244 RATIONAL DEFENCE OP THE GOSPEL. I can venture to die ; for my spirit shall be received to dwell with my Saviour among the spirits of the just that are made perfect. These feeble and withering limbs of mineI canchearfully commit them to dust and the grave ; for thegreat trumpet must sound, the dead must arise, my Redeemer will 'call my flesh from its dark prison ; I shall arise to meet the Lord in the air, and dwell with him for ever in unknown worlds of blessed- ness." Thus I have sheWn you the first thing I proposed, viz. how the gospel in its own nature has a very'proper and powerful tendency in a moral or persuasive way towards the salvation of the soul, as it insures pardoning grace and final blessedness to believers. II. I come now to shew how the gospel is madepowerful to the salvation of sinners by the accompanying influence of the Spirit of God, and this is supernatural and sovereign: Íf I should runover all the particulars Ihave just beforementioned, I might make it appear in eachof them, how the Spirit of God by the word ofhis gospel, works this salvation. It is thisblessed Spirit that awakens the stupid and thought- less sinner to a sense of his guilt_ and danger. It is he shews .him theevil of sin, and makeshim groan after deliverance, and cry out, what shall, I do to be saved ? And it is the Spirit that reveals and discovers Christ"Jesus to him as the only and all- sufficient Saviour : It is he who shews the convinced sinner, that there isrighteousness and grace to be found in Christ, to answer all his present complaints and necessities. The word of the gos- pel says these things indeed, but it is like a dead letter, till the living spirit speaks them over again, and, as it were, constrains us tohear the voice of encouragement and hope. It is he repre- sents the death and sufferings of the Son of God, as añ effectual atonement for sin, and makes the soul believe it, and teaches us how to lay holdon this hope, to fly to this refuge, to receive this atonement : It is the Spirit of God thatsoftensthe hardest heart, and melts it into godly sorrow : It is he makes us willing to accept of Jesus as a Prince and a Saviour, to renew our sinful natures, to refine our hearts, and thereby to reform our lives : It is hethat takes the blood of Christ, and appliesit to a distressed conscience under the guilt of sin, and thus gives the disquieted soul rest and peace : He takes of the things of Christ, and shays them unto us in all their glory and sufficiency for our salva- tion, and thereby justly obtains the name of the paraclete, that is, an advocate for Christ, and a, comforter to us : John xiv. 26. and xv..26. and xvi. 14, I5. He composes the ruffles of the disturbed mind, and speaks all the . waves of the soul into a calm : He makes all within us peaceful and easy, under the apprehensions of divine forgiveness through themerit ofChrist.
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