The fifth device Satan hath to draw souls off from religious services, and to keep souls off from holy duties, is,
Device (5). By presenting to them the paucity and poverty of those that walk in the ways of God, that hold on in religious practices. Saith Satan, Do not you see that those that walk in such and such religious ways are the poorest, the meanest, and the most despicable persons in the world This took with them in John vii. 47-49, ‘ Then answered the pharisees, Are ye also deceived? Have any of the rulers, ot of the pharisees, believed on him? But this people who knoweth not the law are cursed.’
Now the remedies against this device are these that follow:
Remedy (1). The first remedy against this device of Satan is, to consider, That though they are outwardly poor, yet they are inwardly rich. Though they are poor in temporals, yet they are rich in spirituals.? The worth and riches of the saints 1s inward. The King’s daughter is all glorious within,” Ps. xlv. 13. Hearken, my beloved brethren, hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? saith James ii. 5. ‘I know thy poverty, but thou art rich,’ saith John to the church of Smyrna,” Rev. ii. 4 What though they have little in possession, yet they have a glorious kingdom in reversion. Fear not, little flock, it is your Father’s pleasure to give you a kingdom, Luke xii. 32. Though saints have little in hand, yet they have much in hope. You count those happy, in a worldly sense, that have much in reversion, though they have little in possession; and will you count the saints miserable because they have little in hand, little In possession, though they have a glorious kingdom in reversion of this? I am sure the poorest saint that breathes will not exchange, were it in his power, that which he hath in hope and in reversion, for the possession of as many worlds as there be stars in heaven, or sands in the sea, &c.
Remedy (2). The second remedy against this device of Satan is, to consider, That im all ages God hath had some that have been great, rich, wise, and honourable, that have chosen his ways, and cleaved to his service in the face of all difficulties. Though not many wise men, yet some wise men; and though not many mighty, yet some mighty have; and though not many noble, yet some noble have. Witness Abraham, and Jacob, and Job, and several kings, and others that the Scriptures speak of. And ah! how many have we among ourselves, whose souls have cleaved to the Lord, and who have swum to his service through the blood of the slain, and who have not counted
their lives dear unto them, that they and others might enjoy the holy things of Christ, according to the mind and heart of Christ, &c.! Remedy (8). The third remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider, That the spiritual riches of the poorest saints do infinitely transcend the temporal riches of all the wicked men in the world; their spiritual riches do satisfy them; they can sit down satisfied with the riches of grace that be in Christ, without honours, and without riches, &c? He that drinks of that water that I shall give him, shall thirst no more,” John iv. 13. The riches of poor saints are durable; they will bed and board with them; they will go to the prison, to a sickbed, to a grave, yea, to heaven with them. The spiritual riches of poor saints are as wine to cheer them, and as bread to strengthen them, and as cloth to warm them, and as armour to protect them. Now, all you that know anything, do know that the riches of this world cannot satisfy the souls of men, and they = are as fading as a flower, or as the owners of them are, &c.
Remedy (4). The fourth remedy against this device is, seriously to consider, That though the saints, considered comparatively, are few; though they be ‘a little, little flock, ‘a remnant,’ ‘a garden enclosed,’ “a spring shut up, a fountain sealed,’ though they are as the summer gleanings;’ though they are ‘ one of a city, and two of a tribe; though they be but a handfulto a houseful, a spark to a flame, a drop to the ocean, yet consider them simply in themselves, and so they are an innumerable number that cannot be numbered. As John speaketh: After this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and peoples, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands,’ Rev. vii. 9. So Matthew speaks: ‘ And I say unto you, that many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven,” Mat. viii. 11. So Paul: But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,” Heb. xii. 22.
Remedy (5). The fifth remedy against this device of Satan is, seriously to consider, That it will be but as a day before these poor despised saints shall shine brighter than the sun in his glory. It will not be long before you will wish, Oh! that we were now among the poor, mean despised onesin the day that God comes to make up his jewels! It will not be long before these poor few saints shall be lifted up upon their thrones to judge the multitude, the world, as the apostle speaks: Know ye not that the saints shall judge the world 1 Cor. vi. 2. And in that
day, oh! how will the great and the rich, the learned and the noble, wish that they had lived and spent their days with these few poor contemptible creatures in the service of the Lord! Oh! how will this wicked world curse the day that ever they had such base thoughts of the poor mean saints, and that their poverty became a stumbling-block to keep them off from the ways of sanctity.!
