Chap. 29. An Expofition urn the Bock rf )cs B. Vrr°. 23. (03 bringetb forth fruit, as it dotbkalfo its you /inçe the day you heard of it, andknew the Grace of God in truth. W e"may know many,yea, I fuppofe all the trulhes of the grace of Goo, and yet not at all know thegrace of God in truth. But if, where the word of the truth of the Gofpel ccmer,it comes allo in truth, they who to re- ceive it cannot but be fruitful.The rainof the word falls by di- reetion,fome have it not at all(wheo their neighbou s,likegáideoní fieece,are wet with it, theyPike the earth round abettor are dry.) Thefe mu(i needs be unfruitful ; orhels receive this word -rain (howmuch or how long focver it falls among thorn) only at the cares, it wets only the outfide of them, but foals not ir, the! allo remainunfruitful. But whenfoever the rain of the word, like (as we call it) a good ground- lhower, goes to the root, the heart and confcience of a man, which is the fame with that ex- preflionof the Apofile to the Colofians, if it be known in truth, the foul can no more with-hold its fruit, then good ground can, when feafonably and fuffrciently rained upon. The Apofile Teter (2Eph. a. g, 6, 7.) exhorts the Saints to much diligence inad- ding grace to grace, and concludes (v. 8.) For if tbefe things be in you, and abound,they make you that you !ball neither be barren, nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jaffa thrift.. But why doth the Apofile fay, if there things be in you, they make you that you lhall not be unfruitful in the knowledge of Chrili,feeing there are our fruitfulnels?I conceive the Apollle rpeakes of the manifetlation of their fruitfulnels, not of the man- ner of the caufation of it ; as if he had laid, by there things being and abounding in you, it will appear that you are not barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of Chrili. For indeed the knowledge of Chrili which comesto us in the rain of theGolpe', is that, which gives all thofc graces both their being andabounding in us, and makes us that we cannot be barren nor unfruitful. Further, This fpirìtual rainbath fome effe&s, for which there is no parallel in thenatural rain ; as ftrll (which was intimated before) it changeth the very nature of the foyi. Natural rain doth 'only draw out that verme and fatnels which is in the earth ; whereas this fpiritual rain falling upon hearts as barren as the wildernefs, makes them fruitful, like a Paradife, or the Gardenof God; yea fallingupon a rock, a flinty rock, it bath (through thepretence of the holySpirit with it) a. power
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