to consume the Adversaries III. The Third General Point I am to insist on from the Text is the End of our Saviour's Appearance and that is here said to be the putting away of Sin Once in the end of the World hath he appeared to put away Sin This is that which the Scripture every where assigns as the Business and Design of Christ's coming To run over all the particular Texts would be tedious in so plain a Case I shall therefore only name one or two This is the Account that St. John gives of his Appearance 1 Ep. Ch. 3. Ye know saith he that he was manifested to take away our Sins And again this is the account that the Angel gives to Joseph a little before his Birth Mat. 1.20 Fear not saith he to take unto thee Mary thy Wife for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost And she shall bring forth a Son and thou shalt call his Name Jesus for he shall save his People from their sins He was called Jesus because he was designed by God to be our Saviour for so much that word imports And he is therefore our Saviour because he saves his People from their Sins which is in the words of the Text to put them away But what is it to be saved from our Sins or to have our Sins put away Since the Salvation we have by Christ doth consist in this it is fit we should a little more particularly insist on it In Answer therefore to this Question we say that two things are implyed in Christ 's putting away Sin First His saving or delivering us from the Guilt of our Sins and the Punishment due to them Secondly His saving or delivering us from the Power and Dominion of them In these two things consists the Salvation obtained for us by Jesus Christ and if either of them was wanting or was not effected he would not be a compleat Saviour First Christ appeared to put away Sin by delivering us from the Guilt and Punishment of it that is to say by procuring for us the Pardon and Remission of it This is the Salvation which Zachary in his Hymn foretels John Baptist should publish to the World Luke 1. To give knowledge of salvation to his people for the Remission of their sins And this is that Redemption of Christ which St. Paul speaks of 1 Coloss 14. In whom we have redemption through his blood even the forgiveness of sins And lastly St. Paul's Sermon to the Gentiles is Be it known unto you Men and Brethren that through this Man Jesus Christ is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins and by him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the Law of Moses Acts. 13. And therefore much less certainly by the Law of Nature The effect of these Texts is That all Mankind are Sinners are concluded under Sin are become Guilty before God as the Apostle speaks The most innocent Person is not excepted All without exception have by their Sins fallen short of the Glory of God Means now for the freeing themselves from the Guilt of these Sins they have none nor is it possible they should have for that wholly depends upon the pleasure of Him to whom they have rendred themselves obnoxious and that is God the Governour of the World Here therefore appears the infinite Mercy of God and the Kindness of our Saviour The Eternal Word interposeth and offers himself to become Man and in that Person to make satisfaction for the Sins of the World And God accepts the Terms And hereupon a Covenant is made between God and Mankind wherein God for his part upon account of this Mediation of Christ promises Forgiveness of all Sins to all true Penitents all the World over O joyful Tidings these What ease is here to wounded Consciences What comfort to despairing Sinners What encouragement to all Men every where to repent If we consider Mankind in their pure Naturals and as without Christ Jesus this plainly was their Case They did believe a Supreme God and their Reason it is likely would tell them that God was Good and Merciful But yet this Reason could discover no more than God's general Goodness to them that all along endeavoured to please and approve themselves to Him But as for his Willingness to pardon and forgive Sinners especially those that had offended him by very grievous Crimes or lived in a long habitual course of Wickedness this they could not conclude from their Reason Nay if they did reason as they justly might they might rather be inclined to believe that he would not pardon such Criminals For as their Reason told them that God was Good So the same Reason told them that he was Just and had an infinite Regard to the Honour and Reputation of his Laws Which Laws their own Consciences told them they had heinously transgressed nor had they any thing wherewith to compensate or make satisfaction for the Transgression of them And therefore what could they expect from so Just a God but to undergo the punishment they had deserved This was a very uncomfortable Reasoning And yet such a one it was as there was no answer to be given to in the State of Nature and therefore in what a melancholy Condition were Mankind all the while What encouragement had they seriously to set upon the Amendment of their wicked Lives Or if they did what Fruit what Comfort could they promise to themselves by such an amendment But Blessed be God that hath removed us out of these uncertainties Blessed be God that hath given us the greatest assurance that is possible of his Love and Kindness to the greatest of Sinners and consequently laid the greatest Obligation upon all Mankind to turn from their evil Ways He hath sent his Son his only Son into the World on purpose to assure us of his good Will to us to give a demonstration of the unfeigned Love and Kindness that He bears to every Soul of the Sons of Adam that he would not have any of them perish but that they should all come to the knowledge of the Truth and be saved This Son of His doth most Solemnly in the Name of his Father proclaim Pardon and Remission of Sins to every one that should believe in Him There is no Sinner excepted even the Oldest the Greatest the most Enormous of Sinners if they will come in and submit to the Yoke of Jesus Christ have his certain Promise that they shall be received And least any one should fear the Divine Justice upon account that there is no satisfaction made to it for his Sins Our Lord hath taken care to remove that Objection For he by the unvaluable Merits of his Person and the free unconstrained Offering up of Himself to an ignominious Death upon the Cross on the behalf of Mankind hath made a full compleat and entire Satisfaction to God's Justice for all the Sins of the World from
