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that great day. Come now and delay not, lest the spirit of God should cease to strive with you: like Noah's dove to take its flight and no more to return. We read of wars and commotions, now this is nothing compared with that great and notable day. Behold the fig tree now in tender buding; O shepherd! hark ye, and wake, and hear the cries of bleeding Zion! While the celestial sun is yet shining, let us act our part like pure hearted men and fly unto Jesus and beg for sinners for God to have mercy on them, for we see by the revelation of God, the earth will burn, the moon will bleed, the sun will be turned into darkness, and behold! the comets will blaze through the sky, and then you will hear Jesus say unto his watchmen, leave the walls of Zion. The trumpet is to be blown no more: and he will say, come ye blessed, enter into the kingdom which I have prepared for you, well and faithful have you run your course to the end of life, and here is a crown for you: while entering, O hear the shouts, the loud hallelujah of the church militant! Triumphant are we come together to part no more: the glorious song will be sung, victory, we have overcome, and to enter into that great assembly the church of the first born. Now to the wicked look back O my soul and wonder, could it be possible that an intelligent man or woman, could neglect their soul's salvation, while the gospel trumpet was sounding unto them to awake and fly to Jesus, for there is no other help found, nor no other name given whereby man can have salvation! But their excuse was, that while the lamp holds out to burn, they had time enough. But what I understand by the lamp's burning is, while the spirit of God is striving with man, for God said to the antideluvian world, my spirit shall not always strive with man, and then when God had shut Noah into the ark, the spirit ceased to strive with them, so it was with Sodom when Lot went out of it, it rained fire and brimstone, and this was David's language. See 11 Ps. 6 v. Sinners now ought to consider this sentence, for I warn you as for eternity, to consider, it is for the interest of your never dying souls. Consider when God's thunder begins to roll, and the elements with its awful terror spliting the earth, rending the rocks, the lightning flashing from pole to pole, the wind blowing, the seas boiling; while in your house