The Judgment of God: Has It Come To Your Church?

In his sermon on 1 Peter 4:17-19 entitled "The Church's Visitation," Richard Sibbes takes up the subject of God's judgments and discipline of the Church. I think it is here where we must consider our current day, our current lives, our current churches, is judgment approach and/or is it already here?

Sibbes asks the question, "How may we know when some judgment is approaching?"

The Scripture is wondrous full in the point. God usually, before any heavy judgment, visits a people with lesser judgments. His footsteps first appear in some small token of his displeasure; but if that prevails not, then he brings a greater.

Sign 1. ‘This, and this have I done,’ saith the Lord, ‘and yet ye have not returned unto me.’ Amos iv. 6,7. There be droppings before the ruin of a house. Lesser judgments make way for greater, as a little wedge makes way for a greater; and, therefore, where less afflictions prevail not, there cannot but be an expectation of greater. ‘Why should I smite you any more? saith God; ‘you fall away more and more,’ Isa. i.5; that is, I must have a sweeping judgment to carry you clean away.

Sign 2. Again, usually before some great calamity God takes away worthy men, ‘the councillor, and the captain, and the man of war,’ Isa. iii. 2, 3. This is a fearful presage that God threateneth some destruction, for they are the pillars of the church and the strength of the world; they are those that make the times and places good wherein they live; for they keep away evil and do good by their example and by their prayers many ways. A good man is a common good. The city thrives the better as Solomon saith, for a righteous man, Prov. xi 10, 11, Eccles. ix. 15. Therefore, we have cause to rejoice in them, and it is an evil sign when such are removed. [ed.-compare reflections on Sibbes own death, by Catlin, in the Appendix to Memoir, pp. cxxxiii-v.]

Sign 3. God usually visits a people when some horrible crying sins reign amongst them, as (1) atheism. Beloved, God stands upon his prerogative then, when he is scarce known in the world; when they say, Where is God? God sees us not, &c. So, likewise (2), when idolatry prevails. This is spiritual adultery and a breach of covenant with God. Again, (3), when divisions grow amongst a people. Union is a preserver. Where there is dissension of judgment, there will soon be dissension of affections; and dissipation will be the end if we take not heed. For the most part, ecclesiastical dissensions end in civil; and therefore we see, before the destruction of Jerusalem, what a world of schisms and divisions were amongst the Jews. There were Pharisees and Sadducees, &c. It was the ruin of the ten tribes at length, the rent that Jeroboam caused in religion. It is a fearful sign of some great judgment to fall upon a church, when there is not a stopping of dissensions. They may be easily stopped at first, as waters in the beginning; but when they are once gotten into the very vital parts of the church and commonwealth, we may see the mischief, but it is hardly remedied.

Sign 4. Again, when sin goes with some evil circumstances and odious qualities, which aggravate the same in the sight of God, as when sin grows ripe, and abounds in a land or nation. At such a time as this a man may know there is some fearful judgment approaching.  Question: But when is sin ripe?  Ans. 1. When it is impudent; when men grow bold in sin, making it their whole course and trade of life. When men’s wicked courses are their ‘conversation,’ they cannot tell how to do otherwise.  2. When sin grows common and spreads far. It is an ill plea to say. Others do so as well as I. Alas! the more sin, without fear or dread of the Almighty, as if men would dare the God of heaven to do his worst. Oh, beloved, such persons as go on still in their sins to provoke the Lord, do put a sword, as it were, into God’s hands to destroy themselves. The old world, you know, was very secure. No doubt, they mocked at holy Noah when he made the ark, as if he had been a doting old man. Notwithstanding, he foretold them of the wrath to come. And our Saviour, Christ, saith, ‘Before the end of the world it shall be as in the days of Noah,’ Mat. xxiv. 38. Beloved, God hath his ‘old worlds’ still. If we have the same course and security of sinning, we must look for the same judgments. And, therefore, compare times with times. If the times now answer former times, when God judged them, we may well expect the same fearful judgments to fall upon us.

Sign 5. Unfruitfulness threateneth a judgment upon a people. When God hath bestowed a great deal of cost and time, he looks we should answer his expectation in some measure. The fig tree in the gospel had some respite given it, by reason of the prayers of the vine-dresser; but afterward, when it brought forth no fruit, it was cut down and cast into the fire. Beloved, who amongst us would endure a barren tree in his garden? That which is not fit for fruit is most fit for fire. We can endure a barren tree in the wilderness, but not in our orchards. When God, the great husbandman in his church, sees that upon so great and continual cost bestowed upon us, we remain yet unfruitful, he will not suffer us long to cumber the ground of his church.

Sign 6. Again, decay in our first love is a sign of judgment approaching. God threatened the church of Ephesus to remove his candlestick from among them, for their ‘decay in their first love,’ Rev. ii. 4; that having surfeited of plenty and peace, he might recover her taste by dieting of her. Decay in love proceeds from disesteem in judgment; and God cannot endure his glorious gospel should be slighted, as not deserving the richest strain of our love. The Lord takes it better where there is but little strength and a striving to be better, than when there is great means of grace and knowledge, and no growth answerable, but rather a declining in goodness. I beseech you lay these things to heart. The Lord is much displeased when Christians are not so zealous as they should be; when there is not that sweet communion of saints among them, to strengthen and encourage one another in the ways of holiness as there might be; when there is not a beauty in their profession to allure and draw on others to a love and liking of the best things; when there is not a care to avoid all scandals that may weaken respect to good things, and bring an evil report on the ways of God; when they labor not with their whole hearts to serve the Lord in a cheerful manner, &c. The very not serving God answerable to encouragements, is a certain sign of ensuing danger, Deut. xxviii. 47.

Use. Therefore, I beseech you, let us look about us whether these be not the times wherein we live, that judgment must begin at the house of God. The Lord complains in Jeremiah, Jer. viii. 7, that the turtle and other silly creatures knew the time of their standing and removing, but his people did not know his judgments. Do the creatures know their times and seasons, and shall Christ complain that we know not the day of our visitation? What a shame is this! I beseech you, let us know and consider our times. If we have a time of sinning, God will have a time of punishing.