your filthinefs, and from all your idols, will I cleanfe you.-A news heart alfo will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the heart of stone out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.--I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my ftatutes, and ye fhall keep my judgements and do them.—And ye shall dwel! in the land which I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God*. Again. Their present lamentable ftate is fhewn under the figure of a valley full of dry bones, of which there is no hope, and the Prophet is bid to prophesy upon them: he did fo, till they lived, and stood upon their feet a great army. Then mark the application. Then he laid unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whol Houfe of Ifrael: behold, they fay, Our bones are dried, and our hope is left; we are cut off for our parts.-Therefore prophesy, and say unto them, Thus faith the Lord God, B. hold, O my peopl, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Ifrael.-And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I bave opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves.—And shall put my Spirit upon yon, and ye shall live; and I fhall place you in your own Land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, faith the Lordt. He fpeaks much in the fame ftile throughout, but the three last verses are so remarkable, that they must not be paffed over. Moreover, I will make a covenant of pea.e with them-it shall be an everlafting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will fet my fanctuary in the midft of them for vermore. My tabernacle also shall be with them; yea, I will ba * Ezek. xxxvi. 23---29. +Ibid xxxvii. 13--1 be their God, and thy fhall be my people.-And the bearben fhall know that 1 the Lord do fanctify, when my fanctuary Shall be in the midft of them for evermore *. The terms, for ever, and for evermore, plainly refer to a gospel state of things; and such a state as hath not yet taken place. 13. Now though the above quotations are fufficient, yet will it not be amifs to call in the teftimonies of fome other Prophets. After making mention of the apoftacy of the Jews in the Prophet Hofea, he fays, Thirfore, behold, I will allare her, and bring her into the wilderness, and Speak comfortably to her. And I will give her vineyards from thence, and the valy of Achor for a door of hope; and she fball fing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when he came up out of the land of Egypt.-And it shall be at that day, faith the Lord, that thou shalt call me Isy1, (that is, my husband) and fhalt call me no more BAALI, that is, my Lord t. And I will betroth thee unto me for ever, yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgement, and in leving-kindness, and in mercies. And I will betroth thee unto me in faithfulness, and thou fhalt know the Lord But Judah fhill dwell for ever, and Jerufalem from gneration to generation: For I will cleanfe their blood that I have not cranjed: for the Lord dwelleth in Zion | In that day will I raise up the tabernacl: of David that is fellen, « and close up the bre. ches thereof; and I will raise up the ruins, and will build it as in the days of old.. - And I will bring again the captivity of Ifracl, and thy fhail build the waste cit ess * Ezek. xxxvii. 26, 27, 28. Ibid, ver. 19, 20. Hof, ii. 14, 15, 16. Il Joel iii. 20, 21. and inhabit them; and they fhall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they fhall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. And I will plant them upon their own land, and they fhall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, faith the Lord thy God". But upon Mount Zion fhall be deliverance, and there fhall be holiness; and the House of Jacob fhall poffefs their poffeffions t. 14. ONE may observe, in most of the places where the returning of the chofen race is mentioned, we fee that connected with the people's forrow and penitential distress; fo, in Micah, after piteous mourning, the cloud disperses, and light reaks out, and, with holy exaltation,-Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, that paffeth by the tranfgreffion of the remnant of his heritage? He retaire:h not bis anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.He will turn again, he will have compaffion upon us: he will fubdue our iniquities; and thou wilt caft all their fins into the depths of the fea.Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou haft fworn unto our fathers from the days of old ‡ The remnant of If al shall not do iniquity, nor peak lies; neither fhall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they fhall feed and lie down, and none fhall make them afraid. And at that time will I bring you again, even in the time that I gather you: for I will make you a name and a praise among all people of the earth; and I will turn back your captivity before your eyes, faith the Lord Likewife, after an exultation on the coming of Zion's lowly King, and the blood of his covenant, delivering the prisoners, he adds,And the Lord their God fhall farve them, * Amos ix. 11---15. + Obad. ver. 17. || Zeph. iii. 13---20. them, in that day, as the flock of his people: for they shall be as the ftones of a crown lifted up as an enfign upon his land. For how great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty!Corn fhall make the young men chearful, and new wine the maidens *. Thus, I think, it is fufficiently proved, that God is both able and willing to bring home his ancient people again. III. We now come to the condition,-If they abide not fill in unbelief. This unbelief was the fource of many calamities, and at length the caufe of their being rejected for a feafon. It certainly was very inexcufable in them, who had been favoured with fo many miraculous displays of the power, presence; and goodness of God. He had brought their forefathers out of Egypt with a mighty hand, and with an out-stretched arm; he divided the Red Sea before them, rained down manna for their fuftenance, and brought them water out of the flinty rock. He led them forth with a pillar of a cloud by day, and with flaming fire by night. He gave them laws and ordinances himself, and spoke to them with an audible voice. He gave them a particular form of worship, and committed to them the lively oracles. He drove out the nations from before them, and gave their land for an inheritance-houses which they had not built, and vineyards which they had not planted-and they drank of wells which they had not digged. The fun and moon flood ftill till God had overthrown their enemies; yea, they eat and drank, and faw God t. All this renders their unbelief very inexcufable; yet God has not caft them away. * Ch. x. 16, 17. + Exod. xxiv. away. Perhaps if we take a view of our own unbelief, it is as inexcufable as theirs, nay, in many cases, more fo; for we have all the miraculous interpofitions of Providence recorded for our instruction as well as they, and the Gospel preached unto us in a clearer manner. Likewife we profels to believe the New Teftament, which is a full explanation of the most important events of the Old : Add to this, we have their fall, through unbelief, as an awful example.---Because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou that ftandeft by faith, be not high-minded, but fear : For if God pared not the natural branches, take heed left he he spare not thee. Tnus the Apostle reafons from their fall: For if the cafting of them away be the reconciling of the world, what fhall the receiving of them be lut life from the dead? He then adds,-Behold, therefore, the goodness and feverity of God; on them which fell feverity; but towards thee goodness; if thou continue in his goodness: otherwife thou fhalt be cut off. And they alfo, if they abide not in unbelief, fhall be graffed in: For, as we have proved at large, God is both able and willing to graff them in. For if thou wert cut out of the olive, which is wild by nature, and wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive-tree; how much more fhall thefe, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own clive-tree? * 2. THEIR own olive-tree! that is, precious Chrift! who, as touching the flesh, came from them; and, therefore, they have a peculiar right in him. He died for them, and died that their fins might be deftroyed; and, confequently, that their unbelief might be deftroyed. They are a part of his purchased poffeffion, having re * Rom. xi. I---25. deemed |
