SERM II. GODS ELECTION OF MEN IN JESUS CHRIST. I proceed .therefore immediately to the second thing I proposed, which was to shew what are the properuses of this doctrine of Gód's election of sinners to salvation, and giving them into the hands of ,his Son. This great truth is not designed to be a matter of mere speculation, and much less to be tossed and bandied about in noisy quarrels and controversies among the disciples of Christ, but it bath its sacred and glorious uses; among which are such as these : Use I.--Since we are chosen to be holy, as well as happy, we may search and find out our election by our sanctification, and make it sure and evident. So the apostle Peter advises; 2 Pet. i. 10; Give diligence to make your calling and election sure," that is, tomake standing to take in the meaning of the word preached ; they have also a will to accept or refuse the proposals of grace, to receive or reject 'this all- sufficient Saviour: But there is an aversion in them to attend to and obey the gospel, through the corruption of their nature by original sin ; their minds will not learn divine things, because they shut their eyes ; their wills refuse to receive the grace of the gospel, they shut it out of their hearts; they have a delight in sin, a dislike of Christ, and of his salva- tion, which consists in holiness and the love of God ; they have a rooted obstinacy of will against the methods of divine mercy. " This is their condemnation ; John iii. 19. that light came into the world, and they loved darkness rather than light ;" and therefore they must die in their sins, because " they would not come Unto Christ, that they might have life ;" John v. 40. I confess this aversion, this obstinacy of mind andwill against the gospel may be called natural, or rather native, as it conies to us by nature in its present corrupted state ; and in scripture it is sometimes represented as impotence or inability to repent, to return to God, to receive Christ, and his grace ; John vi. 65. " No man can come to me, except it were given himof my Father." And it is termed blindness of mincl and hardness of heart, and a death in sin ; not that there is, really such a natural inca- pacity in their mind and will to receive this grace, as there is in a blind or dead carcase; but it is a moral impotency, as it is well expressed by our divines, because the aversion is so strong and sorooted in their hearts, that they will never renounce sin, and receive the salvation of Christ, without the powerful influences of divine grace. And that it is a moral impotence and not properly'natùral, appears by the moral remedies applied to cure it, viz. commands, promises, threaten- ings, 4-c. which it would be useless and ridiculous to apply to natural im potence, that is, to make the blind see, or the dead arise. Both the first and second answer to this objection, may be represented by ávery fair similitude. Suppose God has decreed, that he will make the rising sun-beams shine so effectually on a thousand certain persons; that they shall be roused thereby to their morning work, and enjoy the pleasare of it ! May 'we not say, the sun has beams sufficient to enlighten the whole nation, and they have all a natural power to behold and enjoy
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