externally affaulted; but I am defiled by them as well as troubled.

Sol. This is a different cafe. True, it is fo, and must be so, or elfe it had fignified nothing to your relief. For had Chrift been internally defiled, he had not been a fit Mediator for you; nor could you have had any benefit, either by his temptations, or fufferings for you. But he being tempted, and yet still efcaping the defilement of fin, hath not only fatisfied for the fins you commit when tempted, but also got an experimental fenfe of the mifery of your condition, which is in him (though now in glory) as a spring of pity and tender compaffion to you. Remember, poor tempted Chriftian, "the God of peace thall "fhortly tread Satan under thy feet," Rom. xvi. 20. Thou fhalt fet thy foot on the neck of that enemy: and as soon as both thy feet are over the threshold of glory, thou shalt call back a fmiling look, and fay, now, Satan, do thy worft; now I am there where thou canst not come. Mean while, till thou be out of his reach, let me advise thee to go to Jefus Christ, and open the matter to him; tell him how that base spirit falls upon thee, yea, sets upon thee, even in his prefence: intreat him to rebuke and command him off: beg him to confider thy cafe, and fay, Lord, doft thou remember how thy own heart was once grieved, though not defiled, by his affaults? I have grief and guilt together upon me. Ah Lord; I expect pity and help from thee; thou knowest the heart of a stranger, the heart of a poor and tempted one. This is fingular relief in this cafe. O try it!

It was

Inference 5. Was Chrift yet more humbled, by his own fympathy with others in their diftreffes? Hence we learn, that a compaffionate fpirit, towards fuch as labour under burdens of fin, or affliction, is Chrift-like, and truly excellent: this was the Spirit of Chrift: O be like him! Put on as the elect of God, bowels of mercy, Col. iii. 12. "Weep with them that weep, "and rejoice with them that rejoice," Rom. xii. 15. Cain that faid, "am I my brother's keeper ?" Blessed Paul was of a contrary temper, 2 Cor. xi. 29. "Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is offended, and I burn not?" Three things promote fympathy in Chriftians, one is the Lord's pity for them; he doth as it were fuffer with them; "in all their afflictions he was afflicted † ;” Ifa. lxiii. 9. Another is, the relation we fu

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In all the afflictions, loffes, and troubles that befal believers, Chrift faith, Half mine yea, he not only bears half, but all the burden,

SERM. XIX. ftain to God's afflicted people: they are members with us in one body, and the members fhould have the fame care of one another, 1 Cor. xii. 25. The laft is, we know not how foon ourselves may need from others, what others now need from us. "Restore "him with the spirit of meekness, confidering thyself, left thou "alfo be tempted," Gal. vi. 1.

Inference 6. Did the world help on humiliation of Christ by their bafe and vile ufage of him? Learn hence, that the judgment the world gives of perfons, and their worth, is little to be regarded. Surely it difpenfes its fmiles and honours very prepo. fterously and unduly. In this refpect, among others, the faints are ftiled perfons, "of whom the world is not worthy," Heb. xi. 38. i. e. it doth not deferve to have fuch choice spirits as thefe are, left in it, fince it knows not how to use or treat them. It was the complaint of Salvian, above eleven hundred years ago; "if any of the nobility (faith he) do but begin to turn to God, prefently he lofeth the honour of nobility! O in how little honour is Chrift among Christian people, when religion fhall make a man ignoble!" So that (as he adds) "many are compelled to be evil, left they fhould be esteem"ed vile." And indeed, if the world gives us any help to discover the true worth and excellency of men by, it is by the rule of contraries, for the moft part. Where it fixes its marks of hatred, we may ufually find that which invites our refpect and love. It should trouble us the lefs to be under the flights and difrefpects of a blind world. "I could be even proud upon it," (faith Luther)" that I fee I have an ill name from the world."

And Jerom bleffed God that counted him worth to be hated "of the world." Labour to ftand right in the judgment of God, and trouble not thyfelf for the rafh and headlong cenfures of men. Let wicked men, faith one, cut the throat of my credit, and do as they like beft with it; when the wind of their calumnies hath blown away my good name from me in the way to

burden, and more than all; for he bears us and our burdens too. O that more of his Spirit dwelt in his people. We are, or have been, or may be what he is.

* Si quis ex nobilitate converti ad Deum cœperit, ftatim bonorem nobilitatis amittit. O quantulus in Chriftiano populo honor Chrifti eft ubi religio ignobilitatem facit! Salv. lib. 4. de Gub.

Dei.

+ Superbus fio, quod video nomen pessimum mihi crefcere; gau• deo rebellis dici. Luth.

Gratias ago Dea meo, quod dignus fum, quem mundus ode

rit. Hieron.

heaven, I know Chrift will take my name out of the mire, and wash it, and restore it to me again.

Inference 7. From the whole of Chrift's humiliation in his life, learn you to pass through all the troubles of your life with a contented compofed fpirit, as Chrift your forerunner did. He was perfecuted, and bare it meekly; poor, and never murmured; tempted, and never yielded to the temptation; reviled, and reviled not again. When ye therefore pass through any of these trials, look to Jefus, and confider him. See how be that paffed through thofe things before you, managed him. felf in like circumitances; yea, not only beat the way by his pattern, and example for you, but hath in every one of thofe conditions left a bleffing behind him, for them that follow his steps.

