-; JOHN xi. 25.-Jefus faid unto her, I am the refurrection, and the life. THE THIRD SERMON ON THI TEXT. O was, I. In the first place, to inquire what may be imported in this amiable, this defirable title that Christ takes to himself, the refurrection and the life? II. Of whom is he the refurrection and the life? IV. To what fort of life is he the refurrection? V. How comes this about, or by what means is this effected, that he is the refurrection and the life to us? VI. Why is he the refurrection and the life? And then, As to the firft of thefe, I spoke to it upon Saturday evening. I touched a little on the fecond and third heads yefterday. I fhewed to whom Chrift is the refurrection and the life. To this I anfwered, (1.) That he is not the refurrection and the life to fallen angels; but he is the refurrection and the life to fallen man. (2.) He is not the refurrection of the Jews only, but the refurrection of the Gentiles alfo, that were afar off. Says the Father to Chrift, "It is but a light thing that thou fhouldt be my fervant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preferved of Ifrael:" but he " gave him alfo to be a light to enlighten the Gentiles," to us poor Gentiles 129 Gentiles that lay in darknefs many thoufands of years. And then, (3.) Chrift is the refurrection of churches. (4.) He is the refurrection of every individual finner in the day of converfion and believing. And then, laftly, Chrift is the refur rection of languishing faints and believers. The third general head I touched was, Of what is he the refurrection? To this I anfwered in a good many particulars. 1ft, He is the refurrection of God's declarative glory in this lower world. His glory was obfcured by the fin of man, until Chrift illuminated the divine perfections to greater advan tage than they were before; they were darkened by the fin of man. He is the refurrection of the holy law that was broken all to pieces, as it were; for "he magnifies the law, and makes it honourable," and the Lord is fo well pleafed with his obe-dience to the law, that he proclaims himself to be a reconciled God in him.-Again, he is the refurrection of the human nature that was funk below its original excellency. The crown fell from our heads in the firft Adam, but O it is fet up again on our heads in the fecond Adam; he himself is the crown on our head, he is the ornament of the human nature.Again, he is the refurrection of all faving difcoveries of God. None had known God after the fall, if the only begotten Son, which is in the bofom of the Father," had not revealed him. He is the refurrection of our righteoufnefs. We loft our original righteoufnefs in Adam; but he brings it in again into the world, he " brings in an everlafting righteoufnefs." The righteoufnefs of the firit Adam was but thort-lived, but the righteoufhefs of the fecond Adam is everlasting, it will never fail. He is the refurrection of our fonfhip. Adam was declared to be the fon of God at his creation, but he loft it to himself and us; but the fecond Adam brings us back again to God's family, we have faith through him, we have adoption through him, we have fanctification through him; he is the refurrection of our fanctification, and if ever you were made holy, it is the Son of God that hath made you fo by his Spirit. He is the refurrection of our peace; he made reconciliation for our iniquities by his blood.-He is the refurrection of correfpondence between God and us. All correfpondence between God and us was broken up by the fall; but Christ brings us again into the prefence of God, we have "fellowhip with the Father, and with his Son Jefus Chrift."-He is the refurrection of all the graces of the Spirit in the foul. He is the refurrection of our faith; he is the author and finifher of that. He is the refurrection, of our love; for we had never loved him, nor any of Adam's family, if he had not first loved us. He is the refurrection of our hope: "We are be 2 gotten gotten again (faith the apoftle Peter) unto a lively hope, by the refurrection of Jefus Chrift from the dead." He is the refurrection of our repentance; for "him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour for to give repentance to Ifrael, and forgivenefs of fins." He is the refurrection of our obedience unto God; he is the commander of our obedience, he is the pattern of our obedience, he is the strength of our obedience, and through him our obedience is accepted, and through him our obedience is rewarded. All thefe particulars I endeavoured to enlarge upon, therefore I have only named them now in a curfory way. There is one thing I fhall mention before I proceed, and that is, that Chrift is the refurrection of a shattered and broken creation. No fooner had fin entered into the world, but the wrath of God came down, and the creation began to groan under the weight of wrath that fin had brought upon it. We read of the whole creation groaning on the account of fin; "Curfed is the ground for thy fake," fays God to Adam; that curfe is a dead weight upon the earth, it either had been reduced to its primitive nothing, or to its original chaos out of which it was at firft formed. The eternal Son of God feeing the wrath of his Father coming down upon this lower world, he fteps in and offers a ranfom for it, faying, O Father, give me a remnant of the loft race of Adam for a poffeffion: let the earth, and all that is in it, be mine, and upon the granting it to me, I promise to fatisfy thy juftice, to repair the honour of thy law and fovereignty, and to reftore the disjointed creation to its primitive beauty and order. Upon this parole and promife, God the Father makes a gift of the whole creation to him, "all power in heaven and earth" is devolved upon him; he "he gives him the Heathen for an inheritance, and the ends of the earth for a poffeffion; he gives him power over all flefh, and gives him to be head over all things to the church, which is his body;" and he hath a human body prepared for him, that he might be "the man of his right hand ;" and, in the fulness of time having put on the human nature, he, with the