IX.

mitted from age to age. But how much more SER M. reafon have we to wonder, that he fo concerns himself about, and takes fuch care for a company of wretched mifcreants, among whom he is not valued! Still his treasures are opened to us; his fun fhines, his rain falls, and in ways of grace and mercy he leaves not himself without witness, in that he is continually doing us good, Giving rain from heaven and fruitful feasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness; though in the mean time men will not know who feeds them, and maintains their life, and parcels out their breath to them, every moment, from time to time.

SURELY it becomes us deeply to adore that patience, and bounty, that are fo continually exercised towards fuch creatures; who are here shut up in the dark, as it were, from one day to another. GoD appears not to them; they fee him not, and in the mean time agree in this, that they will have no thoughts of him, but have him in perpetual obli vion. Yet all the while they have natural powers and faculties, which if employed in the inquiry, might easily inform them, that they did not make themfelves; that they have not their life in their own hands, neither can they prolong it at their own pleasure, in as much as all of us live, and move, and have our being in God. However, they content themfelves with their ignorance of him; and yet he hath fuftained the world, and upheld the pillars of it, when fometimes it hath been ready to diffolve, and burft afunder, with VOL. I. that

Acts XIV. 17:

L

• Acts XVII. 28.

VOL. that weight of wickedness that hath overwhelmed it for a time.

I.

WE ought furely in the contemplation of this to fay, how far are his ways above our ways, and his thoughts above our thoughts! Men fometimes when they receive but a petty injury, and an apparent wrong from another, are presently wondering, that the earth doth not fwallow up the man that hath done them this palpable wrong; that vengeance spares him; or that God fuffers fuch a one to live. Oh why do not we turn all our wonder this way; that GOD fpares those that are perpetually affronting him! making it as it were the whole business of their life to testify to all the world, how little they care for him that made them! We ought then to confider with great admiration that vaft and immenfe goodness, which is fo indulgent to men all this while. Again,

4. WE may hence learn too the abfolute neceffity, and proper business of the Redeemer how great need there was of a Redeemer, and what work, and bufinefs he has to do on the behalf of finful men.

WE may learn, I fay, how great need there was of fuch a one. For who can stand under the weight of this charge, to have lived days, and months, and years in this world, deftitute of the love of GOD? Any man that apprehends the horror of the thing, and knows how inexcufable a wickedness it is, and how horrid, notwithstanding any pretence of excufe, cannot but be greatly

affected

affected by it; methinks palenefs muft poffefs his SER M. face, and pining his heart, to be fubject to fo IX. heavy a charge, and alfo liable to be convicted

of not loving Go D. it should be easy to was of a Redeemer.

And then, one would think, understand what need there The creation would not be able to fuftain this burden, to have creatures in it that loved not GOD, and were difaffected to their own original. If this guilt were to be parcelled out among the creation, how foon would it make all things fly afunder! and how impoffible would it be for things to fubfift and hold together! How great then was the need of a Redeemer in this cafe?

And

AND we may fee what his business hereupon must be also, that is, both to expiate the guilt of fuch as have not loved GOD, and to procure that they may do fo for the time to come. these two we are to confider not as feparate and apart from one another. We are not to fancy or imagine, that Chrift hath only this to do, namely to procure pardon for our not having loved GOD. Sure he is to procure grace also that we may, and effectually fhall do fo for the future, or else he will profit us but little. If we have to do with Christ at all, if ever we receive any benefit at all by him, it must be this double benefit in conjunction; not the one feparate from the other.

THE imagination runs in common among men, as if Chrift's business as mediator was only to reconcile God to men, and not man to Go D. But how expressly doth the Scripture speak of this part L 2

too!

I.

VOL. too! You that were fometime alienated, and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now bath be reconciled. He muft reconcile us to God. And therefore the Apostle again faith, that GoD was in Chrift reconciling the WORLD to himself. To take out of the hearts of men the enmity that is reigning every where against Go D, and bring them into love with him, is the very business of the gospel.

THERE did not need a gofpel to be preached to heaven, to incline GOD to man; but there was a neceffity of difpenfing one on earth to men, to incline them to Go D. If the business had only been to reconcile GOD to man, there had been no need of a gospel at all. The affair of our redemption might have been tranfacted between the Father, and the Son, in GoD's eternal counfel. Chrift might have died as he did, and the ends of his dying be never known to us, were it not that this was the means, that the spirit of Chrift was to work by, in order to overcome men's hearts, and flay the enmity in them, not to be done by any other way. And fhall any of us think, that Chrift came into the world to procure the falvation of those, that loved not God? This were to think, that he came into the world to banish the love of GOD out of it.

THEREFORE we must know, that if ever we be the better for Chrift it must be both in his expiating our guilt, for not loving GOD; and in removing cur enmity, that our love may be fet upon

upon him, our hearts joined with him, and in- SERM. gaged in communion and fellowship with him, IX.

in our future courfe. For this is the business of a Mediator between GOD and man: to falve the breach on both fides; to make a mutual agreement between both parties; to vindicate Go D's right, and fo to act the part of a juft Redeemer, and to procure man's righteousness, which is the part of a merciful Redeemer. This was his thought: "This cafe must be either redreffed in "men by working a change in them, or elfe "vindicated upon them." This he is obliged to as Redeemer. The Father hath given all judgement into his hand; and as it were depofited. his rights there, to be vindicated by him, or reftored.

5. LEARN hence the generous nature of divine love in men. The love that we owe, and that good fouls do live in the exercise of, and actually bear to GoD, of how noble and generous a nature I fay, is it? Their love is of fo refined and folid a nature, that it breaks through the whole sphere of fenfe, and flies above all visible things, and pitcheth upon an invifible object. There it terminates, and takes up its refidence. It never refts till it has flown up thither, and seeks no excuse from the duty of love to GoD, merely because he is invifible. It defpifeth to be so excufed, and neglects, and difregards the dictates. of fenfe in the cafe. This is the genius of divine L 3 love,