what He has commanded; then may we regard the attempts of our enemies without dismay; then may we have firm and stedfast hope, that the gates of Hell shall not prevail against us: that though it may please God that we should suffer for a while;—as we suffered, together with good King Charles, at the hands of the Dissenters; as we suffered, in the days of bloody Queen Mary, at the hands of the Roman Catholics; as we suffered during the first three hundred years after Christ, at the hands of the Heathens and the Jews;—yet that eventually triumph will await us; that He will bring our Church out of the trial, like gold out of the fire, more pure and of greater worth, ("I will purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin;" Is. i. 25.) that "all things will work together for good" to us; and that the purpose aimed at by the affliction is, that He "may present our Church to Himself as a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish." Ephes. v. 27.
It will hence appear, that it is in the power of every individual, by a holy and religious life in the true faith and fear of God and our Lord Jesus Christ, to promote not only his own salvation, but the welfare and stability of the Church of Christ; or by an unholy, careless, and irreligious life, not only to secure his own
