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I. WHERE A CHILD OF GOD WOULD NOT LIVE ALWAYS. On earth. The utmost to be enjoyed or expected on this side heaven, cannot make him wish that it may be always with him as now, that this may be his everlasting abode.

1. You that are men of the world, would you live always?

2. You that have much of this world's goods, would you live alway?

II. WHY A CHILD OF GOD WOULD NOT LIVE ALWAY IN THIS PRESENT STATE. It is common for men in distress to wish for death, as having no other notion of it than of its being a freedom from their present pain and misery.

1. Because it is the will of God that the child of God should not live alway.

2. Saints would not live alway, from the concern and zeal they have for God's glory.

3. From love to Christ the saint is willing to depart.

4. A child of God would behave after the example of Christ.

5. As feeling the evils of the present state, and having the believing prospect of a better.

(1) Those on earth that are even got nearest to heaven in preparation for it, are imperfect as to grace, and have much of the remains of corruption in them.

(2) Saints, while on earth, are in a state of sorrow as well as sin.

(3) Saints are in a state of warfare.

(4) They are here on trial as probationers for eternity, and so must be full of care and solicitude, how it shall go with them, and lest they should miscarry.

(5) In the present state, saints are at a distance from Christ.

(6) A child of God has foretastes of a better life.

III. WHAT IS IMPLIED IN THIS SAYING?

1. That the saint believes he is one who is already, through grace, prepared for a better life.

2. While in this world, a child of God should think and speak, not as an inhabitant of it, but as a traveller through it; not as one fixed here, but as one in motion towards a better country, that is, a heavenly.

IV. IN WHAT MANNER SHOULD A CHILD OF GOD THUS SPEAK?

1. With a deep sense of the evil of sin, which hath made this world so undesirable.

2. With great seriousness, upon the consideration, how awful a thing it is to die.

3. Not as peremptorily fixing the time to what date he would have his life drawn out, or when cut off, but with entire resignation, referring the matter to God.

V. TO WHOM MAY A SAINT SPEAK THUS?

1. To God by way of appeal.

2. To others we may utter this, when speaking of the concerns of our souls, and of eternity, to engage them to regard us as those who are dying, and well satisfied in the choice we have made, of God for our portion, and heaven as our home.

3. To himself. Application —

(1) How admirable is the grace of God in the change it makes in His people!

(2) What reason have we to bless God for the discoveries of the Gospel.

(3) Make sure of a title to a better life and state.

(D. Wilcox.)

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KJV: I loathe it; I would not live alway: let me alone; for my days are vanity.

WEB: I loathe my life. I don't want to live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are but a breath.