Ver. 9.—1. There is a state of perfect peace with God to be at- tained under imperfect obedience. 2. Nothing can give perfect
500 SUMMARY OF DOCTRINAL AND [CHAP. IX. 10.
peace of conscience with God but what can make atonement for sin.
Ver. 10.—1. There is nothing in its own nature so mean and abject but the will and authority of God can render it of sacred use and sacred efficacy, when he is pleased to ordain and appoint it. 2. The fixing of times and seasons for the state of things in the church is solely in the hand of God, and at his sovereign disposal. 3. It is a great part of the blessed liberty which the Lord Christ brought into the church,—namely, its freedom and liberty from legal impositions, and every thing of the like nature in the worship of God. 4. The time of the coming of Christ was the time of the final general reformation of the worship of God, wherein all things were unchangeably directed unto their proper use.
Ver. 11.—1. The bringing forth and accomplishing the glorious effects of the hidden wisdom of God, were the true and real good things intended for and promised to the church from the beginning of the world. 2. These things alone are absolutely good to the church, all other things are good or evil as they are used or abused. 38. So excellent are these good things, that the performance and pro- curing of them were the cause of the coming of the Son of God, with his susception and discharge of his sacerdotal office. 4. Such a price and value did God put on these things, so good are they in his eyes, that he made them the subject of his promises to the church from the foundation of the world. 5. The human nature of Christ, where- in he discharged the duties of his sacerdotal office, in making atone- ment for sin, is the greatest, the most perfect, and excellent ordi- nance of God, far excelling those that were most excellent under the old testament. 6. The Son of God undertaking to be the high priest of the church, it was of necessity that he should come by or have a tabernacle wherein to discharge that office. 7. God is so far from being obliged unto any means for the effecting of the holy counsels of his will, that he can when he pleaseth exceed the whole order and course of the first creation of all things, and his provi- dence in the rule thereof.
Ver. 12.—1. The entrance of our Lord Jesus Christ as our high priest into heaven, to appear in the presence of God for us, and to save us thereby to the uttermost, was a thing so great and glorious as could not be accomplished but by his own blood. 2. Whatever difficulties lay in the way of Christ, as unto the accomplishment and perfection of the work of our redemption, he would not decline them, nor desist from his undertaking, whatever it cost him. 3. There was a holy place meet to receive the Lord Christ after the sacrifice of himself, and a suitable reception for such a person after so glorious a performance. 4. If the Lord Christ entered not into —
CHAP. IX. 15.] PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS. 501
the holy place until he had finished his work, we may not expect an entrance thereinto until we have finished ours.
Ver. 13, 14.—1. There is such an evidence of wisdom and right- eousness, unto a spiritual eye, in the whole mystery of our redemption, sanctification, and salvation by Christ, as gives an immovable foundation unto faith to rest upon in its receiving of it. 2. The efficacy of all the offices of Christ towards the church depends on the dignity of his person, 3. There is nothing more destructive to the whole faith of the gospel than by any means to evacuate the immediate efficacy of the blood of Christ. 4. Christ’s offering him- self was the greatest expression of his inexpressible love. 5. It is evident how vain and insufficient are all other ways of the expiation of sin with the purging of our consciences before God. 6. Faith hath ground of triumph in the certain efficacy of the blood of Christ for the expiation of sin. 7. Nothing could expiate sin and free conscience from dead works but the blood of Christ alone, and that in the offering himself to God through the eternal Spirit. 8. It was God, as the supreme ruler and lawgiver, with whom atonement for sin was to be made. 9. Thesouls and consciences of men are wholly polluted before they are purged by the blood of Christ. 10. Even the best works of men, antecedently to the purging of their con- sciences by the blood of Christ, are but dead works. 11. Justification and sanctification are inseparably conjoined in the design of God’s grace by the blood of Christ. 12. Gospel worship is such, in its spirituality and holiness, as becometh the living God.
Ver. 15.—1. It is an act of mere sovereign grace in God, to pro- vide such a blessed inheritance for any of them who had sinfully cast away what they were before intrusted withal. 2. All our interest in the gospel inheritance depends on our receiving the promise by faith. 3. The conveyance and actual communication of the eternal inheritance by promise, to be received by faith alone, tends exceed- ingly unto the exaltation of the glory of God, and the security of the salvation of them that do believe. 4. Effectual vocation is the only way of entranée into the eternal inheritance. 5. Though God will give grace and glory unto his elect, yet he will do it in such a way as wherein and whereby he may be glorified also himself. 6. Such is the malignant nature of sin, of all transgression of the law, that unless it be removed, unless it be taken out of the way, no person can enjoy the promise of the eternal inheritance. 7. It was the work of God alone to contrive, and it was the effect of infinite wisdom and grace to provide, a way for the removal of sin, that it might not be an everlasting obstacle against the communication of an eternal inheritance unto them that are called. 8. A new testa- ment providing an eternal inheritance in sovereign grace; the