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expects the fruit of his vineyard at the season, and makes his people "like a<br />
tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season,"<br />
will also give them the crown in his season. He that will have a word of joy<br />
spoken in season to him that is weary, will surely cause the time of joy to<br />
appear in the fittest season. <strong>The</strong>y who are not weary in well-doing, shall, if<br />
they faint not, reap in due season. If God giveth rain even to his enemies,<br />
both the former and the latter in its season, and reserveth the appointed<br />
weeks of harvest, and covenants that there shall be day and night in their<br />
season; then surely the glorious harvest of the saints shall not miss its season.<br />
Doubtless, he who would not stay a day longer than his promise, but brought<br />
Israel out of Egypt on the self-same day when the four hundred and thirty<br />
years expired, neither will he fail of one day or hour of the fittest season for<br />
his people's glory. When we have had in this world a long night of darkness,<br />
will not the daybreaking and the rising of the Sun of Righteousness be then<br />
seasonable? When we have passed a long and tedious journey through no<br />
small dangers, is not home then seasonable? When we have had a long and<br />
perilous war, and received many a wound, would not a peace, with victory,<br />
be seasonable? Men live in a continual weariness; especially the saints, who<br />
are most weary of that which the world cannot feel; some weary of a blind<br />
mind; some of a hard heart; some of their daily doubts and fears; some of the<br />
want of spiritual joys; and some of the sense of God's wrath. And when a<br />
poor Christian hath desired, and prayed, and waited for deliverance many<br />
years, is it not then seasonable? We lament that we do not find a Canaan in<br />
the wilderness, or the songs of Sion in a strange land; that we have not a<br />
harbor in the main ocean, nor our rest in the heat of the day, nor heaven<br />
before we leave the earth; and would not all this be very unseasonable?<br />
7. As this rest will be seasonable, so it will be suitable. <strong>The</strong> new nature<br />
of the saints doth suit their spirits to this rest. Indeed, their holiness is<br />
nothing else but a spark taken from this element, and by the Spirit of Christ<br />
kindled in their hearts: the flame whereof, mindful of its own divine original,<br />
ever tends to the place from whence it comes. Temporal crowns and<br />
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