Page:Affectionate address to children.pdf/1



AN

AFFECTIONATE ADDRESS

TO

BY JOHN BROWN, LATE MINISTER OF THE GOSPEL IN

HADDINGTON.

dear little children, for whom I ought to "travail as in birth, till Christ be formed in your soul;" suffer me, "by the mercies of God," and "in the bowels of Jesus Christ," to beseech you, while you peruse this, to lay to heart, the one thing needful—a saving interest in the Son of God, and renovation into his image; know and consider the things which concern your peace, your eternal peace, before they be hid from your eyes. Remember now thy Creator," (thy Saviour,) "in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not." O that you would consider your last end! the dread eternity, the delightful heaven, or fearful hell that is before you! Should you slight the present call, should you tarry a moment longer without Christ, perhaps you are undone for ever: "Now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation."

Oh! think, seriously think, how deplorable is your natural estate! In Adam you have all sinned. You are "children of disobedience; ehildrenchildren [sic] of wrath, even as others." Your carnal mind is enmity against God, and your heart "hard as an adamant;" is filled with all unrighteousness, is "deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; and out of it do proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witncsswitness [sic], blasphemies." With horror contemplate the number of your vain thoughts, your idle words, your evil works!