if it have been " a fountain sealed," whose fault is that? Has not God promised, by his Holy Spirit to open it? and has not Christ told you, that " if you would ask of him, he would give you living waters, which should be in you a well of water springing up unto everlasting life ? " What is there that has been wanting to you? Has there been any defect of evidence ? No : the evidence has shone forth as bright as the sun. Has there been any want of encouragement ? No : there is not any species of encouragement that has not been poured upon you as a flood. Nothing has been wanting, but a humble and docile spirit. It is your own pride, and worldliness, and unbelief, that has kept from you the blessings of salvation: and you have none but yourselves to blame.]
Application —
[I say, then, confess your hypocrisy, and humble your- selves for it And take the Holy Scriptures, and
" search them with all diligence ; and pray to the Holy Spirit to guide you into all truth." But mark more especially what they speak of Christ ; for " of Him they testify in every part c :" and, having found him, believe in him, and surrender up your- selves to him : and let your whole life attest the consistency of your character, and the integrity of your hearts before God.]
c ver. 39.
Christ's messiahship proved.
John vi. 14. Then those men, when they had seen the miracle that Jesus did, said, This is of a truth that prophet that should come into the ivorld.
THE friends of infidelity wish it to be thought, that the Gospel which they reject is not supported by such a weight of evidence as would justify them in yielding to it an implicit and unqualified obedience. But they have, unperceived by themselves, a bias against the truth ; and will suffer any slight difficulty, which they are not able to solve, to outweigh all the most decisive proofs that can be adduced in its sup- port. Where the mind is candid, and open to con- viction, it will be satisfied with that measure of evidence which the subject itself fairly admits of, without demanding such as it is unreasonable to expect. The persons of whom my text speaks, afford
1635.] Christ's messiahship proved. 367
us a good example in this respect. They had seen a stupendous miracle wrought before them, even the feeding of five thousand men, besides women and children, with five loaves, and two small fishes: and they were convinced that no person could work such a miracle as this, unless God were with him ; and therefore, without further hesitation, they said, We are expecting the Messiah ; and this must be he : " Of a truth, this is that Prophet who should come into the world."
From this acknowledgment I will take occasion to consider,
I. The proofs which Christ gave of his Messiahship —
Miracles may properly be regarded as proofs of a divine mission —
[I am not prepared to say that a miracle is of itself, inde- pendent of all its circumstances, a sufficient proof that the person performing it comes from God. For there may be circumstances so peculiar, as to account for God's permission of such an event, even whilst the persons through whose instrumentality it occurs, are no better than hypocrites and impostors. The magicians of Pharaoh were permitted to imi- tate some of the miracles of Moses, for the very purpose of demonstrating the more forcibly, that Moses alone was invested with any authority from him. They were permitted to turn their rods into serpents : but Moses' rod swallowed up all of theirs. They were permitted to inflict several plagues; but they could not remove one. Moses alone was empowered to do that. Nor could they follow Moses beyond a certain extent, or even avert from themselves the plagues that Moses inflicted: so that they themselves were made witnesses for Jehovah, and were constrained to say, " This is the finger of God."