Imatges de pàgina
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1 Of the wonders fhewed in the waters, and therein,
Of the divifion of Jordan.

This was a great wonder, the story of it is recorded fo, for the day before it was done fobna faid to the people:

Sanctifie your felves, for to morrow the Lord will do wonders among you: yea, God himself faid to fofua; This day will I magnifie thee in the fight of all Ifrael, that they may know, that as I was with Moles, fo I will be with thee.

The wonder is fet down thus:

No fooner did the feet of the Priests which bare the Ark, dip in the brim of the water, but the waters that came down from above frood, androfe up upon an heap very far from the City Adam, that is befide the Zaretan and thofe that came down from the Sea of the plain, even the falt. Sea failed, and were cut off and the people paffed over right against Jericho.

This was fo great a wonder, that we read,

when all the Kings of the Amorites which were on the fide of Jordan weftward;and all the Kings of the Cananites which were by the Sea, heard that the Lord had dried up the waters of Jordan from before the children of Ifrael: untill we were passed over that their hearts melted: neither was there fpirit in them any more, because of the children of Ifrael.

And the Pfalmift doth celebrate the prayfes of God for the fame, with poeticall ftreins of divine rapture; he putteth both together, as this our Pfalmift doth, both that of the Red Sea, and this of fordan,

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The Seafaw that and fled: (i.e. it faw that, when Ifrael came out of Egypt, Judah was his Sanctuary, and Ifrael his dominion.) Jordan was driven back...

what ailed thee O Sea, that thou fleddeft? thou Iordan that thon waft turned back?

The things moft remarkable in that wonderfull work of God were thefe;

Ihat the waters of fo great a River as Jordan fhould recoil towards their head; for water being a ponderous body, doth naturally fall downward, and feeketh ftill the lower

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place; but God did make a wall of water to ftop the decourse of the ftream, which was a work against nature: for the other part of the ftream ran on, and left the land dry.

2. The second wonder was the means that God used to ac complish this great work for the Priests that did bear the Arke muft fet the firft foot into the River, for God faid;

Affoon as the foals of the feet of the Friefts, that bear the Arke of Jul.3.13. the Lord, the Lord of all the Earth, shall rest in the waters of Jordan, the waters of Fordan shall be cut off, &c.

Here was the Arke, the Sacrament vifible of Gods invifible prefence, and the Priests of the Lord bearing it: they had the warrant of Gods Word to attempt this paffage, and they did not fo much as wet their feet in that river; no fooner did the foals of their feet touch the water, but they fled from the Lord, not from the Priefts; yet from the Priefts as the Lords instruments,not that any vertue or efficacie was in the feet of the Priefts, the vertue was in the Sacrament of Gods prefence, the Ark which they carried upon their fhoulders : neither was the vertue of that wonder in the Saerament efficiently and primarily, but mediately and inftrumentally.

It was the work of the Lordof all the Earth, whofe Sacrament was the Arke, whofe fervants the Priests.

3 A third wonder was the faith of the Priefts that did bear the Arke, who could believe a thing in nature fo impossible, in reafon fo improbable, that they durft attempt it both in regard of their ovvn perfons, but especially of the Ark of God vvhich they did bear.

Mofes vvanted faith in a leffe matter, vvhen God bade him onely fpeak to the Rock, he fmote it tvvice, once in vain to punish his unbelief, once vvith fucceffe to fulfill Gods promife.

Yet the Priests believed faithfully, and obeyed vvvillingly, and did not debate the matter anxioufly, or go on timerou

fly.

4 A fourth wonder was in the time, for it was in the time of 1.3.1. the harvest when Jordan overfloweth all the banks, when there

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was a great deal more river then channel, and the more water, the more wonder.

5 We may adde here to a fifth, that when all the people Jh.4.5. were paft over, Joshua did command twelve men out of every Tribe a man, to return back again into the midst of the Channel, and they were not priefts, but lay-men, and they were not to follow the Ark, but to goe before it, and from thence, they must every man bring upon his fhoulder a stone, and thofe were fet up in Gilgall for a monument of this paffage, for the memoriall thereof to their children.

Josh. 4.18.

Exod.7.20.

6 The last wonder was, that when the twelve men returned from the midft of the channell of Jordan, to the land which was for them to dwell in. The Priefts following them with the Arke of God, the foals of their feet were no sooner lifted upon the dry land, but

The waters of Jordan returned to their place, and flowed over all his banks as they did before. But he names river in my Text, fo; Further, this mention of the Rivers is yet referred to a former ftory, wherein God declared his power in the Rivers of the Egyptians, and that not improperly, because thenthe people were in the house of bondage, and the firft Plague which God put upon the Egyptians was this, All the waters were turned into blond, the fish died, and the Waters ftanke.