ransom of his blood, buys the visible creation; he buys the elect as a feed to serve him; he buys this earth as a theatre; he buys the wicked world as tools to ferve his purpofe of grace with refpect to an elect world, and, when he has ferved himself of them, he cafts them away into the fire of hell. Thus Chrift is the refurrection and the life of a shattered creation; and, if it were not kept up by his power, it would fink to nothing, or fink down into hell under the load of God's wrath: and whenever Chrift hath finished what he defigned, he will take it and purge it from fin that VOL. II. 4 E had 1 had defiled it; then he will erect "a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteoufnefs." But I fhall not infist further on this head. I go on to, IV. The fourth head I propofed in the general profecution of the doctrine, which was, to inquire unto what life it is we are raised up by him who is the refurrection and the life? In anfwer unto this, I give you the following properties of that life we are raifed to by him who is the refurrection and the life. 1. It is a foul-life, it is a spiritual life. Alas for it, Sirs! there are many dead fouls among us in living bodies. Many have the appearance of life, but their fouls are dead; they are walking up and down the world as fo many ftatues, "dead in trefpaffes and fins." But that moment the foul comes to Jefus, the foul comes to live, "Hear, and your fouls fhall live," If. lv. 3. What a valuable life is the life of the foul, in comparifon of the body! Indeed the generality make a greater account of their bodies than they do of their fouls; they fell their fouls unto the devil, in pampering their bodies, which will hortly moulder down to the duft. "What will it profit a man (fays our Saviour) though he fhould gain the whole world, and lofe his own foul? or what can a man give in ex change for his foul?" O what a valuable thing is the foul! O come to him who is the refurrection and the life: "Hear, and your fouls fhall live." Again, 2. It is a righteous life, even in the eye of the law of God, that is bestowed by him who is the refurrection and the life. In fome fenfe it may be called a legal life, a law-life, in regard there is no injury done to the law, in beftowing this life upon the dead finger. As you heard the Son of God became the refurrection, and the life, by " magnifying the law, and making it honourable." The believer that is made alive by Chrift, he can ftand the trial of the law, and look it in the face, and fay, "Who hall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that juftifieth: who is he that condemneth? It is Chrift that died, yea rather, that is rifen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who alfo maketh interceflion for us." And then, 3. It is a holy life that fprings from him that is the resurrection and the life. Chrift himself is holy, the holy One; and whenever he takes a gripe of the finner, he makes him "free from the law of fin and death;" he makes the creature that was lying among the pots, to be like the wings of a dove covered with filver, and her feathers with yellow gold," and then the beauty of holiness is upon that foul. And then, 4. (As you were hearing in the former difcourfe), It is a very humble and felf-denied life they have from Chrift. They live, but they will not venture to fay they live. faith the apostle," but it is not I, but Chrift that liveth in me.' "Not I, but the grace of God in me." Hence it follows, 5. In the fifth place, It is a life of faith; for when a man gets the life of grace, he does not live upon that life, it is but like a drop of water caft into a veffel, it is foon spent, but he lives upon the fountain of grace. Believer, the fountain of life is not within thee, it is above thee, and it is without thee; it is in Chrift Jefus. "Your life is hid with Chrift in God;" for, fays Paul, Gal. ii. 20. "I am crucified with Chrift: Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Chrift liveth in me." And what follows?" The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God." Faith does not glory in any thing the man has received; no, faith, as it were, forgets what it received, but it reaches forward, and it ay comes back to the fountain of life, to draw water there: " With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of falvation," If. xii. 3. So that, I fay, it is a life of faith. Hence it follows, 6. It is a life of love. Whenever life enters into the finner, he begins to love the Lord and his word: "O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day." And as the fparks fly upward, fo this love is ay cafting its sparks toward heaven: "Whom having not feen, ye love; in whom though now ye fee him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unfpeakable, and full of glory," 1 Pet. i. 8. And this makes it, 7. A life of joy and pleasure : " Whom having not feen, ye love," &c.; "believing, ye rejoice with joy unfpeakable, and full of glory." Some have a notion, that are unacquainted with religion, that it is a dull and melancholy life; and therefore they stand a-back from it; and I wish believers may not give them too much occafion. If you fee any of the faints dull and melancholy, it is not a part of their religion, but it is rather their irreligion, and their unacquaintedness with the Lord, it is their failing and infirmity; but when faith is fet a-work, it hath a joy that no man can take from them. You that have joy, and know nothing of this, your joy is "like the crackling of thorns under a pot," like a bundle of ftraw that makes a blaze, that foon goes out: but this is a joy that never totally or finally perishes, floods of water will not be able to quench it; every blink of the Lord's countenance makes the heart fo glad, that corn and wine are but draff and sand in comparison of it, it is a jóyful life! And then, 8. The life we have from him that is the refurrection and the life, it is a royal life, it is a princely life. He does not creep as the men of the world do, to whom the ferpent's curfe cleaves; by nature the feed of the ferpent lie grovelling on the |