Section III. — Fii'st, To tlie ininistors. It reproves the vain-glorious preacher ; who, instead of making known the mystery of the gospel, enters the pulpit to make himself known ; who blows up his sermon with a windy pomp of words ; and frames his discourse rather to tickle their ears, than to profit their souls ; to send them home applauding the preacher for his wit, rather than admiring the excellences of Christ, and the riches of his grace. Thus many speak one word for Christ, and two for themselves. This is a great wickedness, which Paul solemnly clears himself of, 1 Thess. ii. .5, 6: ' Neither at any time used we Hattering words, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetous- ness ; God is witness ; nor of men sought we glory.' O, how seldom are any- converted by such sermons ! These vain-glorious preachers may be like Rachel, fair, but their ministry is likely to be barren. Secondly, Abstruse preachers, who do not make the mysteries of the gospel known, but make truths, plain in themselves, mysterious, by their dark, perplexed discourses upon them. What is said of some commentators, — that the places on which they treat were plain till they expounded them, maybe said of some preachers, their text was clear till their obscure discourse upon it darkened it. What greater wrong can a preacher do his hearers than this I The preacher is to open scriptures, but these turn the key the wrong way, and lock them up from their knowledge. They are to hold up the gospel glass before their people, whereby they may see to dress their souls, like a bride against their hus- band's coming : but by that time that they have breathed on their text, it is so obscured that they cannot see their faces in it. That water is not the deepest that is thickest and muddy : nor the matter always the most profound, when the preacher's expression is dark and obscure. We count it a blemish in speech, when a man's pronunciation is not distinct : I know not how it shoidd be thought a perfection, to be obscure in the delivery of our conceptions. The deeper the sculpture in the seal, the clearer the impression : the more fully any man understands a thing, the more able he will be to deliver it plainly to others. As a clipped speech comes from an impediment in the instnunents of speech, so a dark and obscure delivery of our thoughts beti-ays a defect in our appr-ehensions, except it should come from an affectation of soaring high in our expressions above the reach of vulgar understandings ; and this is worst of all. Thirdly, The mere nioi'al preacher, the stream of whose ])reaching runs not in an evangelical channel. Moral duties he presseth, and sins against the moral law he exclaims against; neither dare I blame him for that; the Christian's creed doth not make void the ten commandments. One of the first sermons our Saviour jireached was most of it spent in pressing moral duties. Matt. v. And never was there more need for this than in our days, in which Christianity hath been so wounded in its reputation by the moral dishonesty of many of its professors. But I level my reproof against them for this, that they do not preach the law evangelically, and make that the main design of their ministry, for which they received their commission, and that is, to make known the mystery of ihe gospel; to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ: 'And to make all men see wh^t is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ,' Ephes. iii. 8, 9. Surely, it is a foul blot upon their sermons and labours, who reveal little of Christ and the mystery of the gospel through the whole course of their ministry. The woe is pronounced not only against the indolent minister, but also against the minister who preacheth not the gospel, — ' Woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel,' 1 Cor. ix. IG. A lecture on ethics will not make thy people wise unto salvation. It were well if thou couldst preach thy driniken neighbour sober, and the riotous temperate ; but this is no more than Plato did for his Polemo : this may make them men, that were before beasts ; but thou nuist preach them out of themselves, as well as out of their flagitious practices : from the confidence of their righteousness, as well as from the love of their sins, or thou leavest them short of heaven. In a word, preach moral duties, l)ut in an evangelical strain. Convince them they cannot do these without grace from Christ; for want of which the heathen's virtues were but gilded vices. Wc must come to good works by faith, and not to faith by good works. 'I'lie tree must be good before the fruit can be so : ' Without me ye can do nothing.' Then convince them, when they are most exact in moral duties, this must not
g\Q AN ENCOURAGEMENT TO FAITHFUL MINISTERS.