and death, and even eternity cannot deliver us from his hands. He has manifested his wrath and displeasure, and his hatred to sin in more than ten thousand instances; such as the drowning of the old world; the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah; the drowning of Pharaoh and his hosts; and permit me to tell you fellow sinners; that except you repent of your sins, believe in the Lord Je. sus Christ, deny yourselves, take up the cross, and follow Christ through good and evil report, you shall all likewise perish:-yes, you must unavoidably feel the loss of every thing that is good, and feel the sense of every thing that is bad, under the wrath and displeasure of God forever, in that miserable place where the worm dieth not and where the fire is not quenched: continually crying the harvest is past, and the summer is ended, and our souls not saved.

Sinners now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation. To-day if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation; for the period is not far distant; when every one of you shall evidently see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not. Therefore agree with your adversary quicklywhile you are in the way with him. All the dumb Idols the false gods of the heathens are dead. The God of Abraham; Isaac, and Jacob is the only living God; and he is the God of the living, and not of the dead. If you are united to the living God, by faith in Christ; by vir tue of that union your bodies shall raise from the grave and when united to your souls appear like the glorious body of our blessed Redeemer, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing; shining brighter in glory than the sun in his full meridian.

May the living God quicken those that are dead in trespasses and sins, and revive his work in the midst of

the years, strengthen the weak graces of his people, and bless the labors of his servants, so that many might be purged from dead works to serve the living God. There is a fountain fill'd with blood,

Drawn from Immanuel's veins;

And sinners plung'd beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains.

Amen.

SERMON XXII

ON THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST.

Who his own self bore our sins, in his own body, on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unte righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed-I Peter 2 chapter, 24 verse.

What great encouragement is given to the followers of Jesus, to bear, patiently, the afflictions of the present life, by contrasting the shortness of the season of endurance with the eternal weight of glory, and the glorious enjoyment reserved for them in heaven. How forcible the argument employed by the apostle to urge Christians to lead a life of holiness, in this world, drawn from the fearful, certain and near approach of another! What a vivid and terror-inspired description does he give us of the dissolution of nature at the great consummation While you read imagine, that you see hea. ven and earth enwrapped in flames, and hear the sound of the inextinguishable and victorious fire, melting the elements to the centre of the globe! You see on high

the elements rent assunder and rolling together like a scroll. The beauty and glory of the magnificent palace fades away, and becomes lost to your vision in the smoke of its burning, and while your ear is saluted, your soul is horrified with the tremendous crush of its final fall! Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be, in all holy conversation and godliness; not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance, but as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation. Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear, showing forth the praise of Him, who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Labor, by the grace of God, to glorify his name in life, that you may die in peace, your eyes seeing the salvation of the Lord. We are further exhorted to follow the footsteps of Christ, and to suffer according to the example that he has left us, but not in all things, for the same end. The blood of the martyrs was not the blood of the atonement, but the blood of Christ, who bore our sins in his own body on the tree, is the great propitia

tion.

In speaking from these words, we shall notice
I. The sufferings of Christ.

II. The design of his sufferings.

1. The sufferings of Christ for his people, are set forth in the text in the four following expressions:-bearing our sins-bearing our sins his own self-bearing our sins his own self in his own body-and bearing our sins his own self in his own body on the tree

1. To have a correct understanding of the expression bearing sin, we must turn to the record of the ordinance to which it alludes, which is as follows: And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, he shall

bring the live goat, and Aaron shall lay both his hands on the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness. And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness. But this part of the ceremony must be proceeded by another part, of awful import.

The goat upon which the lot for the Lord had fallen must be slain as a sin offering. You see it brought be fore the Lord; and Aaron, in the name of the great Lawgiver, puts his hands upon him, as much as to say, this day thou shalt die, Blood must be shed and sprinkled upon, and before the mercy-seat, and seven times upon the great altar. Then the scape goat bears the sins of the children of Israel, to the land of forgetfulnessbehind God's back, that they might return to trouble them no more. The goat of the sin offering was not only bound and slain, but also burnt up with the fat thereof. He who bore our sins in his own body on the tree, was bound with the chords of eternal love, mercy and grace.

His human nature was consumed upon the high altar of his divinity, by the fire of the wrath and indignation of God against sin. Fire and blood and the smoke of sweet incense, were continually in the temple: fire, denoting the wrath of God against sin, -blood, prefiguring the sacrificial blood of Christ, and the smoke of sweet incense, typifying his living intercession at the right hand of the Father, upon the ground of his vicarious sufferings, and death upon the cross.— From the high altar, on the summit of Calvary, a pillar of smoke, of the sweetest incense, ascended to the heav en of heavens. Father forgive them. In hell there is fire

also, and sinners there offer the sacrifice of personal sufferings upon the altar of divine justice. They are salted by fire and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever. But this black, sulphurious, and highly offensive smoke, is not sweet incense, it never can satisfy justice, it never will be pleasing in the sight of God. But the smoke of Calvary is of sweet snelling It satisfied the demands of justice, and was accepted in the court of heaven.

savor.

To bear sins, is a mode of expression frequently oc. curring in the old testament, and signifies the enduring of punishment. Of the impenitent sinner it is said, he shall bear his iniquity, that is, he shall endure the punishment for his sins. Forgivenesss will never come to his relief, he must here bear his own burden, and forever sink be neath the load. Christ bearing sins, then, signifies his enduring the punishment for the sins of his people, and glory to God, that every poor trembling sinner can lay his burden on one who is able to bear it. Of Christ we road, "he shall bear their iniquities." He bore our sins in his own body on the tree. The law passed by the sinner and arrested Jesus, who willingly gave himself up, saying, "if ye seek me, let these go away." The great depth of the Saviour's sufferings is the sea of oblivion, in which are buried forever, the sins of the penitent. Sufficiently deep is this sea to bury the greatest, and sins of the deepest huc. The Father turned his back upon his Son when on the tree of Calvary! There is the place where are hidden the sins of his people.They can be found no more.

2. He bears sins, his own self. No one's shoulder beareth the burden but his own. God and the sinner were parties at variance. There was but one that could stand between them as Mediator, and he gave himself an offering and a sacrifice. Uniting in himself the two