(4.) A partial change. Men are altered in some things, but the old nature still remaineth ; their religion is but like a new piece in an old gar- ment ; the heart is not new moulded, so as to leave an impression upon all our actions. The renewed are ' holy in all manner of conversation,' ivirdar} uvaarpo^fj, 1 Peter i. 15 ; 2 Peter iii. 11 ; 2 Cor. v. 17. They drive a new trade for another world, and set upon another work to which tliey were strangers before; must have new solaces, new comforts, new motives. The new creature is entire, not half new half old ; but with many the heart is like ' a cake not turned.'
[3.] ^Vhen thus new framed and fashioned, it belongeth to God, it hath special relation to him, James i. 18. It must needs be so ; they have God's nature and life. (1.) Nature, 2 Peter i. 4. They are made like God, bear his image and superscription ; it is a curious piece of workmanshi]), in which God hath showed his wisdom, goodness, and power ; and so they are sealed and marked out for his })eculiar ones. (2.) The life of God, that came'from him, and tendetli to him. Others are 'alienated from the life of God/ Eph. iv. 18. They recover it, 1
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Pet. W. 6. His spirit is a principle of life in tlicm, so that they are really alive to God, and dead to sin and the world.
[4.] This workmanship on us as new creatures far surpasseth that which maketh us creatures onl}'. That came from hisgeneral good- ness, this from hispeculiar love ; there it is goodness, here it is grace : 2 Tim. i, 9, ' He hath called us with an holy calling, according to his own purpose and grace.' Creatures are sustained by his common pro- vidence, but new creatures by liis special care and covenant : 'He open- eth his liand, and satisfieth the desii-e of every living thing,' Ps. cxlv. 16. But he especially preserveth and supplieth believers, 1 Tim. iv. 10. He giveth others bodily comforts ; but these, soul-refreshings and spiritual graces, Eph. i. 3. There is vestigium^ a tract or footprint of God in all the creation ; these have his image restored in them : Eph. iv. 24, ' The new man is created after God.' Well, then, this is that we should look after, that we may be his workmanship made again. It is a woful thing to be God's workmanship by creation and not by renovation. It is better, never to have been Gocl's- creature in the first making, if not his creature in the second making. Better thou hadst been a beast, yea, a toad, oa- serpent, than a man ; for when the beasts die, death puts an end to their pains and pleasures at once, but all thy comforts end with death, and tlien thy pains begin : the beasts have no remorse to sour their pleasures, but man hath conscience, and there- fore can have no rest till he return to God.
Secondly, God's way of concurrence to establish this relation. It is a creation. The phrase is often used : . Eph. iv. 24, ' The new man is created after God.' No other liand could finish this piece of workman- ship. God often sets it forth by this term: Isa. xliii. 7, 'I have created him for my glory, I liave formed him, yea, I have made him.' So ver. 21, ' This people have I formed for myself; they shall show forth my praise.' So in other places. Now, creation is a work of omnipo- tency, and proper to God. There is a twofold creation. In the begin- ning God made some things out of nothing, and some things ex inhaljiU materia, out of foregoing matter, but such as was wholly unfit for such things as were madeof.it; as when God made Adam out of the dust of the ground, and Eve out of the rib of man. Take the notion in the former or latter sense, and it will suit with the matter in hand. (1.) We are formed anew of God, as it were out of a state of nothing, and get a new being and a new life. To this there are frequent allu- sions in scripture ; as Kom. iv. 17, 'He calleth the things that are not as though they were ;' 2 Cor. iv. 6, ' Who speaketh ('O eliraiv) light out of darkness,' he bringeth life out of death, something out of nothing. Now there is such a distance between these two terras that the work can only be accomplished by a divine power. (2.) Creation out of unfit matter. We were wholly indisposed, averse from good, perverse resisters of it. Now, to bring us to love God and holiness, to re- store God's lost image to us, it is a new forming or making of us, and must be looked upon, not as a low, natural, or common thing, but as the work of him who gave us his image at first : Col. iii. 10, 'The new man is renewed after the image of him that created him.' To turn a heart of stone into a heart of flesh, God challengeth it to himself, Ezek. xxxvi. 26. This creation showeth two things : —