•^ J Conf Pam 12ino #S99 
 
 isnv I>^^D^flSD^. 
 
 ^533 
 
No. 94. 
 
 WHY SIT YE HERE IDLE? 
 
 This significant and stirrincj inquiry was 
 addressed by the prophet to his country- 
 men, when threatened with war, famine, 
 and pestilence, as the punishment ot 
 their great sins. He seems to see the sor- 
 est calamities just ready to overwhelm 
 them ; he drops the thread of prophecy, 
 and cries out, Why do we ait still, till de- 
 struction overtake us? Let us ttee into 
 >the defenced cities, and seek a refuge from 
 threatening evils. 
 
 Fellow-citizen, fellow-sinner, whoever 
 you may be, pardon me, if I seem abrupt- 
 ly to address this inquiry to you. A case 
 80 urgent, and so deeply involving your 
 dearest interests, admits of no delay, — 
 
Methinks I see you tlireatened witL war, 
 famine, and pestilence ; a disastrous war 
 with God, a famine of the bread of life, 
 and a pestilence that kills the soul. And 
 I cannot refrain from asking, in all the 
 urgency of an aiFectionate solitude for your 
 eternal well-being, Why sit you here idle 1 
 
 Do you say, I have nothing to do? A 
 miner nothing to do, who has a life of sin 
 to repent of* a world of sin within him to 
 su<>due, another world of sin about him to 
 reclaim, and a liejl of endless sin and mise- 
 ry yawning before him to escape ; who has 
 not yet entered upon the work of securing 
 the pardon of his sins and the salvation of 
 his soul ; who has yet to decide between 
 death and life, between heaven and hell ! 
 Surely j^ou have enough to do : you have 
 a work assigned, you as the business of 
 life. Life was given you tor no other pur- 
 pone than to do it. 
 
 And it is a great and difficult work, — 
 For a sinner to become a Christian, a 
 child of hell an heir of heaven, is a work oi 
 such unequalled magnitude, and such ex- 
 treme difficulty, that you are exhorted in 
 the Scriptures to strive and agonize for its 
 accoraphshrnent^j to t^ke the kingdom oi 
 
 
heavon by violence ; and you are told, that 
 so far from being oble to do it at any mo- 
 ment without much effort, it is impossible 
 for yoa to do it by your unaided exer- 
 tions; so that if, by ftittii^g idle, you weary 
 out the patience ot God, and forfeit hfs 
 help, yon will never be able to accomplish 
 it, and will lose your soul. Why then will 
 you sit idle ? 
 
 Not because God interposes any obsta- 
 cles to your salvation. Look, I pray yt»u, 
 at what God hath sacritlced in the person 
 of the Father, and suffered in the person 
 of the Son, and done in the person of the 
 Spirit, for your salvation. Look at all the 
 declarations of his word, and tlie arrange- 
 ments ot his providence, and the provi- 
 sions of his grace, and tell me what more 
 he could have done tor you than he has 
 already done. And have you the hardi- 
 hood, have you the injustice and ingrati- 
 tude, in the face of all this, to charge bini 
 w^ith unwillingness that you should be 
 saved ? Why then sit idle '? 
 
 Kot because others will do this great 
 
 WDrk for you. God desires to have it 
 
 Idone, with a strength of feeling and an 
 
 rdor of lov3 for your soul, which you 
 
cantiot conceive, which words cannot ex- 
 press, which (iini be set forth only by such 
 signs of iivfliiite signi-ficance as the incar- 
 nation of his Bon, the bloody agonies of 
 the garden, the atoning sacrifice on the 
 cross, and the gift of the Holy Spirit. — 
 But it w you who must repent and believe, 
 'svho must trust in the merits of Christ, 
 and cherish the influences of the Spirit. — 
 Pious parents and Christian friends can 
 pray f n- you, and labor with you, and 
 weep over you, but they cannot shed the 
 tear of penitence, nor offer the prayer of 
 the publican in your stea*l, nor in your, 
 stead become reconciled to God ; no, nor 
 in your stead suiter the wrath of God and 
 the pains of hell for ever. Your own eye 
 must see. and your oiori ear liear^ and yc'Ur 
 oivn heart fpeL Yourself n\xx?>i repent and 
 believe, and love and act in the most vigor- 
 ous €.f:erc-se of your best powers and affec- 
 tions. You must give an account oi your- 
 self beibro God. ■ x^nd your own soul 
 must be saved or lost. inetlUbly happy or 
 unutterably miserable forever? Why, 
 then s.t idle? 
 