Thanks be to God for Fefus Chrift.

Opens CHRIST's Humiliation unto Death, in his first preparative Act for it.

JOHN Xvii. 11. And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world; and I come to thee: Holy Father, keep through thine own name, thoje whom thou haft given me; that they may be one, as we are.

WE

E now come to the last and lowest step of Christ's humiliation, which was in his fubmitting to death, even the death of the cross. Out of this death of Chrift, the life of our fouls fprings up; and in this bloed of the crois, all our mercies fwim to us. The blood of Chrift runs deep to fome eyes: the judicious believer fees multitudes, multitudes of ineftimable bieffings in it. By this crimson feuntain I refolve to fit down; and concerning the death of Chrift, I fhall take diftinctly into confideration the preparations made for it: the nature and quality of it; the deportment and carriage of dying Jefus; the fune ral folemnities with which he was buried; and laftly, the bleffed defigns and glorious ends of his death.

The preparatives for his death were fix. Three on his own part, and three more by his enemics. The preparations made by himself for it, were the folemn recommendation of his friends VOL. I.

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to his Father; the inftitution of a commemorative fign, to perpetuate and refresh the memory of his death in the hearts of his people, till he come again. And his pouring out his foul to God, by prayer in the garden; which was the pofture he chose to be found in, when they fhould apprehend him.

This fcripture contains the first preparative of Chrift for death, whereby he fets his houfe in order, prays for his people, and bleffes them before he dies. The love of Chrift was ever tender and strong to his people; but the greatest manifeftations of it was at parting. And this he manifefted two ways efpecially; viz. in leaving fingular fupports, and grounds of comfort with them in his laft heavenly fermon, in Chap. xiv: xv. xvi. and in pouring out his foul most affectionately to the Fa ther for them in this heavenly prayer, Chap. xvii. In this prayer he gives them a fpecimen, or fample, of that his glorious interceffion-work, which he was just then going to perform in heaven for them. Here his heart overflowed, for he was now leaving them, and going to the Father. The laft words of a dying man are remarkable, how much more a dying Sa viour? I fhall not launch out into that bleffed ocean of precious matter contained in this chapter, but take immediately into confideration the words that I read, wherein I find a weighty petition, strongly followed and fet home with many mighty ar guments.

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1. We have here Chrift's petition, or request in behalf of his people, not only thofe on the place, but all others that then did, or afterwards fhould believe on him. And the fum of what he here requests for them is, that his Father would keep them through his name. Where you have both the mercy, and the means of attaining it. The mercy is to be kept. Keeping implies danger. And there is a double danger obviated in this request; danger in respect of fin, and danger in respect of ruin and deftruction. To both these the people of God lie open in this world.

The means of their prefervation from both is the name, i. e. the power of God. This name of the Lord is that " strong tower "to which the righteous fly, and are lafe," Prov. xviii. 10. Alas! It is not your own ftrength or wisdom that keeps you, but ye are kept by the mighty power of God. This protecting power of God, doth not, however, exclude our care and diligence, but implies it; therefore it is added, "Ye are kept by the mighty "power of God, through faith, to falvation," 1 Pet. i. 5. Gost keeps his people, and yet they are to keep themselves in the love.

of God, Jude. 21. to keep their hearts with all diligence, Prov. iv. 23. This is the fum of the petition.

2. The arguments with which he urgeth and presses on this request, are drawn partly from his own condition, "I am no more "in the world ;" i. e. I am going to die; within a very few hours I fhall be feparated from them, in regard of my corporeal prefence. Partly from their condition; "but these are in the world;" i. e. I must leave them in the midst of danger: and partly from the joint intereft his Father and himself had in them; "Keep

those that thou haft given me :" With several other most prevalent pleas, which, in their proper places, fhall be anon produced, and difplayed, to illustrate and confirm this precious truth which this fcripture affords us.

Doct. That the fatherly care, and tender love of our Lord Jefus Chrift, was eminently discovered in that pleading prayer he poured out for his people at his parting with

them.

It pertained to the priest and father of the family to blefs the reft, especially when he was to be feparated from them by death. This was a rite in Ifrael. When gcol Jacob was grown old, and the time was come that he fhould be gathered to his fathers, then "he bleffed Jofeph, Ephraim, and Manaffeh, faying, God, "before whom my fathers Abraham and Ifaac did walk, the "God which fed me all my life long unto this day, the angel "which redeemed me from all evil, biefs the lads," Gen. xlviii. 15, 16. This was a prophetical and patriarchal bleffing: not that Jacob could blefs as God bleffes; he could fpeak the words of bleffing, but he knew the effect, the real bleffing itself, depended upon God. And though, he bleffed authoritatively, yet not poteftatively; i. e. he could, as the mouth of God, pronounce bleffings, but could not confer them +. Thus he bleffed his children, as his father Ifaac had also blessed him beLI 2

*

* Jacob defired to blefs his fons, not with a common, but with a prophetic and patriarchal bleffing; for he knew that he only could fpeak the words, but the effect depended on another; therefore he fought the blefling from him, with whom fpeaking and doing are. one and the fame thing, i. e. God himself. Ainsworth in loc.

Blefling is either poteftative, which is to confer temporal blef fings by a mere act of the will; or authoritative, which is, by virtue of one's office, to pray for, and to pronounce temporal or eternal blessings to be conferred by God. Pareusı