DISCOURSE III. , 585 ledge of Christ, and become the savour of life unto life, to a mul- titude of souls ! 2. It is promised again unto Sion, that it shall be said con rowing her,. this and that man was born there; Psalm lxxxvii. 2, 3. There shall be many souls, who are by nature dead in trespasses and sins, called, as it were, out of their graves, they shall be raised from the dead, they shall be born unto God in the assemblies of his people, under the reign of the Messiah. It is evident this Psalm belongs to the christian state and dispen- sation, for it prophesies_ concerning Egypt and Babylon, Tyre and Philistia, that the heathen countries shall become converts, the Gentiles shall be born a-new, shall bemade the children of Godin Sion. It is by the word of God preached in theassemblies, that men are regenerated or born again ; 1 Cor. iv. 15. 1 Pet. i. 23. every divine truth contributing toward this blessed work. The whole counsel of God for the salvation of men must be preached in every place : Theknowledge ofthelaw for the discovery of Mir sin, and danger, and distress, and the grace of ,the gospel for the relief of the distressed. It is this gospel of Christ that is the power of God to salvation both to Jesys and Gentiles ; Rom. i. 16. 'aloft the arm of the Lord shall be revealed, and this divine report shall be believed ; Is. lii. 1. The law of God may and must be preached with its severity of terror and its strictness of demand, that sinners may be awakened and convincedof their guilt and weakness, of their helpless and hopeless state in them- selves, that they may fly to the refuge that is set before them in -the gospel. And where the law kills, the gospel can give life : Where the law works despair, the gospelprovides hope. Faith and hope soften the soul to repentance, and work up the heart to anew, a holy, and an obedient temper, by the influence and mo- tive of love. By this means, the loose, and the vile, and the sensual sinneris born into a new life of temperance ; and the pro fane renounces his impiety, and grows in love with religion and godliness. Sion is the usual place,. where these wonders, of converting grace, are wrought amongmen, by the presence of the quickening spirit. Is it not a sad and dismal thing to read what Solomon speaks ; Eccles. viii. 10. Is it not a most lamentable and de- plorable case, that multitudes of the wicked in our days, should come and go from the place pf the holy, from theassemblies for divine worship, and abide still dead in sin, and are buried with- out repentance ? Let us enquire of our consciences, Is this the case of any soul Of us here ? Let us awaken our hearts this day to cry earnestly unto God, that we may never more come and depart, from theplaces where Gad is worshipped, without being born unto God, without being regenerated by theword,, without
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=