the beginning to the end thereof So that now every one hath free Access to God and a Right to his Favour through the Blood of Jesus Christ And though we have been never so bad never so unworthy yet if we have but the Hearts to forsake our Sins and come to Jesus Christ we shall as certainly obtain the Acceptance and the Love of our Heavenly Father as if we had been Innocent and never sinned at all Nay God is not only willing to receive us but he earnestly begs and sollicits us to take his Mercy And so pleased he is at the Return of a Sinner that our Saviour has told us there is joy in Heaven over such a one Nay more joy among the Angels over a sinner that repenteth than over ninety nine just persons that need no Repentance O how welcome ought this News to be to us How transported should we be at the infinite Kindness of God manifested to us by our Saviour O! praised be God for his astonishing Love For ever adored be our Lord Jesus that has made a Propitiation for us by his Blood O let us for ever kiss and hug the pretious unvaluable Scriptures of the New Testament if there was nothing else in them but that faithful Saying that Saying worthy of all Men to be received That Jesus Christ came into the World to save Sinners to save you and me and all Sinners even the greatest of Sinners O! who is there that is in his Wits would chuse to be out of the Christian Dispensation or be left to the Methods of Nature and Philosophy for the attaining their Happiness as some loose People among us do sometimes talk Were the natural Talents of Mankind exalted far above what they either are or ever have been yet I would value that one Saying That Jesus Christ came into the World to save Sinners more than all the Notions and Speculations of Reason and Philosophy I would desire to know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified I would with the Apostle count all things as loss nay as Dung in comparison of the Excellency of the Knowledge of Christ Jesus my Saviour and that I may be found in him not having my own Righteousness which is by Nature but that Righteousness which is by the Faith of Jesus Christ who gave himself for me And thus much of Christ's appearing to put away Sin in the first Notion of that Expression But Secondly Christ appeared to put away Sin in another sense That is to say To destroy the Power and Dominion of it from among Men to abolish it so as that it should not henceforth reign in our mortal Bodies To free us from Sin as the Apostle speaks that is to enable us to lead holy and virtuous Lives So that whereas Mankind heretofore yielded their Members Servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity so they should now yield their Members Servants to righteousness unto holiness Thus to put away Sin was as principal an End of Christ's coming as the other before mentioned nay perhaps more principal For the other in true reasoning may be said to be wholly in order to this Certain it is unless this End be attained the other will signifie nothing to us For we are not capable of any Benefit from that Remission of Sin which was purchased for us by Christ until our Sins be put away by Repentance and and we become holy Persons by the change and renewal of our Natures Never therefore let us deceive our selves Though Christ hath actually put away all the Sins of the World in the former sense by his satisfaction that is to say hath procured the Pardon of them hath taken away the Sting of them so as that they shall not be deadly to any Yet all this is upon supposition that the Strength of them be taken away in us that they have no Dominion over us that we mortifie them in all our Members that we daily die to them and live a Life of Righteousness All that Christ merited or purchased for the World will not do us the least good unless we be made conformable to him in his Death and Resurrection by our dying to Sin and living to Righteousness And in truth if we will mind it the putting away Sin in this sense of it hath as great weight laid upon it in Scripture and is as often assigned for the great End and Business of Christ's appearance as the other St. John tells us plainly that for this purpose was the Son of God manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil And St. Paul likewise tells us that he therefore gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works And lastly St. Peter gives the same account of his coming Acts 3.26 where he tells us that therefore God raised up his Son Jesus that is sent him into the World for his raising up there spoken of as any one will see that looks into the Context was not his being raised from the dead but his being manifested to Mankind For here the Apostle's business is to apply that Promise or Prophesie of Moses unto our Saviour viz. That God would in due time raise up to his People a Prophet like unto him whom they should all be obliged to hearken to I say therefore