8. Moreover, the godly have the most honourable attendance. The creatures are all theirs: though not in point of civil propriety, yet as means appointed and managed by God their Father, for their best advantage. The angels of God are ministering spirits for them: not as our servants, but as God's servants for our good. As ministers in the church are not the servants of men, but the servants of God for men. And so, "whether Paul or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present or to come, all are ours;" 1 Cor. iii. 22. The shepherd's servant is not the servant of the sheep, but for the sheep. And so the angels disdain not to serve God in the guarding of the weakest saints. As I formerly shewed you from Heb. i. 14. and Psal. xci. 11, 12. and xxxiv.7. "The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them. For he giveth his angels charge over us, to keep us in all our ways: they shall bear us up in their hands, lest we dash our foot against a stone." Sun and moon, and all the creatures, are daily employed in our attendance. O how wonderful is the love of God to his unworthy servants in their advancement! Remember it when thou art scorning at the servants of the Lord, or speaking against them, that those poor, those weak despised Christians, that thou art vilifying, have their “ gels beholding the face of God their Father in the heavens. Take heed therefore that ye despise not the least of these." It is the warning of Christ, Matt. xviii. 10. The same blessed spirits that attend the Lord, and see his face in blissful glory, do attend and guard the meanest of the godly here on earth. As the same servants use to wait upon the Father and the children, in the same family, or the bigger children to help the less.

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9. And it is the honour of the godly, that they that are themselves most honourable, do honour them. To be magnified by a fool, or wicked flatterer, is small honour; but to be magnified by the best and wisest men, this is true honour. We say that honour is in him that giveth it, and not in him that receiveth it. But it is God himself that honoureth his saints. It is he that speaketh all these great and wondrous things of them, which I have hitherto recited. Search the texts which I have alleged, and try whether it be not he. And surely to have the God of heaven to applaud a man, and put honour upon him, and so great honour, is more than if

all the world had done it. Yet we may add (if any thing could be considerable that is added unto the approbation of God), that all his servants, the wisest, and the best, even his holy angels, are of the same mind, and honour the godly in conformity to their Lord.

And here Christian, I require thee from the Lord, to consider the greatness of thy sin and folly, when thoú art too desirous of the applause of men, especially of the blind, ungodly world; and when thou makest a great matter of their contempt or scorn, or of their slanderous censures. What! is the approbation of the eternal God so small a matter in thy eyes, that the scorn of a fool can weigh it down, or move the balance with thee? If a feather were put into the scales against a mountain, or the whole earth, it should weigh as much as the esteem or disesteem of men, their honouring thee, or dishonouring thee, should weigh against the esteem of God, and the honour or dishonour that he puts upon thee (as to any regard of the thing itself; though as it reflecteth on God, thou mayst regard it). He is the wise man that God calls wise; and he is the fool that God calls fool, (and that is every one that "layeth up riches for himself, and is not rich towards God;" Luke xii. 20, 21.) He is the happy man that God calls happy; and he is a miserable man that God counts miserable; and who those are you may see in Psal. i. and many Scriptures before cited. Hear the words (and you that are believers lay up the blessed promise) of Christ himself, John xii. 26. "If any man serve me, him will my Father honour." And who cares then for the dishonours of all the wicked of the world? Our "tried faith as more precious than gold, will be found unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ;" 1 Pet. i. 7. See 2 Tim. ii. 21. We must learn therefore to imitate our Lord; and not to receive our honour from men; and not to imitate the wicked "that receive honour one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God." There is enough for us in God's approbation. And yet all his servants do imitate their Lord; and his judgment is their judgment; and whom he honoureth, them do they honour; angels, and saints, and all that enter into the tabernacle of the Lord, do" contemn the vile, and honour them that fear the Lord;" Psal. xv. 4. And though no man's judgment or praise be valuable in comparison of the Lord's, yet the honour and praise that is given

by the wise and godly, is more than a thousand times as much from ignorant ungodly men. If the Athenian orator regarded the censure of Socrates more than of all the rest of his auditors, we have cause to judge the eulogies of experi enced holy men a greater honour than of thousands of the wicked, and greater than all their contempt or scorn is able to weigh down. The applause of the wicked is ofttimes a dishonour in wise men's eyes. Was it not Balaam's chiefest honour to hear from Balak, "I thought to promote thee to great honour, but the Lord hath kept thee back from honour;" Numb. xxiv. 11. The honour that God keepeth a man from is no honour; but is an honour to be kept from such honour by the Lord. Innocent poverty is incomparably more honourable than riches by iniquity, which is the greatest shame.

