Ver. 3.—1. God’s ordination or appointment gives rules, measures, and ends, unto all sacred offices and employments. 2. There is no
494 SUMMARY OF DOCTRINAL AND [cHAP. VIII. 4.
approach unto God without continual respect unto sacrifice and atonement. 3. There was no salvation to be had for us, no, not by Jesus Christ himself, without his sacrifice and oblation. 4 As God designed unto the Lord Christ the work which he had to do, so he provided for him, and furnished him with whatever was necessary thereunto. 5. The Lord Christ being to save the church in the way of office, he was not to be spared in any thing necessary thereunto. 6. Whatever state or condition we are called unto, what is necessary unto that state is indispensably required of us.
Ver. 4.—1. God’s institutions, rightly stated, do never interfere. 2. The discharge of all the parts and duties of the priestly office of Christ, in their proper order, was needful unto the salvation of the church.
Ver. 5.—1. God alone limits the signification and use of all his own institutions, 2. It is an honour to be employed in any sacred service that belongs unto the worship of God, though it be of an in- ferior nature unto other parts of it. 3. So great was the glory of the heavenly ministration in the mediation of Jesus Christ, that God would not at once bring it forth in the church, until he had prepared the minds of men, by types, shadows, examples, and representations of it. 4. Our utmost care and diligence in the consideration of the mind of God is required in all that we do about his worship.
Ver. 6.—1. God, in his infinite wisdom, gives proper times and seasons to all his dispensations to and towards the church. 2. The whole office of Christ was designed to the accomplishment of the will and dispensation of the grace of God. _3. The condescension of the Son of God to undertake the office of the ministry on our be- half is unspeakable, and for ever to be admired. 4 The Lord Christ, by undertaking this office of the ministry, hath consecrated and made honourable that office unto all that are rightly called unto it, and do rightly discharge it. 5. The exaltation of the human nature of Christ unto the office of this glorious ministry depended solely on the sovereign wisdom, grace, and love of God. 6. It is our duty and our safety to acquiesce universally and absolutely in the ministry of Jesus Christ. 7. The provision of a mediator between God and man was an effect of infinite wisdom and grace. 8. There is infinite grace in every divine covenant, inasmuch as it is estab- lished on promises. 9. The promises of the covenant of grace are better than those of any other covenant. 10. Although one state of the church hath had great advantages and privileges above another, yet no state had whereof to complain, while they observed the terms prescribed unto them. 11. The state of the gospel, or of the church under the new testament, is accompanied with the highest spiritual privileges and advantages that it is capable of in this world.
CHAP. VIII. 9.] PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS. 495
Ver. 7.—1. Whatever God had done before for the church, yet he ceased not, in his wisdom and grace, until he had made it par- taker of the best and most blessed condition whereof in this world it is capable. 2. Let those unto whom the terms of the new cove- nant are proposed in the gospel take heed to themselves that they sincerely embrace and improve them, for there is neither promise nor hope of any further or fuller administration of grace.
Ver. 8.—1. God hath ofttimes just cause to complain of his people, when yet he will not utterly cast them off. 2. It is the duty of the church to take deep notice of God’s complaints of them. 3. God often surpriseth the church with promises of grace and mercy. 4. “He saith,” that is, TI7."DN), “saith the Lorp,” is the formal object of our faith and obedience, 5. Where God placeth a note of observation and attention, we should carefully fix our faith and con- sideration. 6. The things and concerns of the new covenant are all of them objects of the best of our consideration. 7. There is a time limited and fixed for the accomplishment of all the promises of God, and all the purposes of his grace towards the church. 8. The new covenant, as collecting into one all the promises of grace given from the foundation of the world, accomplished in the actual exhibition of Christ, and confirmed in his death and by the shedding of his blood, and thereby becoming the sole rule of new spiritual ordi- nances of worship suited thereunto, was the great object of the faith of the saints of the old testament, and is the great foundation of all our present mercies. 9. All the efficacy and glory of the new cove- nant do originally arise from, and are resolved into, the author and supreme cause of it, which is God himself. 10. The covenant of grace in Christ is made only with the Israel of God, the church of the elect. 11. Those who are first and most advanced as to outward privileges are oftentimes last and least advantaged by the grace and mercy of them.