We believe that the tabernacle of God will be among men, that he will dwell among them, and they shall see his face, and his name shall be in their foreheads. Therefore, let the future bring with it what it may, all will be well with him. Oh, that you would come and learn it! We have received a divine life, by which we are made partakers of the divine nature, having "escaped the corruption which is in the world through lust." Will you be willing to endure the revilings of slanderous tongues? Be not drugged with the laudanum of self-security! Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God. Now, Christ is his people's representative. Jesus when he was on earth, had a baptism to be baptised with, and how was he straitened until it was accomplished! Paul is but giving us two sides of the truth, both equally true, the one needful for our warning, the other admirable for our consolation. As far as I can guess, the main text on which these people build the doctrine of the universal Fatherhood, is that quotation which the apostle Paul took from a heathen poet "As certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring." It does not say that they shall work, or that they have worked; both of these are implied, but it says that they do work now. It still lingers in the realm of bondage, and is not brought into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Oh, what a glorious doctrine is that of election, when a man can see himself to be elect. Romans 8:16-17 . We are co-heirs; if he be truly an heir, so are we; and if he be not, neither are we. There were no seats whatever provided tor the priests. Would that he were not so severe, so rigorously just, so sternly strict to his integrity." I know this I believe God was at work with my heart for years before I knew anything about him. The face of Jesus is more lovely to God than all the worlds, his eyes are brighter than the stars, his voice is sweeter than bliss; therefore doth the Father will to have his Son's beauty reflected in ten thousand mirrors in saints made like to him, and his praises chanted by myriads of voices of those who love him, because his blood has saved them. 13:1-14. "For ye were sometime darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord; walk as children of the light." The other night, just before Christmas, two men who were working very late, were groaning in two very different ways, one of them saying, "Ah, there's a poor Christmas day in store for me, my house is full of misery." But in addition to his sermons, he regularly reading a Bible passage before his message and gave a verse-by-verse exposition, rich in gospel insight and wisdom for the Christian life. You have perhaps received an increase to your wealth, and after the first flush of pleasure which was but natural, you have said, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity; this is not my joy." We come and spend our time and our money upon our pleasures before we pay our just and fair debts. The gold itself was fused in the atoning sacrifice, but the minting of it, making it into that which should be the current coin of the merchant, was the resurrection of Christ. But our liberty is incomplete. We are heirs with Christ. Climbing the lofty Alps, or wandering through the charming valley, skimming the blue sea, or traversing the verdant forest, we have felt that this world, however desecrated by sin, was evidently built to be a temple of God, and the grandeur and the glory of it plainly declare that "the earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof." It shall work for thy good. When thou art commanded to believe and repent, when thou art exhorted to flee from the wrath to come, the sin lies on thy own head if thou dost despise the exhortation, and reject the commandment. Psalms 16:5 . That shows that this is used as an argument drawn from something mentioned before. I repeat it again, any one of them is all-sufficient. And yet it is within reach of every truly penitent sinner. So in regard to God. And all between is full of grace and truth. Ministers are helpers of the joy of the saints. When he is about to favour an individual he casts the shadow of hopeful expectation over his soul. Yet I have been upheld till now, who could hold me up but my God!" Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor! Oh! Gentlemen, the apostle Paul was well aware of your objections; and therefore mark how confidently he asserts the doctrine. Go into yonder house. We have, indeed, in the death of Christ, a great atonement; an atonement so great, that none can measure its height and depth, its length and breadth. The raising and elevation of Christ to that throne of dignity and favour, is the elevation, the acceptance, the enshrinement, the glorifying of all his people, for he is their common head, and stands as their representative. I used this argument; I thought it might be a new one; I am sure it is a forcible one. If we be not debtors to the present, then men were never debtors to their age and their time. You think you can do wondrous things; you say. Let her, then, as Christ's queen, claim the earth as hers, and send her heralds forth from sea to sea to bid all men bow