2. If so, there will be a solemn dedication of ourselves to God : Ptom. vi. 13, 'But yield yourselves to God, as those that are alive from the dead.' The reason is, because the great effect of grace is a tendency towards God, and that tendency produceth a setting apart of
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ourselves for God's use and service ; and the reality of this is seen in using ourselves for God.
3. Wiiere there is life there v^ill be vital operations. For life is active and stirring ; it cannot be hidden, but will bewray itself in all that we do, though not at all times in a like measure. Our prayers will be the prayers of a living man ; our conferences and discourses such as come from those that have life in them ; our whole service of God such as hath warmth and zeal in it : James v. 16, ' The fervent, effectual prayer of a righteous man;' and Kom. xii. 11, 'Not slothful in business, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord ; ' our addresses to God, such as become feeling of wants, an appetite after and savour of spiritual things. And if christians do not feel this life (for sometimes it is weak and obstructed), they cannot be satisfied, nor rest in this frame. When dull of hearing, or cold in prayer, they rouse up and stir up themselves : Isa. Ixiv. 7, ' There is none that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee.' What is wanting in fervour is made up in sense and feeling and bemoaning their con- dition ; so that the heart is alive, because it is sensible of its deadness, living though not lively. But the chief note is a sincere desire to please, honour, and glorify God ; and that by virtue of Christ's resurrection christians obtain the g^race of a new life.
SERMON XXX.
That they loMcJi live should not henceforth live to themselves, hut to him that died for them, and rose again. — 2 Cor. v. 15.
We are still upon the second fruit of Christ's purchase — he died that we might die in a conformity to his death, and he died that we might live with a respect to his resurrection. His death is the merit of it, but his resurrection is the pattern, pledge, and fountain of this new life. I propounded to speak —
1. Of the fruit itself ; the grace of the new life wrought in us, in conformity to Christ's resurrection.
2. The aim and tendency of that life; which is to refer all our; actions to God, ' that they which live should not henceforth live "tO' themselves, but to him that died for them, and rose again.' The aim is propounded—
1.] Negatively — Not to themselves.
2.] Affirmatively — But to him that died for them, and rose ar/ain.
1.] Negatively — ' Not to themselves : ' to their own ease, honour, and profit, their own wills, own interests, and own ends.
[2.] Positively — ' To him : ' according to his will, for his honour and glory.
Doct. The duty and property of the spiritual life is to refer all our actions, not to self, but to God.
1. For proof of the point, take one place for both : Rom. xiv. 7, 8, ' For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. For whether we live, we live unto God ; or whether we die, we die unto the
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Lord ; for whether we live or die, we are the Lord's/ A christian is not his own man, and therefore liveth not to himself, but he is the Lord's in hisj^erson, all his relations, enjoyments, conditions, interests; he is the Lord's by every kind of. right and title, and hath not power over the least action that he doth, or comfort he enjoyeth : if health, wealth, uses it for God ; if children, loves them in order to God ; and therefore referreth all to God. In the text the apostle sal th, None of us — none of those that are in Christ. The apostle speaketh of weak and strong christians, they all agree in this ; and he shrewdly implieth that lie that liveth to himself is none of Chiist's. Now —
[1.] Not to self, for self-denial is required as our first lesson : Mat. xvi. 24, ' If any man will come after me, let him deny himself.' Christ telleth us the worst at first. So see how per- emptory Christ is : Luke xiv. 26, -If any man come to me, and hate not father and mother, wife and children, brethren and sisters, yea, and liis own life also, he cannot be my disciple.' It is too late for the vote of man and foolish reason to interpose, out of hope to get this law repealed. No, it is unalterably stated that no interest of ours, no, not life itself, which maketh us capable of enjoying all other worldly interests, can be pleaded in bar to our duty, or by way of exception or reservation in our subjection to Christ. Now, if self must be denied, and all the interests of it renounced, certainly we must not live to ourselves. God taxetli his people for their self-seeking and self-aiming: Hos. x. 1, 'Israel is an empty vine, that bringeth forth fruit to himself ; ' as a vine that only maketh a shift to live, and to draw sap to itself, but bringeth forth no fruit to the owner. Certainly, as in the spiritual we receive all from Christ, we use all for him ; as rivers run into the sea, from whence their channels are filled. They do not live in Christ that do not live to Christ. Visible, nominal christians are as the ivy that closeth about the bark, btit bringeth forth no berries by virtue of its own root ; but these really engrafted into Christ do bring forth fruit to Christ.