3. Though God gives more light and grace to the church in one season than another, yet in every season he gives what is sufficient to guide believers in their faith and obedience to eternal life.

6. It is the duty of believers, in every state of the church, to improve the spiritual provision that God hath made for them; always remembering, that to whom much is given, much is required.

§9. And to close this chapter we may observe:

1. God measures out to all his people their portion in service, sufferings, privileges, and rewards, according to his own good pleasure. And therefore the apostle shuts up this discourse of the faith, obedience, sufferings, and successes of the saints under the Old Testament, with a declaration that God had yet provided more excellent things for his church, than any they were made partakers of. All he doth in this way, is of mere grace and bounty, and therefore he may distribute these things as he pleaseth.

2. It is Christ alone who was to give, and could give perfection or consummation to the church; he was in all things to have the pre-eminence.

3. All the outward glorious worship of the Old Testament had no perfection in it; and so no glory compared to that which is brought in by the gospel, 2 Cor. iii, 10.

4. All perfection, all consummation is in Christ alone; for in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily; and we are complete in him who is the head of all principality and power.

CHAPTER XII.

VERSE 1.

Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.

$1. The design of the chapter, and the several parts of it. 2. (I) Their expo. sition. Witnesses, what here intended. $3. A cloud of them, what. §4. The weight to be laid aside, what, 95. How to be laid aside. $6-8. The sin that easily besets us, what. $9. How it may be laid aside. $10. The duty itself of running the Christian race. §11. Which is set before us. §12. It requires strength and speed. 613, Patience, $14, 15. (II.) Observations.

$1. THIS chapter contains an application of the doctrine declared and confirmed in the foregoing chapter. Doctrine and use was the apostle's method. There are three general parts of the chapter:

1. A pressing of the exhortation in hand from new additional motives, ver. 1-11.

2. A direction to special duties, necessary to a due compliance with the general exhortation, ver. 12-17. 3. A new cogent argument to the same purpose, taken from a comparison between the two states of the law and gospel to the end of the chapter.

His whole discourse is exceedingly pregnant with arguments to the purpose in hand. For it both declares what hath been the lot of true believers in all ages from the beginning, which none ought now to be surprised with; what was the way of their deportment so as to please God; and what was the success or victory which they obtained in the end.

Concerning the passage in hand we may observe, that the whole of it is figurative, consisting in sundry metaphors drawn from the comparison of our patient abiding in the profession of the gospel, and our contending for a prize. The exposition of the

words is not so much to be taken from the precise signification of them, as from the matter plainly in. tended in them.

§2. (I.) I shall open the words in the order wherein they lie in the text. The first thing is, the motive and encouragement given to our diligence in the duty exhorted to. "Seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses;" we having so great a cloud of witnesses placed about us; we, we also, or even we. The apostle joins himself with these Hebrews, not only the better to insinuate the exhortation into their minds, by engaging himself with them, but also to intimate that the greatest and strongest believers stand in need of this encouragement. Witnesses are of two sorts:

1. Such as behold the doing of any thing, and give their testimony to it when it is done. For in the striving and contest in these public games which are alluded to, there were multitudes, clouds of spectators, that looked on to encourage those that contended by their applauses, and to testify of their success.

So is it with us in our patient perseverance; all the saints of the Old Testament do, as it were, stand looking on us in our striving, encouraging us to our duty, and ready to testify to our success with their applauses. They are all placed about us to this end; and thus we are encompassed with them. And they are so in the scripture, wherein they being dead, yet see, and speak, and bear testimony. The scripture hath encompassed us with them, so that when we are in our trials, whatever way we look in it, we may behold the faces of some or other of these worthies looking on, and encouraging us.

2. But the intention of the apostle may be better taken from his general scope, which requireth that

the witnesses be such as testify to what is to be done, and the grounds of truth whereon it ought to be done. For he intends, especially the persons whom he had before enumerated; and that which they testify to is this, that faith will carry believers safely through all that they may be called to do or suffer in the profession of the gospel. They all jointly testify to these things, that it is best for us to believe and obey God, whatever may befall us in our so doing. Faith, where it is true and sincere, will engage those in whom it is, to venture on the greatest hazards, dangers, and miseries in the world, rather than to forego their profession, and it will safely carry us through them all. Those who testify these things are important witnesses in this cause. Testifying to the folly of our fears, the falseness of all the suggestions of unbelief, and the fraud of Satan's temptations; as also to the excellency of the duties whereto we are called, and the certainty of our success in them through believing.

And in this sense do I take the witnesses here intended, both because of the scope of the place, and that we know by experience of what kind of use this testimony is. But if any think better of the former sense, I shall not oppose it. For in the whole verse the apostle doth, as it were, represent believers in their profession, as striving for victory, as upon a theatre. Christ sits at the head of it, as the great Agonothetes, the judge and rewarder of those that strive lawfully, and acquit themselves by perseverance to the end. All the saints departed divinely testified unto, stand on every side, looking on, and encouraging us in our course; which was wont to be a mighty provocation to men, to put forth the utmost of their strength in the public contests for victory. Both these senses are consistent.

And in all au

§3. Of these witnesses, there is said to be a cloud, "so great a cloud." A cloud in Hebrew is (y) a thick, perplexed, or condensed thing. God compares the sins of his people to a cloud, and a thick cloud, because of their multitude, the vapor of them being condensed like a cloud, Isa. xliv, 22. thors, a thick body of men or soldiers compacted together, is usually called a cloud of them. So Homer, Iliad iv, (Αμα δε νεφος ειπειοπεξῶν} with him followed a cloud of footmen. So Livy, (Peditum equitumque nubes;) a cloud of horse and foot. Wherefore, "so great a cloud," is, so great a number, or multitude at once appearing together to witness in this cause. What is done in the scripture for our use, is immediately done to us; and what is spoken in it, is spoken to us, see ver. 5.

§4 "Let us lay aside every weight." Those who were to run in a race, freed themselves from all weight or burden; and such things as might entangle them, as long garments, which, cleaving to them, should be their continual hinderance. "Laying aside," or as others render the word (azobeμLevo) casting away. The word is once used in the New Testament with respect to a natural action; Acts vii, 58, "The witnesses (exε0εvio) laid down—that is, put off and laid downtheir clothes;" which gives light into the metaphor. In all other places it is used with respect to vicious habits, or causes of sin, which we are to part with, or cast away as hinderances, see Ephes. iv, 22-25, Col. iii, 8; James i, 21; 1Pet. ii, 1. Let no man be confident in himself; he hath nothing of his own but will obstruct him in the way of holy ordinances. Unless these things are deposed, we cannot run the race with

success.

That which we are first to lay aside, is (oynov zaviα) "every weight." The expresson will scarce allow,