God raised up his Son Jesus i. e. sent him into the World that he might bless his People in turning every one of them from their Iniquities This turning every one from their Iniquities was the great End for which our Lord Jesus Christ was manifested unto Mankind And indeed Reason will teach us all this as well as Revelation For in the nature of the thing none can be truly Happy but those that are truly Pious And in the same degree and proportion that any one is wicked or is under the power of his Lusts in the same degree he must needs be miserable So that if Christ came to be our Saviour and in that meant either to make us happy or to keep us from being miserable there was an absolute necessity that his first and principal Design must be to root out of our Nature all Sin and Wickedness and to restore the Image of God in our Minds which consists in unchangeable Purity and Holiness and Goodness Away therefore with all those Hypotheses that give such an account of Christ's coming into the World as to make the ultimate End of it to be the freeing us from Hell and Damnation and purchasing Heaven and Eternal Life for us but without any respect had to the renewing our Natures or the making us sincerely Holy and Virtuous All such accounts of Christ's Undertaking are monstrously unreasonable and absurd For not to insist upon the manifest Affront they put upon God's Justice and Holiness in making Him the great Patron of Sin whilst they assert Him to be the Justifier of wicked Men even whilst they continue wicked
his Enjoyments So that however the varieties of his Condition may occasion a change in his Pleasures yet can they never cause any Loss or Destruction of them And this security he enjoys not as some of the Stoicks of old pretended to do by an Imaginary Insensibility or by changing the names of Things calling that no Evil which Really is one but by an absolute Resignation of himself to the Will of God and an Hearty acquiescing in his wise Providence He is certain there is a God that governs the World and that nothing happens to him but by his Order and Appointment And he is certain also that this God hath a real Kindness for him and would not dispense any Event unto him but what is really for his Good and Advantage And these thoughts so support his Spirit that he not only bears patiently but thanks God for whatever happens to him And instead of Fretting and Complaining that things succeed otherwise than he expected he resolves with himself that that Condition whatever it be in which he actually is is indeed best for him and that which he himself were he to be the Carver of his Fortunes supposing him but truly to understand his own Concernments would chuse for himself above all others But farther besides this security from Outward Disturbances which our Vertue obtains for us there is another Evil which it also delivers us from with which the wicked Man is almost perpetually haunted and which seldom suffers him to enjoy any sincere unmingled Pleasure That which I mean is the Pangs of an Evil Conscience the Fears the Restlesness the Confusion the Amazements that arise in his Soul from the sense of his Crimes and the just Apprehensions of the Shame and Vengeance that doth await them possibly in this Life but most certainly in the Life to come How Happy how Prosperous soever the Sinner be as to his other Affairs yet these Furies he shall be sure to be plagued with no pompousness of Condition no costly Entertainments no noise of Company will be able to drive them away Every Man that is wicked cannot but know that he is so and that very Knowledge is a Principle of perpetual Anguish and Disquietude Be his Crimes never so secret yet he cannot be confident they will always continue so and the very Apprehension of this makes him feel all the Shame and Amazement of a present Discovery But put the case he hath had the good luck to sin so closely or in such a nature that he need fear nothing from Men yet he knows there is an Offended God to whom he hath a sad and a fearful Reckoning to make a God too Just to be Bribed too Mighty to be Over-awed too Wise to be Imposed upon And is not the Man think you under such Reflections as these likely to live a very Comfortable life Ah none knows the Bitterness of them but himself that feels them To the Judgment of others he perhaps appears a very happy Man he hath the World at his beck all things seem to conspire to make him a great Example of Prosperity we admire we appland his Condition But ah we know not how sad a heart he often carries under this fair Out-side we know not with what sudden Damps his Spirit is often struck even in the heighth of his Revellings We know not how unquiet how broken his sleeps are how oft he starts and looks pale when the Wife that lies by his side understands not what the matter is with him He doth indeed endeavour all he can to stifle his Cares and to stop the mouth of his Conscience He thinks to divert it with Business or to flatter it with little Sophistries or to drown it with Rivers of Wine or to calm it with soft and gentle Airs And he is indeed sometimes so successful in these Arts as for a while to lay it asleep But alas this is no lasting Peace the least thing awakens it even the sound of a Passing-Bell or a clap of Thunder nay a Frightful Dream or a Melancholy Story hath the power to do it and then the poor Man returns to his Torment And now judge you whether the Honest and Vertuous Man that is free from all these Agonies that is at Peace with God and at Peace with his own Conscience that apprehends nothing terrible from the one nor feels any thing troublesome from the other but is safe from Himself and from all the world in his own Innocence Judge I say