SERMON XVIII.

God is Love.

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I JOHN iv. 8. God is Love.

OVE is a gentle, pleafing theme, the nobleft paffion of the human breaft, and the fairest ornament of the rational nature. Love is the cement of fociety, and the fource of focial happinefs; and without it the great community of the rational univerfe would diffolve, and men and angels would turn favages, and roam apart in barbarous folitude. Love is the fpring of every pleasure; for who could take pleasure in the poffeffion of what he does not love! Love is the foundation of religion and morality; for what is more monftrous than religion without love to that God who is the object of it! Or who can perform focial duties without feeling the endearments of thofe relations to which they belong! Love is the foftener and polisher of human minds, and transforms barbarians into men: its pleasures are refined and delicate, and even its pains, and anxieties have fomething in them foothing and pleafing. In a word, love is the brightest beam of divinity that has ever irradiated the creation; the neareft resemblance to the ever-bleffed God; for God is Love.

God is love. There is an unfathomable depth in this concife laconic fentence, which even the penetration of an angel's mind cannot reach; an ineffable excellence, which even celeftial eloquence cannot fully reprefent. God is love; not only lovely and loving, but love itfelf; pure, unmixed love, nothing but love; love in his nature and in his operations; the object, fource, and quinteffence of all love.

My

My prefent defign is to recommend the Deity to your affections under the amiable idea of Love, and for that end to fhew that his other perfections are but various modifications of love.

I. Love comprehends the various forms of divine beneficence. Goodness, that extends its bounties to innumerable ranks of creatures, and diffufes happiness through the various regions of the univerfe, except that which is fet apart for the dreadful, but falutary and benevolent purpose of confining and punishing incorrigible malefactors; Grace, which fo richly fhowers its bleffings upon the undeferving, without past merit of the profpect of future compenfation; Mercy, that commiferates and relieves the miferable as well as the undeferving; Patience and Long-fuffering, which fo long tolerate infolent and provoking offenders; what is all this beneficence in all thefe its different forms towards different objects, what but Love under various names? It is gracious, merciful, patient, and long-fuffering love! love variegated, overflowing, and unbounded! what but love was the Creator of fuch a world as this, fo well accommodated, fo richly furnished for the fuftenance and comfort of its inhabitants? and what but love has planted it fo thick with an endlefs variety of beings, all capable of receiving fome ftream of happiness from that immenfe fountain of it, the divine goodness? Is it not love that preferves fuch an huge unwieldy world as this in order and harmony from age to age, and fupplies all its numerous inhabitants with every good? and O! was it not love, free, rich, unmerited love, that provided a Saviour for the guilty children of men? It was because God loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him fhould not perish, but have everlasting life! John iii. 16. O love! what haft thou done! what wonders haft thou wrought! It was thou, almighty love, that broughteft down the Lord of glory from his celeftial throne to die upon a crofs an atoning facrifice for the fins of the world. And what but love

is it that peoples the heavenly world with colonies transplanted from this rebellious province of Jehovah's dominions; that forms fuch miracles of glory and happiness out of the dust, and the shattered polluted fragments of human nature! and what but eternal love perpetuates their blifs through an eternal duration? but it is fo evident, that these instances of divine goodness are only the effects of love, that it is needless to attempt any farther illuftration.

II. What is divine wifdom but a modification of divine love, planning the beft adapted schemes for communicating itself in the most advantageous, beneficient, and honourable manner, fo as to promote the good of the great whole or collective fyftem of creatures by the happinefs of individuals; or to render the punishment and mifery of individuals, which for important reasons of ftate may be fometimes neceffary in a good government, fubfervient to the fame benevolent end? Whatever traces of divine wifdom we fee in creation; as the order and harmony of the great system of nature, its rich and various furniture, and the confpiracy of all its parts to produce the good of each other and the whole; whatever divine wisdom appears in conducting the great scheme of Providence through the various ages of time; or in the more astonishing and godlike work of redemption: in a word, whatever difplays of divine wisdom appear in any part of the universe, they are only the fignatures of divine love. Why was yonder fun fixed where he is, and enriched with fuch extenfive vital influences, but because divine love faw it was beft and most conducive to the good of the fyftem? Why were our bodies fo wonderfully and fearfully made, and all their parts fo well fitted for action and enjoyment, but because divine love drew the plan, and stamped its own amiable image upon them? Why was the manifold wisdom of God displayed, not only to mortals, but also to angelic principalities and powers, Ephef. iii. 10. in the fcheme of redemption, which advances at once the honours Kkk

