2. It is of great use to encourage believers to wait for the accom- plishment of the promises. Every promise rightly understood is a creat- ing word. When God saith that he will make them perfect to every good work, it is as much as if he said, Be thou perfect, be thou justified, be thou sanctified, be thou enabled to every work of holiness, be thou glorified. When he saith, ' It is your Father's pleasure to give you a kingdom,' to make you able to every good work, to keep you by his power to salvation, he hath signified his pleasure, and that is enough ■to assure us it shall be effected. Look upon the word of God in creation :as a pledge of the accomplishment of the promises. We doubt, because we are ignorant of the power of God's word. Your unbelief would be much abated if you would consider his creating the world, — how God could bring all things out of nothing. All the creatures are looking- glasses, that we may read what God can do by his word ; in them his
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siifiBciency and efficacy are proposed to us to behold. When we have nothing left us but a promise, we may see all things in it. If God hath made heaven by his word, he can give thee heaven, and make good his promises by his word. God's word is the foundation of the creature'.s being, and the foundation of your faith. If heaven could be made and prepared by the word of his power, certainly the promises will be accomplished and made good to your souls, and you shall be brought to heaven by the word of his truth.
The third and last circumstance is the matter, or rather term, from which God's work began ; there was no prejacent or pre-existent matter. It is a note of form and order; ex nihilo, that is, 2^ost nihilum — 'So that things that are seen were not made of things that do appear.' The words have undergone variety of constructions. Calvin, leaving out the preposition, rendereth it, Ut non apparentium spectaculajierent, making it parallel with Rom. i. 20, 'For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and godhead.' But this is to force the grammatical construction. Some understand by ' things not seen,' the idea or module of all things in the divine mind ; but this is to bring down the apo.stle's language to the doctrine of the- school of Plato. Some understand the chaos, and that the apostle alludeth to the translation of the Septuagint of what is in the original, ' And the earth was without form, and void,' Gen. i. 2, the Septuagint renders ^ 8e 777 ijv doparo^ kuI d7rapacrKevaaro<; — The earth was invisi- ble and unprepared. This may be in part respected here, for ' darkness was upon the face of the deep ; ' and so it may well be called, ' things not appearing.' Eather by ra /xij ^aivofxeva you may understand ra fX7] ovra — out of nothing. And the word was suited with the apostle's scope, which is to prove that faith contents itself with the word of God, though nothing be seen ; that which was not at all could not be seen. Though these two latter expositions may be compounded, all things were made either immediately by God out of nothing, or immediately out of the chaos.
Quest. But here may be a doubt ; How did God make all things out of nothing, since man was made of the dust of the earth ? and all things were made out of the chaos, the first mass and lump that was without form ? I answer, There is a double creation : out of nothing, and out of that which is as good as nothing.
1. There is a creation out of mere nothing ; so the Lord framed many things, as the heaven of heavens, the dwelling-place of God and angels, and the spirits of blessed men. He could not make that from the earth and water, for that was not. So the chaos, or the earth that was void and without form, God made that out of nothing. And God made light out of nothing — ' He commanded light to shine out of dark- ness,' 2 Cor. iv. 6. So the angels, and tlie souls of men, which were breathed into them by the breath of God : Gen. ii. 7, ' God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.' God made all these out of mere nothins:.
2. God made some things out of foregoing matter, which is yet called a creation, because the matter was altogether indisposed and unfit for such a use. There was no disposition in the matter to receive
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such a shape as God bestowed upon it ; the form was merely from the power of God, as the firmament was made out of the water : Ps. civ. 3, ' He layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters ; ' that is, the firmament, which was made by the rarefaction and expansion of the waters. So the sun, moon, and stars were made out of the first light ; for either it was annihilated or it yet remaineth. Annihilated it could not be, for the wise God made nothing but for some end, and we do not read that he abolished anything he had made ; therefore it remain- eth dispersed in the sun, moon, and stars, otherwise what is the use of it ? Fishes were made out of the waters : Gen. i. 20, ' Let th.-; waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life.' Birds were made out of the earth, and so beasts : Gen. ii. 19, ' And out of the ground the Lord formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air.' The body of man was made out of the dust of the ground ; Gen. ii. 7, ' And the Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground ;' and the woman was taken out of the man : Gen. ii. 22, ' And the rib, which the Lord God had taken fi'om man, made he a woman.'