Apostles ; saying, " Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?"
Now, if you doubt not the Saviour's love in giving this solemn warning to his followers, let not me be thought harsh, if I call your attention to it, I. As delivered to the Apostles —
God in every age has of his own sovereign will and pleasure, chosen, irrespective of any merit in them- selves, the objects of his more especial favour —
[Even in heaven did he choose some of the angelic host in preference to others, whom, in his righteous judgment, he suffered to fall and perish : on which account they who " kept their first estate" are called his " elect angels V And after man also had sinned, God chose our fallen race in preference to the fallen angels ; providing a Saviour for us, when he had made no such provision for them. To various offices also has he chosen men, as Moses, to bring his people out of Egypt ; Aaron and his descendants, to officiate in the priesthood, whilst the descendants of Moses were only Levites ; and Saul and David to exercise the royal functions in Jerusalem ; and Cyrus, three hundred years before any such person existed in the world, to restore his people from Babylon. The whole Jewish people were " chosen by God to be to him a holy nation, and a peculiar treasure to him above all the people upon earth0." In like manner our blessed Saviour chose his twelve Apostles. " They did not choose him, but he themd;" calling one from his nets, and another from the receipt of custom ; and after- wards another, in the midst of his most hostile purposes, and blood-thirsty pursuits e. He appealed to them, " Have not I chosen you twelve ? " Have I not distinguished you above others, to be my stated attendants, and to be instructed by me with all imaginable clearness in the things which to others are revealed only in parables f?]
But though, in external circumstances, there is a great resemblance between the elect, there is often a sad difference between them —
[As, amongst the Jews, " all were not Israel who were of Israel g," so all the elect are not " elect unto salvation h: as we clearly see amongst the chosen Apostles, one of whom was, and remained to the last, " a devil." In their call they were alike, as they were also in their endowments (the power of working
b 1 Tim. v. 21. e Deut. vii. 6. * John xv. 16.
e Acts xxii. 14. f Luke viii. 10. s Rom. ix. 6.
11 2 Thess. ii. 13.