parched earth under them-not for barrenness, but for thirstiness! Let me say, "My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord." Does the earth so greedily drink the showers, and open as many mouths as there are clefts in it, to receive what the clouds dispense? And shall these precious soul-enriching showers fleet away unprofitably from me? If so, then what an account have I to make for all those gospel-blessings that I have enjoyed; for all those gospel-dews and showers wherewith I have been watered! Should I be found fruitless at last, it will fare better with the barren and uncultivated wilderness than with me; more tolerable for Indians and barbarians that never heard the gospel, than for me who have been so assiduously and plentifully watered by it. CHAPTER X. On a Dearth through wunt of Rain. Observation.-IT is deservedly accounted a sad judgment, when God shuts up the heavens over our heads, and makes the earth as brass under our feet. Then the husbandmen are called to mourning; all the fields languish, and the cattle pine with thirst. Such a sad state the prophet describes. "The nobles have sent their little ones to the waters; they came to the pits and found no water; they returned with their vessels empty; they were ashamed and confounded, and covered their heads, because the ground is chapt; for there was no rain in the earth; the plowmen were ashamed, they covered their heads; yea, the hind also calved in the field, and forsook it, because there was no grass; and the wild asses did stand in the high places; they snuffed up the wind like dragons; their eyes failed because there was no grass," Jer. xiv. 3. And that which makes the want of rain so terrible a judgment, is the famine of bread, which necessarily follows these extraordinary droughts, Div. No. XVI. F and is one of the sorest temporal judgments which God inflicts upon the world. Application. And they truly have as much cause to weep and tremble, over whose souls God shuts up the spiritual clouds of the gospel, and thereby sends a spiritual famine upon their souls. Such a judgment the Lord threatens in Amos viii. 11. "Behold the day is come, saith the Lord, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the word of the Lord." Parallel to which is that text in Isa. v. 6. "I will lay it waste; it shall not be pruned nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns; I will also command the clouds that they rain not upon it." And we find both in human and sacred histories, that when God has shut up the spiritual clouds, removing or silencing his ministers, Christians have ever been deeply affected with it, and reckoned it a most tremendous judgment, Thus the Christians of Antioch, when Chrysostom their minister was banished, judged it better to lose the sun out of the firmament, than lose their minister. And when Nazianzen was taking his leave of Constantinople, as he was preaching his farewell sermon, the people were exceedingly affected with his loss; and among the rest, an old man in the congregation fell into a bitter paroxysm of grief, and cried out," Go, father, if you must; and take away the whole Trinity with you;" meaning, that God would not stay when he was gone. How did the Christians of Antioch also weep and lament, when Paul was taking his farewell of them? He had been a cloud of blessings to that place; but now they must expect no more showers from him. When the ark of God, which was the symbol of the divine presence among the Jews, was taken, "all the city cried out." The loss of a gospel-ministry is an inestimable loss, not to be repaired but by its own return, or by heaven! In the times of popish persecution, when godly ministers were haled away from their flocks to martyrdom, the poor Christians would meet them in their way to prison or the stake, with their little ones in their arms, and throwing themselves at their feet, would thus bespeak them: "What shall be our estate, now you are gone to martyrdom? Who shall instruct these poor babes? Who shall ease our afflicted consciences? Who shall lead us in the way of life?" And to let you see there is sufficient ground for this sorrow, when God restrains the influences of the gospel, solemnly consider that it is a dreadful token of God's great anger against a people to remove the gospel from them. The anger of God was fearfully incensed against the church of Ephesus, when he did but threaten to come against her, and remove the candlestick out of its place, Rev. ii. 5. It is a stroke at the soul, a blow at the root; usually the last, and therefore the worst of judgments.-Consider also the deplorable state in which all unregenerate souls are left, after the gospel is removed from them. What will become of these? By whom shall they be gathered? It made the bowels of Christ yearn within him, when he looked upon the scattered multitude that had no shepherd, Matth. ix. 36.