views of his beauty, and more enlarged discoveries of his excel- lency We should consider too, what our more immediate
necessities require ; so that we may be ready to spread them all
before him, and to inquire of him respecting them
Then the more enlarged our expectations of benefit from the ordinances are, the more abundant will be God's communications of blessings to us by them. If we " open our mouths ever so wide, he will fill them'."]
To this I would urge you, from the consideration, that such love to God's ordinances is,
1. Most conducive to your present happiness — [Hear the testimony of David himself: " Blessed is the man whom thou choosestand causest to approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts : he shall be satisfied with the good- ness of thy House, even of thy holy Temple"." And with this agrees the experience of every living saint. Hence every true Believer can say, " Lord, 1 liave loved the hal)itation of thy House, and the place where th'ine honour dwelleth "" : or rather, the more appropriate language of his heart is, " O God, thou art mv God : early will I seek thee : my soul thirsteth for thee ; my flesh longeth for thee, in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is ; to see thy power and thy glory, so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary^'." 1 will leave you to judge, whether a person with such desires, and such enjoyments, be not happy. And if vou are persuaded that he must be so, then seek your own hap- piness in this way, in which you catmot possibly be disappointed : for " he never said to any, Seek ye my face in vain."]
1. The best preparative for heaven —
[Heaven is a place of continued occupation ; of exercises for which we are now to be trained. We must now obtain a taste for heavenly employments ; and' in that taste real piety consists. We quite mistake if we imagine that religion consi>ts in notions or in forms : it is a taste ; a taste not formed by nature or education ; but wrought in us by the Spirit of God : and the accjuisition of this constitutes our mectncss for heaven. What happiness could a soul that feels the exercises of devotion irksome, find in heaven ; where the singing praises to God and to the Lamb forms the one employment of all around the throne, and will to all eternity ? If this be not the pleasure which you chiefly affect in this world, be assured that you are not prepared to unite with saints and angels in the world to come. U this be not your state, whatever knowledge you may possess, you are yet carnal : for God himself has said, that " tbey who are after the flesh do mind {savour) the things of the flesh ; and they who are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit^." I pray you then
to ' Ps. Ixxxi. 10. " Ps. Ixv. 4. ' Ps. xxvi. 8.
' Ps. Ixiii. \, 2, 4, 5. " Rom, viii. 5. ^^aiave-n.