I have read of Ingo, an ancient king of the Draves, who, making a stately feast, appointed his nobles, at that time pagans, to sit in the hall below, and commanded certain poor Christians to be brought up into his presence-chamber, to sit with him at his table, to eat and drink of his kingly cheer; at which many wondering, he said, He accounted Christians, though never so poor, a greater ornament to his table, and more worthy of his company, than the greatest peers unconverted to the Christian faith; for when these might be thrust down to hell, those might be his consorts and fellow-princes in heaven You know how to apply it. Although you see the stars sometimes by their reflections in a puddle, or in the bottom of a well, ay, in a stinking ditch, yet the stars have their situation in heaven. So, though you see a godly man in a poor, miserable, low, despised condition for the things of this world, yet he is fixed in heaven, in the region of heaven: Who hath raised us up,’ saith the apostle, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus’ Oh! therefore, say to your own souls, when they begin to decline the ways of Sion because of the - poverty and paucity of those that walk in them, The day is at hand when those few, poor, despised saints shall shine in glory, when they shall judge this world, and when all the wicked of this world will wish that they were in their condition, and would give ten thousand worlds, were it in their power, that they might but have the honour and happiness to wait upon those whom for their poverty and paucity they have neglected and despised in this world.
Remedy (6). The sixth remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider, That there will come a time, even in this life, in this world, when the reproach and contempt that is now cast upon the ways of God, by reason of the poverty and paucity of those that walk in those ways, shall be quite taken away, by his making them the head that have days without number been the tail, and by his raising them wp to much outward riches, prosperity, and glory, who have been as the outcast because of their poverty and paucity. John,
speaking of the glory of the church, the new Jerusalem that came down from heaven, Rev. xxi. 24, tells us, ‘ That the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the eafth do bring their glory into it” So the prophet Isaiah, They shall bring their sons from far, and their silver and their gold with them. For brass I will bring gold, and for iron I will bring silver, and for wood brass, and for stones iron, chap. 1x. 17. And so the prophet Zechariah speaks: chap. xiv. 14, And the wealth of all the heathen round about shall be gathered together, gold, and silver, and apparel, in great abundance The Lord hath promised that the meek shall inherit the earth,” Mat. v. 5; and heaven and earth shall pass away, before one jot or one tittle of his word shall pass unfulfilled,” ver. 18. Ab, poor saints! now some thrust sore at you, others look a-squint upon you, others shut the door against you, others turn their backs upon you, and most of men (except it be a few that live much in Godand are filled with the riches of Christ) do either neglect you or despise you because of your poverty; but the day is coming when you shall be lifted up above the dunghill, when you shall change poverty for riches, your rags for robes, your reproach for a crown of honour, your infamy for glory, even in this world.
And this is not all, but God will also mightily increase the number of his chosen ones, multitudes shall be converted to him: Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Sion travailed, she brought forth children. And they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the Lord, out of all nations, upon horses, and in chariots, in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord; as the children of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel into the house of the Lord,’ Isa. lxvi 8, 19, 20. Doth not the Scripture say, that ‘ the kingdoms of this world must become the kingdoms of our = Lord’? Rev. xi. 15. Hath not God given to Christ the heathen, and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession’? Ps. ii. 8. Hath not the Lord said, that in the last days the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be lifted up above the hills, and shall be established in the top of the mountains, and all nations shall flow unto it,” Isa. ii. 2 and liv. 14 and lxi. 9. Pray, read, and meditate upon Isa. Ix. and lxvi. and ii. 1-3, and there you shall find the multitudes that shall be converted to Christ. And oh! that you would be mighty in believing; and, in wrestling with God, that he would hasten the day of his glory, that the reproach that is now upon his people and ways may cease!