SEAM. III. INWARD WITNESS TO CHRISTIANITY. 3T ed, convinced -of sin and of righteousness; they learnt their ruin and their recovery at once, through the atone- ment and grace of Christ : The poor came home en- riched with various graces : the blind see wonders, and the lame return.: leaping and rejoicing in the hope of glory. This gives plain proof of a divine doctrine, and a divine- attending spirit and power. It is the blessed spirit of God, who dictated these divine truths of the gospel, that accompanies them with his own power to the minds and consciençes of those who hear the gospel preached, and by his own ,power works this glorious change in the hearts- and lives of sinners: It is through the 'sanctification of the spirit, and the belief of the truth, that sinners are called by. the gospel, to the obtaining -of the glory of Our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 Thess. ii. 13, 14. It is by the preach- ing of this gospel, attended' with this spirit, that-the fornicators and -adulterers become chaste, the thieves and extortioners are made honest andjust ; _.the covetous earth-worms become heavenly-minded, the drunkards are turned sober, and these heirs of hell are made fit to inherit the kingdom df God. The unclean àre washed; the unholy are sanctified, and the guilty justified in the name of the Lord rJesus and by the ,Spirit of our God, 1 Con vi. 9, 10, 1 1.- It is the blessed Spirit the Com- forter, -that speaks peace to the-consciences ofbeliëvers; through the atoning blood of Christ; it is he sheds abroad the love- ofGod in their hearts, by believing the gospel, Rom. v. 5. and it is-he that fills themwith love to God and to their neighbour; for this love is the fruit of the spirit, Gal. v. 22: and when the Spirit of God shines upon his own work in the soul of man, andmakes this glorious change appear to the self-examining, chris- tián, 'it is a nòble testimony-that it gives- to .the truth and divinity of the gospel of Christ. IV. -This witness to the truth of.christianity is certain and infallible, in the nature and reason of things and where this divine life arises to a considerable height, it gives a full assurance to the christian, that his religion is true. Eternal life begun in the soul, according to the description of it, cannot rise from a false doctrine ; it must proceed from the God of truth,. who himself is DJ-
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=