whether such a one hath not laid to himself better and surer Foundations for Pleasures and a happy Life than the Man that by indulging his Lusts and Vices only breeds up a Snake in his Bosom which will not cease to Sting and Gall him beyond what a Tongue is able to express or a witty Cruelty to invent Fourthly and lastly Besides the benefits of Religion for removing the hinderances of our Pleasures it also adds to Humane Life a world of Pleasures of its own which vicious men are utterly unacquainted with And these are of so excellent a kind so delicious so enravishing that the highest gratifications of sense are not comparable to them Never till we come to be heartily Religious do we understand what true Pleasure is That which ariseth from the grateful motions that are made in our outward senses is but a faint shadow a mere dream of it Then do we begin to enjoy true Pleasures indeed when our Highest and Divinest Faculties which were wholly laid asleep while we lived the Life of Sense begin to be awakened and to exercise themselves upon their proper objects when we become acquainted with God and the Infinite Abyss of Good that is in him when our hearts are made sensible of the great Love and Good-will he bears us and in that Sense are powerfully carried out in Joy and Love and Desire after him When we feel the Divine Nature daily more and more displayed in our Souls shewing forth it self in the blessed Fruits of Charity and Peaceableness and Meekness and Humility and Purity and Devotion and all the other Graces of the Holy Spirit It is not possible but that such a Life as this must needs be a Fountain of inexpressible Joy to him that leads it and fill the Soul with transcendently greater Content than any thing upon Earth can possibly do For this is the Life of God this is the Life of the Blessed Angels above this is the Life that is most of all agreeable to our own Natures While we live thus things are with us as they should be our Souls are in their natural Posture in that state they were framed and designed to live in whereas the Life of Sin is a state of Disorder and Confusion a perpetual violence and force upon our Natures While we live thus we enjoy the Pleasures of Men whereas before when we were governed by Sense we could pretend to no other satisfactions but what the Brutes have as well as we In
which is more accommodated to Cities and publick Societies than to Cloysters and Deserts And lastly Mat. 5.16 this is to walk in a conformity to his command who hath bid us make our light so to shine before men that they may see our good works and glorifie our Father which is in Heaven But Fourthly and lastly If it be a thing so necessary that every man should do Good in his life as hath been represented then how much to be reproved are they that do no Good till their death That live scrapingly and uncharitably and uselesly to the world all their lives long and then when they come to die think to Atone for their sins and neglects of this kind by shewing some extraordinary Bounty to the poor or devoting some part of their Estates to publick or pious uses I must confess this kind of proceeding doth to me seem just like the business of putting off a man's repentance to his death-bed It is absolutely necessary that a Man should repent though it be never so late and so it is that he should do good if he have done little Good in his life he is bound as he loves his soul to shew some extraordinary uncommon instances of Charity and a Publick Spirit when he comes to die But then it is here as it is with the long delaying of Repentance the deferring it so long has robbed the man of the greatest part of the praise and the comfort he might have expected from it His Rewards in Heaven will be much less though his good deeds should be accepted but he is infinitely uncertain whether they will or no. It must be a very great act of Generosity and Charity that can obtain a pardon for a whole life of uncharitableness Let us all therefore labour and study to do Good in our lives let us be daily giving evidences to the World of our kind and charitable disposition and let not that be the first which is discovered in our last Will and Testament If God hath blessed us with worldly goods let us distribute them as we see occasion in our life time when every one may see we do it voluntarily and not stay till we must be forced to part with them whether we will or no for that will blast the credit of our good deeds both with God and man I have said enough concerning the first point recommended in the Text viz. doing Good I now come briefly to Treat of the other that is Rejoycing which is equally a part of the business of this day There is no Good saith Solomon in any earthly thing or there is nothing better for any Man than to rejoyce and to do Good The Rejoycing her recommended is capable of two senses the first more general and more concerning us as Christians the other more particular and which more immediately concerns us as we are here met upon this occasion In the first place by Rejoycing we may take to be meant a constant habit of joy and chearfulness so that we are always contented and well pleased always free from those anxieties and disquiets and uncomfortable reflexions that make the lives of mankind miserable This now is the Perfection of Rejoycing and it is the utmost degree of Happiness that we are here capable of It must be granted indeed that not many do arrive to this state but yet I doubt not but that it is a state that may be attained at least in a great measure in this world Otherwise the Holy Men in Scripture and particularly the Apostles of our Lord would never have recommended it to us so often as they have done Rejoyce evermore 1 