o INWARD WITNESS TQ CHRISTIANITY. and invest themwith a perfect righteousness, to begin the work of grace in them, to fill them with principles of holiness, and by degrees to fit them for his glory : such a soul is a believer on the Son of God, and such a soul has the witness in himself, that our religion is divine, and thatchristianity is from above. Y. The second thing I proposed to consider, is, What is the inward witness that faithgives to the truth of christianity? At the first promulgation of the gospel, there were some souls overpowered with present miracles, attended with a divine light shining into them. This was such as theycould not resist, such as carried glorious evidence with it, and effectually wrought upon them to believe that our religion was fromheaven, that Christ was the Son of God, and that his name was the only ground of hope for salvation. This was miraculous andextraor- dinary, and not to be expected every day now ; such was the conversion of St. Paul to christianity, and many such instances of miracles appeared in the first seasons of the gospel. But the witness that the apostle John speaks of in my text, is such as belongs to every believer. It is an universal proposi-, Lion, He that believes, has the witness in himself. Inorder therefore to enquire into thenature of this testimony, I shall notlead you, nor myself into the land of blind enthusiasm, that region of clouds and darkness, that pretends to divine light. The apostle does not mean here a strong impulse, an irrational and ungrounded assurance that our religion is true. Many times these vehement impulses are but the foolish fires of fancy, that give the enquiring traveller no steady light or conduct, but lead him for astray from truth. Christianity has a better witness than this ; being such as belongs to every believer, it must approve itself to the reason of men. And Iwill endeavour to explain it thus according to scripture. Let it first be noted here, that the word witness is used fre- quently, by our translators, to signify testimony, or evidence. Nor will it create any confusion to use these words promiscuously in this discourse, while we distinguish them from the thing r itnesed, (which in the original, is also µap1vps) and is translated therecord, tier. 10, 11. Now if we enquire what is that testimony to christianity, or that inward witness that everybeliever has in himself, let us con- sider what that record is which God has testified concerning his Son ChristJesus. That you will find in the context, ver. 11, 12. This is the record or thing witnessed, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son; he that hatlt. the Son of God bath life, and he that Math not the Son bath not life. He then that believes on the Son of God hath the witness, or testimony to christianity, in himself, for he bath within him the thing test,- jied. ,=1e bath eternal life in himself, he bath this eternal life
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