318 NONE EXCLUDED FROM HOPE. DIEM. XTX. it includes all the heathen world, so that when the apos- tlesays, the gospel brings salvation both to the Jew and the Greek, he shews the extent of this benefit toall man- kind that hear and receive it. It may be worth our while to spend a few hints upon the order in which the apostle represents the communi- cation of this blessing, viz. to the Jew first, and then to the Greek or gentile. When he describes, in the secondchapter of this epis- tle, the terms or conditions of the covenant of works, he sets mankind in the same order : he pronounces indig- nation and wrath upon every soul that doth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the gentile ; but glory, honour and peace to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the gentile. So when he declares the blessings of the covenant ofgrace or the gospel, he brings the salvation first upon the Jews, and then upon the gentile nations : And one reason of it may be this, that the Jews having been favoured with an earlier and more express discovery of the nature and will of God than the heathens, they seem to stand fairest for the participation of divine blessings and that, even by the law ofworks, if life and righteousness could have been obtained by it, as well as by the covenant ofgrace, or law of faith. But if they abuse their knowledge, and their sacred advan- tages, to the neglect of God and godliness, faith and works, they justly fall under a more severe condemna- tion everyway, because their guilt is greater. But there may be some special reasons given why God thought it proper, in the course ofhis providence, to send the notice of this salvation by Jesus Christ among the Jews, before he sent it to the gentile world. I. The Jews were the chosen people of God, the sons and daughters of Abraham, his friend, the first favour- ites of heaven, considered as a family and a nation : and as he first preached to them the purity and perfection of his law, whence they might discover their own sin and misery, so he published his gospel of grace by Jesus Christ first among them, and sent his son with the mes= sages of peace and forgiveness first to their nation. The Great God thought it becoming his equity to pub- lish his abounding mercy first toward them, amongst whom he first published his law, to skew them their guilt 5
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