Thess 9 16. Phil. 4.4 saith S. Paul to the Thessalonians And to the Philipians Rejoyce in the Lord always and again I say rejoyce The way to attain to this happy condition doth consist chiefly in these three things First a great innocence and vertue a behaving our selves so in the world that our Consciences shall not reproach us This St. Paul lays as the Foundation of Rejoycing This saith he is our rejoycing 2 Cor. 1.12 the Testimony of our Conscience that in simplicity and godly sincerity I have had my conversation in this world It is in vain to think of any true solid Joy or Peace or Contentment without a hearty Practice of all the duties of our Religion so that we can satisfie our selves of our own sincerity before God And then secondly To make us capable of this constant Rejoycing besides the innocence of our lives there must go a firm and hearty persuasion of God's particular Providence a belief that he not only dispenseth all events that come to pass in the World even the most inconsiderable but that the measure of the Dispensations of his Providence is infinite Wisdom and Goodness and nothing else so that nothing doth or ever can happen to us in particular or to the world in general but what is for the best Now when we firmly believe this and frequently attend to it how can we be either solicitous for the future or discontented at the present events of things let them fall out never so cross to our desires and expectations This is the best Antidote in the world and an effectual one it is against all trouble and vexation and uneasiness that can happen to us upon any occasion whatsoever to wit the consideration that all things are managed by an infinitely wise and good God and will at last prove for the best how unaccountable soever they appear to us at present And this is that which the wise man insinuates in the verse before the Text when he saith that God hath made every thing beautiful in his season Thirdly Another requisite both for the procuring and preserving this continual chearfulness and rejoycing is a frequent and fixed attention to the great rewards of the other world which God hath promised to all that truly love him and endeavour to please him This consideration will extreamly add to our comfort and contribute to our Rejoycing under all the miseries and afflictions that we can possibly fall into namely that whatsoever condition we are in here we shall certainly in a little time be in a most happy and glorious one and the worse our circumstances are in this life the greater if we be good shall be our happiness in the next 2. Cor. 4.17 for these light afflictions as S. Pual tells us which indure but for a moment do work for us a far more exceeding weight of glory This then is the joy that we are to endeavour after in the first place to be constantly well pleas'd and contented with our present condition whatever it be and these are the ways to attain to it But Secondly There is another more particular Notion of Rejoycing and which I conceive Solomon doth chiefly intend in the words of the Text and that is the free and comfortable enjoyment of the good things of this life that God hath
up to our selves in store a good Foundation against the time to come that we may lay hold on eternal life And this is the Third thing I am to insist on from the Text. I mean not here to trouble you with the Criticisms about the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Text by disputing whether it should be render'd Foundation as it is in our Translation though to lay up a Foundation seems an unusual way of speaking we do not lay up Foundations but build upon them or whether the word should be taken to signifie the Bond or the Evidence that God hath given us for the performance of his part of the Covenant as it is used by this Apostle elsewhere where he tells us that the Foundation of God standeth sure having this seal that is to say 2 Tim. 2.19 that Covenant or Indenture that God hath made with Mankind standeth sure and hath this Seal put to it for Men do not put Seals to Foundations but to Covenants Or lastly whether the word should be rendred a Treasure so as to read the Text thus laying up to themselves a good Treasure against the time to come that they may lay hold on eternal life Vid. Dr. Hammond in loc The original word say the Learned is capable or being translated all these ways and the last seems as natural as any for to lay up Treasure to our selves against the time to come is a proper way of speaking and that which our Saviour frequently useth in that very thing we are here treating of But it matters not much which of them we pitch upon for they all come to one sense and that is this That to be very charitable in this World is a good means to secure to our selves a title to eternal happiness in the next But to prevent all misunderstanding that may happen of this point I desire before I speak directly to it to premise these two things First Though we do maintain with the Ancient Church the efficacy of Charity and good works for the furthering a Man's Salvation yet we utterly reject those Doctrines which the Modern Romanists have advanced in this matter The Popish doctrines about good works are these three following that good works are meritorious do deserve the Favour and the Rewards of God Almighty Again that the surplusage of a Man's good works that is to say the merits of so many of his good deeds as are over and above what is sufficient to save his own soul may by the Church be dispensed out to the benefit of others they being part of the Church's treasure and upon this foundation they ground their Indulgences And lastly that good works i. e. the Alms of dying persons that are given to the Church or