Go his love. But such as are in co- | shall not depart from me." venant have their mercies sweet- will so love the saints, that h ened with God's love, and they will not forsake them; and th swim to them in the blood of saints shall so fear God, tha Christ. As Naaman said to Ge- they shall not forsake him. 'Ti hazi, 2 Kings v. 23., "Take two a covenant of eternity. It mus talents," so saith God to such as be so; for who is this covenan are in covenant, take two talents, made with? Is it not with be -take health, and take Christ lievers? and have not they coa with it, take riches, and take my lition and union with Christ love with them,--take the venison, Christ is the head, they are the and take the blessing with it, body, Eph. i. 23. This is a nea take two talents. union, much like that union be tween God the Father and Christ, John xvii. 21., “As thou, Fa ther, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be One in us.' Now the union between Christ and the saints being so inseparable, it can never be dissolved, or the covenant made void; you may die with comfort. 3. You may upon all occasions plead the covenant. If you are haunted with temptations, plead the covenant: Lord, thou hast promised to bruise Satan under my feet shortly, wilt thou suffer thy child to be thus worried? take off the roaring lion. If in want, plead the covenant: Lord, thou hast said, "I shall want no good thing," wilt thou save me from hell, and not from want? wilt thou give me a kingdom, and deny me daily bread ? 4. If in covenant with God, all things shall co-operate for your good: etiam mala cidunt in bonum, Ps. xxv. 10. Not only golden paths, but his bloody paths. Every wind of providence shall blow them nearer heaven. Affliction shall humble and purify, Heb. xii. 13. Out of the bitterest drug God distils your salvation. Afflictions add to the saints' glory. The more the diamond is cut, the more it sparkles; the heavier the saints' cross is, the heavier shall be their crown. 6. Thou art in covenant with God, and thou art going to thy God: behold a death-bed cordial; death breaks the union between the body and the soul, but perfects the union between Christ and the soul. This hath made the saints desire death as the bride the wedding-day: Phil. i. 23., cupio dissolvi. Lead me, Lord, to that glory," (said one) glimpse whereof I have seen in a glass darkly." Use 5th. Of direction: to shew how you should walk who have tasted of covenant-mercy-Like as a people in covenant with God. As you differ from others in respect of dignity, so you must in point of carriage. 5. If thou art in covenant once, 1st. You must love this God. then for ever in covenant. The God's love to you calls for love. text calls it, an everlasting co- 1. It is amor gratiatus,—a free venant.' Such as are in covenant love. Why should God pass by are elected; God's electing love is others and take you into a league unchangeable, Jer. xxxii. 40., " I of friendship with himself? In will make an everlasting covenant the law, God passed by the lion with them, that I will not turn and eagle, and chose the dove: away from them; but I will put so he passes by the noble and my fear in their heart, that they mighty. 2. It is amor plenus, 3dly. Walk thankfully, Ps. ciii. a full love. When God takes you | your communion with God, but into covenant, you are his Heph-holiness? zibah, Isa. lxii. 5.; his delight is in you; he gives you the key of 1. God is your God in covenant, all his treasure, he heaps pearls he hath done more for you than upon you, he settles heaven and if he had made you ride upon earth upon you, he gives you a the high places of the earth, and bunch of grapes by the way, and given you crowns and sceptres. O saith, Son, all I have is thine.' take the cup of salvation, and bless And doth not all this call for the Lord! Eternity will be little love? Who can tread upon these enough to praise him. Musicians hot coals, and his heart not burn love to play on their music where in love to God? there is the loudest sound; and 2dly. Walk holily. The coven-God loves to bestow his mercies ant hath made you a royal nation, where he may have the loudest therefore be an holy people. Shine praises. You that have angels' as lights in the world; live as reward, do angels' work. Begin earthly angels. God hath taken that work of praise here, which you into covenant, that you and you hope to be always doing in he may have communion toge-heaven. ther; and what is it keeps up CHRIST THE MEDIATOR OF THE COVENANT. HEE. xii. 24. Jesus the Mediator of the New Covenant, &c. JESUS CHRIST is the sum | Saviour, he is a sanctifier, Mat. and quintessence of the gospel, i. 21., "He shall save his people the wonder of angels, the joy and from their sins." There is no triumph of saints. The name of other Saviour, Acts iv. 12., “NeiChrist is sweet, it is as music in ther is there salvation in any ear, honey in the mouth, and other." As there was but one the a cordial at the heart.