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of the divine perfections and government, and the happiness of rebellious and ruined creatures, by an expedient which nothing but infinite wifdom could ever devife the incarnation, the obedience, and paffion of the co-equal fon of God? Why, I fay, but because divine love would otherwise be under restraint, and incapable of giving full fcope to its kind propenfions in a manner honourable to itself and conducive to the public good? In fhort, divine wisdom appears to be nothing else but the fagacity of love, to discover ways and means to exercise itself to the greatest advantage; or, which is the fame, divine wisdom always acts under the benign determination and conduct of love: it is the counsellor of love to project schemes fubfervient to its gracious purposes; and in all its councils love prefides.

III. What is divine power but the omnipotence of love? Why did omnipotence exert itself in the production of this vaft amazing world out of nothing? It was to open a channel in which the overflowing ocean of love might extend itself, and diffufe its streams from creature to creature, upwards as high as the most exalted archangel, and downwards as low as the meaneft vital particle of being, and extenfive as the remoteft limits of the univerfe, and all the innumerable intermediate ranks of exiftences in the endless chain of nature. And why does divine power still fupport this prodigious frame, but to keep the channel of love open from age to age? and for this purpofe it will be exerted to all eternity. Perhaps I fhould affift your ideas of Divine Power, if I fhould call it the acting hand, the inftrument, the fervant of love, to perform its orders, and execute its gracious defigns.

IV. What is the holinefs of God but love? Pure, refined, and honourable love. What is it but the love of excellence, rectitude, and moral goodnefs? Holiness, in its own nature, has a tendency to promote the happinefs of the univerfe: it is the health, the good conftitution of a reasonable being; without which it has

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no capacity of relifhing thofe enjoyments which are fuitable to its nature. It is no arbitrary mandate of heaven that has established the infeperable connection between holinefs and happiness, between vice and mifery. The connection is as neceffary, as immutable, and as much founded in the nature of things, as that between health of body and a capacity of animal enjoyments, or between sickness and a difrelifh for the most agreeable food. Every creature in the universe, as far as he is holy is happy; and as far as he is unholy he is miferable. Therefore, by how much the more holy Jehovah is, by fo much the more fit he is to communicate happinefs to all that enjoy him; and confequently he is an infinite happiness, for he is infinitely holy. His taking fo much care to promote holiness is but taking care of the public good. The ftrict exactions of his law, which contains every ingredient of the moft perfect holiness, and admits of no difpenfation, are but strict injunctions to his fubjects to pursue that course which infallibly leads them to the most confummate happiness; and every abatement in his demands of obedience would be a licence to them to deduct fo much from their happiness, and render themselves fo far miferable with his confent. That mitigation of the rigor of his law, which fome imagine he has made to bring it down to a level with the abilities of degenerate creatures, difabled by their voluntary wickednefs, would no more contribute to their felicity than the allowing a fick man to gratify his vitiated taste by mixing a little deadly poifon in his food would contribute to the recovery of his health, or the prefervation of his life. The penal fanctions of the divine law are but friendly warnings against danger and mifery, and honeft admonitions of the deftructive confequences of fin, according to the unchangeable nature of things; they are threatenings which discover no malignity or illnature, as finners are apt to imagine, but the infinite benevolence of the heart of God: threatenings which are not primarily and unconditionally intended to be executed,