before him, and confess him to be their King. There is a third black portion, too, namely, temptation. "Complete the sentence, lictors;" and their heads are smitten off in the father's presence. Suppose it to be a time of war centuries back. Those things may be desirable, but they are not the ultimatum of the saints. Thus have I tried to set forth the cheering fact that the Spirit helps the people of God. Edwards "is widely acknowledged to be America's most important and original philosophical theologian," and one of America's greatest intellectuals. Only let the gospel be preached, and there shall be an end of war; let it thoroughly pervade all ranks of society, and saturate the mind of nations, and there shall be no more lifting of the spears, they shall be used for pruning hooks; no bathing of swords in blood, for they shall be turned into the peaceful ploughshares of the soil; we shall then have no hosts encountering hosts; we shall have no millions slain for widows to deplore; but every man shall meet every other man, and call him "brother." It does not charge manhood with an aversion merely to the dominion, laws, or doctrines of Jehovah; but it strikes a deeper and surer blow. "There's the respect that makes calamity of so long life," that there is so much longer time for temptation and trial. Brethren, we are debtors to the past. I see the heavens on fire, rolling up like a scroll I see sun, moon, and stars pale now their feeble light the earth is tottering; the pillars of heaven are rocking; the grand assize is commenced the herald angels descend, not to sing this time, but with thundering trumpets to proclaim, "He comes, he comes to judge the earth in righteousness, and the people in equity." I am not going to expatiate upon this wondrous theme. He was born into this world in a very humble place, amidst the oxen, and in the manger; but yet he lacked not the songs of angels, and the adoration of the heavenly hosts. He died for thee, if now thou dost confess thy guilt. Is that the tenor of thy life towards God, and towards his law? You had a share in his death. See the victim of justice the sacrifice of atonement for your transgression. You, that were going to thrash mountains, find that molehills cast you down. My fellow creature, dost thou not know that God sent his Son from his bosom, hung him on the tree, and there suffered him to die for sinners, the just for the unjust? The Spiritual Resurrection of our Mortal Body (8:1-13) 8:1. At this present time, the groaning and travailing which are general throughout creation, are deeply felt among the sons of men. III. First, he flings down the gauntlet, and challenges a battle, crying, "Who is he that condemneth?" Romans 8:22-23 . Thou canst bear faithful witness, if thou wouldst speak the truth, that each person here has so transgressed against God, so continually broken his laws, violated his Sabbath, trampled on his statutes, despised his gospel, that it is true, aye, most true, that "the carnal mind is enmity against God. We have him first very succinctly, but very fully described in these words "Them that love God, them who are the called according to his purpose." Are you prepared now to be despised and rejected of men that you may at last ascend up on high, leading captivity captive? III. I cannot be punished for my sin. You have felt as sure about the promise as you felt about the trial. He comes within the gates. This is styled by our new philosophers as old cumbersome scheme of theology, and it is proposed that it be swept away a proposition which will never be carried out, while the earth remaineth, or while God endureth. In illustrating the effectual call of grace, which is given to the predestinated ones, I must first use the picture of Lazarus. But the text, you see, furnishes us with a higher witness than this. Let me feel the worm that never dies rather than the stings of an offended conscience, if indeed this is not itself, "the worm that dieth not." There is a result to come of it of the best kind. We have this. In too many instances ministers of religion has propagated doubt, and the result is a general hardening of the popular feeling, and a greatly-increased neglect of public worship. Again, I hear him cry, "Who shall lay anything to my charge?" If we are at enmity with God, what merit can we have? With that attack upon his Sonship the fiend commenced the battle. I have said that I would endeavor, in the third place, to show the great enormity of this guilt. He looked forward with glad anticipation to the time when the wain should creak beneath the sheaves, and when the harvest home should be shouted at the door of the barn. He is delivered and I am delivered too. But listen to another word of the Lord in the first epistle of John, iii. Thine eternity, O God, is mine to keep me in existence, that I may ever be preserved. