not only made of God unto them wisdom and righteousness, the one curing our ignorance, the other our guilt; but he is made fanctification alfo, to relieve us againft the dominion and pollutions of our corruptions: "He comes both by water and by blood, not by "blood only, but by water alfo," 1 John v. 6. purging as well as pardoning: How complete and perfect a cure is Chrift!

But yet fomething is required beyond all this to make our happinefs perfect and entire, wanting nothing; and that is the removal of thofe doleful effects and confequences of fin, which (notwithstanding all the fore-mentioned privileges and mercies) ftill lie upon the fouls and bodies of illuminated, justified, and fanctified perfons. For even with the beft and holieft of men, what fwarms of vanity, loads of deadnefs, and fits of unbelief, do daily appear in, and opprefs their fouls! to the imbittering of all the comforts of life to them? And how many difeafes, deformities, and pains opprefs their bodies, which daily moulder away by them, till they fall into the grave by death, even as the bodies of other men do, who never received fuch privileges from Chrift as they do? For if Chrift be in us" (as the apoftle fpeaks, Rom. viii. 10.) "the body " is dead, because of fin: Sanctification exempts us not from mortality.

But from all these, and whatfoever clfe, the fruits and confequences of fin, Chrift is redemption to his people alfo : This feals up the fum of mercies: This fo completes the happiness of the faints, that it leaves nothing to defire.

Thefe four, wifdom, righteousness, fanctification and redemption, take in all that is neceffary or defirable, to make a foul truly and perfectly bleffed.

Secondly, We have here the method and way, by which the elect come to be invefted with thefe excellent privileges: the account whereof, the apoftle gives us in thefe words, "Who of God is made unto us," in which expreffion, four things are remarkable.

Firft, That Christ and his benefits go infeparably and undividedly together: it is Chrift himself who is made all this unto us: we can have no faving benefit feparate and apart from the perfon of Chrift: : many would willingly receive his privileges, who will not receive his perfon; but it cannot be; if we will have one, we muft take the other too: Yea, we must accept his person first, and then his benefits: as it is in the marriage covenant, fo it is here.

Secondly, That Chrift with his benefits must be perfonally and particularly applied to us, before we can receive any actual, faving privilege by him; he must be [made unto us] i. e. particularly applied to us; as a fum of money becomes, or is made the ranfom

and liberty of a captive, when it is not only promifed, but paid down in his name, and legally applied for that ufe and end, When Chrift died, the ranfom was prepared, the fum laid down; but yet the elect continue ftill in fin and mifery, notwithstanding, thi by fcctual calling it be actually applied to their perfons, and then they are made free, Rom. v. 10, 11. reconciled by Chrift's , death, by whom "we have now received the atonement."

Thirdly, That this application of Chrift is the work of God, and not of man: "Of God he is made unto us:" The fame hand that prepared it, must also apply it, or elfe we perish, notwithstanding all that the Father hath done in contriving, and appointing, and all that the Son hath done in executing, and accomplishing the defign thus far. And this actual application is the work of the Spirit, by a fingular appropriation.

Fourthly, and lafly, This expreffion imports the fuitablenefs of Chrift, to the neceffities of finners; what they want, he is made to them; and indeed, as money answers all things, and is convertible into meat, drink, raiment, phyfic, or what elfe our bodily neceflities do require; fo Chrift is virtually, and eminently all that. the neceflities of our fouls require; bread to the hungry, and clothing to the naked foul. In a word, God prepared and furnished him on purpose to answer all our wants, which fully fuits the apofile's fenfe, when he faith, "Who of God is made unto us widom and righteoufnefs, fanctification and redemption." The fum of all is,

Pot. That the Lord Jefus Chrif, with all his precious benefits, becomes ours, by God's special and effectual application.

