CONSIDERATION XII
The Importance of Salvation
"We beseech you, brethren, .... to do your own business." 1 Thess. iv. 10, 11.
First Point.
THE "business" of eternal salvation is assuredly an affair which is to us more important than any other, and yet it is the most neglected by Christians. They spare neither time nor diligence to attain that post, or to gain that lawsuit. To conclude hat marriage, how many counsels, how many steps are taken? they neither eat nor sleep. And yet to secure eternal salvation, What do they do? how do they live? They do nothing, nay, they do all things to lose it; and the larger number of Christians so live, as if death, judgment, hell, heaven, and eternity could not be an article of faith, but fables invented by the poets. If they lose a lawsuit or a harvest, what grief do they not feel? What pains do they not take to repair the loss? If they lose a horse or a dog, what diligence do they not exercise to find it? They lose the grace of God; they sleep, they jest, and they laugh. Wonderful fact! All are ashamed to be called negligent in the affairs of the world, and yet how many are not ashamed to neglect the affairs of eternity, which is all-important! They deem the saints to be wise, since they have attended solely to their salvation; and then they attend to all other things of the world, and not at all to the soul! But, says S. Paul, do you, my brethren, do you, attend only to that great concern which you have, of your eternal salvation; for this is the affair which is