-The judgment will appear very heavy, if you consider the loss which God's own people sustain by the removal of the gospel; for therein they lose their chief glory. The principal thing in which the peculiar glory of Israel consisted was this, that " unto them were committed the oracles of God." On this account it was called the glorious land; Dan, xi. 16. This made them greater than all the nations round about them; Deut. iv. 7, 8. By losing the ordinances they lose their comforts, and soul-refreshments; they lose their defence and safety; they lose their spiritual food and soul-subsistence. In a word, a spiritual famine necessarily follows, a famine the most terrible of all famines. Now to show you the analogy between this and a temporal famine, that therein you may see what cause you have to be deeply affected with it, consider these five particulars 1. A famine is caused by the failing of bread, or that which is in the stead and has the use of bread. Dainties and superfluous rarities may fail, and yet men may subsist comfortably. As long as people have bread and water, they will not famish; but once take away bread, and the spirit of man fails. On this account bread is called a staff, because what a staff is to an aged and feeble man, that bread is to the faint and feeble frame. And what bread is to the natural spirits, that, and more than that, the word is to gracious spirits. "I have esteemed the words of thy mouth more than my necessary food," Job xxiii. 12. If once God break this staff, the inner-man, that hidden man of the heart, will quickly begin to fail and faulter. 2. It is not every degree of scarcity of bread that presently makes a famine, but a general failing of it; when no bread is to be had, or that which is to be had, yields no nutriment. And so it is in a spiritual famine, which is occasioned, either by God's removing all the ordinances, or else, though there be preaching, prayer, and other ordinances left, yet the presence of God is not with them. 3. In a famine, mean and coarse things become sweet and pleasant. Famine raises the price and value of them. That which before you would have thrown to your dogs, now goes down pleasantly with yourselves. "To the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet." It is storied of Artaxerxes Memnon, that when he was flying before his enemies, he fed hungrily upon barley-bread, and said, "O what pleasure have I hitherto been ignorant of!" When great Darius drank the water, that had been defiled with dead carcases, which had been slain in battle, he professed to have never drunk more pleasant drink. Just so does the famine of the word raise the price and estimation of vulgar and despised truths. O what would we then give for one of those sermons, one of those sabbaths, we formerly enjoyed! "In those days the word of the Lord is precious." When God calls to the enemy to take away and remove his contemned but precious dainties from his children, they will then learn to prize their spiritual food at a higher rate. 4. In time of famine some persons suffer more than others. The dearth falls heaviest on the poor; as long as any thing is to be had for money, the rich will have it. So it falls out in a spiritual famine. Although the most experienced and best furnished Christians will have enough to do to live in the absence of ordinances, yet they are likely to subsist much better than weak, ignorant, and inexperienced ones. Some Christians have husbanded their time well, and, like Joseph in the seven years' plenty, laid up for a scarcity. The word of God dwells richly in them. Some there are, who are strong, and the word of God remaineth in them; of whom it may be said, as Jerome said of Nepotianus, that by long and assiduous meditation on the scriptures, he had made his breast the very library of Christ. But others are babes in Christ; and though God will preserve that good work which he has begun in them, yet these poor babes will soonest feel, and be most concerned in, the loss of their spiritual father. 66 5. In time of famine, there are pitiful cries and heartbreaking complaints, wherever you go. O the many pale: faces you then see, and the sad language that rings in your ears in every place! One cries, Bread, bread;" another faints and falls down at your door. “All her people sigh." Yea, the poor little ones cry to their mothers, "Where is the corn and wine?" and then pour out their souls into their mothers' bosom. Just so it is in a famine of the word. Christians every where sigh and cry, "O where are our godly ministers? our sabbaths, sermons, sacraments? My fathers! my fathers! the chariots of Israel, and the horsemen thereof! How beautiful were your feet upon the mountains!" And then they weep, like the people at Paul's departure, to think they shall see their faces no more. Reflections. Is the famine of the word such a fearfuljudgment? asks the ungrateful sinner. Then, Lord, pardon my unthankfulness for the plentiful and long-continued enjoyment of such a precious and invaluable mercy. How lightly have I esteemed the great things of the gospel! O that with eyes and hands lifted up to heaven, I might bless the Lord that ever I was brought forth in an age of so much light, in a valley of visions, in a land flowing with gospel-mercies! "Hath not God made of one blood all the nations of men to dwell on the face of the earth? and determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation?" Acts xvii. 26. Many of these great and populous nations are involved in gross darkness. Now that of all the several ages of the world and places in it, God should choose the best place for me and bring me forth in it, in such a happy period of time, |