The Jerusalem Sinner Saved; or Good News for the Vilest of Men by John Bunyan 1689

the next year after Isaac was born; and then Ishmael was fourteen years
old. Now that day that Isaac was weaned, that day was Ishmael rejected;
and suppose that Isaac was three years old before he was weaned, that
was but the seventeenth year of Ishmael; wherefore the day of God’s
grace was ended with him betimes; Gen. xvii. 24, 25; chap. xxi. 2–11; Gal.
iv. 30.
2. Cain’s day ended with him betimes; for after God had rejected him,
he lived to beget many children, and build a city, and to do many other
things. But alas! all that while he was a fugitive and a vagabond. Nor
carried he any thing with him after the day of his rejection was come,
but this doleful language in his conscience, “From God’s face shall I be
hid;” Gen. iv. 10–15.
3. Esau, through his extravagancies would needs go to sell his birthright,
not fearing (as other confident fools) but that yet the blessing
would still be his, after which he lived many years; but all of them
under the wrath of God, as was, when time came, made appear to his
destruction; for “When he would have inherited the blessing, he was
rejected, for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it
carefully with tears;” Heb. xii. 14–16.
Many instances might be given as to such tokens of the displeasure of
God against such as fool away, as the wise man has it, the prize which is
put into their hand; Prov. xvii. 16.
Let these things, therefore, be a further caution to those that sit under
the glorious sound of the Gospel, and hear of the riches of the grace of
God in Christ to poor sinners.
To slight grace, to despise mercy, and to stop the ear when God speaks,
when he speaks such great things, so much to our profit, is a great
provocation.
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