taphor at all. It was not Paul who lived, but Christ lived in him, in the strictest and proper fense; and more fo than the wisest of us,

most proper

in our present state, are ca

pable of apprehending.

que

I was faying, to live to God is to devote ourselves to him, and his work and fervice. And if any fhould put the ftion the Jews put to our Lord, John vi. 28. "What fhall we do that we may work the "works of God?" we have his anfwer to it who certainly best understood it, “This is the work of God, that "whom he hath fent."

ye believe on him This is the only any thing for God;

way that man can do
and all that the best believers do, or can
do, is but giving him the glory due unto
his name, and acknowledging his grace,
And this is the fingular fpecialty of his
fervice, that all the profit of their labour
redounds to themfelves. Their master
needs none, and can receive none. The
Apostle understood his master's direction;
The life he lived in the flesh was, he says,
by the faith of the Son of God: and where
this is wanting, all that can be done with-
out it, is but affronting God in the basest
manner; for what the Apostle fays is e-
vident

1

1

vident in the nature of the thing: "He that "believes not his teftimony, or record, concerning his Son, makes him a liar,” and treats him as fuch.

Whoever has fo far confidered this teftimony, as to know any thing of Christ, cannot mifs to find in him the highest evidence God could give of his love to the world; and that he has stated it in fuch a manner, that no one perfon has more or lefs reason than another to believe it. All who hear it, are called, are commanded, to believe in him whom he hath fent; and all have equal encouragement and affurance of fuccefs in this way, infomuch that, strictly and properly, faith is no more but the application of the general declarations in the testimony to one's felf. Thus we see the Apostle took it; and fets an example to us, He does not pretend any particular revelation of the love of God, and his everbleffed Son, to himself more than to others; nor did he need any; and therefore pleases himself with a conclufion, arifing fo naturally and neceffarily from the truth as it is in Jefus; and concludes with the ftrongest confidence of faith, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

And the
Apostle

Apoftle has taught us, in the inftance of Abraham, Rom. iv. 20. that the stronger one's faith, and the lefs wavering and doubting, the greater is the glory the believer gives to God. The whole gospel fpeaks the fame language that Chrift did to Jairus in a very defperate-like cafe, Fear not; only believe. And it would be much to our advantage, that we put to ourselves the queftion Jefus put to Peter, when, to all human fenfe and reafon, he was inevitably to be swallowed up in the raging fea. Our Lord had, at his own request, bid him come to him, walking on the water: but though he ventured boldly, and fet out fair, he was afraid, and begun to fink: 0 thou of little faith, faid · his master, wherefore didft thou doubt? He could find no reafon; and lefs, if poffible, will any one find in this cafe, who takes in the whole truth as it is in Jefus.

I know not how it hath happened, that many, even serious people, not only do in fact, but have even been taught, to foothe them felves in the want of this affurance of faith; as if it were their unhappinefs, but not their fin. But furely they must be egregioufly mistaken who make VOL. III. fuch

S

fuch a conclufion: for nothing can be more certain, than that fo much as there is of abatement of the most perfect confidence of faith, fo much there is of unbelief, Rom. v. 20.: and I hope no body will fay that is no fin. It is true, there may be faith where there is much doubting; nay, one may say, there can be no doubting where there is not fome faith: but weak faith cannot fail to make a weak Chriftian. And if the Apostle John's account of the rife and progrefs of the love of God in the heart of man, (which, by the way, is really writing the law of God there), may be credited, juft fo far as the love of God to us is known and believed, fo far will this law of love be planted and rooted in the heart; for (c we love him, because he firft loved us," 1 John iv. 19. So very ill-grounded, and indeed very foolish, is the cant which has been echoed from mouth to mouth ever fince

the Apostle's days, that preaching faith in Christ, and the free fovereign grace of God in him, is prejudicial to the practice of holiness, and tends to foothe people in a courfe of fin. Surely the love of God

is holiness, and perfect love is perfect holinefs for all the duties God has com'manded are no other than the native exercifes and actings of it, and what perfect love would perform though they had never been commanded.

But high as this apoftle was exalted, and fo nearly united to Christ, as to be one fpirit, and to have one life with him, and thence of courfe to live by Chrift living in him; yet he was still in the flesh; not as men naturally are, who cannot please God fo long as they continue in that ftate; but he was in the body, and therefore abfent from the Lord, as it is written, 2 Cor. v. 6. This vail of flesh hides the spiritual world from us; so that we must either depend on the report God has condefcended to make of the ftate of that world, or be altogether ignorant of it, "We walk by faith, not by fight:" and thus the Apostle tells us, that the whole of his living was by the faith of the Son of God, who loved him, and gave himself for bim.

By this expreffion, the faith of the Son of God, may be understood Chrift's perfonal faith, as it cannot be doubted that the man. S 2 Jefus,