[3.] Then do but consider the consequents of it, both in this life and the life to come. In this life, what immunities and privileges have we ! Free access to God ; we may come and treat with him when we please, as children to a father, when we stand in need of anything. ' We have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father :' Rom. viii. 15. If we ail anything, we may go to our Father and acquaint him with our case and grief And we shall have a child's allowance here in the world. The heirs of glory are well provided
Mat. YI. 9.] the lord's prayer. 45
for in their nonage ; they have aright to a hirge portion ; all the good things of the world, meat, drink, marriage, snch things they have by a son's right. They have a right to the creature, in and by him wlio is heir of all things, so they are established in their right which Adam lost : 1 Tim. iv. 3, 4. And they are under the ministry of angels ; tlie angels are sent forth to be their guardians, and to supply and pro- vide for them.
And then, in the life to come (for we are not only sons, but heirs), we have a right to the glorious inheritance ! Rom. viii. 17, 'If chil- dren, then heirs, heirs of God.' Here all the children are heirs, male and female, every son and daughter an heir and joint-heirs with Christ. We do as it were divide heaven between us ; we have a great, blessed, and glorious inheritance ; poor despicable creatures, ' chosen heirs of a kingdom :' James ii. 5.
[4.] You will see it was a very great privilege, if you consider how we come to be entitled to it : Eph. i. 5, ' Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children, by Jesus Christ, to himself. ' We come to it in and by Jesus Christ. Christ was fain to come down, and to take a mother upon earth, that we might have a Father in heaven. He comes down, and was made a man ; he became our brother, and so layeth the foundation for the kindred : Heb. ii. 11. Nay, not only incarnate, but he died to purchase this title for us. When the busi- ness was debated in the council of the Trinity, how lost man might be restored in blood, and have a right and interest in God ; and when justice put in exceptions against us, Jesus Christ was content to be 'made under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons:' Gal. iv. 4, 5. There could be no reconciliation, no amity, no alliance, until sin was expiated and justice satisfied; therefore Christ was not only ' made of a woman,' but ' made under the law;' first our brother by incarnation, and then our redeemer by his death and suffering. As under the law, if a man had waxen poor, the next of kin was to be his redeemer : Lev. xxv. 25 ; or if he had sold himself, ver. 47, one of his brethren was to redeem him. Christians, there was a kind of sale and forfeiture on our part of the inheritance and right and title of children ; therefore Jesus Christ, when he became a man, jure jiro- pinquitcdis, by virtue of his kindred and nearness to us, came to redeem his people, and purchase us to God. And this is the relation which is mainly intended in this place ; for mark, Christ taught his disciples to pray, ' Our Father ;' others, they cannot speak of this relation ; and in them all that believe, and all that walk in the Spirit, these alone can come to God as a father.
II. What advantage have we in prayer by taking up God under this notion and relation, when we can come to him and say, ' Our Father'?
1 . It conduceth to our confidence in prayer.
2. It furthereth our duty.
First, It conduceth to our confidence in prayer : for it is not an empty title or a naked relation ; but this is the ground of all that favour and grace which we stand in need of, and receive from God. It is notable, 2 Cor. vi. 18, saith God, ' I will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters.' In other places it is said,
46 AN EXPOSITION OF [MaT. VI. 9.
Ye shall be called my sons ; but here, You shall he my sons ; you shall not only be called so, but be so. He will really perform all the parts of a father to us ; yea, no father like God. The outward father is but a shadow ; as in all comparisons, outward things are but the shadow and similitude , the reality is in inward things. A servant is not always a servant, there may be a release ; a husband is not always a husband, there may l3e a separation by divorce ; but a father is always a father, and a child a child. ' I am the true vine.' The outward -sane is but a shadow, but Christ himself hath the true properties of a vine. So the outward father is but a shadow and similitude, the reality is in Grod ; none so fatherly and kind as he : Mat. vii. 11, ' If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto yom- children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good tilings to them that ask him ? ' There is a lioio riiucli more upon the fatherly care of God. Natural parents, whose affections are stinted and limited, nay, corrupt and sinful, when a son comes for a fish, will not give him a scorpion, when he comes for bread, will not give him a stone. That were a monstrous thing, vile and unnatural. So Isa. xlix, 1.5 : ' Can a woman forget her sucking-child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb ? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.' Passions in females are more vehement ; the mother hath stronger affections. If the mother could do so as totally to forget that ever she had such a child, yet she would not forget her sucking-child — a poor, shiftless, helpless babe, that can do notliing without the mother, a child which never provoked her, — she would not forget such a child. They may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Certainly, God which hath left such an impression upon the hearts of parents, hath more of pity, bounty, and goodness in his own heart ; for whatsoever of God is in the creature, is in God in a more eminent manner.