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light of these fentiments we may be affifted to form fome judgment, what is the prevailing turn and bent of our own minds towards it,

RECOLLECTIO N.

COME then, my foul, and when fo divine and glorious a righteousness is provided and exhibited in the gospel, and which the faints in all ages have difcovered fuch an high efteem of, how does thou ftand affected towards it? Haft thou had any heart-impreffive difcovery of thy want of it? any heart-affecting discovery of its fuperior excellency and glory? Haft thou feen and felt thy mifery by reason of fin? and whilft pained with a view of thy guiltiness in the fight of a holy and righteous God, where art thou looking, and to whom and what, for pardon and acceptance with him? Here is the great enquiry, How fin may be pardoned, thy fins pardoned; and fuch a finner as thou art, juftified in the fight of God. Haft thou dwelt upon this enquiry? have thy thoughts been ferioufly and folemnly exercifed about it? and what has been the refult? Has it brought thee to attend with pleasure to the discovery which the gofpel makes of a righteousness in another, when thou haft none of thine own? Haft thou feen the Redeemer's righteoufnefs to be every ways fuited to thy cafe, and equal to all thy guilt; a perfect and an all-fufficient righteousness, a perfect and an all-fufficient relief? Has the discovery of this been welcome to thee? been as life from the dead? Art thou bleffing

God

God from the bottom of thy heart for providing fuch a righteoufnefs? and doft thou count all things but lofs for the excellency of the knowledge of it? and in what manner haft thou been dealing with God about it, and an intereft in it?

Canft thou, O my fou!! remember the time, the day when thou waft proftrate at a throne of grace, and begging of God, that he would give thee to believe in Chrift and his righteousness? impute it to thee, and pardon and justify thee in and thro' it? Doft thou thankfully receive it, and gladly make out to it, as the guilty man-flayer to the city of refuge, as the perifh-, ing finner to his only hope? Doft thou fear to ftop in any thing fhort of this righteousness, and left any thing fhould turn thee afide from it? Go on, my foul, and fee whether thou canst quit and renounce every thing else; do it readily, chearfully, and entirely, that thou mayest be found in Christ alone: None but Chrift, None but Chrift; Doft thou lay the stress of all thy hopes on him, as there is no other name under heaven whereby we can be faved; and when thou wanteft pardon and peace, comfort and establishment, art thou looking and applying to him for them? to him and none elfe? and what doft thou know of real and fupreme love to him, as the fruit and effect of that faith, whereby thou doft receive him? O my foul! how oughteft thou to take care of every thing, that would weaken thy esteem and reverence for him, to whofe righteousness, death and love thou oweft thine all? Art thou mourning that thou loveft him no more? but ftill art thou deter

mined

mined to abide by him? Is the pride of thy fpirit bowed to a thankful acceptance of his righteousness and grace? and if thou canst not reach that height as to fee thine own interest in him, art thou following hard after him? and amidst all the fears and infirmities of thy prefent ftate, art thou fometimes preffing for wards with a holy impatience to that day, when thou fhalt join in the praises of those, who are afcribing blessing, and honour, and glory, and power unto him that fitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever ?

SERMON

SERMON VI.

ISAIAH xlv. former part of the 24th

Verfe,

Surely, hall one fay, in the Lord have I righteousness.

HAVING in the prosecution of our subject explained the nature of that righteoufnefs which we have in the Lord Jefus Chrift for our juftification; ftated the way in which we come to have an interest in it; and traced out at large that difpofition and tendency of foul, which believers believe and discover towards it: Let us now proceed in the

Fourth and laft place, to represent the perfection and value of this righteoufnefs: how glorious it is in itself, and how full and extenfive to answer all the purposes for which we want it. And

1. It is the righteoufnefs of a glorious perfon; for it is the righteoufnefs of one, who is God as well as man. In that obedience which

Chrift

Christ performed, and in those fufferings which he fuftained in the room and ftead of his people, he is to be confidered not only, not merely as man, but as he was and is God-man; as truly God, as really man; and God man in the one Perfon of the Mediator: And fo near was the union of the two natures in the Perfon of our Immanuel, that from it refults a communication of properties and characters, fo that what was proper to one nature, and is only true of that, is predicated of the other, or rather of the perfon conftituted of both.

We have a paffage from Chrift's own mouth in his conference with Nicodemus, that will help to explain this; and as our Lord was then gradually opening out to him the method of falvation, he seems to aim at giving him fome notices of the conftitution of his own perfon, by whom this falvation was to be effected: To this purpofe he tells him, John iii. 13. And no man hath afcended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. Chrift in his human nature was not then in heaven, but engaged in a perfonal conference with Nicodemus on earth; but he was then in heaven as to his divine nature; and fo what belonged to one nature only is predicated of the perfon. We have other paffages in which our Lord fpeaks of himself in the fame manner; as when he tells his dif ciples upon one occafion, me ye have not always with you, Mark xiv. 7. and on another, Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the word, Matth. xxviii. 20. In his human nature he was not to be always with his difciples, but

was

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