 Kot because ifc is a matter of so small 
 importauce whether the work is done ur 
 
not J that it may safely be left to take care of 
 itself. Sit idle, and so far from doing the 
 work, or its being done for you, you are 
 doing the opposite with your might. Sit 
 idle, and your feet are rtwift in the road to 
 liell. Do this work, and you have done 
 all that chioiiy concerns you. Neglect it, 
 and you have done nothing that i^of any 
 value. You have wasted your time, per- 
 verted your talents, thrown away yourtself 
 at one fearful cast tor ever. And what is 
 a man advantaged, if he gain the whole 
 world, and lose himself^ Why then sit 
 idle? 
 
 Not because you have any too much 
 time for doing this work. God gives us 
 time tor thi^? purpose, and for no other. — 
 Every man feels, when he lies uj)on his 
 dying bed, that the whole of life wisely 
 devoted, was not a moment too much to 
 make his calling and election sure. Yet 
 you have spent" ten, twenty, thirty, forty 
 years, without entering upon the great 
 business of life. Have you any more time 
 to throw away — you,, who never had too 
 much, and yet have wasted one-half, two- 
 thirds, perhaps nearly all of it, perhaps 
 
all but the very last flay or hcair ? l>o you 
 stili linger? 
 
 Think not that other beings and other 
 things will stand sii li and wait for your 
 action. Every th^ug else will move on., 
 whether yon do or not. Lite will flee 
 iipnce, and death will hurry on. Death 
 never stands still : be has already begun 
 his work on you, he wili not stop tillhe 
 has finisbed h, and he v>"Jl finish it far 
 r-ooncr than you expect. Time wili roll 
 away, and eternity draw near. Time 
 never stand.s still: it rolls, it flies away, 
 like the vapor; like the li lightning ilash, it 
 appears for an instant, nnd then darts 
 away^ to be seen no more. * God never sits 
 fitill. Give thanks to him that he does 
 not fail to cause the sun to rif3e and the 
 rain to descend. He will carry forward 
 the wheels of nature, and the arrange- 
 ments of his providence, and the designs 
 of his grace, and all his steadfast nar- 
 j}oses. Christ never sits still. What if he 
 had remained in the bosom ot the Father, 
 or should now suspend his work of inter« 
 cession? He will build up his kingdom 
 and gather in his elect, aud bring you to 
 
his ju(]giQeiit-st?at, (ind fhow your Eaked 
 soul to your own eye iind to the aBsembied 
 universe, and proiiouiice upon you the ir- 
 reversible sentence of bleseiiiff*or cui^ing. 
 and send you to hejrivenor hell, where you 
 will sit idle no more ; where you w'ill do 
 yonr appointed vvork, and do it well, and 
 keep doiug it with<>ut cessation, and with- 
 out end : for so do all in the unseen world. 
 Heaven is never idle. Saints an angels 
 servo God day and night in his temple. — 
 They never need and never wish to rest in 
 their .s.eraphic work. And it is the per- 
 feelion of their state, that the period will 
 ncM^r arrive when they wilt be inactive — 
 Tney ^\i]\ work on, and sing on, and shine* 
 on for (rver. xVnd when they have out- 
 lived thtii own highest conception of a 
 happy eterniiyy it will be the peijection ot 
 their bliss ti at it is yet to be et ^,^^ 
 
 Hell is wever still.. Dev^: . d joet men 
 too, have no lest day nor .j^t, no rest in 
 sinning, no re^t in sufrering, no rest iu 
 sinking deeper .nd deeper still in remorse 
 and despair^an'i shame and everlaBtin^ 
 contempt : * "^ 
 
" Burning continually, yet unconsumed ; 
 For ever wasting, yet eudurioj? still ; 
 Dying perpetually, yet never dead : 
 Where there are groans that never end, and sighs 
 That always sigh, and tears th-at ever weep, 
 ■ And ever fall, but not in Mercy's sight." 
 
 No; they never sit idle in hell, and they never 
 will; and -that is the keenest pang in t.heir suffer- 
 ings. When they have groaned out a period lon- 
 ger than their utmost imagination of an BUrnity, 
 it will be the bitterest ingredient in their cup— 
 the deep still lower than the lowest deep in hell — 
 that it is yet to he eternal. 
 
 Have you yet to choose between these two 
 worlds?. for in one or the other you must dwell, 
 and must work for ever. Why then, why sit 
 idle ? How will you answer the question to your 
 own .understanding, to your conscience, to your 
 duty, to your interest, lt> the world, and' to God? 
 Sit idle, when property and reputation, and 
 health and life are at stake, sit unmoved betore 
 the lion's paw, at the cannon's mouth, at the edge 
 of the precipice, on the brink of the cataract, 
 and I will hold my peace. Buf I cannot keop 
 silenc/e and see you sit idle in a world of proba- 
 tion, in a Christian land, on the eve of the judg- 
 ment, on the brink of eternity, on the dividing 
 line between an eternal heaxen and an eternal 
 hell. W 
 
HoUinger Corp. 
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