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: It seems a great change in this chapter from the sad tone at the beginning to the joyous note at the end; but, indeed, there is no contradiction between the two. If we suffer orthodoxy to fail, or God's truth to be dishonored, future generations will despise and execrate our name. There are four things of which I shall speak this morning. Once more I will appeal to his advocacy 'Who maketh intercession for us.' If there be some points in the covenant of grace where wisdom has been deficient, and therefore by error it may miscarry, or by lack of legal right may prove null and void, it is as surely null towards Christ as towards ourselves, for he is jointly concerned therein. He instructs us as to our need, and as to the promises of God which refer to that need. What is that? It will be a terrible thing to have to answer to the great and mighty God for having so sinned." Romans 8:34 . And I see him look downwards; there lies the old dragon, bound in chains, the accuser of the brethren; and the apostle stares him in the face, and says, "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" Hear all those holy men who have written in the inspired volume, and ye shall find them all confessing that they were not clean, no not one; yea, one of them exclaimed, "O wretched man that I am; who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Yea, that harp is mine, and my soul by faith would make every string resound with melody. Would you take Job's jewels, but not his dung-hill? "Oh," say you, "we never shall." The dreariest thing you can read is the newspaper. Consider this, believer. We have around us appliances for doing good, such as men never possessed before; we behold around us machinery for doing evil, such as never was at work even in earth's worst days. But, remember, the text tells us that all God is, is ours. I think I have shown this; only may God give us grace to rest upon this precious "yea, rather, who is risen from the dead.". I have done when I have called your attention to one more thing. It seems to be, so far as we can judge, much more painful than the first, and has an anguish in it of the severest sort. Shall we not, in some degree, repay the immense debt of our obligation by seeking to make the future also debtors to us, that our descendants may look back and acknowledge that they owe us thank for preserving the Scriptures, for maintaining liberty, for glorifying God? So the high priest takes off his royal robes, and puts on the garments of the minor priest, and goes within the veil, and sprinkles the blood upon the mercy-seat. He took the payment and bore it to God, took his wounds, his rent body, his flowing blood, up to his Father's very eyes, and there he spread his wounded hands and pleaded tor his people. He has paid all we owed and he will vindicate his own death, and claim for the travail of his soul its due reward, which is the forgiveness and the salvation of all guilty men who have come and put their trust in him. As sure as thou art God's called child today, thy poverty shall soon be at an end, and thou shalt be rich to all the intents of bliss. Now, when effectual calling comes into a house and singles out a man, that man will be compelled to go forth without the camp, bearing Christ's reproach. Abel, the protomartyr, entering alone into heaven, shall not have a more secure title to the inheritance than he who, last of woman born, shall trust in Christ, and then ascend into his glory. First, in 8:37 he says that "we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.". Unless we are the sons of God the Holy Spirit's indwelling shall not be ours: we are shut out from the intercession of the Holy Ghost, ay, and from the intercession of Jesus too, for he hath said, "I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me.". For human righteousness is only human; being human, it is finite; and, being finite, it falls short somewhere or other. So live, so act, ye sons of God, that the world may say of you, "Yes, these men bring forth the fruits of God; they are like their Father; they honour his name; they are indeed filled with his grace, for their every word is as true as his oath; their every act is sincere and upright; their heart is kind, their spirit is gentle; they are firm but yet they are generous; they are strict in their integrity, but they are loving in their souls; they are men who, like God, are full of love; but like him are severely just. That will be the subject of this blog. Are we not his sons, and is there not a debt the son owes to the father which a lifetime of obedience can never remove? If all the processes of grace fail in the case of any professors, what is to be done with them? His works bore witness of him. Oh for 400 Scoevolas, 400 men who for Christ's sake would burn, not their right hands, but their bodies, if indeed Christ's name night be glorified, and sin might be stabbed to the heart. Ah! I think I could indeed plead if I were pleading for myself. Last of all, I have another practical point. Now, he never would sit if the work were not fully done. "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" He reads the heart itself: "he knoweth,' says the text, "what is the mind of the Spirit." Death hath no more dominion over him and no more dominion over me; his deliverance is mine, his freedom mine for ever. But yonder is the Saviour,, and he is called Jesus, "For he shall save his people from their sins." 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