254 DIRECTIONS FOR GETTING AND KEEPING God is come down into our nature; and so infinite goodness and mercy is incarnate. The man"Christ Jesus is able now to save to the utmost all that come to' God by him. We have a merciful High-Priest that is acquainted with our infirmities. 2. Herein we see the will of God putting forth itself for our help in the most astonishing way that could be imagined. Here is more than merely a gracious inclination. It is an office of saving and showing mercy also that Christ bath undertaken; -even " to seek and to save that which was lost ; " to bring home straying souls to God ; to be the great Peace-maker between God and man, to reconcile God to man, and man to God; and`so to be-the Head and Husband of his people. Certainly the, devil 'strangely ,wrongeth poor troubled souls in this point, that he can bring them to have such hard,sus- picious thoughts-of Christ, and sá' much to overlook the glory of mercy, which so shineth in, the face of the Son of Mercy itself. How canwe more contradict the nature of Christ, and the gospel description of him, than : to think him a dcstroymg hater of his creatures, and one that watcheth for our halting, and bath more mind to hurtus than to help us? How could he have manifested more willingness to save, and more tender compassion to the souls of men, than he bath fully manifested ? That the Godhead should condescend to- assume our nature is a thing so wonderful, 'even to astonishment, that it puts faith to it to apprehend it ;; for it is ten thousand times more condescension than for the greatest kingto be- come a fly or a toad' to save .such creatures. And shall weever have low andsuspicious thoughts ofthe gracious and merciful nature of Christ, after so strange and full a discovery of it? If twenty were ready to drown in the sea, and if one that were able to swim and fetch all out, should cast himself into the water, and offer themhis help, were itnot foolish ingratitude for any to say, ' I know not yet whether he be willing to help me or not;' and so to have jealous thoughts of his good-will, and so perishin refusing his help ? How tenderly did Christ deal with all sorts of sinners ! He professed that he' "came not into, the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved." Did he weep over a rejected, unbelieving people, and was he desirous of their desolation ? " How oft would he have gathered them as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, (mark, that he wouldhave done this for. them that he cast off,) and theywould not ! " When his disciples would have had " fire come down from heaven, to consume those that refused him," he reproves them, and tellsthem, " They knew not what spirit they were of," (the common case of them that miscarry,`by suffering their zeal to overrun their Chris- tian wisdom and meekness.) Yea, he prayeth for his crucifiers, and that on the cross, not forgetting them in the heat ofhis suffer-
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