Clergy will by the means of the Masses and Diriges that they purchase to be said for them be effectual for the freeing their Souls out of the Torments of Purgatory These are the Popish Doctrines concerning good works which we all justly reject as having no foundation in Scripture or good Antiquity and being apparently contrived for the promoting their secular gain and advantage But then as for the necessity or the conduciveness of good works to a Man's Salvation which is all we here plead for I know no good Protestant but doth as earnestly contend for it as any of that Communion Secondly Whatever efficacy we attribute to works of Charity as a means for the obtaining eternal life we would not be understood hereby to exclude the necessary concurrence of other Vertues and Graces to that end It doth not from hence follow that it is an indifferent matter what Religion a Man is of or what kind of life he leads if he be but mighty bountiful to the Poor and do a great deal of good in his life No how acceptable to God soever the Sacrifice of Alms and Charity be yet we are not to expect it shall be available to our Salvation unless it proceed from a pure Heart and be offered with a lively Faith in Jesus Christ and accompanied with a sincere endeavour to obey all God's Commandments Eternal Happiness is not proposed in the Gospel as a reward of any one single Vertue no not of the greatest but of all of them together if indeed there can be any true Vertue where there is not a conjunction of all I say if there can be for St. James seems to affirm that there cannot Whosoever saith he shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point Jam. 2.10 he is guilty of all But now having said this by way of caution to prevent all occasion that any may take from our so earnestly pressing Charity to undervalue and neglect other Duties It cannot be denyed on the other side that very great effects are by our Saviour and his Apostles ascribed to this vertue with respect to Mens Salvation in the other World Luk. 6.30 35. In the 6. of St. Luke our Lord thus adviseth Love saith he your enemies give to him that asketh do good and lend hoping for nothing again so shall your reward be great and ye shall be the children of the most highest Now sure to be entitled to great rewards and to be the children of the most high doth look farther than this present World Our Saviour without doubt means the same thing here that he expresses upon the same occasion in another place viz. they those that you do good to cannot recompence you Luk. 14.14 but you shall be recompenced at the Resurrection of the just Again Luk. 16. the Parable of the unjust Steward that provided so well for himself against a bad time out of his Master's Goods is wholly designed to this purpose and that the Application of it sufficiently shews for our Saviour having said that the Lord of this Steward commended him for his providence and care of himself he thus applies it to all his Disciples verse 9. Wherefore I say unto you make you friends to your selves of the Mammon of unrighteousness i. e. of these false deceitful riches that when you fail you may be received into everlasting habitations plainly declaring that the best provision that rich Men can make for themselves against the time of their death in order to their reception into the other World must be the charitable actions they do with their Wealth while they live here Lastly Luk. 12.33 In another place our Saviour saith the very same thing in effect that is said in the Text for this is his counsel to all that mean to be happy in the next life viz. that they sell that they have that is when the times are such that it is reasonable so to do that they give alms for thereby they provide to themselves bags which wax not old a Treasure in the Heavens where no thief approacheth nor moth corrupteth To these three Texts of our Saviour's I shall add three others of three of his Apostles which speak
is had allowed as many sensual Liberties to its Disciples as that doth and lastly had been carried on in the World by the same ways and means that that hath been that is by the Force of Arms and Dint of the Sword it would have been no great wonder that it should have prevailed as we see it hath done But that a Religion which had no Worldly Advantages to promise to its Followers Nay on the contrary was so contrived that none could own it but he must at the same time deny all his Temporal Interests quit his Friends his Reputation and all his Fortunes in this World and live in hourly expectation of a Martyrdom that such a Religion as this should not only not die with the first Broachers of it but daily grow and spread and the more it was persecuted the more increase till at last it so weathered out all Opposition that it got Possession of the Thrones of Princes and Kings became Nursing Fathers to it I say Whoever is not convinced that the Finger of God was in this would scarce have been convinced that the Finger of God was in our Saviour's Miracles had he been alive and present when they were done But this Effect of Christianity both the Prophets and our Lord long ago foretold and this we now see was verified long ago and is still verified in our days Though those that lived with our Saviour had no experience hereof nor perhaps would several of them have been forward to believe it though it had been told them So that in this respect we have a most Considerable Argument for our Religion which they had not Secondly This is not all Those that undertook the Religion of our Saviour upon his Preaching had no Experience of it They were to be the first Experimenters themselves They ran a great Risque and ventured the Sale of all that they had and yet