ing lion, feeking whom he may devour. It frets and grates his proud and envious mind, to fee others find rest when he can find none; an effectual plaifter applied to heal our wound, when his own must bleed to eternity: And he obtains his end fully, if he can but keep off fouls from Chrift. Look therefore, upon all thofe objections and difcouragements raised in your hearts against coming to Chrift, as fo many artifices and cunning devices of the devil, to deftroy and ruin your fouls. It is true they have a very specious and colourable appearance; they are gilded over with pretences of the juftice of God, the heinous nature of fin, the want of due and befitting qualifications for fo holy and pure a God, the lapfing of the season of mercy, and an hundred others of like nature: but I befeech you, lay down this as a fure conclufion, and hold it faft; that whatever it be that difcourages and hinders you from coming to Chrift, is directly against the intereft of your fouls, and the hand of the devil is certainly in it.

Inf. 2. Hence alfo it follows, that unbelief is the true reason of all that difquietnefs and trouble, by which the minds of poor finners are fo racked and tortured.

If you will not believe, you cannot be established; till you come to Chrift, peace cannot come to you: Chrift and peace are undivided. Good fouls, confider this; you have tried all other ways, you have tried duties, and no reft comes; you have tried reformation, reftitution, and a ftricter courfe of life; yet your wounds are ftill open, and fresh bleeding; these things, I grant, are in their places both good and neceffary; but, of themfelves, without Chrift, utterly infufficient to give what you expect from them: why will you not try the way of faith? Why will you not carry your burthen to Chrift? O! that you would be perfuaded to it, how foon would you find what fo long you have been seeking in vain! How long will you thus oppofe your own good? How long will you keep yourselves upon the rack of confcience? Is it eafy to go under the throbs and wounds of an accufing and condemning confcience? You know it is not: you look for peace, but no good comes; for a time of healing, and behold trouble. Alas! it must, and will be fo ftill, until you are in the way of faith, which is the true and only method to obtain rest.

Inf. 3. What caufe have we all to admire the goodness of God, in providing for us a Chrift, in whom we may find reft to our fouls!

How hath the Lord filled and furnished Jefus Chrift with all that is fuitable to a believer's wants! Doth the guilt of fin terrify his confcience? Lo, in him is perfect righteoufnefs to remove that guilt, fo that it fhall neither be imputed to his perfon, nor reflected by his confcience, in the way of condemnation as it was before. In him alfo is a fountain opened, for wafhing and for cleansing the

filth of fin from our fouls; in him is the fulness both of merit, and of fpirit, two fweet fprings of peace to the fouls of men: well might the apoftle fay, "Chrift the wisdom of God," 1 Cor. i. 30. and well might the Church fay, " He is altogether lovely," Cant. v. 16. Had not God provided Jefus Chrift for us, we had never known one hour's reft to all eternity.

Inf. 4. How unreasonable, and wholly inexcufeable, in believers, is the fin of backfliding from Chrift! Have you found rest in him, when you could not find it in any other! Did he receive, and ease your fouls, when all other perfons and things were phyficians of no value? And will you, after this, backflide from him again? O what madness is this! "Will a man leave the fnow of Lebanon, which "cometh from the rock of the field? Or fhall the cold, flowing "waters, that come from another place, be forfaken ?" No man that is in his wits would leave the pure, cold, refreshing stream of a crystal fountain, to go to a filthy puddle, lake, or an empty ciftern; fuch the beft enjoyments of this world are, in comparison with Jefus Chrift.

That was a melting expoftulation of Chrift's with the difciples, John vi. 67, 68. when fome had forfaken him, "Will ye alfo 66 go away?" And it was a very fuitable return they made, Lord, whither away from thee fhould we go! q. d. From thee, Lord! No, where can we mend ourselves? be fure of it, whenever you go from Chrift, you go from reft to trouble. Had Judas reft? Had Spira reft? and do you think you fhall have reft? No, no, "The backflider in heart fhall be filled with his own ways," Prov. xiv. 14. "Curfed be the man that departeth from him, he shall be as the "heath in the defert, that feeth not when good cometh, and fhall "inhabit the parched places of the wilderness," Jer. xvii. 5. If fear of fufferings, and worldly temptations, ever draw you off from Chrift, you may come to thofe ftraits and terrors of confcience that will make you with yourfelves back again with Chrift in a prifon, with Christ at a stake.

Inf. 5. Let all that come to Chrift learn to improve him to the reft and peace of their own fouls, in the midst of all the troubles and outward diftreffes they meet with in the world.

Surely reft may be found in Chrift in any condition; he is able to give you peace in the midft of all your troubles here. So he tells you in John xvi. 33. "These things have I fpoken to you, that in

me you might have peace; in the world ye fhall have tribula"tion." By peace he means not a deliverance from troubles, by taking off affliction from them, or taking them away by death from all afflictions; but it is something they enjoy from Chrift in the very midst of troubles, and amidst all their afflictions, that quiets and gives them reft, fo that troubles cannot hurt them. Certain

ly, believers, you have peace in Chrift, when there is little in your own hearts; and your hearts might be filled with peace too, if you would exercife faith upon Chrift for that end. It is your own fault if you be without rest in any condition in this world. Set yourfelves to ftudy the fulness of Chrift, and to clear your intereft in him; believe what the fcriptures reveal of him, and live as you believe, and you will quickly find the peace of God filling your hearts and minds.

Bleed be God for Jefus Chrift.

SERMON X.

Wherein the general Exhortation is enforced, by one drawn from the firft Title of CHRIST.

MATTH. ix. 12.

