Let us then go out of the camp to him, bearing his reproach; let our songs of triumph be his dying on the tree, and our whole religion to love and live to him who endured the cross and despised the shame for our sakes. To him be everlasting praise and glory. Amen.

DISCOURSE XXXIX.

THE WIDOW OF NAIN.

IN

Weep not. LUKE Vii. 13.

N the days of our Saviour's flesh, as he was fulfilling his course, and walking about doing good, it is observed, that he not only preached in the synagogue, or in the temple, or where great multitudes resorted, but oftentimes seemed to go long journies only to speak with few, or with single persons, or to heal one sick, or to help a sinner ready to perish. He must needs go through Samaria to save an adulteress, and a few out of the city of Sychar; he would go into Jericho to save Zaccheus, and be fatigued in a throng another time, that one poor woman might touch the hem of his garment; and on another day go to the pool of Bethesda to heal one lame man; travel along the road to help a blind beggar or two ; and go into Simon's house to give a wretched woman the opportunity to sit at his feet, and hear of and receive his free forgiveness. All this serves to show how the Lord is of tender pity, and despises not the least soul he made. This should teach his ministers not to spare any pains or labour, though it should be to toil and spend themselves in journies, by land or sea, if only one single soul is thereby won to the kingdom of God. It should also teach every sinner, that though he may think little whether he be saved or not, and though he may undervalue his own soul, the Lord had not thought so, but spared no pains to redeem and make that neglected soul happy. Should

a guilty

f

a guilty and self-condemned man, or woman, or little child think, I am unworthy the Lord's notice, I am but as a piece of vile dust or ashes, and may justly be passed over unheeded by him that made me: He may learn from all these instances, and from all our Saviour's behaviour in the gospel, that our very hairs are numbered, and that the least and [most] worthless heart is not rejected by him, or cast off, or forsaken because of his being good for nothing, and worse. A person used to affliction and crosses, can sometimes be tempted to think there is no help for me; the Lord has forsaken me; he has cast me aside as a dog; my God has forgotten me: for their sakes, therefore, he saith in the prophet Isaiah, "A woman А can forget her sucking child, but I can never forget thee;" as if he would say, However small and mean thou art in thine own eyes, however despicable and worthless in the eyes of others, thou art dear to me; I have esteemed thee precious; I have graven thee on the palms of my hands.

We were all to him like grasshoppers, and as a drop of the bucket, or as a little grain of dust on the balance compared with his heavenly worlds and their hosts; but yet he would not see us perish as a thing of nought, but [from] the beginning, his eternal mercies moved him to be our Saviour, and to help a people who had no other friend, and who could not help themselves. He saw us, as it is said in Ezekiel," In our blood," i. e. in our sin and ruin, when no eye pitied us, nor could do any thing to wash us or cover us; and he had compassion on us; and though he knew he could have made a better world with a word, and though he knew what a poor unthankful race we should prove, it did not shut up the bowels of his everlasting love, but he would become our Saviour. Nor this alone; but if only one soul had sinned, the least and poorest

that

that ever was, rather than that soul should have perished without any means of help, he would have as freely left his throne, and suffered, as for all the whole creation. Who can read the gospel and not see that this is his very heart? If a Magdalene came weeping behind him, he was overcome, and: must pardon her. When a dying rebel, after all his blasphemy, and hardened behaviour, began to relent, and beg to be remembered in his intercession, his heart yearned, and he took him straight into his favour. The tears and distress of Saul made him hasten away Ananias to speak comfortably to him. Even the outward troubles and sicknesses which oppressed such as he saw in the streets, or who came to him, so touched him, that nothing is more frequently repeated all through the gospel than such expressions; " Jesus had compassion on him; I have compassion on the multitudes;" and he bids the dæmoniac tell his friends, how the Lord had had compassion on him; and this tenderness of nature made him heal all, of whatever disease they had, whether it was spiritual or bodily, so that the report of his merciful behaviour was blazed about, insomuch that when they came to be helped, and could not get to him for the press, or were blind, and could not find their way to him, or were lepers, and were afraid to come near to him, they cried out," Jesus, have mercy on us! Lord, have mercy upon me! Lord, pity me!" intimating, by the very manner of their speaking, that they had been told of his tender behaviour to others, and begged the same grace; as if they had said, Lord Jesus, thou hast helped others in their deplorable state, O help us! O have mercy on us too! Indeed all our Lord's words, his actions, his carriage, proved him to be the same proclaimed of old by the fathers, "The Lord gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great

great goodness, him whose compassions fail not, he whose mercy endureth from one generation to another.

Though he is and was a just God, yet he delights in mercy, and he is touched to the heart with the miseries of his poor people. How far this has been visible, we may see in his behaviour at the grave of Lazarus, when he saw the grief of the two sisters of the deceased, and beheld one weeping at his right hand, and the other at his left, his meek heart melted, and Jesus wept too. He considered their distress, and remembered sin had been the cause of all this trouble. Had there been no sin, there could have been no death, nor sorrow, nor sighing; therefore his friends and enemies, his angels and apostles could see how God pitied his children in their fallen state; nor did he cease groaning in spirit before all the Jews, till they observed it and said, " Behold how he loved him!" And when nothing could dry up the sister's tears whom he loved, but recalling their brother, he made use of his Almighty Divinity, and spoke him again into life.

But though this was a most special mark and proof of the Lord's great tenderness and pity, there is in the word preceding the text, another edifying and singular relation of Jesus Christ's tender mercy, which I shall this day speak of, and must pray all to hear with the utmost attention.

As he was one day entering the city, called Nain, with many of his disciples, and many other people, he met at the gate of the city the corpse of a dead man, whom they were carrying out to his burial, and many of the people of the city attended the solemn procession. The man was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow; and it appears, by what our Saviour spoke to her, that she followed her son, weeping and lamenting greatly. This sight so

affected