2. All good is of God : 1 Cor. iv. 7, ' Who maketh thee to differ ? and what hast thou, that thou hast not received ? ' and Jer. xxiv. 7, ' I will give them a heart to know me.' It is his grace maketh the differ- ence : Mat. xiii. 11, ' It is given you to know the mystery of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.' The cause of putting a difference between the one and the other is in the will of God the giver ; the advantages in the means of better temper, better ministry, somewhat there is in that : Acts xiv. 1, ' They so spake, that a great multitude of Jews and Greeks believed.' All this is to be imputed to God's external providence. One way of preaching may be more apt to convert souls than another ; a dart, headed and feathered, and sent out of a strong bow will pierce deeper than falling of its own weight ; pure solid doc- trine, rationally enforced, is more likely to do the deed ; but yet the thorough cause of the difference is internal grace changing the heart, and powerfully inclining it to God : Acts xi. 21, ' The hand of the Lord
300 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VHI. [SeR. XXXVIH,!
was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord.* It is God's mighty power maketh the difference.
3. Whatever God doth in time, he purposed to do before all time ; for God doth nothing rashly and by chance, but all by counsel and predestination. It is according to his purpose, especially in man's salvation ; nothing is done but what he decreed to be done ; even the least circumstance, time, means, and occasion, it is all according to purpose, not of yesterday, but from all eternity: Acts ix. 11, God's sending Ananias to Paul, and was not that foreknown and deter- mined ?
Use. Is to press us to admire grace. Nothing moved God to let out his love upon us but his free, eternal, distinguishing love ; nothing keepeth the heart so right with God as a due sense of his free grace and love ; for the glory of his grace was the great thing God aimed at in all his dealings with us : Eph. i. 6, 12, ' To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved ; that we should be to the praise of his glory who first trusted in Chi-ist ; ' Kom. ix. 23, 'And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory.' This is the study of the saints : Eph. iii. 18, 19, ' May be able with all saints to comprehend what is the breadth and length, and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge.' It is the great excitement to duty : 2 Cor. v. 14, ' The love of Christ constraineth us ; ' Rom. xii. 1, ' I beseech you by the mercies of God ; ' 1 John iv. 19 ; Titus ii. 11, 12. It breedeth a good spirit if love is at the bottom of all our duties.
2. We have the truest view of our obligations to God in his elec- tive love ; dulcius est ipso /ante. Nothing will so much excite our love and gratitude as to consider —
1. That God all-sufficient, who needeth nothing, should choose us. He might have possessed himself if he had never created anything without himself. If you remove all creatures from him, you detract nothing from God ; if you add all to him, you increase nothing in God. It is the creature's indigent condition that maketh him go without his own compass for the happiness of his being. Man cannot be happy in loving himself, nor be satisfied in his own intrinsic perfections, there- fore seeketh supplies from abroad ; but God's happiness is to love him- self and delight in himself.
2. That when God would look abroad among the creatures, he would choose us whom he found in the polluted mass of mankind, and make us objects of his grace, and when he came to call us, found us entangled in other sins, as Abraham, the father of the faithful, an idolater, Joshua xxiv. 2 ; every one that looketh into himself will find they were in temper to choose anything rather than Christ, unless the Lord had prevented us by his goodness, and turned our crooked wills. And if we consider why we taken and others left : Jer. iii. 14, ' I will take you one of a city, and two of a family.' And lastly, if we consider this powerful prosecution of his eternal purpose, this certainly will excite our love and gratitude.
VeR. 29.] SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIIL 301
SERMON XXXIX.
For whom Tie did foreknow, he also did predestinate to he conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren. — KoM, viii. 29.
Here is a reason why all afflictions work together for good to the called according to purpose, because they were predestinated to be like Christ in all manner of likeness — in sufferings, holiness, felicity. In sufferings ; they must be afflicted as Christ was ; he had his share, and they have their share : Col. i. 24, ' I rejoice in my sufferings, that I may fill up what is behind of the sufferings of Christ in my flesh.' Christ mystical is to suffer so much ; he was appointed, and they are appointed : 1 Thes. iii. 3, ' That no man should be moved by these afflictions ; for yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto.' Holiness : we are to be holy as he is holy, as well as afflicted as he was afflicted, 1 Peter i. 15. And again for felicity : his sufferings had a good end, so shall ours ; he bore afflictions, and passed through them to eternal glory — ' The captain of our salvation was made perfect by sufferings,' Heb. ii. 20 ; so in us, the cross maketh way to the crown ; we can go no other way to heaven than Christ did. Therefore the conclusion out of all is, that afilictions work for good ; they do not infringe our holiness, but promote it rather, if we be humble, meek, and patient as Christ was ; they do not infringe our happiness, for still it fareth with us as it did with Christ. As he was a pattern in bearing afflictions holily and courageously, so in the crown of glory to be obtained after the victory ; he was the leader of a patient and obedient people to everlasting happiness. So that here is a double argument why all afflictions must turn to good : because our afflictions fall not out besides the purpose of God ; as not in Christ, so not in us ; the head was to bear his share, and the members their share : and because the cross and sufferings are a means conducing to conformity to Christ in holiness and happiness — ' For whom he did foreknow,' &c. In the words observe —