1 o6 Meditations and DifcottrjeJ How h~fl thou taken on thee the monftrous iliap~ and Image of Satan ! And yet thy prefent mifery thy entrance into dnft and darknefs, is no way to be compared with what is to en file. Eternal E)iftre(s lies at the door. But yet look up once more, and beholdme, rhat thou mayeft have fome GJymps of what is in the defigns of Infinite \Nifdom, Love and Grace. Come forth from thy vainjhelter thy hiding place; I will put my [elf into thy condition. l will undergo and bear that burrhen of guilt and punifhment, which would fink thee ~ ternally into the bottom of Hell. l wi11 pay that 7JJhich I never took; and be made tempcrrzlly a curfe for thee, that thou mayeft attain unto E:ernal Bldf(dne(s. To the fame Purpofe he flJeaks umo convinced Sinners in the Invitation he gives tllem to come unto him. THUS is the Lord Chrift [et forth in the Gof pel evidently auc~fied before our eyes, Gal. 3·. I. Namely, in the Reprefenration that is made of his Glory, in the fuff'ering he underwent for the Difcharge of the Office he had undertaken. Let us then behold him as poor, detpifed, per[ecuted, .reproached, reviled, hm~ged on a Tree ; in all labQuring under a fenfe of the JY.rath of God due unto our fins. Unto this end are they tecorded in the Gofpei, read, preached, and reprefented unto us. But whz.t can we lee herein? what Glory is in theft things? Are not thefe the Things which all the wortd of Jews and Gem'iles fl:umbled and took offence at? Thofewherein he was appojnted to be a (tone of.fhunbling, and a ro~.'k ~f Offence? Was it not efl:eemed a foclijh thing to look for help and deliverance by the mife.ries of another? To look
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=