will glorify it again. He will give it its utmost glory

in him.

2. That God will yet exercife and lay out those properties of his to the utmost in our behalf. Tho' he hath made them all glorious in a way that may tend to our good, yet it doth not abfolutely follow that he will use them for our good; for do we not fee innumerable perfons perishing everlastingly, notwithstanding the manifestation of himself which God hath made inChrist. Wherefore further, God hath committed all his properties into the hand of Christ, if 1 may fo fay, to be managed in our behalf, and for our good, He is the power of God, and the wisdom of God, he is the Lord our righteousness, and is made unto us of God, wisdom and righteoufness, fanctifi cation and redemption. Chrift having glorified his Father in all his attributes, he hath now the exercife of them committed to him, that he might be the Captain of falvation to them that do believe. So that if in the righteoufnefs, the goodness, the love, the mercy, the all-fufficiency of God, there be any thing that will do us good, the Lord Jefus is fully interested with the difpenfing of it in our behalf. Hence God is faid to be in him reconciling the world unto himself, 2 Cor. v. 18. Whatever is in him he layeth it out for the reconciliation of the world, in and by the Lord Chrift. And he becomes the Lord our righteousness, Ifa. xlv. 24, 25. and this is the fecond thing required.

3. There re naineth only then, that these attri butes of God, fo manifefted, and exercised, are powerful and able to bring us to the everlasting fruition of hin. To evince this, the Lord wraps up the whole covenant of grace in one promife, fignifying no less than, I will be your God. In the

covenant, God becomes our God, and we are his people, and thereby all his attributes are ours`alfo; and left that we should doubt, when once our eyes are opened, to fee in any measure the inconceivable difficulty that is in this thing, what imaginable obftacles on all hands there lye against us, that all is not enough to deliver and fave us, God hath, 1 fay, wrapt it up in this expreffion, Gen. xvii. 1. I am, faith he, God Almighty, All-fufficient! I am wholly able to perform all my undertakings, and to be thy exceeding great reward. I can remove all difficulties, anfwer all objections, pardon all fins, conquer all oppofition, I am God all-fufficient. Now you know in whom this covenant and all the promises thereof are ratified, and in whose blood it is confirmed: to wit, in the Lord Chrift alone; in him only is God an all fufficient God to any, and an exceeding great reward. And hence Christ himfelf is faid to fave to the utmost them that come to God by him, Heb. vii. And thefe three things, I fay, are required to be known, that we may have a faving acquaintance, and fuch as is attended with confolation, with any of the properties of God; and all these being hid only in Christ, from him alone it is to be obtained.

This then is the first part of our first demonftration, that all true and found wifdom and knowlege, is laid up in the Lord Christ, and from him alone to be obtained; because our wifdom confifting in a main part of it, in the knowlege of God, his nature and his properties, this lyes wholly hid in Christ, nor can poffibly be obtained but by him.

For the knowlege of ourselves, which is the fecond part of our wifdom, this confifts in thefe three things, which our Saviour fends his Spirit to con

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vince the world of; even fin, righteoufnefs, and judgment, Johnvi. 8. to know ourselves in reference unto thefe three, is a main part of true and found wisdom, for they all refpect the fupernatural and immortal end whereunto we are appointed, and there is none of thefe, that we can attain unto, but only in Chrift.

1. In refpect of fin, there is a fenfe and knowlege of fin left in the confciences of all men by nature. To tell them what is good and evil, in many things to approve and difapprove of what they do in reference to a judgment to come, they need not go farther than themfelves, Rom. ii. 14, 15. But this is obfcure and relates moftly to greater fins, and is in fum, that which the apostle gives us, Rom. i. 32. They know the judgment of God," that they which de fuch things are worthy of death. This he placeth among the common prefumptions and notions that are received by mankind, namely, that it is righteous with God, that they who do fuch things are worthy of death. And if that be true, which is commonly received, that no nation is fo barbarous or rude, but it retaineth fome fenfe of a Deity, then this alfo is true, that there is no nation but hath a fenfe of fin, and the difpleasure of God for it. For this is the very first notion of God in the world, that he is the Rewarder of good and evil; hence were all the facrifices, purgings, expiations, which were fo generally fpread over the face of the earth; but this was and is but very dark, in refpect of that knowlege of fin with its appurtenances, which is to be obtained.

A further knowlege of fin upon all accounts whatever, is given by the law; that law which was added because of tranfgreffion, Gal. iii, 19. Rom. vii,

13. This revives doctrinally all that fense of good and evil which was at firft implanted in man; and it is a glafs whereinto whofoever is able spiritually to look, may fee fin in all its uglinefs and deformity. The truth is, look upon the law in its purity, holinefs, compafs, and perfection, its manner of delivery with dread, terror, thunder, earthquakes, fire, the fanction of it, in death, curfe, wrath, and it makes a wonderful difcovery of fin, upon every account, its pollution, guilt, and exceeding finfulness are feen by it. But yet all this doth not fuffice to give a man a true and through conviction of fin. Not but that the glass is clear, but of ourselves we have not eyes to look into it; the rule is ftraight, but we cannot apply it: and therefore Chrift fends his Spirit to convince the world of fin, John xvi. 8. who, thoug1 as to fome ends and purpofes he makes ufe of the law, yet the work of conviction, which alone is an ufeful knowlege of fin, is his peculiar work. And fo the discovery of fin, may alfo be faid to be by Christ, to be part of the wifdom that is hid in him. But yet there is a twofold regard befides this, of his fending his Spirit to convince us, wherein this wildom appears to be hid in him.

1. Because there are fome near concernments of fin, which are more clearly held out in the Lord Christ's being made fin for us, than any other way.

2. In that there is no knowlege to be had of fin, fo as to give it a fpiritual and faving improvement, but only in him.

1. For the firft. There are four things in fin, that clearly fhine out in the cross of Chrift. 1. The defert of it. 2. Mans impotency by reafon of it. 3. The death of it. 4. A new end put to it.

1. The defert of fin doth clearly fhine in the cross

of Chrift, upon a twofold account.. 1. Of the perfon fuffering for it. 2. Of the penalty he under

went.

1. Of the perfon fuffering for it: this the fcripture oftentimes very emphatically fets forth, and lays great weight upon, John iii. 6. God fo loved the world, as that he fent his only begotten Son. It was his only Son that God fent into the world to fuffer for fin, Rom. viii. 32. He spared not his only Son, but bim gave up to the death for us all. To fee a flave beaten and corrected, argues a fault committed, but yet perhaps the demerit of it was not very great. The correction of a fon argues a great provocation; that of an only Son, the greateft imaginable. Never was fin feen to be more abominably finful and full of provocation, than when the burden of it was upon the fhoulders of the Son of God. God having made his Son, the Son of his love, his only begotten, full of grace and truth, fin for us, to manifeft his indignation against it, and how utterly, impoffible it is, that he fhould let the leaft fin go unpunished, he lays hand on him, and fpares him not. If fin be imputed to the dear Son of his bofom, as upon his own voluntary affumption of it, it was, (for he faid to his Father, Lo I come to do thy will, and all our iniquities did meet on him,) he will not spare him any thing of the due defert of it; is it not moft clear from hence, even from the blood of the cross of Chrift, that fuch is the demerit of fin, that it is altogether impoffible that God fhould pass by any, the leaft, unpunished; if he would have done it for any, he would have done it in reference to his only Son; but he fpared him Moreover!

not.