Motive

But when Jefus heard that, he faid unto them, They that be whole need not a phyfician, but they that are fick.

H

AVING opened, in the former difcourfes, the nature and method of the application of Chrift to finners; it remains now that I prefs it upon every foul, as it expects peace and pardon from God, to apply and put on Jefus Chrift, i. e. to get union with him by faith, whilft he is yet held forth in the free and gracious tenders of the gofpel. To which purpose I fhall now labour in this general ufe of exhortation, in which my laft fubject engaged me; wherein divers arguments will be further urged, both from 1. The titles, and

2. The privileges of Jefus Christ.

The titles of Chrift are fo many motives or arguments fitted to perfuade men to come unto him. Amongft which, Chrift, as the Phyfician of fouls, comes under our first confideration, in the text before us.

The occafion of thefe words of Chrift, was the call of Matthew the publican, who, having firft opened his heart, next opened his houfe to Chrift, and entertains him there. This ftrange and unexpected change, wrought upon Matthew, quickly brings in all the neighbourhood, and many publicans and finners reforted thither; at which the ftomachs of the proud Pharifees began to fwell. From this occafion they took offence at Chrift, and, in this verse, Chrift takes off the offence, by fuch an answer as was fitted both for their conviction and his own vindication. But when Jefus

heard that, he faid unto them, "The whole have no need of a " phyfician, but they that are fick."

He gives it, faith one, as a reason why he converfed fo much with Publicans and finners, and fo little among the Pharifees, because there was more work for him; Chrift came to be a physician to fick fouls; Pharifees were fo well in their own conceit, that Christ faw that they would have little to do with him, and fo he applied himself to those who were more fenfible of their fickness. In the words, we have an account of the temper and state both

of,

And,

1. The fecure and unconvinced finner, 2. The humbled and convinced finner, 3. Of the carriage of Chrift, and his different refpect to both. First, The fecure finner is here defcribed, both with refpect to his own apprehenfions of himfelf, as one that is whole, and alfo by his low value and efteem for Chrift, he fees no need of him; "The whole have no need of the physician."

Secondly, The convinced and humbled finner is here also defcribed, and that both by his ftate and condition, he is fick; and by his valuation of Jefus Chrift, he greatly needs him: they that are fick need the physician,

Thirdly, We have here Chrift's carriage, and different respect to both; the former he rejects and paffeth by, as thofe with whom he hath no concernment; the latter he converfeth with in order to their cure.

The words thus opened, are fruitful in obfervations. I fhall neither note nor infift upon any befide this one, which fuits the fcope of my difcourfe, viz.

Doct. That the Lord Jefus Chrift is the only phyfician for fick fouls.

The world is a great hofpital, full of fick and dying fouls, all wounded by one and the fame mortal weapon, fin. Some are fenfelefs of their mifery, feel not their pains, value not a physician; others are full of fenfe, as well as danger: mourn under the apprehenfion of their condition, and fadly bewail it. The merciful God hath, in his abundant compaffion to the perifhing world, fent a phyfician from heaven, and given him his orders under the great feal of heaven, for his office, Ifa. lxi. 1, 2. which he opened and read in the audience of the people, Luke iv. 18. "The Spirit of "the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach "good tidings unto the meek, he hath fent me to bind up the "broken-hearted," &c. He is the tree of life, whofe leaves are for the healing of the nations: he is Jehovah Rophe, the Lord that

healeth us; and that as he is Jehovah Tzidkenu, the Lord our righteoufnefs. The brazen ferpent that healed the Ifraelites in the wilderness, was an excellent type of our great physician, Chrift, and is expressly applied to him, John iii. 14. He rejects none that come, and heals all whom he undertakes; but more particularly, I will,

First, Point at those diseases which Chrift heals in fick fouls, and by what means he heals them.

Secondly, The excellency of this phyfician above all others: there is none like Chrift, he is the only phyfician for wounded fouls. Firft, We will enquire into the diseases which Chrift the phy fician cures, and they are reducible to two heads, viz.

1. Sin, and,

2. Sorrow.

First, The difeafe of fin; in which three things are found exceeding burdenfome to fick fouls.

1. The guilt,

2. The dominion,

3. The inherence of fin; all cured by this physician, and how. Firft, The guilt of fin; this is a mortal wound, a ftab in the very heart of a poor finner. It is a fond and groundless distinction that Papists make of fins mortal and venial; all fin, in its own nature is mortal, Rom. vi. 23. «The wages of fin is death." Yet though it be fo in its own nature, Chrift can and doth cure it by the fovereign balfam of his own precious blood, Eph. i. 7. "In "whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness "of fins, according to the riches of his grace." This is the deepest and deadlieft wound the foul of man feels in this world. What is guilt but the obligation of the foul to everlasting punishment and mifery? It puts the foul under the fentence of God to eternal wrath; the condemning fentence of the great and terrible God; than which, nothing is found more dreadful and infupportable: put all pains, all poverty, all afflictions, all miferies, in one feale, and God's condemnation in the other, and you weigh but fo many feathers against a talent of lead.

This disease, our great physician, Chrift, cures, by remiffion, which is the diffolving of the obligation to punishment; the loofing of the foul that was bound over to the wrath and condemnation of God, Col. i. 13, 14. Heb. vi. 12. Micah vii. 17, 18, 19. This remiffion being made, the foul is immediately cleared from all its obligations to punishment. Rom. viii 1. «There is no condemnation." All bonds are cancelled, the guilt of all fins is healed or removed, original and actual, great and fmall. This cure is performed upon fouls by the blood of Chrift; nothing is found in VOL. II. Bb