are highly honoured who stand to him in the relation of children. Now this honour have all his faints: and therefore it becomes them to rejoice ever more.. upon 2. And as the honour, fo also the happy fruits and confequences of this relation are another thing which should induce them to rejoice. If God is the father of chriftians, then they have teafon to expect that he will fupply their wants, and bestow them all things needful for them. Earthly parents will give good gifts unto their children. What man is there among you, fays our Saviour, Matt. VII. 9, 10. whom if his fon afk bread, will be give him a ftone? or, if be afk a fifh, will be give him a ferpent? No man is fo barbarous and unnatural as to treat his children in this manner: nor when they ask him for things useful and neceffary, will they give them things unprofitable and hurtful; but, on the contrary will beftow upon them things good and useful for them. And if fo; how much more will our heavenly father give good things unto his children, provided they ask him for them with humility and importunity? Again: G Again: if God is the father of chriftians, then they may expect that the afflictions which they endure fhall turn to their fpiritual benefit and advantage; for they are but the corrections of a kind indulgent father, who aims thereby to reclaim them from error, and to bring them back into the path of virtue and holiness. We have had fathers of our flesh (faith the apoftle, Heb. XII. 9.) who corrected us, and we gave them reverence. Shall we not much rather be in fubjection to the father of Spirits and live? For they verily, for a few days, chaftened us after their own pleasure; but he, for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. Again if God is the father of chriftians, then they have a title to the heavenly inheritance. Thus the apostle reasons, Rom. VIII. 17. If children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Chrift. He argues after the fame manner in the epiftle to the Galatians, chap. IV. ver. 7. Thou art no more a fervant, but a fon; and if a fon, than an heir of God through Chrift. These are advantages which accrue to the chriftian by adoption: and therefore adoption is a juft ground of rejoicing. IV. An IV. Another reafon why chriftians fhould rejoice evermore, is because they are heirs of eternal glory. That they are fo, appears from the texts juft quoted out of the epiftles to the Romans and Galatians; where chriftians are called heirs of God, and joint heirs with Chrift. I fuppofe I need not take the pains to prove, that an heir of God, and an heir of glory, are all one. An heir of God, is one who shall be made a partaker of the divine felicity: and that is what I mean by an heir of glory. The happinefs of the future ftate confists in a likeness and conformity to God: and therefore they who fhall be partakers of this happiness, may well be called the heirs of God; becaufe in the future ftate they fhall resemble God in the immortality of their nature, and in the purity of their fouls. 1. In the immortality of their nature. Our Saviour tells us, Luke XX. 35that they who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the refurrection from the dead, cannot die any more, for they are equal unto the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the refurrection. It is worth obferG 2 vation, vation, that they are called the children of God, because they are the children of the refurrection. In like manner the apostle Paul, in his epiftle to the Romans, calls the refurrection the manifeftation of the fons of God, chap. VIII. ver. 19. and at the 23d verse he calls it our adoption. We ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. Now chriftians are the fons of God, becaufe now they live a divine life, being raised from the death of fin to the life of righteousness: but then shall they more eminently appear to be fo, when to this figurative refurrection of their fouls fhall be added that real one of their bodies, and their whole man, both foul and body, fhall be for ever happy in the fight and enjoyment of God. He 2. As chriftians fhall resemble God in the immortality of their nature, fo fhall they also in the purity of their fouls. Herein they do in fome meafure resemble him in this world. that hath this hope in him, faith the apostle John, meaning the hope of the enjoyment of God in another world, purifieth himself even as he is pure; 1 Joh. III. 3. But how faint and imperfect is the the resemblance now, in comparison of what it will be hereafter? In this world the best chriftians have fome remainders of fin and corruption. There is a law in our members warring against the law of our minds. The flesh lufteth against the fpirit, and the spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other, fo that we cannot do the things that we would. As in this world we know but in part, so we are fanctified but in part but when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. Our bleffed Lord, who loved the church, and gave himself for it, that he might fanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, will e'er long prefent it to himself a glorious church, without Spot or wrinkle or any fuch thing. In the other world the faints fhall be thoroughly purified. As they fhall have no temptations from without, fo they shall have no irregular appetites from within. No longer shall reafon draw one way and inclination another. No: the conflict shall for ever cease. What God and reafon command, that shall they always obey without reluctancy. Without reluctancy did I fay? I fhould have faid, with the greatest G 3 |