10. Lastly, it is unspeakable, everlasting honour that holiness doth tend unto, and which holy men shall enjoy with God. The very relation of a godly man to his everlasting glory, is an honour ten thousand times surpassing the honour of all the kingdoms of the world. If you did but know that one of your poor neighbours should certainly be a king, would you not presently honour him, even in his rags? You may know that the saints shall reign with Christ, as sure as if an angel from heaven had told you so, and more; and therefore how should a saint be honoured? If God had but legibly marked out some among you for salvation, and written in their foreheads This man shall be saved,' would not all the parish reverence that man? Why, a heavenly mind, and the love of God, self-denial, and holy obedience, are heaven-marks infallible, as true as the Gospel, and written by the same hand as the Gospel was, I mean by the Spirit of God himself. If a voice from heaven should speak now of any person in the congregation, and say,This man shall reign in heaven for ever,' would it not be an honour above all your worldly honours? Why, holiness is God's image, and the Spirit is the earnest of our inheritance, and beareth witness with our spirits, that we are the sons of God, and have the promise, and seals, and oath of God for our certainty; yea, and the knowledge of God in Christ is the beginning of eternal life. And what would we have more? The presence of Christ in a little of his glory upon the mount, transported the three disciples: and the glimpse of the glory of God which Moses saw, did make his face shine that the Israelites

could not behold it. The approach of the saints to God in holy worship here on earth, are exceeding honourable, because they anticipate of heaven, and it is upward that they look. "Glory and honour are in his presence: strength and gladness are in his place." The soul that is beholding God by faith, and conversing with the heavenly inhabitants, is quite above all earthly things: and as angels are more honourable than men, and heaven than earth, so are believers that converse in heaven with angels, yea with Christ himself by faith, more honourable than terrestrial carnal men,

But the great honour is behind; yet near at hand; when the promised crown is set upon their heads. O mark the honour that is promised them by the Lord of truth. The soul itself before the resurrection of the body, shall be with Christ; Phil. i. 23. Even present with the Lord; 2 Cor. v. 1. 8. "If any man serve me, let him follow me, and where I am there shall also my servant be;" John xii. 26. And at the resurrection Christ that hath "loved the church and gave, himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it—will present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish ;" Eph. v. 25, 26. Will they not be honourable even in the eyes of the ungodly world, when they hear the sentence of their Lord, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world;" Matt. xxv. 34. and ver. 23. "Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." When Christ "shall come to be glorified in his saints, and admired in all them that believe;" Mark here, that it is one end of the coming of Christ, to be glorified and admired in his saints: "Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him;" Jude 14, 15. “Our hearts shall be established, unblamable in holiness before God even our Father at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints;" 1 Thess. iii. 12, 13. We shall then praise him "that hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and made us kings and priests to God;" Rev. i.5,6. "He that overcometh shall be clothed with white raiment, and confessed by Christ before the Father and the

angels of heaven;" chap. iii. 5. Yea, he shall be a pillar in the temple of God, and go out no more: and Christ will write on him the name of God, and the name of the city of God, New Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from God, and his own name;" ver. 12. Yea, he will "grant to him to sit with him in his throne, as he himself hath overcome and is set down with his Father in his throne;" ver. 21. And he will honour his saints to be judges of angels, and of the world; 1 Cor. vi. 2, 3. And "they that overcome and keep his words unto the end, to them will be given power over the nations, and they shall rule with a rod of iron, and break them to shivers as the vessels of a potter; even as Christ received of his Father; and he will give them the morning star;" Rev. ii. 26, 27. "He that hath an ear to hear let him hear" the glorious things that are promised to the saints. "The high praises of God shall be in their mouths and the two edged sword in their hands- to execute on

the wicked the judgment written, such honour have all his saints;" Psal. cxlix. 6.9. Then shall we hear the praises of the heavenly society saying, "We give thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, and art to come, because thou hast taken to thee thy great power and hast reigned, and the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead that they should be judged, and that thou shouldst give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints and them that fear thy name, small and great, and shouldst destroy them that dwell on the earth." "Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear;" Matt. xiii. 43. Yea, "they shall be equal to the angels of God;" Luke xx. 36. This is the inheritance of the saints in light, of which God is now making us meet to be partakers; Col. i. 12. If "all that sat in the council against him, saw Stephen's face as it had been the face of an angel" (Acts vi. 15.), what shall be the glory of the saints when themselves shall see the face of God, and his name shall be written in their foreheads; (Rev. xxii. 4.) when the ungodly world shall know, that holiness was the most honourable state?

But perhaps some will say, that this language will make them proud. To tell them that they are the most honourable persons in the world, is the way to make them the proudest persons.'