condition; not less than for a beggar to be taken from the dunghill, and set on a throne, Ps. cxiii. 7, 8. It should be our care to preserve this honourable and happy relation, and endeavour to act up to it; knowing to whom our choicest affections are due, studying to be the true children of Christ in obedience, as well as by adoption and grace, and remembering always that holiness becometh his house for ever. Even so, Lord Jesus, grant we may resolve to be thine, and may be heirs of thy glory. Thus you see, my brethren, how Christ is made unto us what he is called, and is, "Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace." Each of these titles holds forth blessing, happiness, and comfort to us; let us look well to our interest in them. All Christ's names are promises, and signify what he has to do in us; but if we do not put ourselves into his hands for that purpose, we hear them in vain. What remains is, that you take the words of the text for your guide, "to examine yourselves whether you be in the faith?" Make the inquiry, as persons that would not be deceived for the world, with respect to your salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ. Put your hearts to answer the great interesting question, whether you know him in any measure, in his grace, power, and peace, according to the virtue of these names. And may he, who has all power given unto him in heaven and earth, assist and bless you in it. To him, with God the Father, and God the Holy Ghost, the blessed Trinity in Unity, be glory and praise for ever and ever. Amen. SERMON IV. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew, v. 10. THE righteousness of the Gospel, considered as inherent in ourselves, is very different from what passes for such in common esteem. It is real inward holiness; the renewal of our souls in the image of God; the knowledge and love of God by his own Spirit. It is the full and free surrender of ourselves, our whole state and being, to God in simplicity and sincerity, that he may choose for us, and live in us, and be all in all to us. It is an upright will and an obedient conscience; the sacrifice of the heart, and the mind that was in Christ. It is turning to God from the evil that is in the world, and in our natures, with the whole strength of our will and desires; walking continually in his presence, and giving up ourselves without reserve to his operations. It begins in humility, is rooted in faith, nourished by prayer, perfected by love, and ends in acquaintance and communion with God here, and the everlasting enjoyment of him hereafter. And it is the highest wisdom in man, and the sole end of his creation, thus to "seek after God, if haply he might feel after him and find him;" to turn to him in faith and longing earnest desire; to resign our will to him, and place our affections upon him, that he may flow in upon us with his goodness, and communicate his own happiness to us. } It is the design of this discourse to illustrate the nature of Gospel-righteousness, or true holiness; to contrast it with that which commonly passes for such in the world; to show why the first is persecuted and the last applauded; and then to conclude with a few inferences. The Bible was written to show us the absolute indispensable necessity of being renewed in the deep ground of our hearts; to teach us the one sole method of being restored to the original dignity and perfection of our natures; to quicken our desires and endeavours after it; to furnish us with all proper helps for it; and especially to caution us against trusting to any expedients or inventions of our own in this great affair, in opposition to the counsel and will of God for our salvation and recovery, so fully declared to us, and so plainly set before us. It acquaints us that the whole state and condition of man, when he first came out of the hands of his Maker, was very different from what it is now: that he stood before God as an angel in paradise, holy and happy, with a capacity of receiving continually new degrees of life and blessing from him: that by withdrawing his heart from him, and foolish imagination of being more perfect and happy independently of him, he fell, as God had told him he would, and as every creature necessarily must do that turns its will and desires from God, into a state of misery, corruption, and death: that, in this sad condition of darkness and alienation from the life of God, he begat children in his own likeness, who are, therefore, the heirs of his sin and weakness; born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards; wearying themselves in a vain pursuit after happiness; and sure never to see the hour when they are at rest, and can say they have what they wish for, because they have that fatal taint in their blood, that aversion to God, and love to the creature, which is the death of their souls, and the essence of misery. That, notwithstanding the dreadful fall of man into this unnatural helpless state of sin and condemnation, the God and Father of mercies did not forsake him, or leave him to perish in it, but took occasion from hence to display the riches of his nature, and make all his goodness pass before him, by proposing to him a method of recovering all he had lost, by giving him an assurance of pardon, and being received to grace and favour, as if he had never sinned, through faith in a Redeemer. The seed of the woman was promised to bruise the serpent's head; to destroy and break in pieces the dominion which the devil, that crooked serpent, had gotten over the whole race of mankind, by the disobedience and rebellion of their first parents: he was to be our Immanuel, God again with us and in us, to carry us safely through all the stages of our return to God; to purge out our inbred corruptions; to set up the kingdom of heaven in our souls; to bring in everlasting righteousness, and make us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. And "to as many as receive him" in faith, and love, and full conviction of their own weakness and wretched unworthiness, " he gives power to become the sons of God;" entering as deeply into their nature as sin had done, and raising up again in them the life and nature of heaven, healing them in his blood, comforting them with his presence, and purifying them by his Spirit. And as the Bible thus discovers to us the deep ground of our fall, and offers us redemption from it, and calls us to come out of it, so it informs us that if ever we are possessed of our primitive integrity, it must be the gift of God. To stand in the order and will of God; to be in subjection to the Father of our spirits; to receive all his commands with the undisputing simplicity of little children; to love him with all the heart; to delight in him, and long to enjoy him, and forsake all for him: this is as much above the power as it is contrary to the nature of man in his present condition. And whoever thinks he can master his corruptions in his own strength, and restore himself to a capacity of doing the will of God ر from the heart, I am confident either never tried, or else he takes a false measure of his state and nature, and brings down his duty to so small a matter, as any man may do, but God will never accept. No! When the awakened soul begins to ask itself, "Can these dry bones live?" it answers at once, "Lord God, thou knowest." It finds by its own experience, and repeated fruitless endeavours after holiness, that our regeneration is the work of an almighty power, and that we can no more restore the image of God to ourselves, now we have lost it, than we could have made ourselves in it at the first; and, therefore, it casts itself wholly upon God, condemned and helpless, praying incessantly for deliverance, and doing all it does in religion to prepare itself for the divine operations. And this, indeed, is a hopeful time, and a happy entrance upon the Gospel state, and "blessed are they who thus hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled" with the very thing they hunger and thirst after; with righteousness they shall go on from strength to strength, and from one degree of goodness to another, rejoicing in their progress, as the surest mark of their adoption and acceptance to a share of that perfect righteousness which is treasured up for believers in Christ, and imparted to all those who, by faith, become living members of his body. But this humility - this self-contempt - this patient waiting for the kingdom of God -- this loving faithful obedient spirit - this devotion of the whole man to God - this aspiring after inward holiness by the power of the Holy Ghost - does it meet with fair treatment and a favourable reception in the world? Is it common for men to bid God speed to them who are looking out for a change of their state, and resolve to enter upon a Christian course? To assist them in their resolutions, and pray for grace to imitate them? This would be supposing |