There is a twofold application of our redemption, one primary, the other fecondary. The former is the act of God the Father, applying it to Chrift our furety, and virtually to us in him; the lat ter is the act of the Holy Spirit, perfonally and actually applying it to us in the work of converfion: The former hath the respect and relation of an example, model, or pattern to this; and this is produced and wrought by the virtue of that. What was done upon the perfon of Chrift, was not only virtually done upon us, confidered in him as a common public reprefentative perfon, in which fenfe, we are faid to die with him, and live with him, to be crucified with him, and buried with him, but it was alfo intended for a platform, or idea, of what is to be done by the Spirit, actually upon our fouls and bodies, in our fingle perfons. As he died for fin, fo the Spirit applying his deatli to us in the work of mortification, caufes us to die to fin, by the virtue of his death: And as he was quickened by the Spirit, and raised unto life, fo the Spirit applying

unto us the life of Chrift, caufeth us to live, by fpiritual vivification Now this perfonal, fecondary, and actual application of redemption to us by the Spirit, in his fanctifying work, is that which I am engaged here to difcufs and open; which I fhall do in these following propofitions.

1. Corks Prop. The application of Chrift to us, is not only comprehenfive of our juftification, but of all thofe works of the Spirit which are known to us in fcripture by the names of regeneration, vocation, fan&tification, and converfion.

Though all these terms have fome fmail refpective differences among themselves, yet they are all included in this general, the applying and putting on of Chrift, Rom. xiii. 14 Put ye on the "Lord Jefus Chrift."

Regeneration expreffes thofe fupernatural, divine, now qualities, infuled by the Spirit into the foul, which are the principles of all holy actions.

Vocation expreffes the terms from which, and to which, the foul: moves, when the Spirit works favingly upon it, under the gospelcall.

Sanctification notes an holy dedication of heart and life to God: Our becoming the temples of the living God, feparate from all pro phane finful practices, to the Lord's only ufe and fervice.

Converfion denotes the great change itfelf, which the Spirit cauleth upon the foul, turning it by a fweet irrefiftible efficacy from the power of fin and Satan, to God in Chrift.

-Now all thefe are imported in, and done by the application of Chrift to our fouls: for when once the efficacy of Chrift's death, and the virtue of his refurrection, come to take place upon the heart of any man, he cannot but turn from fin to God, and become a new creature, living and acting by new principles and rules. So the apoftle obferves, 1 Theff. i. 5, 6. fpeaking of the effect of this work of the Spirit upon that people, "Our gofpel (faith he) came "not to you in word only, but in power; and in the Holy Ghoft:" There was the effectual application of Chrift to them. «And

you became followers of us, and of the Lord," ver. 6. there was their effectual call. And ye turned from dumb idols to ferve "the living and true God, ver. 9. there was their converfion. "So that ye were enfamples to all that believe," ver. 9. there was their life of fanctification or dedication to God. So that all thefe are comprehended in effectual application.

Prop. 2. The application of Chrift to the fouls of men is that great project and defign of God in this world, for the accomplishment whereof all the ordinances and all the officers of the gospel are appointed and continued in the world.

This the gofpel exprefsly declared to be its direct end, and the

SERM. I. great business of all its officers, Eph. iv., 11, 12. " And he gave «fome apoftles, and fome prophets, and fome evangelifts, and ❝ fome paftors and teachers; till we all come in the unity of the

faith, and the knowledge of the Son of God; to a perfect man, "unto the measure of the ftature of the fulnefs of Chrift," i. e. the great aim and scope of all Chrift's ordinances and officers, are to bring men into anion with Chrift, and fo build them up to perfection in him; or to unite them to, and confirm them in Chrift: and when it fhall have finifhed this defign, then fhall the whole frame of gofpel-ordinances be taken down, and all its officers difbanded. The kingdom (i. e. this prefent economy, manner,

and form of government) thall be delivered up," 1 Cor. xv. 24. What are minifters, but the bridegroom's friends, ambaffadors for God, to befetch men to be reconciled? When therefore all the elect are brought home in a reconciled ftate in Chrift, when the marriage of the Lamb is come, our work and office expire together.

