Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

ing Him as their Judge. By appealing to their reason, by awakening their fears of punishment, by exciting their desires of happiness, the cause of God will be again triumphant; they will again, greatly to our satisfaction, and their own interest, join in the prayers and praises of the Church, and will attend to our discourses, as men anxious to be led into the paths of Salvation.

I will presume upon the continuance of your attention, whilst I attempt to shew more particularly the mighty advantages to be derived from, occasionally, visiting our respective flocks.

The first advantage I shall mention is, that the Lord's Day will assume an appearance more becoming its transcendent holiness. With many of the lower class of people, Sunday is a day of dissipation. Some houses of entertainment, it is well known, receive more company of that description, and exhibit more disgraceful scenes of riot and imtemperance, on that day, than on any other in the week. And the Lord's Day, instead of being, as it ought to be, to all families a blessing, is, to some, I tremble whilst I pronounce it! a curse. The parents and masters not being confined by their secular employments, and not attending public worship, hasten with impatience, to the society of those who are as profligate as themselves; and regardless of the wants of their families at home, they not only expend their money, but corrupt their principles, and thus become odious to themselves, and reproachful to their Christian profession, living in forgetfulness, perhaps in contempt of the Being, from whom "they have received "life, and breath, and all things." Whereas, if men

are

are once persuaded to attend, together with their housholds, the public worship of Almighty God, they will soon learn to esteem the Lord's Day as instituted to promote His glory, and their own Salvation. They will employ a part of their leisure in acquainting themselves with the nature and the will of God, as revealed in His holy word, and in communicating a knowlege of it to their families: instead of conniving at, perhaps encouraging, their children in the most abominable excesses on that day, they will warn them by precept, against the sacrilegious profanation, and engage them by example, to the devout observance

of it.

If then this single advantage would arise from visiting our parishoners from house to house, I may, without the apprehension of incurring your displea sure, appeal to yourselves, whether it does not become a part of our ministerial duty, which we are bound, by the most solemn obligations, religiously to fulfil ?

Among those who attend public worship, there is a very small proportion who celebrate the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. Now by visiting them personally, when we enforce, in our conversation, the necessity of the duty, they relate their sentiments of the nature of the Ordinance, they urge their objections, and express their fears of receiving it unworthily. Thus we have an opportunity of making them better acquainted with the tendency and importance of the doctrine-of persuading them to a radical amendment of their lives, if they are, openly, addicted to sin-in order that they may be prepared to commemorate their Redemption in the way appointed by the Author of it; and if they

are

are under the impression of scrupulous fears-if they are afraid of eating or drinking judgment to them selves we can dispel their apprehensions, and comfort their souls, and thus communicate the enlivening blessings of the Gospel, which are contemned by infi delity, overlooked by indifference, and rejected by superstition.

If the Command delivered by our Blessed Lord in the institution of the Sacrament is general, and to be imposed upon all, who are called by His name, and profess his Religion; if it be-as we are taught, from His own words, to believe it is-indispensable to Salvation; surely it is incumbent on Us to explain the nature, and urge the obligation, of it upon all, as far as it is practicable, individually, that they, "by eating of that bread, may live for ever." And this can be done only, by teaching, as the Apostle expresses it," both publicly, and from house to "house" for however perspicuously the subject may be treated from the pulpit, it is liable to be misunderstood; however earnestly enforced, to be misrepresented. There seems, therefore, no way of in, structing our parishoners properly in the truth of the doctrine, but by familiar conversation-by adapting our language to their comprehensions, securing, at the same time, their good opinion, by the interest we discover, and the solicitude we express, for their present welfare, and their future happiness. The neglect of the Holy Communion is so very general throughout the kingdom, that the Clergy cannot, either too soon, or too earnestly, devote their time, apply their

See the sixth chapter of John

zeal

zeal, and consecrate their talents, to correct the opinions, inform the judgment, and interest the affections, of our several flocks, on this most important subject.

But the efficacy of visiting the people committed to our charge will still further appear by our progressive success, in persuading them to establish in their several families domestic worship. This is an act of devotion to which very many housholds are, it should seem, entire strangers. Public admonition must, on this subject more especially, be seconded by private exhortation. And until the observance of this duty becomes general, vain will be our endeavors to implant a principle of Religion in the heart. The reverence due to the Lord's Day, the celebration of the Blessed Sacrament, the practice of family devotion must be the distinguishing features in the lives of our several flocks, if we hope to "render them "a people prepared for the Lord." Now experience may convince us, that we might as well expect "the Ethiopian to change his skin, or the leopard "his spots," as to attempt to establish our hearers in an habitual obedience to these holy laws, merely by teaching in public the indispensable necessity of fulfilling them.

Why men have so notoriously failed in the observance of these duties is foreign to my purpose to enquire; but it may give strength to my argument to consider, that, wherever we are successful, by our pastoral visits, in persuading men to discharge these neglected duties, we are introducing into every such family, indescribable and invaluable blessings. And if the observation of the wise man be true, that "the child,

❝ trained

* trained up in the way he should go, will not hastily "depart from it," we may, without presumption, entertain the hope, that both they and their housholds, "their children and their children's children, will walk "in the way of the Lord, and observe his Ordinances 66 to do them."

Let us here, my Reverend Brethren, suppose, that one master of a family, that one father of children, who hath lived in the notorious neglect of these evangelical duties, is prevailed. with by the means I am now recommending, first to go to Church him. self-then to take his family to attend public Worship along with him—afterwards to receive the Holy Sacrament, and to establish in his house the custom of daily prayer-let us suppose one such effect to be produced-and such an effect will not, cannot, be confined to a single family-and let us ask ourselves what would be our feelings on the occasion? Would the successful prosecution of any useful, would the complete attainment of any advantageous, object, afford the mind so much exquisite and uninterrupted consolation, as such satisfactory evidences of our labors, as such unequivocal demonstrations of our zeal in the cause of God, and the welfare of mankind? Let us reflect upon the happiness we should have communicated to the several individuals of the family-let us reflect that, to us they would attribute the peace of mind they enjoy in the present, and the hopes of glory they expect in a future, life-let us reflect that we shall meet them at the Tribunal of God, not loaded with their reproaches, and distracted with our own, but as "our crown and rejoicing, our

[ocr errors]

glory and joy." And whilst, by such animating

VOL. III.

M m

reflections,

« ZurückWeiter »