[2.] Mercy to a convinced sinner seems ofttimes as re- mote, as rivers from a rock of flint. The truth is, he never came near mercy, who thought not himself far from it. When the Israelites cried. We are ready to die for thirst, then stood they on the ground, where rivers were to run.
[3.] Thirsty souls shall want no water, though it be fetched for them out of a rock. Panters after the blood of Jesus shall assuredly have refreshment and pardon, through the most unconquerable difBculties. Though grace and mercy seem to be locked up from them, like water in a flint, whence tire is more natural than water; yet God will not strike the rock of his justice and their flinty hearts together. to make hell-fire sparkle about their ears; but with a rod of mercy on Christ, that abundance of water may be drawn out for their refreshment.
[4.] The most eminent temporal blessings, and suitable refreshment (water from a rock for them that are ready to perish), is but an obscure representation of that love of God, and refreshment of souls, which is in the blood of Jesus. Carnal things are exceeding short of spiritual, temporal things of eternal.
[5.] The blood of Christ is abundantly sufficient for his whole church to refresh themselves, streams, rivers, a whole sea.
These, and the like observations, flowing from the typical relation of the blessing intimated, shall not farther be in- sisted on; one only I shall take from the historical truth.
XXI. Observation. God sometimes bringeth plentiful deliverances and mercies for his people from beyond the keii
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of sense and reason, yea, from above the ordinary reach of much precious faith.
I mean not what it ought to reach, which is all the oni- nipotency of God ; but what ordinarily it doth, as in this very business it was with Moses. I say, plentiful deliver- ances, mercies like the waters that gushed out in abundant streams, until the earth was cloven with rivers; that the people should not only have a taste and away, but drink abundantly, and leave for the beasts of the field. From be- yond the ken of sense and reason, by events which a rationally wise man is no more able to look into, than an eye of flesh is able to see water in a flint ; or a man probably suppose, that divers millions of creatures should be refreshed with Avaters out of a rock, where there was never any spring from the foundation of the world.
Now concerning this observe,
1. That God hath done it.
2. That he hath promised he will yet do it.
3. Why he will so do?
1, He hath done it.- I might here tire you with pre- cedents. I could lead you from that mother deliverance, the womb of all others, the redemption that is in the blood of Jesus, down through many dispensations of old, and of late, holding out this proposition to the full. One shall suffice me, and if some of you cannot help yourselves with another, you are very senseless.
Look upon Peter's deliverance. Acts xii. The night be- fore he was to be slain, he was kept safe in a prison, a prison he had neither will nor power to break. He was bound with two chains, beyond his skill to unloose, or force asunder. Kept he was by sixteen soldiers, doubtless men of blood and vigilancy, having this to keep them waking, that if Peter escaped with his head, they were to lose theirs. Now that his deliverance was above sense and reason, himself intimates, ver. 11. ' He hath delivered me from the expecta- tion of the Jews.' The wise, subtle Jews concluded the matter so secure, that without any doubts or fears they were in expectation of his execution the next day. That it was also beyond the ready reach of much precious faith, you have an example in those believers, who were gathered to- gether in the house of Mary. ver. 12. calling her mad, who
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first affirmed it, ver. 15. and being astonished when their eyes beheld it, ver. 16. the whole seeming so impossible to carnal Herod, after its accomplishment, that he slays the keepers as false in their hellish trust; a just recompense for trusty villains.
The time would fail me to speak of Isaac,"*^' and Joseph, Gideon, Noah, Daniel, and Job, all precedents worthy your consideration. View them at your leisure, and you will have leisure, if you intend to live by faith.
2. He hath said it. It is a truth abounding in promises and performances. I shall hold out one or two; it will be worth your while to search for others yourselves. He that digs for a mine, finds many a piece of gold by the way.
Isa. xli. 14 — 16. 'Fear not, thou worm Jacob, antl ye few men of Israel. Behold, I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth : thou shalt thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills as chaff. Thou shalt fan them,' &c. To make a worm a thresh- ing instrunjent with teeth, to cause that instrument to beat mountains and hills into chaff, that chaff to be blown away with the wind, that that worm may rejoice in God; to ad- vance a small handful of despised ones to the ruin of moun- tainous empires and kingdoms, until they be broken and scattered to nothing, is a mercy that comes from beyond the ken of an ordinary eye. Ezek. xxxvii. 3. the prophet professeth that the deliverance promised was beyond his apprehension. 'Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.' The Lord intimates in the following verses, that he will provide a means for his church's recovery, when it seemeth as remote therefrom, as dry bones scattered upon the face of the earth are from a mighty living army. This he calls opening their graves, ver. 12, 13. The reasons of this are,