-I shall ark to save the world from drownwave the context, and only speaking, so there is but one Jesus to of that which concerns our pre- save sinners from damning. As sent purpose: having discoursed Naomi said to her daughters-inof the covenant of grace, I shall law, Ruth i. 11., "Are there yet speak now of the Mediator of the any more sons in my womb?” Covenant, and the restorer of So hath God any other sons in the lapsed sinners, Jesus the Me- womb of his eternal decree, to be diator of the new covenant.' saviours to us, besides Christ? Job xxviii. 12., "Where shall wisdom be found? the depth saith, it is not in me; and the sea saith, it is not in me.' Let me allude, Where shall salvation be found? The angel saith, it is not in me; mortality saith, it is not in me; the ordinance saith, it is not in me; Christ alone is the well spring of There are several names and titles in scripture given to Christ, as the great restorer of mankind: 1. Sometimes he is called a Saviour, Mat. i. 21. His name shall be called Jesus. The Hebrew word for JESUS, signifies a Saviour, and whom he saves from hell, he saves from sin: where Christ is a life; the ordinance is the conduit- | son is amiable; he is all made up of love and beauty. He is the effigies of his Father, Heb. i. 3., "The express image of his person." Consider, pipe that conveys salvation, but Christ is the spring that feeds it. "Neither is there salvation in any other." 1st. Christ's person in two na 2d. His two natures in one person. 2. Sometimes Christ is called a Redeemer: Isa. lix. 20., "The tures. Redeemer shall come to Sion." Some understand it of Cyrus, others of an angel; but the most ancient Jewish doctors understood it of Christ, the Redeemer of the elect: Job xix. 23., 66 My Redeemer liveth." The Hebrew word for Redeemer signifies such a one as is near a-kin, and hath right to redeem a mortgage; so Christ is near of kin to us, being our elder brother, therefore hath the best right to redeem us. 3. Christ is called a Mediator in the text," Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant." The Greek word for Mediator, signifies a middle person, one that doth make up the breach between two disagreeing parties. God and we were at variance by sin, now Christ doth mediate and umpire between us, he reconciles us to God through his blood, therefore he is called the Mediator of the new covenant. There is no way of communion and intercourse between God and man, but in and through a Mediator; Christ takes away the enmity in us, and the wrath of God, and so makes peace. Nor is Christ only a Mediator of reconciliation, but intercession, Heb. ix. 24.," Christ is entered, not into the holy place made with hands, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us." The priest, when he had slain the sacrifice, was to go with the blood before the altar and mercy-seat, and show it to the Lord. Now, in Christ our blessed Mediator, consider two things. 1st. His person. 2d. His graces. I. His person. His per 1st. Christ's person in two natures. 1. Look upon his human nature as incarnate. The Valentinians deny his human nature; but John i. 14., "The Word was made flesh." It is spoken of Christ the promised Messiah. Christ took our flesh, that the same nature which sinued might suffer; and "the Word was inade flesh," that through the glass of his human nature we might look upon God. QUEST. Why is Christ called the Word? Ans. Because, as a word is the interpreter of the mind, and reveals what is in a man's breast, so Jesus Christ reveals his Father's mind to us concerning the great matters of our salvation, John i. 18. Were it not for Christ's manhood, the sight of the Godhead would be formidable to us; but through Christ's flesh we may look upon God without terror. And Christ took our flesh, that he might know how to pity us; he knows what it is to be faint, sorrowful, tempted, Ps. ciii. 14., "He knows our frame." And he took our flesh, that he might, as Austin saith, ennoble our human nature with honour. Christ having married our flesh, hath exalted it above the angelical nature. 2. Look upon Christ's divine nature. Christ may be fitly compared to Jacob's ladder, Gen. xxviii. 12., which reacheth from earth to heaven. Christ's human nature was the foot of the ladder, which stood upon earth; his divine nature the top of the ladder, which reacheth to heaven. This being a grand article of our faith, I shall amplify. I know the Arians, Socinians, Ebonites, would rob Christ of the best jewel of his crown,-his Godhead; but the Apostolical, Nicene, Athanasian creeds, affirm Christ's Deity; to this the churches of Helvetia, Bohemia, Wittemberg, Transylvania, &c. give their full consent; and the scripture is clear for it. He is called the mighty God,' Isa. ix. 6., " And in him dwells the fulness of the Godhead," Col. ii. 9. He is of the same nature and essence with the Father. So Athanasius, Basil, Chrysostom; 1. Is God the Father called Almighty? so is Christ, Rev. i. 8., "The Almighty."-2. Is God the Father, the heart-searcher? so is Christ, John ii. 25., "He knew their thoughts ?"-3. Is God the Father omnipresent? So is Christ, John iii. 13., "The Son of Man which is in heaven." Christ as God was then in heaven, when as man he was upon the earth. QUEST. Is God eternal? Ans. Christ is the everlasting Father, Isa. ix. 6., which scripture may be urged against the Cerinthian heretics, who denied the pre-existency of Christ's Godhead, and held that Christ had no being till he derived it from the Virgin Mary. 4. Doth divine worship belong to the first person in the Trinity? so it doth to Christ, John v. 23., Heb. 1. 