Page:Bush burning, yet not consumed, or, The church in the furnace, yet still preserved (2).pdf/22

 Chriſt. O believe on him and be enriched for ever.

2. Is it ſo as has been ſaid then then, beware of wronging the Buſh the owner will highly refute the leſt wrong done to his bleſſed Buſh. When Paul, in bloody rage, was perſecuting and raiſing flame in the Buſh, there came a voice unto him; Saul, Saul, why perſecuteſt thou me? Every ſtroke thou giveſt to my members, Chriſt looks upon it done to himſelf; for they and he are myſtically one. If a man were inflicting grievous torture upon your Son, would not every cry of his pierce your very heart? That is but a very faint reſemblance of Chriſt's love to believers; for his love is like himſelf infinite. So that every ſtroke ye give his people, is given to himſelf, and he will reſent it highly. O ſirs, what ails the world at the poor Buſh of Chrift? 'Tis a very harmleſs creature, which like an innocent lamb, means and does harm to nobody. Indeed ſirs, the world cannot endure the heavenly favour of Chriſt that is about believers. Ye that be hated of all men, ſays Chriſt, for my name's ſake. That's a prediction of the entertainment believers ſhall get from the men of the world. They ſhall be hated, For what? juſt for Chriſt's name's ſake, that perfumes them, and ſo ſhalt render them diſagreeable to all men, But the world cannot come near Chriſt's Buſh: they abhor her: ſhe ſmells ſo with a favour of Chriſt about her, that the world, which likes nothing but the ſmell of hell, hates her, and ſays with the Edomites, raze, raze her out of the land: let not the Buſh ſtand a moment longer in our land. and hence they think they would have a good and merry time of it, if once the Buſh were rooted up and taken away- Then would their floods of iniquities, errors, Patronage ſupremacy, apoſtacy and tyrannical uſurpations over the Lord's heritage, and their other darlings flow amain. O fooliſh, mad and frantic perſons, who thus think and thus act!