knew not so certainly what kind of Treasure they should Purchase But we have the Experience and Suffrage of Sixteen Ages which will all vouch that what we lay out in this way will prove valuable Treasure will Reward all the Pains and all the Expence we are at for the Purchasing of it We have never in the compass of our own knowledge nor in all History met with any who seriously laid out themselves in the Service of Jesus Christ and lived up to his Religion that ever grudged the Pains they took about it or repented themselves that they believed or practised as they did The more any Man has been a Christian still the more he hath thanked God for it still the more Quiet of Mind and Peace of Conscience he hath possessed the more he hath enjoyed him self and the less he hath feared Death and all other outward Calamities If ever any Christian hath repented of any thing it is that he hath not been Christian enough that he hath not so heartily believed in our Saviour and obeyed his Precepts as he should have done This we all know and must be sensible of and it is a mighty Evidence of the Truth and Goodness of the Religion we profess We now can try our Religion and give our Approbation of it by the same Standard and Measures by which we try and approve of our Customs and Common Laws After long experience we find the Usefulness and the Conveniency of it and to put another in its place would involve us in horrible Mischiefs and Dangers and Perplexities But this Argument for Christianity those that were the first Converts to it could not have and therefore in this respect also we have the advantage of them Thirdly and Lastly There is another very Considerable standing Argument for the Truth of the Christian Revelation which those in our Saviour's Time were uncapable of and that is the Events which he by the Spirit of Prophecy foretold should after his Death come to pass in the World most of which have punctually hapned as he predicted them and the rest in due time we doubt not will be accomplished I have not leisure to prosecute this Argument particularly only two things I cannot pass by without mention in both of which our Lord shewed himself as wonderful and as true a Prophet as ever appeared in the World The one is the Destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple which he foretold with all the Circumstances imaginable both as to Time and Manner Now all that he said concerning that Destruction was punctually verified even according to the Accounts that the Jewish Historian gives us of that Matter And when afterwards Julian the Emperour with a design to blast the Credit of our Saviour's Prophecy resolved to re-edifie that Temple and set Men on work for that purpose he was soon forced to desist from his Enterprise by Earthquakes and Globes of Fire issuing from out of the Foundations As the Writers of that time both Christian and Pagan do assure us The other Instance I mention is our Saviour's Prophecy of the Rejection of the Jews and that they should be carried Captive into all Nations till the Times of the Gentiles were fulfilled Now this we see hath been accomplished for many Ages and still continues to be so in our days That Nation of the Jews who were once the Peculiar People of God settled in the Land of Canaan by his own immediate Hand are now dispersed all the World over but no where incorporated into a Nation Yet which indeed is wonderful they continue Jews still a People that mingle not with the rest of the World and that are still as zealous for the Scriptures from whence we fetch the Grounds of our Christianity as ever they were So that they are a standing Monument of God's Vengeance upon a People for rejecting the Gospel and a standing Testimony of the Truth of our Saviour's Prophecies These things now with others that I might name are very considerable Evidences of the Truth of our Religion which those that were Contemporary with our Saviour could not have So that putting all these things together I think we may safely draw our Conclusion viz. That we now have as great or greater Arguments to convince us of the Truth of Christ's Revelation as or than they had who were Witnesses of what he did and taught And consequently those that are not persuaded now by the Evidence of it would not have been persuaded though they had seen with their Eyes or heard with their Ears the Publication of the Gospel Which is in effect to say They would not have been persuaded though one had risen from the dead But notwithstanding all this that I have said it is to be feared the thing will not easily go down with many of us but still with the Rich Man in the Parable after all that Abraham had said concerning Moses and the Prophets we will insist on our former Notion Nay but if one came to us from the Dead we should repent The Motives that are offered to us in the Gospel
that the Souls Immortality is demonstrable by the light of Nature yet there are generally these two Inconveniences in the Arguments they make use of for the Proof of this matter which render them in a great measure ineffectual for the reforming mens lives First They are generally of so great Subtilty so Nice so Metaphysical so much above the reach of ordinary Capacities that they are useless to the greatest part of Mankind who have not understandings fitted for them And Secondly They have this inconvenience likewise that a Man doth not see the Evidence of them without actual attention to a long Train of Propositions which attention it may be when a Man most stands in need of their Support he shall neither have the leisure nor the humour to give But now the Christian Method of proving another Life is quite of another strain and wholly free from these inconveniences