SERMON XLVI. 47 &er's will, and to take care of those whom the Father had gi- ven him, to keep them from perishing, and toraise them up at the last day. Now this is what our divines generally call the covenant of redemption, even these sacred transactionsbetween God the Fa- ther, and his Son Jesus Christ; before the foundation of the world ; and I think the scripturecalls it the covenant ; Ps. lxxxix. 28. When the Psalmist has represented Christ, under the cha- racter of David, as chosen of Godfrom among the people; to lay our help upon him, he adds, my covenant shall stand fast with hint; saith the Lord, his seed will Imake to endure for ever ; and though they may sometimes fall into sin, yet Iwill not suffer my f ithfillness tofail: my covenant will Inot break, noralter the thing that is gone out of my lips. Once, have I sworn by my holiness, that Iwill not lie unto David, that is, I will fulfil the promise's that I have made to my Son, the true David, the king of Israel, or the head of my chosen people ; for I have confirmed this cove- nant with him, by divine solemnities- And I am sure, the five first verses of the seventeenth of John, wherein our Saviour pleads with his Father, carry in them the plain language of a covenant as every reader may observe. The only thing which remains on this head, is briefly to run ever the articles of this covenant, or the mutual engagementsbe- tween God the Father, and his Son Jesus Christ. First then, let us consider what it was Christ undertook, as the chosen Saviour of his people. The only begotten Sonof God, who lay in the bosom of his Father, and had glory with him be- fore the world was ; John 1. 18. and xvii. 5. agreed to come forth from the Father, and to come into the world, and to be emptied of that glory for a season; John xvi. 28. Phil. ii. 7. to take flesh andblood upon him; Heb. ii. 14. to be born-of a woman ; Gal. iv. 4. and to be made in the likeness of sirfill'Jleslt; Rom. viii. 3. and in the fashion of a man, that he might be boneof our bone, and flesh of our flesh, and become a proper'head for such mem- bers as we are ; Eph. v. 30. and that he might be our brother, and kinsman, who should havea right to redeem our lost inheri- tance. He who was in the form of God, consented to take upon him the form of a servant; Phil. ii. 7. and past through a life of various labour, reproach, and suffering, as well as performed the duties of the moral and ceremonial law, not only that he might become a pattern to us, of patience and universal holiness, but that he might do all the will of God, and fulfil the righteousness of that law which mankind had broken ; Ps. 7, 8. He under- took also tobecome a preacher of righteousness and of grace,and to explain the law of God, and proclaim the gospel of salvation among men ; Ps. xl. 9. Is. lxi. 1.
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