bedient even unto the death: wherefore God alfo hath highly exalted thee, and given thee a name above every name, that at the name of Jefus every knee bould bow, in heaven, earth, and under the earth. Waft thou not as low as the grave? and yet haft afcended on high, led captivity captive, and received gifts for men! Art thou not he, who li veth, and was dead? and behold, thou art alive for evermore! who is exalted, and waft low and defpifed; and behold, thou art exalted above all created = heavens for ever! who rejoiceft, and did weep, and figh, and groan; and behold, thou art furrounded with boundless joys for evermore! who reigneft victoriously, and waft in the form of a fervant; and behold, thou reigneft in glorious majefty for evermore! Art thou not a wonderful One indeed! fhall men and angels ever enough admire thee? though every moment of eternity shall be filled with admiration of my ravished heart. 21. God minifefted in the flefb for ever a mystery. And is duft and ashes for ever exalted to fuch an incomprehenfible pitch of glory? Oduft, how cameft thou hither? ftrange! that the Almighty hath exalted thee above fun, moon, and stars; and hath brought thee into his immediate prefence, to carry the leaft tincture of fupernatural heavenly glory upon thee, to become the temple of the Holy Ghoft! But, men and angels, what are your conceptions of this duft, to be the temple, whereia the high and lofty One, the Almighty JEHOVAH, the eternal confubftantial Son of God, doth perfonally dwell, and with which he is perfonally united? Is not this a myftery? Is not this an infinite abyfs, men and angels, into whofe furthermoft you shall never be able to dive? 22. That God fhould bring about the highest ex altation altation of human nature, through man's horrid ingratitude, an ocean of wonders. : To think, that these bodily eyes behold my Redeemer, might aftonish ten thousand worlds are we not all overwhelmed in astonishment? is not every one crying, What hath God done? O thy incomprehenfible ways! O thy irresistible power! O thy unfearchable wisdom ! O thy love, thy bound lefs love! love that palleth all understanding! ftrange! hath the Almighty exalted thee, O man's nature,untothis incomprehenfible dignity?it was much thou receivedst the characters of divine majesty and excellency; yet more to be admitted into friendship and converfe with the great and dreadful Former of all. O! are not fuch gradations of wonder, like mil lions of worlds, placed above millions of worlds, and again, and again, and for evermore? Is not man infinitely obliged to fuch a Sovereign? If the crawling worms beinfinitely obliged for their being, what shall be faid of man, created with fo noble a being, in fo noble a condition? Was it poffible he could ever have loved, feared, praised him enough? Was it poffible a creature, thus dealt with, could rebel? Yet ftrange! when this dreadful prodigy did enter the creation; O aftonishing rebellion! monstrous ingratitude! from thenceforth, what could be expect. ed, but pure vengeance, like an overflowing flood, fhould destroy head and tail, root and branch, with an eternal destruction? Could any mercy have been expected from heaven to earth, when carth had denounced open enmity against heaven? What fhouldst thou have done, dread Sovereign of all things, with bafe, monftrous and ingrate mankind, but make it wholly the butt of thy unmixed wrath? What are never fo many. worlds of men and an gels to thee, that thou fhouldft fpare them, if once they they dare to utter one word against thee? Shouldft thou reduce to nothing what thou haft created, what haft thou loft, fince thou couldst produce, in this very moment, millions of millions of worlds? Yea, and if produced, what are they, but as fo many millions of fhadows and nothings before thee? O the condefcendency! the fweetness of thy nature! O the boundless riches of thy grace! O the height, the depth, the length, the breadth of thy unJearchable ways! haft thou become friends with man again? entered into a treaty of peace and reconciliation with him? held out the golden fceptre, as a manifestation of the thoughts of boundless love, that flamed in thy heart from all eternity? erecting a glorious throne of free, altogether free grace, upon the horrid apoftafy and rebellion of ungrate man? Who could have imagined fuch a difpenfation as this? Were you expecting this, you glorious angels, when ye beheld man backflide fo monftrously? Were you thinking fo prodigious ingratitude would come to this? Were you not amazed at fuch a fecond covenant, after the breaking of the first? Yea, are we not all in the fame admiring frame? O eternity! thou art not fufficient to make the impreffion old, which God hath enftamped on the minds of men and angels. The objects are wonderful! Our faculties are wonderfully elevated! what wonder, my heart is fixed? O this frame of spirit! I fee, I see that a world of altogether free grace was the only design of eternity! even that heaven should be filled for ever with a fong, To him that fitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb, for ever and ever. Lord, what hast thou done? Not only haft thou become friends with man again; not only haft thou made him thine everlasting minion, but thou haft alfo perfonally affumed affumed his nature, that thou mightest draw him nearer thyself, and manifeft thy glory unto him, in a more familiar, intimate, fweet and wonderful way, than was poffible in the firft difpenfation! Wonderful! did man cast off the image of his Maker? and did his Maker take upon him man's image, to restore all again? Didst thou, O my God, affume perfonally our nature, even in its lowest eflate, that thou mighteft weep, and figh, and groan, and forrow, and die for undone man? Is not this love indeed! man had deftroyed himfelf, but did our excellent Wellbeloved ftep in betwixt eternal wrath, and the miserable finner, and all the billows of divine vengeance did he receive, till divine fury was pacified ! No forrow, no fhame, no pain could terrify him: infinite love is invincible. I will not spare base man, faid offended Majefty, in the day he rebels against me, as I have faid, he muft die the death; for the word hath gone out of my mouth. Be it fo, faith the Son of God, here am I, a man ready to fuffer all forrow, grief, and pain of foul and body, unto the very death: hath man finned? man fhall bear the punishment. I, even I will die the death; facrifice and offerings thou wilt not accept; but a body thou haft given me. I will bear their grief; I will carry their forrows. My Father, I am glad thou lay upon me the iniquity of them all; they are thine and mine from eternity: this was our transaction before all ages, that in the fulness of time, I fhould lay down my life for thefe thou hast given me out of the world; Therefore thou, Father, doft love me, because I lay down my life for my sheep. 23. The relations betwixt God and us are ever lafting amazement. Who can fearch into the depths of thy bound els lefs love? Thou haft delivered us from going down into the pit; thou bast found a ranjom: this is a draught of infinite wifdom, the eternal wonder of men and angels! verily, thy loves are incomprehenfible, matchlefs, boundlefs, and unchangeable; which, though we fometimes doubted, in the days of our abfence, yet all are now evident, as the noonday light; paft, prefent, and to come, present themfelves for ever. O then, my happinefs overflows its banks! am not I overjoyed, as at the first entry? how familiarly and fweetly do I converse with thee, O excellent Wellbeloved? myriads of ages appear not a moment in thy prefence. This difpenfation is an eternal wonder would not this have been thought a horrid petition, before the promulgation of the gofpel? O that thou wert as my brother, that fucked the breafts of my mother? when I fbould find thee without, I would kiss thee: his left hand fhould be under my head, and his right hand bould embrace me. I am my beloved's, and bis defire is towards me. Indeed our dignity before our fall was high and glorious: but, this difpenfation of love! Sirs, is not God our Brother, our Husband, our Redeemer, our only Wellbeloved? O our happiness ! what shall we do throughout eternity but wonder? God manifefted in the flefb, O ftrange! Lord God Almighty, what couldft thou do more to creatures? 24. Men and angels run themselves in an eternal circle of beholding and admiring God vifibly manifefted. Shall I not behold and admire, admire and behold, and flame and love, while this immortal Being remains? The vail is drawn aside, and we behold clearly the man, Chrift Jefus, filled with the Godhead Indeed the earth is full of a divine gloF ry, |