That Demonstration which Christ hath given us of a glorious Immortality by his Resurrection from the dead as it is infinitely certain and conclusive so it is plain and easy short and compendious powerful and operative No Man that believes the matter of Fact can deny the Cogency of it Men of the meanest Capacities may apprehend it Persons in a crowd of business and in the midst of temptations may attend to it And it hath this Vertue besides that it leaves a lasting impression upon the Spirits of those that do believe and consider it Thanks therefore to our Lord Jesus Christ for this excellent Instrument of Piety that he hath given us by his Resurrection Everlasting Praises to his name that he hath thus brought Life and Immortality to light by his Gospel This very thing alone was there nothing else to be said for the Christian Revelation would sufficiently justify both the Gospel it self and our Lord Jesus the Author of it to all Mankind nay and effectually recommend his Religion above all others that ever were taught to all Persons in all Nations of the World IV. Fourthly and Lastly There is still a further Blessing coming to us by our Saviour's Resurrection from the dead and in which indeed is chiefly seen and expressed the great Power of it for the making us Holy and Vertuous That is to say Unto it we do principally owe all that supernatural Grace and Assistance by which we are enabled to vanquish our Corruptions and to live up to the Precepts of our Religion As Christ by his Resurrection did oblige us to lead new lives As Christ by his Resurrection did demonstrate the truth of the Christian Religion which is wholly in order to our leading new lives As by his Resurrection he cleared up to us the certainty of our future State and thereby gave us the greatest Motive and Encouragement to lead new lives So in the last place by the same Resurrection he acquired a Power of conferring Grace and Strength and Influence upon us by the Virtue of which we are in fact inabled to lead new lives Tho' Christ by his death reconciled us to God and procured a Pardon of Sin for us yet the actual benefit of this Reconciliation the actual application of this Pardon did depend upon our performance of certain Conditions Which conditions were that we should mortify all our evil affections and frame our Lives suitable to the Laws of the Gospel But now the Grace and Power by which we are inabled to do this was not the effect of Christ's Death but of his Resurrection It was when he ascended up on high and led Captivity Captive that is when he had vanquished Death which had vanquished all the World before It was then as the Scripture assures us and not till then that he was in a capacity of giving gifts unto men It was not till he was glorified as St. John observes that the holy spirit was given Hence it is that we every where find the Apostles attributing the business of Man's Justification and Salvation as much or more to Christ's Resurrection than to his Passion If Christ be not risen saith St. Paul 1 Cor. xv your Faith is in vain ye are yet in your Sins Indeed if Christ had perished in the Grave we had still had all the load of our sins upon us because we had no assurance that God had accepted the Atonement and Propitiation which he had made for them And much less could we have promised to our selves that we should have been assisted by any Divine Power for the subduing of them Again the same St. Paul tells us Rom. iv that Christ was delivered for our sins and raised again for our justification Christ's Death was the Sacrifice the Satisfaction for our Sins But it was by the means of his Resurrection that that Sacrifice and Satisfaction is applied to us and we for the merits of it become justified before God Lastly To name no more Texts Who saith the same Apostle Rom. viii shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect It is God that justifyeth Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again who is even at the right hand of God who also maketh intercession for us Here then is the great Power of our Saviour's Resurrection to make us good Christ being risen from the dead hath all Power given him both in Heaven and in Earth God as St. Paul expresseth it hath put all things under his feet and hath given him to be head over all things to the Church Eph. 1.22 Now in the fullness of that Power that he is invested with as he doth on one hand with never-failing efficacy make continual Intercession for his Church and every Member of it So he doth on the other hand out of the fulness of that Power derive and communicate so much Strength and Grace and Assistance of the Divine Spirit to all Christians that if they make a good use of it they shall not fail to perform all those Conditions of Faith and Repentance and a Holy Life that are required of them in order to their being made actual partakers of all those unspeakable Benefits which he purchased for Mankind by his Death and Sufferings Christ by his Resurrection is become both our High-Priest and our King both our Advocate and our Lord. By that Power which he then obtained as our Priest and Advocate he doth with Authority recommend us and all our concernments to his Father As our King and Lord he rules and governs us he takes care of us he provides for us he represses the insults of his and our Enemies and defeats all their attempts against us And lastly he supplies us from time to time with such a measure of Grace and Strength and influence of his Divine Spirit as he sees is needful or proper for our Condition If all this now that I have said be the effect of our Saviour's Resurrection as it certainly is Must we not needs own that there is a mighty Power in it for the making us good