III. Its sufficiency —
[The believer feels in himself that he is a partaker of those very benefits which Christ came to bestow. He is alive from the dead, and is enabled to live as no unregenerate man can live. Let any one behold a river which a few hours ago was running down with a rapid current to the sea, running back again with equal rapidity to the fountain head; and will he doubt how this is effected ? He may not be able to say what influence that is by which it is produced, or how that operation is effected : but he sees that there is a power which has wrought this: he sees it in its effects, just as he sees the trees agitated by the wind, though he knows not whence that wind comes, or whither it goes. He cannot declare how the Spirit which Jesus has imparted to him, operates upon his soul: but he can no more doubt who it is that has thus created him anew, than who it is that formed the universe. He is a perfect wonder to himself; a spark kept alive in the midst of the ocean, a bush ever burning, yet never consumed. He is a living witness for
the Lord Jesus, that he is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him.]
Behold then here,
1 . The true nature of the Gospel —
[The Gospel is a remedy. The whole world are sick : and in Christ Jesus there is all that every sinner needs a ]
2. The blessedness of those who truly receive it —
[All are in one great hospital : and those who submit not to the physician die : but those who take his prescriptions live. True, they are not cured at once : it is possible too that they may suffer occasional relapses for a little season : but through the care of their heavenly Physician, their recovery is progressive ; and when the good work is perfected within them, they are removed to that happy world, of which " no inhabitant will ever have occasion to complain that he is sick." And what a witness will the believer have within himself at that day ! At that day there will be amongst all the millions of the saints but one feeling of perfect health, and but one ascription of praise " to him who loved them, and washed them from their sins, and made them kings and priests unto their God and Father for ever and ever."]
a 1 Cor. i. 30.