It may also renew the memory of tvvo more paffages over z Ki .2.8. fordan, one of Eliah, who took his mantle and wrapped it together, and fmote the waters, and they were divided hither and thither, Virfe 14. fo that they two went over on dry land. Another of Elisha,who took up the mantle of Eliah, and stood by the River of Jordan, andsaid, Where is the Lord God of Eliah, and fmate the water, and it parted hither and thither, and Elisha past over..

2 In the next place, he remembreth the Sea, meaning the Red Sea, and Gods riding through it, and conducting his f Exo.14 16. rael through the midst of it, the ftorie of it is recorded by Mofes.

And there are many vvonders in it..

The danger that Ifrael vvas in, the Egyptians behind

them.

them vvith povver and fury to deftroy them, the Sea before them to fvvallovv them, God opened them a paffage through the Sea to fave them for the over-taking of their enemies, and to lead them to the next fhoar, a wonderfull helpe in extremity of danger.

2 Another vvonder, that God rather ufed Mefes and his Exo.14.16 rod, then his ovvn vvord, in the parting of the waters of the Sea for using the Miniftry and service of men, in his great and extraordinary operations, he doth honour to men therein, as he faid to fofhua.

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This day will I begin to magnifie thee in the fight of all Ifrael, Jon .37. that they may know that as I was with Mofes, fo I will be with thee.

So the Pfalmift faith,

Thou leadeft thy people like sheep by the hand of Mofes and Aaron: It is wel obferved of Master Calvine, Miniftros fimul commendat,quibus tam honorificum munus deus injunxit.

So in the Gofpel,Chrift hath honored his Minifters,towhom he hath committed the office of the miniftry of reconciliation : teaching by them, baptizing by them,binding and loofning by them, for though he do all these things himself, as he faith, Sine me nihil poteftis facere, without me you can do nothing, yet he will do nothing ordinarily in these things without us, because this is his Ordinance, and the established conftitution in his Church..

Pfa.77.30.

3 As he used the miniftry of Mofes in this great work of di- Ex.14.21 viding the fea, fo did he alfo use the fervice of an Eaft-wind all the night, to drive back the vvaters, that dry land might appear.

This abated nothing of the honour of God, that he used the fervice of his creatures, neither can this feparation of the waters be, therefore afcribed to fome naturall caufes," seeing this wind was miraculously fent of God to this purpose.

Some enemies of God have flandred this miracle, andfaid, that the paffage of Ifrael was but an advantage taken of an extraordinary neap tide, which turns the truth into a lye, for

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it is here added, that the vvaters vvere a vvall on both fides of them.

The work it felf of dividing the fea, that was the greateft, what is the rod of Mofes, or the force of an east wind to part the waters in two, and to cut out a lane of dry land, in the midft of the fea for fuch an armie to paffe through on foot, to make the waters a fluent and liquid element to ftand on both sides, as a wall and fence to their paffage.

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Yet I must tell you that many learned have believed and written, that the waters of the fea were divided in twelve places, and twelve lanes, cut out, for the twelve tribes to passe over every of the tribes a part, and by himself.

"And this was the tradition of the Hebrews: as St. Origen, upon this place affirmeth.

Audivi à majoribus traditum quod in ifta digreffione maris, fingulis quibufq; tribubus filiorum Ifr. fingule aquarum divifiones facte funt, & propria unicuiq; tribui in mari aperta fit via And for proof, he alledgeth the words of the Pfalme. He divided the red fea into parts, it is rendered in divifions, implying more than one divifion.

I fay with St. Origen. Hac à majoribus obfervata in Scripturis divinis religiofum credidi non tacere.

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But though this do much advance the glory of Gods ér, yet because it is not recorded in this ftory of the paffage, we need not admit it, and against it I finde, that the place alledged will not carry it through, For the fame word which is used to expreffe the divifion of the waters in this ftory, is afed by Mofes, in the story of Abraham:

Who by the comandement of God, took a young heifer,a sheegoat, a rum, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon, an divided them in the midit, and layed each piece, one against another.

Here was a divifion made but into two parts, onely, yet it is faid after that, behold, a fmoaking furnace, and a lamp of fire paft between those pieces: the word is the fame, yet the divifion was but into two,no doubt,that story would not have concealed fo great an addition to the wonder, fo much ferning to fet forth the glory of God.

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