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confidence often grieve our beloved, and provoke him to depart, refusing the joys of his falvation. If he appears to us at fome particular feasons, as he did to the difciples going to Emmaus, he immediately vanishes out of our fight. We are often obliged to repeat the antient, melancholy complaint, I fought him whom my foul loveth, I fought him but I found him not: Is this, beloved reader, is this thy complaint now? Art thou weeping, and lamenting with the difconfolate Mary, They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him? Be not furprised, nor dif couraged by this want of fenfible communion with thy Redeemer. It is thy Father's pleasure that thou shouldest walk by faith, whilst thou art kept in this world. This is the path in which all thy brethren and fifters who are now in glory have trodden before thee. They were in doubt, in perplexities, in afflictions, in tribulations often; but out of all thefe the Lord hath delivered them, and from all thy prefent fears and diftreffes he will shortly deliver thee. The God of all grace who hath called thee to his eternal glory by Jefus Chrift, after thou haft fuffered a little, will bring thee to the full fruition of this glory. Thy faith fhall then give way to the clearest vision, and thou shalt eternally behold thy Beloved without a vail, without a cloud.

3. WE learn from this do&trine that the immediate prefence of Jefus Jehovah conftitutes the

joy of the heavenly world. Admit the departing fpirit to the communion of patriarchs and prophets and apoftles, it would be unfatisfied: Introduce it to the fociety of Enoch who formerly walked with God, and was tranflated without feeing death; of Abraham the father of the faithful; of Ifaiah who teftified with fuch transport of heart, and fuch elevation of ftile, the fufferings of Chrift, and the glory that should follow; of Mofes the great deliverer of the law, and Elijah its restorer, and to all that fhining throng of martyrs who received joyfully the fpoiling of their goods,

who loved not even their lives unto the death for the name of Jefus, but fealed their teftimony with their blood, introduce the departing fpirit to the fociety of all thefe, it would ftill be unfatisfied; nay, was the chriftian, upon his entrance into heaven, brought to the moft intimate fellowfhip of that innumerable company of angels who kept their firft eftate, nobly refifling the folicitations of the reft who apoftatifed from their fovereign; introduce him to thofe feraphims and cherubims who often attended our faviour upon earth, who worshipped him at his birth, who miniftered to him in the wilderness, who ftrengthened him in the garden, who left their feats in bliss and came down to witnefs his afcenfion on high, who now ftand before the throne and caft their crowns at his feet, introduce the departing faint to the fellowship of either, or all thofe he would till be difpofed to exclaim, in the language of

disappointment and grief, Saw ye him whom my foul loveth: 0, that I knew where I might find him, I would go even to his feat. Heaven would be no heaven without the fight and fruition of his Saviour. The fmiles of ten thousand, thousand faints, and ten thousand, thousand angels would impart no confolation without the enjoyment of the Lamb that was flain and redeemed him to God by his blood. The fellowship of Jefus in the closet, in the family, in the fanctuary, formed his chief felicity on earth, and this will be the crown of all his bleffedness and glory in heaven. And, O believer, does not thy fpirit leap for joy at the confideration that thou fhalt be with him; thou fhalt certainly and shortly be with Chrift which is far better. Yes, believer, thou fhalt fee him for thyfelf; thine eyes fhall behold him, and not another. Praise, praise be to his name, the wheels of his chariot fhall not long tarry. A few more revolving feasons, a few more roling funs, a few more fleeting moments; a little more frailty of body, a little more dejection of mind, a little more conflict with corruption, and the darkness of earth fhall be exchanged for the full blaze of heaven's glory. Until the day break, and the fhadows flee away, turn our beloved and be thou like a roe, or a young hart on the mountains of Bether. AMEN.

Our Ruin in the First Adam more than repaired by our Recovery in the Second.

ROMANS v. 20.

WHERE SIN ABOUNDED, GRACE DID MUCH MORE

ABOUND.

THIS chapter, from the twelfth verfe

to the conclufion, is an epitome of divine revelation. The infpired author leads us back to the creation of this world; he reprefents our first Father as engaging in the capacity of our federal head; as violating the facred truft repofed in him, and by his tranfgreffion bringing ruin on himself and his off-spring. The fecond Adam is afterwards introduced as interpofing in behalf of a chofen feed; as fuffering in their nature and name, and by the merit of his facrifice becoming the author of eternal falvation. For if by one man's offence, he teftifies, death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteoufnefs fhall reign in life by one, Fefus Chrift: After the Apostle has taken this comprehenfive furvey of the means of our ruin, and recovery; after he has contemplated the first Adam ftanding the reprefentative of the human family, and, by his wanton difobe

dience, forfeiting every bleffing with refpect to himfelf, and them after he has contemplated the Second Adam fucceeding in his room; fulfilling all righteoufnefs, aud opening a living way to the holiest of all, he draws the important, reviving conclufion contained in our text, where fin abounded, grace did much more abound.

THE term fin, as we noticed in a preceding difcourse,implies a tranfgreffion of the divine law; an omiflion of the duties which it requires, or the commiffion of what is actually forbidden; But in the prefent inftance, its fignification is more extenfive; it implies not merely the act of tranfgreffion, but thofe unnumbered, incalculable evils which have followed in its train; all that dishonor which was thereby manifested to the divine authority; all that mifery to which it expofed our world, and all that derangement or diforder which it introduced into the creation of God;

GRACE ufually fignifies favour which is free, unmerited, unafked; good will manifefted to the unthankful and the undeferving; but the term grace, as here used by the apostle, is much more comprehenfive in its import; it may with propriety be confidered as implying the whole. economy of redemption and its infinitely important confequences; that eternal tranfaction of Jehovah the Father with his Co-equal Son which

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