" Heb. 10:26-28.
The day of grace ends with some men before God takes them out of
this world. Now, then, I would show you by some signs how you may
know that the day of grace is ended, or near to ending with the
barren professor.
First sign. The day of grace is like to be past, when a professor
hath WITHSTOOD, ABUSED, AND WORN OUT GOD'S PATIENCE: then he is in
danger; this is a provocation; now God cries, "Cut it down."
There are some men that steal into a profession, nobody knows how,
even as this fig-tree was brought into the vineyard by other hands
than God's; and there they abide lifeless, graceless, careless, and
without any good conscience to God at all. Perhaps they came in for
the loaves, for a trade, for credit, for a blind; or it may be, to
stifle and choke the checks and grinding pangs of an awakened and
disquieted conscience. Now, having obtained their purpose, like the
sinners of Zion, they are at ease and secure, saying, like Agag,
Surely the bitterness of death is past: I am well; I shall be saved
and go to heaven. Thus in these vain conceits they spend a year,
two, or three; not remembering that at every season of grace, and at
every opportunity of the gospel, the Lord comes seeking fruit.
Well, sinner, well, barren fig-tree, this is but an evil beginning.
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