282 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VI. [SeR. XIV.
coldly set iipoa the practice of Christianity. Let us depend upon God's promise, as Paul: 2 Tim. iv. 18, 'And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom, to whom he glory for ever and ever, amen.'
5. There are certain ordinances whereby this grace is conveyed to us. The Spirit joineth his power and efficacy with the proper insti- tuted means for the subduing of sin. The word is a powerful instru- ment, which the Holy Ghost useth for the cleansing of the soul from sin : John xv. 3, ' Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you ; ' yea, for the killing of sin, therefore it is called ' The sword of the Spirit.' When we come to hear, some new con- sideration is still given out for the further sanctifying of the heart : John xvii. 17, ' Sanctify them through thy truth ; thy word is truth.' In prayer we come to act faith and repentance, looking up to God for help ; and with brokenness of heart mourning over our corruptions : Zech. xii. 10, ' I will pour upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplications, and they shall look upon him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his first-born.' By every prayer offered in the brokenness of our hearts sin receiveth a new wound. So the sacraments ; as in the Old Testament, circum- cision signified a sanctifying of the heart : Deut. xxx. 6, ' And the Lord thy God will circumcise thy heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live ; ' and the paschal lamb was a type of Christ, ' Who taketh away the sins of the world,' John i. 29. So baptism and the Lord's supper. Baptism signifieth the washing away of sin : Acts xxii. 16, ' Arise and be baptized, and wash away thy sins ; ' and he that liveth in sin forgetteth, that is, neglecteth his baptism : 2 Peter i. 9, ' He hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins ; ' as for- getting the law is neglecting the duty of it : Ps. cxix. 153, ' I do not forget thy law ; ' he carrieth himself as if he were never baptized, for baptism is a vowed death to sin. So for the Lord's supper. Every serious remembrance or meditation of Christ's death should quicken us anew to crucify sin, and to make it hateful to our souls. (1.) As it representeth the great act of Christ's condescending love, which is a moving forcible argument to persuade us to deny our inordinate self-love : 2 Cor. v. 14, 15, ' For the love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead, and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.' (2.) It is a viewing the heinousness and odiousness of sin there represented to us in the agonies and sufferings of Christ ; the more we consider of them, the greater apprehensions should we have of the evil of sin, the exactness of God's justice, the terror of his wrath: Kom. viii. 3, Tor what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh.' Christ was made sin for us, and then endured these things : 2 Cor. v. 21, 'He hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we
VeR. 14.] SERMONS UPON ROMAN'S VI. 283
might be made the righteousness of God in him.' When we look upon sin through Satan's spectacles, or the cloud of our own passions or carnal affections, we make nothing of it ; but it is a terrible spec- tacle to see the fruit of sin in the agonies and sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are there represented to us, 'as if he were crucified before our eyes,' Gal. iii. 1. Oh! never have slight thoughts of sin more. (3.) As it imi)lietli a solemn mutual surrendry between Christ and us : Cant. ii. 16, ' I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine.' Christ giveth himself and his grace to us, as our redeemer and saviour. We accept Christ and his benefits upon his own terms, and surrender ourselves to him, as his redeemed ones, with thankfulness for so great a favour and benefit : Eom. xii. 1, ' I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.' Now all this must needs be a great weakening of sin, both the remembrance of Christ's love, the representation of his great sufferings necessary for the expiation of it, and our solemn renewed dedication of ourselves to God and his service, and doing this in a holy duty instituted by God for this end and purpose ; for the Spirit of God works by the appointed means, and the use of instituted duties is no fruitless labour, for God would not set us a-work in a duty that should yield no profit and benefit to us.