Prop. 3. Such is the importance and great concernment of the perfonal application of Chrift to us by the Spirit, that whatsoever the Father hath done in the contrivance, or the Son hath done in the accomplishment of our redemption, is all inavailable and ineffectual to our salvation without this.

It is confeffedly true, that God's good pleafure appointing us from co falvation, is, in its kind, a moft full and fufficient impulfive caufe of our falvation, and every way able (for fo much as it is concerned) to produce its effect. And Chrift's humiliation and fufferings are a moft complete and fufficient meritorious caufe of our falvation, to which nothing can be added to make it more apt, and able to procure our falvation, than it already is: yet neither the one nor the other can actually fave any foul, without the Spirit's application of Chrift to it; for where there are divers focial caufes, or concaufes, neceffary to produce one effect, there the effect cannot be produced until the laft caufe hath wrought. Thus it is here, the Father hath elected, and the Son hath redeemed; but until the Spirit (who is the laft caufe) hath wrought his part alfo, we cannot be faved. For he comes in the Father's and in the Son's name and authority, to put the laft hand to the work of our falvation, by bringing all the fruits of election and redemption home to our fouls in this work of effectual vocation. Hence the apostle, 1 Pet. i. 2. noting the order of causes in their operations, for the bringing about of our falvation, thus ftates it, "Elect, "according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through "fanctification of the Spirit unto obedience, and sprinkling of the "blood of Jefus Chrift." Here you find God's election and Chrift's blood, the two great caufes of falvation, and yet neither of

these alone, nor both together, can fave us; there must be added the fanctification of the Spirit, by which God's decree is executed; and the fprinkling (i. e. the perfonal application of Chrift's blood) as well as the shedding of it, before we can have the faving benefit of either of the former caufes.

Prop. 4. The application of Chrift, with his faving benefits, is exiactly of the fame extent and latitude with the Father's election, and the Son's intention in dying, and cannot possibly be extended to one soul far

ther.

"Whom he did predeftinate, them he alfo called," Rom. viii. 30. and Acts xiii. 48. " As many as were ordained to eternal life, "believed;" 2 Tim. i. 9. "Who hath faved and called us with "an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to "his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Jefus Chrift, "before the foundation of the world."

The Father, Son, and Spirit, (betwixt whom was the council of peace) work out their defign in a perfect harmony and confent as there was no jar in their council, fo there can be noņe in the execution of it: those whom the Father, before all time, did chufe; they, and they only, are the perfons, whom the Son, when the fulness of time for the execution of that decree was come, died for, John xvii. 6. « I have manifefted thy name unto the "men, which thou gaveft me out of the world; thine they were, " and thou gavest them me;" and ver. 19. "For their fakes I "fanctify myself;" i. e. confecrate, devote, or fet myself apart for a facrifice for them. And thofe for whom Chrift died, are the perfons to whom the Spirit effectually applies the benefits and purchases of his blood: he comes in the name of the Father and Son: "But the world cannot receive him, for it neither fees, nor "knows him," John xiv. 17. "They that are not of Chrift's "fheep, believe not," John x. 26.

Chrift hath indeed a fulness of faving power, but the difpenfation thereof is limited by the Father's will; therefore he tells us, Matt. xx. 23. “It is not mine to give, but it fhall be given to them "for whom it is prepared of my Father." In which words he no ways denies his authority, to give glory as well as grace; he only fhews that in the difpenfation proper to him, as Mediator, he was limited by his Father's will and counfel.

And thus alfo are the difpenfations of grace by the Spirit, in like manner, limited, both by the counfel and will of the Father and Son. For as he proceeds from them, fo he acts in the administration proper to him, by commiflion from both. John xiv. 26. "The Holy Ghoft whom the Father will fend in my name;" and as he comes forth into the world by this joint commiflion, fo his difpenfations are limited in his commiffion; for it is faid, John xvi,

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