6.," Let all the angels of God worship him."-5. Is creation proper to the Deity? this is a flower of Christ's crown, Col. i. 16., “ By him were all things created.”—6. Is invocation proper to the Deity; this is given to "Lord Christ, Acts vii. 59.. Jesus receive my spirit.”—7. Is recumbency and trust peculiar to God the Father? this is given to Christ, John xiv. 1., "Ye believe in God, believe also in me." Christ must needs be God, not only that the divine nature might support the human from sinking under God's wrath, but also to give value and weight to his sufferings. Christ being God, his death and passion is meritorious ; Christ's blood is called sanguis Dei,-the blood of God, Acts xx. 28., because the person who was offered in sacrifice was God as well as man. This is an invincible support to believers; it was God who was offended, and it was God who satisfied. Thus Christ's person in two natures. 2d. Consider Christ's two natures in one person, God-man, 1 Tim. iii. 16., "God manifest in the flesh." Christ had a twofold substance, divine and human ; yet not a twofold subsistence, both natures make but one Christ. A scion may be grafted into another tree, a pear-tree into an apple, which, though it bear different fruits, is but one tree; so Christ's manhood is united to the Godhead in an ineffable manner; yet though there are two natures, yet but one person. This union of the two natures in Christ was not by transmutation, the divine nature changed into the human, or the human into the divine,nor by mixture, the two natures mingled together as wine and water are mixed,-both the natures of Christ remain distinct, yet make not two distinct persons, but one person; the human nature not God, yet one with God. II. Consider Christ, our Mediator, in his graces: these are the sweet savour of his ointments, that make the virgins love him. Christ, our beloved Mediator, is said to be "full of grace and truth," John i. 14. He had the anointing of the Spirit without measure, John iii. 35. Grace in Christ is after a more eminent and glorious manner than it is in any of the saints. 1. Jesus Christ, our Mediator, hath perfection in every grace, Col. i. 10. He is a panoply, magazine, and storehouse of all heavenly treasure, all fulness. This no saint on earth hath; he may excel in one grace, but not in all as Abraham was eminent for faith, Moses for meekness, but Christ excels in every grace. lest there be not enough for us and you." The saints have no grace to spare_to_others but Christ diffuseth his grace to others; grace in the saints is as water in the vessel, grace in Christ is as water in the spring; John i. 16., "Of his fulness have we received grace for grace." Set a glass under a still or limbeck, and it receives water from the limbeck drop by drop; so the saints have the drops and influences of Christ's grace distilling upon them. What a rich consolation is this to those who either have no grace, or their stock is but low! They may go 2. There is a never-failing ful- to Christ, the Mediator, as a ness of grace in Christ; grace in treasury of grace: "Lord, I am the saints is ebbing and flowing, indigent, but whither shall it is not always in the same de- carry my empty vessel, but to a gree and proportion; at one time full fountain?" Ps. lxxxvii. 7., David's faith was strong, at ano- "All my springs are in thee;" I ther time so faint and weak that am guilty, thou hast blood to you could hardly feel any pulse, pardon me; I am polluted, thou Ps. xxxi. 22., " I said, I am cut hast grace to cleanse me; I am off from before thine eyes." But sick unto death, thou hast the grace in Christ is a never-failing" balm of Gilead, to heal me." fulness, it did never abate in the Gen. xli. 56., Joseph opened all least degree, he never lost a drop the storehouses of corn: Christ of his holiness. What was said is our Joseph, that opens all the of Joseph, may more truly be ap- treasuries and storehouses of plied to Christ, Gen. xlix. 23., grace, and communicates to us. The archers shot at him, but He is not only sweet as the his bow abode in strength." Men honey-comb, but drops as the and devils shot at him, but his honey-comb; this is a great comgrace remained in its full vigour fort, in Christ our Mediator there and strength," his bow abode is a cornucopia, and fulness of all in strength.' grace; and Christ is desirous that we should come to him for grace, like the full breast that aches till it be drawn. " 3. Grace in Christ is communicative, his grace is for us; the holy oil of the Spirit was poured on the head of this blessed Aaron, that it might run down upon us. The saints have not grace to bestow on others. When the foolish virgins would have bought oil of their neighbour virgins, Matth. xxv. 8, 9., “ Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out," the wise virgins answered, "Not so, Use 1st. Admire the glory of this Mediator; he is God-man, he is co-essentially glorious with the Father. All the Jews that saw Christ in the flesh, did not see his Godhead; all that saw the man did not see the Messiah ; the temple of Solomon within was embellished with gold; tra |